Considering how things are going in the world today, I thought it might be a good time to revisit the story of the rich man and Lazarus. From Luke 16: 19-31: 19"There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. 20At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores 21and longing to eat what fell from the rich man's table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores."
22"The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and was buried. 23In hell,[a] where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. 24So he called to him, 'Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.'
25"But Abraham replied, 'Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. 26And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.'
27"He answered, 'Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my father's house, 28for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.'
29"Abraham replied, 'They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.'
30" 'No, father Abraham,' he said, 'but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.'
31"He said to him, 'If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.' "
====================
Short version: What goes around, comes around.
And also we have Luke 18:25:
"For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."
OK, so why all the dogging out of the rich? Well, I certainly am not an advocate of socialism or communism as it has been practiced, nor do I have any problem with capitalism, in theory. The issue is that when you provide for yourself at the expense of others (over and above fair and reasonable profit), then you have a problem.
Let's look at Rush Limbaugh's earnings for example. His latest contract with Clear Channel was for 400 million dollars. We know things work a bit differently in the media world than they do in other fields when it comes to money. Rush gets a piece of the advertising revenue, which even he admits is "confiscatory." (I'll point out that Rush considers himself a Christian)
Rush has about 20 million listeners a day and if an advertiser wants to tap the listenership then they pay what they are told to pay and if they do not like it then, tough. Basically, Clear Channel, like other media firms, extort money instead of charging more realistic rates for the numbers of viewers/listeners to the show in question. Rush, like most entertainers, gets his money by overcharging advertisers. There is nowhere else a radio advertiser can go to get their message to an audience of 20 million listeners other than to Rush. I heard Glenn Beck make a comment a while ago, that he felt he was worth the 25 million a year he gets because so few other people could do his job. It is this type of thinking that earns the rich their trip to the hot fire pit of hell.
So, should the rich just start giving away all their money to the poor? No, but they should understand that they do have an obligation to help those less wealthy than themselves. Once their needs have been met, they should consider distributing some of their surplus income (perhaps in the form of additional jobs or raises) to the needy....over and above the Biblically suggested minimum of ten percent. As it is, about 20% of the people in the U.S. have 80% of the wealth. Spreading some of that around could help restore the middle class. Henry Ford figured out, a hundred years ago, that you cannot make products your employees cannot afford to buy.
What ever happened to compassionate conservatism?
Friday, August 14, 2009
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
With liberty and healthcare for all.
Mass. healthcare reform is failing us
By Susanne L. King March 2, 2009
MASSACHUSETTS HAS been lauded for its healthcare reform, but the program is a failure. Created solely to achieve universal insurance coverage, the plan does not even begin to address the other essential components of a successful healthcare system.
What would such a system provide? The prestigious Institute of Medicine, part of the National Academy of Sciences, has defined five criteria for healthcare reform. Coverage should be: universal, not tied to a job, affordable for individuals and families, affordable for society, and it should provide access to high-quality care for everyone.
The state's plan flunks on all counts.
First, it has not achieved universal healthcare, although the reform has been a boon to the private insurance industry. The state has more than 200,000 without coverage, and the count can only go up with rising unemployment.
Second, the reform does not address the problem of insurance being connected to jobs. For individuals, this means their insurance is not continuous if they change or lose jobs. For employers, especially small businesses, health insurance is an expense they can ill afford.
Third, the program is not affordable for many individuals and families. For middle-income people not qualifying for state-subsidized health insurance, costs are too high for even skimpy coverage. For an individual earning $31,213, the cheapest plan can cost $9,872 in premiums and out-of-pocket payments. Low-income residents, previously eligible for free care, have insurance policies requiring unaffordable copayments for office visits and medications.
Fourth, the costs of the reform for the state have been formidable. Spending for the Commonwealth Care subsidized program has doubled, from $630 million in 2007 to an estimated $1.3 billion for 2009, which is not sustainable.
Fifth, reform does not assure access to care. High-deductible plans that have additional out-of-pocket expenses can result in many people not using their insurance when they are sick. In my practice of child and adolescent psychiatry, a parent told me last week that she had a decrease in her job hours, could not afford the $30 copayment for treatment sessions for her adolescent, and decided to meet much less frequently.
In another case, a divorced mother stopped treatment for her son because the father had changed insurance, leaving them with an unaffordable deductible. And at Cambridge Health Alliance, doctors and nurses have cared for patients who, unable to afford the new copayments, were forced to interrupt care for HIV and even cancers that could be treated with chemotherapy.
Access to care is also affected by the uneven distribution of healthcare dollars between primary and specialty care, and between community hospitals and tertiary care hospitals. Partners HealthCare, which includes two major tertiary care hospitals in Boston, was able to negotiate a secret agreement with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts to be paid 30 percent more for their services than other providers in the state, contributing to an increase in healthcare costs for Massachusetts, which are already the highest per person in the world. Agreements that tilt spending toward tertiary care threaten the viability of community hospitals and health centers that provide a safety net for the uninsured and underinsured.
There is, though, one US model of healthcare that meets the Institute of Medicine criteria: Medicare. Insuring everyone over 65, Medicare achieves universal coverage and access to care, is not tied to a job, and is affordable for individuals and the country. Medicare simplifies the administration of healthcare dollars, thereby saving money. We need to improve Medicare, and expand this program to include everyone.
A bill before Congress, the United States National Health Insurance Act, would provide more comprehensive coverage for all. The bill includes doctor, hospital, long-term, mental health, dental, and vision care, prescription drugs, and medical supplies, with no premiums, copayments, or deductibles.
People would be free to choose doctors and hospitals, and insurance would not be tied to a job. Costs would be controlled because health planning in a national health program can reestablish needed balance between primary/preventive care and high-tech tertiary care. A modest, progressive tax would replace what people currently pay out of pocket. This program would pay for itself by eliminating the wasteful administrative costs and profits of private insurance companies, and save $8 billion to $10 billion in Massachusetts alone.
We must let Congress know we want improved access to affordable healthcare for all, not more expensive private health insurance we can't afford to use when we are sick. Massachusetts healthcare reform fails on all five Institute of Medicine criteria. Congress should not make it a model for the nation.
Susanne L. King, M.D., practices in Berkshire County.
======================
OK, enough is enough. While the business of America is business, the health insurance companies are now pricing themselves out of business. Fewer and fewer companies can afford to supply health coverage.
When I started in retail even the cashiers got health insurance. Today, only the store manager usually gets full boat coverage included as a perk. Most department managers have their coverage partially subsidized and the rest of the employees have to pay the total (and totally unaffordable) premium.
Many of my conservative bretheren rightly worry about single payer health coverage, citing the obvious fact that the government screws up everything it tries to manage. Attempting to adopt the Massachusets model nationally would fail, as the above article states.
Affordable health coverage for all is not rocket science though. Doing nothing about health care reform will allow the ever greedy, but stupid, health insurance companies to simply end up offering coverage that will be affordable to only the top ten percent of the population---who knows, maybe that is the master plan to limit population growth? Just let the poor peons die.
Things do not have to be that way though. Dr. King favors some type of modified Medicare. I think she is on the right track. For proifit healthcare insurance companies should all be converted to non-profit corporations. Executive salaries should be limited and we should have mandatory tort reform. One part of the high cost of medicine is dealing with all the paperwork of thousands of different insurance companies. Simplify the paperwork by having a national health insurance policy standard where all policies issued must be identical in coverage with no exclusions for pre existing conditions.
I might even go so far as to suggest making Anthem the only health care company and make it a quasi governmental agency. Keep Medicare and expand it to include those who otherwise cannot afford health insurance.
Other people have other equally good suggestions, but as far as health insurance, the private sector for profit companies have got to go. Too bad the Dems lack the balls to ram through universal health care. Once you have it, then you can tweak it. If you never have the option, then the whole system will tank if things continue as they are.
By Susanne L. King March 2, 2009
MASSACHUSETTS HAS been lauded for its healthcare reform, but the program is a failure. Created solely to achieve universal insurance coverage, the plan does not even begin to address the other essential components of a successful healthcare system.
What would such a system provide? The prestigious Institute of Medicine, part of the National Academy of Sciences, has defined five criteria for healthcare reform. Coverage should be: universal, not tied to a job, affordable for individuals and families, affordable for society, and it should provide access to high-quality care for everyone.
The state's plan flunks on all counts.
First, it has not achieved universal healthcare, although the reform has been a boon to the private insurance industry. The state has more than 200,000 without coverage, and the count can only go up with rising unemployment.
Second, the reform does not address the problem of insurance being connected to jobs. For individuals, this means their insurance is not continuous if they change or lose jobs. For employers, especially small businesses, health insurance is an expense they can ill afford.
Third, the program is not affordable for many individuals and families. For middle-income people not qualifying for state-subsidized health insurance, costs are too high for even skimpy coverage. For an individual earning $31,213, the cheapest plan can cost $9,872 in premiums and out-of-pocket payments. Low-income residents, previously eligible for free care, have insurance policies requiring unaffordable copayments for office visits and medications.
Fourth, the costs of the reform for the state have been formidable. Spending for the Commonwealth Care subsidized program has doubled, from $630 million in 2007 to an estimated $1.3 billion for 2009, which is not sustainable.
Fifth, reform does not assure access to care. High-deductible plans that have additional out-of-pocket expenses can result in many people not using their insurance when they are sick. In my practice of child and adolescent psychiatry, a parent told me last week that she had a decrease in her job hours, could not afford the $30 copayment for treatment sessions for her adolescent, and decided to meet much less frequently.
In another case, a divorced mother stopped treatment for her son because the father had changed insurance, leaving them with an unaffordable deductible. And at Cambridge Health Alliance, doctors and nurses have cared for patients who, unable to afford the new copayments, were forced to interrupt care for HIV and even cancers that could be treated with chemotherapy.
Access to care is also affected by the uneven distribution of healthcare dollars between primary and specialty care, and between community hospitals and tertiary care hospitals. Partners HealthCare, which includes two major tertiary care hospitals in Boston, was able to negotiate a secret agreement with Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts to be paid 30 percent more for their services than other providers in the state, contributing to an increase in healthcare costs for Massachusetts, which are already the highest per person in the world. Agreements that tilt spending toward tertiary care threaten the viability of community hospitals and health centers that provide a safety net for the uninsured and underinsured.
There is, though, one US model of healthcare that meets the Institute of Medicine criteria: Medicare. Insuring everyone over 65, Medicare achieves universal coverage and access to care, is not tied to a job, and is affordable for individuals and the country. Medicare simplifies the administration of healthcare dollars, thereby saving money. We need to improve Medicare, and expand this program to include everyone.
A bill before Congress, the United States National Health Insurance Act, would provide more comprehensive coverage for all. The bill includes doctor, hospital, long-term, mental health, dental, and vision care, prescription drugs, and medical supplies, with no premiums, copayments, or deductibles.
People would be free to choose doctors and hospitals, and insurance would not be tied to a job. Costs would be controlled because health planning in a national health program can reestablish needed balance between primary/preventive care and high-tech tertiary care. A modest, progressive tax would replace what people currently pay out of pocket. This program would pay for itself by eliminating the wasteful administrative costs and profits of private insurance companies, and save $8 billion to $10 billion in Massachusetts alone.
We must let Congress know we want improved access to affordable healthcare for all, not more expensive private health insurance we can't afford to use when we are sick. Massachusetts healthcare reform fails on all five Institute of Medicine criteria. Congress should not make it a model for the nation.
Susanne L. King, M.D., practices in Berkshire County.
======================
OK, enough is enough. While the business of America is business, the health insurance companies are now pricing themselves out of business. Fewer and fewer companies can afford to supply health coverage.
When I started in retail even the cashiers got health insurance. Today, only the store manager usually gets full boat coverage included as a perk. Most department managers have their coverage partially subsidized and the rest of the employees have to pay the total (and totally unaffordable) premium.
Many of my conservative bretheren rightly worry about single payer health coverage, citing the obvious fact that the government screws up everything it tries to manage. Attempting to adopt the Massachusets model nationally would fail, as the above article states.
Affordable health coverage for all is not rocket science though. Doing nothing about health care reform will allow the ever greedy, but stupid, health insurance companies to simply end up offering coverage that will be affordable to only the top ten percent of the population---who knows, maybe that is the master plan to limit population growth? Just let the poor peons die.
Things do not have to be that way though. Dr. King favors some type of modified Medicare. I think she is on the right track. For proifit healthcare insurance companies should all be converted to non-profit corporations. Executive salaries should be limited and we should have mandatory tort reform. One part of the high cost of medicine is dealing with all the paperwork of thousands of different insurance companies. Simplify the paperwork by having a national health insurance policy standard where all policies issued must be identical in coverage with no exclusions for pre existing conditions.
I might even go so far as to suggest making Anthem the only health care company and make it a quasi governmental agency. Keep Medicare and expand it to include those who otherwise cannot afford health insurance.
Other people have other equally good suggestions, but as far as health insurance, the private sector for profit companies have got to go. Too bad the Dems lack the balls to ram through universal health care. Once you have it, then you can tweak it. If you never have the option, then the whole system will tank if things continue as they are.
Friday, August 7, 2009
Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics
Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics
The Bureau of Labor Statistic's July 2009 nonfarm payroll employment decline was only 247,000. This is interesting in light of ADP's estimated decline of 371,000 nonfarm jobs. Usually, the BLS figures are a bit closer to ADP's numbers.
Obviously, the gubmint is cooking the books. Actual unemployment is around 16%. There was an old saying in the Soviet Union.."if you want milk, take your pail to the radio." We are getting closer and closer to those days.
Obama is encouraging citizens to rat each other out. (email: Flag@whitehouse.gov) He is increasing his rhetoric, "I don't want the folks who created the mess to do a lot of talking. I want them to get out of the way so.." we can screw the Country up a lot worse than Bush did.
Frankly, I had thought America had turned a corner when we had a majority of voters who looked past someone's skin color and put a mostly black man in the President's office. Instead of being the President of the United States and behaving accordingly, we now just have Barack Obama, H.N.I.C.. (If only Colin Powell....)
You have ACORN and the Dem controlled unions engaging in the suppression of free speech and attacking TeaPartyers. Far from helping to unify the nation, Obama and the Dems are leading us down the path of civil war. (It might be worth remembering that there are a lot more dumbass rednecks with guns than there are liberal left wing elitists, so the South might just win this one) Bottom line, Obama's brown shirts may have a tougher time than Hitler's brown shirts.
So much for the Dems being the party of love and unity. Anyone up for starting a third party..........that's actually decent?
The Bureau of Labor Statistic's July 2009 nonfarm payroll employment decline was only 247,000. This is interesting in light of ADP's estimated decline of 371,000 nonfarm jobs. Usually, the BLS figures are a bit closer to ADP's numbers.
Obviously, the gubmint is cooking the books. Actual unemployment is around 16%. There was an old saying in the Soviet Union.."if you want milk, take your pail to the radio." We are getting closer and closer to those days.
Obama is encouraging citizens to rat each other out. (email: Flag@whitehouse.gov) He is increasing his rhetoric, "I don't want the folks who created the mess to do a lot of talking. I want them to get out of the way so.." we can screw the Country up a lot worse than Bush did.
Frankly, I had thought America had turned a corner when we had a majority of voters who looked past someone's skin color and put a mostly black man in the President's office. Instead of being the President of the United States and behaving accordingly, we now just have Barack Obama, H.N.I.C.. (If only Colin Powell....)
You have ACORN and the Dem controlled unions engaging in the suppression of free speech and attacking TeaPartyers. Far from helping to unify the nation, Obama and the Dems are leading us down the path of civil war. (It might be worth remembering that there are a lot more dumbass rednecks with guns than there are liberal left wing elitists, so the South might just win this one) Bottom line, Obama's brown shirts may have a tougher time than Hitler's brown shirts.
So much for the Dems being the party of love and unity. Anyone up for starting a third party..........that's actually decent?
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Follow the Money
AUGUST 5, 2009 12:18PM
Follow the money.
Replying to Norman Kelley's August 3rd post about the increase in Obama haters as evidenced by the "Joker" photoshop of Obama, I indicated that someone trying to do Obama in would probably not be a redneck, but that one should "follow the money."
The birther movement was given a recent shot in the arm with the discovery of a supposedly genuine (but roundly discredited) Obama Kenyan birth certificate. The most currently notable Obama citizenship eligibility lawsuit was filed by Attorney Orly Taitz, who is also a dentist fwiw, and Taitz submitted the allegedly genuine birth certificate to the court for definitive authentication.
The interesting thing is that Dr. Taitz's husband Yosef Taitz is CEO of Daylight Chemical Information Systems. DCIS "in close collaboration" with Novartis Pharmaceutical developed the Day Cart software which is "an application using the uniqueextensibility features of Oracle8i(tm) designed to fully integrate themolecular structures and reactions in an Oracle8i database serverenvironment. As an integrated module DayCart does not require any call-outsor other operations outside of the Oracle server, in order to perform itsfunctions. DayCart delivers the speed, capacity and performance of Daylighttools throughout the organization. Use of DayCart with the Oracle8i server,unlocks the access of existing Oracle* applications and tools (such as SQL,PL/SQL, Java, C, etc.) to the array of chemical information."
So, Orly's hubbie is in the tank with Novartis, a company that could stand to lose big bucks if we go to a single payer/nationalized health care system. Yes, there is much fraud and waste with Medicare, but the government can limit the payment for certain medications and, if necessary, circumvent patent law through legislation allowing it to have generic production of drugs that were previously covered under a patent, that could erode the profits of pharmaceutical companies that spent millions of dollars on R&D for certain drugs.
I originally thought this birther thing had no wings, but following the money we see the bird my take flight (in some form) after all.
Yosef Taitz article link: http://chemport.ipe.ac.cn/cgi-bin/chemport/getfiler.cgi?ID=ChmYwAHaYyWYUq3HlOMGPUWGlcVo9W34GYXMM6nkdJUN1Ths35rJve1CPnEXyUTC&VER=C
Follow the money.
Replying to Norman Kelley's August 3rd post about the increase in Obama haters as evidenced by the "Joker" photoshop of Obama, I indicated that someone trying to do Obama in would probably not be a redneck, but that one should "follow the money."
The birther movement was given a recent shot in the arm with the discovery of a supposedly genuine (but roundly discredited) Obama Kenyan birth certificate. The most currently notable Obama citizenship eligibility lawsuit was filed by Attorney Orly Taitz, who is also a dentist fwiw, and Taitz submitted the allegedly genuine birth certificate to the court for definitive authentication.
The interesting thing is that Dr. Taitz's husband Yosef Taitz is CEO of Daylight Chemical Information Systems. DCIS "in close collaboration" with Novartis Pharmaceutical developed the Day Cart software which is "an application using the uniqueextensibility features of Oracle8i(tm) designed to fully integrate themolecular structures and reactions in an Oracle8i database serverenvironment. As an integrated module DayCart does not require any call-outsor other operations outside of the Oracle server, in order to perform itsfunctions. DayCart delivers the speed, capacity and performance of Daylighttools throughout the organization. Use of DayCart with the Oracle8i server,unlocks the access of existing Oracle* applications and tools (such as SQL,PL/SQL, Java, C, etc.) to the array of chemical information."
So, Orly's hubbie is in the tank with Novartis, a company that could stand to lose big bucks if we go to a single payer/nationalized health care system. Yes, there is much fraud and waste with Medicare, but the government can limit the payment for certain medications and, if necessary, circumvent patent law through legislation allowing it to have generic production of drugs that were previously covered under a patent, that could erode the profits of pharmaceutical companies that spent millions of dollars on R&D for certain drugs.
I originally thought this birther thing had no wings, but following the money we see the bird my take flight (in some form) after all.
Yosef Taitz article link: http://chemport.ipe.ac.cn/cgi-bin/chemport/getfiler.cgi?ID=ChmYwAHaYyWYUq3HlOMGPUWGlcVo9W34GYXMM6nkdJUN1Ths35rJve1CPnEXyUTC&VER=C
Monday, August 3, 2009
Another wrench tossed into the works.
I must admit, I did not see this one coming:From ( http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/defectors-tell-of--burmas-secret-nuclear-reactor-1766566.html )
Defectors tell of Burma's secret nuclear reactor
North Korea is helping country develop weapons, according to the men
By Roger Maynard in Sydney
Monday, 3 August 2009
Two of Asia's most oppressive regimes may have joined forces to develop a nuclear arsenal, according to strategic experts who have analysed information supplied by a pair of Burmese defectors.
The men, who played key roles in helping the isolated military junta before defecting to Thailand, have provided evidence which suggests Burma has enlisted North Korean help to build its own nuclear bomb within the next five years.
Details supplied by the pair, who were extensively interviewed over the past two years by Professor Desmond Ball of the Australian National University and Thai-based Irish-Australian journalist Phil Thornton, points to Burma building a secret nuclear reactor and plutonium extraction facility with the assistance of North Korea.
Thitinan Pongsudhirak, the head of Thailand's Institute of Security and International Studies, said: "The evidence is preliminary and needs to be verified, but this is something that would completely change the regional security status quo.
"It would move Myanmar [Burma] from not just being a pariah state but a rogue state – that is one that jeopardises the security and well-being of its immediate neighbours," he said.
The nuclear claims, revealed by The Sydney Morning Herald at the weekend, will ring alarm bells across Asia. The newspaper said the testimony of the two defectors brought into sharp focus the hints emerging recently from other sources, supported by sightings of North Korean delegations, that the Burmese junta, under growing pressure to democratise, was seeking a deterrent to any foreign moves to force regime change.
Their evidence also reinforces concerns expressed by Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, in Thailand last week about growing military co-operation between North Korea and Burma. "We worry about the transfer of nuclear technology and other dangerous weapons," she said at a regional security conference.
The two defectors whose briefings have created such alarm are both regarded as credible sources. One was an officer with a secret nuclear battalion in the Burmese army who was sent to Moscow for two years' training. He was part of a nuclear programme which planned to train 1,000 Burmese. "You don't need 1,000 people in the fuel cycle or to run a nuclear reactor. It's obvious there is much more going on," he said.
The other is a former executive of the regime's leading business partner, Htoo Trading, who handled nuclear contracts with Russia and North Korea. The man, who died in 2008, provided a detailed report which insisted that Burma's rationale for a nuclear programme was nonsense.
"They [the generals] say it is to produce medical isotopes for health purposes in hospitals. How many hospitals in Burma have nuclear science? he asked. "Burma can barely get electricity up and running. It's a nonsense," he said.
Professor Ball and Mr Thornton reported that the army defector claimed that there were more than five North Koreans working at the Thabeik Kyin uranium processing plant in Burma and that the country was providing yellowcake – partially refined uranium – to both Iran and North Korea.
The authors concluded that the illicit nuclear co-operation was based on a trade of locally refined uranium from Burma to North Korea in return for technological expertise.
What is missing in the nuclear chain at the moment is a plutonium reprocessing plant, but according to the army defector, one was being planned at Naung Laing in northern Burma, parallel to a civilian reactor which is already under construction with Russian help.
The secret complex would be hidden in caves tunnelled into a nearby mountain. Once Burma had its own plutonium reprocessing plant, it could produce 8kg of weapons-grade plutonium-239 a year, enough to build one nuclear bomb every 12 months.
If the testimony of the two defectors proves to be correct, the secret reactor could be operational by 2014, The Herald reported. "These two guys never met each other, never knew of each other's existence, and yet they both tell the same story basically," said Professor Ball.
"If it was just the Russian reactor, under full International Energy supervision, then the likelihood of them being able to do something with it in terms of a bomb would be zero," Professor ball said. "It's the North Korean element which adds danger to it."
========================
I suppose I should have boned up more on my Asian geography since I have never considered Burma (Now known as Myanmar) of any great significance. It is, however, the largest country by geographical area in mainland Southeast Asia. It's territory encompasses 261,227 square miles and its estimated population is 55,390,000; which is a much larger population than North Korea.
Burma has been run by various military juntas since 1962 and is currently led by Senior General Than Shwe.
Apparently, every small peckered petty dictator wants to get their slimy meathooks on a nuclear weapon and, in Burma's case, this may now be possible in the not too distant future since uranium is a plentiful natural resource there. It also just makes sense that N.Korea is providing technical assistance in return for some yellowcake. The above article mentions Iran is getting yellowcake as well. The Russians (surprise, surprise) have also been helping out. Those dang Ruskies have their hands in quite a bit of nefarious poop. (how 'bout another Russian post Don Rich?)
Depending on how far along Burma is, we may have to take out North Korea AND Burma, although our real target should probably be the Russians. Oh well, more sleepless nights ahead for the U.S. Intelligence analysts. (I figure the Israelis will "do" Iran)
Defectors tell of Burma's secret nuclear reactor
North Korea is helping country develop weapons, according to the men
By Roger Maynard in Sydney
Monday, 3 August 2009
Two of Asia's most oppressive regimes may have joined forces to develop a nuclear arsenal, according to strategic experts who have analysed information supplied by a pair of Burmese defectors.
The men, who played key roles in helping the isolated military junta before defecting to Thailand, have provided evidence which suggests Burma has enlisted North Korean help to build its own nuclear bomb within the next five years.
Details supplied by the pair, who were extensively interviewed over the past two years by Professor Desmond Ball of the Australian National University and Thai-based Irish-Australian journalist Phil Thornton, points to Burma building a secret nuclear reactor and plutonium extraction facility with the assistance of North Korea.
Thitinan Pongsudhirak, the head of Thailand's Institute of Security and International Studies, said: "The evidence is preliminary and needs to be verified, but this is something that would completely change the regional security status quo.
"It would move Myanmar [Burma] from not just being a pariah state but a rogue state – that is one that jeopardises the security and well-being of its immediate neighbours," he said.
The nuclear claims, revealed by The Sydney Morning Herald at the weekend, will ring alarm bells across Asia. The newspaper said the testimony of the two defectors brought into sharp focus the hints emerging recently from other sources, supported by sightings of North Korean delegations, that the Burmese junta, under growing pressure to democratise, was seeking a deterrent to any foreign moves to force regime change.
Their evidence also reinforces concerns expressed by Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, in Thailand last week about growing military co-operation between North Korea and Burma. "We worry about the transfer of nuclear technology and other dangerous weapons," she said at a regional security conference.
The two defectors whose briefings have created such alarm are both regarded as credible sources. One was an officer with a secret nuclear battalion in the Burmese army who was sent to Moscow for two years' training. He was part of a nuclear programme which planned to train 1,000 Burmese. "You don't need 1,000 people in the fuel cycle or to run a nuclear reactor. It's obvious there is much more going on," he said.
The other is a former executive of the regime's leading business partner, Htoo Trading, who handled nuclear contracts with Russia and North Korea. The man, who died in 2008, provided a detailed report which insisted that Burma's rationale for a nuclear programme was nonsense.
"They [the generals] say it is to produce medical isotopes for health purposes in hospitals. How many hospitals in Burma have nuclear science? he asked. "Burma can barely get electricity up and running. It's a nonsense," he said.
Professor Ball and Mr Thornton reported that the army defector claimed that there were more than five North Koreans working at the Thabeik Kyin uranium processing plant in Burma and that the country was providing yellowcake – partially refined uranium – to both Iran and North Korea.
The authors concluded that the illicit nuclear co-operation was based on a trade of locally refined uranium from Burma to North Korea in return for technological expertise.
What is missing in the nuclear chain at the moment is a plutonium reprocessing plant, but according to the army defector, one was being planned at Naung Laing in northern Burma, parallel to a civilian reactor which is already under construction with Russian help.
The secret complex would be hidden in caves tunnelled into a nearby mountain. Once Burma had its own plutonium reprocessing plant, it could produce 8kg of weapons-grade plutonium-239 a year, enough to build one nuclear bomb every 12 months.
If the testimony of the two defectors proves to be correct, the secret reactor could be operational by 2014, The Herald reported. "These two guys never met each other, never knew of each other's existence, and yet they both tell the same story basically," said Professor Ball.
"If it was just the Russian reactor, under full International Energy supervision, then the likelihood of them being able to do something with it in terms of a bomb would be zero," Professor ball said. "It's the North Korean element which adds danger to it."
========================
I suppose I should have boned up more on my Asian geography since I have never considered Burma (Now known as Myanmar) of any great significance. It is, however, the largest country by geographical area in mainland Southeast Asia. It's territory encompasses 261,227 square miles and its estimated population is 55,390,000; which is a much larger population than North Korea.
Burma has been run by various military juntas since 1962 and is currently led by Senior General Than Shwe.
Apparently, every small peckered petty dictator wants to get their slimy meathooks on a nuclear weapon and, in Burma's case, this may now be possible in the not too distant future since uranium is a plentiful natural resource there. It also just makes sense that N.Korea is providing technical assistance in return for some yellowcake. The above article mentions Iran is getting yellowcake as well. The Russians (surprise, surprise) have also been helping out. Those dang Ruskies have their hands in quite a bit of nefarious poop. (how 'bout another Russian post Don Rich?)
Depending on how far along Burma is, we may have to take out North Korea AND Burma, although our real target should probably be the Russians. Oh well, more sleepless nights ahead for the U.S. Intelligence analysts. (I figure the Israelis will "do" Iran)
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Pelosi: Throwing Insurance Companies Under The Bus. Why?
Here is the latest gem from U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nanci Pelosi, via Reuters: "U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday ramped up her criticism of insurance companies, accusing them of unethical behavior and working to kill a plan to create a new government-run health plan."
"It's almost immoral what they are doing," Pelosi said to reporters, referring to insurance companies. "Of course they've been immoral all along in how they have treated the people that they insure," she said, adding, "They are the villains. They have been part of the problem in a major way. They are doing everything in their power to stop a public option from happening."
Hmmmmmmmmmm, so, what is up with that? We all know the Donkeys and Elephants get big contributions from big business, but why is Pelosi biting the hand that feeds her?
We may have the answer:(from dailyfinance.com link:http://www.dailyfinance.com/2009/07/31/after-182-billion-taxpayer-rescue-is-aig-on-the-verge-of-colla/) Is AIG on the verge of Collapse? You may remember American International Group (AIG). The U.S. government gave it $182 billion of taxpayer money last fall in exchange for a 78 percent stake. Of that money, $165 million went for bonuses to a handful of people in its Financial Products Group (FPG), which sold Credit Default Swaps (CDSs) on which AIG lacked the capital to make good. And $200 million more is slated for those good folks in 2009.
Another $12.9 billion of our taxpayer money went to Goldman Sachs Group (GS) so AIG could pay Goldman 100 cents on the dollar for its CDSs. Hank Paulson wanted to keep the names of Goldman and the other recipients secret -- since so many of them were foreign banks, but the information leaked out in March 2009 after Paulson left office.
Now, thanks to some solid reporting in The New York Times, it looks like the rot at AIG is not limited to FPG. While AIG officials have claimed that its problems were isolated to FPG, the reality is that AIG seems to have been running something akin to a shell game of massive proportions. Its shell game version took the form of selling insurance and assigning the resultant risks among its 71 different North American insurance companies.
Thanks to AIG's regulatory arbitrage -- taking advantage of the fact that its 19 state insurance regulators never conduct examinations at the same time -- AIG may have been able to shift assets among the companies to fool state regulators. If one its companies did not have enough money set aside as reserves against future claims, AIG could move assets to that reserve-deficient company right before the state insurance examiner moved in. And once that examiner was gone, AIG could in theory shift the extra cash to the next reserves-deficient company.
Want an example? Consider AIG affiliate National Union (NU). AIG indicated to Pennsylvania state insurance investigators that it had $33.7 billion in assets at the end of 2008 -- more than enough to protect against $21.9 billion in liabilities. But what the Pennsylvania regulators did not see is that $10.9 billion worth of NU's assets were investments in other AIG affiliates, which are not publicly traded and whose value is hard to measure. Subtract that and you have only $22.8 billion in assets.
But wait -- there's more. NU had $42 billion more in liabilities that the Pennsylvania regulators missed. How so? NU had obligations to pay claims of other AIG insurance affiliates -- the biggest of which was $23.1 billion that it owed AIG affiliate American Home (AH). NU owed another $19 billion to several other AIG afiiliates.
Meanwhile, AH had crushing obligations of its own. While the New York state regulators thought it had $26.3 billion in assets to a mere $19.9 billion in liabilities, the reality was far more dire. How so? AH was on the hook for an additional $120.7 billion in guarantees to 16 other AIG affiliates. Thus AH's liabilities really exceeded its assets by $114 billion.
To summarize, AIG's core insurance companies seem to be like a shell game which AIG was able to continue operating because it was able to keep the cash moving from the affiliate that one state regulator had just examined to the one that another state regulator was about to examine.
Unfortunately, it would not surprise me if this was happening and continues to happen at all big U.S. insurance companies. Moreover, I would be shocked if former AIG CEO Hank Greenberg -- who has heaped scorn on his successors -- was unaware of this practice. (Peter Cohan wrote this article)
===========================
The Democrats could have a serious problem since it now looks like AIG was just another giant shell game. The only way the Dems can get out of this is with a quiet bailout, again, of AIG. I think the cat is out of the bag though and Pelosi is distancing herself while getting ready for the new catastrophe of an AIG failure.
You do have to hand it to those AIG boys though. Run a huge multi-billion dollar scam, get the federal government to give you 182 billion, use 165 million of that for bonuses to executives "too valuable to lose" and now you may get even more money. Crime does pay.
I think you will find this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to insurance company scams and incompetence. I overheard a conversation the other day between two long term care insurance company execs. One mentioned that they had badly underestimated how many of their policyholders would be in need of long term care and that they needed to kick up their premiums by 40% or in a few years they would be out of money. Long term care is yet another healthcare issue that we will need to deal with.
Pelosi and the Dems could be in major trouble if AIG tanks, and it looks like some really bad things are going on there.
"It's almost immoral what they are doing," Pelosi said to reporters, referring to insurance companies. "Of course they've been immoral all along in how they have treated the people that they insure," she said, adding, "They are the villains. They have been part of the problem in a major way. They are doing everything in their power to stop a public option from happening."
Hmmmmmmmmmm, so, what is up with that? We all know the Donkeys and Elephants get big contributions from big business, but why is Pelosi biting the hand that feeds her?
We may have the answer:(from dailyfinance.com link:http://www.dailyfinance.com/2009/07/31/after-182-billion-taxpayer-rescue-is-aig-on-the-verge-of-colla/) Is AIG on the verge of Collapse? You may remember American International Group (AIG). The U.S. government gave it $182 billion of taxpayer money last fall in exchange for a 78 percent stake. Of that money, $165 million went for bonuses to a handful of people in its Financial Products Group (FPG), which sold Credit Default Swaps (CDSs) on which AIG lacked the capital to make good. And $200 million more is slated for those good folks in 2009.
Another $12.9 billion of our taxpayer money went to Goldman Sachs Group (GS) so AIG could pay Goldman 100 cents on the dollar for its CDSs. Hank Paulson wanted to keep the names of Goldman and the other recipients secret -- since so many of them were foreign banks, but the information leaked out in March 2009 after Paulson left office.
Now, thanks to some solid reporting in The New York Times, it looks like the rot at AIG is not limited to FPG. While AIG officials have claimed that its problems were isolated to FPG, the reality is that AIG seems to have been running something akin to a shell game of massive proportions. Its shell game version took the form of selling insurance and assigning the resultant risks among its 71 different North American insurance companies.
Thanks to AIG's regulatory arbitrage -- taking advantage of the fact that its 19 state insurance regulators never conduct examinations at the same time -- AIG may have been able to shift assets among the companies to fool state regulators. If one its companies did not have enough money set aside as reserves against future claims, AIG could move assets to that reserve-deficient company right before the state insurance examiner moved in. And once that examiner was gone, AIG could in theory shift the extra cash to the next reserves-deficient company.
Want an example? Consider AIG affiliate National Union (NU). AIG indicated to Pennsylvania state insurance investigators that it had $33.7 billion in assets at the end of 2008 -- more than enough to protect against $21.9 billion in liabilities. But what the Pennsylvania regulators did not see is that $10.9 billion worth of NU's assets were investments in other AIG affiliates, which are not publicly traded and whose value is hard to measure. Subtract that and you have only $22.8 billion in assets.
But wait -- there's more. NU had $42 billion more in liabilities that the Pennsylvania regulators missed. How so? NU had obligations to pay claims of other AIG insurance affiliates -- the biggest of which was $23.1 billion that it owed AIG affiliate American Home (AH). NU owed another $19 billion to several other AIG afiiliates.
Meanwhile, AH had crushing obligations of its own. While the New York state regulators thought it had $26.3 billion in assets to a mere $19.9 billion in liabilities, the reality was far more dire. How so? AH was on the hook for an additional $120.7 billion in guarantees to 16 other AIG affiliates. Thus AH's liabilities really exceeded its assets by $114 billion.
To summarize, AIG's core insurance companies seem to be like a shell game which AIG was able to continue operating because it was able to keep the cash moving from the affiliate that one state regulator had just examined to the one that another state regulator was about to examine.
Unfortunately, it would not surprise me if this was happening and continues to happen at all big U.S. insurance companies. Moreover, I would be shocked if former AIG CEO Hank Greenberg -- who has heaped scorn on his successors -- was unaware of this practice. (Peter Cohan wrote this article)
===========================
The Democrats could have a serious problem since it now looks like AIG was just another giant shell game. The only way the Dems can get out of this is with a quiet bailout, again, of AIG. I think the cat is out of the bag though and Pelosi is distancing herself while getting ready for the new catastrophe of an AIG failure.
You do have to hand it to those AIG boys though. Run a huge multi-billion dollar scam, get the federal government to give you 182 billion, use 165 million of that for bonuses to executives "too valuable to lose" and now you may get even more money. Crime does pay.
I think you will find this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to insurance company scams and incompetence. I overheard a conversation the other day between two long term care insurance company execs. One mentioned that they had badly underestimated how many of their policyholders would be in need of long term care and that they needed to kick up their premiums by 40% or in a few years they would be out of money. Long term care is yet another healthcare issue that we will need to deal with.
Pelosi and the Dems could be in major trouble if AIG tanks, and it looks like some really bad things are going on there.
Friday, July 31, 2009
The Satanic New World Order
The following is a reprint of a Philip Jones article:
The Pornographic Conspiracy
Destroying The Family - Degrading The Human Spirit
By Philip Jones
7-31-9
Introduction.
Throughout the Western World, the Christian foundations of decency, morality, restraint, and integrity; the very moral anchor which held our civilisation together for centuries, has come under a concerted and simultaneous multi-theatre attack, which in it's ferocity and intensity can only be described as diabolical. Here in Northern Europe, with some rare exceptions, the last bastion of what is true, virtuous and righteous, is to be found paradoxically, only amongst the followers of Islam, and make no mistake about it, even that community of faithful believers, is coming under pernicious attack by the agents of change, in the form of the welfare state; dabbling in the affairs of Muslim families, the education system, gradually breaking down the moral and belief systems of the young, and of course, the sick and twisted `entertainment industry` along with the mass media in general.
In my recent article, `Who Rules The World,`[1] I hypothesised that the very source of those afflictions, which have and continue to debase and de-construct our way of life, eroding ever more, all that was once marvellous and righteous, in lands which once formed what was known as `Christendom,` is literally the work of Satan/Lucifer, who with a little help from his legions of `Fallen Angels,` Demon helpers, and his bloodline [3]descendants known as the Illuminati, is establishing his dominion here on earth, just as he set out to do at the very beginning of time.
Having outlined in detail in that three part series the basis for my hypothesis, there is no need to elaborate further here. It is sufficient to direct the reader to that article so that he/she may judge for his/herself whether there is any credibility in my assertion.
Those elements of social and moral decay that we are witnessing today; the increasingly pornographic culture, high divorce rates; growing numbers of unwed single mothers; the hordes of illegitimate children; homosexuality and lesbianism, sexual perversion and the alarmingly high number of abortions, is not some new phenomenon. It is an ingenious and fiendish plot that has been around for many Millennia (see Sodom and Gomorrah and the cruel and debased cultures prevalent throughout the land of Canaan and further afield during Old Testament times) designed to annihilate what is, the very heart and foundation of all good and decent society; namely, the family!
You are about to read written proof of this clandestine conspiracy. You will learn about who and what is behind it, and their fierce unwavering mission to degrade and eradicate the family, separate man from his mate, pervert and `filthify` our God given human spirit, and drag what's left of humanity after their multi faceted depopulation agenda has been taken to it's illogical conclusion, into a Luciferian nightmare, whereby a relatively small and immensely wealthy and powerful `bloodline` elite, hold sway as the `proxy` lords of this planet, for their master, Lucifer.
Destroy The Family.
In 1956, J. Edgar Hoover, [5] the then Director of the FBI, himself a 33rd Degree Freemason and therefore no stranger to Luciferian machinations and other deviant behaviour, somewhat paradoxically wrote:
"The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent." The Elks Magazine (August 1956)
Mr. Hoover knew what he was talking about, and it is probably even truer today to comment that few people understand, or even consider the malicious forces now arrayed against the family, the institution of marriage and the very nature of our being. They simply cannot comprehend how hell-bent the forces of evil are on destroying the family. Read into the chilling words of Communist demagogue, Lenin: "Destroy the family and you destroy society," [1]and then get an idea of the dire and perilous nature of the situation.
Lenin had a devious plan to carry out his sinister plot and he wasn't alone! We will deal with this in a moment. But firstly, it is necessary to recognise the direct parallels of our current state of affairs to the original Marxist Communist plot to eradicate the family, as was noted in the 1926 July issue of the Atlantic Monthly:
When the Bolsheviki came into power in 1917 they regarded the family, like every other "bourgeois" institution, with fierce hatred, and set out with a will to destroy it. "To clear the family out of the accumulated dust of the ages we had to give it a good shake-up, and we did," declared Madame Smidovich, a leading Communist and active participant in the recent discussion. So one of the first decrees of the Soviet Government abolished the term "illegitimate children." This was done simply by equalizing the legal status of all children, whether born in wedlock or out of it, and now the Soviet Government boasts that Russia is the only country where there are no illegitimate children. The father of a child is forced to contribute to its support, usually paying the mother a third of his salary...
At the same time, a law was passed which made divorce a matter of a few minutes, to be obtained at the request of either partner in a marriage. Chaos was the result. Men took to changing wives with the same zest which they displayed in the consumption of the recently restored forty-per-cent vodka.
"Some men have twenty wives, living a week with one, a month with another," asserted an indignant woman delegate during the sessions of the Tzik. "They have children with all of them, and these children are thrown on the street for lack of support!"
(There are three hundred thousand shelter-less children in Russia to-day, who are literally turned out on the streets. They are one of the greatest social dangers of the present time, because they are developing into professional criminals. More than half of them are drug addicts and sex perverts. It is claimed by many Communists that the break-up of the family is responsible for a large percentage of these children.)
The peasant villages have perhaps suffered most from this revolution in sex relations. An epidemic of marriages and divorces broke out in the country districts. [Marriage became a game where it] was not unusual for a boy of twenty to have had three or four wives, or for a girl of the same age to have had three or four abortions. The peasants bitterly complained: "Abortions cover our villages with shame. Formerly we did not even hear of them." Many women found marriage and childbearing a profitable occupation. They formed connections ( sexual) with the sons of well-to-do peasants and then blackmailed the father for the support of the children. In some cases peasants have been obliged to sell [everything] in order to settle such claims. The law has created still more confusion because women can claim support for children born many years ago.
During the winter of 1924-1925 some of the older Communists accused the younger generation of indulging in loose connections; they blame the girl students for practising frequent abortions Russian women students [noted] that love was almost the only cheap amusement left to them and demanded that they be given free abortions that factory women enjoy Both in the villages and in the cities, the problem of the unmarried mother has become very acute and provides a severe and annoying test of Communist theories.
Another new point was that wife and husband would have an equal right to claim support from the other The woman would have the right to demand support for her child even if she lived with several men during the period of conception; but, in contrast to previous practice, she or the court would choose one man who would be held responsible for the support. Commissar Kursky seemed especially proud of this point because it differed so much from the 'bourgeois customs' of Europe and America.
Another speaker objected to the proposed law on the ground that some women would take advantage of its liberal provisions to form connections with wealthy men and then blackmail them for alimony.[2]
[1] Lenin merely repeated what Socrates had said and what Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx put into words. Lenin set out to do just that, hoping that a new society -- with the State as the ultimate father -- could be constructed. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, we have seen the consequences of the experiment.
[2] The Atlantic Monthly; July 1926; The Russian Effort to Abolish Marriage; Volume 138, No. 1; page 108-114. You can read the document in its entirety byclicking here.
Here's how the scheme to destroy the family is mapped out:
Eliminate the sacredness of the marriage covenant from the minds of the masses. Make them believe marriage is outdated and blasé
Inspire hatred against the family unit, manhood and fatherhood
Institute no-fault divorce and encourage serial divorces
Incite rampant promiscuity, fornication and adultery
Make having illegitimate children become a common practice
Convince society that a child in the womb is not a human being
Provoke women to have abortions without regard to God or their consciences
Make true love seem like cheap amusement
Stimulate the people to confuse sex with love
Create an environment that encourages unwed single motherhood
Inspire men to disrespect, dishonour and abuse women
Design laws that motivate women to commit paternity fraud
Incite homosexuality, lesbianism, sexual immorality and perversion
Influence men to effortlessly abandon children they sire
Most importantly, provoke a fierce relentless gender war
Is there anybody reading this who can't draw parallels with their own society?
As you have read above, what happened in the Soviet Union in 1926 was no accident, and it is important to appreciate and easy to see, that the social and moral carnage now occurring throughout the West; the high divorce rate, the huge numbers of unwed mothers, the rage against fatherhood, the gender wars, the overt battle being waged against marriage and the family, and the highly detailed attacks on the bedrock of our civilisation, are equally as well planned, orchestrated and micromanaged by the same evil force which established and funded that rotten regime.
We will now witness how certain Americans, like their Communist Russian counterparts, have also been and still are, determined to de-construct, dismantle and exterminate the family.
The Conspirators.
"The nuclear family must be destroyed , and people must find better ways of living together. ... Whatever it's ultimate meaning, the break-up of families now is an objectively revolutionary process. ... "Families have supported oppression by separating people into small, isolated units, unable to join together to fight for common interests. ..." - Functions of the Family, Linda Gordon, WOMEN: A Journal of Liberation, Fall, 1969.
"By the year 2000 we will, I hope, raise our children to believe in human potential, not God" - Gloria Steinem, editor of 'MS' magazine.
"We can't destroy the inequities between men and women until we destroy marriage. " -- [Robin Morgan, "Sisterhood Is Powerful," (ed), 1970, p. 537]
"The most merciful thing a large family can do to one of its infant members is to kill it" - Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, in Women and the New Rage, p.67
"Marriage has existed for the benefit of men; and has been a legally sanctioned method of control over women... We must work to destroy it. The end of the institution of marriage is a necessary condition for the liberation of women. Therefore it is important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not to live individually with men." - The Declaration of Feminism , November 1971
"Only when manhood is dead - and it will perish when ravaged femininity no longer sustains it - only then will we know what it is to be free." -- [Andrea Dworkin. "The Root Cause," speech, 26 Sept. 1975, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge (published in Our Blood, ch. 9, 1976).]
"The care of children ...is infinitely better left to the best trained practitioners of both sexes who have chosen it as a vocation...[This] would further undermine family structure while contributing to the freedom of women." - Kate Millet, Sexual Politics 178-179
"In order to raise children with equality, we must take them away from families and communally raise them." -- Dr. Mary Jo Bane, feminist and assistant professor of education at Wellesley College and associate director of the school's Centre for Research on Woman
"Who cares how men feel or what they do or whether they suffer? They have had over 2000 years to dominate and made a complete hash of it. Now it is our turn. My only comment to men is, if you don't like it, bad luck - and if you get in my way I'll run you down." - Letter to the Editor: Women's Turn to Dominate, Signed: Liberated Women, Boronia; Herald-Sun, Melbourne, Australia, February 9, 1996
"Life in this society being, at best, an utter bore and no aspect of society being at all relevant to women, there remains to civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking females only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation, and destroy the male sex." - Valerie Solana, SCUM Manifesto (Society for Cutting Up Men.)
"How will the family unit be destroyed? ... the demand alone will throw the whole ideology of the family into question, so that women can begin establishing a community of work with each other and we can fight collectively. Women will feel freer to leave their husbands and become economically independent, either through a job or welfare."- Female Liberation , by Roxanne Dunbar.
"I feel that 'man-hating' is an honourable and viable political act, that the oppressed have a right to class-hatred against the class that is oppressing them." - Robin Morgan, (editor of MS magazine)
"It is important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not to live individually with men... All of history must be re-written in terms of oppression of women. We must go back to ancient female religions like witchcraft" - The Declaration of Feminism , November 1971.
"God is going to change. We women... will change the world so much that He won't fit any-more." - Naomi Goldenberg, Changing of the Gods: Feminism and the End of Traditional Religions (Quoted at beginning of From Father God to Mother Earth)
I hope that the reader now understands by the sheer malevolence of the above statements, that the Communist `front group` known as the feminist movement, has nothing whatsoever to do with `women's rights,` and everything to do with the complete and total emasculation of the human male, the enforced collapse of patriarchy and the breakdown of the family, thereby facilitating the depopulation agenda[2] and aiding the implementation of the Satanic New World Order. This attack against the family, against the institution of marriage and against God and country is not a game!
These people are serious about abolishing the family unit, and the American nation, along with all other nation states in fact. They are relentless and will stop at nothing to eradicate God, morals, marriage, manhood, womanhood, fatherhood, motherhood, husband-hood and love of nation from our hearts and minds. Their mission is to persuade the masses to engage in a cloaked form of Satan Worship, disguised among other things as humanistic atheism, pantheism, `earth` worship, along with accompanying social aberrations such as misogyny, domestic violence, child abandonment, child support schemes and traps, paternity fraud, serial divorces, serial abortions, pornography, sexual perversion, homosexuality and lesbianism.
Pornography : Debasing Human Nature.
It cannot be argued that one of the most insidious weapons being used in this war against God's most honoured institution, is Pornography, and it is this aspect of the vengeful battle being directed against the hearts, souls and consciences of men and women, not only here in the west, but increasingly due to internet access, on a global scale, which I will now deal with in some detail.
Sexual material of all kinds is now all too easily accessible through television, movies, music videos, and particularly the Internet. Many will have us believe that this relentless intrusion of pornographic, sexualised imagery is harmless, but it is anything but. It is a debased aberrant form of human sexuality, encouraged by the agents of those doing the work of Lucifer, which is highly addictive, destructive, demoralising, corrupting and eventually fatal to any chance of a moral and decent way of life. Despite what its apologists and defenders say, pornography has a profoundly negative effect on how people view sex and sexual behaviour. Researchers at the National Foundation for Family Research and Education concluded not surprisingly that "exposure to pornography puts viewers at increased risk for developing sexually deviant tendencies." According to the report, "the rape myth (belief that women cause and enjoy rape, and that rapists are normal) is very widespread in habitual male users of pornography."
There is also evidence that the repeated use of pornography can interfere with the ability to enjoy and participate in normal marital intimacy. Dr.Victor Cline, a specialist in treating sex addiction, has documented a recurring progression in the use of pornography. If left unchecked, what starts as casual viewing of pornography can eventually lead to an escalation to more hard-core, aberrant material. This, he claims, can lead to deviant sexual acts. Behavioural scientists agree. Dr. Cline reports that "any type of sexual deviation can be acquired in this way, and that it cannot be eliminated even by massive feelings of guilt." Eventually, the viewer may try to act out the pornography-based, immoral fantasies, often with devastating results.
The course of this problem may be gradual and undetected, concluded Cline. He states: "Like a cancer, it keeps growing and spreading. It rarely ever reverses itself, and it is also very difficult to treat and heal. Denial on the part of the male addict and refusal to confront the problem are typical and predictable, and this almost always leads to marital or couple disharmony, sometimes divorce, and sometimes the breaking up of other intimate relationships."
The Damage To Young People.
Some researchers say that exposure to pornography can affect the natural development of a child's brain. Of course it can! Statistics show that the primary consumers of pornography are boys between the ages of 12 and 17 years. In fact, for many, pornography is their primary source of sexual education. This has very disturbing ramifications. "Teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases," notes one report, "are completely non-existent in porn, giving a false belief that there are no adverse consequences to behaviours depicted in pornography." Young males are being targeted by this industry of filth for a very definite reason: to warp and pervert their ability to interact normally with girls, by portraying the human female as little more than a collection of body orifices to be filled.
Dr.Judith Reisman, [6] president of the Institute for Media Education, and one of the most exceptional human beings currently inhabiting this planet, concludes: "Health-based neurological observations about the instinctual brain-imprinted response to pornographic sights and sounds indicates that viewing pornography is a biologically significant event that overrides informed consent-and that is harmful to children's [moldable] 'plastic' brains because it compromises their grasp of reality and thus their mental and physical health, their well-being and their pursuit of happiness."
Pornography shapes attitudes and influences behaviour. Its messages are enticing primarily because they are fantasy and thus presented as more exciting than the real thing. "Individuals using pornography set themselves up for unrealistic expectations leading to damaged relationships," notes one report. Pornography not only can, but is of course intended, to destroy trust and openness, two highly essential qualities in a marriage. Because it is primarily viewed in secret, pornography use often leads to deception and lying. Mates feel betrayed. They do not understand why their marriage partner no longer finds them desirable, and what's more nor does he..
Remember, as we have discussed above, the object of the exercise is the destruction of the family. How many marriage breakups and broken homes can be blamed on pornographic addiction?
At a 2003 meeting of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, two thirds of the 350 divorce lawyers who attended, said the Internet played a significant role in the divorces in the past year, with excessive interest in on-line porn contributing to more than half such cases. Pornography had an almost non-existent role in divorce just seven or eight years ago[7]
The insistence on selfish instant gratification at all costs is inbuilt and inherent in pornography use. Hence, viewing pornography is unloving. It undercuts a true believer's fight to maintain chastity and a clean moral standing before God. Pornography exploits men, women and children. It demeans them and robs them of their dignity and rights.
The Main-Streaming Of Perversion.
Many people today are ambivalent toward pornography, because like all those other vices now prevalent in the West, it has entered the mainstream and become to a large degree, accepted practice. Modern attitudes toward pornography may be reflected by the 'prostitute-chic' fashions many celebrities sport, the music videos that increasingly flaunt sexual imagery, and the advertising media's adoption of a "porno aesthetic."
Doctors now claim that pornography can spark an addiction that is far more difficult to overcome than drug addiction. Treatment for drug addicts usually starts with detoxification to remove the substance from the body. But addiction to pornography, explains Dr. Mary Anne Layden of the University of Pennsylvania, "produces mental imagery which is permanently implanted in the mind of the user and is scaled in by brain chemistry." That is why individuals can vividly recall pornographic images from years past. She concludes: "This is the first addictive substance for which there is no hope for detoxification." But does that mean it is impossible to break free from pornography's influence? And what specific harm does pornography cause?
Internet Pornography Facts:
About 75 percent of Internet pornography originates in the United States. Close to 15 percent originates in Europe.
It is estimated that some 70 million people a week visit pornographic Web sites. About 20 million of these users are in Canada and the United States.
A study revealed that during a recent one-month period, Germany had the largest audience for on-line pornography in Europe, followed by Great Britain, France, Italy, and Spain.
In Germany, Internet pornography users spend an average of 70 minutes each month viewing pornographic sites.
Among European viewers of Internet pornography, those above 50 years of age spend the most time connected to adult Web sites.
According to one source, 70 percent of Internet pornography traffic occurs during the day.
It is estimated by some that 100,000 Internet sites include material on child pornography.
About 80 percent of the Internet's commercial child pornography originates in Japan.
There is a proven connection between pornography and rape, as well as other forms of violence against women and children. Infamous serial killer Ted Bundy admits that he had a "strong appetite for violent pornography." He says: "This condition is not immediately seen by the individual or identified as a serious problem. But this interest becomes geared towards matters of a sexual nature that involve violence. I cannot emphasize enough the gradual development of this. It is not short-term."
Rather than portraying sexual relations as a beautiful and intimate expression of love between a man and a woman in honourable marriage, pornography demeans and distorts the sexual act. Casual and perverted sex is portrayed as being exciting and desirable. Personal gratification with little or no regard for the other person is highlighted. Women, men, and children are portrayed as objects that exist only for sexual gratification. "Beauty is measured by proportion of body parts, shaping unrealistic expectations," says one report. "Depicting women as anonymous, ever-wanting/waiting, empty sex toys for men, stripping and exposing their bodies for monetary gain and entertainment cannot possibly translate into a message that can exist in harmony with equality, dignity and humanity," concludes another report.
Soon, like any other improper stimulation, what initially arouses becomes mundane and routine. "Over time," says one writer, "[the users of pornography] require more explicit and deviant material. They may push their partners into increasingly bizarre sexual activities, diminishing their [own] capacity to express real affection." Does that sound like a harmless diversion?
Instead of love, pornography cultivates self-centred, selfish desire, and fractures and stains every person it contaminates. It destroys all decency and is a major threat to our traditional way of life, and particularly, marriage and family.
Pornography - A Vicious Assault On The Family.
It is a sad reality that many Internet porn viewers are children. Youngsters who though prohibited by law from purchasing pornographic literature or from renting pornographic videos, can gain access to these in their own home with a few clicks of the mouse. The choices are endless. Many children regularly visit Internet sites without their parents' knowledge. In fact, The Detroit News states that "more than two in five children have subscribed to a web site or other service online even though nearly 85 percent of parents have rules against them doing so."
Many think that a casual brush with pornography is harmless. However, the facts show otherwise. Consider the case of a couple who seemed to have an ideal marriage. They were financially secure, and they loved to travel. Their friends thought of them as close, affectionate, and devoted, and in many ways they were. However, problems arose when the husband started looking at pornography. Writing to a popular advice columnist, his anxious wife described her concerns: "When [my husband] first started to spend a lot of time on the computer in the middle of the night and early morning, he told me it was 'research.' I walked in on him one morning and caught him looking at [pornography]. He said it was only a matter of curiosity. When I took a closer look at what he was watching, it made me sick. He was embarrassed and promised to stop, and I believed he meant it. He has always been honourable-a man of his word."
This man's perverse habit has cost him his self respect, his honour, his integrity, and the respect and admiration of his wife. It has destroyed something intrinsic and wholesome within him. He has become weakened and his resolve degraded. Many men are now being lured into a similar trap; anxious to avoid discovery, they log on late at night or early in the morning. If they are caught, they often try to cover up what they are doing by lying, as this man did. Can anyone reasonably claim that a "hobby" that causes "a man of his word" to sneak around in the middle of the night and to lie to loved ones is harmless?
Pornography makes a profit out of the suffering of others, and is designed in the main to degrade and subvert the innate goodness in people, causing serious personal and family problems, to isolate, corrupt and demoralise. Many people caught up in this evil `racket,` have admitted that watching pornography has prevented them from developing close relationships with others. They don't want people around while they indulge their passion for pornography. People tend to fantasize when they watch pornography, and fantasy does not equip a person to cultivate strong relationships or to deal with life in the real world. Increasingly, we are hearing of cases where people who look at or read pornographic material even have trouble enjoying normal sexual relations with their mate. Is that conducive to good family relations? Of course not. Nor is it intended to be. Can a pastime that alienates people from those who care the most about them be truly innocuous?
We must consider God's original purpose for married people. He lovingly endowed husbands and wives with the ability to give joyous expression of their love for each other, through honourable sexual relations. Proverbs 5:18, 19 shows that these were meant to be pleasurable: "Rejoice with the wife of your youth. Let her own breasts intoxicate you at all times. With her love may you be in ecstasy constantly."
Note that love, not depraved animal like lust, was to be the basis for sexual relations. The person who looks at pornography is gratifying his own sexual desires-and alone, in most cases. A married man who looks at pornography may begin to view his mate as a mere object-someone who exists solely for his pleasure, or conversely, he simply loses interest in her altogether. This is far from the dignity and honour that the Creator intended men to accord women. (see 1 Peter 3:7) Such a practice that interferes with the most intimate aspects of marriage can never be viewed as desirable? Moreover, the pornographic industry, owned and controlled as it is by the Illuminati, understands only too well that what begins as a casual indulgence inevitably leads to a damaging long-term addiction. One writer observed: "Just as drug addicts require more potent drugs to receive a 'high,' consumers of pornography must have a more intense experience to achieve the same euphoric feelings as before."
That is apparently what happened to the husband mentioned earlier in this article. One evening several months after he promised to stop watching pornography, his wife returned home and found him at the computer. From his demeanour she could see that something was wrong. "[He] appeared quite nervous and upset," she wrote; "I looked at the computer, and sure enough, he had been looking at some unbelievably raunchy stuff. He said he was sincere when he promised to give it up, but he just couldn't stay away from it."
Just like narcotics, gambling, alcohol and the plethora of other vices tearing down the Christian moral fabric of our societies, pornography has been created and designed to create an immoral dependency, which destroys not only the trust and respect of loved ones, but a person's self respect and trust in himself. It is a tool of those who will dethrone all righteousness and goodness and replace it with the purest of evil.
Lucifer's Indulgence: Humankind's Scourge.
Sarah Evelyn Isobel Payne [4]was murdered by Roy William Whiting in July 2000. The subsequent investigation became a high profile murder case in the United Kingdom. Following his conviction, Whiting was imprisoned for life and is currently being held in the maximum security Wakefield prison, in West Yorkshire.
There is one fact in the disturbing history of Roy Whiting, convicted of the murder of eight year-old Sarah Payne, which has not received much attention. He had kept large quantities of pornography in his garage workshop. Indeed, there is scarcely a sex offender who has not had an acute pornography habit. In America, the FBI has reported that 81 percent of sex killers have said their biggest sexual interest lay in viewing pornography, and in compulsive masturbation. Now, no-one would suggest that pornography alone causes such men to go and commit these terrible offences; and many men who use porn lead otherwise blameless lives.
But equally, as the British sex crimes expert, Ray Wyre has observed, pornography creates a climate of thought and belief which influences attitudes towards women and children. What's more, Wyre says, the more men masturbate to pornographic fantasies, the more likely they are to put those fantasies into practice. In other words, porn has an effect on the behaviour of those who use it. Yet many think instead it acts as a safety valve. Unlike fantasies involving violence, sexual pornography is widely thought to be harmless. More than that, `Tatler` magazine now reports that porno-chic is the new fashion statement. After all, our society now runs on sex like a car runs on petrol. TV, films, ads for everything from perfume to ice cream, are all sold on more and more explicit sex. So since sex is no longer taboo, isn't it ridiculous to behave like Mrs Grundy over pornography?
After all, the argument goes, English culture has always been bawdy and debauched. Just think of Chaucer's Miller's Tale; or Shakespeare's prostitute Doll Tearsheet; or, indeed, the pornography produced by the Victorians. Who now would ban the works of DH Lawrence, Radclyffe Hall, James Joyce or Henry Miller, all of whom were once considered obscene? Tastes change all the time, along with standards of acceptability. Pornography is a legitimate form of expression which may even do some good, say it's apologists .
Such an ostensibly sophisticated view is surely naive and self-deluding. It was fashionable in the sixties and seventies to believe that if people were freed from rules and constraints, they could be trusted to place limits on their own behaviour. But as the feminist Germaine Greer has observed, porn is nothing to do with freedom of expression. It is a ruthless industry which abuses not only those who furnish its imagery but also the men who pay for its product.
The Graphic Detail.
Today's pornography is no longer a bit of full-frontal nudity and some explicit bumping and grinding. What was illegal merely eighteen months ago - and could only be obtained by means of a package slipped out from the back of some tacky premises - is now legally on open display in licensed sex shops and available through the internet. The spread of computers has hugely increased the availability of pornography, which can be downloaded so easily from the web. What was considered illegal material, amounted to cruelty, degradation and humiliation of women through close-ups of penetration, ejaculation and masturbation. Now such images are all legal.
The details are sordid, and will shock many. But it is surely essential that people are aware of what is being tolerated in the name of freedom of expression and of personal choice. For these legal videos do not merely show loveless, sad encounters. They dehumanise sex altogether. There is very little view of faces or indeed any part of the anatomy apart from the genital region. Women and men are reduced to pieces of hydraulic machinery. The action consists mainly of close-ups of anal and vaginal penetration, sometimes simultaneous. Sometimes the girl undergoes double penetration while practising oral sex on a third man, or with more than one man at the same time. The female genital region is always shaved to produce a disturbing simulation of a child; worse still, it is often pulled back so the camera peers right inside it. The impression that fills the screen is of a carcass being rammed in every orifice.
What's even more revolting is that in many of these videos the men ejaculate over the girl's face. In one, as the eight or so men she is servicing do this to her, the girl's expression is fixed in a ghastly simulation of pleasure - but for one brief moment when she thinks the camera isn't looking, the mask slips and you see her utter disgust and despair before she resumes her pose. We are told that such girls are consenting adults. But so what? Has our society really arrived at such a pass that if a girl is so damaged that she allows herself to be treated worse than any animal - in effect, as a thing - this is considered acceptable because she is not doing it at knife-point?
Do we not care about the terrible degradation not only of the girl, but of the men buying this material, and of our whole society? Are we all now so de-sensitised that we have somehow persuaded ourselves that tolerating such monstrousness is in our interests?
The answer is despairingly `YES.` Our societies, hearts and minds are truly in the grip of the `Wicked One.`
An Expanding Industry.
Thanks to the internet, the sheer volume of pornography has exploded. Tapping in the word 'porn' to one server alone brings up 24,522 sites. These legal websites feature a huge amount of anal sex. This is all about pain and contempt. 'Watch young teens bite their lips as they get it in the ass for the first time!' invites one site. 'Amazing anal - the world's nastiest site', boasts another. Yet another promises: 'It's hurting time: home to extreme pain hardcore'. This displays hot wax poured onto and even pins stuck through women's genitals, and asserts: 'These wenches do it because they love it', fuelling the murderous fantasy that women want to be hurt.
There's also heavy emphasis on 'teen sluts'. These are almost certainly older girls pretending to be children, but even so this shades into paedophilia since the pitch is the stomach-heaving fantasy that these are children who will be 'split' open. And all this is legal. You look at these vile images and you wonder what kind of a man could possibly find pleasure or release in them. For it's no longer just the denizens of sleazy Soho who are consumers of hard-core. It's the banker or the teacher or the advertising executive sitting in front of his computer in his neat suburban house or up-market apartment, downloading this viciousness from the web and then going out for a nice meal with his wife or girlfriend.
These websites, however, are immensely repetitive and tedious. They invite a credit card subscription on the promise of more extreme material, but then deny access to it unless yet more money is paid. In this way they lead the man on in the hope of finding the ultimate forbidden thrill. So when this doesn't materialise, what could be more inevitable or easy for him than to get into an internet 'chat room' and download illegal paedophile pictures of penetration or oral sex with a child?
The illegal stuff on video and on the web is now confined to things like paedophilia, bestiality, torture or coprophilia, which involves bodily waste products. Yet such is the slide in norms of behaviour, the police expect that in due course these taboos too will disappear. So how is all this being allowed to happen? In the UK, the law controlling pornography is the 1959 Obscene Publications Act, which outlaws any material likely to deprave or corrupt. The first problem is the subjective nature of this definition and the absence of any firm evidence of the harm such images can do.
Legal Aid.
In May 2000, a decision by the UK courts dramatically undermined the restraint the law did offer. Mr Justice Hooper turned down a legal challenge by the British Board of Film Classification, to a decision by its own appeal panel that the Board had been wrong to insist on cuts of explicit sequences before it would license a group of porn videos. As result, the BBFC had to rewrite its own guidelines, which until then had outlawed explicit penetration or ejaculation from the videos it licensed. When board members asked the public for their views, they were told - to their horror - that the public wanted to make their own decision whether or not to view such material.
The outcome was that the Board had no option but to issue revised guidelines which they feared would open the floodgates. Just as they predicted, they found themselves licensing the kind of highly disturbing pornography that had previously been illegal. Moreover, these new guidelines rapidly became a benchmark for everyone else. So porn sites on the web started to circulate equally explicit material; top shelf magazines stocked by corner newsagents, started to include equivalent pictures; and TV stations such as Channel Four and Five are now also pushing to take advantage of this shift in practice.
A Harmless Diversion?
The argument is that pornographic images don't harm anyone as they are merely fantasies. But fantasies of what? Of hurting women? Of humiliating them? Of treating them as dehumanised objects?As the philosopher Roger Scruton argues in his book `Sexual Desire,` fantasy has a tendency to remake the world in its own image. So the 'harmless' porn voyeur can turn into a rapist with a gun. For his fantasy is governed by monstrous myths and illusions - that women wish to be raped, that children are waiting to be awakened to sexual pleasure, or that violence is a natural right.
Pornography objectifies women and reduces them to a commodity. Such dehumanisation affects the man's behaviour, ranging from withdrawal of intimacy through to harsh treatment of women, to outright abuse. Dr Trevor Stammers, a GP who has often written about sexual problems, says most women he counsels whose husbands are into porn claim this has destroyed their marriages. The husband prefers to find sexual release from a computer because this doesn't require any personal engagement by him. So he chooses physical sensation without love. 'There is no doubt', says Dr Stammers, 'that as a result of using pornography such men become far more callous towards women. What they are seeking from porn is the illusion of power and control over them'.
Research studies back up the suggestion that using pornography badly affects behaviour and relationships. American academics Dolf Zillmann and Jennings Bryant have shown that pornography can diminish a person's sexual happiness, that it damages beliefs about sexuality and attitudes towards women, and that it desensitises people to rape as a criminal offence. An American survey last year showed that more than 200,000 people were effectively addicted to porn through websites and associated chat-rooms. Victor Cline of the University of Utah has documented how men who become addicted to pornography, begin to want more explicit or deviant material, and end up acting out what they have seen.
Isn't that to 'deprave and corrupt' by any reasonable understanding of those terms? Yet far from being outlawed, porn is becoming mainstream behaviour. Sado-masochism has its own fashionable clubs. In Britain, Sodomy was made legal for women when the age of homosexual consent was reduced to 16yrs; what was once considered an intolerable assault on women, from which the law should protect them, has now become their 'right.' And urination during sex - the 'golden shower' is even discussed enthusiastically in teen magazines.
Conclusion.
What we once believed righteous has been dethroned by that which we once knew to be evil. A world turned on it's head. The very mention that Christianity, or Islam, are the last bastions of virtue and morality causes the majority of people here in the West to `short circuit, ` and close down. The family unit is an endangered species. How many young men and women today even consider that a life of devotion and duty to each other, as man and wife, and to their would be offspring, as parents, is an end in itself? The whole concept of what was not so long ago taken for granted, has become somehow irrelevant and even to a degree redundant.
By gratuitously portraying immoral and lewd acts, pornography undercuts or sabotages a persons efforts to discern between what is good and what is not. It is nothing less than a loss of God! There is nothing harmless about pornography. It is exploitive and corrupting. It can and increasingly does destroy relationships, perverting the natural expression of sexual intimacy into a voyeuristic activity. It poisons the mind and spirituality of the voyeur. It promotes selfish, greedy attitudes and teaches people to view others as objects fit only to satisfy their lust. It undermines all efforts to do good and maintain a clean conscience.
Truly, pornography is Satan's scourge against mankind, and a major `siege gun` in the Illuminati's plan to dehumanise and depopulate. How far away they are from the setting up of their New World Order with it's `New Feudal` social model and reduced serf class it is hard to say. What is for certain though is that our best hope and defence against this evil scheme is our faith in God and a renewed commitment to the institutions of marriage and family.
For it is surely in these we can begin to build the `fortress` of our resistance.
Comments to : http://righteousalliance.blogspot.com/2009/07/pornographic-conspiracy-destroying.html
Reference:
1] http://righteousalliance.blogspot.com/2009/07/who-rules-worldthe-origin-of-evil.html
2] http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_sociopol_depopu.htm
3] http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/bloodlines/index.htm
4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Whiting
5] http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/J._Edgar_Hoover
6] http://www.google.com/search?q=Dr+Judith+Reisman&rls=com.microsoft:en-g
b:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GPEA_enDK310
7] http://www.divorcewizards.com/Divorce-Statistics-Pornography.html
Source link: http://www.rense.com/general86/porno.htm
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Well, I've certainly seen my share of porn (particularly in college) and I think Jones is correct. We all know we are nearing the end game, so everyone should be getting prepared, spiritually at least.
The Pornographic Conspiracy
Destroying The Family - Degrading The Human Spirit
By Philip Jones
7-31-9
Introduction.
Throughout the Western World, the Christian foundations of decency, morality, restraint, and integrity; the very moral anchor which held our civilisation together for centuries, has come under a concerted and simultaneous multi-theatre attack, which in it's ferocity and intensity can only be described as diabolical. Here in Northern Europe, with some rare exceptions, the last bastion of what is true, virtuous and righteous, is to be found paradoxically, only amongst the followers of Islam, and make no mistake about it, even that community of faithful believers, is coming under pernicious attack by the agents of change, in the form of the welfare state; dabbling in the affairs of Muslim families, the education system, gradually breaking down the moral and belief systems of the young, and of course, the sick and twisted `entertainment industry` along with the mass media in general.
In my recent article, `Who Rules The World,`[1] I hypothesised that the very source of those afflictions, which have and continue to debase and de-construct our way of life, eroding ever more, all that was once marvellous and righteous, in lands which once formed what was known as `Christendom,` is literally the work of Satan/Lucifer, who with a little help from his legions of `Fallen Angels,` Demon helpers, and his bloodline [3]descendants known as the Illuminati, is establishing his dominion here on earth, just as he set out to do at the very beginning of time.
Having outlined in detail in that three part series the basis for my hypothesis, there is no need to elaborate further here. It is sufficient to direct the reader to that article so that he/she may judge for his/herself whether there is any credibility in my assertion.
Those elements of social and moral decay that we are witnessing today; the increasingly pornographic culture, high divorce rates; growing numbers of unwed single mothers; the hordes of illegitimate children; homosexuality and lesbianism, sexual perversion and the alarmingly high number of abortions, is not some new phenomenon. It is an ingenious and fiendish plot that has been around for many Millennia (see Sodom and Gomorrah and the cruel and debased cultures prevalent throughout the land of Canaan and further afield during Old Testament times) designed to annihilate what is, the very heart and foundation of all good and decent society; namely, the family!
You are about to read written proof of this clandestine conspiracy. You will learn about who and what is behind it, and their fierce unwavering mission to degrade and eradicate the family, separate man from his mate, pervert and `filthify` our God given human spirit, and drag what's left of humanity after their multi faceted depopulation agenda has been taken to it's illogical conclusion, into a Luciferian nightmare, whereby a relatively small and immensely wealthy and powerful `bloodline` elite, hold sway as the `proxy` lords of this planet, for their master, Lucifer.
Destroy The Family.
In 1956, J. Edgar Hoover, [5] the then Director of the FBI, himself a 33rd Degree Freemason and therefore no stranger to Luciferian machinations and other deviant behaviour, somewhat paradoxically wrote:
"The individual is handicapped by coming face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent." The Elks Magazine (August 1956)
Mr. Hoover knew what he was talking about, and it is probably even truer today to comment that few people understand, or even consider the malicious forces now arrayed against the family, the institution of marriage and the very nature of our being. They simply cannot comprehend how hell-bent the forces of evil are on destroying the family. Read into the chilling words of Communist demagogue, Lenin: "Destroy the family and you destroy society," [1]and then get an idea of the dire and perilous nature of the situation.
Lenin had a devious plan to carry out his sinister plot and he wasn't alone! We will deal with this in a moment. But firstly, it is necessary to recognise the direct parallels of our current state of affairs to the original Marxist Communist plot to eradicate the family, as was noted in the 1926 July issue of the Atlantic Monthly:
When the Bolsheviki came into power in 1917 they regarded the family, like every other "bourgeois" institution, with fierce hatred, and set out with a will to destroy it. "To clear the family out of the accumulated dust of the ages we had to give it a good shake-up, and we did," declared Madame Smidovich, a leading Communist and active participant in the recent discussion. So one of the first decrees of the Soviet Government abolished the term "illegitimate children." This was done simply by equalizing the legal status of all children, whether born in wedlock or out of it, and now the Soviet Government boasts that Russia is the only country where there are no illegitimate children. The father of a child is forced to contribute to its support, usually paying the mother a third of his salary...
At the same time, a law was passed which made divorce a matter of a few minutes, to be obtained at the request of either partner in a marriage. Chaos was the result. Men took to changing wives with the same zest which they displayed in the consumption of the recently restored forty-per-cent vodka.
"Some men have twenty wives, living a week with one, a month with another," asserted an indignant woman delegate during the sessions of the Tzik. "They have children with all of them, and these children are thrown on the street for lack of support!"
(There are three hundred thousand shelter-less children in Russia to-day, who are literally turned out on the streets. They are one of the greatest social dangers of the present time, because they are developing into professional criminals. More than half of them are drug addicts and sex perverts. It is claimed by many Communists that the break-up of the family is responsible for a large percentage of these children.)
The peasant villages have perhaps suffered most from this revolution in sex relations. An epidemic of marriages and divorces broke out in the country districts. [Marriage became a game where it] was not unusual for a boy of twenty to have had three or four wives, or for a girl of the same age to have had three or four abortions. The peasants bitterly complained: "Abortions cover our villages with shame. Formerly we did not even hear of them." Many women found marriage and childbearing a profitable occupation. They formed connections ( sexual) with the sons of well-to-do peasants and then blackmailed the father for the support of the children. In some cases peasants have been obliged to sell [everything] in order to settle such claims. The law has created still more confusion because women can claim support for children born many years ago.
During the winter of 1924-1925 some of the older Communists accused the younger generation of indulging in loose connections; they blame the girl students for practising frequent abortions Russian women students [noted] that love was almost the only cheap amusement left to them and demanded that they be given free abortions that factory women enjoy Both in the villages and in the cities, the problem of the unmarried mother has become very acute and provides a severe and annoying test of Communist theories.
Another new point was that wife and husband would have an equal right to claim support from the other The woman would have the right to demand support for her child even if she lived with several men during the period of conception; but, in contrast to previous practice, she or the court would choose one man who would be held responsible for the support. Commissar Kursky seemed especially proud of this point because it differed so much from the 'bourgeois customs' of Europe and America.
Another speaker objected to the proposed law on the ground that some women would take advantage of its liberal provisions to form connections with wealthy men and then blackmail them for alimony.[2]
[1] Lenin merely repeated what Socrates had said and what Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx put into words. Lenin set out to do just that, hoping that a new society -- with the State as the ultimate father -- could be constructed. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, we have seen the consequences of the experiment.
[2] The Atlantic Monthly; July 1926; The Russian Effort to Abolish Marriage; Volume 138, No. 1; page 108-114. You can read the document in its entirety by
Here's how the scheme to destroy the family is mapped out:
Eliminate the sacredness of the marriage covenant from the minds of the masses. Make them believe marriage is outdated and blasé
Inspire hatred against the family unit, manhood and fatherhood
Institute no-fault divorce and encourage serial divorces
Incite rampant promiscuity, fornication and adultery
Make having illegitimate children become a common practice
Convince society that a child in the womb is not a human being
Provoke women to have abortions without regard to God or their consciences
Make true love seem like cheap amusement
Stimulate the people to confuse sex with love
Create an environment that encourages unwed single motherhood
Inspire men to disrespect, dishonour and abuse women
Design laws that motivate women to commit paternity fraud
Incite homosexuality, lesbianism, sexual immorality and perversion
Influence men to effortlessly abandon children they sire
Most importantly, provoke a fierce relentless gender war
Is there anybody reading this who can't draw parallels with their own society?
As you have read above, what happened in the Soviet Union in 1926 was no accident, and it is important to appreciate and easy to see, that the social and moral carnage now occurring throughout the West; the high divorce rate, the huge numbers of unwed mothers, the rage against fatherhood, the gender wars, the overt battle being waged against marriage and the family, and the highly detailed attacks on the bedrock of our civilisation, are equally as well planned, orchestrated and micromanaged by the same evil force which established and funded that rotten regime.
We will now witness how certain Americans, like their Communist Russian counterparts, have also been and still are, determined to de-construct, dismantle and exterminate the family.
The Conspirators.
"The nuclear family must be destroyed , and people must find better ways of living together. ... Whatever it's ultimate meaning, the break-up of families now is an objectively revolutionary process. ... "Families have supported oppression by separating people into small, isolated units, unable to join together to fight for common interests. ..." - Functions of the Family, Linda Gordon, WOMEN: A Journal of Liberation, Fall, 1969.
"By the year 2000 we will, I hope, raise our children to believe in human potential, not God" - Gloria Steinem, editor of 'MS' magazine.
"We can't destroy the inequities between men and women until we destroy marriage. " -- [Robin Morgan, "Sisterhood Is Powerful," (ed), 1970, p. 537]
"The most merciful thing a large family can do to one of its infant members is to kill it" - Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, in Women and the New Rage, p.67
"Marriage has existed for the benefit of men; and has been a legally sanctioned method of control over women... We must work to destroy it. The end of the institution of marriage is a necessary condition for the liberation of women. Therefore it is important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not to live individually with men." - The Declaration of Feminism , November 1971
"Only when manhood is dead - and it will perish when ravaged femininity no longer sustains it - only then will we know what it is to be free." -- [Andrea Dworkin. "The Root Cause," speech, 26 Sept. 1975, at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge (published in Our Blood, ch. 9, 1976).]
"The care of children ...is infinitely better left to the best trained practitioners of both sexes who have chosen it as a vocation...[This] would further undermine family structure while contributing to the freedom of women." - Kate Millet, Sexual Politics 178-179
"In order to raise children with equality, we must take them away from families and communally raise them." -- Dr. Mary Jo Bane, feminist and assistant professor of education at Wellesley College and associate director of the school's Centre for Research on Woman
"Who cares how men feel or what they do or whether they suffer? They have had over 2000 years to dominate and made a complete hash of it. Now it is our turn. My only comment to men is, if you don't like it, bad luck - and if you get in my way I'll run you down." - Letter to the Editor: Women's Turn to Dominate, Signed: Liberated Women, Boronia; Herald-Sun, Melbourne, Australia, February 9, 1996
"Life in this society being, at best, an utter bore and no aspect of society being at all relevant to women, there remains to civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking females only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation, and destroy the male sex." - Valerie Solana, SCUM Manifesto (Society for Cutting Up Men.)
"How will the family unit be destroyed? ... the demand alone will throw the whole ideology of the family into question, so that women can begin establishing a community of work with each other and we can fight collectively. Women will feel freer to leave their husbands and become economically independent, either through a job or welfare."- Female Liberation , by Roxanne Dunbar.
"I feel that 'man-hating' is an honourable and viable political act, that the oppressed have a right to class-hatred against the class that is oppressing them." - Robin Morgan, (editor of MS magazine)
"It is important for us to encourage women to leave their husbands and not to live individually with men... All of history must be re-written in terms of oppression of women. We must go back to ancient female religions like witchcraft" - The Declaration of Feminism , November 1971.
"God is going to change. We women... will change the world so much that He won't fit any-more." - Naomi Goldenberg, Changing of the Gods: Feminism and the End of Traditional Religions (Quoted at beginning of From Father God to Mother Earth)
I hope that the reader now understands by the sheer malevolence of the above statements, that the Communist `front group` known as the feminist movement, has nothing whatsoever to do with `women's rights,` and everything to do with the complete and total emasculation of the human male, the enforced collapse of patriarchy and the breakdown of the family, thereby facilitating the depopulation agenda[2] and aiding the implementation of the Satanic New World Order. This attack against the family, against the institution of marriage and against God and country is not a game!
These people are serious about abolishing the family unit, and the American nation, along with all other nation states in fact. They are relentless and will stop at nothing to eradicate God, morals, marriage, manhood, womanhood, fatherhood, motherhood, husband-hood and love of nation from our hearts and minds. Their mission is to persuade the masses to engage in a cloaked form of Satan Worship, disguised among other things as humanistic atheism, pantheism, `earth` worship, along with accompanying social aberrations such as misogyny, domestic violence, child abandonment, child support schemes and traps, paternity fraud, serial divorces, serial abortions, pornography, sexual perversion, homosexuality and lesbianism.
Pornography : Debasing Human Nature.
It cannot be argued that one of the most insidious weapons being used in this war against God's most honoured institution, is Pornography, and it is this aspect of the vengeful battle being directed against the hearts, souls and consciences of men and women, not only here in the west, but increasingly due to internet access, on a global scale, which I will now deal with in some detail.
Sexual material of all kinds is now all too easily accessible through television, movies, music videos, and particularly the Internet. Many will have us believe that this relentless intrusion of pornographic, sexualised imagery is harmless, but it is anything but. It is a debased aberrant form of human sexuality, encouraged by the agents of those doing the work of Lucifer, which is highly addictive, destructive, demoralising, corrupting and eventually fatal to any chance of a moral and decent way of life. Despite what its apologists and defenders say, pornography has a profoundly negative effect on how people view sex and sexual behaviour. Researchers at the National Foundation for Family Research and Education concluded not surprisingly that "exposure to pornography puts viewers at increased risk for developing sexually deviant tendencies." According to the report, "the rape myth (belief that women cause and enjoy rape, and that rapists are normal) is very widespread in habitual male users of pornography."
There is also evidence that the repeated use of pornography can interfere with the ability to enjoy and participate in normal marital intimacy. Dr.Victor Cline, a specialist in treating sex addiction, has documented a recurring progression in the use of pornography. If left unchecked, what starts as casual viewing of pornography can eventually lead to an escalation to more hard-core, aberrant material. This, he claims, can lead to deviant sexual acts. Behavioural scientists agree. Dr. Cline reports that "any type of sexual deviation can be acquired in this way, and that it cannot be eliminated even by massive feelings of guilt." Eventually, the viewer may try to act out the pornography-based, immoral fantasies, often with devastating results.
The course of this problem may be gradual and undetected, concluded Cline. He states: "Like a cancer, it keeps growing and spreading. It rarely ever reverses itself, and it is also very difficult to treat and heal. Denial on the part of the male addict and refusal to confront the problem are typical and predictable, and this almost always leads to marital or couple disharmony, sometimes divorce, and sometimes the breaking up of other intimate relationships."
The Damage To Young People.
Some researchers say that exposure to pornography can affect the natural development of a child's brain. Of course it can! Statistics show that the primary consumers of pornography are boys between the ages of 12 and 17 years. In fact, for many, pornography is their primary source of sexual education. This has very disturbing ramifications. "Teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases," notes one report, "are completely non-existent in porn, giving a false belief that there are no adverse consequences to behaviours depicted in pornography." Young males are being targeted by this industry of filth for a very definite reason: to warp and pervert their ability to interact normally with girls, by portraying the human female as little more than a collection of body orifices to be filled.
Dr.Judith Reisman, [6] president of the Institute for Media Education, and one of the most exceptional human beings currently inhabiting this planet, concludes: "Health-based neurological observations about the instinctual brain-imprinted response to pornographic sights and sounds indicates that viewing pornography is a biologically significant event that overrides informed consent-and that is harmful to children's [moldable] 'plastic' brains because it compromises their grasp of reality and thus their mental and physical health, their well-being and their pursuit of happiness."
Pornography shapes attitudes and influences behaviour. Its messages are enticing primarily because they are fantasy and thus presented as more exciting than the real thing. "Individuals using pornography set themselves up for unrealistic expectations leading to damaged relationships," notes one report. Pornography not only can, but is of course intended, to destroy trust and openness, two highly essential qualities in a marriage. Because it is primarily viewed in secret, pornography use often leads to deception and lying. Mates feel betrayed. They do not understand why their marriage partner no longer finds them desirable, and what's more nor does he..
Remember, as we have discussed above, the object of the exercise is the destruction of the family. How many marriage breakups and broken homes can be blamed on pornographic addiction?
At a 2003 meeting of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, two thirds of the 350 divorce lawyers who attended, said the Internet played a significant role in the divorces in the past year, with excessive interest in on-line porn contributing to more than half such cases. Pornography had an almost non-existent role in divorce just seven or eight years ago[7]
The insistence on selfish instant gratification at all costs is inbuilt and inherent in pornography use. Hence, viewing pornography is unloving. It undercuts a true believer's fight to maintain chastity and a clean moral standing before God. Pornography exploits men, women and children. It demeans them and robs them of their dignity and rights.
The Main-Streaming Of Perversion.
Many people today are ambivalent toward pornography, because like all those other vices now prevalent in the West, it has entered the mainstream and become to a large degree, accepted practice. Modern attitudes toward pornography may be reflected by the 'prostitute-chic' fashions many celebrities sport, the music videos that increasingly flaunt sexual imagery, and the advertising media's adoption of a "porno aesthetic."
Doctors now claim that pornography can spark an addiction that is far more difficult to overcome than drug addiction. Treatment for drug addicts usually starts with detoxification to remove the substance from the body. But addiction to pornography, explains Dr. Mary Anne Layden of the University of Pennsylvania, "produces mental imagery which is permanently implanted in the mind of the user and is scaled in by brain chemistry." That is why individuals can vividly recall pornographic images from years past. She concludes: "This is the first addictive substance for which there is no hope for detoxification." But does that mean it is impossible to break free from pornography's influence? And what specific harm does pornography cause?
Internet Pornography Facts:
About 75 percent of Internet pornography originates in the United States. Close to 15 percent originates in Europe.
It is estimated that some 70 million people a week visit pornographic Web sites. About 20 million of these users are in Canada and the United States.
A study revealed that during a recent one-month period, Germany had the largest audience for on-line pornography in Europe, followed by Great Britain, France, Italy, and Spain.
In Germany, Internet pornography users spend an average of 70 minutes each month viewing pornographic sites.
Among European viewers of Internet pornography, those above 50 years of age spend the most time connected to adult Web sites.
According to one source, 70 percent of Internet pornography traffic occurs during the day.
It is estimated by some that 100,000 Internet sites include material on child pornography.
About 80 percent of the Internet's commercial child pornography originates in Japan.
There is a proven connection between pornography and rape, as well as other forms of violence against women and children. Infamous serial killer Ted Bundy admits that he had a "strong appetite for violent pornography." He says: "This condition is not immediately seen by the individual or identified as a serious problem. But this interest becomes geared towards matters of a sexual nature that involve violence. I cannot emphasize enough the gradual development of this. It is not short-term."
Rather than portraying sexual relations as a beautiful and intimate expression of love between a man and a woman in honourable marriage, pornography demeans and distorts the sexual act. Casual and perverted sex is portrayed as being exciting and desirable. Personal gratification with little or no regard for the other person is highlighted. Women, men, and children are portrayed as objects that exist only for sexual gratification. "Beauty is measured by proportion of body parts, shaping unrealistic expectations," says one report. "Depicting women as anonymous, ever-wanting/waiting, empty sex toys for men, stripping and exposing their bodies for monetary gain and entertainment cannot possibly translate into a message that can exist in harmony with equality, dignity and humanity," concludes another report.
Soon, like any other improper stimulation, what initially arouses becomes mundane and routine. "Over time," says one writer, "[the users of pornography] require more explicit and deviant material. They may push their partners into increasingly bizarre sexual activities, diminishing their [own] capacity to express real affection." Does that sound like a harmless diversion?
Instead of love, pornography cultivates self-centred, selfish desire, and fractures and stains every person it contaminates. It destroys all decency and is a major threat to our traditional way of life, and particularly, marriage and family.
Pornography - A Vicious Assault On The Family.
It is a sad reality that many Internet porn viewers are children. Youngsters who though prohibited by law from purchasing pornographic literature or from renting pornographic videos, can gain access to these in their own home with a few clicks of the mouse. The choices are endless. Many children regularly visit Internet sites without their parents' knowledge. In fact, The Detroit News states that "more than two in five children have subscribed to a web site or other service online even though nearly 85 percent of parents have rules against them doing so."
Many think that a casual brush with pornography is harmless. However, the facts show otherwise. Consider the case of a couple who seemed to have an ideal marriage. They were financially secure, and they loved to travel. Their friends thought of them as close, affectionate, and devoted, and in many ways they were. However, problems arose when the husband started looking at pornography. Writing to a popular advice columnist, his anxious wife described her concerns: "When [my husband] first started to spend a lot of time on the computer in the middle of the night and early morning, he told me it was 'research.' I walked in on him one morning and caught him looking at [pornography]. He said it was only a matter of curiosity. When I took a closer look at what he was watching, it made me sick. He was embarrassed and promised to stop, and I believed he meant it. He has always been honourable-a man of his word."
This man's perverse habit has cost him his self respect, his honour, his integrity, and the respect and admiration of his wife. It has destroyed something intrinsic and wholesome within him. He has become weakened and his resolve degraded. Many men are now being lured into a similar trap; anxious to avoid discovery, they log on late at night or early in the morning. If they are caught, they often try to cover up what they are doing by lying, as this man did. Can anyone reasonably claim that a "hobby" that causes "a man of his word" to sneak around in the middle of the night and to lie to loved ones is harmless?
Pornography makes a profit out of the suffering of others, and is designed in the main to degrade and subvert the innate goodness in people, causing serious personal and family problems, to isolate, corrupt and demoralise. Many people caught up in this evil `racket,` have admitted that watching pornography has prevented them from developing close relationships with others. They don't want people around while they indulge their passion for pornography. People tend to fantasize when they watch pornography, and fantasy does not equip a person to cultivate strong relationships or to deal with life in the real world. Increasingly, we are hearing of cases where people who look at or read pornographic material even have trouble enjoying normal sexual relations with their mate. Is that conducive to good family relations? Of course not. Nor is it intended to be. Can a pastime that alienates people from those who care the most about them be truly innocuous?
We must consider God's original purpose for married people. He lovingly endowed husbands and wives with the ability to give joyous expression of their love for each other, through honourable sexual relations. Proverbs 5:18, 19 shows that these were meant to be pleasurable: "Rejoice with the wife of your youth. Let her own breasts intoxicate you at all times. With her love may you be in ecstasy constantly."
Note that love, not depraved animal like lust, was to be the basis for sexual relations. The person who looks at pornography is gratifying his own sexual desires-and alone, in most cases. A married man who looks at pornography may begin to view his mate as a mere object-someone who exists solely for his pleasure, or conversely, he simply loses interest in her altogether. This is far from the dignity and honour that the Creator intended men to accord women. (see 1 Peter 3:7) Such a practice that interferes with the most intimate aspects of marriage can never be viewed as desirable? Moreover, the pornographic industry, owned and controlled as it is by the Illuminati, understands only too well that what begins as a casual indulgence inevitably leads to a damaging long-term addiction. One writer observed: "Just as drug addicts require more potent drugs to receive a 'high,' consumers of pornography must have a more intense experience to achieve the same euphoric feelings as before."
That is apparently what happened to the husband mentioned earlier in this article. One evening several months after he promised to stop watching pornography, his wife returned home and found him at the computer. From his demeanour she could see that something was wrong. "[He] appeared quite nervous and upset," she wrote; "I looked at the computer, and sure enough, he had been looking at some unbelievably raunchy stuff. He said he was sincere when he promised to give it up, but he just couldn't stay away from it."
Just like narcotics, gambling, alcohol and the plethora of other vices tearing down the Christian moral fabric of our societies, pornography has been created and designed to create an immoral dependency, which destroys not only the trust and respect of loved ones, but a person's self respect and trust in himself. It is a tool of those who will dethrone all righteousness and goodness and replace it with the purest of evil.
Lucifer's Indulgence: Humankind's Scourge.
Sarah Evelyn Isobel Payne [4]was murdered by Roy William Whiting in July 2000. The subsequent investigation became a high profile murder case in the United Kingdom. Following his conviction, Whiting was imprisoned for life and is currently being held in the maximum security Wakefield prison, in West Yorkshire.
There is one fact in the disturbing history of Roy Whiting, convicted of the murder of eight year-old Sarah Payne, which has not received much attention. He had kept large quantities of pornography in his garage workshop. Indeed, there is scarcely a sex offender who has not had an acute pornography habit. In America, the FBI has reported that 81 percent of sex killers have said their biggest sexual interest lay in viewing pornography, and in compulsive masturbation. Now, no-one would suggest that pornography alone causes such men to go and commit these terrible offences; and many men who use porn lead otherwise blameless lives.
But equally, as the British sex crimes expert, Ray Wyre has observed, pornography creates a climate of thought and belief which influences attitudes towards women and children. What's more, Wyre says, the more men masturbate to pornographic fantasies, the more likely they are to put those fantasies into practice. In other words, porn has an effect on the behaviour of those who use it. Yet many think instead it acts as a safety valve. Unlike fantasies involving violence, sexual pornography is widely thought to be harmless. More than that, `Tatler` magazine now reports that porno-chic is the new fashion statement. After all, our society now runs on sex like a car runs on petrol. TV, films, ads for everything from perfume to ice cream, are all sold on more and more explicit sex. So since sex is no longer taboo, isn't it ridiculous to behave like Mrs Grundy over pornography?
After all, the argument goes, English culture has always been bawdy and debauched. Just think of Chaucer's Miller's Tale; or Shakespeare's prostitute Doll Tearsheet; or, indeed, the pornography produced by the Victorians. Who now would ban the works of DH Lawrence, Radclyffe Hall, James Joyce or Henry Miller, all of whom were once considered obscene? Tastes change all the time, along with standards of acceptability. Pornography is a legitimate form of expression which may even do some good, say it's apologists .
Such an ostensibly sophisticated view is surely naive and self-deluding. It was fashionable in the sixties and seventies to believe that if people were freed from rules and constraints, they could be trusted to place limits on their own behaviour. But as the feminist Germaine Greer has observed, porn is nothing to do with freedom of expression. It is a ruthless industry which abuses not only those who furnish its imagery but also the men who pay for its product.
The Graphic Detail.
Today's pornography is no longer a bit of full-frontal nudity and some explicit bumping and grinding. What was illegal merely eighteen months ago - and could only be obtained by means of a package slipped out from the back of some tacky premises - is now legally on open display in licensed sex shops and available through the internet. The spread of computers has hugely increased the availability of pornography, which can be downloaded so easily from the web. What was considered illegal material, amounted to cruelty, degradation and humiliation of women through close-ups of penetration, ejaculation and masturbation. Now such images are all legal.
The details are sordid, and will shock many. But it is surely essential that people are aware of what is being tolerated in the name of freedom of expression and of personal choice. For these legal videos do not merely show loveless, sad encounters. They dehumanise sex altogether. There is very little view of faces or indeed any part of the anatomy apart from the genital region. Women and men are reduced to pieces of hydraulic machinery. The action consists mainly of close-ups of anal and vaginal penetration, sometimes simultaneous. Sometimes the girl undergoes double penetration while practising oral sex on a third man, or with more than one man at the same time. The female genital region is always shaved to produce a disturbing simulation of a child; worse still, it is often pulled back so the camera peers right inside it. The impression that fills the screen is of a carcass being rammed in every orifice.
What's even more revolting is that in many of these videos the men ejaculate over the girl's face. In one, as the eight or so men she is servicing do this to her, the girl's expression is fixed in a ghastly simulation of pleasure - but for one brief moment when she thinks the camera isn't looking, the mask slips and you see her utter disgust and despair before she resumes her pose. We are told that such girls are consenting adults. But so what? Has our society really arrived at such a pass that if a girl is so damaged that she allows herself to be treated worse than any animal - in effect, as a thing - this is considered acceptable because she is not doing it at knife-point?
Do we not care about the terrible degradation not only of the girl, but of the men buying this material, and of our whole society? Are we all now so de-sensitised that we have somehow persuaded ourselves that tolerating such monstrousness is in our interests?
The answer is despairingly `YES.` Our societies, hearts and minds are truly in the grip of the `Wicked One.`
An Expanding Industry.
Thanks to the internet, the sheer volume of pornography has exploded. Tapping in the word 'porn' to one server alone brings up 24,522 sites. These legal websites feature a huge amount of anal sex. This is all about pain and contempt. 'Watch young teens bite their lips as they get it in the ass for the first time!' invites one site. 'Amazing anal - the world's nastiest site', boasts another. Yet another promises: 'It's hurting time: home to extreme pain hardcore'. This displays hot wax poured onto and even pins stuck through women's genitals, and asserts: 'These wenches do it because they love it', fuelling the murderous fantasy that women want to be hurt.
There's also heavy emphasis on 'teen sluts'. These are almost certainly older girls pretending to be children, but even so this shades into paedophilia since the pitch is the stomach-heaving fantasy that these are children who will be 'split' open. And all this is legal. You look at these vile images and you wonder what kind of a man could possibly find pleasure or release in them. For it's no longer just the denizens of sleazy Soho who are consumers of hard-core. It's the banker or the teacher or the advertising executive sitting in front of his computer in his neat suburban house or up-market apartment, downloading this viciousness from the web and then going out for a nice meal with his wife or girlfriend.
These websites, however, are immensely repetitive and tedious. They invite a credit card subscription on the promise of more extreme material, but then deny access to it unless yet more money is paid. In this way they lead the man on in the hope of finding the ultimate forbidden thrill. So when this doesn't materialise, what could be more inevitable or easy for him than to get into an internet 'chat room' and download illegal paedophile pictures of penetration or oral sex with a child?
The illegal stuff on video and on the web is now confined to things like paedophilia, bestiality, torture or coprophilia, which involves bodily waste products. Yet such is the slide in norms of behaviour, the police expect that in due course these taboos too will disappear. So how is all this being allowed to happen? In the UK, the law controlling pornography is the 1959 Obscene Publications Act, which outlaws any material likely to deprave or corrupt. The first problem is the subjective nature of this definition and the absence of any firm evidence of the harm such images can do.
Legal Aid.
In May 2000, a decision by the UK courts dramatically undermined the restraint the law did offer. Mr Justice Hooper turned down a legal challenge by the British Board of Film Classification, to a decision by its own appeal panel that the Board had been wrong to insist on cuts of explicit sequences before it would license a group of porn videos. As result, the BBFC had to rewrite its own guidelines, which until then had outlawed explicit penetration or ejaculation from the videos it licensed. When board members asked the public for their views, they were told - to their horror - that the public wanted to make their own decision whether or not to view such material.
The outcome was that the Board had no option but to issue revised guidelines which they feared would open the floodgates. Just as they predicted, they found themselves licensing the kind of highly disturbing pornography that had previously been illegal. Moreover, these new guidelines rapidly became a benchmark for everyone else. So porn sites on the web started to circulate equally explicit material; top shelf magazines stocked by corner newsagents, started to include equivalent pictures; and TV stations such as Channel Four and Five are now also pushing to take advantage of this shift in practice.
A Harmless Diversion?
The argument is that pornographic images don't harm anyone as they are merely fantasies. But fantasies of what? Of hurting women? Of humiliating them? Of treating them as dehumanised objects?As the philosopher Roger Scruton argues in his book `Sexual Desire,` fantasy has a tendency to remake the world in its own image. So the 'harmless' porn voyeur can turn into a rapist with a gun. For his fantasy is governed by monstrous myths and illusions - that women wish to be raped, that children are waiting to be awakened to sexual pleasure, or that violence is a natural right.
Pornography objectifies women and reduces them to a commodity. Such dehumanisation affects the man's behaviour, ranging from withdrawal of intimacy through to harsh treatment of women, to outright abuse. Dr Trevor Stammers, a GP who has often written about sexual problems, says most women he counsels whose husbands are into porn claim this has destroyed their marriages. The husband prefers to find sexual release from a computer because this doesn't require any personal engagement by him. So he chooses physical sensation without love. 'There is no doubt', says Dr Stammers, 'that as a result of using pornography such men become far more callous towards women. What they are seeking from porn is the illusion of power and control over them'.
Research studies back up the suggestion that using pornography badly affects behaviour and relationships. American academics Dolf Zillmann and Jennings Bryant have shown that pornography can diminish a person's sexual happiness, that it damages beliefs about sexuality and attitudes towards women, and that it desensitises people to rape as a criminal offence. An American survey last year showed that more than 200,000 people were effectively addicted to porn through websites and associated chat-rooms. Victor Cline of the University of Utah has documented how men who become addicted to pornography, begin to want more explicit or deviant material, and end up acting out what they have seen.
Isn't that to 'deprave and corrupt' by any reasonable understanding of those terms? Yet far from being outlawed, porn is becoming mainstream behaviour. Sado-masochism has its own fashionable clubs. In Britain, Sodomy was made legal for women when the age of homosexual consent was reduced to 16yrs; what was once considered an intolerable assault on women, from which the law should protect them, has now become their 'right.' And urination during sex - the 'golden shower' is even discussed enthusiastically in teen magazines.
Conclusion.
What we once believed righteous has been dethroned by that which we once knew to be evil. A world turned on it's head. The very mention that Christianity, or Islam, are the last bastions of virtue and morality causes the majority of people here in the West to `short circuit, ` and close down. The family unit is an endangered species. How many young men and women today even consider that a life of devotion and duty to each other, as man and wife, and to their would be offspring, as parents, is an end in itself? The whole concept of what was not so long ago taken for granted, has become somehow irrelevant and even to a degree redundant.
By gratuitously portraying immoral and lewd acts, pornography undercuts or sabotages a persons efforts to discern between what is good and what is not. It is nothing less than a loss of God! There is nothing harmless about pornography. It is exploitive and corrupting. It can and increasingly does destroy relationships, perverting the natural expression of sexual intimacy into a voyeuristic activity. It poisons the mind and spirituality of the voyeur. It promotes selfish, greedy attitudes and teaches people to view others as objects fit only to satisfy their lust. It undermines all efforts to do good and maintain a clean conscience.
Truly, pornography is Satan's scourge against mankind, and a major `siege gun` in the Illuminati's plan to dehumanise and depopulate. How far away they are from the setting up of their New World Order with it's `New Feudal` social model and reduced serf class it is hard to say. What is for certain though is that our best hope and defence against this evil scheme is our faith in God and a renewed commitment to the institutions of marriage and family.
For it is surely in these we can begin to build the `fortress` of our resistance.
Comments to : http://righteousalliance.blogspot.com/2009/07/pornographic-conspiracy-destroying.html
Reference:
1] http://righteousalliance.blogspot.com/2009/07/who-rules-worldthe-origin-of-evil.html
2] http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_sociopol_depopu.htm
3] http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/bloodlines/index.htm
4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Whiting
5] http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/J._Edgar_Hoover
6] http://www.google.com/search?q=Dr+Judith+Reisman&rls=com.microsoft:en-g
b:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GPEA_enDK310
7] http://www.divorcewizards.com/Divorce-Statistics-Pornography.html
Source link: http://www.rense.com/general86/porno.htm
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Well, I've certainly seen my share of porn (particularly in college) and I think Jones is correct. We all know we are nearing the end game, so everyone should be getting prepared, spiritually at least.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Suicide is Painless
Was sitting in Sunday school class today and in response to a discussion topic, one of the attendees, who works for the county coroner's office, mentioned that they had a record number of suicides for the month of July and that in three instances the victims were women who shot themselves in the head. This is a bit odd in that when women kill themselves they usually prefer a method that does not cause disfigurement, so when you have chicks blowing their brains out, it means they are truly hell bent on offing themselves, without regard to what condition they will be found in or presented in at the funeral.
I think this may be the beginning of a long uptick in suicides as a result of the lousy economy. It is not just happening locally or just in the U.S. as this Telegraph article excerpt indicates:
Wave of suicide sweeps China's graduate class
Millions of students will graduate in China this year, but with up to a third unable to get a job the number of suicides is soaring.
By David Eimer in Hebei Province Published: 9:00PM BST 25 Jul 2009
Chinese student Liu Wei who, consumed with guilt about her parents' financial sacrifices, took her own life
July was supposed to have marked the start of Liu Wei's new life.
With more than six million other students across China, the 21-year-old was due to graduate from college this month.
For Miss Liu, the daughter of poor farmers, a degree was to be her passport out of a life of poverty, a way to escape working in the fields, or toiling as a humble migrant worker in a far-off factory in southern China.
But her dream of making the huge leap from farm girl to college graduate will never become reality. Deeply depressed and ashamed about her failure to find a job to take up when she graduated, and consumed with guilt about the financial sacrifices her family had made for her, Miss Liu brought her studies and her life to a premature end by drowning herself in a ditch full of freezing, filthy water.
"She did it because she was worried she wouldn't be able to find a job and so she wouldn't be able to repay us," her grief-stricken father, Liu Shangyun, told The Sunday Telegraph. His eyes were downcast as he recalled how he saw her alive for the last time, just two weeks before her death.
"I took her back to college. She seemed normal and she sent me a message saying, 'Don't worry, I'm OK,'" said Mr Liu. But the next time he saw her, it was to identify her body.
Miss Liu's reaction to her predicament was extreme, but not unusual. In April, a report by the Shanghai Education Commission listed suicide as the leading cause of death among students. And with one in three of this year's graduates unable to get a job, according to education ministry figures released last week, Miss Liu's anxiety about finding work is shared by most students.
"I'm afraid of being unemployed," said Chen Meijun, who is about to graduate from the Capital University of Economics and Business in Beijing with a degree in e-commerce.
"It's a lot of pressure because my family will worry. They try and comfort me, but the main pressure is from me. I feel I should be able to find a job after four years of studying."
China faces a huge glut of graduates. With 1.5 million graduates from last year still out of work, there are simply not enough jobs to go around, and the problem has been exacerbated by the impact of the global financial crisis.
For Beijing, which in October will celebrate 60 years of communist rule in China, soaring graduate unemployment could not have come at a worse time.
Now, the authorities face the prospect of the harmonious society which the ruling Chinese Communist Party hails as its greatest achievement being destabilised by protests from millions of China's brightest young people.
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In the United States, it is not just civilians who are having problems. In 2008 the Army experienced a record number of suicides with 2009 suicides set to surpass 2008. From Army.mil : "Army leadership acknowledges increased stress from a high operations tempo resulting from two wars.
Yet, as Chiarelli told the media earlier this year, 2008 statistics show 35 percent of those who committed suicide had no deployment experience at all.Since the beginning of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has lost more than 580 Soldiers to suicide. In 2008, the number of reported suicides jumped 21 percent from the previous year, Army officials said.
To combat this elusive enemy, the Army is in the midst of fielding a new type of training to educate Soldiers and civilians alike on suicide. While the content is drawn from existing sources, presentation is both more widespread and participatory."
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On top of all this, there have been dozens of family murder-suicides in American in the last couple of years. Teen suicides and, in particular, female teen suicides are on the rise. From the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Facts for Families May 2008: "Suicide is the third leading cause of death for 15-to-24-year-olds, and the sixth leading cause of death for 5-to-14-year-olds."
I fear that as the economic and political situation worsens, suicides will continue to spike upward. The political bickering needs to stop and some tangible efforts at economic stabilization and recovery need to be enacted NOW. Attention Dems and Pubs, CUT THE CRAP AND GET TO WORK.
I think this may be the beginning of a long uptick in suicides as a result of the lousy economy. It is not just happening locally or just in the U.S. as this Telegraph article excerpt indicates:
Wave of suicide sweeps China's graduate class
Millions of students will graduate in China this year, but with up to a third unable to get a job the number of suicides is soaring.
By David Eimer in Hebei Province Published: 9:00PM BST 25 Jul 2009
Chinese student Liu Wei who, consumed with guilt about her parents' financial sacrifices, took her own life
July was supposed to have marked the start of Liu Wei's new life.
With more than six million other students across China, the 21-year-old was due to graduate from college this month.
For Miss Liu, the daughter of poor farmers, a degree was to be her passport out of a life of poverty, a way to escape working in the fields, or toiling as a humble migrant worker in a far-off factory in southern China.
But her dream of making the huge leap from farm girl to college graduate will never become reality. Deeply depressed and ashamed about her failure to find a job to take up when she graduated, and consumed with guilt about the financial sacrifices her family had made for her, Miss Liu brought her studies and her life to a premature end by drowning herself in a ditch full of freezing, filthy water.
"She did it because she was worried she wouldn't be able to find a job and so she wouldn't be able to repay us," her grief-stricken father, Liu Shangyun, told The Sunday Telegraph. His eyes were downcast as he recalled how he saw her alive for the last time, just two weeks before her death.
"I took her back to college. She seemed normal and she sent me a message saying, 'Don't worry, I'm OK,'" said Mr Liu. But the next time he saw her, it was to identify her body.
Miss Liu's reaction to her predicament was extreme, but not unusual. In April, a report by the Shanghai Education Commission listed suicide as the leading cause of death among students. And with one in three of this year's graduates unable to get a job, according to education ministry figures released last week, Miss Liu's anxiety about finding work is shared by most students.
"I'm afraid of being unemployed," said Chen Meijun, who is about to graduate from the Capital University of Economics and Business in Beijing with a degree in e-commerce.
"It's a lot of pressure because my family will worry. They try and comfort me, but the main pressure is from me. I feel I should be able to find a job after four years of studying."
China faces a huge glut of graduates. With 1.5 million graduates from last year still out of work, there are simply not enough jobs to go around, and the problem has been exacerbated by the impact of the global financial crisis.
For Beijing, which in October will celebrate 60 years of communist rule in China, soaring graduate unemployment could not have come at a worse time.
Now, the authorities face the prospect of the harmonious society which the ruling Chinese Communist Party hails as its greatest achievement being destabilised by protests from millions of China's brightest young people.
===========================
In the United States, it is not just civilians who are having problems. In 2008 the Army experienced a record number of suicides with 2009 suicides set to surpass 2008. From Army.mil : "Army leadership acknowledges increased stress from a high operations tempo resulting from two wars.
Yet, as Chiarelli told the media earlier this year, 2008 statistics show 35 percent of those who committed suicide had no deployment experience at all.Since the beginning of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has lost more than 580 Soldiers to suicide. In 2008, the number of reported suicides jumped 21 percent from the previous year, Army officials said.
To combat this elusive enemy, the Army is in the midst of fielding a new type of training to educate Soldiers and civilians alike on suicide. While the content is drawn from existing sources, presentation is both more widespread and participatory."
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On top of all this, there have been dozens of family murder-suicides in American in the last couple of years. Teen suicides and, in particular, female teen suicides are on the rise. From the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Facts for Families May 2008: "Suicide is the third leading cause of death for 15-to-24-year-olds, and the sixth leading cause of death for 5-to-14-year-olds."
I fear that as the economic and political situation worsens, suicides will continue to spike upward. The political bickering needs to stop and some tangible efforts at economic stabilization and recovery need to be enacted NOW. Attention Dems and Pubs, CUT THE CRAP AND GET TO WORK.
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Obama: Kenya or Hawaii?
So, just where was Obama born, Kenya or Hawaii? Does it really matter? Let's look at the 2008 election results:
...............................Obama........................ McCain
Popular Vote...............69,456,897.................. 59,934,814
Percentage..................... 52.9%........................... 45.7%
Electoral Votes............... 365................................ 173
Even allowing for the usual voter fraud, Obama still won by a clear majority of the popular vote and the electoral college vote.
If Obama was born in Hawaii, nothing changes. If Obama was born in Kenya and gets removed from office, we will have to have all the legislation he signed be voted on again and to avoid a major legislative catastrophe, congress and the successor President would just reapprove of all the previous legislation signed into law by Obama.
Despite any opinion to the contrary, Obama won the election fair and square. He is our President and he clearly sucks out loud at it. You wanted him, you got him. "Bubba, go git me a six pack, I need a beer." (Actually, I think the entire nation could use a cold one........or two........or three..)
...............................Obama........................ McCain
Popular Vote...............69,456,897.................. 59,934,814
Percentage..................... 52.9%........................... 45.7%
Electoral Votes............... 365................................ 173
Even allowing for the usual voter fraud, Obama still won by a clear majority of the popular vote and the electoral college vote.
If Obama was born in Hawaii, nothing changes. If Obama was born in Kenya and gets removed from office, we will have to have all the legislation he signed be voted on again and to avoid a major legislative catastrophe, congress and the successor President would just reapprove of all the previous legislation signed into law by Obama.
Despite any opinion to the contrary, Obama won the election fair and square. He is our President and he clearly sucks out loud at it. You wanted him, you got him. "Bubba, go git me a six pack, I need a beer." (Actually, I think the entire nation could use a cold one........or two........or three..)
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Time to legalize Hemp farming in the United States.
Um, nutjob, are you out of your mind? Probably, but that's not the point. Our economy is crashing and an incredibly lucrative cash crop is being denied to our farmers for political reasons. Hemp was grown in the U.S. through WWII. Hemp seed oil was used in american fighter aircraft. Just how useful is Hemp? The following information comes from http://www.hempbasics.com/ and is a really good summary of hemp uses:
General Hemp Information, Uses, Facts
On an annual basis, 1 acre of hemp will produce as much fiber as 2 to 3 acres of cotton. Hemp fiber is stronger and softer than cotton, lasts twice as long as cotton, and will not mildew.
Cotton grows only in moderate climates and requires more water than hemp; but hemp is frost tolerant, requires only moderate amounts of water, and grows in all 50 states. Cotton requires large quantities of pesticides and herbicides--50% of the world's pesticides/herbicides are used in the production of cotton. Hemp requires no pesticides, no herbicides, and only moderate amounts of fertilizer.
On an annual basis, 1 acre of hemp will produce as much paper as 2 to 4 acres of trees. From tissue paper to cardboard, all types of paper products can be produced from hemp.
The quality of hemp paper is superior to tree-based paper. Hemp paper will last hundreds of years without degrading, can be recycled many more times than tree-based paper, and requires less toxic chemicals in the manufacturing process than does paper made from trees.
Hemp can be used to produce fiberboard that is stronger and lighter than wood. Substituting hemp fiberboard for timber would further reduce the need to cut down our forests.
Hemp can be used to produce strong, durable and environmentally-friendly plastic substitutes. Thousands of products made from petroleum-based plastics can be produced from hemp-based composites.
It takes years for trees to grow until they can be harvested for paper or wood, but hemp is ready for harvesting only 120 days after it is planted. Hemp can grow on most land suitable for farming, while forests and tree farms require large tracts of land available in few locations. Harvesting hemp rather than trees would also eliminate erosion due to logging, thereby reducing topsoil loss and water pollution caused by soil runoff.
Hemp seeds contain a protein that is more nutritious and more economical to produce than soybean protein. Hemp seeds are not intoxicating. Hemp seed protein can be used to produce virtually any product made from soybean: tofu, veggie burgers, butter, cheese, salad oils, ice cream, milk, etc. Hemp seed can also be ground into a nutritious flour that can be used to produce baked goods such as pasta, cookies, and breads.
Hemp seed oil can be used to produce non-toxic diesel fuel, paint, varnish, detergent, ink and lubricating oil. Because hemp seeds account for up to half the weight of a mature hemp plant, hemp seed is a viable source for these products.
Just as corn can be converted into clean-burning ethanol fuel, so can hemp. Because hemp produces more biomass than any plant species (including corn) that can be grown in a wide range of climates and locations, hemp has great potential to become a major source of ethanol fuel.
Literally millions of wild hemp plants currently grow throughout the U.S. Wild hemp, like hemp grown for industrial use, has no drug properties because of its low THC content. U.S. marijuana laws prevent farmers from growing the same hemp plant that proliferates in nature by the millions.
From 1776 to 1937, hemp was a major American crop and textiles made from hemp were common. Yet, The American Textile Museum, The Smithsonian Institute, and most American history books contain no mention of hemp. The government's War on Drugs has created an atmosphere of self censorship where speaking of hemp in a positive manner is considered politically incorrect or taboo.
United States Presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson grew hemp, used products made from hemp, and praised the hemp plant in some of their writings.
No other natural resource offers the potential of hemp. Cannabis Hemp is capable of producing significant quantities of paper, textiles, building materials, food, medicine, paint, detergent, varnish, oil, ink, and fuel. Unlike other crops, hemp can grow in most climates and on most farmland throughout the world with moderate water and fertilizer requirements, no pesticides, and no herbicides. Cannabis Hemp (also known as Indian Hemp) has enormous potential to become a major natural resource that can benefit both the economy and the environment.
Uses
Housing
70% of the Cannabis Plant total weight is made up of the 'hurd' or woody inner core. This part of the plant is THC free (i.e. Hemp) and is used in housing construction. The silica leached from the soil by the plant combined with unslaked lime forms a chemical bond similar to cement which is fire and water proof. Cannabis Homes
Food
Hemp may be grown also for food (the seed) but in the UK at least (and probably in other EU countries) cultivation licenses are not available for this purpose. Within Defra (the UK's Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) hemp is treated as purely a non-food crop, despite the fact that seed can and does appear on the UK market as a perfectly legal food product.
Nutrition
Both the complete protein and the oils contained in hempseeds (rich in lanolin and linolenic acids) are in ideal ratios for human nutrition.
Fiber
Until its rediscovery in the late 1980s, the use of hemp for fiber production had declined sharply over the past decades, but hemp still occupied an important place amongst natural fibers as it is strong, durable and unaffected by water. The main uses of hemp fiber were inrope, sacking, carpet, nets and webbing. A hemp clothing industry was reborn in the West in 1988, and hemp is being used in increasing quantities in paper manufacturing. The cellulose content is about 70%.
Harvesting the fiber Hemp stem.
Smallholder plots are usually harvested by hand. The plants are cut at 2 to 3 cm above the soil and left on the ground to dry. Mechanical harvesting is now common, using specially adapted cutter-binders or simpler cutters.
The cut hemp is laid in swathes to dry for up to four days. This was traditionally followed by retting, either water retting whereby the bundled hemp floats in water or dew retting whereby the hemp remains on the ground and is affected by the moisture in dew moisture, and by moulds and bacterial action. Modern processes use steam and machinery to separate the fiber, a process known as thermo-mechanical pulping.
Fuel
Fuel can be a by-product of hemp cultivation. One fuel would be biodiesel because of the oils in the seeds and stalk of the hemp, another would be biofuel from the fibrous stalks.
Cultivation
Millennia of selective breeding have resulted in varieties that look quite different. Also, breeding since circa 1930 has focused quite specifically on producing strains which would perform very poorly as sources of drug material. Hemp grown for fiber is planted closely, resulting in tall, slender plants with long fibers. Ideally, according to Defra in 2004 the herb should be harvested before it flowers. This early cropping is because fiber quality declines if flowering is allowed and, incidentally, this cropping also pre-empts the herb's maturity as a potential source of drug material, even though the tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) content would still be very low with these strains of hemp.
The name Cannabis is the genus and was the name favored by the 19th century medical practitioners who helped to introduce the herb's drug potential to modern English-speaking consciousness. Cannabis for non-drug purposes (especially ropes and textiles) was then already well known as hemp.
The name marijuana is Mexican (or Latin American) in origin and associated almost exclusively with the herb's drug potential. That marijuana is now well known in English as a name for drug material is due largely to the efforts of US drug prohibitionists during the 1920s and 1930s. We can surmise that this name was highlighted because it helped to characterize the herbal drug as quite alien to English-speaking culture.
Varieties
There are broadly three groups of Cannabis varieties being cultivated today:
Varieties primarily cultivated for their fiber, characterized by long stems and little branching, called industrial hemp
Varieties grown for seed from which hemp oil is extracted
Varieties grown for medicinal or recreational purposes.
A nominal if not legal distinction is often made between hemp, with concentrations of the psychoactive chemical THC far too low to be useful as a drug, and Cannabis used for medical, recreational, or spiritual purposes.
Historical cultivation
From the 1881 Household Cyclopedia:
The soils most suited to the culture of this plant are those of the deep, black, putrid vegetable kind, that are low, and rather inclined to moisture, and those of the deep mellow, loamy, or sandy descriptions. The quantity of produce is generally much greater on the former than on the latter; but it is said to be greatly inferior in quality. It may, however, be grown with success on lands of a less rich and fertile kind by proper care and attention in their culture and preparation.
In order to render the grounds proper for the reception of the crop, they should be reduced into a fine mellow state of mould, and be perfectly cleared from weeds, by repeated plowings. When it succeeds grain crops, the work is mostly accomplished by three plowings, and as many harrowings: the first being given immediately after the preceding crop is removed, the second early in the spring, and the last, or seed earth, just before the seed is to be put in. In the last plowing, well rotted manure, in the proportion of fifteen or twenty, or good compost, in the quantity of twenty-five or thirty-three horse-cart loads, should be turned into the land; as without this it is seldom that good crops can be produced. The surface of the ground being left perfectly flat, and as free from furrows as possible; as by these means the moisture is more effectually retained, and the growth of the plants more fully promoted.
It is of much importance in the cultivation of hemp crops that the seed is new, and of a good quality, which may in some measure be known by its feeling heavy in the hand, and being of a bright shining color.
The proportion of seed that is most commonly employed is from two to three bushels, according to the quality of the land; but, as the crops are greatly injured by the plants standing too closely together, two bushels, or two bushels and a half may be a more advantageous quantity.
As the hemp plant is extremely tender in its early growth, care should be taken not to put the seed into the ground at so early a period, as that it may be liable to be injured by the effects of frost; nor to protract the sowing to so late a season as that the quality of the produce may be effected. The best season, on the drier sorts of land in the southern districts, is as soon as possible after the frosts are over in April; and, on the same descriptions of soil, in the more northern ones, towards the close of the same month or early in the ensuing one.
The most general method of putting crops of this sort into the soil is the broadcast, the seed being dispersed over the surface of the land in as even a manner as possible, and afterwards covered in by means of a very light harrowing. In many cases, however, especially when the crops are to stand for seed, the drill method in rows, at small distances, might be had recourse to with advantage; as, in this way, the early growth of the plants would be more effectually promoted, and the land be kept in a more clean and perfect state of mould, which are circumstances of importance in such crops. In whatever method the seed is put in, care must constantly be taken to keep the birds from it for some time afterwards.
This sort of crop is frequently cultivated on the same piece of ground for a great number of years, without any other kind intervening; but, in such cases, manure must be applied with almost every crop, in pretty large proportions, to prevent the exhaustion that must otherwise take place. It may be sown after most sorts of grain crops, especially where the land possesses sufficient fertility, and is in a proper state of tillage.
Thick stands of fiber hemp compete well with weeds.
As hemp, from its tall growth and thick foliage, soon covers the surface of the land, and prevents the rising of weeds, little attention is necessary after the seed has been put into the ground, especially where the broadcast method of sowing is practiced; but, when put in by the drill machine, a hoeing or two may be had recourse to with advantage in the early growth of the crop.
In the culture of this plant, it is particularly necessary that the same piece of land grows both male and female, or what is sometimes denominated simple hemp. The latter kind contains the seed.
When the grain is ripe (which is known by its becoming of a whitish-yellow color, and a few of the leaves beginning to drop from the stems); this happens commonly about thirteen or fourteen weeks from the period of its being sown, according as the season may be dry or wet (the first sort being mostly ripe some weeks before the latter), the next operation is that of taking it from the ground; which is effected by pulling it up by the roots, in small parcels at a time, by the hand, taking care to shake off the mould well from them before the handfuls are laid down. In some districts, the whole crop is pulled together, without any distinction being made between the different kinds of hemp; while, in others, it is the practice to separate and pull them at different times, according to their ripeness. The latter is obviously the better practice; as by pulling a large proportion of the crop before it is in a proper state of maturity, the quantity of produce must not only be considerably lessened, but its quality greatly injured by being rendered less durable.
After being thus pulled, it is tied up in small parcels, or what are sometimes termed baits.
Where crops of this kind are intended for seeding, they should be suffered to stand till the seed becomes in a perfect state of maturity, which is easily known by the appearance of it on inspection. The stems are then pulled and bound up, as in the other case, the bundles being set up in the same manner as grain, until the seed becomes so dry and firm as to shed freely. It is then either immediately threshed out upon large cloths for the purpose in the field, or taken home to have the operation afterwards performed.
The hemp, as soon as pulled, is tied up in small bundles, frequently at both ends.
It is then conveyed to pits, or ponds of stagnant water, about six or eight feet in depth, such as have a clayey soil being in general preferred, and deposited in beds, according to their size, and depth, the small bundles being laid both in a straight direction and crosswise of each other, so as to bind perfectly together; the whole, being loaded with timber, or other materials, so as to keep the beds of hemp just below the surface of the water.
It is not usual to water more than four or five times in the same pit, till it has been filled with water. Where the ponds are not sufficiently large to contain the whole of the produce at once, it is the practice to pull the hemp only as it can be admitted into them, it being thought disadvantageous to leave the hemp upon the ground after being pulled. It is left in these pits four, five, or six days, or even more, according to the warmth of the season and the judgment of the operator, on his examining whether the hemp material readily separates from the reed or stem; and then taken up and conveyed to a pasture field which is clean and even, the bundles being loosened and spread out thinly, stem by stem, turning it every second or third day, especially in damp weather, to prevent its being injured by worms or other insects. It should remain in this situation for two, three, four, or more weeks, according to circumstances, and be then collected together when in a perfectly dry state, tied up into large bundles, and placed in some secure building until an opportunity is afforded for breaking it, in order to separate the hemp. By this means the process of grassing is not only shortened, but the more expensive ones of breaking, scutching, and bleaching the yarn, rendered less violent and troublesome.
After the hemp has been removed from the field it is in a state to be broken and swingled, operations that are mostly performed by common laborers, by means of machinery for the purpose, the produce being tied up in stones. The refuse collected in the latter process is denominated sheaves, and is in some districts employed for the purposes of fuel. After having undergone these different operations, it is ready for the purposes of the manufacturer.
History
Hemp use dates back to the Stone Age, with hemp fiber imprints found in pottery shards in China over 10,000 years old.
Major hemp producing countries
From the 1950s to the 1980s the Soviet Union was the world's largest producer (3,000 km² in 1970). The main production areas were in Ukraine, the Kursk and Orel regions of Russia, and near the Polish border.
Other important producing countries were China, Hungary, the former Yugoslavia, Romania, Poland, France and Italy.
Canada, United Kingdom, and Germany all resumed commercial production in the 1990s. British production is mostly used as bedding for horses; other uses are under development. The largest outlet for German fiber is composite automotive panels. Companies in Canada, UK, USA and Germany among many others are processing hemp seed into a growing range of food products and cosmetics; many traditional growing countries still continue with textile grade fiber production.
Future of hemp
In the last decade hemp has been widely promoted as a crop for the future. This is stimulated by new technologies which make hemp suitable for industrial paper manufacturing, use as a renewable energy source (biofuel), and the use of hemp derivatives as replacement for petrochemical products.
The increased demand for health food has stimulated the trade in shelled hemp seed. Hemp oil is increasingly being used in the manufacturing of bodycare products.
Jesse Ventura was a vocal proponent of hemp cultivation while governor of Minnesota, though agricultural policymakers within his administration felt that hemp cultivation could not compete economically with crops such as corn and soybeans.
THC in hemp
Hemp contains delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is the psychoactive ingredient found in hashish. THC is present in all hemp varieties to some extent. In varieties grown for use as a drug, where males are removed in order to prevent fertilization, THC levels can reach as high as 20-30% in the unfertilized females which are given ample room to flower.
In hemp varieties grown for seed or fiber use, the plants are grown very closely together and a very dense biomass product is obtained, rich in oil from the seeds and fiber from the stalks and low in THC content. EU regulations limit THC content to 0.3% in industrial hemp. In Canada, the THC limit is 1%.
On October 9, 2001, the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) ruled that even traces of THC in products intended for food use would be illegal as of February 6, 2002. This Interpretive Rule would have ruled out the production or use of hempseed or hempseed oil in food use in the USA, but after the Hemp Industries Association (HIA) filed suit the rule was stayed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on March 7, 2002. On March 21, 2003, the DEA issued a nearly identical Final Rule which was also stayed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on April 16, 2003. On February 6, 2004 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a unanimous decision in favor of the HIA in which Judge Betty Fletcher wrote, "[T]hey (DEA) cannot regulate naturally-occurring THC not contained within or derived from marijuana-i.e. non-psychoactive hemp is not included in Schedule I. The DEA has no authority to regulate drugs that are not scheduled, and it has not followed procedures required to schedule a substance. The DEA's definition of "THC" contravenes the unambiguously expressed intent of Congress in the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) and cannot be upheld". On September 28, 2004 the HIA claimed victory after DEA declined to appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States the ruling from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals protecting the sale of hemp-containing foods. Industrial hemp remains legal for import and sale in the U.S., but U.S. farmers still are not permitted to grow it.
The DEA's strong opposition to a chemical widely thought to be less addictive or harmful than legal nicotine or alcohol leads some of its critics to charge ulterior motives such as protection of the synthetic-fiber, wood pulp, petrochemical, and pharmochemical industries. The position has been an occasional embarrassment to the US government, as when they ignored their own arguments and grew it large-scale in Kentucky and Wisconsin for World War II. Critics of the HIA, however, argue that the necessities of the war and the unavailability of adequate synthetic substitutes outweighed the social, health, and public safety risks of producing hemp. Today, they assert, those risks are substantial, according to many experts, because hemp resembles crude marihuana and there is no visual way to distinguish the two. This, alone, would make enforcement of the marihuana laws by federal and state authorities all but impossible if hemp were legalized. The critics of HIA often allege that it is the HIA that may have an ulterior motive in promoting hemp for economic reasons while really seeking to legalize marihuana for recreational use. They add that if the federal government were to authorize the production of industrial hemp, it would likely require registration of farmers, inspections and audits of farms, and a "strict liability" clause in the law to allow administrative seizure of all land parcels upon which any crude marihuana is grown or where hemp with a THC level above one percent is found. This would discourage farmers from trying to use hemp to circumvent the law's prohibition of marihuana while still protecting the public's right to produce industrial hemp -- a compromise that would satisfy all but those with the aforementioned hidden agenda.
The presence of (some) THC in hemp varieties and the fear that THC could be extracted from industrial hemp for illegal purposes has hampered the development of hemp in many countries. Since the early 1990s, however, many countries, including Canada, Australia, the UK, The Netherlands and Germany, allow hemp plantings and commercial scale production. Plant breeders are working on the development of new varieties which are low in THC.
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The U.S. is losing out on hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue from this crop. There is no logical reason we should not be growing hemp as fast as we can. This is not a liberal or conservative issue, it is a common sense issue. Wake Up America!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
General Hemp Information, Uses, Facts
On an annual basis, 1 acre of hemp will produce as much fiber as 2 to 3 acres of cotton. Hemp fiber is stronger and softer than cotton, lasts twice as long as cotton, and will not mildew.
Cotton grows only in moderate climates and requires more water than hemp; but hemp is frost tolerant, requires only moderate amounts of water, and grows in all 50 states. Cotton requires large quantities of pesticides and herbicides--50% of the world's pesticides/herbicides are used in the production of cotton. Hemp requires no pesticides, no herbicides, and only moderate amounts of fertilizer.
On an annual basis, 1 acre of hemp will produce as much paper as 2 to 4 acres of trees. From tissue paper to cardboard, all types of paper products can be produced from hemp.
The quality of hemp paper is superior to tree-based paper. Hemp paper will last hundreds of years without degrading, can be recycled many more times than tree-based paper, and requires less toxic chemicals in the manufacturing process than does paper made from trees.
Hemp can be used to produce fiberboard that is stronger and lighter than wood. Substituting hemp fiberboard for timber would further reduce the need to cut down our forests.
Hemp can be used to produce strong, durable and environmentally-friendly plastic substitutes. Thousands of products made from petroleum-based plastics can be produced from hemp-based composites.
It takes years for trees to grow until they can be harvested for paper or wood, but hemp is ready for harvesting only 120 days after it is planted. Hemp can grow on most land suitable for farming, while forests and tree farms require large tracts of land available in few locations. Harvesting hemp rather than trees would also eliminate erosion due to logging, thereby reducing topsoil loss and water pollution caused by soil runoff.
Hemp seeds contain a protein that is more nutritious and more economical to produce than soybean protein. Hemp seeds are not intoxicating. Hemp seed protein can be used to produce virtually any product made from soybean: tofu, veggie burgers, butter, cheese, salad oils, ice cream, milk, etc. Hemp seed can also be ground into a nutritious flour that can be used to produce baked goods such as pasta, cookies, and breads.
Hemp seed oil can be used to produce non-toxic diesel fuel, paint, varnish, detergent, ink and lubricating oil. Because hemp seeds account for up to half the weight of a mature hemp plant, hemp seed is a viable source for these products.
Just as corn can be converted into clean-burning ethanol fuel, so can hemp. Because hemp produces more biomass than any plant species (including corn) that can be grown in a wide range of climates and locations, hemp has great potential to become a major source of ethanol fuel.
Literally millions of wild hemp plants currently grow throughout the U.S. Wild hemp, like hemp grown for industrial use, has no drug properties because of its low THC content. U.S. marijuana laws prevent farmers from growing the same hemp plant that proliferates in nature by the millions.
From 1776 to 1937, hemp was a major American crop and textiles made from hemp were common. Yet, The American Textile Museum, The Smithsonian Institute, and most American history books contain no mention of hemp. The government's War on Drugs has created an atmosphere of self censorship where speaking of hemp in a positive manner is considered politically incorrect or taboo.
United States Presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson grew hemp, used products made from hemp, and praised the hemp plant in some of their writings.
No other natural resource offers the potential of hemp. Cannabis Hemp is capable of producing significant quantities of paper, textiles, building materials, food, medicine, paint, detergent, varnish, oil, ink, and fuel. Unlike other crops, hemp can grow in most climates and on most farmland throughout the world with moderate water and fertilizer requirements, no pesticides, and no herbicides. Cannabis Hemp (also known as Indian Hemp) has enormous potential to become a major natural resource that can benefit both the economy and the environment.
Uses
Housing
70% of the Cannabis Plant total weight is made up of the 'hurd' or woody inner core. This part of the plant is THC free (i.e. Hemp) and is used in housing construction. The silica leached from the soil by the plant combined with unslaked lime forms a chemical bond similar to cement which is fire and water proof. Cannabis Homes
Food
Hemp may be grown also for food (the seed) but in the UK at least (and probably in other EU countries) cultivation licenses are not available for this purpose. Within Defra (the UK's Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) hemp is treated as purely a non-food crop, despite the fact that seed can and does appear on the UK market as a perfectly legal food product.
Nutrition
Both the complete protein and the oils contained in hempseeds (rich in lanolin and linolenic acids) are in ideal ratios for human nutrition.
Fiber
Until its rediscovery in the late 1980s, the use of hemp for fiber production had declined sharply over the past decades, but hemp still occupied an important place amongst natural fibers as it is strong, durable and unaffected by water. The main uses of hemp fiber were inrope, sacking, carpet, nets and webbing. A hemp clothing industry was reborn in the West in 1988, and hemp is being used in increasing quantities in paper manufacturing. The cellulose content is about 70%.
Harvesting the fiber Hemp stem.
Smallholder plots are usually harvested by hand. The plants are cut at 2 to 3 cm above the soil and left on the ground to dry. Mechanical harvesting is now common, using specially adapted cutter-binders or simpler cutters.
The cut hemp is laid in swathes to dry for up to four days. This was traditionally followed by retting, either water retting whereby the bundled hemp floats in water or dew retting whereby the hemp remains on the ground and is affected by the moisture in dew moisture, and by moulds and bacterial action. Modern processes use steam and machinery to separate the fiber, a process known as thermo-mechanical pulping.
Fuel
Fuel can be a by-product of hemp cultivation. One fuel would be biodiesel because of the oils in the seeds and stalk of the hemp, another would be biofuel from the fibrous stalks.
Cultivation
Millennia of selective breeding have resulted in varieties that look quite different. Also, breeding since circa 1930 has focused quite specifically on producing strains which would perform very poorly as sources of drug material. Hemp grown for fiber is planted closely, resulting in tall, slender plants with long fibers. Ideally, according to Defra in 2004 the herb should be harvested before it flowers. This early cropping is because fiber quality declines if flowering is allowed and, incidentally, this cropping also pre-empts the herb's maturity as a potential source of drug material, even though the tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) content would still be very low with these strains of hemp.
The name Cannabis is the genus and was the name favored by the 19th century medical practitioners who helped to introduce the herb's drug potential to modern English-speaking consciousness. Cannabis for non-drug purposes (especially ropes and textiles) was then already well known as hemp.
The name marijuana is Mexican (or Latin American) in origin and associated almost exclusively with the herb's drug potential. That marijuana is now well known in English as a name for drug material is due largely to the efforts of US drug prohibitionists during the 1920s and 1930s. We can surmise that this name was highlighted because it helped to characterize the herbal drug as quite alien to English-speaking culture.
Varieties
There are broadly three groups of Cannabis varieties being cultivated today:
Varieties primarily cultivated for their fiber, characterized by long stems and little branching, called industrial hemp
Varieties grown for seed from which hemp oil is extracted
Varieties grown for medicinal or recreational purposes.
A nominal if not legal distinction is often made between hemp, with concentrations of the psychoactive chemical THC far too low to be useful as a drug, and Cannabis used for medical, recreational, or spiritual purposes.
Historical cultivation
From the 1881 Household Cyclopedia:
The soils most suited to the culture of this plant are those of the deep, black, putrid vegetable kind, that are low, and rather inclined to moisture, and those of the deep mellow, loamy, or sandy descriptions. The quantity of produce is generally much greater on the former than on the latter; but it is said to be greatly inferior in quality. It may, however, be grown with success on lands of a less rich and fertile kind by proper care and attention in their culture and preparation.
In order to render the grounds proper for the reception of the crop, they should be reduced into a fine mellow state of mould, and be perfectly cleared from weeds, by repeated plowings. When it succeeds grain crops, the work is mostly accomplished by three plowings, and as many harrowings: the first being given immediately after the preceding crop is removed, the second early in the spring, and the last, or seed earth, just before the seed is to be put in. In the last plowing, well rotted manure, in the proportion of fifteen or twenty, or good compost, in the quantity of twenty-five or thirty-three horse-cart loads, should be turned into the land; as without this it is seldom that good crops can be produced. The surface of the ground being left perfectly flat, and as free from furrows as possible; as by these means the moisture is more effectually retained, and the growth of the plants more fully promoted.
It is of much importance in the cultivation of hemp crops that the seed is new, and of a good quality, which may in some measure be known by its feeling heavy in the hand, and being of a bright shining color.
The proportion of seed that is most commonly employed is from two to three bushels, according to the quality of the land; but, as the crops are greatly injured by the plants standing too closely together, two bushels, or two bushels and a half may be a more advantageous quantity.
As the hemp plant is extremely tender in its early growth, care should be taken not to put the seed into the ground at so early a period, as that it may be liable to be injured by the effects of frost; nor to protract the sowing to so late a season as that the quality of the produce may be effected. The best season, on the drier sorts of land in the southern districts, is as soon as possible after the frosts are over in April; and, on the same descriptions of soil, in the more northern ones, towards the close of the same month or early in the ensuing one.
The most general method of putting crops of this sort into the soil is the broadcast, the seed being dispersed over the surface of the land in as even a manner as possible, and afterwards covered in by means of a very light harrowing. In many cases, however, especially when the crops are to stand for seed, the drill method in rows, at small distances, might be had recourse to with advantage; as, in this way, the early growth of the plants would be more effectually promoted, and the land be kept in a more clean and perfect state of mould, which are circumstances of importance in such crops. In whatever method the seed is put in, care must constantly be taken to keep the birds from it for some time afterwards.
This sort of crop is frequently cultivated on the same piece of ground for a great number of years, without any other kind intervening; but, in such cases, manure must be applied with almost every crop, in pretty large proportions, to prevent the exhaustion that must otherwise take place. It may be sown after most sorts of grain crops, especially where the land possesses sufficient fertility, and is in a proper state of tillage.
Thick stands of fiber hemp compete well with weeds.
As hemp, from its tall growth and thick foliage, soon covers the surface of the land, and prevents the rising of weeds, little attention is necessary after the seed has been put into the ground, especially where the broadcast method of sowing is practiced; but, when put in by the drill machine, a hoeing or two may be had recourse to with advantage in the early growth of the crop.
In the culture of this plant, it is particularly necessary that the same piece of land grows both male and female, or what is sometimes denominated simple hemp. The latter kind contains the seed.
When the grain is ripe (which is known by its becoming of a whitish-yellow color, and a few of the leaves beginning to drop from the stems); this happens commonly about thirteen or fourteen weeks from the period of its being sown, according as the season may be dry or wet (the first sort being mostly ripe some weeks before the latter), the next operation is that of taking it from the ground; which is effected by pulling it up by the roots, in small parcels at a time, by the hand, taking care to shake off the mould well from them before the handfuls are laid down. In some districts, the whole crop is pulled together, without any distinction being made between the different kinds of hemp; while, in others, it is the practice to separate and pull them at different times, according to their ripeness. The latter is obviously the better practice; as by pulling a large proportion of the crop before it is in a proper state of maturity, the quantity of produce must not only be considerably lessened, but its quality greatly injured by being rendered less durable.
After being thus pulled, it is tied up in small parcels, or what are sometimes termed baits.
Where crops of this kind are intended for seeding, they should be suffered to stand till the seed becomes in a perfect state of maturity, which is easily known by the appearance of it on inspection. The stems are then pulled and bound up, as in the other case, the bundles being set up in the same manner as grain, until the seed becomes so dry and firm as to shed freely. It is then either immediately threshed out upon large cloths for the purpose in the field, or taken home to have the operation afterwards performed.
The hemp, as soon as pulled, is tied up in small bundles, frequently at both ends.
It is then conveyed to pits, or ponds of stagnant water, about six or eight feet in depth, such as have a clayey soil being in general preferred, and deposited in beds, according to their size, and depth, the small bundles being laid both in a straight direction and crosswise of each other, so as to bind perfectly together; the whole, being loaded with timber, or other materials, so as to keep the beds of hemp just below the surface of the water.
It is not usual to water more than four or five times in the same pit, till it has been filled with water. Where the ponds are not sufficiently large to contain the whole of the produce at once, it is the practice to pull the hemp only as it can be admitted into them, it being thought disadvantageous to leave the hemp upon the ground after being pulled. It is left in these pits four, five, or six days, or even more, according to the warmth of the season and the judgment of the operator, on his examining whether the hemp material readily separates from the reed or stem; and then taken up and conveyed to a pasture field which is clean and even, the bundles being loosened and spread out thinly, stem by stem, turning it every second or third day, especially in damp weather, to prevent its being injured by worms or other insects. It should remain in this situation for two, three, four, or more weeks, according to circumstances, and be then collected together when in a perfectly dry state, tied up into large bundles, and placed in some secure building until an opportunity is afforded for breaking it, in order to separate the hemp. By this means the process of grassing is not only shortened, but the more expensive ones of breaking, scutching, and bleaching the yarn, rendered less violent and troublesome.
After the hemp has been removed from the field it is in a state to be broken and swingled, operations that are mostly performed by common laborers, by means of machinery for the purpose, the produce being tied up in stones. The refuse collected in the latter process is denominated sheaves, and is in some districts employed for the purposes of fuel. After having undergone these different operations, it is ready for the purposes of the manufacturer.
History
Hemp use dates back to the Stone Age, with hemp fiber imprints found in pottery shards in China over 10,000 years old.
Major hemp producing countries
From the 1950s to the 1980s the Soviet Union was the world's largest producer (3,000 km² in 1970). The main production areas were in Ukraine, the Kursk and Orel regions of Russia, and near the Polish border.
Other important producing countries were China, Hungary, the former Yugoslavia, Romania, Poland, France and Italy.
Canada, United Kingdom, and Germany all resumed commercial production in the 1990s. British production is mostly used as bedding for horses; other uses are under development. The largest outlet for German fiber is composite automotive panels. Companies in Canada, UK, USA and Germany among many others are processing hemp seed into a growing range of food products and cosmetics; many traditional growing countries still continue with textile grade fiber production.
Future of hemp
In the last decade hemp has been widely promoted as a crop for the future. This is stimulated by new technologies which make hemp suitable for industrial paper manufacturing, use as a renewable energy source (biofuel), and the use of hemp derivatives as replacement for petrochemical products.
The increased demand for health food has stimulated the trade in shelled hemp seed. Hemp oil is increasingly being used in the manufacturing of bodycare products.
Jesse Ventura was a vocal proponent of hemp cultivation while governor of Minnesota, though agricultural policymakers within his administration felt that hemp cultivation could not compete economically with crops such as corn and soybeans.
THC in hemp
Hemp contains delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), which is the psychoactive ingredient found in hashish. THC is present in all hemp varieties to some extent. In varieties grown for use as a drug, where males are removed in order to prevent fertilization, THC levels can reach as high as 20-30% in the unfertilized females which are given ample room to flower.
In hemp varieties grown for seed or fiber use, the plants are grown very closely together and a very dense biomass product is obtained, rich in oil from the seeds and fiber from the stalks and low in THC content. EU regulations limit THC content to 0.3% in industrial hemp. In Canada, the THC limit is 1%.
On October 9, 2001, the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) ruled that even traces of THC in products intended for food use would be illegal as of February 6, 2002. This Interpretive Rule would have ruled out the production or use of hempseed or hempseed oil in food use in the USA, but after the Hemp Industries Association (HIA) filed suit the rule was stayed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on March 7, 2002. On March 21, 2003, the DEA issued a nearly identical Final Rule which was also stayed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals on April 16, 2003. On February 6, 2004 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a unanimous decision in favor of the HIA in which Judge Betty Fletcher wrote, "[T]hey (DEA) cannot regulate naturally-occurring THC not contained within or derived from marijuana-i.e. non-psychoactive hemp is not included in Schedule I. The DEA has no authority to regulate drugs that are not scheduled, and it has not followed procedures required to schedule a substance. The DEA's definition of "THC" contravenes the unambiguously expressed intent of Congress in the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) and cannot be upheld". On September 28, 2004 the HIA claimed victory after DEA declined to appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States the ruling from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals protecting the sale of hemp-containing foods. Industrial hemp remains legal for import and sale in the U.S., but U.S. farmers still are not permitted to grow it.
The DEA's strong opposition to a chemical widely thought to be less addictive or harmful than legal nicotine or alcohol leads some of its critics to charge ulterior motives such as protection of the synthetic-fiber, wood pulp, petrochemical, and pharmochemical industries. The position has been an occasional embarrassment to the US government, as when they ignored their own arguments and grew it large-scale in Kentucky and Wisconsin for World War II. Critics of the HIA, however, argue that the necessities of the war and the unavailability of adequate synthetic substitutes outweighed the social, health, and public safety risks of producing hemp. Today, they assert, those risks are substantial, according to many experts, because hemp resembles crude marihuana and there is no visual way to distinguish the two. This, alone, would make enforcement of the marihuana laws by federal and state authorities all but impossible if hemp were legalized. The critics of HIA often allege that it is the HIA that may have an ulterior motive in promoting hemp for economic reasons while really seeking to legalize marihuana for recreational use. They add that if the federal government were to authorize the production of industrial hemp, it would likely require registration of farmers, inspections and audits of farms, and a "strict liability" clause in the law to allow administrative seizure of all land parcels upon which any crude marihuana is grown or where hemp with a THC level above one percent is found. This would discourage farmers from trying to use hemp to circumvent the law's prohibition of marihuana while still protecting the public's right to produce industrial hemp -- a compromise that would satisfy all but those with the aforementioned hidden agenda.
The presence of (some) THC in hemp varieties and the fear that THC could be extracted from industrial hemp for illegal purposes has hampered the development of hemp in many countries. Since the early 1990s, however, many countries, including Canada, Australia, the UK, The Netherlands and Germany, allow hemp plantings and commercial scale production. Plant breeders are working on the development of new varieties which are low in THC.
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The U.S. is losing out on hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue from this crop. There is no logical reason we should not be growing hemp as fast as we can. This is not a liberal or conservative issue, it is a common sense issue. Wake Up America!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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