Dow's Deadly Harvest: The Return of Agent Orange

Whether you are aware of it or not, your food, air and water are the battle ground upon which a titanic struggle between the multinational biotech corporations Monsanto and Dow AgroScience is now playing out. As a result, your health and environment (and that of all future generations) are at profound risk of irreparable harm.

Dow AgroSciences (a subsidiary of Dow Chemicals) recently announced their development of genetically-engineered corn, soybean, and cotton plants metabolically resistant to the herbicide 2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D), a major ingredient in Agent Orange. What this means for our future is that, if approved for use, vast regions of our country will soon be sprayed with a chemical that has been linked to over 400,000 birth defects in Vietnam.

How did we end up here?

Source: Activist Post

"Reverse robocall" campaign lets citizens phone-blast SOPA supporters

A Web-based civic action site is providing a way for people irate about the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) to voice their opinions in a very literal way. Reverse Robocall, a site set up by Shaun Dakin and Aaron Titus, allows users to record a message through the site and perform their own robocalls to politicians and lobbyists.

For a fee of $10, Reverse Robocall will let you record a message that will be delivered as a phone call to the offices of the co-sponsors of SOPA and each of the associations and lobbying groups that have backed the bill in Congress—88 in all. You can even customize the phone number that will appear in caller ID for the call in order to avoid being blocked by systems that reject calls without them. And, if you choose, you can let others listen into your message on the site and rate your effort.

Source: Ars Technica

Israelis march against ultra-Orthodox segregation campaign

Thousands of Israelis gathered Tuesday night to protest against ultra-Orthodox extremists whose campaign for gender segregation has erupted into verbal and physical abuse against women.

Police said about 3,000 people showed up in the town of Beit Shemesh, with "several hundred" police supervising. There were no clashes between participants and ultra-Orthodox residents who have recently been filmed spitting at a woman and verbally harassing an eight-year-old girl.

Source: Breitbart

USDA responsible for mass poisoning of millions of birds

Sunshine helps prevent skin cancer while sunscreens promote it

(NaturalNews) There are three types of skin cancer - of which melanoma is the most dangerous and potentially lethal because it can metastasize into other body parts. The other two non-melanoma types, squamous cell carcinoma and basal cell carcinoma, are treatable and not as threatening or able to metastasize as melanoma.

Most skin cancer cases are of the basal cell carcinoma type, which can destroy surrounding tissue and disfigure facial skin areas if unchecked. It is advisable to check with a dermatologist if you have any unusual new moles or sores that won't heal anywhere on your skin. Skin biopsies are easy to perform.

Mainstream medicine blames the sun for all three types, and recommends sun screen lotions to block sun exposure. But one should take their sloppy science of prevention with several grains of salt.

Just about any dermatologist still holds to the myth that you need to avoid direct sunlight or lather your body with sunscreen to avoid skin cancer. Recently, the opposite has been determined to be true in both cases.

Source: Natural News

Korea's Got Talent

World's Second And Third Largest Economies To Bypass Dollar, Engage In Direct Currency Trade

This is not a good sign for the USD. Currency wars.

To all who still think that in the war of attrition between the USD and the EUR (because contrary to what some have "discovered" only recently, currency wars have been going on for a long, long time and will continue to do so, before morphing into trade and real wars), in which both currencies are doomed, and where the winner takes it all, if only for a few minutes, we bring to your attention the following most recent update out of the Pacific Rim (where incidentally the Shanghai Composite has resumed its relentless track lower with the obvious intention of closing 2011 at its 52 week low) in which we find i) that the dollar's hegemonic control over the world is ending, and ii) that the mercantilist relationship so long sustained between China and the US, may be shifting and reversing, and in its next metamorphosis will see Japan buying the bonds of... China (although probably not for long - see next post). As Bloomberg reports, "Japan and China will promote direct trading of yen and yuan without using dollars and will encourage the development of a market for the exchange, to cut costs for companies, the Japanese government said. Japan will also apply to buy Chinese bonds next year, the Japanese government said in a statement after a meeting between Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao in Beijing yesterday." And before someone blows it off as merely more foreign relations posturing, "“Given the huge size of the trade volume between the Asia’s two biggest economies, this agreement is much more significant than any other pacts China has signed with other nations,” said Ren Xianfang, a Beijing-based economist with IHS Global Insight Ltd." As for China's reverse mercantilist move, one which will stun anyone who believes that Yuan is still undervalued, "Finance Minister Jun Azumi said Dec. 20 buying of Chinese bonds would be beneficial for Japan because it would help reveal more information about financial markets in China, the world’s largest holder of foreign currency reserves." Speaking of, has Albert Edwards gloated yet that given enough time, he always ends up being proven right, in this case about the CNY's upcoming devaluation?

Source: Zerohedge