Media ArticlesExcerpts of Key Media Articles in Major Media
Note: Explore our full index to key excerpts of revealing major media news articles on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.
The U.S. Army, in a search for "nonlethal incapacitating agents," tested cannabis-based drugs on GI volunteers throughout the 1960s according to Dr. James Ketchum, the psychiatrist who led the classified research program at Edgewood Arsenal in Maryland. Ketchum retired as a colonel in 1976. He has written a memoir, "Chemical Warfare: Secrets Almost Forgotten," in which he describes experiments conducted at Edgewood and defends the Army's ethical standards. In a talk to the Society of Cannabis Clinicians in Los Angeles last month, Ketchum recounted to 20 doctors the Army's experiments with cannabinoid drugs. Only a small fraction of Ketchum's work at Edgewood involved THC derivatives. Ketchum says he was motivated to write his memoir because the media has conflated the ethical, scientific drug studies conducted by the Army on knowing volunteers with the kinky, unsafe drug studies conducted by the CIA on unwitting civilians. "None, to my knowledge, returned home with a significant injury or illness attributable to chemical exposure," Ketchum says. "Nevertheless, years later, a few former volunteers did claim that the testing had caused them to suffer from some malady." Those claims came from subjects exposed to agents other than EA 2233, he says.
Note: Though the Army may have been somewhat more ethical than the CIA, why has the media had so little coverage of these unethical programs to develop mind control capabilities. For more information on secret mind control programs based on 18,000 pages of declassified government documents, click here.
In laboratory experiments, a team at the University of Glasgow simulated what happens in the human stomach. They found vitamin C (ascorbic acid) mopped up potential cancer-causing compounds that are made when saliva and food mixes with stomach acid. But when they added fat to the mix, the ascorbic acid could no longer convert the hazardous compounds into safe ones. Antioxidants like ascorbic acid protect against the formation of (carcinogenic) nitrosocompounds by converting the nitrosating species into nitric oxide. However, when fat is present, it reacts with the nitric oxide to reform nitrosating species, the scientists found. Bridget Aisbitt, nutrition scientist for the British Nutrition Foundation, said: ... "This research is interesting." She said fat-compatible antioxidants in the body, such as beta-carotene, could also neutralise the nitrosocompounds. This is another reason to underline the importance of a healthy balanced diet where meals high in fat should not be frequent and five portions of fruit and vegetables - our main source of vitamin C - are eaten each day.
Note: Why isn't it being widely reported the Vitatmin C and beta-carotene are effective cancer fighters? For a possible answer by one of the top physicians in the U.S., click here.
One in three people are expected not to cooperate with identity card checks, Home Office papers from 2004 suggest. The working assumptions were revealed in the documents published by the Department for Work and Pensions under the Freedom of Information laws. They show that the assumption was that the cards, due to be introduced on a voluntary basis from 2008, would become compulsory to own - though not carry - in 2014. Lib Dem MP Mark Oaten had asked for the information to be made public when he was the party's home affairs spokesman in 2004. The department had resisted his request, which came under the Freedom of Information Act. But the department was ordered to release the data by the Information Commissioner - a decision which was subsequently backed by the Information Tribunal.
Note: Why do you think the government was so keen on keeping this information secret? For more, click here.
Behind the county hospital's tall cinderblock walls, a 27-year-old tuberculosis patient ... sits in a jail cell equipped with a ventilation system that keeps germs from escaping. Robert Daniels has been locked up indefinitely, perhaps for the rest of his life, since last July. But he has not been charged with a crime. Instead, he suffers from an extensively drug-resistant strain of tuberculosis. It is considered virtually untreatable. County health authorities obtained a court order to lock him up as a danger to the public because ... he did not heed doctors' instructions to wear a mask in public. "I'm being treated worse than an inmate," Daniels said. "I'm all alone. Four walls. Even the door to my room has been locked. I haven't seen my reflection in months." He said sheriff's deputies will not let him take a shower -- he cleans himself with wet wipes -- and have taken away his television, radio, personal phone and computer. His only visitors are masked medical staff members who come in to give him his medication. Though Daniels' confinement is extremely rare, health experts say it is a situation that U.S. public health officials may have to confront more and more because of the spread of drug-resistant TB and the emergence of diseases such as SARS and avian flu.
Note: If the above link fails, click here. What possible reason is there for taking away this man's TV, radio, cell phone, and computer? Are we being prepared for mass quarantines and imprisonment due to disease? For more, click here.
The depositions of the parents of Columbine killers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold will be kept under seal in the National Archives for 20 years, a federal judge ruled Monday. No one, including violence prevention experts, will be able to see them until they are unsealed, U.S. District Judge Lewis Babcock ruled. They will be kept permanently in the National Archives, where they are considered to be of historical value. The depositions of the parents took place in 2003 in connection with a lawsuit filed by the families of five slain Columbine High School students. Brian Rohrbough, the father of slain student Daniel Rohrbough, said he was angered by the ruling. Rohrbough, who watched as attorneys interviewed the parents during the deposition sessions, said there is nothing in them that would cause any harm. Instead, their release could prevent further school shootings, he said. Rohrbough is under court order not to divulge details. "There is no rational reason to lock them up," Rohrbough said. "It's just the idea that it would be OK in 20 years, and can't be OK today."
Note: Why all the secrecy? Could it be to hide evidence showing it could have been stopped?
A secret FBI intelligence unit helped detain a group of war protesters in a downtown Washington parking garage in April 2002 and interrogated some of them on videotape about their political and religious beliefs. [Washington] D.C. police said authorities only recently found the logs of police responses to that day's events. That discovery came after three years of police assurances in federal court that no such records or logs existed showing the FBI's role. The FBI and D.C. police said they had no records of such an incident. And police told a federal court that no FBI agents were present when officers arrested more than 20 protesters that afternoon for trespassing; police viewed them as suspicious for milling around the parking garage entrance. Similar intelligence-gathering operations have been reported in New York, where a local police intelligence unit tried to infiltrate groups planning to protest at the Republican National Convention in 2004, and in Colorado, where records surfaced showing that the FBI collected names and license plates of people protesting timber industry practices at a 2002 industry convention.
Dorothy Hansen used to pay her taxes faithfully every year - until the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Since then, the 87-year-old Sebastopol resident has stopped filing her income tax returns to show her disapproval of the war. "I am very sure that I don't want to have any part in killing people and I certainly don't want a part in any wars that do just that," Hansen said. With the tax-filing deadline just two weeks away, some... are using it as an opportunity to protest the war by withholding their tax dollars to fund it. Known as war tax resisters, they consider it an act of civil disobedience. Some withhold only a symbolic portion of what they owe - $10.40, for example, to represent the 1040 tax form - while others, like Hansen, refuse to pay anything at all. Many will redirect their tax dollars to a charity of their choice. The risks can be costly if a resister is caught. Some resisters have had their wages garnisheed or property seized. Jesse Weller, an IRS spokesman, said the agency does not keep statistics on war tax resisters. The National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee ... said they have no way of tracking their numbers either. Weller said the IRS goes after promoters of tax resistance more aggressively than those who participate in the movement and warns that anyone who gets caught can face a criminal or civil penalty. Nonetheless, war tax resisters persist. Hansen said she will stand by her beliefs regardless of the consequences.
Note: See the letter WantToKnow.info founder Fred Burks wrote to the IRS on why he is withholding war taxes. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing war news articles from reliable major media sources.
The March 16 recall of 91 pet food products manufactured by Menu Foods wasn't big news at first. Early coverage reported only 10-15 cats and dogs dying. I'm a contributing editor for a nationally syndicated pet feature ... and all of us there have close ties to the veterinary profession. What we were hearing from veterinarians wasn't matching what we were hearing on the news. Although ... Menu Foods started getting complaints as early as December 2006, FDA records state the company received their first report of a food-related pet death on February 20. One week later, on February 27, Menu started testing the suspect foods. Three days later, on March 3, the first cat in the trial died of acute kidney failure. Nearly one month passed from the date Menu got its first report of a death to the date it issued the recall. At that point, Menu had seen a 35 percent death rate in their test-lab cats. We started a database for people to report their dead or sick pets. As of March 31, the number of deaths alone was at 2,797. Pet owners were encouraged to report deaths and illness to the FDA. But ... there was no place on the agency's Web site to do so. The FDA kept confirming a number it had to have known was only the tip of the iceberg. It prevented veterinarians from having the information they needed to treat their patients. It allowed the media to repeat a misleadingly low number ... preventing a lot of people from really grasping the scope and implication of the problem. An import alert buried on the FDA Web site ... identified the Chinese company that is the source of the contaminated gluten -- gluten that is now known to be sold not only for use in animal feed, but in human food products, too.
Note: If you want to understand how the FDA sometimes works to support big industry at the expense of our health (and in this case the health of our pets), the entire article is a big eye-opener. Click here for more.
France's famous high-speed train, the TGV, broke its 17-year-old world speed record today when it hit a top speed of 357.2 mph. Another French train held the previous rail train record, set in 1990, of 320.2 mph. Normal TGV trains have a cruising speed of 186 mph. Japan holds the absolute speed record for a train, with its magnetically levitated Maglev train that floats over a guideway on a magnetic field without ever touching the track. The Maglev set a record of 361 mph in 2003.
Note: A CNN report states that the fastest train in the U.S. is the Acela, with a top speed of 150 mph. The same report notes "the top speed for most passenger trains outside the Northeast Corridor ... is 79 mph." Another CNN article comments "Japan's Shinkansen trains, introduced just before the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, regularly hit 186 mph." Why are American trains so backward compared to the rest of the world? Could it have anything to do with oil? For more, click here.
Gary McKinnon has lost his appeal against extradition to the US on hacking charges. To hear the US government tell it, Gary McKinnon is a dangerous man, and should be extradited back to America to stand trial. One US prosecutor has accused him of committing "the biggest military computer hack of all time". But Mr McKinnon has said his motives were harmless and innocent. He was, he says, simply looking for information on UFOs. If found guilty, Mr McKinnon could face decades in US jail, and fines of close to $2m. Mr McKinnon said that ... he never acted with malicious intent. But he did admit that he hacked into dozens of US government computer systems. In fact, he calmly detailed just how easy it was to access extremely sensitive information. But for some, his method of hacking is not nearly so interesting as his reason for doing it. Mr McKinnon told the BBC that he is convinced that the United States government is withholding critical information about Unidentified Flying Objects. His supporters say that instead of prosecuting him, the US government should thank him for pointing out massive computer security lapses. As for his quest to find evidence of a UFO cover-up, Mr McKinnon has said that he found some circumstantial evidence online ... including what he said are photos with what he speculated were alien spacecraft airbrushed out of the picture.
Note: For inspiring, reliable information on the UFO cover-up, see our two-page summary available here.
If you have ever wondered why the cost of prescription drugs in the United States are the highest in the world or why it's illegal to import cheaper drugs from Canada or Mexico, you need look no further than the pharmaceutical lobby and its influence in Washington, D.C. Congressmen are outnumbered two to one by lobbyists for an industry that spends roughly a $100 million a year in campaign contributions and lobbying expenses to protect its profits. One reason [drug company] profits have exceeded Wall Street expectations is the Medicare prescription drug bill ... passed three-and-a-half years ago. The unorthodox roll call on one of the most expensive bills ever placed before the House of Representatives began in the middle of the night. The only witnesses were congressional staffers, hundreds of lobbyists, and U.S. Representatives like Dan Burton, R-Ind., and Walter Jones, R-N.C. "The pharmaceutical lobbyists wrote the bill," says Jones. Why did the vote finally take place at 3 a.m.? "They didn't want on national television in primetime," according to Burton. "I've been in politics for 22 years," says Jones, "and it was the ugliest night I have ever seen." Jones says the arm-twisting was horrible. It certainly wasn't ugly for the drug lobby which ... has been a source of lucrative employment opportunities for congressmen when they leave office. In all, at least 15 congressional staffers, congressmen and federal officials left to go to work for the pharmaceutical industry, whose profits were increased by several billion dollars. "They have unlimited resources," Burton says. "And when they push real hard to get something accomplished in the Congress of the United States, they can get it done."
Note: This article also states that the Medicare prescription bill "was the largest entitlement program in more than 40 years, and the debate broke down along party lines." Usually Republicans are against entitlement programs while Democrats support them. Why was it the opposite in this case? Could it be that big industry made huge profits from the passage of this bill? For lots more, click here.
We could make faster progress against cancer by changing the way drugs are developed. In the current system, if a promising compound can’t be patented, it is highly unlikely ever to make it to market — no matter how well it performs in the laboratory. The development of new cancer drugs is crippled as a result. The reason for this problem is that bringing a new drug to market is extremely expensive. In 2001, the estimated cost was $802 million; today it is approximately $1 billion. To ensure a healthy return on such staggering investments, drug companies seek to formulate new drugs in a way that guarantees watertight patents. In the meantime, cancer patients miss out on treatments that may be highly effective and less expensive to boot. In 2004, Johns Hopkins researchers discovered that an off-the-shelf compound called 3-bromopyruvate could arrest the growth of liver cancer in rats. The results were dramatic; moreover, the investigators estimated that the cost to treat patients would be around 70 cents per day. Yet, three years later, no major drug company has shown interest in developing this drug. The hormone melatonin, sold as an inexpensive food supplement in the United States, has repeatedly been shown to slow the growth of various cancers when used in conjunction with conventional treatments. Early this year, another readily available industrial chemical, dichloroacetate, was found by researchers at the University of Alberta to shrink tumors in laboratory animals by up to 75 percent. However ... dichloroacetate is not patentable, and the lead researcher is concerned that it may be difficult to find funding from private investors to test the chemical. Potential anticancer drugs should be judged on their scientific merit, not on their patentability.
Note: To explore several cancer cures which have shown dramatic potential, yet are not being studied for lack of funds due to inability to patent the process, click here. Why are these very promising treatments not being fast-tracked as the expensive AIDS drugs were? For a top MD's revealing comments on this, click here. And for why the media won't feature these promising cancer treatments in headlines, click here.
The Persian poet Rumi was surrounded by news of terrorism. Mass murders from war -- what today would be called genocide and ethnic cleansing -- were a routine part of Rumi's 13th-century world. So, where's the bloodshed in Rumi's writing? Rumi, a man so advanced in Islamic training that he could issue fatwas, divorced himself from talk of revenge, retribution and eye-for-an-eye killings. Like Jesus, Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., Rumi insisted violence was an unsatisfying way of resolving issues. Sentiments like that have turned Rumi into one of America's best-selling poets -- someone whose thoughts on love and other matters are revered by hundreds of thousands of readers. Interest in the mystic from Persia (now Iran) -- in his all-inclusive message that the faithful of all religions have a common humanity -- has mushroomed in the past six years. Go to Borders, Barnes & Noble or any neighborhood bookstore, and you're likely to find many more Rumi titles than books by Robert Frost or Walt Whitman. So, who is Rumi? He was a mystic and a scholar. He was an adherent of religious Islam ... who, in the later part of his life, famously said, "I am not a Jew nor a Christian, not a Zoroastrian nor a Moslem." The love and longing that Rumi felt was everywhere, including his soul. "Keep in mind that the holy Quran states there is no force in religion," says Naini, a Rumi expert who has lectured on the poet at the United Nations. "Rumi wants to remind us that we are all children and the creation of God, regardless of religion, race, color, nationality, etc." In the current climate of war and warmongering ... Rumi's biggest gift to readers today may be his emphasis on the power of love and tolerance.
In another sign that Japan is pressing ahead in revising its history of World War II, new high school textbooks will no longer acknowledge that the Imperial Army was responsible for a major atrocity in Okinawa, the government announced late Friday. The Ministry of Education ordered publishers to delete passages stating that the Imperial Army ordered civilians to commit mass suicide during the Battle of Okinawa, as the island was about to fall to American troops in the final months of the war. The decision was announced as part of the ministry’s annual screening of textbooks used in all public schools. The ministry also ordered changes to other delicate issues to dovetail with government assertions, though the screening is supposed to be free of political interference. The decision on the Battle of Okinawa ... came as a surprise because the ministry had never objected to the description in the past. The fresh denial of the military’s responsibility in the Battle of Okinawa and in sexual slavery — long accepted as historical facts — is likely to deepen suspicions in Asia that Tokyo is trying to whitewash its militarist past even as it tries to raise the profile of its current forces. The ministry’s new position appeared to discount overwhelming evidence of coercion, particularly the testimony of victims and survivors themselves.
Note: History many times is written -- or in this case re-written -- by those in power.
Exposure to dirt may be a way to lift mood as well as boost the immune system, UK scientists say. Lung cancer patients treated with "friendly" bacteria normally found in the soil have anecdotally reported improvements in their quality of life. Mice exposed to the same bacteria made more of the brain's "happy" chemical serotonin, the Bristol University authors told the journal Neuroscience. A lack of serotonin is linked with depression in people. The scientists say more work is now needed to determine if the bacterium Mycobacterium vaccae has antidepressant properties. Lead researcher Dr Chris Lowry said: "These studies help us understand how the body communicates with the brain and why a healthy immune system is important for maintaining mental health. They also leave us wondering if we shouldn't all spend more time playing in the dirt." The work could also help experts' understanding of why an imbalance in the immune system leaves some individuals vulnerable to mood disorders like depression, he added.
For six years, Fife Symington was governor of Arizona. He now says that while he was governor, he had a brush with something not from America or from this planet. "It was absolutely breathtaking," Symington said. "I mean when I saw it, I said this is definitely a UFO. I have never seen anything like this in my life." It was an event that is now the stuff of legend, called the Phoenix Lights. There was video taken in 1997 of those mysterious lights flying in formation in the Arizona night sky, and was witnessed by thousands. Symington recently described his sighting of the Phoenix Lights as "a geometric form with extremely bright lights on the leading edge." That's a different story than Symington gave when he was governor, when he held a fake news conference to present the source of the glowing lights: his chief of staff in a Martian costume. Symington now says that he was just trying to keep everyone calm. The Air Force claimed that the famed Phoenix Lights were nothing more than flares that had been dropped by military aircraft during training exercises. But Symington believes otherwise. "There is always that 5 percent of sightings, which are inexplicable, which leads me to believe there are definitely UFOs," he said. Many people agree with Symington. Just this week, France became the first country to put all its X-files online — about 100,000 documents were released, describing many sightings over the last 70 years. There was so much public interest, the Web site crashed within two hours.
Note: For lots more reliable, verifiable information suggesting a major UFO cover-up, click here.
Income inequality grew significantly in 2005, with the top 1 percent of Americans — those with incomes that year of more than $348,000 — receiving their largest share of national income since 1928. The top 10 percent, roughly those earning more than $100,000, also reached a level of income share not seen since before the Depression. While total reported income in the United States increased almost 9 percent in 2005, the most recent year for which such data is available, average incomes for those in the bottom 90 percent dipped slightly compared with the year before, dropping $172, or 0.6 percent. The gains went largely to the top 1 percent, whose incomes rose to an average of more than $1.1 million each, an increase of more than $139,000, or about 14 percent. The new data also shows that the top 300,000 Americans collectively enjoyed almost as much income as the bottom 150 million Americans. The top group received 440 times as much as the average person in the bottom half earned, nearly doubling the gap from 1980. The disparities may be even greater. The [IRS] estimates that it is able to accurately tax 99 percent of wage income but that it captures only about 70 percent of business and investment income, most of which flows to upper-income individuals. For Americans in the middle, the share of income taken by federal taxes has been essentially unchanged across four decades. By comparison, it has fallen by half for those at the very top of the income ladder. [Incomes of] the top tenth of a percent and top one-hundredth of a percent ... soared by about a fifth in one year, largely because of the rising stock market and increased business profits.
Ever since the 9/11 attacks, Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf has doggedly made the case to Washington that he is the finger in the dike holding back a wave of Islamic extremism. Having successfully argued his own indispensability, General Musharraf has reaped billions of dollars in economic aid and arms sales — while encountering little challenge from Washington over his backsliding from steps toward democratic rule. Military aid to Pakistan grew from under $10 million in the three years prior to 9/11 to more than $4 billion in the three years after. But now it is political protest, fueled by Musharraf's steps to consolidate and extend his power, that is washing over Pakistan. That is presenting the U.S. with a classic dilemma of the war on terrorism: Does a key leader's security value outweigh his authoritarian practices? Earlier this month, Musharraf suspended the country's Supreme Court chief justice. Ever since, Pakistan's middle classes — one of the chief beneficiaries of the military leader's eight-year rule — have taken to the streets. Also fueling the uproar are suspicions that Musharraf is paving the way to another term as both president and chief military leader. Musharraf cited "abuse of power" when he suspended Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammed Chaudhry on March 9. Chaudhry had also expressed his view that it was not legal under the constitution for Musharraf to seek another presidential term while remaining the Army chief. The Bush administration has ... has expressed concern over some clashes that have turned violent but has reiterated support for Musharraf as a valuable ally in the war on terror.
Note: Once again security triumphs over democracy as the U.S. pours billions of tax dollars into this dictatorship which has been known to harbor terrorists.
Our collective failure has been to take our political leaders at their word. This week the BBC reported that the government's own scientists advised ministers that the Johns Hopkins study on Iraq civilian mortality was accurate and reliable. Published in the Lancet ...it estimated that 650,000 Iraqi civilians had died since the American and British led invasion in March 2003. Immediately after publication, the prime minister's official spokesman said that the Lancet's study "was not one we believe to be anywhere near accurate". The foreign secretary ... said that the Lancet figures were "extrapolated" and a "leap". President Bush said: "I don't consider it a credible report". Scientists at the UK's Department for International Development thought differently. They concluded that the study's methods were "tried and tested". Indeed, the Johns Hopkins approach would likely lead to an "underestimation of mortality". The Ministry of Defence's chief scientific adviser ... recommended "caution in publicly criticising the study". When these recommendations went to the prime minister's advisers, they were horrified. Tony Blair was advised to say: "The overriding message is that there are no accurate or reliable figures of deaths in Iraq". At a time when we are celebrating our enlightened abolition of slavery 200 years ago, we are continuing to commit one of the worst international abuses of human rights of the past half-century. Two hundred years from now, the Iraq war will be mourned as the moment when Britain violated its delicate democratic constitution and joined the ranks of nations that use extreme pre-emptive killing as a tactic of foreign policy.
Note: This article is written by Richard Horton, the editor of the highly esteemed British medical journal Lancet.
With humanity coming up fast on 2012, publishers are helping readers gear up and count down to this mysterious — some even call it apocalyptic — date. Since November, at least three new books on 2012 have arrived in mainstream bookstores. Journalist Lawrence Joseph forecasts widespread catastrophe in Apocalypse 2012: A Scientific Investigation Into Civilization's End. Spiritual healer Andrew Smith predicts a restoration of a "true balance between Divine Feminine and Masculine" in The Revolution of 2012. In 2012, Daniel Pinchbeck anticipates a "change in the nature of consciousness." Each arrives in the wake of the 2006 success of 2012: The Return of Quetzalcoatl, which has been selling thousands of copies a month since its release in May. The books also build on popular interest in the Maya. Authors disagree about what humankind should expect on Dec. 21, 2012, when the Maya's "Long Count" calendar marks the end of a 5,126-year era. Maya civilization, known for advanced writing, mathematics and astronomy, flourished for centuries in Mesoamerica, especially between A.D. 300 and 900. Its Long Count calendar ... tracks more than 5,000 years, then resets at year zero. Publishers seem to be courting readers who believe humanity is creating its own ecological disasters and desperately needs ancient indigenous wisdom. Part of the 2012 mystique stems from the stars. On the winter solstice in 2012, the sun will be aligned with the center of the Milky Way for the first time in about 26,000 years. This means that "whatever energy typically streams to Earth from the center of the Milky Way will indeed be disrupted on 12/21/12 at 11:11 p.m. Universal Time," Joseph writes.
Note: There are many misconceptions spreading about 2012. Some say the Mayan calendar ends in 2012, when in fact the Mayan calendar never ends. The "alautun," for example is a Mayan unit of time measure equal to over 60 million years. The claim that the sun will align with the center of the Milky way is 2012 is also a misconception. Calculations of this date are not exact, with one expert giving a date of 1998 plus or minus 18 years. Many seem to want something big to happen in 2012, when perhaps the most important time on which to focus on is this moment, right now.
Important Note: Explore our full index to key excerpts of revealing major media news articles on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.