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Best of the Web: Grapes of Wrath - 2011

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"And the great owners, who must lose their land in an upheaval, the great owners with access to history, with eyes to read history and to know the great fact: when property accumulates in too few hands it is taken away. And that companion fact: when a majority of the people are hungry and cold they will take by force what they need. And the little screaming fact that sounds through all history: repression works only to strengthen and knit the repressed." - John Steinbeck, Grapes of Wrath
John Steinbeck wrote his masterpiece The Grapes of Wrath at the age of 37 in 1939, at the tail end of the Great Depression. Steinbeck won the Nobel Prize and Pulitzer Prize for literature. John Ford then made a classic film adaption in 1941, starring Henry Fonda. It is considered one of the top 25 films in American history. The book was also one of the most banned in US history. Steinbeck was ridiculed as a communist and anti-capitalist by showing support for the working poor. Some things never change, as the moneyed interests that control the media message have attempted to deflect the blame for our current Depression away from their fraudulent deeds. The novel stands as a chronicle of the Great Depression and as a commentary on the economic and social system that gave rise to it. Steinbeck's opus to the working poor reverberates across the decades. He wrote the novel in the midst of the last Fourth Turning Crisis. His themes of man's inhumanity to man, the dignity and rage of the working class, and the selfishness and greed of the moneyed class ring true today.

Hourglass

Best of the Web: Bread, dignity and lies

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So Omar "Sheik al-Torture" Suleiman has warned that the only alternative to dialogue with the opposition is "a coup". The suave United States Central Intelligence Agency point man for extraordinary renditions to Egypt, now Washington-anointed "orderly transition" conductor, may be more versed in electroshocks than onanism; otherwise he would have realized that a military dictatorship toppling itself still ends up as a military dictatorship.

Yet maybe that's exactly what he meant. Suleiman said protests are "very dangerous" - not so subtly implying the interference of hidden agendas by foreign journalists; a subversive coalition of the US, Israel, Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran and al-Jazeera; the Muslim Brotherhood (MB); and all of the above (and all duly evoked by the regime).

Osama Saraya, editor-in-chief of the pro-government newspaper al-Ahram, who was there when Suleiman uttered his sinister warnings, is assured he meant not only a military coup, but an Islamist coup as well.

Phoenix

Best of the Web: The most important thing you probably don't know about cholesterol

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Summary:
  • The simplified view of cholesterol as "good" (HDL) or "bad" (LDL) has contributed to the continuing heart disease epidemic
  • Not all LDL cholesterol is created equal. Only small, dense LDL particles are associated with heart disease, whereas large, buoyant LDL are either benign or may protect against heart disease.
  • Replacing saturated fats with carbohydrates - which has been recommended by the American Heart Association for decades - reduces HDL and increases small, dense LDL, both of which are associated with increased risk of heart disease.
  • Dietary cholesterol has a negligible effect on total blood LDL cholesterol levels. However, eating eggs every day reduces small, dense LDL, which in turn reduces risk of heart disease.
  • The best way to lower small, dense LDL and protect yourself from heart disease is to eat fewer carbs (not fat and cholesterol), exercise and lose weight.
Not all cholesterol is created equal

By now most people have been exposed to the idea of "good" and "bad" cholesterol. It's yet another deeply ingrained cultural belief, such as the one I wrote about last week, that has been relentlessly driven into our heads for several decades.

But once we've put on our Healthy Skeptic goggles, which I know all of you fair readers have, we no longer simply believe what we're told by the medical establishment or mainstream media. Nor are we impressed or in any way swayed by the number of people that tell us something is true. After all, as Anatole France said, "Even if fifty million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing."

Words to live by.

The oversimplified view of HDL cholesterol as "good" and LDL cholesterol as "bad" is not only incomplete, it has also directly contributed to the continuing heart disease epidemic worldwide.

But before we discover why, we first have to address another common misconception. LDL and HDL are not cholesterol. We refer to them as cholesterol, but they aren't. LDL (low density lipoprotein) and HDL (high density lipoprotein) are proteins that transport cholesterol through the blood. Cholesterol, like all fats, doesn't dissolve in water (or blood) so it must be transported through the blood by these lipoproteins. The names LDL and HDL refer to the different types of lipoproteins that transport cholesterol.

Megaphone

Best of the Web: Egyptian military falls out with protesters who won't leave Liberation Square until civilian rule is secure

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© Emilio Morenatti/APA protester waves an Egyptian flag on top of a tank during celebrations in Liberation Square in Cairo today.
Egypt's new military administration and the pro-democracy protesters who brought down Hosni Mubarak were at odds today over the path to democratic rule.

The army sought to stave off pressure from jubilant protesters to swiftly hand power to a civilian-led administration by saying that it is committed to a "free democratic state".

The military leadership gave no timetable for the political transition, and many of the demonstrators who filled Cairo's Tahrir square for 18 days rejected the military's appeal to dismantle the barricades and go home.

They said they were waiting for specific commitments from the military on their demand for a civilian-controlled interim administration, the lifting of the oppressive state of emergency and other steps toward political liberalisation.

Che Guevara

Best of the Web: Globoctopus Tightens its Grip

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© Khaled Elfiqi/EPAProtesters celebrate in Tahrir Liberation Square
Dog Poet Transmitting.......

The Egyptians are doing what is necessary to force change. The workers are striking. This is the key action necessary to bring down a government when you lack the guns and the media. No government can endure a protracted shutdown of the economy. It was through the economy and the currency that corporations and a certain criminal banking country took over control of so many governments in the first place. I believe it is a principal law of most countries that the government cannot be ruled by a foreign power. Trafficking with influence for gain is a form of treason. It is widespread now, throughout the western world and the reason the economies are crumbling, due to the activities of corporations and banks.

The predictable behavior of corporations is what led to the definition of fascism as being, 'government under corporate control'. In America, the single biggest evidence that this is so, came about when the highest court in the land ruled that it was legal for corporations to buy the government. A decade earlier they were the last gasp fixer, for a stolen election. Nothing has been the same since and quality of life is in the toilet, except for the few who are living it up at the expense of the many. When an economy shuts down, by the will of the people who turn the wheels, everything comes to a halt.

Gear

Best of the Web: FOX News Insider: "Stuff Is Just Made Up"

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© Fox News
Asked what most viewers and observers of Fox News would be surprised to learn about the controversial cable channel, a former insider from the world of Rupert Murdoch was quick with a response: "I don't think people would believe it's as concocted as it is; that stuff is just made up."

Indeed, a former Fox News employee who recently agreed to talk with Media Matters confirmed what critics have been saying for years about Murdoch's cable channel. Namely, that Fox News is run as a purely partisan operation, virtually every news story is actively spun by the staff, its primary goal is to prop up Republicans and knock down Democrats, and that staffers at Fox News routinely operate without the slightest regard for fairness or fact checking.

"It is their M.O. to undermine the administration and to undermine Democrats," says the source. "They're a propaganda outfit but they call themselves news."

And that's the word from inside Fox News.

Magic Wand

Best of the Web: The Shiny Harbingers of Change, More Frequent and Brighter: Mysterious Noctilucent Clouds As Seen from Space

Mysterious "night shining" or noctilucent clouds are beautiful to behold, and are usually seen during the summertime, appearing at sunset. They are thin, wavy ice clouds that form at very high altitudes and reflect sunlight long after the Sun has dropped below the horizon. Scientists don't know exactly why they form, but continue to observe them - both from Earth and from space. These images were taken by the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on NASA's Aura satellite.

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© NASPolar mesospheric clouds (PMCs) observed by the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on the Aura satellite. Maps by Robert Simmon
Also called polar mesospheric clouds, they are puzzling scientists with their recent dramatic changes. They used to be considered rare, but now the clouds are growing brighter, are seen more frequently, are visible at lower and lower latitudes than ever before, and - as these satellite image reveal - they are now even appearing during the day.

Comment: The article mentions Matthew DeLand's measurements of a long-term trend towards more and brighter noctilucent clouds linking to rising greenhouse gases. And we would like to clarify, just in case there is anyone left who's not been paying attention, that it has nothing to do with Global Warming.

What we suspect has really been happening, based on our research thus far, is that the upper atmosphere is cooling because it is being loaded with comet dust, which shows up in the form of noctilucent clouds and other upper atmospheric formations. The comet dust is electrically charged which is causing the earth's rotation to slow marginally. The slowing of the rotation is reducing the magnetic field, opening earth to more dangerous cosmic radiation and stimulating more volcanism. The volcanism under the sea is heating the sea water which is heating the lower atmosphere and loading it with moisture. The moisture hits the cooler upper atmosphere and contributes to a deadly mix that inevitably leads to an Ice Age, preceded for a short period by a rapid increase of greenhouse gases and "hot pockets" in the lower atmosphere, heavy rains, hail, snow, and floods.

Expect this trend to continue but don't believe in "man-made Global Warming". Whatever warming there has been, it's really a prelude to the way Ice Ages begin. Let's hope that there aren't any catastrophically large chunks in that stream of comet dust cycling through our solar system.


Che Guevara

Best of the Web: Egypt's hope turns to fury as Mubarak clings to power

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© Pedro Ugarte/AFP/Getty ImagesDemonstrators in Tahrir Square. President Mubarak had seemed on the verge of giving in to demands to resign.
President hands some powers to vice-president Suleiman but will remain in control until September elections

President Hosni Mubarak dashed the hopes of hundreds of thousands of Egyptians celebrating what they expected would be his resignation speech by defiantly telling them he would not bow to domestic or foreign pressure to quit.

Mubarak said he would hand some powers to his vice-president, Omar Suleiman, but would remain in overall control until September to oversee what he called an orderly transition to an elected government. He repeated a pledge not to seek re-election.

He also said that there would be no going back on a commitment of long-term political reform after the two weeks of growing protests to demand his resignation. However, he ominously referred to the army playing a role in ensuring an orderly transfer of power.

Stormtrooper

Best of the Web: Egypt army to shoot commanders?

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Protesters sit inside the tracks of Egyptian Army tanks both to prevent them from moving and to shield themselves from the rain, as a soldier, talks to one of them at the protest site opposite the Egyptian Museum near Liberation Square in downtown Cairo.

An Egyptian activist says several Egyptian army officers and soldiers have warned the military that they will no longer shoot protesters, instead they will shoot the commanders.

"I think some of them (the army personnel) might join protesters. We have heard some of the officers and soldiers saying if we receive an order to shoot people, we would shoot whoever issued the order," Wael Abbas, a member of the opposition Egypt Revolution Youth Movement, told Press TV in a phone interview on Thursday.

Egypt Revolution Youth Movement has been one of the active rights groups in 17 days of revolution which has rocked the North African country.

"I have no confirmation if the army is going to intervene in favor of the protesters or in favor of the regime," Abbas added.

Revolution has entered its 17th consecutive day in crisis-hit Egypt, despite massive crackdown on demonstrators in the past two days, which left more than a hundred people killed or wounded.

Thousands of pro-democracy protesters camped overnight in the streets in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, near parliament building, the site of a massive march on Wednesday.

The angry protesters blocked roads and railways connecting the northern part of the country to the south on Thursday.

Meteor

Best of the Web: Giant Meteorites Slammed Earth Around A.D. 500?

Double impact may have caused tsunami, global cooling.

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© Illustration by Detlev van Ravenswaay, Astrofoto, Peter Arnold Images, PhotolibraryAn asteroid hurtles toward Earth in an artist's rendering.
Pieces of a giant asteroid or comet that broke apart over Earth may have crashed off Australia about 1,500 years ago, says a scientist who has found evidence of the possible impact craters.

Satellite measurements of the Gulf of Carpentaria (see map) revealed tiny changes in sea level that are signs of impact craters on the seabed below, according to new research by marine geophysicist Dallas Abbott.

Based on the satellite data, one crater should be about 11 miles (18 kilometers) wide, while the other should be 7.4 miles (12 kilometers) wide.

For years Abbott, of Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, has argued that V-shaped sand dunes along the gulf coast are evidence of a tsunami triggered by an impact.

"These dunes are like arrows that point toward their source," Abbott said. In this case, the dunes converge on a single point in the gulf - the same spot where Abbott found the two sea-surface depressions.

Comment: Interestingly, this was described by the Cassiopaeans long before any studies about it were published:
Session 12 September 1998

Q: (L) On the subject of supernovas; I have discovered that three of the supernovas of antiquity which have be discovered and time estimated by the remnants, if they were not observed, occurred in or near Cassiopeia at very interesting points in history.

A: Yes...

Q: (L) Well, one of these periods in history was around 1054. This is a very interesting time. It just so happens that there are no European records of this supernova which was recorded by the Chinese, Japanese, and perhaps even the Koreans. Yet, there are no European records. What happened to the European records?

A: Europe was in a "recovery mode" at the "time."

Q: (L) Recovery from what?

A: Loss of civilized structure due to overhead cometary explosion in 564 AD.

Q: (C) There were certain historical facts you picked up, so that doesn't make sense to me. (L) On the other hand it might, because there is some stuff from Gregory of Tours that is real bizarre. What effect did this have on the civilized structure? Was it a direct effect in terms of material, or did it have effects on people causing them to behave in an uncivilized and barbaric way?

A: Well, the burning fragmentary shower ignited much of the land areas in what you now refer to as Western Europe. This had the results you can imagine, causing the resulting societal breakdown you now refer to as "The Dark Ages."

Q: (L) Well, it damn sure was dark. There is almost a thousand years that nobody knows anything about!

A: Check Irish or Celtic, and French or Gallic records of the era for clues. There were temporary "islands of survival," lasting just long enough for the written word to eke out.