BUCKNACKT'S SORDID TAWDRY BLOG
We should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive & well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate, bier or wein in hand, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WHOO-HOO, WHAT A RIDE!!!!!!"
MAGAT cultist say we suffered for 8 years under Obama. If this is suffering bring it on!!! From the Anderson News the sentence I hear most from well-meaning, conservative friends since President Trump’s election is this: “We suffered 8 years under Barack Obama.”
The day Obama took office, the Dow closed at 7,949 points. Eight years later, the Dow had almost tripled.
General Motors and Chrysler were on the brink of bankruptcy, with Ford not far behind, and their failure, along with their supply chains, would have meant the loss of millions of jobs. Obama pushed through a controversial, $8o billion bailout to save the car industry. The U.S. car industry survived, started making money again, and the entire $80 billion was paid back, with interest.
While we remain vulnerable to lone-wolf attacks, no foreign terrorist organization has successfully executed a mass attack here since 9/11.
Obama ordered the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden.
He drew down the number of troops from 180,000 in Iraq and Afghanistan to just 15,000, and increased funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs.
He launched a program called Opening Doors which, since 2010, has led to a 47 percent decline in the number of homeless veterans.
He set a record 73 straight months of private-sector job growth.
Due to Obama’s regulatory policies, greenhouse gas emissions decreased by 12%, production of renewable energy more than doubled, and our dependence on foreign oil was cut in half.
He signed The Lilly Ledbetter Act, making it easier for women to sue employers for unequal pay.
His Omnibus Public Lands Management Act designated more than 2 million acres as wilderness, creating thousands of miles of trails and protecting over 1,000 miles of rivers.
He reduced the federal deficit from 9.8 percent of GDP in 2009 to 3.2 percent in 2016.
For all the inadequacies of the Affordable Care Act, we seem to have forgotten that, before the ACA, you could be denied coverage for a pre-existing condition and kids could not stay on their parents’ policies up to age 26.
Obama approved a $14.5 billion system to rebuild the levees in New Orleans.
All this, even as our own Mitch McConnell famously asserted that his singular mission would be to block anything President Obama tried to do.
While Obama failed on his campaign pledge to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay, that prison’s population decreased from 242 to around 50.
He expanded funding for embryonic stem cell research, supporting groundbreaking advancement in areas like spinal injury treatment and cancer.
Credit card companies can no longer charge hidden fees or raise interest rates without advance notice.
Most years, Obama threw a 4th of July party for military families. He held babies, played games with children, served barbecue, and led the singing of “Happy Birthday” to his daughter Malia, who was born on July 4.
Welfare spending is down: for every 100 poor families, just 24 receive cash assistance, compared with 64 in 1996.
Obama comforted families and communities following more than a dozen mass shootings. After Sandy Hook, he said, “The majority of those who died today were children, beautiful little kids between the ages of 5 and 10 years old.”
Yet, he never took away anyone’s guns.
He sang Amazing Grace, spontaneously, at the altar.
He was the first president since Eisenhower to serve two terms without personal or political scandal.
He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
President Obama was not perfect, as no man and no president is, and you can certainly disagree with his political ideologies. But to say we suffered? If that’s the argument, if this is how we suffered for 8 years under Barack Obama, I have one wish: may we be so fortunate as to suffer 8 more.
MORE on the propaganda campaign being waged by bayer, monsanto, dow, and syngenta to name a few to prevent glyphosate from being banned in Europe and then in the U.S. due to major health concerns. This from the Guardian.....
Revelations come as Europe wrestles over renewal question for Bayer’s Roundup herbicides
A French farmer sprays glyphosate herbicide ‘Roundup 720’ made by agrochemical giant Monsanto, in Piace, north-western France, in a cornfield, near a wind farm on 23 April 2021. Photograph: Jean-François Monier/AFP/Getty Images
A new analysis of more than 50 previously secret, corporate-backed scientific studies is raising troubling questions about a history of regulatory reliance on such research in assessing the safety of the widely used weedkilling chemical known as glyphosate, the key ingredient in the popular Roundup herbicide.
In a 187-page report released on Friday, researchers from the Institute of Cancer Research at the Medical University of Vienna in Austria said a thorough review of 53 safety studies submitted to regulators by large chemical companies showed that most do not comply with modern international standards for scientific rigor, and lack the types of tests most able to detect cancer risks.
“The quality of these studies, not of all, but of many of these studies is very poor. The health authorities … accepted some of these very poor studies as informative and acceptable, which is not justified from a scientific point of view,” Siegfried Knasmueller, the lead author of the analysis told the Guardian.
Glyphosate is the most widely used herbicide in the world, and is particularly popular with farmers growing common food crops. But there is heated debate in many countries about whether or not glyphosate herbicides should continue to be used due to concerns they may cause cancer.
The corporate studies at issue focus on the genotoxic properties of glyphosate – whether or not it causes DNA damage – and they support corporate assurances that the chemical is safe when used as directed and does not cause cancer. They were commissioned and/or conducted by the former Monsanto Co, which is now a part of Bayer AG, as well as Syngenta, Dow, and others involved in making and/or selling glyphosate.
Though some of the studies date back decades, they have been part of recent submissions to regulators in Europe and the United States, where regulators have agreed with the companies in concluding there is no cancer risk with glyphosate. European officials reaffirmed that view in an 11,000-page report issued last month.
The new analysis challenges those safety assurances, finding that much of the methodology used in the industry studies is outdated and not in keeping with international quality standards. Of the 53 studies submitted to regulators by the companies, only two were acceptable, according to current internationally recognized scientific standards, said Knasmueller.
Particularly problematic, he said, was the focus on testing for chromosome damage in early stages in red blood cells of the bone marrow in laboratory mice and rats. These tests routinely detect only 50-60% of carcinogens, according to Knasmueller. “So many carcinogens are not detected with this method,” he said.
A type of test known as “comet assay” has a much higher value for identifying carcinogens because it can quantify and detect DNA damage in individual cells in a variety of organs, and is commonly used for evaluating genotoxicity, according to Knasmueller. But no comet assay tests were included, according to the analysis.
“I cannot understand why the health authorities did not ask for such data,” said Knasmueller, who is an expert in genetic toxicology and along with his work at the cancer institute is editor-in-chief of two prominent scientific journals, including Mutation Research – Genetic Toxicology and Environmental Mutagenesis.
Knasmueller was asked to review the studies by the SumOfUs non-profit advocacy group, though he said he was not paid for the work. A co-author on the analysis and fellow cancer institute scientist, Armen Nersesyan, was paid roughly €3,500 ($4,146) , however.
If Knasmueller’s observations are accurate, the new finding of flaws in industry studies means regulatory assurances about glyphosate safety in Europe and the United States have been based, at least in part, on shoddy science.
Analysis comes at a critical time as Bayer is asking European regulators to reauthorize glyphosate ahead of the expiration of approval next year. Photograph: Josh Edelson/AFP/Getty Images
Linda Birnbaum, former director of the US National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences, said there has been an ongoing problem that is not unique to glyphosate with regulators taking industry studies “at industry’s word”, while ignoring red flags raised in non-industry-funded research.
The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) said it could not comment on the analysis but said all interested parties will have the opportunity to submit comments on the draft assessment of glyphosate. The agency did not answer a question about its level of confidence in the validity of industry studies.
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) confirmed that no comet assay tests are required but said the agency “strives to use high-quality studies” and “a broad set of data” when evaluating pesticides. As well, the EPA “independently evaluates required studies for scientific acceptability” that meet agency and international guidelines, an EPA spokeswoman said.
The analysis comes at a critical time as Bayer and a contingent of companies calling themselves the Glyphosate Renewal Group (GRG) are again asking European regulators to reauthorize glyphosate ahead of the expiration of approval next year, and as the industry battles to preserve glyphosate use globally.
Bans or reductions in use have been called for in several countries, including Mexico, where a glyphosate ban is to take effect in 2024, and in France, where the government last year announced financial incentives for farmers who stopped using the chemical. In the US, New York City recently banned glyphosate use on city property and other cities have implemented reductions or bans.
The GRG did not respond to a request for comment. But Bayer, a leading member of the GRG, said the package of studies submitted to regulators is “one of the most extensive scientific dossiers ever compiled for a pesticide active ingredient”.
Bayer said for the current registration review, it was “required” to submit the older genotoxicity studies along with new corporate genotoxicity studies. As well, the companies submitted to regulators “a vast review of thousands of published scientific publications regarding glyphosate”, said a Bayer spokesman.
Concerns about glyphosate have mounted since 2015 when the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), part of the World Health Organization, classified glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen based on scientific studies conducted by independent researchers. Unlike regulators, IARC relied primarily on a large body of published and peer-reviewed research and not industry studies in its classification.
The IARC classification led a group of European lawmakers in 2017 to demand access to industry studies that had been given to regulators but withheld from public scrutiny. Monsanto’s are stamped as “company confidential”.
A 2019 court decision forced EFSA to provide public access, however, clearing the way for scrutiny such as the Knasmueller analysis.
It is not clear if some or all of the 53 studies examined in the analysis are part of the package the GRG recently submitted to European authorities.
Glyphosate was only narrowly given a five-year renewal in Europe in December 2017 after the European parliament voted against renewal.
Several questionable interactions between Monsanto and regulators have come to light in recent years, including the fact that EFSA dismissed a study linking the company’s weedkiller to cancer after consultation with a US EPA official linked to Monsanto. Documents also demonstrated that an EU report declaring glyphosate safe was in part copied and pasted from a Monsanto study.
And when the EPA consulted with a scientific advisory panel assembled in Washington DC in December 2016, panel members complained that EPA officials were not following proper scientific guidelines for how to assess research about glyphosate health impacts.
“This puts once more a finger on a sore spot: that national regulators do not seem to pay close scrutiny when looking at the quality of industry’s studies,” said Nina Holland, researcher at the watchdog group Corporate Europe Observatory. “This is shocking as it is their job to protect people’s health and the environment, not to serve the interests of the pesticide industry.”
PUTIN & #MOSCOWMITCH LIKE IT LIKE THAT I am really glad I transferred 71% of my 401K to a safe, no loss portfolio about a month ago. I have been reading and hearing all kinds of economist predicting a recession in 2020 for the past year and made the move to protect most of my retirement funds and I am thanking God I did! This probably isn't the beginning of the recession, hopefully is is just a really loud warning shot. From NPR
Stocks are falling sharply Wednesday on deepening worries over a slowdown in the global economy.
The Dow has dropped 800 points, or about 2.5%. Investors have been whipsawed in recent days from mixed signals emerging from the Trump administration about tariffs and the escalating trade war with China.
The jitters were exacerbated amid worrisome economic data from two big countries was announced. Germany posted negative growth in the latest quarter, and China's industrial output fell to a 17-year low.
An even bigger worry: The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note fell below 2-year Treasuries for the first time since 2007. In other words, you would get a higher interest rate for government debt that matures in two years than in 10 years.
Such an inversion in yields has a strong track record of predicting a recession, especially the longer it continues. Each of the last seven recessions, dating back to 1969, were preceded by the 10-year falling below the 2-year.
Chris Zaccarelli, chief investment officer for Independent Advisor Alliance, commented on today's bond market turmoil: "The periods when the yield curve inverts are when markets believe we are headed into a recession and either inflation will be lower and/or the Federal Reserve will be forced to lower short term interest rates."
On Tuesday, the Trump administration said it was postponing some of its new tariffs on Chinese imports. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative announced that 10% tariffs on certain popular consumer items — including cellphones, laptop computers, video game consoles, computer monitors and some toys, shoes and clothing — will be postponed until Dec. 15.
"What we've done is we've delayed it, so that they won't be relevant to the Christmas shopping season," President Trump told reporters.
The delays affect about $160 billion worth of imports, according to calculations by the advocacy group Tariffs Hurt the Heartland. Tariffs on another $112 billion worth of Chinese imports are still set to take effect on Sept. 1 as scheduled.
NOT MY pres drumpf/trump hasn't been bragging about the biggest decline in the stock market, wonder why???? He loves to run his YUGE mouth about the biggest this and that but he has one of satan's minions, NOT MY vice-pres pence, trying to explain what is going on and calm the electorate and market. Th problem is these people constantly lie and deceive so can they be believed? AND the Dow lost 666 points last Friday, who could be responsible for that, NOT MY pre drumpf/trump and Satan? WELL, ISN'T THAT SPECIAL!?!?!?
Major stock indexes dropped sharply Friday, with the Dow Jones industrial average tumbling 666 points amid signs that wage growth is finally picking up.
The 2.6 percent drop in the Dow came as the Labor Department reported that 200,000 jobs were added to the economy last month, which was stronger than expected, and the unemployment rate stayed at 4.1 percent — the lowest since 2000.
But worries about inflation grew when the report showed that average hourly wages grew 2.9 percent from a year ago — the largest increase since June 2009. Yields for 10-year Treasurys hit four-year highs Friday.
All this sets the stage for the Federal Reserve to continue raising interest rates, with the next hike expected in March. That would make credit cards, car loans and mortgages more expensive.
The Dow closed at 25,520.96, and Friday's 666-point drop was the sixth-worst ever. The index is still up more than 3 percent since the year began. But with a loss of about more than 1,000 points since Monday, it was the blue chip index's worst weekly performance in two years.
Among the stocks in the Dow, Apple fell 4.3 percent Friday, Exxon Mobil lost 5.1 percent, Chevron was down nearly 6 percent and Goldman Sachs dropped 4.5 percent.
Other major stock indexes fell about 2 percent Friday. The broader S&P 500 slid 60 points, to 2,762.13; the Nasdaq index lost 145 points, closing at 7,240.95.
Carl Tannenbaum, chief economist at Northern Trust, says Friday's employment report shows the economy continues to have a lot of energy.
The higher wage growth and potentially higher inflation "might then lead the Federal Reserve to raise their interest rates more rapidly than the market is comfortable with," he told NPR's John Ydstie.
NPR's Jim Zarroli reports that the wage gains have investors wondering "are we going too fast? Are we going to see more inflation? ... Then you have these big tax cuts taking effect, which means people could be spending more. The government's going to have to borrow more — what's that going to mean?"
But, he says, "The stock market was really due to come down anyway. We have these corrections. They're normal. You can't have stocks rising at these levels all the time."
The stock market went on a wild ride again on Monday, with the Dow Jones industrial average closing down 1,175 points, its worst point drop in history. The Dow closed down 4.6 percent and turned negative for the year.
At one point Monday afternoon, the Dow was down 1,579 points — the largest intraday point drop in the history of the index.
"Investors were dumping out of stocks," NPR's Uri Berliner reports. "They were in free fall, something we've seen very little of during the steady bull market since basically 2009. And now we're seeing nerves in the market — some fear."
The previous largest point drop for the Dow was 778 points in September 2008, in the midst of the financial crisis.
Market participants were focused on the threat of higher inflation after Friday's jobs report showed a pickup in wages, which portends more interest rate increases from the Federal Reserve.
"I think we are in a changing environment where it looks like we're going to have a bit higher inflation and so that has markets on edge," Gus Faucher, chief economist of the PNC Financial Services Group, told NPR's Windsor Johnston. "And I think volatility is likely to be higher in 2018 than it was in 2017."
Analysts suggest that program trading caused the wild sell-off, NPR's John Ydstie reported. "As quickly as the market fell, it recovered much of the ground it had lost as investors remembered the economy and corporate earnings remain strong," he added.
The Dow closed at 24,345.75. Monday's losses came on top of Friday's 666-point dropin the blue-chip index, which resulted in the worst week for the index in two years.
Other major stock indexes also fell Monday, with the S&P 500 down 113 points, or 4.1 percent, and the Nasdaq down 273 points, or 3.8 percent.
Many financial professionals say this sell-off is healthy for the market. Stock prices letting off steam is "better than if they continue to rise and then pop like a balloon that's overinflated," Berliner says. "But if fear takes over the market then it could get quite ugly."
In the past week, both the Dow and the S&P 500 have now lost over 5 percent from their recent all-time highs.
Stock indexes around the world also fell Monday, including London's FTSE 100, which closed down 1.5 percent, and Japan's Nikkei, which fell 2.5 percent.
