Order my Steps-Mighty Clouds of Joy

CNN - Drs. Esselstyn and Ornish interview about Bill Clinton going Vegan

Forks Over Knives

Forks Over Knives

9/11 Mysteries - [Full Length]

I'd Rather Have Jesus by Joshua Cehulik

The Kinsey Syndrome 1/17

Greenpeace finds highly toxic chemicals in branded clothing

by Christina Luisa

(NaturalNews) Earlier this week Greenpeace announced at the launch of its report "Dirty Laundry 2" that traces of toxic chemicals have been detected in products made by 14 big brand top clothing manufacturers.

These chemicals, called nonylphenol ethoxylates (NPEs), are commonly used as detergents in industries including the production of natural and synthetic textiles. NPEs break down to form nonylphenol, a dangerous toxin that has persistent and hormone-disrupting properties. This toxin has been proven to mimic female hormones, alter sexual development and affect reproductive systems.

Greenpeace said it purchased 78 different branded clothing samples (most of them made in China, Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines) from 18 countries around the world and subjected them to careful scientific analysis. NPEs were detected in two-thirds of the samples the group tested, including popular brands such as Calvin Klein, Adidas, Converse, Ralph Lauren, Abercrombie & Fitch, Bauer Hockey, Cortefiel, Uniqlo, Gap, H&M, Lacoste, Nike, Phillips-Van Heusen Corporation (PVH Corp) and Puma. During the course of the past year, Greenpeace has found that all of these commonly purchased brands are linked to two specific manufacturers.

The issue of toxic chemicals in clothing is not only a problem for the developing countries where textiles are made. Since residual levels of NPEs are released when clothes are washed, these chemicals are now inching their way into countries where their use is banned or avoided.

The danger of NPEs

Certain components of NPEs have been involved in the widespread "feminization" of male fish in parts of Europe and also in the disruption of hormone processes in some mammals, according to the campaign group WWF. Even at low levels, this toxin represents a big threat to the environment and to human health. It is no coincidence that use of NPEs is completely restricted in Europe.

Our skin is our largest organ and what we put on it our bodies literally drink in. Everything we consume - including the chemicals that linger on and in our clothing -- either gets assimilated or eliminated. Chemical toxins we expose our skin to through our clothing and skincare/body products can tax our bodies in a major way.

NPEs can certainly contribute to the increasing incidence of health problems linked to hormonal disturbances.

All of our modern-day toxic overload concerns should be considered against the backdrop of a monumental biological shift. Only 150 years ago, girls got their first period at around age 15 or 16 and went through menopause in their late 30s and 40s. However, in modern times girls often begin puberty as early as 9 and menopause generally does not occur until around 50.

Not only have we increasingly begun pushing and trifling with our bodies in ways we never did before, but our environments are also becoming increasingly toxic in ways we are often not fully aware of. This is evident when noting the fact that the period in which women's bodies go through a series of significant hormonal shifts has extended over a much longer period of time, increasing not only their fertile years, but also their chances of getting breast cancer. Toxic chemical exposure through household products, our modern food supply, beauty/care products and clothing certainly all play into this.

The alarming truth about clothing factories

In the past, Greenpeace became concerned by the amount of water used to make the majority of our clothing. On average, fiber for one cotton t-shirt requires 713 gallons of water to make, and traditional wet-dye methods for clothing use from seven to 75 gallons of water per pound of fabric. All this adds up to trillions of gallons of water each year passing through textile factories merely for dyeing alone.

Now Greenpeace has gone on to prove that the water leaves the factories polluted with heavy metals and toxic chemicals that cause serious health problems to animals and people. Recently "Dirty Laundry" has outright accused the manufacturers of well-known textile brands such as Adidas of polluting major rivers in China with chemical waste.

The practices of two of China's major textile dye factories were closely examined within the details the company released of its year-long investigation. To gather the information Greenpeace campaigners wore protective suits and collected water samples from outside the factories being carefully analyzed. The results clearly showed that toxins are spilling into China's rivers on a daily basis.

According to Greenpeace, the discharge from these factories includes heavy metals and "hazardous and persistent chemicals with hormone-disrupting properties were found being discharged from these facilities." Alkylphenols including nonylphenols were found in wastewater samples from both factories examined, and perfluorinated chemicals (PFCs) were present in the wastewater from one of the complexes (the Youngor Textile Complex).

Eight samples of wastewater from two factories in the Yangtze and Pearl River deltas, identified as suppliers for the brands, contained "a cocktail of hazardous chemicals": Greenpeace said in last month's "Dirty Laundry" report.

Clothing companies respond -- or do they?

Most of the international brands found to be tainted with these toxins have denied using the dye services at either of the two guilty factories, saying that they are only "cut and sew" customers for these locations. However, that does not change the fact that the practices of these two factories are typical of what you'll find all over China - where most of our clothing is made -- and anywhere else wet-dyeing is used in the production of clothes.

When the Greenpeace report was released, Greenpeace activists dressed as referees caused a ruckus when they surrounded one of Adidas' busiest flagship stores in Hong Kong and demanded that the store eliminate hazardous chemicals in their products. The activists also forcefully urged potential customers to "rethink" their decision to purchase the contaminated clothing.

After storming the store, the activists handed out campaign leaflets to customers and gave store staff yellow warning cards that cautioned the brand line of clothing to "play clean".

Since then Nike and Puma have been the only brands to promise to eliminate the use of hazardous chemicals in their products -- but only by year 2020!

One would assume that as the second biggest supplier in the sportswear industry, Adidas has a clearly posed obligation to detoxify its global supply chain.

However, Adidas has ignored repeated requests for comment, according to a Greenpeace spokeswoman. The company previously admitted it uses the Youngor Group -- one of the accused clothing suppliers -- for garment cutting and sewing only and not to source fabrics. Adidas has now asked Youngor to investigate Greenpeace's claims and added that the company has a comprehensive policy on avoiding dangerous substances and chemicals.

Many of the name-brand clothing companies accused have reportedly been working on improving their sustainability efforts and reducing the environmental footprint of their products. However, their plans at no point included clear-cut goals to eliminate toxic dyes.

Greenpeace urges companies: "Detox Now!"

Greenpeace has now launched the Detox Now! campaign to pressure Nike, Adidas and other big clothing companies to publicly agree to eliminate the release of hazardous chemicals from the entire lifecycle of their products.

People around the world are responding rapidly and enthusiastically. Thousands have signed an online petition, and 600 people in ten different countries showed up outside Nike and Adidas stores and did a striptease on July 23rd of this year.

The pressure from the public is beginning to take some effect, but not nearly enough. Puma was the first of the companies last week to take responsibility for the toxins released in the making of their athletic apparel and shoes. However, the company has stated that elimination of these toxins will take up to 9 years. In a statement posted to their website, Puma says:

"...Sportlifestyle company PUMA recognizes the urgent need for reducing and eliminating industrial releases of all hazardous chemicals. According to its approach based on prevention and precautionary principles, PUMA is committed to eliminate the discharges of all hazardous chemicals from the whole lifecycle and all production procedures that are associated with the making and using of PUMA products by 2020."

No word has come yet from Adidas or other brands on if they will agree to Greenpeace's request and eliminate these dangerous toxins from their supply lines.

These toxins are unnecessary harm to our lives

The Greenpeace report is an important step toward educating people about just how hazardous the textile industry is. It's also a good method of putting necessary pressure on big name brands who claim to want to be eco-friendly (and have the resources available) to move the apparel industry into a non-toxic future. You can sign the Detox Now! petition here: http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/toxics/water/detox/Tell-Nike-and-Adidas-to-Detox/

Synthetic textiles don't need water in order to absorb dyes properly. The high temperatures these textiles require to get the fibers to take on colors can be achieved without using water at all. This means that these popular apparel brands DO have choices in the matter and could easily eliminate the toxins used to dye their shoes, shirts, and other products.

Read more about toxins in clothing here:
http://www.naturalnews.com/022803.html

Sources used and further reading:

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/08/23-1

http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?read=213789

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/08/23/greenpeace-finds-toxic-chemicals-in-top-brand-name-clothes/

http://www.naturalnews.com/005342.html

http://organicfamilycircle.com/synthetic-chemicals-make-dangerous-clothing-advantages-organic-fabrics.html

New Age Bible Versions - Gail Riplinger

Hospital patients now being microchipped with "electronic tattoos"

by Christina Luisa

(NaturalNews) Being microchipped is now being spun as a method of protecting the health of hospital patients. To help mask the practice of this bodily invasion with a trendy, high-tech appearance, microchipping sensors are being referred to as "electronic tattoos" that can attach to human skin and stretch and move without breaking.

Supposedly the comparisons of this hair-thin electronic patch-like chip to an electronic tattoo are being made because of how it adheres to the skin like a temporary tattoo using only water.

The small chip is less than 50 micrometers thick, which is thinner in diameter than a human hair. It is being marketed as a "safe" and easy way to temporarily monitor the heart and brain in patients while replacing bulky medical equipment currently being used in hospitals.

This device uses micro-electronics technology called an epidermal electronic system (EES) and is said to be a development that will "transform" medical sensing technology, computer gaming and even spy operations, according to a study published last week.

The hair-thin chip was developed by an international team of researchers from the United States, China and Singapore and is described in the Journal of Science.

The proven link between animal microchipping and cancer

Pet microchips have become increasingly common over the past few years. These chips are marked with a small barcode that can be scanned just like the tags on grocery items.

This seems to suggest that microchips are meant to turn the wearer into an object that can be tracked and catalogued. Once inserted in an animal, the chip stays there for the entirety of its lifetime and can be used to identify the pet if it should be found on the street or turned into a shelter. The subdermal chips are often recommended by vets and animal care experts as a way to ensure lost pets find their way home again.

But research suggests that despite their proclaimed usefulness, pet microchips may cause cancer. Multiple studies have clearly linked pet microchips with increased incidence of cancer and tumors in mice and rats.

In the past, public disclosure of these suggested links between microchipping and cancer in animals stirred widespread concern over the safety of implantable microchips in living beings. The animal microchip study findings that created such an uproar were so persuasive that Dr. Robert Benezra, head of the Cancer Biology Genetics Program at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, was quoted in an article about microchipping as saying, "There's no way in the world, having read this information, that I would have one of those chips implanted in my skin, or in one of my family members."

A 2001 study found that 1% of rats with implanted microchips developed cancerous tumors near the chip location. At least a dozen animal studies have been done between 1990 and 2007 and most concluded that microchips significantly increased the risk of cancer at the microchip site.

Soon we'll all have "cool electronic tattoos!"

All the electronic parts of the new EES chip are built out of wavy, snake-like components which allow them to be stretched and squeezed. They also contain tiny solar cells which can generate power or get energy from electromagnetic radiation. The sensor is mounted on to a water-soluble sheet of plastic and attached to the body by brushing the surface with water - hence the comparison to a temporary tattoo.

This new device being implanted in hospital patients certainly looks and acts like a microchip - yet it is persistently being referred to as an "electronic tattoo" in order to make the concept appear harmless, friendly - even trendy!

Invasive microchips - is the cost worth the convenience?

Scientists claim the supposed advantage of the EES chips is their ability to cut back on the bevy of wires, gel-coated sticky pads and monitors that are currently relied on to keep track of the vital signs of hospital patients. Apparently these traditional forms of bulky equipment and monitors are overly "distressing" to patients.

It appears scientists believe these new microchips are convenient enough that they outweigh the potential risks.

In test trials, the microchip was purposefully attached to the throat of a human and used to detect differences in words such as up, down, left, right, go and stop. Researchers used these functions to control a simple computer game.

Is the convenience of not having to manually operate equipment great enough to justify the implantation of an electronic sensor beneath the skin of humans? Would you trust a microchip to monitor your bodily functions without causing health hazards in the process?

The future of America: microchipped zombies

Researchers believe the technology could be used to replace traditional wires and cables, but this sounds remarkably like an excuse used to cover up the real truth: that this new microchipping method is a way to ensure all of us are eventually microchipped and able to be tracked and monitored. Soon, everyone will be required to wear chips or "tattoos" that prove they got their vaccinations, to link to health records, credit history and social security records.

If the government can require Americans to carry microchipped documents including your work, financial and health records, it seems it is only a matter of time before these chips will be implanted for the sake of "convenience" or "security." According to them, all of this is being done "for our own good."

Read more and watch videos about the government's agenda to microchip all humans by 2017 here: http://yedies.blogspot.com/2010/11/...

Sources used and further reading:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-14...

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?
id=CNG.6e1e2ad90e2d94b12b6258b7e9c5b33d.611&show_article=1

http://www.suite101.com/content/do-...

Strange Sounds in Colorado Before Earthquake

6.9 Earthquake In Peru

The Quigley Formula - [The World Government Conspiracy]

A 5.9 magnitude earthquake centred in Virginia News Report

East Coast earthquake rocks nation's capitol, halting dollar printing presses (satire)

by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor

(NaturalNews) A 5.9-strong earthquake rocked the East Coast today, with aftershocks felt from New York to Florida. Official buildings throughout Washington D.C. were evacuated, emptying the nation's capitol of bureaucrats and causing a momentary but notable economic stimulus to be felt across the nation, dwarfing the aftershocks of the quake itself.

Some damage was reported, however. A woman in Virginia screamed and called 911 when her outdoor flower vase fell and shattered on her back porch. President Obama took a break from his golf game to promise he would declare a national emergency and cut her a bailout check, as her decorative vase was declared "too big to fall."

In the halls of Congress, a Senator's desk overturned while he was sitting at it, revealing an intern.

At the Federal Reserve, the massive printing presses that churn out an endless stream of bailout money shuddered to a halt, causing a pause in food inflation but panicking bailout recipients who are now completely dependent on government money for their existence. Meanwhile at the Pentagon, internal emails revealed a flurry of questions asking for any intelligence on whether the earthquake was an "act of terrorism" and if so, could Mother Nature be arrested under the Patriot Act and held in Guantanamo Bay?

Some buildings were damaged in the quake. The White House was found to be leaning to the left, and the U.S. Treasury was discovered to be leaning on China. Thanks to aftershock ripple waves, the statue of Thomas Jefferson rumbled and thumped its way across the floor of the Jefferson Memorial as D.C. park police tried to arrest it for "illegal dancing" but were summarily trampled by twelve tons of granite. They are the only known fatalities of the earthquake so far, and will not be missed.

Right after the quake settled down, millions of Maryland and Virginia residents all looked at each other and wondered, "Why didn't we ever buy an emergency water filter?" The entire population, it turns out, was ill-prepared in terms of stored food, emergency lighting and community defense, prompting the gang bangers in the area to join hands and pray for an even larger earthquake so they could begin looting like the recent youth riots in London.

The USDA building suffered some minor damage during the quake, collapsing the agency's GMO division and causing a setback to Monsanto which was counting on the USDA to keep pushing its patented genetically engineered seeds.

The real shockwaves of the day, however, were felt economically as runaway debt spending under the Obama administration racked up $3 million per minute, meaning the three-minute earthquake cost the nation $9 million in clock time, not even counting any actual damage. Under Obama's leadership, the national debt has increased by $4 trillion (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20095704-503544.html) -- a number that should measure 9.0 on the Richter scale of runaway debt, if anyone were actually paying attention.

The mainstream media, meanwhile, blamed the entire earthquake on Ron Paul, who it proclaimed "cannot win the Presidency" but somehow has mutant superhero powers that allow him to control the Earth's tectonic plates. Ron "Richter" Paul later stated he would use his newfound powers to shift Washington D.C. into the Atlantic ocean, turning it into a small island nation that could drive itself into ruin while the rest of the United States disconnects from Washington and experiences economic freedom and prosperity.

Next, Ron Paul promises he will cause a tidal wave of public support to wash over the nation and reclaim liberty from the tyrants currently running the country. The status quo political establishment, of course, will characterize it as a "national disaster" and try to convince the American people they would be much better off remaining enslaved to a dictatorial nanny state that rules over them by decree.

But the People, having now witnessed the devastating aftershocks of Obamanomics -- and its Washington D.C. epicenter -- may have already wised up and prepared themselves to embrace real freedom in America.

God bless saints , I did feel it here in New York. I only felt the movements for at least 10 seconds or less. First time feeling a quake while awake ( no pun intended). The last real quake New York had I was asleep and was told about it. Possibly a sign of more things to come. I just kept calling on the name of Jesus and shortly the quaking stopped. There's power in the Name.

Pregnant women now being dosed with toxic chemotherapy drugs

by Christina Luisa

(NaturalNews) In the world of medicine, the toxicity of chemotherapy drugs is widely known. They make your hair fall out, after all, and that's on top of the muscle wasting, vomiting and overall health deterioration that chemo drugs admittedly produce. But now the insanity has reached a new low with doctors routinely prescribing chemotherapy drugs to pregnant women!

When a woman becomes pregnant, she is told to avoid alcohol, caffeine, cigarettes, sushi and other conceivable risks to the fetus. Almost every single medication and supplement has warnings that pregnant women should consult a doctor before use.

The utmost of concern is taken to ensure the protection of the unborn child. So does it seem reasonable that researchers claim that exposing pregnant women to chemotherapy (a deadly treatment that kills living cells) does not APPEAR to affect the fetus?

Though still fairly rare (the rate of pregnancy associated cancer is about 1 in 1,000 pregnancies), the incidence of pregnancy associated breast cancer is quickly on the rise.

It is becoming more common that pregnant women with breast cancer or other forms of cancer are being treated with chemotherapy despite the potential danger this is to the life growing inside of them. Doctors have even told pregnant patients they will die within a short period of time if they don't get chemotherapy, without informing them of more natural and safe options for treating their disease.

New data from researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center says that pregnant women treated for breast cancer supposedly do at least as well as non-pregnant women.

These results contradict earlier studies showing that outcomes were worse for pregnant women treated for breast cancer. Many doctors in the past have also recommended abortion, advising that chemotherapy could cause birth defects.

In a German study examining outcomes among 122 pregnant breast cancer patients, researchers concluded that pregnant patients can often be treated as aggressively as non-pregnant patients, with little evidence of ill effects to their babies.

These findings are said to prove that pregnant women who have breast cancer can be treated successfully without harming their babies. Abortion, the only other option that seems to be prevalently considered in cases of cancer during pregnancy is unnecessary.

Experts admit to being unsure about what is behind the new statistics but are apparently assuming the only important fact from the new research findings is the revelation that women treated while pregnant "do well."

One more reason not to trust oncologists

Even if cancer is detected in early pregnancy, women are being advised that chemo is completely okay if it is put off until the second trimester, in order to minimize the risk of birth defects.

Studies have shown that the birth defect rate is as high as 20% when chemotherapy is given in the first trimester, but that this rate drops to around 1.3% when chemotherapy is given later in the pregnancy. This percentage is said to be on par with the national average.

Chemotherapy given after the first trimester "does not usually harm the fetus but may cause early labor and low birth weight." Putting off chemo until the later trimesters is supposedly good reasoning because the first trimester is the most vulnerable period of a pregnancy, when vital organs are still forming.

However, what makes doctors and researchers think that this fact means the rest of the pregnancy does not also require extreme caution, especially when it comes to lethal drugs in large doses?

Pregnant patients are also recommended to receive the same drugs as non-pregnant patients in the same proportional doses according to weight. Chemotherapy treated patients usually get a combination of three drugs -- fluorouracil, doxorubicin, and cyclophosphamide. However, it is clearly stated on Drugs.com that Doxorubicin can cause fetal harm when administered to a pregnant woman.

This type of barbaric cancer treatment and the potent drug regimen during pregnancy carries the possibility of having disastrous effects in many cases. How could this amount and form of toxicity possibly not have some sort of significant harm on the vulnerable cells developing into a tiny human within a mother's womb?

Instead of referring pregnant women to natural cancer treatments that are entirely safe for their unborn children, oncologists are pushing them toward the "cure-all" of the corrupt cancer industry chemo. This means more money for them, but what about the children that will likely suffer due to the powerfully toxic treatments they were exposed to while in their mothers womb?

Questionable (uncertain) claims

It is being claimed by researchers, scientists, and doctors that chemotherapy has supposedly no detrimental effect on the fetus and that there is no increased risk of congenital defects in children who are exposed to chemotherapy during pregnancy.

The reasoning used for this is that the placenta acts "as a filter" for most of the products researched and "protects the fetus against the damaging effects of chemotherapy."

New research is stating that some medications barely penetrate the placenta, while in cases of other drugs the same concentration is found in both the mother and fetus. Does this sound like convincing enough evidence that the fetus is protected from the harmful effects of chemo?

An article in the Journal of Clinical Oncology also claims chemotherapy administered to pregnant women during second or third trimesters for the treatment of breast cancer APPEARS safe for both the fetus and mother.

In fact, many of the articles published on similar research studies on chemotherapy during pregnancy claim that the dangerous treatment APPEARS safe for unborn children. This wording certainly sounds confident and sound.

Although it has been clinically proven chemotherapy and radiation therapy can cause changes in germ cell DNA, most such changes are claimed to "not be viable, yielding only a slightly increased risk of birth defects." Only a slightly increased risk? Really? Even a New York Times article clearly stated that "Contradictions abound about just how chemotherapy affects babies in utero."

The same article mentions how the FDA has established 5 categories for the use of drugs during pregnancy, with category A the only unequivocally safe one. Most chemotherapeutic agents fall into category D, meaning there is clear evidence of risk to the fetus.

The study that started it all

In 1973, a senior researcher at the Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social in Mexico City named Dr. Agustin Aviles saw his first pregnant patient with leukemia. This woman became the catalyst for his revolutionary study on the effects of chemo while pregnant and the first of 84 patients who received chemotherapy during pregnancy between 1973 and 2003 (58 of them during the first trimester).

All 84 had acute leukemia, advanced Hodgkin's or malignant lymphoma and were told by doctors that putting off chemotherapy for even a few days could kill both them and the unborn children in their wombs.

Among all 84 cases in his study, every fetus survived and 5.8% of them had birth defects -- most of which were reported to be supposedly minor. In a follow-up study, Aviles examined 43 children born to mothers who received chemo from 1970 to 1986.

The children's ages ranged from 3 to 19 at the time of his assessment and all were recorded to have normal physical, neurological and psychological development. Because of this study and other more recent ones, doctors have been telling patients they don't have to make a choice between their lives and the life of their baby.

Although Aviles found that only 5.8 % of the babies of mothers who had undergone chemo in the first trimester were born with defects, other studies have found defects in the 14 to 19 % range when chemo is given in the first trimester. Even during the second and third trimesters, chemo is not risk free. Some studies clearly indicate that chemotherapy increases the risk of stillbirth, low birth weight and retardation.

Pregnant chemo patients are taking a potentially dangerous gamble

Most of the problems described in the babies exposed to chemotherapy in this minor study were said by a doctor to not be related to the treatment, but were "most probably due to other circumstances." These circumstances were not specified, however.

Some of the problems recorded in the study included: alopecia, trisomia 18 (a chromosomal disorder which caused a baby to die one week after birth), necrotic enterocolitis (a severe bacterial infection of the intestine which caused a baby to die three weeks after birth), sepsis (blood infection), neutropenia (low white blood cell count) and anaemia. Few studies have followed the long-term development of children born to women who received chemotherapy during pregnancy.

Although growing numbers of doctors are recommending chemo as an option for pregnant women, many of these women are still refusing treatment unless they abort their fetus first. However, some women have stated that being pregnant increases their will to survive after being diagnosed.

This is a decision that clearly carries a lot of weight in many different ways, and the only person who should be responsible for deciding what is best for the baby is the mother carrying its life in her body.

Article that talks about risks of chemo during pregnancy: http://www.otispregnancy.org/files/chemotherapy.pdf

Sources and further reading:
(http://www.kantrowitz.com/cancerpoints/pregnantwithcancer.html)

http://www.webmd.com/breast-cancer/news/20080418/breast-cancer-in-pregnancy-chemo-is-ok

http://healthland.time.com/2010/10/21/pregnant-women-with-breast-cancer-should-get-chemo/

http://www.thebreastcaresite.com/tbcs/CommunitySupport/Breast+Cancer+Breakthroughs
/Chemotherapy+Now+Recommended+for+Pregnant+Women+with+Breast+Cancer.htm

http://www.amoena.com/tbcs/CommunitySupport/Breast+Cancer+Breakthroughs/Chemotherapy+During+Pregnancy.htm

http://news.cancerconnect.com/chemotherapy-for-breast-cancer-safe-for-pregnant-women-during-second-and-third-trimesters/

http://www.drugs.com/clinical_trials/research-into-cancer-during-pregnancy-treating-pregnant-women-chemotherapy-has-no-detrimental-foetus-8290.html

(http://www.cancerinpregnancy.org/node/65)

(http://www.medpagetoday.com/MeetingCoverage/SABCS/23904)

http://www.breastcancer.org/tips/fert_preg_adopt/bc_pregnancy/treatment.jsp)

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/31/magazine/31cancer-t.html

8/22/2011 -- How do we communicate with each other during a disaster?

Fukushima Cracks in Earth with Steam Coming Out WTF? 8/17/11

The Vitamin Water Deception - exposes truth behind this non-healthy beve...

Vitamin Water exposed as sugar water in Food Investigations video

by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor

(NaturalNews) In a new Food Investigations video entitled, "The Vitamin Water Deception," the non-profit Consumer Wellness Center (www.ConsumerWellness.org) takes aim at the misleading marketing and high sugar content of Vitamin Water (a Coca-Cola product). The video was created by the Consumer Wellness Center and narrated by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, who also created the hugely popular "Blueberry Deception" video which has received over one million views across the internet.

Watch the Vitamin Water Deception at:
http://naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=9D14A...

Or YouTube at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8lL...

In this video report, you'll learn:

• Why Vitamin Water is mostly just "sugar water."

• Why the vitamins used in Vitamin Water are really just synthetic chemicals.

• How Coca-Cola altered the serving size of the beverage, making the sugar content appear to be less than what it really is.

• Why Vitamin Water advertising and marketing is misleading.

• The shocking truth of how even Coca-Cola's own attorneys publicly admitted that Vitamin Water is not a "healthy beverage." (http://www.naturalnews.com/029425_v...)

• Why one health group calls Vitamin Water "non-carbonated soda" and claim it contributes to weight gain, diabetes, obesity and other diseases.

• What to drink that's far better for you than Vitamin Water.

• Why the fruit flavor varieties of Vitamin Water contain no actual fruit.

• The truth of how Vitamin Water uses the cheap synthetic form of Vitamin B12 - Cyanocobalamin, which contains cyanide molecules.

• Why Vitamin Water is dead, processed food that has been pasteurized.

The links to watch the video are:

NaturalNews.TV:
http://naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=9D14A...

YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8lL...

Why Food Investigations is so popular

The Food Investigations series, created by Mike Adams, has been a huge hit across the internet, achieving mainstream news coverage and racking up millions of views across the many duplicate videos that have been posted. Old media news networks even ripped off the story and ran their own version of it, propping up their in-house personalities as the "experts" who "discovered" the very same things about food that Mike Adams first exposed in Food Investigations.

The first episode of Food Investigations, The Blueberry Deception, exposed the use of fake blueberries in cereals, bagels, breads and other products made by mainstream food companies such as General Mills and Kellogg's. Shortly after this episode was released by the Consumer Wellness Center, Kellogg's changed the box for one of their blueberry cereals, altering their text and removing the pictures of blueberries from one of the side panels.

You can watch The Blueberry Deception at:
http://naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=7EC06...

Or YouTube at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_Hj...

You may also enjoy watching the comedy skit created by Mike Adams called General Mills Mind Games, which satirizes the lack of blueberries in their "Blueberry Pomegranate TOTAL cereal":
http://naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=85151...

8/19/2011 -- Back to back 6.2 and 6.5 magnitude earthquakes in the west ...

DEVIL VATICAN!(Part 26),The Great Prostitute

THE OPRAH DEVILUTION-Advancer Of Perversion

Search Me, O Lord by Carrey Lane

Activist Post: Smart Meters: Another attack on the 4th Amendment

Activist Post: Smart Meters: Another attack on the 4th Amendment

While Romans burn: Italian sunbathers sizzle on Sicily beach as Mount Etna erupts

By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 8:44 PM on 12th August 2011
These Italian sunbathers seem to be making the most of their summer holidays
So determined are they to enjoy their time on the beach, they don't even turn their heads to the sight of Europe's largest volcano erupting behind them.
Or perhaps it's just volcano fatigue - after all, this is the sixth time Mt Etna has erupted in the last month.

Relaxing: These sunbathers on a beach in Sicily seems unbothered by the eruption of Mt Etna in the distance

Eruption: This is the sixth time that Etna has gone off in the last month

Spectacle: This group of tourists is transfixed by Etna's activity

But the spectacle clearly still has the ability to attract some, as these pictures show crowds of tourists watching the eruptions on the island of Sicily
And one man is brave enough to get right up close to the action in order to to take photographs.

 

Although the eruptions look violent, they tend not to be particularly damaging, as the lava flows safely away in well-worn channels.
But clouds of ash can make life unpleasant for residents and tourists in the picturesque villages crowded around the foot of the volcano.

Intrepid: This man gets up close to the plume of ash to get the perfect picture

Lava: Etna is one of the most active volcanoes in the world, so displays like this come relatively frequently

Tourists: Etna is one of Sicily's major attractions, despite its potentially deadly dangers

However, although some flights have been disrupted over the last few months, there has not been the same large-scale disruption to European airspace that was seen after the explosion of Iceland's Eyjafjallajökull last year.
Mt Etna is one of the most active volcanoes in the world - hardly a year goes by where it does not erupt in some way.
But this constant activity has helped those who live near Etna to adapt to its presence and take its eruptions in their stride, as these photos show.

Huge: But Etna's ash clouds are less disruptive to aircraft than you might expect

Barren: The volcano dominates this deserted landscape

 

8/9/2011 -- Hawaii Pu'u O'o Volcano -- AMAZING LAVA SHOTS! multiple view...

Postal Service proposes cutting 120,000 jobs, pulling out of health-care plan

By Joe Davidson, Published: August 11

SEATTLE — The financially strapped U.S. Postal Service is proposing to cut its workforce by 20 percent and to withdraw from the federal health and retirement plans because it believes it could provide benefits at a lower cost.
The layoffs would be achieved in part by breaking labor agreements, a proposal that drew swift fire from postal unions. The plan would require congressional approval but, if successful, could be precedent-setting, with possible ripple effects throughout government. It would also deliver a major blow to the nation’s labor movement.
In a notice informing employees of its proposals — with the headline “Financial crisis calls for significant actions” — the Postal Service said, “We will be insolvent next month due to significant declines in mail volume and retiree health benefit pre-funding costs imposed by Congress.”
During the past four years, the service lost $20 billion, including $8.5 billion in fiscal 2010. Over that period, mail volume dropped by 20 percent.
The USPS plan is described in two draft documents obtained by The Washington Post. A “Workforce Optimization” paper acknowledges its “extraordinary request” to break its labor contracts.
“However, exceptional circumstances require exceptional remedies,” the document says.
“The Postal Service is facing dire economic challenges that threaten its very existence. . . . If the Postal Service was a private sector business, it would have filed for bankruptcy and utilized the reorganization process to restructure its labor agreements to reflect the new financial reality,” the document continues.
In a white paper on health and retirement benefits, the USPS said it was imperative to rein in health benefit and pension costs, which are a third of its labor expenses.
For health insurance plans, the paper said, the Postal Service wanted to withdraw its 480,000 pensioners and 600,000 active employees from the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program “and place them in a new, Postal Service administered” program.
Almost identical language is used for the Civil Service Retirement System and the Federal Employees Retirement System.
The USPS said the programs do not meet “the private sector comparability standard,” a statement that could be translated as meaning that government plans are too generous and too costly.
“FEHB may exceed what the private sector does in certain areas,” said Anthony J. Vegliante, USPS chief human resources officer and executive vice president. “It may not meet what the private sector does in other areas. So cost may be above the private sector, while value may be below the private sector.”
Bills that would rein in employee benefits or have workers pay more for the benefits have been introduced in Congress and met with vigorous opposition from federal employee organizations. Intentionally or not, the Postal Service’s proposal provides support for such legislative initiatives.
The proposals are the USPS’s latest money-saving effort in a series of moves, some as recent as a few weeks ago and others stretching over a decade.
The Postal Service has reduced its workforce by 212,000 positions in the past 10 years and recently announced it is considering the closing of 3,700 post offices. It also has asked Congress to allow it to deliver mail five days a week instead of six and to change a requirement that it pre-fund retiree health benefits.
The USPS said it needs to reduce its workforce by 120,000 career positions by 2015, from a total of about 563,400, on top of the 100,000 it expects by attrition. Some of the 120,000 could come through buyouts and other programs, but a significant number would probably result from layoffs if Congress allows the agency to circumvent union contracts.
“Unfortunately, the collective bargaining agreements between the Postal Service and our unionized employees contain layoff restrictions that make it impossible to reduce the size of our workforce by the amount required by 2015,” according to the optimization document. “Therefore, a legislative change is needed to eliminate the layoff protections in our collective bargaining agreements.”
The layoff protection, however, does not apply to employees with fewer than six years of service, which presumably would include thousands of workers.
Postal union leaders quickly and sharply rejected the plans.
“The APWU will vehemently oppose any attempt to destroy the collective bargaining rights of postal employees or tamper with our recently negotiated contract — whether by postal management or members of Congress,” American Postal Workers Union President Cliff Guffey said.
“Our advisers are not encouraging us at all to even consider it,” said National Rural Letter Carriers’ Association President Don Cantriel.
“We are absolutely opposed” to the layoff proposal, he said. “We are opposed to pulling out of the Federal Employees Health Benefits plan.”
National Association of Letter Carriers President Fredric V. Rolando said: “The issues of lay-off protection and health benefits are specifically covered by our contract. . . . The Congress of the United States does not engage in contract negotiations with unions, and we do not believe they are about to do so.”
How Congress will respond to the proposals, however, remains to be seen. Many Republicans, including those who have sponsored legislation that labor considers anti-union, may support the plan. Some Democrats, for which organized labor is an ally, could back union opposition. But the Postal Service’s critical financial situation could make some Democrats have second thoughts.
Two members of Congress who have introduced separate postal reform bills were noncommittal on the USPS plan.
A spokeswoman for Sen. Thomas R. Carper (D-Del.) said, “He is particularly interested in learning whether these proposals would be fair to employees and effective in reducing the Postal Service’s costs.”
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said: “These new ideas from the Postal Service are worth exploring. Options for reform and cost savings that will protect taxpayers from paying for a bailout, now or in the future, need to be on the table.”

AFP:  

Electronic skin tattoo has medical, gaming, spy uses

Aug 11 03:43 PM US/Eastern

 

This image courtesy of J. Rogers, University of Illinois shows an epidermal...

A hair-thin electronic patch that adheres to the skin like a temporary tattoo could transform medical sensing, computer gaming and even spy operations, according to a US study published Thursday. The micro-electronics technology, called an epidermal electronic system (EES), was developed by an international team of researchers from the United States, China and Singapore, and is described in the journal Science.

"It's a technology that blurs the distinction between electronics and biology," said co-author John Rogers, a professor in materials science and engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
"Our goal was to develop an electronic technology that could integrate with the skin in a way that is mechanically and physiologically invisible to the user."
The patch could be used instead of bulky electrodes to monitor brain, heart and muscle tissue activity and when placed on the throat it allowed users to operate a voice-activated video game with better than 90 percent accuracy.
"This type of device might provide utility for those who suffer from certain diseases of the larynx," said Rogers. "It could also form the basis of a sub-vocal communication capability, suitable for covert or other uses."
The wireless device is nearly weightless and requires so little power it can fuel itself with miniature solar collectors or by picking up stray or transmitted electromagnetic radiation, the study said.
Less than 50-microns thick -- slightly thinner than a human hair -- the devices are able to adhere to the skin without glue or sticky material.
"Forces called van der Waals interactions dominate the adhesion at the molecular level, so the electronic tattoos adhere to the skin without any glues and stay in place for hours," said the study.
Northwestern University engineer Yonggang Huang said the patch was "as soft as the human skin."
Rogers and Huang have been working together on the technology for the past six years. They have already designed flexible electronics for hemispherical camera sensors and are now focused on adding battery power and other energy options.
The devices might find future uses in patients with sleep apnea, babies who need neonatal care and for making electronic bandages to help skin heal from wounds and burns.


Copyright AFP 2008, AFP stories and photos shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium

Europe to lead the financial collapse of the West?

by J. D. Heyes

(NaturalNews) In case you haven't noticed - and, in lieu of the press generated by the recent battle royal over how much to increase the U.S. national debt, most of you probably haven't - Europe is on the brink of financial collapse. But before you shed too many tears for the Mother Continent, save a few for America because at the pace we're going, we're next.

Expert economists, who have watched the financial situation in Europe deteriorate over the past year, have watched its politicians and policymakers make one bad fiscal decision after another, each of which has served to perpetuate, if not accelerate, the continent's impending economic collapse.

Though Europe's fiscal problems are systemic, they first began to manifest in Greece, Portugal and Ireland, where the global economic downturn badly exposed these nations' habitual overspending. Most of it was on social benefits and entitlements that they haven't been able to afford for years, but they were able to buy mostly by borrowing against their future (sound familiar?).

In Greece in particular, the overspending has put the national debt at about €300 billion, or $413 billion, which is larger than the country's entire annual GDP. Worse, though Greek lawmakers and European Union officials tried to implement austerity measures, they were vehemently opposed by the nation's entitlement generations. In response, workers across the country staged strikes that closed airports and government offices, courts, schools and other public offices.

Even better-than-expected employment data in the world's biggest economy for last month doesn't seem to stem the river of bad vibes concerning Europe's future. On Friday, the U.S. Department of Labor sparked a short run into positive territory for American and global stocks when it released a much anticipated report showing job growth in July was, at 117,000, higher than expected.

But lingering doubts among investors about Europe's ability to pull itself back from the economic abyss took over and left markets dazed and staggering by day's end. In fact, markets in France, Germany and Great Britain - the continent's strongest economies - all ended the day on a negative note.

At this point, maybe the most savvy investors and politicos have already seen the writing on the wall, and the markets are reflecting that realization.

"We are less than three years away from where Greece had its debt crisis as to where they were from debt to GDP," David Walker, former chief Comptroller and head of the Government Accountability Office, told CNBC in an interview Aug. 2.

The negativity is justified. Remember that Greece's debt is already more than 120 percent of its entire annual GDP (gross domestic product, the sum of income from all goods and services). The U.S. just hit that level of debt this week after Congress authorized, and President Obama signed, another increase in the government's debt ceiling. Worse, economic growth in the U.S., like Europe, is also floundering.

See the parallel?

"The fact of the matter is that government has grown too big, promised too much and waited too long to restructure. Our problem is overwhelmingly a spending problem," Walker says.

And while that would appear to be obvious, lawmakers set the entire country up for failure when they, some time ago, forgot about stewardship (taking care not to injure or harm the next generation of Americans) and instead focused on buying loyalties here and now using the U.S. Treasury as a personal piggy bank.

European leaders have done the same thing. The only difference between Europe and America is that they appear to be closer to being swallowed by the coming fiscal tsunami.
God will take care of His people who trust in Him. So we have no fear.

USA loses AAA credit rating as S&P downgrades due to runaway debt and government spending

by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor

(NaturalNews) The USA lost its long-coveted AAA debt rating late Friday as Standard & Poor's downgraded the nation's debt to AA+, citing out-of-control government spending and record budget deficits. This is something that key members of the Obama administration promised would never happen (http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/budget/156747-geithner-no-risk-that-us-loses-its-top-credit-rating).

They were wrong, of course; just like the entire cabal of useless bureaucrats in Washington is wrong about what's going to happen next. This downgrade of the debt rating by S&P, you see, is what NaturalNews and other alternative media leaders have been predicting and warning about for years. The U.S. government's runaway debt spending, we warned, was entirely unsustainable. The risk of default is not merely high, but it's actually so high that if S&P had any honesty, it would have downgraded U.S. debt to junk status years ago. (The fact that it's still at AA+ is a mathematical joke.)

The flight away from US debt

Why does this debt rating matter? Consider, for starters, why S&P waited until after the markets closed on a Friday to even make its announcement. This gives Washington the weekend to try to figure out some kind of rescue plan before Monday morning when institutional investors around the world will begin what can only be called the mass flight away from U.S. debt. The great selloff will begin in earnest, and this will flood the open markets with toxic US debt that no one in their right mind would dare purchase.

Institutional investors, you see, are frequently bound by rules that require them to invest solely in AAA-rated debt sources. With S&P's downgrade of U.S. Treasury debt, these institutions (which include some of the largest investment funds in the world) must, by their own rules, sell off 100% of their US debt holdings. This will all be happening at virtually the same time when the week opens on Monday.

The impact of all this is that the US will need to pay higher interest rates to issue new debt. It will be more expensive, in other words, for the US to find buyers of its debt, and this will be very quickly reflected in the compounding debt burden tacked on the total national debt, which is currently at $14.5 trillion and counting (http://www.usdebtclock.org/).

Since every administration in the White House absolutely refuses to cut government spending -- and the Obama administration wants to INCREASE it! -- the government is forced to keep issuing more debt at higher interest rates.

This brings me to the rule of 72.

Compounding debt interest adds up quickly

The rule of 72 provides a simple way to calculate how long it takes for money to double when subjected to compounding interest. Simply take 72 divided by the annual interest rate, and that tells you the number of years necessary for the money (or in this case, the debt) to double.

For example, if you loan me $10,000 and you charge a 7% interest rate, then using the rule of 72, I know that in roughly ten years, I will owe you double what you loaned me, or $20,000.

If you loan me $10,000 and you charge me a 10% interest rate, then I know I'll owe you $20,000 in 7 years.

At a 12% interest rate, compounding debt doubles every six years.

As compounding interest rates rise, the acceleration of the total debt owes grows very rapidly. So even a tiny increase in the interest rate on debt will result in a compounding accelerated growth in the total debt burden. With S&P downgrading the US debt rating to AA+, the interest rate the US Treasury will now be forced to pay on the debt will be higher than it was before, and this means we are now facing an accelerated financial blowout schedule.

A nation brought to its knees by government crooks and tyrants

The financial demise of the US government, in other words, is now significantly closer than it was two days ago. The fiscally corrupt American empire cannot survive without its false AAA debt rating. That's why this debt downgrade will accelerate the total debt default we've been warning about for years.

The US government today, of course, is run by liars and thieves, crooks and thugs. Virtually every word uttered by the White House Press Secretary is a complete fabrication. Everything you're being told from official sources about the US debt is a bald-faced lie. The US debt is a giant Ponzi scheme that's about to come tumbling down in a complete financial wreck. We warned you this was coming, even as internet trolls claimed it was impossible for the US to default on its debt. Impossible? Then why did it nearly happen just last week?

People like Gerald Celente and Paul Craig Roberts have been right about the coming debt implosion, which is why the mainstream media largely refuses to talk to them. Only the alternative media has the guts to report the truth about the impending financial collapse the US government now unquestionably faces.

Even the US Postal Service has financially collapsed and has just announced it is in default (http://news.yahoo.com/us-postal-warns-could-default-222059604.html).

Do we even have two years remaining?

S&P says it will revisit the US debt situation in two more years and possibly downgrade the debt rating to AA at that time (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-08-06/u-s-credit-rating-cut-by-s-p-for-first-time-on-deficit-reduction-accord.html). Two years? Are you kidding? I'm not even sure the US government as we know it today will exist at all in two years. And even if it does, things can only get worse because the runaway debt spending will never be halted. Washington is in a spending blowout phase that looks a whole lot like the waning days of the Roman Empire as it tried to service its military imperialism even while its own politicians at home had all become deeply invested in corruption.

As the US spirals into a total financial collapse, you can expect a rise of the police state just as we're seeing right now with the Rawesome Foods raid (http://www.naturalnews.com/033220_Rawesome_Foods_armed_raids.html). As any empire begins to collapse, it pulls out the guns to try to keep its citizens in line. Free Speech is stripped away from citizens (http://www.naturalnews.com/033244_Rawesome_Foods_gag_order.html) and law is abandoned in favor of total government tyranny against the People.

That's precisely what we're seeing in America today, with the ATF's illegal gun running (http://www.naturalnews.com/032934_ATF_illegal_firearms.html), the FDA's illegal raids on vitamin manufacturers, the USDA's total betrayal of public health as it conspires with GMO companies to unleash massive genetic contamination across our planet, and so on. We are watching the last desperate gasps of a dying corrupt empire -- an empire that can no longer survive by telling the truth so has turned instead to insidious lies and a total assault on freedom.

History will call this time "the beginning of the collapse of the American empire." You are living it, folks. It's a fascinating time to be alive. Just try not to get crushed when this once-great empire comes crumbling down all around you. Very few people are prepared for what's coming. Perhaps 99% of the American people are completely and utterly clueless about all this. They will not be happy when they wake up one day and find out the dollar has been devalued, abandoned or massively hyper-inflated. That's the day you don't want to find yourself thinking "Gee, maybe I should have gotten prepared a little sooner..."

My financial preparedness course published in March of this year warned about all this, by the way, and it provides numerous valuable solutions for protecting yourself from the coming debt collapse. Check it out at: http://premium.naturalnews.tv/Be_Prepared_Not_Scared_Financial_Preparedness__NN.htm

People who have already learned this information are ahead of the game and will be far better prepared for the massive financial collapse that's coming. Only people living in total denial can't see what's becoming obvious now: The financial end of America approaches.

8/6/2011 -- Global UPTICK continues -- Earthquake and Volcano update a...

Blessings In the Battle

The Hidden Faith of The Founding Fathers 2010

The Evil that is Yoga/Kabbalah!

Evil, The Illuminati, NWO 2013 MUST SEE!!!

8/4/2011 -- 6.3 magnitude earthquake -- Russia -- Kuril Islands (pacific)

ELABORATE WELFARE HOUSING PROJECT

The New Atlantis Documentary - Secret Mysteries Of Americas Beginnings

Dave Hunt - New Age Occultism

8/2/2011 -- coming on 11/9/11 Comet Elenin ... CNN ireport TOP stories

Why I Support Self Check-Out in Stores

I was in a Duane Reade store in New York over the weekend.Purchased a few items and went to the check out line. I was the only other customer in the store at the time. The cashier was already assisting a customer so I waited; and waited....and waited. Just about the time I thougth I had waited long enough the manger appeared from the back and he was coming to the front of the store.The cashier suddenly said to the customer she was assisting " Let me take care of the lady behind you."So she moves to he side and the cashier asks me; Are you ready?" My response was " I've been ready." to which she just shrugged.
I have seen this behavior in many stores where you have to wait in long lines for customer assisance in stores and in the post office.
Fortunately, in a store near where I work the CVS has engineered Self-Check out which turned out to be a great hit in the area.
Last month I saw an article where a chain fo stores was cancelling self-check out in oder to implement more personal contact between customers and cashiers.
I am not at all against human contact but I have observed in many occasions  a clerk/cashier will purposefully ignore a customer waiting to be helped in order to continue fraternizing ( in some cases) with one customer because they are friends. In the case with the Duane Reade cashier, the customer she was dealing with needed assistance with her camera. Well the cashier in question was not a camera expert based on her answers to the lady's questions/ She could have easily asked her to step aside and allow her to assist me and then continue afterwards. As we see though the manager had to appear on the scene to cause the woman to be willing to correct her error.
In a self-check out scenario  no waiting would have been necessary.
As Christians we know patience is a virtue and oftentimes the  Lord will put us in a situation where we must be patient and wait for something.
That's good because our flesh needs to be tempered and under control.
However there are other times when no waiting is necessary. You're up next go for it. 

The cheapest, fastest, easiest way to detoxify the whole body, look younger and be healthier

by Jane Goldberg

(NaturalNews) Some years back I heard Bernard Jensen, one of our country's great nutritionists and author of over 50 books, tell the story of Samson, "the Saxon Giant." Samson was a weight lifter and wrestler who was brought to the United States by Florenz Zeigfield in the 1920's as one of the featured acts in the Zeigfield Follies. Besides his strength, Samson was also known for his baby-soft skin, a feature that Samson attributed to his daily regimen of dry skin-brushing, and a fact that greatly intrigued Jensen.

One year, so the story went that Jensen told, Samson lost the world's championship heavyweight weight-lifting contest by just 10 ounces. Jensen was able to find and examine Samson's diaries, and found that Samson had a novel theory explaining his defeat. Samson attributed his loss to the fact that he had neglected to dry-brush his skin for three weeks prior to the contest.

Jensen decided to do a little experiment of his own to see why Samson would have reached such an unusual conclusion. Jensen bought a skin brush and stood on brown wrapping paper while he brushed his own body. After enough debris had fallen onto the paper, Jensen sent the material to a lab. The lab found a lot of dead skin, which, of course, was expected. But the lab also found dried catarrh, urea, sodium chloride, sebum and metabolic acid wastes. From his little experiment, Jensen came to understand that when these substances are not removed from the skin, they can become backed up in the muscle structure, and can consequently cause a loss of vitality. Jensen became a great advocate for daily dry-skin brushing.

One of the most wonderful things about our bodies is that its largest organ - the skin -- is on its outside. We can, and do, automatically and continuously both nourish and detoxify our bodies through the skin.

The ability of the skin to accept substances and deliver them to the bloodstream is well-known. The skin serves as a direct link to all the other organs. Contemporary physicians have revived the age-old practice of delivering medicine through the skin. Heart patients use nitroglycerin patches; cigarette smokers try to break their addiction through the use of nicotine patches. So great, in fact, is the ability of the skin to absorb substances that one drop of essential oil placed on the fingertip will show up in hair analysis ten minutes later.

The skin's ability to excrete toxins, however, is not as well emphasized. In natural health circles, the skin is referred to as the body's third lung, or third kidney. It aids tremendously in throwing off all toxins from the body. We absorb more impurities, and eliminate more waste through the skin than any other organ in our bodies (including the colon). Two pounds of waste are eliminated every day through the skin. The skin works hand in hand with the kidneys. On hot days, we do a lot of our elimination through our skin, and our kidneys don't have to work as hard. Conversely, on cold days, our kidneys take over this function of the skin because the skin is not eliminating as much.

The body organizes itself, in part, through a continuous dance of creating new while simultaneously shedding old, and it does this process especially efficiently with skin cells.

The skin is often the first place that biological imbalance appears. When the other systems are overloaded in dealing with too many toxins, the skin is utilized as an additional organ of detoxification. Sometimes old cells can cling to the surface of the skin, trapping pathogenic microorganisms like bacteria within; as well new cells are inhibited from breathing. Eruptions, blemishes, odors and colors may appear as the skin tries to do overtime in ridding the body of waste.

Skin brushing is especially useful for lymphatic cleansing. Cleansing the lymphatic system is essential because the lymph glands serve as one of the body's primary defense mechanisms. The lymphatic system cleanses out cellular debris that the bloodstream has not been able to take care of, such as viruses, bacteria and dust.

The lymphatic system is like the circulatory system: it moves a fluid -- which makes up about 80% of total body fluids -- throughout the body. This lymphatic fluid picks up debris as it moves along its path. Normally, excess lymphatic fluid is excreted through the skin, the kidneys and other eliminative organs.

Unlike the circulatory system which has a pump -- the heart -- to keep the fluid moving, the lymphatic system has nothing to keep the fluid moving other than your own movement. When there is toxicity from improper diet or elimination, clothing worn too tightly, or not enough exercise, the lymphatic fluid gets blocked.

Improper lymphatic drainage is one of the main reasons that so many women are plagued with cellulite. The dimples that form on the thighs and buttocks are due to the accumulation of fats, proteins and other waste products that are not being excreted from the body efficiently. These unwanted products are usually carried out of the body by the lymphatic system. Dry skin brushing helps to kick-start the lymphatic system by stimulating the lymph canals, which helps detoxify the blood and reduces the toxic build up that causes cellulite.

Jensen himself was testimony to his own theory. When he was 88, he appeared at a conference I was attending. He rolled up his shirt sleeves and pulled up his pants legs, showing us the skin on his arms and legs. There was not a single wrinkle, line or blemish anywhere on this man's body that we could see. Jensen, like Samson, attributed the beauty of his skin - its tautness, smoothness and elasticity - to his daily regimen of skin brushing.

Jane Goldberg Ph.D is the founder of La Casa Day Spa in New York City, which recently celebrated it's 18th anniversary, making it the oldest spa in New York City.

8/1/2011 -- Severe weather across 1/2 of USA & Hurricane forming -- READ...

8/1/2011 -- "Pushing the envelope" -- CA, NV, OR, WA, ID = Volcanic plum...

8/1/2011 -- DAILY 6.0+ magnitudes continue -- today, another 6.2 earthqu...