Thursday, May 22, 2014

The US Disease-Care System

People frequently claim the US has the best health care system in the world, but the data says otherwise. United Press International (UPI) reports, “Switzerland leads a study of 34 nations for life expectancy at 82.8 years, followed by Japan at 82.7, Italy at 82.7, Spain at 82.7 and Iceland at 82.4.” As for the US: “Higher health spending per capita tends to be associated with lower mortality rates and higher life expectancy, but this is not the case for the United States. The relatively low life expectancy of Americans is particularly striking given how much they spend on their healthcare.” On average, Americans spend two and a half times as much money on healthcare compared to people in other advanced countries, but our life expectancy is the lowest of those countries.
One factor is Americans suffer more violent deaths, but the bigger reason is government intervention in our healthcare. Healthcare providers can’t make money off healthy people, but they make tons of money off sick people, so government perverts our healthcare system to keep people sick. The maze of federal, state and local regulations dwarf the regulations of other countries. The expense of FDA requirements makes it impossible for small companies to compete against Big Ag, Big Pharma and Big Medicine, by design. As a result, chronic illness in the US is, well, chronic. Our government-controlled healthcare system is just another looting program which makes Americans less healthy.
Dr. Terry Wahls learned this firsthand when multiple sclerosis (MS) crippled her. The Daily Beast documents, “By conventional standards, Dr. Wahls received great medical care. She had sympathetic doctors who prescribed cutting-edge drugs. Those drugs cost around $5,000 a week but are only marginally effective.”
Despite her supposedly excellent care, Dr. Wahls continued to get worse until she realized the truth about our healthcare system. “‘We’re not telling patients the truth—that medicines won’t make you well,’ Dr. Wahls says. Patients with multiple medical problems who have found themselves standing in the kitchen choking down pill after pill probably have an idea of what she is talking about. ‘Life is self-correcting chemistry,’ says Dr. Wahls. ‘If we fix the nutrition, this is the real way to address the root cause of most disease.’”
Ironically, Wahls cured herself by rejecting the healthcare system government trained her to practice. “So Dr. Wahls developed a diet that would provide the building blocks her broken cells needed. It’s a modified Paleo diet that entails eating 9 cups of vegetables a day—with plenty of meats, fish, organ meats, nuts, seeds, berries and adequate quantities of good fats—and it provides far more than the RDA [Recommended Daily Allowance] for the 31 key nutrients for the brain. With that diet and physical therapy, she soon began to improve. And after six months, she was able to ride her bike—something she hadn’t been able to do for a decade.”
Eating, taking supplements, and exercising as our bodies evolved to do prevents and cures disease, not government drugs. But there’s much more money to be made treating MS, diabetes, asthma, cancer etc. than there is in preventing or curing them. Our healthcare system is designed to mask symptoms and keep people sick. This is why Wahls calls our system a sick care system. It’s why diabetes in children is skyrocketing. Our government-planned economy doesn't export much, but it exports diabetes alongside the Standard American Diet (SAD).
A recent study discovered “Vampire therapy” could reverse aging. The Telegraph reports, “Now scientists have found that young blood actually ‘recharges’ the brain, forms new blood vessels and improves memory and learning. In parallel research, scientists at Harvard University also discovered that a ‘youth protein’ which circulates in the blood is responsible for keeping the brain and muscles young and strong.” Once again, government scientists rediscover something our ancestors always knew. The more government takes over our lives, the more backward we become.
Dr. Bill Sardi points to too much iron in the blood as a common cause of many chronic diseases associated with aging. He documents nearly 50 studies to back up his claim that the ancient practice of bloodletting could make people healthier and live longer. Sardi comments, “This medical procedure is not likely to ever achieve FDA approval for each and every one of the broad categories of human disease mentioned above. But it is safer than any FDA-approved drug or treatment, far safer than aspirin.” In fact, modern bloodletting is celebrated in the form of donating blood, which Sardi recommends, although the establishment doesn’t acknowledge the health benefits to the donor.
Sardi writes, “In reality the U.S. has the most technically advanced disease-care system in the world. It is not committed towards promoting health but rather to delivery of repeated treatment to allay symptoms rather than address underlying causes of disease. While the life expectancy in some backward nations exceeds that of the United States, it never dawns upon the public that they are being gamed to ensure Big Pharma and Big Doctor has a steady flow of patients to treat.”

Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Big Victory Against the Police State in Dayton

Daytonians dodged a bullet. The people of Los Angeles suburb of Compton learned in late April they had been secretly monitored by air surveillance. The Los Angeles Times reports, “For nine days in early 2012, a small Cessna plane recorded low-resolution images of every corner of the 10.1-square-mile city and beamed them to the local Sheriff’s Department station, where deputies observed incidents including fender benders, a string of necklace snatchings and a shooting.” That’s not all they observed. These Peeping Toms observed everything that happened in Compton during those flights.
The Times documents the Dayton connection, “Ross T. McNutt, president of Persistent Surveillance Systems, which operated the aerial program, said the images beamed back by the cameras were so sweeping that each individual appears as a single pixel -- not nearly discerning enough to detect race, sex and other distinguishing characteristics. And only images tied to known crime scenes received close scrutiny, he said.” Right.
Persistent Surveillance Systems (PSS) is the local TechTown company which Dayton’s rulers planned to contract to monitor everybody in Dayton. Fortunately, after heavy criticism, they temporarily killed the plan, but promised to reconsider after critics became distracted by other issues.
The Compton report casts doubt on the veracity of the claims about the aerial Peeping Tom. For example, if people appear only as a pixel, it would impossible for the camera to resolve a necklace snatching , a shooting, or any action. That’s not very useful. Everything claimed about this spy scheme is fishy. Aerial spy cameras in the 1960s could read license plates. It defies logic that police would choose a lower resolution camera when they could employ one that reads license plates, recognizes facial features, and enables them to stalk your daughter.
Also, the way the system was used in Compton contradicts the Dayton plan. The Dayton Daily News documented, “The city has released a draft policy statement on how it would use the airplane cameras, saying they would only be deployed in a handful of circumstances — to disrupt Part I (felony) crime patterns, to assist in weather emergencies or natural disasters, to monitor illegal dumping, to support tactical operations (SWAT, hostage cases), and to monitor major events or large-scale disturbances.”
That isn’t how the system was used in Compton. It was used for general surveillance because the system is most effective in that role. Government always uses spy systems to their maximum capability. Local rulers’ claims about restricting the use of this spy system are no more credible than the National Security Agency’s claims it doesn’t spy on Americans. Rulers make claims like this to mislead people, then once the program starts, perverts use it to the full extent possible for their own purposes.
The DDN reported another discrepancy, “[Dayton Police Chief Richard] Biehl said the Boston Marathon bombings made a case in favor of the cameras — a major event where surveillance would occur, and images might show a perpetrator coming or going.” This claim contradicts the report that people show up as individual pixels. It would be impossible to track an individual pixel in a crowd of pixels, and it defies logic that Biehl would want to employ such a low-resolution camera when he could employ a modern, high-resolution camera that really could track a person through a crowd. If the plane really doesn’t have a high-resolution camera now, it would get one as soon as Dayton’s rulers signed a contract.
The targeting of Compton highlights the bad intentions behind this technology and validates critics. One Compton resident cut to the heart of the matter, “‘Why are we the target?’ asked Ellen Harris, 67, as she unloaded a cart full of groceries into her car. ‘As citizens we deserve [to know]. We are not all criminals.... It’s an invasion of privacy.’”
If PSS had flown their Peeping Tom plane over Hollywood for nine days, everybody in the world would be up in arms. Twitter would burn up. The Kardashians would sue. Alec Baldwin would go on a homophobic rant. George Clooney would interrupt President Obama and demand McNutt’s head on a platter for peeping in on the backyard activities of Hollywood royalty. And Obama would deliver it. But nobody cares about Ellen Harris, or anybody else, in Compton.
Critics correctly recognize this technology will be used primarily to exploit poor people and minorities. The rich and powerful have the resources to keep it away from them. And no phony government policy will change this.
Biehl justifies his desire to employ the Peeping Tom on dwindling police resources, but the data tell a different story. As the number of police in Dayton is reduced, crime rates have fallen. This happens everywhere. Because we were brainwashed by government schools and government-controlled media, Americans believe police reduce crime. The opposite is true. A Cato study discovered more police leads to more crime. Biehl is trying to justify his bureaucratic fiefdom and his exorbitant salary stolen from taxpayers. Our rulers’ desire for Peeping Tom technology isn’t going away, so we have to stay vigilant.

Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Last Chance for a Tax Revolt in Dayton

There’s a long, patriotic history of tax revolts in America. The Boston Tea Party is the most famous. The Whiskey Rebellion occurred during George Washington’s presidency after big whiskey producers in the east conspired with Alexander Hamilton to tax the whiskey produced by small farmers in the west out of existence. History books teach Washington and Hamilton crushed the rebellion, but few note the farmers ultimately won. They never paid the tax, then Thomas Jefferson repealed it.
Doug French writes of tax revolts during the Great Depression, “History shows that people get angry when you kick them while they are down. During the last great depression there were tax strikes. Property owners created over 1,000 different taxpayer leagues around the country, ‘which voiced outrage over what were perceived as needless government expenditures in a time of severe economic hardship.’”
Few Americans have been kicked more when they’re down than Daytonians. Ohio and Dayton taxes transformed Dayton from the world’s leading center for innovation into one of the top ten fastest dying cities in the country. Local rulers were angry about the Forbes article, but only because it told the truth. In 1960, Dayton’s population was 262,332. In 2010, it was 141,527. It declined every decade in between. That kind of devastating decline is common in communist countries, but shouldn’t happen in America. Just as the burden of government caused the decline in communist countries, it caused the decline in Dayton too. Because of high taxes in Ohio and Dayton, it’s more profitable to do business elsewhere.
No honest person disputes this. Politicians admit they lure businesses into their districts by offering tax incentives. It’s no secret that lower taxes attract investment, and Dayton sorely needs investment. The reason Fuyao almost didn’t come to Moraine was the burden of taxes. The state and city had to offer significant tax reductions to attract Fuyao to what otherwise was the perfect location.
Even communists acknowledge this. Yahoo News reports, “Cuba is proposing a new Cuban foreign investment law that would cut the profits tax in half to 15 percent and exempt most investors from paying it for at least eight years, official media said on Wednesday.” If Dayton’s rulers cut taxes in half today, Dayton’s 50 year decline would immediately reverse and transform into economic growth and job creation. That’s what everybody, officially, wants.
But Dayton’s greedy rulers will never allow that. Albert Einstein defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. The Dayton Daily News documents Dayton’s insanity, “Dayton’s income tax rate has been 2.25 percent since 1984. The first 1.75 percent is permanent, but the final 0.5 percent requires periodic approval, which voters have overwhelmingly given in 1990, 1994, 2000 and 2006.” Same tax rate; same decline. Dayton’s rulers were supposed to cut spending to match that permanent income. That was a lie. Dayton’s greedy rulers never intended this tax to disappear. That’s why Mayor Whaley and her ruling cabal are pushing for that 0.5 income tax to become permanent on May 6. This is voters’ last chance to stop the tax insanity that’s destroying Dayton.
Greed puts Whaley’s machine left of Cuba’s communists. Political machines push for tax hikes in low turnout elections because few people vote. Whaley won the mayoral runoff election last May with only 4865 votes. Even the DDN acknowledges this scandal, “Voter turnout was dismal. Despite high-profile candidates and television ads and numerous mailings, only 9,869 people voted in a city of 141,000. That’s fewer than the number that voted on the income tax issue in Beavercreek, a city of 45,000.” Dayton’s looters earned voters’ contempt, but low turnout this election will benefit them. They hope for low turnout so they can keep partying on dough stolen from taxpayers.
Whaley’s machine pulled out all the stops to pass this tax. All the socialists support it. WHIO provided a free propaganda special. The Dayton Chamber of Commerce supports the tax because higher taxes protect big businesses from smaller competitors. The ballot language doesn’t mention the tax will become permanent. Dayton’s rulers hope most voters won’t know. Plus, workers who live outside the city can’t vote. That’s taxation without representation. America’s Founding Fathers fought a revolution against that.
Every year, tax-feeders tell taxpayers they must sacrifice, supposedly for the common good, but Orwell understood political language is designed to make lies sound like truth. When tax-feeders use the term “common good”, they mean their personal bank accounts. Only parasites benefit from legally robbing taxpayers.
This is the last chance to stop the insanity, reverse Dayton’s decline, and start rebuilding Dayton into a great, productive city like it once was. The common good is served by having the common people keep more of their hard-earned money and making the tax-feeders sacrifice for once. As even Cuba’s rulers admit, if voters reject this tax, the economy in Dayton will improve. A small improvement because it’s a small tax cut, but great transformations have to start with a first step.