Posted: January 16, 2013
I was cruising the web reading gun articles and then I started wondering about writing an article on anti-gun organizations and people. Since anti-gunners are always saying "no one wants to take your guns away" or they want me to live under their take of "sensible gun laws" (neither of which I believe to be prudent, sensible or anything remotely truthful) I figured I would go to the NRA's Institute of Legislative Action to find out who are the people that want to be sure that I can't defend my home or go shooting my .22 in the woods (both heinous acts of human behavior to be sure).
So, hats off the the NRA-ILA team for compiling this list. Here is what the NRA-ILA team had to say.
The following organizations have lent monetary, grassroots or some other type of direct support to anti-gun organizations.
Read more here: http://dailycaller.com/2012/03/01/the-big-list-of-who-hates-guns/
Posted: January 15, 2013
1. Judges deny anti-GMO activists a fair trial
Debate on GMOs refused by court
Announcement by Field Liberation
15 Jan 2013
Dendermonde/Brussels, 15/01/2013 - In the presence of a huge crowd of supporters from a range of organisations, the court of Dendermonde (Belgium) has denied 11 anti-GMO activists the legal right to a defence in court. The court refused to allow defence witnesses to give their statements, and also refused to allow video footage to be shown. This is in violation of article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights which guarantees defendants the right to a fair trial. In response, the 11 field liberators and their lawyers decided unanimously to leave the court room.
In contrast to the vast majority of Belgian court cases, no independent investigating judge was appointed. This is despite the fact that the prosecution has politicised the trial by introducing the charge of forming a criminal gang. The summons to appear was issued directly by the public prosecutor. The investigation was therefore only conducted for the prosecution. In order to be a fair trial, the investigation should also be conducted for the defence. In order to ensure a fair trial, the defence lawyers wanted at least an investigation during the trial, including a number of defence witnesses and video clips. This was refused by the court. At this point the defendants and their lawyers left the courtroom, let the case continue in their absence, and took no further part in the trial.
The civil parties to the case - including ILVO (The Flemish Institute for Agriculture and Fisheries Research), VIB (Flemish Institute for Biotechnology), University of Gent, Hogeschool Gent - put forward their case, and demanded damages.
Read more here: http://www.gmwatch.eu
Posted: January 15, 2013
Should the government be recommending mercury-containing flu shots to everyone, especially if they are useless for 97.5% of adults?
One prominent media outlet says, "Influenza has reached epidemic proportions in the United States, with 7.3 percent of deaths last week caused by pneumonia and the flu," according to the CDC. Another's report, released the same day, says that "despite all those news reports about overcrowded emergency rooms, it's too soon to say whether it will be worse than normal" and quoted the CDC as saying that the number of states reporting "high" levels of flu activity has actually dropped from 29 to 24. A third wonders why fewer than 65% of Americans got a flu shot this year, while a fourth notes that the flu vaccine is only about 62% effective, meaning that over a third of the people who do get flu shots still get the flu.
But that 62% figure is misleading. There are currently three different "epidemics" hitting the US: "true" influenza (type A, type B, or seasonal H1N1 influenza), norovirus ("stomach flu"), and whooping cough. According to a meta-analysis published in the weekly peer-reviewed medical journal The Lancet, the flu vaccine is only 62% effective in preventing type A or B influenza or seasonal influenza A (H1N1). It doesn't protect at all against norovirus and whooping cough. In other words, only 2.7% of all adults get type A or B or H1N1 influenza, and of them, the vaccine will fail 38% of the time, which means it really benefits only about 1.8% of the population.
Read more here: http://www.anh-usa.org/flu-epidemic-the-numbers-just-do-not-add-up/
Posted: January 15, 2013
Would you be surprised to learn that vaccine makers are among their corporate donors? And that their recommendations influence the FDA?
In 1999, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), together with the US Public Health Service, jointly recommended that thimerosal, a vaccine preservative that contains mercury, should be removed from vaccines. In response,the FDA removed thimerosal, or limited it to trace amounts, in all vaccines except flu shots. Now the AAP has reversed itself and says it wants the mercury left in.
In January, the UN Environmental Program will be working on a global treaty to reduce health hazards by banning certain products and processes that release mercury into the environment, and thimerosal in vaccines is one of those products under discussion.
Read more here: http://www.anh-usa.org/ama-wants-to-keep-mercury-in-vaccines/
Posted: January 15, 2013
Washington (CNN) -- A package of gun control proposals including a ban on assault weapons will be unveiled on Wednesday by President Barack Obama in response to last month's Connecticut school massacre.
Obama and Vice President Joe Biden will announce the proposals, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters on Tuesday.
They will be joined by a group of children who wrote letters to the president in the aftermath of the December 14 shooting rampage by a lone gunman who killed 20 students and six adults at a Newtown elementary school, Carney said.
Read more here: http://www.cnn.com
Posted: January 15, 2013
MEDFORD, Ore. (AP) - A measure to ban genetically modified crops in Jackson County in Southern Oregon has qualified for the ballot in 2014.
County officials confirmed that petitions seeking the vote had enough valid signatures - 4,662 were required.
The Medford Mail Tribune reports that means the measure goes to a vote in the May primary election in 2014.
The measure would ban anyone from raising genetically engineered plants in Jackson County, with exemptions for scientific research.
It also calls for the county to conduct inspections and allows enforcement through citizen lawsuits.
Read more here: http://www.kval.com
Posted: January 14, 2013
A new study using data from the US government's Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS) shows that the more vaccines given, the more likely children will die or be hospitalized. The increased rates are highly significant, with a 50% greater chance of death with doubling the number of vaccines and more than 100% increase in hospitalizations - that's double the number of hospital visits!
VAERS is recognized to contain only a small percentage of all adverse vaccination events. As GS Goldman and NZ Miller point out,
[A] confidential study conducted by Connaught Laboratories, a vaccine manufacturer, indicated that ''a fifty-fold under-reporting of adverse events'' is likely. According to
David Kessler, former commissioner of the FDA, ''only about one percent of serious events [adverse drug reactions] are reported.
Read more here: http://gaia-health.com
Posted: January 14, 2013
Fizzy-drink giant Coca-Cola is set to launch a new advert addressing obesity for the first time on television.
The two-minute commercial highlights the firm's record of making low-calorie drinks and reminds viewers all foods contain calories.
The ad, which airs on US cable networks on Monday, follows mounting pressure on the soft drinks industry.
Read more here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-21020749
Posted: January 14, 2013
NEW YORK - Some New York City pharmacies and clinics are reporting flu vaccine shortages prompted by reports of widespread outbreaks.
The city's Health Department said Monday the shortages are in individual locations, and don't reflect a larger supply problem.
The city is maintaining an online map to help residents find flu vaccines.
City Health and Hospitals Corp. facilities, including its clinics, have no shortages.
Read more here: http://online.wsj.com/article/AP6c026692b65f4c7493b430682b2e454f.html
Posted: January 14, 2013
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) today made public almost all supporting documents and data submitted by Monsanto for the authorization in 2003 of its genetically modified maize (corn) NK603. The data were released alongside the announcement by the EFSA that it intends to embark on a broad transparency initiative designed to make data from its risk assessments more available to the broad scientific community and other interested parties.
The move is consistent with the recommendations of an external evaluation of the EFSA by Ernst & Young last September, which called on the EFSA to increase transparency over how it reached its decisions on applications. James Ramsay, a spokesman for the EFSA, which is based in Parma, Italy, says that the plan to release more data in the future is still in the "very early stages" and that a final scheme will be announced after further discussion with stakeholders. The EFSA announcement follows a similar move by the European Medicines Agency, which this year will make public all clinical-trial data it gets from industry as part of product registration.
The EFSA said that it chose to make the NK603 data publicly available first because of the level of public interest in response to a French-led study published in September, which claimed that rats fed the maize or glyphosate herbicide suffered adverse health effects including increased incidence of tumours. The 500-MB download contains all data apart from a small amount of commercially confidential information, says Ramsay. The French study has been roundly criticized by scientists and authorities as being methodologically flawed.
Read more here: http://blogs.nature.com
Posted: January 14, 2013
The U.S. Agriculture Department (USDA) last week said that drought conditions and heat necessitated designating 597 counties in fourteen states as primary natural disaster areas. The affected counties have suffered severe drought for eight consecutive weeks, which qualified them for the automatic designation. 2012 had been the hottest year on record for the continental United States: the year's average temperature of 55.3 degrees Fahrenheit across the Lower 48, which was more than 3.2 degrees warmer than the average for the twentieth century.
The U.S. Agriculture Department (USDA) last week said that drought conditions and heat necessitated designating 597 counties in fourteen states as primary natural disaster areas.
"As drought persists,USDA will continue to partner with producers to see them through longer-term recovery, while taking the swift actions needed to help farmers and ranchers prepare their land and operations for the upcoming planting season," Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said in a statement.
Read more here: http://www.homelandsecuritynewswire.com
Posted: January 11, 2013
Flu activity continues to rise in the U.S., according to new surveillance statistics released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday.
Forty-seven states have now reported widespread influenza activity, according to the CDC's latest FluView report, three more states than officials estimated Wednesday. Two more children have died since last week's report, raising the total to 20 kids who have succumbed to the virus.
The report covers the week of Dec. 30 through Jan. 5, and the CDC releases a revision every Friday.
Twenty-four states and New York City have experienced high influenza activity, with 16 states reporting moderate activity. Last week's report showed high activity in 29 states. A complete look at how your state stacks up can be found on the CDC's website.
Read more here: http://www.cbsnews.com
Posted: January 11, 2013
A new Washington initiative may require labels on genetically engineered foods.
Initiative 522, which was submitted to the Washington Secretary of State Jan. 3, would require companies to label all food produced entirely or partly through genetic engineering beginning July 1, 2015. Genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, are plants or animals that have been created using DNA of other organisms. In the United States, this technique is mostly used to create herbicide-resistant crops, according to the initiative.
Formal plant breeding has been going on in agriculture for the last 100 years, said John Tuxill, a professor at Fairhaven College, but primarily through breeding within species or between closely related species.
"It is all dependent upon moving genes through reproduction," he said. "With genetic engineering, you can take genes from completely unrelated organisms and transfer them [to a new organism]."
Read more here: http://www.westernfrontonline.net
Posted: January 11, 2013
What started out as a protest advertised as standing up for the Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association (OSGTA) in its court case against Monsanto turned into an anti-biotechnology rally in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 10.
Members of Food Democracy Now! and other activists gathered in front of the White House in Lafayette Square, directly after attorneys for the OSGTA presented their appeals court arguments about a district court dismissal of a case against Monsanto. The claimants filed suit against Monsanto originally because they wanted Monsanto to be prevented from ever taking legal action against organic seed producers if genetically modified plant traits crossed over into organic fields. The case was originally dismissed because the whole claim was based on speculation rather than any action ever taken by Monsanto. Results of the appeal will be announced in the near future.
After attending the oral argument to appeal the dismissal of the case at the U.S. Court of Appeals, the group, that might have totaled 300 persons, marched to Lafayette Park to protest the "Obama administration's pending approval of 13 new biotech crops and AquaBounty's 'Frankenfish,' a genetically engineered 'salmon,'" according to Food Democracy Now!, which is against GMOs.
Read more here: http://www.agprofessional.com
Posted: January 11, 2013
In November, voters in Washington's San Juan County banned genetically modified crops. Now Southern Oregon's Rogue Valley could follow suit: a proposed ban has qualified for the 2014 Jackson County ballot.
It all began with sugar beets. A company called Syngenta Seeds grows genetically modified sugar beets in Jackson County.
Chuck Burr, who owns an organic seed company and farm in Ashland, says the pollen from sugar beets can drift and cross breed with other plants. Burr worried that his organic chard and a nearby field of genetically modified beets were swapping pollen, and threw away more than $4,000 of seed crop.
Read more here: http://earthfix.opb.org
Posted: January 11, 2013
MEDFORD, Ore. (AP) -- A measure to ban genetically modified crops in Jackson County in Southern Oregon has qualified for the ballot in 2014.
County officials confirmed Wednesday that petitions seeking the vote had enough valid signatures -- 4,662 were required. That means the measure goes to a vote in the May primary election in 2014.
The measure would ban anyone from raising genetically engineered plants in Jackson County, with exemptions for scientific research.
Read more here: http://www.kivitv.com/news/local/186328682.html
Posted: January 10, 2013
A three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, in Washington, D.C., will hear arguments Thursday in the case Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association (OSGATA) v. Monsanto, which includes several plaintiffs from Vermont.
The lawsuit, which centers on patent rights and genetically modified organisms, was thrown out in February by U.S. District Judge Naomi Buchwald of the Southern District of New York. The appeals hearing is an effort by the plaintiffs, who are represented by Daniel Ravicher, executive director of the Public Patent Foundation, to reverse the dismissal .
In her dismissal, Buchwald concluded: "Their (Monsanto's) actions subsequent to the filing of the complaint cannot reasonably be construed as threatening and, regardless, are simply the product of plaintiffs' transparent effort to create a controversy where none exists."
Read more here: http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com
Posted: January 10, 2013
California consumers will have more choices this year for buying foods free of genetically modified ingredients, despite the November defeat of a ballot measure that would have required labeling.
Prop. 37 was a first-in-the-nation effort to require labeling of genetically modified organisms, or GMOs. The measure was defeated by 51 percent after food, soda and agricultural companies donated $46 million to outspend supporters by about 5 to 1.
A number of studies have concluded that genetically modified foods are safe to eat, but supporters worried about the health and environmental consequences of crops engineered in a lab, often to withstand pesticides. Despite the defeat, the measure has generated sharp interest in a voluntary labeling program that verifies products as free of GMOs.
Read more here: http://www.ocregister.com/articles/gmo-382949-non-labeling.html
Posted: January 9, 2013
Supporters of a Washington State ballot initiative that would require GMO labeling have turned in more than 340,000 signatures to the secretary of state's office, well in excess of the number required for certification, the campaign said. Supporters said early polls show strong support for the initiative.
Read more here: http://www.naturalproductsinsider.com
Posted: January 9, 2013
NEW MEXICO - A lawmaker in New Mexico has pre-filed a bill that would require labeling of food and commercial feed containing genetically modified material.
New Mexico will likely become the third state to mull over GMO (genetically modified organism) labeling.
Introduced by State Senator Peter Wirth, Senate Bill 18 is distinguishable from similar initiatives in California and Washington because it would amend state law rather than create an entirely new law.
SB 18 defines genetically modified material as "a substance that has been produced, enhanced or otherwise modified through the use of recombinant deoxyribonucleic acid technology, genetic engineering or bioengineering." Foods containing more than one percent of genetically modified material would be subject to the labeling requirement. Under a new section of the New Mexico Food Act, the disclosure would have to be "displayed in a manner that is conspicuous and easily understood by consumers."
A genetically modified food would be deemed "misbranded" if it failed to comply with the labeling requirement, and the state department of environment would have the authority to conduct an investigation in order to confirm the accuracy of labeling of food products.
Read more here: http://www.naturalproductsinsider.com
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