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Veteran Suicides Outnumber US Military Deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan

27/10/2010

More than 1,000 veterans in California under 35 died after returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan between 2005 and 2008 - three times as many California service members who were killed in conflict overseas, according to a recently published Bay Citizen report.

Investigative journalist Aaron Glantz studied the cases of Reuben Paul Santos, Alex Lowenstein and Elijah Warren to shed light on a growing trend among Afghanistan and Iraq veterans who have died through high-risk behavior and suicide after being discharged. In particular, veterans who returned home to California died through motorcycle and motor vehicle accidents and unintentional poisoning; in addition, veterans were two and a half times as likely to commit suicide as Californians of the same age who had not served in the military.

Glantz, who has reported on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars since 2005, decided to focus on veterans in California because "it's important to look at our own community. [Santos] was this young man that was from a community that was literally right down the street. That's how silent this epidemic is."

Santos returned from the military to his home in Daly City in 2003. He attempted to battle depression with a variety of treatments, from poetry to video games and, eventually, turned to psychiatric treatment. But according to Glantz, a number of bureaucratic obstacles prevented Santos from receiving adequate treatment once he recognized that he needed health care for psychiatric trauma.

Currently, veterans receive five years of free health care following their discharge; when Santos left the military in 2003, veterans were only eligible for two years of free health care - and Santos did not begin to experience symptoms until three years at home.

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression symptoms "don't emerge right away," Glantz said. When Santos did apply to for treatment at the US Department of Veteran Affairs (VA), Glantz said, he "got the runaround," often being transferred among therapists and having to retell his experiences in the war over and over. According to the report, Santos enrolled in a study treating veterans with PTSD six months before his death; after nine weeks with the same therapist, Santos left the study, while his doctor rated him as having "no clinical anxiety at that time."

Santos hung himself three months later. "He finally got treatment, but it was too late," Glantz said. "Reuben's death was preventable. He passed away six years after his return, so there were opportunities for the story to have had a different ending."

Lowenstein and Warren never attempted to receive mental health before committing suicide in 2010 and 2008, respectively. According to the report, less than half of returning veterans register at VA facilities for mental health treatment. A 2008 Rand Corporation study found that only half of veterans who need care seek it, as many traumatized soldiers remain silent to conform to a longstanding Army taboo against mental health care.

"VA and DOD [Department of Defense] appear to have a policy for veterans called 'Don't look, don't find,'" said Paul Sullivan, a Gulf War veteran and executive director of Veterans for Common Sense.

Since 2008, Glantz said, policies have slowly shifted in a positive direction for veterans. "Under President Obama, the amount of money spent on veterans has increased dramatically," Glantz said. "Under President Bush, there was a real head-in-the-sand attitude. That's begun to change." But the VA has a lot of ground to cover to make up for lost time, he said. "We started so late in the game."

Specifically, Glantz recommends that veterans receive automatic registration with the VA, rather than having to seek it out on their own after their mental health begins to deteriorate. "Santos, Warren and Lowenstein should all have been automatically enrolled in the VA when they left the military. They should not have to fight a democracy to get in the system."

Overall, Glantz said, it is the VA and not the veterans that should uphold a standard of proactive behavior. "The VA needs to make themselves more friendly to these young men and help them come forward if they need help," Glantz said. "Out of one million veterans, only half are turning up at the VA, which means the VA needs to do a better job of reaching out to them."

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Another Viewpoint....AMERICA IS GONE!

27/10/2010

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Watching the fading of a once great Republic 2010!

By David Deming

There is a whiff of anarchy in the air this morning. As I sit here writing, a conservative victory in the midterm elections looms. But I find no reason to be optimistic. The midterm elections will solve nothing. The plain fact is that conservatives have lost the battle for America. The country that many of us were born in has ceased to exist. And we have no one to blame but ourselves. Nothing can or will change until we come to terms with the grim reality of moral degeneration. And I have no hope that this can happen, save by some terrible trial.

Last week in Oklahoma City, two pedestrians were run down by cars at the same intersection within a few hours. In one incident, the driver did not bother to stop, but continued driving as if nothing had happened. It was a horrific but perfect metaphor for the self-absorbed entitlement mentality that grips the country.

Every day, the news brings a startling new incident of moral corruption. A few days ago it was reported that an eighteen-year-old geology student at Arizona State University had starred in an online pornographic film in which she performed "explicit and degrading" sex acts for a one-time payment of $2,000. The young woman explained that she needed the money to supplement her scholarship, and then inexplicably proclaimed, "I have morals!"

We are a nation of gluttons. About one-third of adults in the U.S. are obese. To qualify as "obese," the average person has to be not just overweight, but carry an extra thirty-five pounds or more. In the last thirty years, the obesity rate in America has more than doubled. It is the sheerest irony that today, the average person has the choice of a multiplicity of fresh, wholesome, and nutritious foods, all available at the lowest prices in history. But choosing and preparing the best foods takes time and effort. We would rather stuff ourselves with fast food because it's tasty and convenient. The consequences of this slothful lifestyle include hypertension, diabetes, and heart disease. After ruining our health through gluttony, we then go to our physicians and demand a quick fix in the form of a pill. Pharmaceutical companies are glad to oblige. And the government must pay, because free health care is now a "right."

There is no better index for America's moral degradation than television programming. Compare today's shows with those of a generation ago. Every episode of "The Andy Griffith Show" contained a short moral lesson, and "The Twilight Zone" challenged our intellects and stretched our imaginations. But entertainment and instruction have devolved into shock and novelty. The networks are locked in a downward spiral to see who can provide the most outrageous and offensive programming. It's not their fault. They're just giving the American people what they want.

Children are not as smart as their parents. The average child today spends thirteen hours watching television for every hour he spends reading. We blame teachers and schools for failing to educate our children. But what can they do with undeveloped and undisciplined minds that expect to be entertained and rebel at the labor of thought? The decline in intellectual aptitude is so dramatic that the authors of the SAT test have had to add a hundred points to the combined math and verbal score just to make current averages equal of those of a generation ago.

We are oblivious to the fact that our society is intellectually and artistically bankrupt. Modern art is not good enough to be bad. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, Leonardo da Vinci took four years to paint the Mona Lisa. He left the work unfinished because he was always seeking to add "perfection to perfection." Earlier this year, x-ray fluorescence spectroscopy revealed that the way Leonardo created realistic flesh tones was by building up successive layers of pigments that were as thin as a few micrometers. A micrometer is a thousandth of a millimeter.

Compare Leonardo's work with that of the modern American artist Robert Ryman. Ryman began his career working as a security guard at a museum. The guard decided he wanted to become a painter, so he bought some white house paint and slathered it on a canvas. Art critics had orgasms. For decades, Ryman has continued to produce paintings that consist of nothing but monochrome white. The tones and textures vary, but most of Ryman's paintings consist of nothing but a plain white surface. Ryman has explained that he paints only white surfaces because he wants to "reduce visual disturbances." Imagine that the next time you're contemplating Michelangelo's "disturbances" on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

Our popular music is a painful cacophony of obnoxious dissonance. The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries had Mozart, Beethoven, and Tchaikovsky. We have Snoop Dogg and Lady Gaga. Is that progress? We have advanced technology, but do we use it to uplift ourselves? No, we indulge the animal side of our natures. The internet is mostly used for downloading pornography or playing video games.

In America today, everyone is entitled to everything. According to a recent report by NPR, the mentally retarded are now attending college and receiving grants. Professors are being advised (i.e., pressured) to modify their curricula to accommodate the new students. People incessantly demand entitlements and handouts. Every government intervention in the free-market system creates a fresh problem that demands another ruinous intervention with unintended consequences. Nobody is responsible for anything, and no one wants to pay the bills. And believe me, they're coming due.

In this brave new world, everyone has the right to not be offended, and no one can be held accountable for anything. The fundamental unit of human civilization, the family, has been caustically eroded by feminism. The divorce rate is fifty percent. Oklahoma is supposedly a conservative state. Last year, a state legislator introduced a bill that would require parents with minor children seeking a divorce to first undergo counseling. Not only was the bill not passed, but the legislator was derided and mocked. How dare anyone be required to undertake the work necessary to save a marriage for the sake of his or her children? Why, it might interfere with their pursuit of happiness.

We celebrate homosexuality and then wonder why sexually transmitted diseases are exploding. According to the CDC, men-who-have-sex-with-men make up only two percent of the population but account for 53 percent of all new HIV infections and 64 percent of all new syphilis cases.

I'm beginning to acquire an appreciation for Paul's doctrine of Original Sin. The nation that began with freedom of religion has progressed to freedom from religion, freedom from moral constraint, and freedom from responsibility. Just as Plato described in the Republic, the "horses and asses" are "marching along with all the rights and dignities of freemen," and the ultimate result can be only that "tyranny will spring from democracy."

Elections matter only in the short term. Every long-term social index I am aware of is negative. The plain fact is that the American people are too morally degenerate to be capable of effective self-government. The Roman satirist Juvenal understood. "The people that once bestowed commands, consulships, legions and all else, now meddles no more and longs eagerly for just two things -- bread and games!" I can find no reason to be optimistic. It is only our blind vanity that lets us pretend that the United States can endure forever. Rome fell, and so will America. For all intents and purposes, it is already over.

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Workers poisoned while making iPhones

27/10/2010

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Workers in southern China, who say they were assembling Apple laptops and iPhones, have become seriously ill after using a dangerous chemical.

The Number Five People's Hospital in Suzhou has been treating workers who breathed in vapours from the chemical n-hexane.

According to the workers, the chemical was being used in the production of Apple products and has left them unable to walk.

The ABC's Foreign Correspondent snuck into the Number Five People's Hospital to visit a group of women who were working in a very small, badly ventilated factory.

They say they were using n-hexane to glue and polish the logos on Apple products - at least they assumed they were not fakes.

One had kept some of the logos they were using to prove that they were working on Apple products and showed them to the ABC.

After breathing in the chemical's vapours, they became dizzy and numb and eventually they could not walk.

"At first the symptoms were pretty obvious. My hands were numb. I could hardly walk or run," one woman told the ABC.

"I think they knew it was poisonous to human bodies but if they had used another chemical our output would not have increased," another woman said.

"By using n-hexane, it was much more efficient".

The women have now been in hospital for more than half a year.

The workers' boss, Zhong Jianxiang, was not available to be interviewed.

Apple, meanwhile, would not confirm it had sourced products from companies based in China, but said it had tightened its requirements regarding workplace safety at its suppliers.

'It's very painful'

Workers in much bigger factories have also reported similar stories.

The large Taiwanese-owned operation Wintek has 20,000 employees, and its main client is Apple.

"Our company mainly produces the touch screens for mobile phones. Our main client is Apple," one worker said.

Wintek has also been using n-hexane and, after breathing in the chemical, more than 60 workers had to be hospitalised.

"I am back at work but my symptoms are still with me," one worker said.

"My legs still hurt. This will accompany me for the rest of my life. It's very painful."

Wintek has paid its workers' hospital bills and said it had removed n-hexane from its production lines.

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The Green Agenda Is About Getting Rid Of As Many Humans As Possible

26/10/2010

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By Michael Snyder - BLN Contributing Writer

Most people tend to think of environmentalists as warm, cuddly hippies that just want all of us to love one another and to do what is right for the environment. And in fact, there are a few people out there who are actually like that. However, the people at the very heart of the green agenda are a quite different breed. The truth is that there are a growing number of environmental activists (including some very, very famous people) who are publicly advocating the end of our freedoms, the establishment of a Big Brother style world government and the systematic eradication of at least 90% of humanity all for the good of the environment. Unfortunately, this is not a joke and it is not an exaggeration. As you will see below, these people are very, very serious. To these eco-fascists, climate change is the number one threat to the earth, and in order to eliminate that threat "democracy must be put on hold", an authoritarian world government must be established and we need to start getting rid of as many humans as possible.

Posted below is a new video about the importance of fighting "climate change" that was recently released by a prominent global warming activist organization known as 10:10 Global. This short video depicts children and adults being savagely blown to pieces for not reducing their carbon footprints. The organization has since pulled the video and has issued an apology, but the fact that anyone would actually put out such a video is absolutely chilling. In fact, there are many advocates of the green agenda who wish that they could actually press a button and do this kind of thing to "climate change deniers"....

Unfortunately, this type of thinking is not confined to just a few environmental nutcases. For example, Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates is absolutely obsessed with global warming and with population control.

The video posted next contains excerpts from a speech that Gates gave at a recent TED conference. As you watch this, keep in mind that Gates has personally donated hundreds of millions of dollars towards the development of new vaccines and towards "reproductive health" initiatives around the globe.

During his speech, Gates presents a formula for calculating the carbon dioxide that he believes is causing global warming....

CO2 = P x S x E x C

P = People
S = Services per person
E = Energy per service
C = CO2 per energy unit

In the video that you are about to watch below, Gates tells the audience that in order to get carbon dioxide levels on earth down to where they need to be, then "probably one of these numbers is going to have to get pretty close to zero."

So which of those numbers is going to get pretty close to zero?

Will it be "P"?

In the video, Gates describes how the number of people might be reduced....

"The world today has 6.8 billion people... that's headed up to about 9 billion. Now if we do a really great job on new vaccines, health care, reproductive health services, we could lower that by perhaps 10 or 15 percent."

Now wait a second.

Aren't vaccines, health care and reproductive health services supposed to help people live longer?
Keep that question in mind as you watch this video....

There are others in the environmental movement who are even more open about what they feel needs to be done in order to save the planet from humanity.

For example, James Lovelock, the creator of the Gaia hypothesis, stated in an interview with the Guardian earlier this year that "democracy must be put on hold" if the fight against global warming is going to be successful and that only "a few people with authority" should be permitted to rule the planet until the crisis is solved.

A Finnish environmentalist named Pentti Linkola has gone even farther than that. Linkola is openly calling for climate change deniers to be "re-educated", for an eco-fascist world government to be established, for humans to be forcibly sterilized and for the majority of humans to be killed.

The following is how author Paul Joseph Watson recently described some of Linkola's proposals....

Under Linkola’s proposal to save earth from man-made climate change, “only a few million people would work as farmers and fishermen, without modern conveniences such as the automobile.” This system would be enforced by the creation of a “Green Police” who would abandon “the syrup of ethics” that governs human behavior to completely dominate the population.

Linkola calls for forced abortions, while also adding that another world war would be “a happy occasion for the planet” because it would eradicate tens of millions of people. The environmentalist believes that only jackbooted tyranny can help to save mother earth from “the worst ideologies in the world” which he defines as “growth and freedom”.

Unfortunately, this kind of insanity does not just reside in Finland.

The reality is that academia is brimming with nutjobs such as this who want to see the vast majority of humanity wiped out.

For example, Professor of Biology at the University of Texas at Austin Eric R. Pianka is another advocate of radical human population control.

In an article entitled "What nobody wants to hear, but everyone needs to know", Pianka made the following shocking statements....

*First, and foremost, we must get out of denial and recognize that Earth simply cannot support many billions of people.

*This planet might be able to support perhaps as many as half a billion people who could live a sustainable life in relative comfort. Human populations must be greatly diminished, and as quickly as possible to limit further environmental damage.

*I do not bear any ill will toward humanity. However, I am convinced that the world WOULD clearly be much better off without so many of us.

Now keep in mind that this is a professor that is teaching our kids. People actually pay a lot of money to get educated by this guy.

Unfortunately, his views are very much representative of the mainstream these days.

In fact, some of the wealthiest and most prominent people in the world are absolutely obsessed with the green agenda and with population control. Just consider the following quotes....

David Rockefeller: "The negative impact of population growth on all of our planetary ecosystems is becoming appallingly evident."

CNN Founder Ted Turner: "A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal."

Dave Foreman, Earth First Co-Founder: "My three main goals would be to reduce human population to about 100 million worldwide, destroy the industrial infrastructure and see wilderness, with it’s full complement of species, returning throughout the world."

Maurice Strong: "Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?"

Michael Oppenheimer: "The only hope for the world is to make sure there is not another United States. We can’t let other countries have the same number of cars, the amount of industrialization, we have in the US. We have to stop these Third World countries right where they are."

Not only that, but this radical population control agenda has actually reached the highest levels of the U.S. government.

In an absolutely shocking interview with the New York Times, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg openly admitted that abortion is all about population control. In particular, she confessed that abortion is about getting rid of "populations that we don't want to have too many of"....

"Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of."

So was she asked to step down from the Supreme Court?

Did anyone make much of a fuss?

No, Ginsburg is still serving on the Supreme Court and that statement is long forgotten.

You see, the truth is that this population control philosophy runs rampant throughout the highest levels of the U.S. government.

John P. Holdren, Barack Obama's top science advisor, co-authored a textbook entitled "Ecoscience" back in 1977 in which he actually advocated mass sterilization, compulsory abortion, a one world government and a global police force to enforce population control.

On page 837 of Ecoscience, a claim is made that compulsory abortion would be perfectly legal under the U.S. Constitution....

“Indeed, it has been concluded that compulsory population-control laws, even including laws requiring compulsory abortion, could be sustained under the existing Constitution if the population crisis became sufficiently severe to endanger the society.”

On pages 942 and 943, a call is made for the creation of a "planetary regime" that would control the global economy and enforce population control measures....

Toward a Planetary Regime

“Perhaps those agencies, combined with UNEP and the United Nations population agencies, might eventually be developed into a Planetary Regime—sort of an international superagency for population, resources, and environment. Such a comprehensive Planetary Regime could control the development, administration, conservation, and distribution of all natural resources, renewable or nonrenewable, at least insofar as international implications exist. Thus the Regime could have the power to control pollution not only in the atmosphere and oceans, but also in such freshwater bodies as rivers and lakes that cross international boundaries or that discharge into the oceans. The Regime might also be a logical central agency for regulating all international trade, perhaps including assistance from DCs to LDCs, and including all food on the international market.”

“The Planetary Regime might be given responsibility for determining the optimum population for the world and for each region and for arbitrating various countries’ shares within their regional limits. Control of population size might remain the responsibility of each government, but the Regime would have some power to enforce the agreed limits.”

On page 917, the authors advocate the surrender of U.S. national sovereignty to an international organization....

“If this could be accomplished, security might be provided by an armed international organization, a global analogue of a police force. Many people have recognized this as a goal, but the way to reach it remains obscure in a world where factionalism seems, if anything, to be increasing. The first step necessarily involves partial surrender of sovereignty to an international organization.”

You see, that is what those obsessed with the green agenda want.

They want total control of us all so that they can impose the measures that they believe are necessary to "fix" the planet.

Unfortunately, the measures that they believe are necessary would make George Orwell's 1984 look like a Sunday picnic.

And the sad thing is that the world is not anywhere close to overpopulated. If you took 6 billion people and put them four to house on a quarter acre of land, you could fit them all in Alaska and still have room to spare.

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Ethiopia: First Ever Carbon Credit Trade

25/10/2010

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This is sad. Do you think the carbon tax money will pay to feed this child?

The World Bank (WB) paid 34,000 dollars for the purchase of carbon credit from the Humbo Community Based Forest Management Project, marking the first ever incident of carbon trade in Ethiopia.

The project was initiated by World Vision Ethiopia in Humbo, Wolayta Sodo, in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples (SNNP) Regional State. This area is highly degraded where communities used to rely on cutting trees for subsistence. World Vision organised 800 members into seven cooperatives to be engaged in forest development with the purpose of making a living from carbon trading instead of the sale of firewood.

The Humbo Forest, which covers an area of 2,728ht, was the first large-scale forestry project in Africa to be registered by the United Nations (UN) under the Clean Development Mechanism of the Kyoto Protocol. It was registered earlier this year with a promise that the BioCarbon Fund of the WB would buy credit for half of the 330,000tn of carbon the forest would absorb.

Carbon trading was conceived in response to increasing climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions. These gases are largely emitted by countries in the developed world, with Africa contributing only three per cent to four per cent of global emissions.

Ongoing climate negotiations aspire to arrive at a binding agreement to force the main emitters to buy carbon credits from developing countries, the credit being the service provided by forests in absorbing carbon, hence reducing the level of emissions into the atmosphere. To date, all agreements have been on a voluntary basis lacking any mandatory elements. The purchase of credit by the WB falls in that category.

The WB has committed to buy a total of 726,000 dollars worth of credit, at four dollars per metric tonne, from the Humbo Project over 10 years, according to Hailu Tefera, manager of the Climate Change Programmes Department of World Vision.

The agreement for the sale of the credits was made between World Vision Ethiopia, on behalf of the seven cooperatives, and the WB. Humbo was selected because of its high level of degradation.

The WB's payment covers a period of 10 years, according to Edward Dwumfour, senior specialist of Natural Resources and Environment and Management of the WB.

The payment was made through World Vision Australia last week, which will pass it to the Ethiopia branch to be divided among the 800 members of the cooperatives.

"The price of four dollars is low because there is the risk of fire destroying the forest," Hailu said.

The cooperatives could make extra revenues by selling carbon credits from the remaining part of the forest to voluntary buyers as well as from the sale of timber from designated areas. The project also aims to recharge ground water; improve biodiversity; and reduce soil erosion, flooding, and drought.

World Vision Ethiopia intends to provide the Humbo with 100,000 cooking stoves, worth 16.77 dollars to 20.97 dollars each, which could reduce carbon dioxide emissions by up to 60pc, according to Hailu.

After 10 years, half the trees will be cut for the stumps to grow new shoots and the timber will be sold and the revenues shared among the members of the cooperatives. The project started in 2006 with financial assistance of 700,000 dollars from the WB, which helped to plant 1.3 million seeds.

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Are you kidding me? Read this....New strain of swine flu emerges - report

25/10/2010

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Please do not give vaccines!

The H1N1 swine flu virus may be starting to mutate, and a slightly new form has begun to predominate in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore, researchers reported on Thursday.

More study is needed to tell whether the new strain is more likely to kill patients and whether the current vaccine can protect against it completely, said Ian Barr of the World Health Organisation Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza in Melbourne, Australia and colleagues.

"However, it may represent the start of more dramatic antigenic drift of the pandemic influenza A(H1N1) viruses that may require a vaccine update sooner than might have been expected," they wrote in the online publication Eurosurveillance.

It is possible it is both more deadly and also able to infect people who have been vaccinated, they said.

Flu viruses mutate constantly -- this is why people need a fresh flu vaccine every year. Since it broke out in March 2009 and spread globally, the H1N1 swine flu virus has been very stable with almost no mutation.

Scientists around the world keep an eye on all flu strains in case an especially dangerous new mutant emerges. While H1N1 turned out not to be especially deadly, it spread globally within weeks and killed more children and young adults than an average strain does.

WHO declared the pandemic over in August but H1N1 has now taken over as the main seasonal flu strain circulating almost everywhere but South Africa, where H3N2 and influenza B are more common. The current seasonal flu vaccine protects against H1N1, H3N2 and the B strain.

"The virus has changed little since it emerged in 2009, however, in this report we describe several genetically distinct changes in the pandemic H1N1 influenza virus," Barr's team wrote in the report, available at http://www.eurosurveillance.org/ViewArticle.aspx?ArticleId=19692.

"These variants were first detected in Singapore in early 2010 and have subsequently spread through Australia and New Zealand."

The changes are not significant yet, they said. But there have been some cases of people who were vaccinated also becoming infected, and also some deaths.

"Already this variant virus has been associated with several vaccine breakthroughs in teenagers and adults vaccinated in 2010 with monovalent pandemic influenza vaccine (protecting against only H1N1) as well as a number of fatal cases from whom the variant virus was isolated," they wrote.

But there is not enough information to tell whether there may have been other factors making the patients more vulnerable, they stressed.

"It remains to be seen whether this variant will continue to predominate for the rest of the influenza season in Oceania and in other parts of the southern hemisphere and then spread to the northern hemisphere or merely die out," they wrote.

WHO says 18,450 people worldwide are confirmed to have died from H1N1, including many pregnant women and young people. But WHO says it will take at least a year after the pandemic ends to determine the true death toll, which is likely to be much higher.

Seasonal flu kills an estimated 500,000 people a year, 90 percent of them frail elderly people, according to the WHO. The 1957 pandemic killed about 2 million people and the last pandemic, in 1968, killed 1 million.

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Vinny Loves Dees!

22/10/2010

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Vinny Loves Dees, discussed on today's show!

Vinny Loves David Dees and discussed him on today's show......

David Dees began his airbrush art career in the fast paced world of corporate advertising. Begging his way onto a staff position at an Atlanta sweatshop, GraphicsGroup studios, Dees was soon dealing with cutthroat art directors from New York to Chicago, creating the eye catching visuals that sold everything from cartoon package designs on kids cereal boxes, to billboards of dazzling electronics, to the newest soft drink ads.

In the eighties, setting up freelance shop in Los Angeles, Dees had success with the movie industry, painting hundreds of video covers, movie ad campaigns, and store displays for his clients Paramount, Hanna-Barbera, and Walt Disney Studios.

Then, an interest in childrens book illustrations led to a long standing association with Sesame Street, where his colorful and wacky illustrations of Cookie Monster, Big Bird, and the muppets were featured in Sesame Street Magazine nearly every month for the last 15 years, including seven covers, and recently, four Sesame Street children books for Random House and Readers Digest Publishing.

These days, long since replacing the liquid airbrushed acrylic paint with photoshop digital art, high technology has revitalized the look and feel of his artwork.

Then, in 2006, Dees came up with an original style of political art commentary inspired by the 9/11 truth movement and a passion to fight the New World Order agenda. David began creating and releasing an endless barrage of aggressive, and sometimes disturbing, photo-illustration images throughout the internet in an attempt to wake others up about the onslaught of the elite's power hungry world government plan of domination. Sarcastic to the extreme, funny in the approach, most times visually horrifying, this wild new style of illustration screams out our serious world crisis situation in a visual instant.

Patriot heros like Hollywood film producer Aaron Russo who produced "America: Freedom to Fascism", radio talk show legend Jeff Rense, and the world renowned David Icke have all commented on this socially conscious illustration and were not shy in throwing around the term 'political art genius'.

What irony that all of David Dees' years of designing for big corporations trained an art monster who would now turn his creative power back against that very corrupt mainstream media.

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Nicolas Sarkozy bans tall workers from factory walkabout.

22/10/2010

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French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been accused of banning tall workers from attending a factory walkabout – because they will make him look too short.

The 5ft 5ins tall leader is alleged to have sent aides to the plant ahead of an official visit, to stop anyone over 5ft 6 ins from appearing alongside him.

The claims come just a week after Mr Sarkozy was reported to have banned tall bodyguards from his presidential protection team.

Mr Sarkozy, who wears platform heels to disguise his size, is due to visit the Turbomeca areonatics factory near Toulouse on June 22.

But local paper the Republique des Pyrenees said he sent two staff to there first to 'whittle out the tall ones'.

One unnamed engineer working there told the paper: "I am almost six feet tall, and I was told I was not allowed near the official reception group."

The paper commented: "It seems people at the factory decided it was better to yield to the president's wishes than face exile to the land of the pygmies."

Last year Mr Sarkozy was accused of deliberately picking short people to appear alongside him in TV footage on another factory visit. The claim was made by a woman who said she was chosen to stand next to the 5ft 5 ins French president when he visited Faurecia car plants site in Normandy because she was shorter than him.

The woman told the French media afterwards: "It was designed so that no one appeared bigger than the president.

"Access to the factory was restricted so that no one could be shown alongside him."

In May 2009 Sarkozy was pictured using a footstool to make a speech during the D-Day commemorations in Normandy.

The decision to use the six inch wooden box is said to have been made because he was using the same lectern as Gordon Brown, Barack Obama and Canadian premier Stephen Harper – all considerably taller than Sarkozy.

At 5ft 5ins tall in his bare feet, Sarkozy is even shorter than his famous predecessor Napoleon, who was an inch taller.

The president is also one of the world's shortest heads of state – only slightly taller than North Korea's Kim Jong-il and Russia's Dmitry Medvedev, both of whom are 5ft 3ins tall.

The Elysee Palace has always denied any rumours Sarkozy hand picks short people at televised public appearances.

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Two-legged pig learns to walk

22/10/2010

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Full Moon News from Vinny!

A pig born with only its two front legs has become a local celebrity in China after learning to walk.

The 10-month-old pig manages to balance and walk on her front legs even though she now weighs more than 50kg.

Named by villagers Zhu Jianqiang (strong-willed pig), the pig attracts crowds of visitors to its owner's home each day.

Wang Xihai, of Liuqiao village, Xincai County, central China's Henan Province, said it was one of nine born in a litter in January.

"My wife asked me to dump it but I refused, as it's a life," he explained.

"I thought I should give it a chance to survive, and amazingly it has."

Wang started training the two-legged piglet to walk when it was just a few days old by lifting it up by its tail.

"I trained her a little each day. After a month, she could walk upside down on her own," he said.

"A circus offered me a lot of money for her but I won't sell no matter what they offer."

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Millions march in France against pension cuts.

20/10/2010

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By Alex Lantier

An estimated 3.5 million workers and students marched nationwide in France yesterday in a day of action called to oppose pension cuts demanded by President Nicolas Sarkozy. Though the most critical provisions of the pension “reform” have been passed—a two-year increase in the retirement age and a corresponding increase in the pay-in period—the law has yet to be formally voted on by the Senate.

The turnout testified to the determination of workers and young people to fight Sarkozy’s policies. Strikes and protest actions have been building for more than a week.

While it had been reported that the Senate would postpone its final vote on the bill until Thursday, and possibly delay the vote even further, some media outlets were reporting that the vote could take place today, as originally scheduled.

The strikes have spread to oil refineries, oil depots, ports and trucking firms, resulting in a growing gasoline shortage across France. The response of prominent union leaders to the upsurge in working class militancy and the widening economic impact of the strike wave—and opinion polls showing more than 70 percent of the population supporting the strikes—has been to indicate that the mass movement should be ended once the Senate has passed the pension bill.

The union leadership has from the onset sought to use the strikes and protests as a lever to obtain some cosmetic concessions from the government, while accepting the major cuts in the “reform.” They have rejected any struggle to bring down the Sarkozy government, insisting that the movement be limited to applying pressure on the president and the parliament.

They hoped that repeated one-day protests would wear down and exhaust the opposition of workers and students, but to date the intensity of the movement has only increased.

Sarkozy is moving to use the police to break numerous blockades of depots by oil workers. Last week, a large force of riot police was used to end a blockade at a strategic depot near Marseille. As of this writing, the union confederations have organized no public defense of workers occupying the oil depots.

Demonstrations in France’s largest cities were as big or bigger than the record turnout on October 12, the previous day of action. According to estimates by the unions, 330,000 marched in Paris, 240,000 in Marseille, 155,000 in Toulouse, 140,000 in Bordeaux, 60,000 each in Clermont-Ferrand, Rouen, Le Havre and Caen, 50,000 in Rennes, and 45,000 in Lyon.

Smaller regional trade union federations are pushing for broader strike action. In the Ardennes, the all trade union alliance passed a resolution calling for a renewable general strike “in all sectors of economic activity,” with rail workers and Peugeot auto workers voting in large numbers for the resolution.

Speaking to France3 television, Ardennes CGT (General Confederation of Workers) official Patrick Lattuada explained that his members had “completely had it” and were “fed up” with the fact that “the government pays no attention to the population’s demands and expectations.” The October 12 demonstration at Charleville-Mézières, with 10,000 people, was the largest in the region since the May-June 1968 general strike.

Student protests were at record levels, according to statistics provided by high school student unions. The FIDL (Independent and Democratic High School Student Union) said 1,200 of France’s 4,302 high schools were on strike, with 850 schools blockaded. At ten universities students met in general assemblies and voted to blockade their institutions. Youth marching in demonstrations chanted: “Unemployed at 25, exploited at 67, no, no, no!”

Police clashed with demonstrators across the country. In Lyon, police fired tear gas and fought with demonstrators at Bellecour Square and neighboring downtown areas. Dozens of cars were overturned and store windows smashed during the confrontation. Police blamed “1,300 violent protestors.”

The administration of Université Lyon-2 closed the institution “indefinitely” after students voted to blockade it. Similarly, the administration closed Toulouse-Le Mirail University after 75 percent of the 2,000-strong general assembly voted a blockade. Rennes-2 was also closed.

Youth clashed with riot police throughout the Paris suburbs. In Argenteuil, police attacked youth in a confrontation apparently planned in advance by city authorities. City official Nicolas Bougeard told Le Parisien: “It could have been worse. Incidents like that take six months of work to prepare. We put 20 very experienced people in place [official mediators wearing official vests, according to the newspaper] who know the youth and the area very well.” Police helicopters flew overhead to monitor the fighting.

Speaking yesterday morning in the beach resort of Deauville, where he was attending a summit with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, Sarkozy said he would “see with law enforcement that public order would be maintained.” Sarkozy indicated his concern over the situation, but said he would not modify the cuts: “Do I fear excesses? Of course, it’s not with a light heart that I confront them. However, the greatest excess would be to not do my duty, which is to arrange for the financing of pensions.”

He threatened workers occupying refineries and oil depots, saying that “there are people who want to work and who must not be deprived of gasoline.” Upon his return to Paris, Sarkozy met with Prime Minister François Fillon, Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux and several other leading officials. He explained that the meeting aimed to “unblock a certain number of situations.”

The government acknowledged yesterday that France is in the grip of a growing gasoline shortage, with Ecology and Transport Minister Jean-Louis Borloo admitting that 4,000 of France’s 12,500 gas stations are running dry. Prime Minister Fillon said it would take four or five days for gasoline supplies to return to normal.

Trucking company federations warned that numerous enterprises were running out of fuel and might shut down and furlough their workers. According to Agence France-Presse, the Caen Chamber of Commerce and Industry released a report yesterday stating: “There is currently no more fuel available on our territory… We are currently witnessing a slowdown of economic activity, which could halt completely in 48 hours if supplies are not re-established.”

An open struggle is looming between the working class and the state, as police forces try to break the oil strike and resupply businesses, taking away the workers’ most powerful weapon against the passage of Sarkozy’s cuts. In addition to the strike-breaking action by CRS riot police against oil workers outside of Marseille, workers at Grandpuits were formally “requisitioned” and forced back to work under threat of 5-year prison terms.

According to one report, managers secretly arrived by boat at a struck oil depot in Le Havre to restart kerosene shipments to Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle airport. Workers warned that they could not guarantee that the managers would be able to safely operate the equipment to produce kerosene. At a Caen oil depot police broke through workers’ barricades with a bulldozer, after which trucks arrived to haul away supplies.

The press is citing in threatening terms the legal measures available for use against blockades. Le Monde cited lawyers claiming that workers could face immediate dismissal without severance pay. According to the press, high school students could face immediate suspension, 3 years imprisonment and €45,000 fines if they participate in a blockade at a school that is not their own.

The national trade union leaderships have not responded with any campaign to defend striking workers. They are undoubtedly in talks with the government over the terms of a sellout. The major union federations are set to meet Thursday to discuss their next moves.

At yesterday’s protest march, Bernard Thibault, leader of the CGT, which is linked to the Stalinist French Communist Party, appealed to Sarkozy, saying, “Please be reasonable, accept discussion with the trade unions. Do not close yourself off from us with a unilateral choice.”

Thibault vaguely declared that the size of the demonstrations “will allow us to consider other initiatives.” However, unlike on previous days of action, the all trade union alliance did not announce a date for the next day of action.

The CFDT (French and Democratic Labor Confederation), which is France’s second most influential union and is politically close to the Socialist Party, is signaling that it will oppose further action against the cuts if the law is passed by the Senate. CFDT officials told business daily Les Echos: “If strikes continue and broaden, we will have to pursue them. But if they become hard conflicts in a few isolated industrial sectors, we will not be able to give it our approval indefinitely.”

The officials added that they expected this would not lead to a break with the CGT, as Thibault supports their positions: “The situation is challenging for us, but it is for the CGT as well. Bernard Thibault is pushing, but he can’t do too much to bolster his more activist wing, which is contesting his leadership inside the union.”

Thibault’s right-wing record has provoked considerable opposition among workers, including those in the CGT. He was publicly criticized last year by CGT auto delegate Xavier Mathieu for not assisting auto plants targeted for closure. Mathieu said that people like Thibault were “scum” who “are only good for chatting with the government and calming people down.”

Thibault was also criticized for negotiating pension cuts for public sector workers with Sarkozy in 2007, and for mobilizing CRS riot police and CGT thugs against striking undocumented workers occupying CGT offices in Paris last year.

The unions are effectively acting as counselors to Sarkozy on how to impose the cuts. They are warning the government not to move too rapidly in passing the pension bill so as to avoid provoking uncontrollable opposition in the working class.

CGT official Nadine Prigent told Agence France-Presse: “It’s not a done deal that a Senate [vote for the cuts] will calm things down.” The UNSA (National Union of Autonomous Trade Unions) warned: “No one knows what effect that vote will have.”

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