the greater depression is upon us..,

DailyReckoning | Consider:

The eurozone is growing increasingly desperate. Watching the heads of Europe dither and debate over further bailouts to the unhappy Greeks and other troubled PIIGS – before ultimately reaching back into the pockets of the equally unhappy citizens in Germany and the decreasing number of still-functioning economies in the eurozone – reminds me of a down-on-his-luck blackjack player. He’s mortgaged his home to play the game but is now down to his last chips. He doesn’t want to risk his remaining resources but has no choice, because to walk away now will mean taking up residence in a cardboard box. And so, reluctantly, he shoves across another pile. As the PIIGS start to default and either leave the eurozone entirely or are shunted off into some sort of sidecar organization, there will be great volatility in the euro and in the European markets.

The U.S. debt situation is far worse than anyone in Washington is willing to admit. We keep hearing calls for more, not less debt creation. But if people would stop kidding themselves and tally up all the many demands the U.S. government has against it, the actual debt-to-GDP ratio rises to something on the order of 400% – and even that is likely understating things. The fundamental flaws in the U.S. monetary system – flaws that have given license to the bureaucrats to smash the limousine of state straight into a wall – have required a remaking every 20 to 30 years or so. The problem is that there is pretty much nothing else that can be done to save the status quo at this point, and so the monetary system is likely to collapse. That means big changes ahead, including – or perhaps starting with – a poisonous ratcheting up of interest rates.

China’s miracle mirage. While having aspects of a free market, the hard truth is that China is run as a command economy by a cadre of communist holdovers. This is apparent in the cities that have been built for no purpose other than creating jobs and boosting GDP. It is also apparent in the growing inflation in China – the inevitable knock-on of the government’s decision to yank on the levers of money creation harder than any other nation at the onset of the Greater Depression. Meanwhile, signs of social unrest crop up here and there. Though so far they have been swiftly put down, there is no question that the ruling elite has to walk a very fine line. If the Chinese economy stumbles seriously, all bets are off. That we are talking about the world’s second-largest economy means this is not of small consequence.

Japan is essentially offline. Reports from friends in Japan – including one who was initially skeptical about the scale of the problems at Fukushima – have now changed in tone by 180 degrees. You can almost feel the growing sense of desperation as the already massively indebted nation begins to slide toward an abyss. There is little standing in the way of the world’s third-largest economy’s slide.

The Middle East is in flames. This, too, is far from settled. As usual, the U.S. government has been hopping here and there in an attempt to maintain its influence, but at this point pretty much everything is up for grabs. The odds of the U.S. retaining the same level of influence in the region that it has enjoyed over the last century are slim to none, especially now that even the Saudis are shipping more of their oil to China than to the U.S. Again, big changes are ahead.

I’m convinced that nearly everything about today’s world is going to change over the coming decade… much of it for the worse.

crooked corporatist governor forces foreclosure fraud investigators out at AG office

PalmBeachPost | A lead foreclosure fraud investigator for the state said she and a colleague were forced to resign from the Florida attorney general's office, unexpectedly ending their nearly yearlong pursuit to hold law firms and banks accountable.

Former Assistant Attorney General Theresa Edwards and colleague June Clarkson had been investigating the state's so-called "foreclosure mills," uncovering evidence of legal malpractice that also implicated banks and loan serv­icers.

Despite positive performance evaluations, Edwards said the two were told during a meeting with their supervisor in late May to give up their jobs voluntarily or be let go. Edwards said no reason was given for the move.

"It all happened very abruptly," said Edwards, who had worked in the attorney general's office for about three years.

The foreclosure investigations were launched under former Attorney General Bill McCollum, but Edwards said she sensed changes were coming under Gov. Rick Scott and Attorney General Pam Bondi.

"I think they wanted to put people in there that were more in line with their thinking," Edwards said.

Bondi's press secretary said Tuesday that foreclosure investigations are still open and are being personally led or supervised by Division Director Richard Lawson.

"The division has made these investigations a top priority and will continue to actively pursue all of our investigations into foreclosure law firms," said Jennifer Krell Davis.

But Edwards said she was given no time to brief anyone on the investigations and that there were notes that had yet to be transcribed and filed.

Davis said she could not comment on personnel issues when asked about the nature of the resignations.

On May 20, Edwards said she and Clarkson were summoned together to a meeting at 3:30 p.m. and told by Robert Julian, then the South Florida bureau chief for the Economic Crimes Section of the attorney general's office, that they had the opportunity to resign or would be let go immediately. They turned in nearly identical resignation letters that day.

"We had absolutely no idea it was coming," said Edwards, who in an April 22 performance review she provided to The Palm Beach Post was praised by Julian.

big bank exorcisms

Video - Rev. Billy leads Deutschebank exorcism.

Evolver | In recent days we have challenged the devils in the Deutschbank in Dusseldorf, and the ING and UBS in Amsterdam, and HSBC in Liverpool - laying our hands on the cash machines and calling our demons. What are these exorcisms? Why these muscular hexing prayers at the ATM? Of course the big banks have their famous bad practices - redlining, foreclosures, demolitions of communities. But now with the earth crisis there is a broader deeper big bank attack. In the Church of Earthalujah we have come to believe that big banks distance us from each other. The global storm of capital consumerizes and militarizes us. The force of the money leaves us dispirited and alone, more intimate with products and sentimental patriotism than the people around us...

If we human beings don't re-ignite a new kind of meeting - don't meet down in the city square in that crushing crashing way - despite the Spanish Greek Syrian Sri Lankan NYC Liverpool banker's police. If we don't physically re-crowd in a way that collapses nation states and corporations and armies in that touching/shouting/marching that we've seen from Tunis to Madison. If our uprisings don't continue to rise and engulf the planet in the good fire - then the official silence that heats the atmosphere more each day will be the quiet time that kills us all.

Most earth scientists, if you speak to them privately and off the record, will confide that it is, in fact, too late. There will be rapid and chaotic changes on the Earth's surface, and it seems to be in the tectonic plates beneath the surface as much as the polar caps and jet streams and oceans above. Despite this, we can still hope that the Earth might be persuaded to go forward in some kind of collaboration with the human species if it's convinced by the living it feels from us, as a species, as people. The social animal that we are will have to humanize in an extreme way. We will have to become much more intensely human to escape and make irrelevant or flip over the nationstates, working as they do for the distant banks.

So - thinking of another exorcism in a few hours. I know that there will be that sensation that we're asking the Earth to come up through us and it might just feel like bad acting delivered in the manner of most bad action - with misguided, hopeful energy. Our script is from earth scientists and native wisdom and radical faeries from the drag parade. And the script keeps changing as between our sweating and shouting one of the singers comes into the room reading from a book by John Berger. I know that one point of these exorcisms is to - just be together in the act of doing it. We're feeling this as the tour progresses. We are so close together that we ourselves are changing with the effort of willing some kind of forgotten magic that would spiritually hack into the evil. The effort changes us as we make up new songs and leap and push against the bullet-proof edifice of global banking, as we press back against the cash machine's strange hypnosis.

the beginning of the beginning of the end...,

Video - Someone at IEA leaked SPR release announcement

Utilipoint | I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but …

On June 23rd, 2011 the International Energy Agency (IEA) made a significant announcement. For just the third time in its history, it announced the release of oil from strategic reserves — some 60 million BBLs over the preceding month. The announcement pointed to the Libyan situation, where it estimated some 132 million BBLs of light, sweet crude oil had been removed from the market by the end of May, 2011 and noting that greater supply tightness (and the resulting run in up in prices) could threaten the fragile global recovery. The impact of this "shock" announcement was pretty immediate as crude prices fell with Brent Futures falling close to 7.5 percent in the immediate aftermath.

Reuters analyst, John Kemp1, immediately saw the move as targeted against speculators in the market. A view echoed by many U.S. newspapers which ran ugly headlines proclaiming the end of speculation in the market and a return to "fundamentals" and saner prices. If this unheralded and hugely coordinated and difficult decision by the IEA was targeted at speculators, it failed. The sudden unexpected downwards move did hit long biased hedge funds for sure—that can be seen in some rather disappointing returns for May from many managers, but was it even an effective "warning shot" as The Street2 put it? Was it a warning shot at all?

Strangely enough, oil prices were declining prior to the announcement and there was much speculation that the IEA move wasn't as much as a surprise as initially thought. According to one oil-trader, Mark Fisher, it wasn't and he made his accusation on CNBC."This information, in my opinion for what it's worth, was leaked. It was leaked," he rasped. "Somebody knew something." It wouldn't be too much of a surprise if the decision, which not only required agreement of IEA members but likely consultations with OPEC and others, was leaked as crude was down by four percent already.

What is clear is that the IEA's move was a direct market intervention, and yes, it was very much a speculative move by big governments to try to control what should be a free market. So who is crying foul now? After the announcement, the idea that another move by the IEA to keep down prices may be on the table was also mooted. But there is a problem with that strategy—the IEA simply doesn't have enough credible political capability to keep adding from the strategic reserve to the global oil supply. In a matter of months its reserves would be gone and the price of oil would still be close to record highs. As Fisher puts it—it's a risky gamble that the IEA can't win.

Central to this issue is this: the price is where it is at because of fundamentals, not speculators. I have argued this many times before. "To me, price volatility cannot be significantly dampened by reducing the ability of investors to "speculate" nor can it be addressed by greater market oversight and regulation (not that this may not be required for other reasons). It can only be addressed by recognizing and understanding the fact that for now, and the future, we are truly in a supply constrained world and that demands a higher level of thinking, a more strategic set of thinking and strategies at both the national and trans national levels,"4 I stated back in 2009. Even the IEA announcement points to fundamentals as its raison d'etre with its statement about Libyan oil. But hold on … 60 million BBLs to replace 132 million BBLs already lost from the market? Two million BBLs/day for 30 days to replace 1.5 million BBLs per day of lost Libyan oil? No wonder the speculators barely flinched.

The real reason for the release may be indeterminable. Some suggest President Obama has an eye on re-election and sees lower gas prices at the pump as a way to sweeten his chances. Others might suggest the move was really aimed at OPEC, the other speculators in the oil market, but the ones who really can impact prices. The fact is that it is irrelevant. What is relevant today, three years after my last article on this topic, is that nothing much worthwhile has been done to address the underlying issues of supply and demand. The United States still doesn't have an energy policy worth squat, and neither do many other Western economies. In fact, to me, it seems like only China has a practical energy/commodity policy these days—spend worthless T-bills on buying reserves in the ground anywhere you can—and fast.

But since 2009, the situation truly has gotten much worse. The population of this planet grew in those three years to 6.7 billion (by more than three times the population of Germany) and is set to rise to around 10 billion by 2050. Those extra people and their demands for food, energy and raw materials of every kind is the problem. In fact, policy decisions across the board have been counterproductive and counterintuitive. For example, The World Trade Organization changed its rules on subsidies, meaning that rather than buy and stockpile produce from farmers building reserves, governments pay subsidies without buying any of the produce. The impact of that move? No reserves to protect against volatility when some crisis arises. Another example is the move to biofuels again driven by government subsidies&3151that means farmers are turning arable farmland into corn or other ethanol making materials rather than grow food people can actually eat.

Through all of 2011, the cost of food has sat at record levels as measured by FAO price index5. I don't see any inkling of a sign that that situation will improve in the medium to longer-term., which brings me back to the title of this article, "The Beginning of the Beginning of the End." To me, the move by the IEA signals the beginning of the beginning of the end of the life we know. Something has to change and fast, but no one seems willing to tackle the issue. Boris Johnson, Lord Mayor of London, said it better than I back in 2007, "How the hell can we witter on about tackling global warming, and reducing consumption, when we are continuing to add so relentlessly to the number of consumers? The answer is politics, and political cowardice."6 "The debate is surely now unavoidable. Look at food prices, driven ever higher by population growth in India and China. Look at the insatiable Chinese desire for meat, which has pushed the cost of feed so high that Vladimir Putin has been obliged to institute price controls in the doomed fashion of Diocletian or Edward Heath," he states further in his article. Before concluding, he writes, "It is time we had a grown-up discussion about the optimum quantity of human beings in this country and on this planet.” Amen to that.

peak tin: solder is 60% tin and 40% lead...,

DeclineofEmpire | Tin Production — A Classic Case Of Limits To Growth

The tin production story is out there is in plain sight, but only those directly involved in supplying the tin ore, refining it, consuming tin metal or trading commodities are paying any attention. Bloomberg's Bear Market in Tin Ending as Shortages Mean PT Timah’s Profit Advances 55% explains what's going on now, and what's been going on for years now—Erfandi’s fleet of bamboo rafts are dredging 33 percent less tin ore from the rivers of Indonesia's Bangka Island than in 2008, as miners fail to keep pace with consumption that jumped 14 percent in two years.

The vessels operating in the world’s largest exporting nation are hauling up no more than 40 kilograms (88 pounds) of ore daily, from 60 kilograms, as reserves get depleted, said the 46-year-old foreman. Miners from China to Peru are also struggling to meet demand for the metal, used to solder components in almost all electronic equipment...

The market will be in deficit for the fourth time in five years, Barclays Capital says...

Prices climbed 51 percent to $26,185/ton in the past 12 months on the London Metal Exchange [price chart 2000-present, above]

The market is “critically dependent” on exports from Indonesia, Peru and Bolivia, said Edward Meir, a senior analyst at MF Global Holdings Ltd. in Darien, Connecticut. Output from the two South American nations may drop to a combined 48,000 tons this year from 51,100 in 2010, CRU estimates. Indonesian supply may increase “slightly,” ITRI forecasts.

The average metal content of ore is declining because richer deposits are now exhausted, Mohd. Ajib Anuar, group chief executive officer of Malaysia Smelting Corp., the country’s biggest producer, said in an interview in January. Mining companies are removing twice as much waste as they did two decades ago to get to the ore, he said.Lest you think this is a temporary dislocation in the tin market, let there be little doubt that tin is supply-constrained and has been for some time. Stuart Burns wrote Tin — Driven By Fundamentals in August, 2010.

Peak Tin
Tin has supply constraints and yet along with all base metals demand has come back relatively strongly last year and this. Consequently, exchange inventories have dropped and the price has risen. Tin has the best fundamental prospects of all the base metals and will be the first to reach a new all-time price high, Stephen Briggs, metals strategist at BNP Paribas is quoted as saying in a Financial Times article.

Briggs went on to say, “World tin mine production peaked as long ago as 2005. A further decline in Indonesia, serious supply constraints elsewhere and only small sources of new supply suggest that mine output will at best be flat in 2010. It may grow by just 4% in 2011, with little further progress in 2012”. Indonesia’s problems do not appear to be getting any better in spite of significant investment in the development of offshore placer deposits, production is not markedly up.

More recently, Michael Montgomery, writing for Tin Investing News, explained what's going on in Tin Prices At Historic Highs on Supply Deficit.

Currently, the price is well above the pre-crash highs of 2008. The driving force behind the rise in value is simply the tight supply of the metal, and the increasing use of tin as a substitute for lead in solder for electronic equipment...

Supply side tightness and a lack of new production will continue to be the drivers of the tin market in 2011. These issues will not be resolved in the short term, and may continue for quite some time.

Indonesia has stated that it plans to cap tin production at 100,000 tonnes, leaving only 10,000 tonnes to grow from the predicted 90,000 output this year. With China capping production as well, supply deficits may continue over the next few years.

Indonesia would not cap production unless they were planning to conserve their depleting reserves to milk them for all they're worth over the long run.

What about the demand side? Bloomberg tells the story—

Solder represents 52 percent of demand and tinplate 17 percent, according to ITRI Ltd., a St. Albans, England-based researcher. The metal is used in electronic goods and a high proportion of electrical appliances, ITRI said.

critical phosphate: misused and running low...,

Yale | If you wanted to really mess with the world’s food production, a good place to start would be Bou Craa, located in the desert miles from anywhere in the Western Sahara. They don’t grow much here, but Bou Craa is a mine containing one of the world’s largest reserves of phosphate rock. Most of us, most days, will eat some food grown on fields fertilized by phosphate rock from this mine. And there is no substitute.

The Western Sahara is an occupied territory. In 1976, when Spanish colonialists left, its neighbor Morocco invaded, and has held it ever since. Most observers believe the vast phosphate deposits were the major reason that Morocco took an interest. Whatever the truth, the Polisario Front, a rebel movement the UN recognizes as the rightful representatives of the territory, would like it back.

Not many people would call phosphate a critical issue or one with serious environmental consequences. But even leaving aside the resource politics of the Sahara, it is an absolutely vital resource for feeding the world. It is also a resource that could start running low within a couple of decades — and one we grossly misuse, pouring it across the planet and recycling virtually none of it.

The world’s food supplies are alarmingly dependent on the phosphate fertilizer that is hewn from the desert of the Western Sahara. The vast open-cast mine at Bou Craa delivers several million tons of phosphate rock every year down a 150-kilometer-long conveyor belt, the world’s longest, to the Atlantic port of El Ayoun. From there, it is distributed around the world and made into fertilizer.

Morocco’s phosphate reserves are owned by the Office Cherifien des Phosphates, a Moroccan state agency. Given the almost unlimited executive powers of the Moroccan monarch, it might reasonably be said that most of the world's known reserves of phosphate are, in effect, owned by King Mohammed VI and his Alaouite dynasty, which has reigned in Morocco since the 17th century.

If the people of Western Sahara ever resume their war to get their country back — or if the Arab Spring spreads and Morocco goes the way of Libya — then we may be adding phosphate fertilizer to the list of finite resources, such as water and land, that are constraining world food supplies sooner than we think.

Phosphorus is one of the building blocks of all life. Every living cell requires it. Plants need phosphorus to grow as much as they need water. Many soils do not have enough to meet the voracious demands for phosphorus of the high-yielding crop varieties of the Green Revolution. But we can provide more by mining phosphate rock and turning it into fertilizer to spread on the land.

It takes one ton of phosphate to produce every 130 tons of grain, which is why the world mines about 170 million tons of phosphate rock every year to ship around the world and keep soils fertile.

Currently, only about 15 percent of that comes from mines in the Western Sahara and Morocco. But the only other large producers, the U. S. and China, mostly keep supplies for their own use. So Morocco is by far the biggest contributor to international trade, with more than half the total business. The people of India, the world’s largest importer, would be starving without Morocco’s phosphates. Brazil’s agricultural boom would never have happened otherwise.

Even more critically in the longer term, the U.S. Geological Survey says that of the 65 billion tons of the world’s known phosphate rock reserves — and the estimated 16 billion tons that might be economic to mine — almost 80 percent is in Western Sahara and Morocco. Add in China’s reserves, and the figure rises to almost 90 percent. The U.S., with 1.4 billion tons, is close to running out. You can see why agronomists are starting to get worried.

The world is not about to run out of phosphate. But demand is rising, most of the best reserves are gone, and those that remain are in just a handful of countries. Dana Cordell of Linkoping University in Sweden, who runs an academic group called the Global Phosphorus Research Initiative, says we could hit “peak phosphorus” production by around 2030.

As domestic production wanes, the U.S. is starting to join those countries — most of the world, in fact — that import phosphate from Morocco and the Western Sahara. American imports cross the Atlantic courtesy of Potash Corp, the Canada-based fertilizer company whose hostile takeover bid by the Australian mining giant BHP Billiton was blocked by the Canadian government last year. And phosphate mining in Florida, which is home to the world’s largest phosphate mine, is being challenged by environmentalists concerned about its impact on waterways and drinking water supplies.

Already, like other key commodities with once-dominant sources running low, the price of phosphate is starting to yo-yo alarmingly. Prices spiked at an 800-percent increase in 2008.

the mind's eye: pheromones, neuroscience, sexual preferences

Video - Marilyn Monroe puffing on a phatty.

JVKohl | Human physical attraction may not cognitively equate with definitive indications of sexual preferences or definitive sexual behavior, because sexual preferences can be cognitively denied and sexual behavior can be suppressed. Thus, when comparing human and non-human animal behavior, it is difficult to separate cognitive effects, like thoughts, from unconscious affects, like neuroendocrine changes, that may be manifest as human emotions. Therefore, sex researchers cannot be sure whether they are sampling some vague unconscious affect of human behavior that is not cognitively considered by their subjects—and not considered in the study design or the data analysis.

The failure to fully consider unconscious affects that may be manifest as opportunistic behavioral tendencies leads to a lack of clear findings, and the underlying biological underpinnings of sexual preferences can readily be missed. Accordingly, the reporting of incongruous and ill-defined results that are, nonetheless, meaningfully interpreted, is problematic. Meaningful results require an important consideration in any scientific endeavor; we must first get the model right!

No model is consistently used in the scientific study of human sexuality. For example, the effect of auditory stimuli in songbirds or visual stimuli like the colorful plumage of the peacock’s tail are used as examples of sensory input from the social environment that somehow influences sexual behavior in some species. In contrast, the effect of olfactory/pheromonal input from the social environment is more typically used as an example of sensory input that influences levels of hormones and sexual behavior in mammals.

A consistent mammalian model that links olfactory/pheromonal input from the social environment to hormonal influences on sexual behavior should help to reduce disparate findings and debate over inconsistent results from studies of human sexual behavior. Currently, disparate findings and debate tend to weakly support a false nature versus nurture dichotomy. This false dichotomy might well be eliminated from further consideration if individual studies began to more fully address a causal link between nature and nurture. Such a link can be addressed within the context of a developmental model of how olfactory/pheromonal input influences sexual preferences and how these sexual preferences influence sexual behavior.

In non-human animals, a causal relationship must exist among the development of sexual preferences for attractive physical features and how these preferences are manifest in sexual behavior. This causal relationship must develop before sexual preferences or sexual behaviors are expressed. Whether or not it is acknowledged, such a causal relationship appears to exist before human sexual preferences are fully developed and long before adult sexual behavior is expressed. Extension to humans of the mammalian olfactory/pheromonal model presented here addresses a causal relationship that includes the unconscious affect of olfactory/pheromonal input from the social environment on hormones and the development of sexual preferences manifest in the expression of sexual behavior.

why it's hard to eat just one...,

Video - Burt Lahr as the potato chip devil.

MSNBC | It's hard to eat just one potato chip, and a new study may explain why.

Fatty foods like chips and fries trigger the body to produce chemicals much like those found in marijuana, researchers report today (July 4) in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). These chemicals, called "endocannabinoids," are part of a cycle that keeps you coming back for just one more bite of cheese fries, the study found.

"This is the first demonstration that endocannabinoid signaling in the gut plays an important role in regulating fat intake," study researcher Daniele Piomelli, a professor of pharmacology at the University of California, Irvine, said in a statement.

Homemade marijuana chemicals
The study found that fat in the gut triggers the release of endocannabinoids in the brain, but the gray stuff between your ears isn't the only organ that makes natural marijuana-like chemicals. Human skin also makes the stuff. Skin cannabinoids may play the same role for us as they do for pot plants: Oily protection from the wind and sun.

Endocannabinoids are also known to influence appetite and the sense of taste, according to a 2009 study in PNAS, which explains the munchies people get when they smoke marijuana.

In the new study, Piomelli and her colleagues fitted rats with tubes that would drain the contents of their stomachs as they ate or drank. These stomach tubes allowed the researchers to tell whether fat was acting on the tongue, in which case they would see an endocannabinoid release even with the tubes implanted, or in the gut, in which case they wouldn't see the effect.

The rats got to sip on a health shake (vanilla Ensure), a sugar solution, a protein-rich liquid called peptone, or a high-fat beverage made of corn oil. Then researchers anesthetized and dissected the rats, rapidly freezing their organs for analysis.

For the love of fat
Tasting sugars and proteins didn't affect the release of the body's natural marijuana chemicals, the researchers found. But supping on fat did. The results showed that fat on the tongue triggers a signal to the brain, which then relays a message down to the gut via a nerve bundle called the vagus nerve. This message commands the production of endocannabinoids in the gut, which in turn drives a cascade of other signals all pushing the same message: Eat, eat, eat!

This message would have been helpful in the evolutionary history of mammals, Piomelli said. Fats are crucial to survival, and they were once hard to come by in the mammalian diet. But in today's world, where a convenience store full of junk food sits on every corner, our evolutionary love of fat easily backfires.

The findings suggest that by blocking the reception of endocannabinoid signals, medical researchers might be able to break the cycle that drives people to overeat fatty food. Blocking endocannabinoid receptors in the brain can cause anxiety and depression, Piomelli said, but a drug designed to target the gut might not trigger those negative side effects.

body malodours and their topical treatment agents

Wileyonline | Body odour, which encompasses axillary and foot odour, can communicate a strong non-verbal signal [1, 2]. These odours are often unnoticed by the offender because that person has specific anosmia [3]. As a result, the individual is embarrassed when alerted, and his or her self-confidence is compromised. The offensive body odour also has economical consequences stemming from the need to replace damaged/stained clothes and shoes [4, 5].

In contrast to clear findings in animals, the presence of human vomeronasal organs is still being debated. Clearly, the ability to appreciate underarm and foot odours depends solely on an individual’s evolutionary culture and perceptual development. However, the emission of odourless human pheromones has been reviewed and is becoming a popular discussion topic [6].

The human scent is genetically controlled and systemically influenced by dietary and medicinal intake, as well as the application of fragrance products [6–8]. Heavy sweating or hyperhidrosis, particularly at axillary sites, leads to unpleasant odours that cause social embarrassment and reduce self-confidence, especially among women. Hyperhidrosis results from the oversecretion of sweat. Because there is an excessive amount of water in which bacteria can grow, hyperhidrosis is often accompanied by bromhidrosis or osmidrosis or offensive body odour. Both conditions can be treated by topically applying anti-perspirant and deodourant products. Body odour treatment products are part of a multibillion dollar industry [9]. High levels of fragrance are often used in these products to mask malodour [10]. Surprisingly, there is little discussion of odour treatment products in the literature [6], in contrast to other personal care products [11, 12].

This review will summarize the chemical composition and formation of body odour, the use of anti-perspirant, deodourant and herbal products to treat body odour, and a new class of treatment agents that do not change the balance of the skin’s bacterial population.

how does it feel?

Transitionvoice | Joined by wholesale environmental collapse and also by the acceleration of global climate change, the systemic collapse of western civilization is under way.

In fact, it becomes more difficult with every passing day to ignore any of these three phenomena, despite the ongoing irrelevant spew emanating from politicians and the media.

Economic recession? Check, since 2000. Economic depression? Check, since 2008. Rampant “natural” disasters? Check, with increasing frequency. Climate chaos? Indeed, only the willfully ignorant can miss it.

When it rains it pours

Not to put too fine a point on it, but this is what simultaneous, systemic collapses look like. We’re awash in tell-tale interactions between climate change, “natural” disasters, and the industrial economy. A parched planet blows through major cities, obscuring the sun even as record-high temperatures are eclipsed. Fire and flood are on the rise. We used to be able to exert a modicum of control over the latter two phenomena, back when climate chaos wasn’t exploding and the industrial economy wasn’t imploding.

On the other hand, we used to contain nuclear power within nuclear power plants, too. Well, except the occasional Hiroshima and Chernobyl. Now it’s Fukushima, Fort Calhoun, Cooper, and Los Alamos, and all at the same time.

The official line — “Notification of Unusual Event” — is becoming paradoxically common. Our collective, societal ability to keep the plates spinning is no longer a justifiable assumption.

rupert murdoch does the elliot carver dance

Video - Rupert Murdoch sponsored massive corporatist hacking and will not face charges.


Video - Elliot Carver does the Elliot Carver dance...,

You just know Faux News is up to its eyebrows in sketchy corporatist eavesdropping and unauthorized access to "private" information...,

assange still fighting extraordinary rendition...,

Video - Assange still fighting extradition to Sweden.

into eternity..,

Video - Every day, the world over, large amounts of high-level radioactive waste created by nuclear power plants is placed in interim storage, which is vulnerable to natural disasters, man-made disasters, and to societal changes. In Finland the world's first permanent repository is being hewn out of solid rock -- a huge system of underground tunnels - that must last 100,000 years as this is how long the waste remains hazardous.

resistance

Video - Tribute to resistance.

hanford whistle-blower backed by watchdog agency

Video - Talk by Dr. Walter Tamosaitis, the Research and Technology Manager of Hanford's Waste Treatment Plant, who was summarily terminated from his job after he raised safety issues associated with the design and operation of this nuclear facility

LATimes | Walter Tamosaitis, once a top engineer in the nation's nuclear weapons cleanup program, has been relegated to a basement storage room equipped with cardboard-box and plywood furniture with nothing to do for the last year.

Tamosaitis' bosses sent him there when he persisted in raising concerns about risks at the Energy Department's project to deal with millions of gallons of radioactive waste near Hanford, Wash., including the potential for hydrogen gas explosions.

"Walt is killing us," said Frank Russo, Bechtel Corp.'s top manager at the project, in an email to Tamosaitis' boss urging that the engineer be brought under control.

Now, an independent government watchdog agency, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, has backed up Tamosaitis and issued a rebuke to Energy Secretary Steven Chu, concluding that the safety culture at the $12.3-billion project is "flawed" and that significant risks exist in the plant's design.

The conclusion came after a nearly yearlong investigation, which took testimony from 45 witnesses and reviewed 30,000 documents. It confirmed that Tamosaitis had been "abruptly removed from the project" when he raised technical questions about its design, and that the actions against him had frightened other engineers.

"The board finds that expression of technical dissent affecting safety … were discouraged, if not opposed or rejected without review," safety board Chairman Peter Winokur wrote to Chu on June 9. "As of the writing of this finding, Dr. Tamosaitis sits in a basement cubicle in Richland with no meaningful work."

In a five-page response Friday, the Energy Department said it was "committed to continuous improvement and teamwork."

"We believe the plant can operate safely," Deputy Energy Secretary Daniel Poneman said in an interview. "I am not going to kid you, it is challenging technically."

Hanford is the nation's most contaminated piece of property, housing 56 million gallons of highly radioactive sludge in underground tanks that pose a long-term risk of leaking into the Columbia River.

The Energy Department wants to embed the waste into solid glass and ship it to a future dump, but so far not a single gallon has been treated. The project is more than 20 years behind the original schedule, and the cost has more than tripled.

"It's pitiful," said Tamosaitis, who was manager of research and technology for San Francisco-based URS Corp., a prime subcontractor to Bechtel Corp. in building the waste treatment plant.

Until he was removed from his job, Tamosaitis, 63, managed a technical staff of as many as 30 in-house scientists and engineers, and an external staff that numbered in the hundreds. He holds a doctorate in systems engineering. He spent 20 years working for DuPont Corp., running chemical plants all over the country, and then another 20 years in the nuclear cleanup industry.

Tamosaitis sent an email last year to a small circle of the top engineering experts in chemical mixing technology, raising concerns over the decision years ago to use an untested and potentially risky technology in the Hanford design.

The processing of the waste at Hanford requires a large number of mixing tanks up to 400,000 gallons in capacity where sludges, salts and liquids are separated into high-level and low-level radioactivity steams, using chemical processes and filters. More than two dozen key tanks at Hanford would use "pulse jet mixers," a system that engineers compare to turkey basters — liquid is sucked into a tube and then squirted out.

The system was supposed to be cheaper than mechanical agitators and less subject to failure, a crucial feature once the tanks are in operation and too radioactive to service. But no U.S. nuclear plant uses the technology, and Tamosaitis said there was significant doubt whether they could adequately keep the tanks mixed.

If tanks are not kept properly mixed, plutonium solids could settle at the bottom and go critical, he said. A poorly mixed tank could also result in large burps of explosive hydrogen gas. And finally, the solids could plug up pipes in the plant.

HO-41

Science Codex | An international research team has discovered a strain of gonorrhea resistant to all currently available antibiotics. This new strain is likely to transform a common and once easily treatable infection into a global threat to public health. The details of the discovery made by Dr. Magnus Unemo, Dr. Makoto Ohnishi, and colleagues will be presented at the 19th conference of the International Society for Sexually Transmitted Disease Research (ISSTDR) which runs July 10-13 in Quebec City, Canada.

The team of researchers successfully identified a heretofore unknown variant of the bacterium that causes gonorrhea, Neisseria gonorrhoeae. Analyzing this new strain, dubbed H041, allowed researchers to identify the genetic mutations responsible for the bacterium's extreme resistance to all cephalosporin-class antibiotics—the last remaining drugs still effective in treating gonorrhea.

"This is both an alarming and a predictable discovery," noted Dr. Unemo of the Swedish Reference Laboratory for Pathogenic Neisseria. "Since antibiotics became the standard treatment for gonorrhea in the 1940s, this bacterium has shown a remarkable capacity to develop resistance mechanisms to all drugs introduced to control it."

"While it is still too early to assess if this new strain has become widespread, the history of newly emergent resistance in the bacterium suggests that it may spread rapidly unless new drugs and effective treatment programs are developed," Dr. Unemo continued.

Gonorrhea is one of the most common sexually transmitted diseases in the world. In the U.S. alone, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the number of cases is estimated at 700,000 annually.

Gonorrhea is asymptomatic in about 50% of infected women and approximately 2-5% of men. When symptomatic, it is characterized by a burning sensation when urinating and pus discharge from the genitals. If left untreated, gonorrhea can lead to serious and irreversible health complications in both women and men.

In women, the infection can cause chronic pelvic pain and ectopic pregnancy. It can lead to infertility, mostly in women but also in men, and it increases the risk of HIV transmission. In 3-4% of cases, untreated infections spread to the skin, blood, joints, or even the heart and can cause potentially mortal lesions. Babies born of infected mothers are at high risk of developing serious blood and joint infections, and passage through the birth canal of an infected mother can cause blindness in the infant.

simple, straightforward, obvious kwestin...,

Salon | Have the American people outlived their usefulness to the rich minority in the United States? A number of trends suggest that the answer may be yes.

In every industrial democracy since the end of World War II, there has been a social contract between the few and the many. In return for receiving a disproportionate amount of the gains from economic growth in a capitalist economy, the rich paid a disproportionate percentage of the taxes needed for public goods and a safety net for the majority.

In North America and Europe, the economic elite agreed to this bargain because they needed ordinary people as consumers and soldiers. Without mass consumption, the factories in which the rich invested would grind to a halt. Without universal conscription in the world wars, and selective conscription during the Cold War, the U.S. and its allies might have failed to defeat totalitarian empires that would have created a world order hostile to a market economy.

Globalization has eliminated the first reason for the rich to continue supporting this bargain at the nation-state level, while the privatization of the military threatens the other rationale.

The offshoring of industrial production means that many American investors and corporate managers no longer need an American workforce in order to prosper. They can enjoy their stream of profits from factories in China while shutting down factories in the U.S. And if Chinese workers have the impertinence to demand higher wages, American corporations can find low-wage labor in other countries.

This marks a historic change in the relationship between capital and labor in the U.S. The robber barons of the late 19th century generally lived near the American working class and could be threatened by strikes and frightened by the prospect of revolution. But rioting Chinese workers are not going to burn down New York City or march on the Hamptons.

What about markets? Many U.S. multinationals that have transferred production to other countries continue to depend on an American mass market. But that, too, may be changing. American consumers are tapped out, and as long as they are paying down their debts from the bubble years, private household demand for goods and services will grow slowly at best in the United States. In the long run, the fastest-growing consumer markets, like the fastest-growing labor markets, may be found in China, India and other developing countries.

This, too, marks a dramatic change. As bad as they were, the robber barons depended on the continental U.S. market for their incomes. The financier J.P. Morgan was not so much an international banker as a kind of industrial capitalist, organizing American industrial corporations that depended on predominantly domestic markets. He didn't make most of his money from investing in other countries.

In contrast, many of the highest-paid individuals on Wall Street have grown rich through activities that have little or no connection with the American economy. They can flourish even if the U.S. declines, as long as they can tap into growth in other regions of the world.

Thanks to deindustrialization, which is caused both by productivity growth and by corporate offshoring, the overwhelming majority of Americans now work in the non-traded domestic service sector. The jobs that have the greatest growth in numbers are concentrated in sectors like medical care and childcare.

Even here, the rich have options other than hiring American citizens. Wealthy liberals and wealthy conservatives agree on one thing: the need for more unskilled immigration to the U.S. This is hardly surprising, as the rich are far more dependent on immigrant servants than middle-class and working-class Americans are.

3 months in juvie for a myspace joke?

Video - featuring Linda as a first-time offending 'prison virgin', thrown into a savage female prison

Alternet | Seventeen-year-old Hillary Transue did what lots of 17-year-olds do: Got into mischief. Hillary's mischief was composing a MySpace page poking fun at the assistant principal of the high school she attended in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Hillary was an honor student who'd never had any trouble with the law before. And her MySpace page stated clearly that the page was a joke. But despite all that, Hilary found herself charged with harassment. She stood before a judge and heard him sentence her to three months in a juvenile detention facility.

What she expected was perhaps a stern lecture. What she got was a perp walk - being led away in handcuffs as her stunned parents stood by helplessly. Hillary told The New York Times, "I felt like I had been thrown into some surreal sort of nightmare. All I wanted to know was how this could be fair and why the judge would do such a thing."

It wasn't until two years later that she found out why. In Scranton, Pennsylvania, two judges pleaded guilty to operating a kickback scheme involving juvenile offenders. The judges, Mark Ciavarella Jr. and Michael Conahan, took more than $2.6 million in kickbacks from a private prison company to send teenagers to two privately run youth detention centers. Since 2003, Ciaverella had sentenced an estimated 5,000 juveniles. Conahan was accused of setting up the contracts. Many of the youngsters shipped off to the detention centers were first-time offenders.

PA Child Care is a juvenile detention center in Pittston Township, Pennsylvania. It was opened in February 2003. It has a sister company, Western PA Child Care, in Butler County, Pennsylvania. Treatment at both facilities is provided by Mid Atlantic Youth Services. Gregory Zappala took sole ownership of the company when he purchased co-owner Robert Powell's share in June 2008.

In July 2009, Powell pled guilty to failing to report a felony and being an accessory to tax evasion conspiracy in connection with $770,000 in kickbacks he paid to Ciavarella and Conahan in exchange for facilitating the development of his facilities.

The childcare facilities have also been criticized for their costs, which ranged as high as $315 per child per day. Butler County paid Western PA Child Care about $800,000 in payments between 2005 and 2008. Butler County did not renew Western PA Child Care's contract after an extension of the contract ran out at the end of 2008.

The juvenile detention center Hillary was sent to was a private, for-profit facility run by one of the more than 50 companies operating in the five billion dollar private prison industry.

These companies have names you've probably never heard of - like Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) and GEO.

Ironically, it's the federal and state criminal justice systems that produce the private prisons phenomenon and create the opportunity for private operators to capitalize. What they are capitalizing on is America's obsession with handing out long prison sentences out of all proportion to the crimes committed.

Today, the United States has locked up more prisoners than any other country in the world - 2.3 million-plus people locked up in state and federal prisons and county jails. This has predictably resulted in a shortage of publicly owned prison beds - a shortage increasingly being filled by companies that charge so many dollars for each convict sent their way.

criminal garden in oak park michigan

Julie Bass interview about her criminal front yard gardens in OakPark

oakparkhatesveggies | once upon a time there was a really sweet family who lived in oak park, michigan.

once upon a time, long before our heroes enter the story, the city planted a tree in front of each house in their tidy new suburb.

once upon a time, in the not too distant past, the city’s tree spread it roots (as trees sometimes do) and cracked the sewer pipe of the really sweet family in question.

fast forward to when things get good: WE are that really sweet family! we fixed the damage in the flooded basement, dug up the entire front lawn, removed the roots, replaced the sewer pipe (which was damaged by the city’s tree, please remember), and were left with mountainous heaps of dirt where our front lawn used to be.

we did some reading, did some thinking, and decided to use the space from the former front lawn and turn it into a beautiful garden. we had someone make us 5 pretty wood garden beds, and we planted some seeds. we have no gnomes (although i think they are cute), no overgrown wildflowers (nothing against flowers- just not our style), no man-eating plants (although some of our neighbors make me wish we did), and nothing in any way offensive- unless you count- drum roll, please- now astonished GASP… vegetable plants!

have the swiss been talking to will allen?

Video - Growing Power movement redux.

swissinfo | As people are recognising the need for more sustainably grown produce, new ideas about agriculture are taking shape.

Swiss entrepreneurs Urban Farmers are pushing the concept of local production and have come up with a pioneering solution to many of the problems of conventional farming methods.

Urban Farmers attended the International Federation of Landscape Architects' World Congress at the end of June. The event drew around 850 participants from around the world to Zurich's Kongresshaus to discuss issues including the integration of agriculture into an urban environment.

Using an almost closed-loop aquaponics system – that combines raising aquatic animals with cultivating plants in water – to produce fish, vegetables and herbs, the firm has developed one of the most ecologically friendly ways to eat. They believe the technology can soon be commercialised.

Top retailers Migros and Coop have expressed an interest in the company’s plans and the firm has been awarded a prize by environmental organisation, WWF Switzerland.

The Swiss Farmers Association said it approved of the idea as a complement to traditional farming, but that it was hard to know how workable it was.

"The concept of urban farming sounds like a good idea to us. Actually, it is a form of Suisse agriculture and our goals in miniature: Produce locally, ecologically food for the local population and pay attention that the circulation of nutrients is closed," spokeswoman Sandra Helfenstein told swissinfo.ch.

"Unfortunately, we cannot judge the potential and the viability of a production like this in the city. Are there enough suitable places and are the consumers interested to buy this product for a higher price?"

Rooftop boxes

With acquaponics there is no waste created, no need for soil or pesticides, and it is all contained in a box designed to be set up on the rooftops of urban buildings.

No transportation is required, thereby cutting out oil consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

WWF Switzerland sees one advantage as being that no land needs to be cultivated.

“If you can use a surface that is not otherwise being used, it’s worth a try,” spokesman Philip Gehri told Swiss public radio DRS. “It doesn’t mean though that we think cities can provide for all their food needs this way.”

The Urban Farmers box contains vegetables grown in a glasshouse on top of a tank of fish, which provide nutrients for the plants through their waste as it is taken up with the water through the roots of the plants.

"The beauty of this natural system is that it's a symbiosis of fish and plants which lives on its own," Urban Farmers CEO Roman Gaus told swissinfo.ch.

"The main reason for doing this is ecological," added Gaus.

"We think urban agriculture has a future because the current conventional agriculture is at its peak, with issues such as E-coli, CO2 and so on.”

the double-O portfolio...,

ironic effects of anti-prejudice messages

ScienceDaily | Organizations and programs have been set up all over the globe in the hopes of urging people to end prejudice. According to a research article, which will be published in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, such programs may actually increase prejudices.

Lisa Legault, Jennifer Gutsell and Michael Inzlicht, from the University of Toronto Scarborough, were interested in exploring how one's everyday environment influences people's motivation toward prejudice reduction.

The authors conducted two experiments which looked at the effect of two different types of motivational intervention -- a controlled form (telling people what they should do) and a more personal form (explaining why being non-prejudiced is enjoyable and personally valuable).

In experiment one; participants were randomly assigned one of two brochures to read: an autonomy brochure or a controlling brochure. These brochures discussed a new campus initiative to reduce prejudice. A third group was offered no motivational instructions to reduce prejudice. The authors found that, ironically, those who read the controlling brochure later demonstrated more prejudice than those who had not been urged to reduce prejudice. Those who read the brochure designed to support personal motivation showed less prejudice than those in the other two groups.

In experiment two, participants were randomly assigned a questionnaire, designed to stimulate personal or controlling motivation to reduce prejudice. The authors found that those who were exposed to controlling messages regarding prejudice reduction showed significantly more prejudice than those who did not receive any controlling cues.

The authors suggest that when interventions eliminate people's freedom to value diversity on their own terms, they may actually be creating hostility toward the targets of prejudice.

According to Dr. Legault, "Controlling prejudice reduction practices are tempting because they are quick and easy to implement. They tell people how they should think and behave and stress the negative consequences of failing to think and behave in desirable ways." Legault continues, "But people need to feel that they are freely choosing to be nonprejudiced, rather than having it forced upon them."

Legault stresses the need to focus less on the requirement to reduce prejudices and start focusing more on the reasons why diversity and equality are important and beneficial to both majority and minority group members.

U.S. decrees that marijuana has no accepted medical use

Video - Bob Marley I Shot the Sheriff Live at the Rainbow

LATimes | Marijuana has been approved by California, many other states and the nation's capital to treat a range of illnesses, but in a decision announced Friday the federal government ruled that it has no accepted medical use and should remain classified as a highly dangerous drug like heroin.

The decision comes almost nine years after medical marijuana supporters asked the government to reclassify cannabis to take into account a growing body of worldwide research that shows its effectiveness in treating certain diseases, such as glaucoma and multiple sclerosis.

Advocates for the medical use of the drug criticized the ruling but were elated that the Obama administration has finally acted, which allows them to appeal to the federal courts. The decision to deny the request was made by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and comes less than two months after advocates asked the U.S. Court of Appeals to force the administration to respond to their petition.

"We have foiled the government's strategy of delay, and we can now go head-to-head on the merits," said Joe Elford, the chief counsel for Americans for Safe Access and the lead attorney on the lawsuit.

Elford said he was not surprised by the decision, which comes after the Obama administration announced it would not tolerate large-scale commercial marijuana cultivation. "It is clearly motivated by a political decision that is anti-marijuana," he said. He noted that studies demonstrate pot has beneficial effects, including appetite stimulation for people undergoing chemotherapy. "One of the things people say about marijuana is that it gives you the munchies and the truth is that it does, and for some people that's a very positive thing."

In a June 21 letter to the organizations that filed the petition, DEA Administrator Michele M. Leonhart said she rejected the request because marijuana "has a high potential for abuse," "has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States" and "lacks accepted safety for use under medical supervision." The letter and 37 pages of supporting documents were published Friday in the Federal Register.

This is the third time that petitions to reclassify marijuana have been spurned. The first was filed in 1972 and denied 17 years later. The second was filed in 1995 and denied six years later. Both decisions were appealed, but the courts sided with the federal government.

for-profit predators waiting in the wings...,

NPR | Charter schools are taxpayer-funded schools that are overseen by their own independent boards. Because of their independence, they are allowed to do things that traditional public schools cannot do. School administrators can experiment with things like the length of the school day and the makeup of each school's curriculum.

With that freedom, charter schools have become academic beacons for parents looking to find the best and safest schooling options for their children. But the system's lack of oversight has also created problems. In recent years, there have been investigations in states, including California, Texas, Ohio and Pennsylvania, which found charter school CEOs taking money from their own schools, putting unqualified relatives on their payrolls and engaging in other questionable activities.

On Monday's Fresh Air, Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Martha Woodall details her ongoing investigation into Philadelphia's charter school system, where 19 of the 74 charter schools operating in the city are under investigation for fraud, financial mismanagement and conflicts of interest.

Corruption And Fraud
At one school, the Philadelphia Academy Charter School, parents raised concerns in 2008 after school administrators told them that there was no money available for special education students.

"The school kept saying 'We don't have money [for these students],' " Woodall tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross. "However, there was money being spent on all kinds of other issues. [When parents] raised questions at the Board of Trustees meetings, [they] were basically told, 'We don't want you asking questions.' "

Ultimately, both the founding CEO of Philadelphia Academy Charter School and his successor were charged with stealing almost $1 million from the school's coffers, including money students had collected for a Toys for Tots campaign. The two men — one of whom had only a high school education — also allegedly engaged in questionable real estate deals. As a result, the high school paid rent money for its facilities directly to them.

"They charged really high rental rates for the school to use the building and then they accumulated money through the higher rates," she says. "They were using taxpayer money that was supposed to go to the school for other purposes."

In addition, both the school's founding CEO and his successor had relatives on the school's payroll. The founding CEO's wife was the head of the board of trustees.

"They were making more money and supervising people who had far more experience and more credentials than they had," she says. "In order to keep the school open, the Philadelphia School District required the top administrators to leave and required a replacement of the board, and the board then basically fired all of the relatives. They wanted to sever all ties with all of the families involved."

But Philadelphia Academy Charter School wasn't the only charter school in Philadelphia with ethical and financial problems.

"We've had cases here where large numbers of family members are on the payroll and [other instances where there were] contracts awarded to relatives and friends that include leases on luxury cars," she says. "Part of the problem that we have found is that the boards that are overseeing some of these schools are not involved as deeply as they should be. ... They may be friends of the CEO and therefore they're reluctant to provide the type of oversight that they should be providing."

School districts are supposed to monitor charter schools' academic progress. In the Philadelphia School District, says Woodall, there are seven people overseeing all 74 charter schools in the district — but that office will soon be halved owing to budget cuts.

"You have so few people keeping track of the charter schools," she says. "They don't have opportunities to go out and visit the schools and pay too much attention until the charters are up for renewal. So that gives several years in between where people can get away with things."

the insidious evils of "like" culture

WSJ | If you happen to be reading this article online, you'll notice that right above it, there is a button labeled "like." Please stop reading and click on "like" right now.

Thank you. I feel much better. It's good to be liked.

Don't forget to comment on, tweet, blog about and StumbleUpon this article. And be sure to "+1" it if you're on the newly launched Google+ social network. In fact, if you don't want to read the rest of this article, at least stay on the page for a few minutes before clicking elsewhere. That way, it will appear to the site analytics as if you've read the whole thing.

Once, there was something called a point of view. And, after much strife and conflict, it eventually became a commonly held idea in some parts of the world that people were entitled to their own points of view.

Unfortunately, this idea is becoming an anachronism. When the Internet first came into public use, it was hailed as a liberation from conformity, a floating world ruled by passion, creativity, innovation and freedom of information. When it was hijacked first by advertising and then by commerce, it seemed like it had been fully co-opted and brought into line with human greed and ambition.

But there was one other element of human nature that the Internet still needed to conquer: the need to belong. The "like" button began on the website FriendFeed in 2007, appeared on Facebook in 2009, began spreading everywhere from YouTube to Amazon to most major news sites last year, and has now been officially embraced by Google as the agreeable, supportive and more status-conscious "+1." As a result, we can now search not just for information, merchandise and kitten videos on the Internet, but for approval.

Just as stand-up comedians are trained to be funny by observing which of their lines and expressions are greeted with laughter, so too are our thoughts online molded to conform to popular opinion by these buttons. A status update that is met with no likes (or a clever tweet that isn't retweeted) becomes the equivalent of a joke met with silence. It must be rethought and rewritten. And so we don't show our true selves online, but a mask designed to conform to the opinions of those around us.

Conversely, when we're looking at someone else's content—whether a video or a news story—we are able to see first how many people liked it and, often, whether our friends liked it. And so we are encouraged not to form our own opinion but to look to others for cues on how to feel.

"Like" culture is antithetical to the concept of self-esteem, which a healthy individual should be developing from the inside out rather than from the outside in.

europe, free speech, and the sinister repression of the rating agencies

Telegraph | Before we all join the chorus of abuse against the robber agencies, let us not lose sight of what is happening in the eurozone. The EU authorities are attempting to muzzle free opinion, first by threatening Fitch, Moody’s, and S&P with vague retribution, and then by drafting restrictive laws to prevent them from publishing unwelcome messages.

It is financial repression, pure and simple. The same will be done to the press in due course. Then to you, dear reader.

“We must break the oligopoly of the rating agencies,” says German finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble. By “we”, of course, he means the EU apparatus of coercion.

The European Commission has already created a pan-EU oversight body with binding powers to breathe down the necks of these agencies. It will draft restrictive legislation by the end of the year. The Portuguese downgrade ensures that it will be even nastier.” Developments since the sovereign-debt crisis show we need to take a further look at reinforcing our rules,” said Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso.

Mr Barroso came close to accusing the agencies of cartel activities and a malicious agenda.

“It’s quite strang that the market is almost dominated by only three players. It seems strange that there is not a single rating agency coming from Europe. It shows that there may be some bias in the markets when it comes to the evaluation of the specific issues of Europe.”

Leaving aside the not-small matter that Fitch is owned by the French group Fimalac (quoted on the Paris bourse), or that it is largely run by Britons who belong to the EU and contribute to Mr Barroso’s salary, this talk of anti-European bias cannot pass unchallenged.

Currency unions switch exchange risk into default risk. The rating on countries in currency unions ought to be lower therefore (ceteris paribus). States with their own sovereign currency and debt in their own currency can let the exchange rate take the strain when they get into trouble, as the US and the UK have done. Foreign investors lose money on the exchange rate. There may be all kinds of risks and dangers in the US and the UK, but default is not high on the list (discounting the US soap opera over the debt ceiling).

This not the case at all for EMU laggards. They cannot devalue or inflate away debt. The stress shows up in the bond markets instead. The more relevant comparison in this respect is between the Euroland’s Club Med states and California. The Anglo-Saxon agencies do not rate many US states at AAA. California is A- and may lose that soon enough.

To compare the ratios of national debt to GDP levels in the Anglosphere with those in Europe, as the EU elites tirelessly do, is to the miss the point. My gripe against the agencies is not that they are downgrading all these semi-bankrupt states today, but that they totally failed to signal the inherent dangers of EMU a long time ago when the crucial investment decisions were being made. They too were swept up by euro euphoria. They too failed to understand the inherent structure of monetary union, or to spot obvious warning signs as the drama unfolded and the North-South divide became ever-more apparent. They handed out AAAs like confetti.

That is the great indictment of Fitch, S&P, and Moody’s in this sovereign saga, especially Moody’s (which has since replaced much of its French-led sovereign team). Moody’s still had a A3 rating on Greece in May 2010. Unbelievable.

the war you don't see - redux

John Pilger in conversation with Julian Assange from John Pilger on Vimeo.

quoth Jay Hanson:

This is good in the same tradition as Adam Curtis' videos. It has a dozen or so interviews with media people. It contains a long interview with Julian Assange. Here is the gist.

Everyone in the media and government works for large corporations that demand endless economic growth. The public is a problem that must be dealt with.

If you are a reporter who tells the truth, you won't have access and you can't do your job. Corporations demand that everyone in the media (e.g., Fox News) and government (e.g., Colin Powell) must lie to the people. This explains why we invaded Iraq on a sea of lies. Every decision in our government and the media is an economic calculation.

Assange said he saw several analogies to "money laundering" in government. Money laundering is moving money to a location where normal laws do not apply.

Guantanamo is "people laundering." We send people to places where normal laws do not apply.

Besides the obvious oil interest, Iraq Afghanistan, and Columbia are "taxpayer money laundering" -- ways to divert taxpayer money to corporate friends, who in turn, will give some of it back to the politicians who sent us to those wars. Every decision in our government is an economic calculation.

Everything our government does is about money and profit.

Economic interests (e.g., American arms dealers) will force us to fight a new world war over resources.

Our government will attack and kill anyone who stands in the way of corporate profit.

Information Clearinghouse | The Strange Silencing of Liberal America

Obama's greatest achievement is having seduced, co-opted and silenced much of liberal opinion in the US.

July 07, 2011 "Information Clearing House" -- How does political censorship work in liberal societies? When my film Year Zero: the Silent Death of Cambodia was banned in the United States in 1980, the broadcaster PBS cut all contact. Negotiations were ended abruptly; phone calls were not returned. Something had happened. But what? Year Zero had already alerted much of the world to Pol Pot's horrors, but it also investigated the critical role of the Nixon administration in the tyrant's rise to power and the devastation of Cambodia.

Six months later, a PBS official told me: "This wasn't censorship. We're into difficult political days in Washington. Your film would have given us problems with the Reagan administration. Sorry."

In Britain, the long war in Northern Ireland spawned a similar, deniable censorship. The journalist Liz Curtis compiled a list of more than 50 television films that were never shown or indefinitely delayed. The word "ban" was rarely used, and those responsible would invariably insist they believed in free speech.

The Lannan Foundation in Santa Fe, New Mexico, believes in free speech. The foundation's website says it is "dedicated to cultural freedom, diversity and creativity". Authors, film-makers and poets make their way to a sanctum of liberalism bankrolled by the billionaire Patrick Lannan in the tradition of Rockefeller and Ford.

The foundation also awards "grants" to America's liberal media, such as Free Speech TV, the Foundation for National Progress (publisher of the magazine Mother Jones), the Nation Institute and the TV and radio programme Democracy Now!. In Britain, it has been a supporter of the Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism, of which I am one of the judges. In 2008, Patrick Lannan backed Barack Obama's presidential campaign. According to the Santa Fe New Mexican, he is "devoted" to Obama.

World of not-knowing

On 15 June, I was due in Santa Fe, having been invited to share a platform with the distinguished American journalist David Barsamian. The foundation was also to host the US premiere of my new film, The War You Don't See, which investigates the false image-making of warmakers, especially Obama.I was about to leave for Santa Fe when I received an email from the Lannan Foundation official organising my visit. The tone was incredulous. "Something has come up," she wrote. Patrick Lannan had called her and ordered all my events to be cancelled. "I have no idea what this is all about," she wrote.Baffled, I asked that the premiere of my film be allowed to go ahead, as the US distribution largely depended on it. She repeated that "all" my events were cancelled, "and this includes the screening of your film".

On the Lannan Foundation website, "cancelled" appeared across a picture of me. There was no explanation. None of my phone calls was returned, nor subsequent emails answered. A Kafka world of not-knowing descended.The silence lasted a week until, under pressure from local media, the foundation put out a terse statement that too few tickets had been sold to make my visit "viable", and that "the Foundation regrets that the reason for the cancellation was not explained to Mr Pilger or to the public at the time the decision was made". Doubts were cast by a robust editorial in the Santa Fe New Mexican. The paper, which has long played a prominent role in promoting Lannan Foundation events, disclosed that my visit had been cancelled before the main advertising and previews were published. A full-page interview with me had to be pulled hurriedly. "Pilger and Barsamian could have expected closer to a packed 820-seat Lensic [arts centre]."The manager of The Screen, the Santa Fe cinema that had been rented for the premiere, was called late at night and told to kill all his online promotion for my film. He was given no explanation, but took it on himself to reschedule the film for 23 June. It was a sell-out, with many people turned away. The idea that there was no public interest was demonstrably not true.

Symptom of suppression

Theories? There are many, but nothing is proven. For me, it is all reminiscent of long shadows cast during the cold war. "Something is going to surface," said Barsamian. "They can't keep the lid on this."My 15 June talk was to have been about the collusion of American liberalism in a permanent state of war and in the demise of cherished freedoms, such as the right to call governments to account.

In the US, as in Britain, serious dissent -- free speech -- has been substantially criminalised. Obama the black liberal, the PC exemplar, the marketing dream, is as much a warmonger as George W Bush. His score is six wars. Never in US presidential history has the White House prosecuted so many whistleblowers, yet this truth-telling, this exercise of true citizenship, is at the heart of America's constitutional First Amendment. Obama's greatest achievement is having seduced, co-opted and silenced much of liberal opinion in the US, including the anti-war movement.

The reaction to the cancellation has been illuminating. The brave, such as the great whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, were appalled and said so. Similarly, many ordinary Americans called in to radio stations and have written to me, recognising a symptom of far greater suppression. But some exalted liberal voices have been affronted that I dared whisper the word censorship about such a beacon of "cultural freedom". The embarrassment of those who wish to point both ways is palpable. Others have pulled down the shutters and said nothing. Given their patron's ruthless show of power, it is understandable.

For them, the Russian dissident poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko once wrote: "When truth is replaced by silence, the silence is a lie."John Pilger, renowned investigative journalist and documentary film-maker, is one of only two to have twice won British journalism's top award; his documentaries have won academy awards in both the UK and the US. In a New Statesman survey of the 50 heroes of our time, Pilger came fourth behind Aung San Suu Kyi and Nelson Mandela. "John Pilger," wrote Harold Pinter, "unearths, with steely attention facts, the filthy truth. I salute him."

“The War You Don’t See” is available on www.johnpilger.com

the strange and dangerous militarization of U.S. police forces

Alternet | Just after midnight on May 16, 2010, a SWAT team threw a flash-bang grenade through the window of a 25-year-old man while his 7-year-old daughter slept on the couch as her grandmother watched television. The grenade landed so close to the child that it burned her blanket. The SWAT team leader then burst into the house and fired a single shot which struck the child in the throat, killing her. The police were there to apprehend a man suspected of murdering a teenage boy days earlier. The man they were after lived in the unit above the girl's family.

The shooting death of Aiyana Mo'Nay Stanley-Jones sounds like it happened in a war zone. But the tragic SWAT team raid took place in Detroit.

Shockingly, paramilitary raids that mirror the tactics of US soldiers in combat are not uncommon in America. According to an investigation carried out by the Huffington Post's Radley Balko, America has seen a disturbing militarization of its civilian law enforcement over the last 30 years, along with a dramatic and unsettling rise in the use of paramilitary police units for routine police work. In fact, the most common use of SWAT teams today is to serve narcotics warrants, usually with forced, unannounced entry into the home.

Some 40,000 of these raids take place every year, and are needlessly subjecting nonviolent drug offenders, bystanders and wrongly targeted civilians to the terror of having their homes invaded while they’re sleeping, usually by teams of heavily armed paramilitary units dressed not as police officers but as soldiers. And as demonstrated by the case of Aiyana Mo'nay Stanley-Jones, these raids have resulted in dozens of needless deaths and injuries.

How did we allow our law enforcement apparatus to descend into militaristic chaos? Traditionally, the role of civilian police has been to maintain the peace and safety of the community while upholding the civil liberties of residents in their respective jurisdiction. In stark contrast, the military soldier is an agent of war, trained to kill the enemy.

Clearly, the mission of the police officer is incompatible with that of a soldier, so why is it that local police departments are looking more and more like paramilitary units in a combat zone? The line between military and civilian law enforcement has been drawn for good reason, but following the drug war and more recently, the war on terror, that line is inconspicuously eroding, a trend that appears to be worsening by the decade.

i dunno if I'm with you on entheogens though...,

Video - Mushroom and the Cross montage

Wikipedia | An entheogen ("God inside us,"[4] en εν- "in, within," theo θεος- "god, divine," -gen γενος "creates, generates"), in the strict sense, is a psychoactive substance used in a religious, shamanic, or spiritual context.

Yeah PK Dick's characters keep zoning out and seeing ancient Rome around them, which sounds pretty much right to me. I dunno if I'm with you on the entheogens though, broski.

Aight then, you tell me what was going on in the mysteries, across time, cultures, languages, and a fairly sizeable geography - that bound all of these up together in a continuous skein of dying god symbolism, values, and praxis?