Friday, February 8th, 2013
Stephan: This is overly polemic for SR. But what it is reporting is so corrupt and blatant I decided to put that aside and run it anyway.
The same forces that don't want any GMO labelled, don't want natural products to be labelled as free of GMO. The FDA agreed to this. Could a government regulatory agency be more in the pocket of the industries it is supposed to oversee?
When the FDA approves genetically modified salmon, you would think that it would, at least, be possible to avoid it. Certainly, any producer of non-GM salmon would be sure to label it, since the vast majority of people want to know. However, in the Monsanto-controlled FDA, what the people want has little to do with what they get. The agency will not allow foods to be labeled as non-genetically engineered, and excuses are as absurd as can be imagined.
The FDA’s Claims
Only Following the Law
The FDA claims that there is no material difference between genetically engineered foods and their natural counterparts. Apparently, the inclusion of genes from other species in every single cell in the organism doesn’t amount to a ‘material difference
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Thursday, February 7th, 2013
KEVIN ZEESE and MARGARET FLOWERS, - Truthout.org
Stephan: In the endless blather by the Right about the debt, which is meaningless in the short-term, but which has captured the media, the issues covered in this report rarely get attention. They should. This is the real crisis.
The bipartisans in Washington are currently focused on Social Security and Medicare – not to improve health care and retirement, but to cut them. There is constant, exaggerated ‘sky is falling’ deficit commentary about purported out-of-control spending caused by these programs, while the real twin crises of poverty retirement and health insecurity are ignored. Popular solutions to these crises exist that would strengthen Social Security and Medicare and spur economic recovery.
Facts You Are Not Being Told About Retirement and Health Care
We are in the midst of retirement and health care crises that are projected to worsen in the coming years, but we do not hear any discussion of real solutions to these problems. We do not hear the truth about retirement and health care in the corporate media or from either party. Here are some facts that paint the picture:
Senior poverty is growing: According to the Census Bureau, in last decade, there has been a 78 percent increase in Americans over 60 facing the threat of hunger. The Census Bureau puts the rate of poverty for seniors at nearly 16 percent , or roughly one in six seniors.
Pensions have kept Americans out […]
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Thursday, February 7th, 2013
TOM PHILPOTT, - Mother Jones
Stephan: Superbugs, superweeds. There is an inherent problem with an approach to nature that is predicated on dominance as opposed to cooperation. Whether it is antibiotics or herbicides that approach never gets all the 'bugs' in a hospital, or the weeds in a farm field. The result: the survivors mutate and become resistant, so strong antibiotics, and stronger poisons are required in a future round until, eventually, the drugs and poisons no matter how strong just stop working. That's where we are in our hospitals, and now where we are in our fields. You'd think this progression would be obvious. But the corporate greed for short-term profit just overwhelms good sense.
Last year’s drought took a big bite out of the two most prodigious US crops, corn and soy. But it apparently didn’t slow down the spread of weeds that have developed resistance to Monsanto’s herbicide Roundup (glyphosate), used on crops engineered by Monsanto to resist it. More than 70 percent of all the the corn, soy, and cotton grown in the US is now genetically modified to withstand glyphosate.
Back in 2011, such weeds were already spreading fast. ‘Monsanto’s ‘Superweeds’ Gallop Through Midwest,’ declared the headline of a post I wrote then. What’s the word you use when an already-galloping horse speeds up? Because that’s what’s happening. Let’s try this: ‘Monsanto’s ‘Superweeds’ Stampede Through Midwest.’
That pretty much describes the situation last year, according to a new report from the agribusiness research consultancy Stratus. Since the 2010 growing season, the group has been polling ‘thousands of US farmers’ across 31 states about herbicide resistance. Here’s what they found in the 2012 season:
Superweeds: First they gallop, then they roar. Graph: Stratus
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Thursday, February 7th, 2013
TANYA LEWIS, - Live Science
Stephan: A new step in the emerging new medicine.
Imagine if you could take living cells, load them into a printer, and squirt out a 3D tissue that could develop into a kidney or a heart. Scientists are one step closer to that reality, now that they have developed the first printer for embryonic human stem cells.
In a new study, researchers from the University of Edinburgh have created a cell printer that spits out living embryonic stem cells. The printer was capable of printing uniform-size droplets of cells gently enough to keep the cells alive and maintain their ability to develop into different cell types. The new printing method could be used to make 3D human tissues for testing new drugs, grow organs, or ultimately print cells directly inside the body.
Human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) are obtained from human embryos and can develop into any cell type in an adult person, from brain tissue to muscle to bone. This attribute makes them ideal for use in regenerative medicine - repairing, replacing and regenerating damaged cells, tissues or organs. [Stem Cells: 5 Fascinating Findings]
In a lab dish, hESCs can be placed in a solution that contains the biological cues that tell the cells to develop into specific tissue types, […]
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Thursday, February 7th, 2013
Stephan: We have endless money for war, and we subsidize Big Oil to the tune of tens of billions of dollars, even as their profits soar to empyrean levels. Yet the basic infrastructure of the country is slowly coming apart in front of us, as this report shows. Millions of jobs could be created if we took our future seriously. But we don't.
I find it interesting that I so often find these reports in the foreign press. Why is that do you think? No need to respond, the answer is obvious.
NEW ORLEANS — THE Industrial Canal Lock in New Orleans connects two of America’s highest-tonnage waterways: the Mississippi River-which handles more than 6,000 ocean vessels, 150,000 barges and 500m tonnes of cargo each year, as well as much of its grain, corn and soyabean production-and the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway, which runs from refinery-rich south-eastern Texas to Florida. Ships pass from one to the other via a lock that was built in 1921, and is 600 usable feet long, or half the length of a modern lock. Its replacement was authorised in 1956. Construction on the replacement was authorised in 1998, and then stalled by lawsuits. The most optimistic predictions of the Army Corps of Engineers, which maintains America’s inland waterways, see the new lock being completed in 2030.
A few miles upriver from this archaism sits the Port of New Orleans, one of America’s busiest and most diverse. Like its rivals, the port is ‘intermodal
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