It's the Most Wasteful Time of the Year

Well, another year is almost over and it soon will be time for the holidays and the festivities. We are walking in the stores now and seeing the bright lights of Christmas and Christmas carols playing in most of the stores. It has occurred to me in the past few years how materialistic and commercialized Christmas has become. It has nothing to do with the birth of Christ anymore to most people. It has become an orgy of materialism in the western world. Don't get me wrong, I used to love Christmas like a lot of people, but the real meaning of Christmas has been lost for the most part. You need to look no further than observing Black Friday door crasher sales to notice how pitiful our modern society has become. People wait in line for hours and push and shove each other to save money on the latest gadgets that we probably don’t need anyways. I am not against Christmas itself, just what it has become in our society. It is hard for certain people after a divorce and family breakup or if you recently lost a loved one to get in the mood to celebrate Christmas. Then there are others that have lost their jobs amidst this economic downturn. There is still pressure on them to buy, buy, and buy because that is that is what the media and society expects us to do. If you have kids they probably want and expect more than they ever did. I am not against taking Christmas away from children, because I always had a fairly good Christmas growing up, but here in North America in the past few decades we have spent more money on Christmas than we can really afford. There is lots of pressure indeed put on those that can't afford things and have no means to buy like the media and stores and some of our peers suggest for us to spend.

Christmas is the time of year when there is more waste than any other time of year amongst many individuals. Americans throw away 25 million extra tons of garbage during the Thanksgiving-to-New-Year’s holiday period, as compared to the rest of the year. That’s about 1 million extra tons per week; 25% more than in an average week.

We use more lights for our trees and properties. I happen to like lights myself; however, we need to use LED and environmentally friendly lights. Another thing wasted is wrapping paper. We wrap our gifts just to have them opened a few days later and the paper is thrown out. Christmas cards also use a lot of cardboard. Let's make a choice to recycle cards and wrapping paper this year. When you add to the paper wasted during the holidays millions of trees are chopped down during the holidays to put up in our homes for a few weeks and then thrown out. Make sure if you do use a real tree to dispose of it properly after the holidays are over. In many cases used trees can be used as mulch. Many communities in North America have Christmas tree recycling programs. Then there are the massive amount of toys that are mass-produced in Asia that we buy our children every Christmas. Half of these toys are probably not needed nor wanted and are disposed of in landfills before the next Christmas rolls around. We can't blame things on the kids, as it is the adults that control the media and seduce kids into wanting all this stuff. It is also the adults that no longer want our current televisions, DVD players, computers, MP3 players and other electronic gadgets when they become outdated. We want to dispose of our current versions of electronics and get the latest and greatest, which have new features. Hopefully if we really need that new electronic device we will dispose of the older ones properly by selling it, donating it or recycling it as a last resource. Also, disposable batteries are used a lot more at Christmas. Where do these batteries go? Unfortunately most end up in landfills. There is a lot of waste during the holiday season, and each of us should do our part to cut back on this waste.

We should revert back somewhat and celebrate Christmas the way it should be celebrated. We need to focus on family values and those less fortunate and less on the materialistic ways that have crept into society this past generation. I wish everyone a safe and happy holiday. Please celebrate responsibly. All the best in 2011.

Big Pharma and The Big Deception

"And they did not repent of their murders nor of their sorceries nor of their immorality nor of their thefts." Rev. 19:21

I am going to deviate from my normal topic line somewhat and talk about a topic we can all relate to, but many are blind to what goes on behind the scenes. I still am committed to being environmentally conscious and do what is right to preserve our planet. I also wish we had more alternatives as far as alternate energy and renewable energy. A lot of issues including environmental and health issues are very complicated and cannot easily be solved overnight. There are powerful corporate forces and even government forces that don’t always have the average citizen’s best interests in mind and in many cases not even the environment’s best interest. They just follow the “money trail.” Going forward I want to write more articles that I am passionate about in addition to just “Green” articles. Being green is cool but there is more going on in this world that needs to be mentioned.

Over the past several months, I have been reading some books and watching some other materials discussing big pharmaceutical companies and to some extent big agriculture and some other big corporations. In regards to “Big Pharma”, in many cases they are not interested in curing diseases, as disease means profit for these companies. In fact some pharmaceutical companies along with some of their big corporate friends and to some extent governments, even invent diseases and conditions to increase their profits. One of the books I read and highly recommend is “Medisin” by Dr. Scott Whitaker. I also have listed to some individuals such as Alex Jones and Gerald Celente, who are not afraid to speak out against corruption and I commend them for it.

The interests of groups such as big Pharma have taken hostage of our western civilization. Our modern diets which consist of Genetically Modified foods with hundreds of toxic additives such as aspartame and MSG are causing numerous diseases in people including cancer, diabetes, crohns and colitis and many others, are a big cash cow for the pharmaceutical companies who profit in the billions of dollars from the often preventive illnesses of the population. They have even discovered new diseases to increase their profit. They even hype up other ailments and advertise on corporate controlled mainstream media to peddle their drugs. Children for example are being told that they have Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Autism, and other conditions, which I think, are partly caused by vaccines and the toxic diets and environment that children are exposed to. Then we poison them with numerous drugs such as Ritalin, which of course helps big Pharma. I don’t mean to undermine diseases in children which are a great deal of stress to parents who are often told that medications are their only choice and as a parent they do what they think is right to help their children. Cases of debilitating illnesses and other side effects as a result of vaccinations across the world are on the increase. I wonder if the swine flu last year was even hyped up to make some people very rich. Just follow the money trail and it leads to Tamiflu, Roche and Donald Rumsfeld.

I believe that in many cases that most of the Multi National Pharmaceutical companies do NOT want a cure for most diseases. Disease is profit. The more diseases and the more people with them, the more money they make. Even those who wish to provide natural treatments or offer a reliable cure for a certain disease are kept quiet and even ridiculed. Yes, they can manufacture drugs to control and eradicate some symptoms but they do not want to cure them. They want to keep people sick and in fact some of the side effects from some of these drugs make people even sicker. Most of the doctors get paid for treating disease, not curing them. See the vicious cycle here? How many people are familiar with Codex Alimentarius? Codex Alimentarius is a threat to the freedom of people to choose natural healing and alternative medicine and nutrition. Ratified by the World Health Organization, it is being implemented in many parts of the world including North America. Codex Alimentarius is about the economic wishes of multi-national corporations, in particular, the pharmaceutical industry. If Codex Alimentarius is fully implemented in North America, therapeutic dosages of vitamins, and minerals, and all other nutrients will become unavailable because they will literally become illegal. Therapeutic grade vitamins, minerals, and amino acids would be eliminated from the marketplace. Our water is full of toxins. Our food is full of toxins. Why not fix those issues instead of attacking vitamins and people that wish to take a holistic approach to health? Of course, the big corporations, especially Big Pharma has no interest in a healthy population, and will do what ever is in their power to make the population sick so they are dependant on their drugs.

A few examples of how doctors and society in much of the western world are influenced by big Pharma have personally touched me. About fifteen years ago I was diagnosed with Crohns disease. I gradually got pretty sick and had a specialist that wanted to try different drugs on me. I had taken steroids and other drugs to control my gradually worsening condition. I remember asking my specialist if diet and exercise could make a difference. His reply was that there was not a proven diet or exercise program that he could recommend but advised me I should try another drug. I eventually had to get surgery, which saved my life. I will admit that when I was younger I had a poor diet and was not fully educated in a healthy lifestyle, so I do take some responsibility in the onset of my disease. Years after my surgery, I still have a mild case of manageable Crohn’s, but I know without any doubt that proper diet and exercise along with stress management is the way to go and to only take medication when absolutely needed. We need to get at the root cause of disease and not put bandages on them.

CCSVI the Liberation of multiple sclerosis is another hot issue. I am touched by Multiple Sclerosis indirectly as I have some close friends with the disease. It is another example of how doctors and health officials are bullied by big Pharmaceutical companies. The so-called “liberation treatment” for multiple sclerosis was just declined as a treatment by the Canadian federal government. They decided recently not to fund further research into the treatment the so-called “liberation treatment” for multiple sclerosis. They state there is not enough positive data to confirm that is helps. Just from reading articles and listening to people with MS that had this procedure done, it is more promising than any drug introduced recently. I wonder who is calling the shots here? Big Pharma does not want a cure for MS in my opinion. They make too much money from MS to have it taken away from them. Big Pharma wants you sick. Disease is their business. The more diseases and more people they can control the more money they make. Big Pharma controls our health authorities, doctors and governments by bribing and bullying who they need to in order to make more money. Big Pharma also has a huge control of the mainstream media who are bribed by millions of advertising dollars.

Now, I am not totally against medicine and I am not blaming researchers and scientists that really want to find cures and ways to alleviate human suffering and to genuinely help people. In certain cases medicines have saved lives and help people manage certain diseases. What I am against is the way that multi national corporations have used deception and greed to harm people and especially in this case pharmaceutical companies where they are blocking and robbing some people from optimum health. When pharmaceutical companies and health care officials put their own profit motives ahead of the best interest of patients and even deceive them in order to keep their corrupt game going, I have a huge problem with that. We all need to play a part primarily in disease prevention and secondly in curing disease. That is being aware of the foods we eat and staying away from corporate and processed food as much as we can and buying local when possible. We need to be taking vitamins and herbs when needed and of course exercising when we can. We need to put more pressure on our health authorities to have a more holistic approach to healthcare and not be dictated by Big Pharma. Together we can make a difference

CONTROIL …Crisis in the Gulf ….Are we being told the Truth?

On April 20 of this year we were informed of an oil well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico. The blowout caused a catastrophic explosion on the Deepwater Horizon offshore oil drilling platform. This is currently a massive ongoing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, now considered the largest offshore spill in U.S. history. Experts fear that due to factors such as petroleum toxicity and oxygen depletion, the spill will result in an environmental disaster, damaging the Gulf of Mexico fishing industry, the Gulf Coast tourism industry, and the habitat of hundreds of bird species, fish and other wildlife. The ecosystem in the gulf will be effected for decades because of this. Any many predict that this oil contamination will spread beyond the Gulf. The ecosystem is interconnected from the tiniest organism to humans who drink water and eat food. However, the ecosystem is not the only thing interconnected. The media that fabricates the truth, the governments that also hide the facts and big oil companies are more interconnected than a lot of people realize.

I have been following this story like many other people in this continent and elsewhere on the planet. We are being bombarded with different figures on the size of the spill and what the impact will be. My heart goes out first to the people that lost their lives in the explosion, but now we need to consider the livelihoods of the people in the Gulf region that depend on the sea. We need to take in to account the wildlife being affected along with the long term implications on human health. There are many players involved in this disaster including BP, the US government, the media and other third parties. Some of these entities are trying to cover their own butts first and foremost, so we as the general public are being given conflicting information at times instead of the truth. In my opinion BP for example is trying to sugarcoat the issue somewhat. Did you know that six weeks after this happened amidst all the grief they contributed to, they are paying dividends to their stockholders this quarter. BP will be paying $10.5 billion in dividends this year to shareholders. It has also been reported that BP has contracted for $50 million worth of TV advertising to protect their image during the course of this disaster. In addition, there are other corporations involved in this. In addition to BP, Transocean owns the deep sea rig the Deepwater Horizon and was contracted by BP. Halliburton, an energy services was the provider the cementing or casing for the oil well.

Estimates as of late May show the undersea well has spilled between 17 and 39 million gallons. These estimates differ from those of BP, who claimed the spill had only released 11 million gallons to date. BP has a long record of oil-related disasters in the United States. In 2005, BP’s Texas City refinery exploded, killing 15 workers and injuring another 170. In 2006, one of its Alaska pipelines leaked 200,000 gallons of crude oil. According to the Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico Studies, approximately $1.6 billion in annual economic activity and services are at risk as a result of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. BP is a company valued at $152.6 billion, and which makes $93 million each day. When their costs to try to contain the spill have cost them hundreds of millions of dollars it is simply a cost of doing business. It is money that they can easily absorb. Millions of gallons of oil will remain in the ocean, destroying a great part the underwater ecosystem, and 100 miles of Louisiana coastline will never be the same. Now factor in the beginning of hurricane season and we can just imagine what may happen when even a moderate hurricane strikes that area.

Just after the Deepwater explosion, surviving employees were held in solitary confinement, while BP authorities made them waive their rights to sue. I guess that was their primary concern at that horrific time. Transocean Ltd., the owner of the Deepwater Horizon rig leased by BP, has not getting as much attention in the media. Because of past experience with Gulf Oil spills, Transocean decided to insure the Deepwater Horizon rig for about twice what it was worth. Transocean reported making a $270 million profit from insurance payouts after the disaster. The very worst part about the Deepwater Horizon disaster is that nobody knows how bad it really is because they can’t measure what’s going on. They don’t know how to fully stop the oil from gushing out as of this time and then clean up the damage already done.

The average American consumers 25 barrels of oil per year. That is a startling fact. We can’t stop using oil overnight. We are addicted to it. I have been doing a lot of research on how governments and economies work. I used to be blindfolded and believed every thing I heard from governments and the mainstream media. Not any longer! In fact when you uncover the truth it is often not pretty. We are controlled by big corporate powers in society including big oil companies. These corporations have more control over the media and government more than many of us are aware. Corporations such as BP can manipulate governments and the mainstream media to put a positive spin on the news and not discuss the real facts. In fact this past week. President Obama, speaking to reporters recently, said to the media that BP would be held accountable for financial losses from what he called the "greatest environmental disaster of its kind in our history”. I hope the president is fully sincere in saying that. However, is he just stating that to make the average person affected by the crisis feel better? Will the US government hold BP and the other companies that contributed to this disaster fully accountable. I personally doubt it as major corporations and agencies tied to this will make sure they will accept as little as responsibility as possible. Big Oil and Big Corporations control the government and media more than the average citizen thinks. Citizens of the great country of the United States as well as Canada, where I am from, need to be aware of what is happening around us and not be held hostage by big oil companies any longer.