Stephan: In 1965 I was introduced to the Edgar Cayce material and, as a result, significantly altered my diet. One of the first changes I made was to not eat white bread. It is now recognized as a bedrock principle in the healthy eating movement. Here is the confirmatory evidence for the negative health effects of eating highly processed foods.
Researchers at the University of Navarra followed the diets of more than 9000 young adults over 5 years to determine what impact the consumption of white bread has on a population with a bread heavy diet.
Researchers examined the data, and found that participants who ate whole grain or brown bread had no increased risk of being overweight or obese. Similarly, participants who ate both white and brown or whole grain bread didn’t face an increased risk of obesity or being overweight.
However, the study found that participants who ate more than 3 slices of white bread a day were significantly more likely to be overweight or obese than participants who ate white bread rarely or not at all.
Miguel Martinez-Gonzalez, a professor at the University of Navarra who was involved in the study, stated that the reason frequent consumption of white bread increases your risk of obesity is because the highly refined flour used to make white bread is absorbed by the body as sugar, which is quickly turned into fat.
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, - The Asahi Shimbun (Japan)
Stephan: This is a trend that SR began tracking 10 years ago. It has profound geopolitical implications but also should be seen as a first example of what is going to be a growing trend. In the future overpopulation is not going to be the problem. It is underpopulation that will be the issue. No industrialized state has a sustainable birthrate. And hundreds of millions are going to die as a result of the commitment by the richest individuals and corporations to sustain carbon's ascendency, and block the needed remediation until it is too late. Underpopulation will constitute a major trend and problem in the future. How Japan handles it will be instructive.
Japan’s projected population decline conjures up an image of a ball rolling down a steep slope. According to estimates by the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, the nation’s population will shrink to two-thirds of the current level in the next half-century, and then to one-third 100 years from now.
Three panels of experts have issued reports on how to put the brakes on the decline.
All the reports concur that there are obstacles preventing people who want to marry and have children from doing so, and that these obstacles must be removed.
The reports also offer similar solutions, which boil down to expanding support for parents and changing the ways of working.
The Japan Policy Council, a private research foundation that issued one of the three reports, caught the public’s attention by pointing out the possibility of about half of the nation’s current rural municipalities ceasing to exist if they keep losing their populations to the big cities. But aside from the JPC’s dire warning, the three reports offer no new practical solutions.
This was only to be expected, as what needs to be done is already fairly clear. But the point is whether society and the political community will be receptive […]
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Katie Valentine, - Think Progress
Stephan: I think this is a very big deal. We clearly have emerging technologies that can collectively extract us from the carbon age. Consider this story within the context of the multitude of Fracking stories showing how that technology is destroying the Earth's balance, resulting in earthquakes, polluted water tables and waterways. It is now a question of will. We collectively must band together and vote for that which is compassionate and life-affirming. This is doable.
Click through to see the map.
Wind energy reduced power sector emissions by more than 5 percent last year, saving the same amount of CO2 as taking 20 million cars off the road, according to a new report.
The report, published by the American Wind Energy Association, found that wind energy production in 2013 resulted in carbon emissions reductions of 126.8 million tons. Some states achieved larger reductions than the national average, with 11 states reducing carbon emissions by 10 percent compared to 2011 levels through wind energy. Texas – a state which broke its record for highest wind generation ever in March – had the highest volume of carbon reductions, followed by Illinois, California, and Colorado.
Wind energy’s 2013 emissions reductions by state, using EPA’s AVERT tool.
AWEA’s report noted that reducing carbon also carries co-benefits: sulfur dioxide emissions drop by almost 347 million pounds per year as a result of wind energy production, and nitrous oxide emissions are reduced by 214 million pounds per year, These reductions improve air and water quality. The cost of wind energy has also been falling over the last few years – costs have dropped by 43 percent in four years, according to AWEA, due to improvements in technology.
That decrease in cost […]
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BRIAN TASHMAN, - Right Wing Watch
Stephan: This is the narrative I am beginning to see on the Right. It is a world turned on its head.
Truth In Action Ministries, which has released several over-the-top films (including one likening the rise of gay rights to the sinking of the Titanic), in its latest project takes on the ‘religion” of environmentalism and climate science. The film closely resembles ‘Resisting the Green Dragon,” the 2010 ‘documentary” in which Religious Right activists unironically accused environmentalists of religious fanaticism.
In the new film from Truth In Action, formerly known as Coral Ridge Ministries, Southern Baptist Convention official Richard Land describes environmentalists as ‘watermelons” who are ‘green on the outside and pink on the inside.”
‘Environmentalism has become a religion,” Land says. ‘These are recycled communists, recycled socialists, recycled collectivists who are trying to use a flawed theory of environmentalism to bring about the collectivist society they were unable to bring about politically through socialism and through communism.”
Oklahoma Sen. Jim Inhofe, also interviewed for the film, accuses environmentalists of ‘worshiping the environment” instead of God.
Truth In Action Ministries host John Rabe, meanwhile, warns that policies targeting climate change could lead to the return of communist dictatorships that left ‘over 100 million people killed.”
He also accuses scientists who are working on climate issues of having a ‘pretention to omniscience” and committing idolatry: ‘One of […]
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DEBORAH KOTZ, Reporter - The Boston Globe
Stephan: With summer coming on I thought this might be useful.
Consumer Reports recently issued its annual sunscreen rankings just as we’re starting to shop for sunscreen again. The consumer magazine ranked Coppertone Water Babies and Walmart’s Equate SPF 50 highest for lotions in terms of price and protection from UV rays; for sprays, Bull Frog WaterArmor Sport and Target’s Up & Up took the top rating.
While most of us wouldn’t think to head to the beach without any sunscreen, some of us get a little lazy about applying lotion when heading out to a ball game or bike ride. But a new research finding may provide a little extra motivation – especially for using sunscreen in kids heading off to camp for the day.
Researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital’s Channing Lab examined survey data from more than 100,000 nurses participating in the Harvard Nurses Health study and found that those who had at least five blistering sunburns when they were 15 to 20 years old had a 68 percent increased risk for common skin cancers like basal cell and squamous cell carcinomas and an 80 percent increased risk of the deadlier melanoma by the time they reached middle age.
‘Sudden large amounts of sun exposure that cause major damage to the […]
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