Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Sun May 01, 2011 10:33 am
We live with the unintended consequences of our choices.
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Internet privacy: At every turn, our privacy is compromised by technology
An Editorial The Observer, Sunday 1 May 2011
A pattern is emerging. A researcher discovers that a product or service offered by a large (generally US-based) company contains a security flaw or a feature that compromises the privacy of internet users. The revelations are confirmed by other experts across the internet. The company responsible then goes through a predictable series of steps: first, "no comment", followed by indignant denial, then a PR-spun "explanation" and, eventually, an apology of sorts plus a declaration that the bug will be fixed or the intrusive practice terminated.
A recent example was Apple's extraordinary contortions over the discovery that its iPhone was covertly collecting location data and storing it in unencrypted form. But last week also saw the revelation that devices made by TomTom, the leading manufacturer of GPS navigation systems, had effectively been spying on Dutch users and that the aggregated data had been sold to the police in order to guide the location of speed traps.
Before that, there were the revelations that Google's street-mapping camera cars were also collecting data on every domestic WiFi network they passed. On the web, many sites now deploy hidden "history sniffing" codes to find out what other sites a user has visited, webmail servers "read" every email that passes through them and social networking sites reveal every detail of some subscribers' tastes, activities and location.
What these developments presage is a perfect storm of surveillance, orchestrated not by the state but by huge corporations. Meanwhile, information commissioners across Europe try to enforce data protection laws that were crafted in the mainframe era, long before the founders of Google, Facebook et al were born. Neelie Kroes, the European commissioner responsible for data protection, is determined to reform the law to make US-based companies respect the privacy of their European users. But her efforts are doomed unless those users wake up to the ways their privacy is undermined by the services and devices they use.
Internet users must be more aware of the dangers inherent in the services they use
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) headquarters stand in Silver Spring, Maryland.
A yearlong sting operation, including aliases, a 5 a.m. surprise inspection and surreptitious purchases from an Amish farm in Pennsylvania, culminated in the federal government announcing this week that it has gone to court to stop Rainbow Acres Farm from selling its contraband to willing customers in the Washington area.
The product in question: unpasteurized milk.
It’s a battle that’s been going on behind the scenes for years, with natural foods advocates arguing that raw milk, as it’s also known, is healthier than the pasteurized product, while the Food and Drug Administration says raw milk can carry harmful bacteria such as salmonella, E. coli and listeria.
“It is the FDA’s position that raw milk should never be consumed,” said Tamara N. Ward, spokeswoman for the FDA, whose investigators have been looking into Rainbow Acres for months, and who finally last week filed a 10-page complaint in federal court in Pennsylvania seeking an order to stop the farm from shipping across state lines any more raw milk or dairy products made from it.
The farm’s owner, Dan Allgyer, didn’t respond to a message seeking comment, but his customers in the District of Columbia and Maryland were furious at what they said was government overreach.
“I look at this as the FDA is in cahoots with the large milk producers,” said Karin Edgett, a D.C. resident who buys directly from Rainbow Acres. “I don’t want the FDA and my tax dollars to go to shut down a farm that hasn’t had any complaints against it. They’re producing good food, and the consumers are extremely happy with it.”
The FDA’s actions stand in contrast to other areas where the Obama administration has said it will take a hands-off approach to violations of the law, including the use of medical marijuana in states that have approved it, and illegal-immigrant students and youths, whom the administration said recently will not be targets of their enforcement efforts.
Raw-milk devotees say pasteurization, the process of heating food to kill harmful organisms, eliminates good bacteria as well, and changes the taste and health benefits of the milk. Many raw-milk drinkers say they feel much healthier after changing over to it, and insist they should have the freedom of choice regarding their food.
One defense group says there are as many as 10 million raw-milk consumers in the country. Sales are perfectly legal in 10 states but illegal in 11 states and the District, with the other states having varying restrictions on purchase or consumption.
Many food safety researchers say pasteurization, which became widespread in the 1920s and 1930s, dramatically reduced instances of milk-transmitted diseases such as typhoid fever and diphtheria. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says there is no health benefit from raw milk that cannot be obtained from pasteurized milk.
Acting on those conclusions, the FDA uses its regulatory powers over food safety to ban interstate sales of raw milk and has warned several farms to change their practices.
According to the complaint the FDA filed in court, the agency began to look into Mr. Allgyer’s farm in late 2009, when an investigator in their Baltimore office used aliases to sign up for a Yahoo user group for Rainbow Acres’ customers, and began to place orders under the assumed names for unpasteurized milk.
The orders were delivered to private residences in Maryland, where the investigator, whose name was not disclosed in the documents, would pick them up. By crossing state lines the milk became part of interstate commerce, thus subject to the FDA’s ban on interstate sales of raw milk. The court papers note that the jugs of milk were not labeled - another violation of FDA regulations.
Armed with that information, investigators visited the farm in February 2010, but Mr. Allgyer turned them away. They returned two months later with a warrant, U.S. marshals and a state police trooper, arriving at 5 a.m. for what Mr. Allgyer’s backers called a “raid,” but the FDA said was a lawful inspection.
The investigators said they saw coolers labeled with Maryland town names, and the coolers appeared to contain dairy products. The inspection led to an April 20, 2010, letter from FDA telling Mr. Allgyer to stop selling across state lines.
He instead formed a club and had customers sign an agreement stating they supported his operation, weren’t trying to entrap the owners, and that they would be shareholders in the farm’s produce, paying only for the farmer’s labor.
Customers hoped that would get around the FDA’s definition of “commerce,” putting the exchange outside of the federal government’s purview.
The FDA investigators continued to take shipments, though, and last week went to court to stop the operation.
Ms. Ward, the FDA spokeswoman, didn’t say exactly why they targeted Mr. Allgyer’s farm, but that violations generally are determined either by FDA investigations or by state-obtained evidence.
Pete Kennedy, president of the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund, said undercover stings are not unheard of.
“It happens quite a bit. It’s almost like they treat raw milk as crack. It’s happened in a number of states, and at the federal level,” he said.
His organization has sued to try to halt FDA enforcement, and the case is pending in federal court in Iowa.
Mr. Allgyer’s customers declined to talk about the operations, and when asked whether they knew what would happen to the farm’s distribution, they said they would have to wait and see.
One of those customers, Liz Reitzig, president of the Maryland Independent Consumers and Farmers Association, said she started looking for raw milk when her oldest daughter began to show signs of not being able to tolerate pasteurized milk.
She first did what’s called cow sharing, which is when a group of people buy shares in owning a cow, and pay a farmer to board and milk the cow. But Maryland outlawed that practice and she was forced to look elsewhere for raw milk, and turned to Mr. Allgyer’s farm.
“We like the way they farm, we love their product, it’s super-high-quality, they’re wonderful. It’s just a wonderful arrangement,” she said.
“FDA really has no idea what they’re talking about when they’re talking about fresh milk. They have no concept - they really don’t understand what it’s like for people like me who have friends and family who can’t drink conventional milk,” Ms. Reitzig said.
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Sun May 01, 2011 12:28 pm
Greetings,
From James newsletter ~
#6263 Mother Earths Rights
"We need to treat earth as a being beginning NOW"
*********** The Law of Mother Earth: Behind Bolivia’s Historic Bill A new law expected to pass in Bolivia mandates a fundamental ecological reorientation of the nation’s economy and society.
A boy at the World People's Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
by Nick Buxton posted Apr 21, 2011
Indigenous and campesino (small-scale farmer) movements in the Andean nation of Bolivia are on the verge of pushing through one of the most radical environmental bills in global history. The "Mother Earth" law under debate in Bolivia's legislature will almost certainly be approved, as it has already been agreed to by the majority governing party, Movimiento Al Socialismo (MAS).
The law draws deeply on indigenous concepts that view nature as a sacred home, the Pachamama (Mother Earth) on which we intimately depend. As the law states, “Mother Earth is a living dynamic system made up of the undivided community of all living beings, who are all interconnected, interdependent and complementary, sharing a common destiny.”
The law would give nature legal rights, specifically the rights to life and regeneration, biodiversity, water, clean air, balance, and restoration. Bolivia's law mandates a fundamental ecological reorientation of Bolivia's economy and society, requiring all existing and future laws to adapt to the Mother Earth law and accept the ecological limits set by nature. It calls for public policy to be guided by Sumaj Kawsay (an indigenous concept meaning “living well,” or living in harmony with nature and people), rather than the current focus on producing more goods and stimulating consumption.
In practical terms, the law requires the government to transition from non-renewable to renewable energy; to develop new economic indicators that will assess the ecological impact of all economic activity; to carry out ecological audits of all private and state companies; to regulate and reduce greenhouse gas emissions; to develop policies of food and renewable energy sovereignty; to research and invest resources in energy efficiency, ecological practices, and organic agriculture; and to require all companies and individuals to be accountable for environmental contamination with a duty to restore damaged environments.
The law will be backed up by a new Ministry of Mother Earth, an inter-Ministry Advisory Council, and an Ombudsman. Undarico Pinto, leader of the 3.5 million-strong campesino movement CSUTCB, which helped draft the law, believes this legislation represents a turning point in Bolivian law: "Existing laws are not strong enough. This will make industry more transparent. It will allow people to regulate industry at national, regional, and local levels."
However, there is also strong awareness among Bolivia's social movements—in particular for the Pacto de Unidad (Unity Pact), a coalition of the country's five largest social movements and a key force behind the law—that the existence of a new law will not be enough to prompt real change in environmental practices.
A major obstacle is the fact that Bolivia is structurally dependent on extractive industries. Since the discovery of silver by the Spanish in the 16th Century, Bolivia's history has been tied to ruthless exploitation of its people and its environment in order to transfer wealth to the richest countries; poet and historian Eduardo Galeano’s famous book Open Veins draws largely on the brutal story of how Bolivia's exploitation fuelled the industrial expansion of Europe. In 2010, 70 percent of Bolivia's exports were still in the form of minerals, gas, and oil. This structural dependence will be very difficult to unravel.
Moreover, there is a great deal of opposition from powerful sectors, particularly mining and agro-industrial enterprises, to any ecological laws that would threaten profits. The main organization of soya producers, which claimed that the law “will make the productive sector inviable,” is one of many powerful groups who have already come out against the law. Within the government, there are many ministries and officials that would also like the law to remain nothing more than a visionary but ultimately meaningless statement.
Raul Prada, one of the advisors to Pacto de Unidad, explained that the Mother Earth law was developed by Bolivia's largest social movements in response to their perceived exclusion from policy-making by the MAS government, led by indigenous President Evo Morales. They have generally supported MAS since its resounding election victory in 2005, but were frustrated by what they saw as a lack of progress. Rather than merely expressing their concern, these movements—comprised mainly of indigenous and farming communities—are pro-actively developing a series of new laws. Their first priority was the passage of the Mother Earth Law, based on a commitment made at the historic global Peoples Conference on Climate Change held in Bolivia in April 2010. To some surprise, the diverse movements soon developed a consensual agreement that was supported by MAS legislators.
Raul Prada notes that, even with significant pressure from social movements, transitioning to an economy based on the concept Vivir Bien will not be easy. “It is going to be difficult to transit from an extractive economy. We clearly can't close mines straight away, but we can develop a model where this economy has less and less weight. It will need policies developed in participation with movements, particularly in areas such as food sovereignty. It will need redirection of investment and policies towards different ecological models of development. It will need the cooperation of the international community to develop regional economies that complement each other.”
Ultimately, though, this is a challenge far bigger than Bolivia, says Prada: “Our ecological and social crisis is not just a problem for Bolivia or Ecuador; it is a problem for all of us. We need to pull together peoples, researchers, and communities to develop real concrete alternatives so that the dominant systems of exploitation don't just continue by default. This is not an easy task, but I believe with international solidarity, we can and must succeed.”
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Thu May 05, 2011 3:36 pm
Greetings,
this is worth checking out ~ as to what's possibly developing...
Note:
"It is not a time for fear; rather it is a time for love and cooperation in the context of preparation on all levels for what is to come... there is nothing we can do but prepare and pray—and love like we have never loved before."
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Fri May 06, 2011 2:22 pm
Greetings,
As promised ~ here is the latest update report monitoring this continuing phenomena by Instigator ~from his excellent channel link: https://www.youtube.com/user/thebarcaroller
Number of posts : 1827 Age : 71 Location : UK Humor : yes lots Registration date : 2010-12-18
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Mon May 09, 2011 12:46 pm
the sky look littered with the little buggars
Gabriel Contributor
Number of posts : 4957 Location : Ardmore oklahoma Humor : I hope so Registration date : 2009-01-24
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Mon May 09, 2011 12:51 pm
Great posts Gio....
giovonni Member
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Tue May 10, 2011 12:46 pm
Again and always... Thanks too all here... for your post and kind words
giovonni Member
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Tue May 10, 2011 12:47 pm
Greetings
i've said this before...
i'm sure this resonates with many of you ...as we are moving through the center of the galaxy the Sun (our solar system) is providing a kind of galactic bath. As these photon particles continue to rain down and upon us, we are transmuting. it is extremely important to stay grounded in a consistent vibration of love without fear. Remove yourself from any and all low vibrational habits (addictions) that could hamper this process. By doing this each we each will be in the most safest state ~ the place within our hearts. Gio
***********
From James newsletter...
#6313 "Sun Changing Its Nature Time Speeding Up... Maybe the scientists should talk to the elders?"
DO NOT BE ALARMED -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Black Rain
A Semiconductor film by Ruth Jarman and Joe Gerhardt. Data courtesy of the Heliospheric Imager on the NASA STEREO mission.
" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"Black Rain is sourced from images collected by the twin satellite, solar mission, STEREO. Here we see the HI (Heliospheric Imager) visual data as it tracks interplanetary space for solar wind and CME's (coronal mass ejections) heading towards Earth.
giovonni Member
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Wed May 11, 2011 9:54 am
that's amazing !!
thanks skywatcher
giovonni Member
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Wed May 11, 2011 5:34 pm
Greetings,
Saskatchewan has long been considered Canada's UFO Hotspot...
So... for all those living in and around Saskatoon here's a treat !
From James newsletter...
#6317 "UFO Day in Saskatoon! Screening of ECETI Ranch Documentary w/Dieter"
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Mon May 16, 2011 2:27 pm
Greetings,
If i'm not mistaken ~ James was down at Mt. Shasta for a conference this past weekend, but he should be back posting on his newsletter soon...
So here's the latest from the Eceti Ranch... #6323 Film Screenings: ECETI Ranch-A Documentary -
"Dear Friends,
We are planning on setting out to bring ECETI Ranch: A Documentary followed by Q&Ain Portland, Eugene, Ashland and possibly Seattle. Please email us if you would like to attend OR if you have a space to host a screening event followed by group discussion. We would love to connect with our extended family and introduce this great film from The Mapmakers http://vimeo.com/18940412 for all to share and discuss. If you are interested in either attending or hosting an event in your city.. .please email us at" [email]ecetievents@gmail.com
giovonni Member
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Mon May 16, 2011 2:56 pm
A note to all who follow the thread, i will be attending the June conference 'Up at the Ranch' and will report here ~ all the goings on with lots post and pictures ~ Gio
giovonni Member
Number of posts : 549 Age : 73 Location : within my heart Humor : lots of it! Registration date : 2009-02-19
Subject: Re: Up at the Ranch (James Gilliland and Trout Lake) Tue May 17, 2011 5:28 pm
i felt it important enough to post and listen to the broadcast here also ~
It comes from NPR's radio program "Fresh Air" and it certainly adds a new twist to this secretive base
Area 51: An Uncensored History of America's Top Secret Military Base, by Annie Jacobsen Area 51 is surrounded by more myths than almost any other government building in the world. That stems from a number of notable occurrences, including, of course, the supposed crash landing of a UFO in Roswell in 1947. The rest revolves around the fact that it's a top-secret military base, which means -- well, it's top-secret. Area 51 is billing itself as the first credible book about the military base, complete with plenty of interviews, firsthand accounts and more. The "truth" will probably never get out there, but if nothing else, this book might offer a few answers to the billions of questions people have asked over the years..
Sun May 01, 2011 10:33 am
