From the day you're born until the day you die, touch is a vital component of humans' emotional and physical health. Touch is a means of communicating compassion and trust. It recharges the immune system, aids in babies' growth, reduces stress, stimulates oxytocin and dopamine, and lowers blood pressure and heart rate. Plus, as an added bonus, it feels great! Yet many of us suffer from a touch deficit and are deprived of the essential contact that helps us bond with others.

On this episode of the Health and Wellness Show we'll discuss the importance of platonic touch, including hugs, cuddles, massages and Reiki. A wise psychologist once said, "We need four hugs a day for survival. We need eight hugs a day for maintenance. We need 12 hugs a day for growth." Hopefully, this show will help you meet your touch quota!

Stay tuned for Zoya's Pet Health Segment where the topic will be the benefits of having a pet.

Running Time: 01:32:36

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Here's the transcript of the show:

Given that Islamic terrorism has been the most influential political and social meme of the last 17 years, the motive for a 'Muslim terror attack' at a UK concert venue 2 weeks before a UK general election may be more complicated than it at first seems.

After the lull in anti-Trump hysteria courtesy of his mega Tomahawks, the never-Trumpers are back in action. Trump met with Lavrov in the Oval Office. Ergo, the Kremlin is now in full control of the White House. Or so the hysteroidal media no-brainers would have us believe. The sight of a Russian - nay, more than one Russian! - in the White House was enough to provoke ecstatic heights of gleeful agitation among those who seem to derive some perverted sense of satisfaction that their deepest nightmares are true. This form of pathological masochism would be hilarious if it weren't for the fact that it is tearing the United States apart.

First, some anonymous somebody criminally leaked details of an Israeli intelligence operation involving ISIS to the Washington Post, but mendaciously blamed Trump for doing just that. Only Trump didn't, and the Russians have the transcripts to prove it. But the Americans don't want those transcripts. They derive too much pleasure from seeing their fearful fantasies come true, thus justifying even more leaks that don't bear any resemblance to reality. Thus, second, some anonymous somebody leaked that Trump called Comey a nutjob to Lavrov, hinting that Trump had political motivations for firing him. This on the heels of the alleged Comey memo suggesting Trump tried to get Comey to back down on his investigation of Flynn - despite the fact that Comey already testified under oath that no such thing happened. Oh, and the Russians apparently bragged that they had total control of Flynn's mind using Soviet-era ESP technology, or something like that.

But it's not all bad news. The unsolved murder of DNC staffer is back in the news, with several individuals claiming they know that he was the leaker of the DNC emails. If true, that would reflect somewhat poorly on Mrs. Clinton and her team of ne'er-do-wells. After all, one of the Podesta emails has him writing "I'm definitely for making an example of a suspected leaker whether or not we have any real basis for it." And if there was a basis for it? What then, Mr. Podesta?

Tune in to Behind the Headlines this Sunday 21 May from 6-8pm CET (4-6pm UTC, 12-2pm EST) for all the juicy details of the Never-ending Trumpathon

Running Time: 01:43:40

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The battle-lines in the information war are drawn. The mainstream media, which the people increasingly see as unreliable, believes that the free flow of ideas and information on the Internet is a threat to our well-being.

The war on 'fake news' began in earnest in November 2016. The Washington Post then released a blacklist, compiled by anonymous source PropOrNot, on which 200 sites were accused of "Russian propaganda efforts to undermine American democracy and interests."

Among those blacklisted are former Republican delegates, former presidential candidate Ron Paul, former US Assistant Secretary of Finance Paul Craig Roberts, The Corbett Report, Natural News and SOTT.

As a social species, human beings are highly influenced by the people in their immediate environment and the world at large. Role models, whether they be parents, teachers, neighbors, celebrities or world leaders, provide us with an example of personal development and serve as motivators to help us reach our goals. Personal success depends on behaving in certain ways and not behaving in other ways so on this episode of the Health and Wellness we'll discuss the topic of role models -- those who inspire us to great heights as well as those who set a bad example.

Stay tuned for Zoya's Pet Health Segment where the topic will be stress free vet visits for your pets.

Running Time: 01:35:26

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If Trump is smart like he claims he is, he'd use the media bias against him to his advantage. Last week he appears to have done just that, firing FBI Director James Comey on the eve of a surprise meeting with Russian foreign minister Lavrov in the White House. The reaction from most media talking heads was predictable, loudly bleating that this move is proof that Trump is taking orders from the Kremlin. Their reaction was so over-the-top that even Senator Lindsey Graham had to talk them down from their hysteria.

It's easy to produce endless streams of fake news and repeat the same talking points across a global media empire when you control such an empire, but the danger for those interests it serves is that, with every passing week, they are alerting more and more of the hitherto disinterested masses to the increasingly blatant psychopathology of the entrenched elites. The more the media must lie to bridge the reality gap between the elites and the people, the more absurd its narratives become.

A case in point is the French presidential election: how credible is it, to French voters, that the candidate who was the fullest representation of everything they had come to detest in previous governments (for those 'of the right'; the destruction of traditional values and kowtowing before foreign powers - and for those 'of the left'; the destruction of the welfare state and the enrichment of the elites at the expense of the people) won more votes than candidates who spoke to some or all of their concerns?

Join us this Sunday 14 May from 6-8pm CET (4-6pm UTC, 12-2pm EST) as we go Behind the Headlines to find that scarce commodity: the real news!

Running Time: 02:02:02

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Donald Trump may not have drained the swamp in the delusional fairy tale way that so many people thought he could - remember, overly simplistic campaign promises are just for votes, real life is much more complex - but in his ongoing battle with the Washington swamp screwballs and the more insidious deep state operators, he is at least making good on his implicit promise to provide us all with a good laugh now and then. That the fun is often at the expense of the US liberal media and people like John McCain just makes it all the funnier.

So Trump fired FBI director James Comey. OMG! REALLY!?? NO WAY!! That's TERRIBLE! I'm TERRIFIED (that last one is an actual quote). This news is only a big deal if, frankly, you're an idiot, and there are lots of those in the Washington political establishment and the US liberal media.

Planetary environmental chaos continued unabated this April.

After Peru was inundated in March, Columbia was next in line for massive rainfall and flooding which provoked deadly landslides in the city of Mocoa. Major flooding and landslides also hit India, Indonesia, the USA and China, while

Wildfires once again struck the US state of Florida while very late snow saw many European nations blanketed, with many crops destroyed.

Meteor/fireballs were also spotted from one end of the planet to the other and a comet made a special appearance.


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Today lightweight Emmanuel Macron enters the ring to do battle with Marine Le Pen in the French presidential elections. By any objective measure, Macron would be laughed off the stage and back into that hole in the Rothschilds' basement he crawled out of. But no, it looks like he's slated to win, thanks to a remarkably biased media campaign and enough foreign meddling to make a neocon blush. Not to mention a conveniently timed "Russian hack attack" that is perhaps too little too late, but which will provide months of material for anti-Russian rhetoric from France's robo-banker non-entity.

In other news, Russia, Iran and Turkey have put together a plan whose implementation could spell the end of the war in Syria. With a little help from Trump on the sidelines, the Astana group has agreed to create four "de-escalation zones" in Syria. Once more, the U.S. played no major role in the negotiations, though Putin did speak to Trump about it over the phone, and Lavrov says they used some of the Americans' ideas. Are things looking better for Russian-US relations, and a coming end to 6-year dirty war in Syria?

Tune in today to Behind the Headlines to find out and hear live coverage of the French election.

Join your hosts this Sunday May 7th from 1:00 - 2:30pm EST (7:00 - 8:30pm CEST)

Running Time: 01:18:42

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Over the past 15 years, fighting-talk has periodically flared over 'what to do about that crazy Asian dictator' in North Korea. Today's round of brinkmanship by the US/Western 'deep state' against North Korea will - in all probability - unfold the same way as in previous episodes; it will fizzle out. China is a guarantor of North Korean security, so the US will not go to war with North Korea. Period.

The battle between Trump and the Washington Crazies for control of the reins of empire continues, however, and the 'Krazy Korean' is relevant to that. I hope to get to that in a later article, but in the meantime, take note of the contradictory messages coming from the US. One minute, US Navy battle-groups are 'en route to North Korea'; the next they're heading in the opposite direction. One minute, THAAD missile systems are 'installed and operational in South Korea'; the next, Trump wants South Korea to pay for them. One minute, someone on the US National Security Council is telling NBC News that the US is considering 'decapitating the North Korean regime'; the next, Trump announces he'd be honored to meet Kim Jung Un... All of which has provoked the South Korean and Japanese governments to denounce Trump's confusing and contradictory statements. Is there a method in Trump's apparent madness?

I recently read The China Mirage: The Hidden History of American Disaster in Asia by James Bradley, a breathtaking panorama of US and Chinese trajectories from the Opium Wars in the mid-19th century to the birth of 'Communist' China and 'Pax Americana' a hundred years later. This naturally encompassed US involvement in Korea, so in this article I'd like to share some historical context that is either incomplete or missing from summaries of US-Korean relations I've seen online so far.

The US has a long history of propping up crazy Asian dictators - from imperial Japan to 'Christian' Chiang Kai-shek in 'New' China to Catholic Diem in the short-lived US invention of South Vietnam. 'North' Korea is similarly a US invention. After existing for hundreds of years as a sovereign country, Korea fell under Japanese imperial influence in the late 19th century. The Japanese had by then become the 'Yankees of the Far East' and so accepting were they of civilized Western ways (and Anglo-Saxon values in particular), that the US and British empires were able to convince the Japanese that they should expand their empire as a check against Russian economic expansion in the Far East and as a vehicle through which to 'Americanize' China and the wider region.