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Editors of World’s Most Prestigious Medical Journals: “Much of the Scientific Literature, Perhaps HALF, May Simply Be Untrue”

Zero Hedge | June 4, 2015

Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine are the two most prestigious medical journals in the world.

It is therefore striking that their chief editors have both publicly written that corruption is undermining science.

The editor in chief of Lancet, Richard Horton, wrote last month:

Much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue. Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses, and flagrant conflicts of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, science has taken a turn towards darkness. As one participant put it, “poor methods get results”. The Academy of Medical Sciences, Medical Research Council, and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council have now put their reputational weight behind an investigation into these questionable research practices. The apparent endemicity [i.e. pervasiveness within the scientific culture] of bad research behaviour is alarming. In their quest for telling a compelling story, scientists too often sculpt data to fit their preferred theory of the world. Or they retrofit hypotheses to fit their data. Journal editors deserve their fair share of criticism too. We aid and abet the worst behaviours. Our acquiescence to the impact factor fuels an unhealthy competition to win a place in a select few journals. Our love of “significance” pollutes the literature with many a statistical fairy-tale. We reject important confirmations. Journals are not the only miscreants. Universities are in a perpetual struggle for money and talent, endpoints that foster reductive metrics, such as high-impact publication. National assessment procedures, such as the Research Excellence Framework, incentivise bad practices. And individual scientists, including their most senior leaders, do little to alter a research culture that occasionally veers close to misconduct.

***

Part of the problem is that no-one is incentivised to be right.

Similarly, the editor in chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Marcia Angell, wrote in 2009:

It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine.

In her must-read essay, Dr. Angell skewers drug companies, university medical departments, and medical groups which set the criteria for diagnosis and treatment as being rotten with corruption and conflicts of interest.

And we’ve previously documented that the government sometimes uses raw power to cover up corruption in the medical and scientific fields.

Postscript: Corruption is not limited to the medical or scientific fields. Instead, corruption has become systemic throughout every profession … and is so pervasive that it is destroying the very fabric of America.

June 6, 2015 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

Conservative ‘warrior nation’ mythology glorifies Boer War against evidence

By Yves Engler | Rabble | June 3, 2015

In their bid to brand Canada a “warrior nation,” Stephen Harper’s Conservatives seek to glorify Canadian military history, regardless of its horrors.

On Saturday Canada’s Minister of Veteran Affairs released a statement to mark “113 years since the end of the South African war.” Erin O’Toole said, “Canada commemorates all those who served in South Africa, contributing to our proud military history.”

But the Boer War was a brutal conflict to strengthen British colonial authority in Africa, ultimately leading to racial apartheid. In the late 1800s the Boers, descendants of Dutch settlers, increasingly found themselves at odds with British interests in southern Africa. Large quantities of gold were found 30 miles south of the Boer capital, Pretoria, in 1886 and the Prime Minister of U.K.’s Cape Colony, Cecil Rhodes, and other British miners wanted to get their hands on more of the loot.

There was also a geostrategic calculation. The Boer gold and diamond fields in the Orange Free State and Transvaal were drawing the economic heart of southern Africa away from the main British colonies on the coast. If this continued London feared that the four southern African colonies might unite, but outside of the British orbit, which threatened its control of an important shipping lane.

Between 1898 and 1902 London launched a vicious war against the Boer. With Cecil Rhodes’ Imperial South African Association promoting anti-Boer sentiment in this country, some 7,400 Canadians fought to strengthen Britain’s position in southern Africa.

The war was devastating for the Boers. As part of a scorched-earth campaign the British-led forces burned their crops and homesteads and poisoned their wells. About 200,000 Boer were rounded up and sent to concentration camps. Twenty-eight thousand (mostly children) died of disease, starvation and exposure in these camps.

In Another Kind of Justice: Canadian Military Law from Confederation to Somalia, Chris Madsen points out that, “Canadian troops became intimately involved in the nastier aspects of the South African war.” Whole columns of troops participated in search, expel and burn missions. Looting was common. One Canadian soldier wrote home, “as fast as we come up the country… we loot the farms.” Another wrote, “I tell you there is some fun in it. We ride up to a house and commandeer anything you set your eyes on. We are living pretty well now.” There are also numerous documented instances of Canadian troops raping and killing innocent civilians.

As with the Boer, the war was devastating for many Africans. Over 100,000 Blacks were held in concentration camps but the British failed to keep a tally of their deaths so it’s not known how many died of disease or starvation. Some estimate that as many as 20,000 Africans were worked to death in camps during the war.

Unlike the Boer, the plight of black South Africans didn’t improve much after the war. In Painting the Map Red: Canada and the South African War, 1899-1902, Carman Miller notes, “Although imperialists had made much of the Boer maltreatment of the Blacks, the British did little after the war to remedy their injustices.” In fact, the war reinforced white/British dominance over the region’s Indigenous population.

The peace agreement with the Boer included a guarantee that Africans would not be granted the right to vote before the two defeated republics gained independence. In The History of Britain in Africa, John Charles Hatch explains: “By the time that self-government was restored in 1906 and 1907, they [the Boer] were able to reestablish the racial foundations of their states on the traditional principle of ‘No equality in church or state.'” Blacks and mixed-race people were excluded from voting in the post-war elections and would not gain full civil rights for nine decades.

For Harper’s Conservatives the details of the Boer War are barely relevant. What matters is that Canadians traveled to a distant land to do battle beside a great empire. That’s the “warrior nation” they seek to create.

June 4, 2015 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

MI5 blackmailed child sex abusers

Press TV – June 3, 2015

Some reports suggest that the British Security Service, MI5, shielded pedophile politicians from prosecution to blackmail them back in the 1970s.

“There’s now substantial evidence that the Security Service were condoning that, they knew of it and made use of it so as to blackmail the abusers and prevent some of the abusers being brought to book at the time,” Belfast Telegraph quoted a lawyer for one of the child abuse victims as saying.

The revelation was made in Belfast High Court during the hearing of the Kincora Boy’s Home case.

The victims of the abuse at the Kincora boys’ home in Belfast have filed the legal action with the aim to force a full independent probe that would have the authority to compel the secret service to hand over documents and witnesses to give testimonies.

‘Utterly scandalous’

Meanwhile, Amnesty International announced that investigation into child abuse at Kincora Boys’ Home in east Belfast should be investigated by the UK parliament.

“The Kincora affair may be one of the most disturbing episodes of the Troubles…The claims that MI5 turned a blind eye to child abuse, actively blocked a police investigation, and instead used the pedophile ring for intelligence-gathering purposes, are utterly scandalous,” said Amnesty International’s Northern Ireland Programme Director Patrick Corrigan.

‘Catalog of cover-ups’

Founder and Spokesperson of National Association for People Abused in Childhood expressed the hope that the forthcoming national inquiry would scrutinize the cover-ups.

“There has been a catalog of cover-ups and security services, MI5, senior police officers, probably senior politicians,” Peter Saunders told Press TV on Wednesday.

The British government has so far refused to include the case within the scope of a child abuse inquiry established by Home Secretary Theresa May.

London is seeking a different inquiry in which the MI5 would not be forced to hand over documents or compel witnesses to testify regarding the abuse at the boys’ home.

June 4, 2015 Posted by | Corruption, Deception | , | Leave a comment

Disused nuclear subs cost UK £16mn in 5 years, pose ‘radiation risk’

RT | June 3, 2015

The British government has spent £16 million storing and maintaining its unused nuclear submarines over the past five years, figures suggest.

The 19 laid-up submarines have been stored in Fife, Scotland, and Devonport, England since 1980 and 1994, respectively.

Figures obtained by the BBC in a Freedom of Information request found that of the 12 submarines at Davenport, eight were still fuelled and four were sitting without fuel. In Rosyth, Fife, all seven submarines are still fueled.

The cost of keeping them safe involves preventing any of the nuclear substances on board being released into the atmosphere.

Campaigners have called the cost a “huge embarrassment,” while the Ministry of Defense (MoD) said it takes its duties to manage the submarines “very seriously.”

The MoD revealed in documents that the “cost to the taxpayer of maintaining them safely is rising significantly as they age and as more submarines leave service,” adding that full dismantling of the subs could not take place until a site was found for the nuclear reactors.

Ian Avent, of Plymouth based campaign group Community Awareness Nuclear Storage and Radiation, told the BBC: “The big problem is that eight submarines on Devonport still have their fuel on board and that is potential for [a] disaster.

“The submarines are a huge embarrassment for the MoD.

“They need to make a decision soon on where they are going take the waste fuel, so dismantling can start.”

Jane Tallents, an anti-nuclear campaigner and adviser on the MoD’s submarine dismantling project, said: “The MoD dragged its feet after the first submarine was laid up but 12 years ago they decided to do something.

“It is a complicated project and there have been points where they have stalled and gone slowly but they have kept moving with it.”

The MoD said the submarines “undergo regular maintenance to keep them in a safe condition.”

John Large, an engineering consultant, said the “lack of decision and decisive management” was halting the decommissioning process.

“It also exposes the public, and the naval base workforce, to continuing radiological risk arising from untoward accident or incident,” he said.

An MoD spokesperson said: “As a responsible nuclear operator, the MoD takes its duty to manage the disposal of submarines very seriously.

“All activity is undertaken in a safe, secure, cost-effective and environmentally sound manner.”

June 3, 2015 Posted by | Environmentalism, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | Leave a comment

BBC admits Israeli defense minister interview breached impartiality rules

RT | June 3, 2015

The BBC has acknowledged that its presenter Sarah Montague did not adequately challenge controversial comments made by Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon about Palestine on the broadcaster’s flagship Radio 4 “Today” program.

Head of Editorial Complaints Fraser Steel wrote to complainants admitting that, while there were some mitigating reasons, the interview with Ya’alon fell below the standards of impartiality required of the BBC.

“Mr Ya’alon was allowed to make several controversial statements on those matters without any meaningful challenge and the program makers have accepted that the interviewer ought to have interrupted him and questioned him on his assertions.”

In a statement, a BBC spokesman said: “The BBC has reached a provisional finding that the complaints should be upheld and will be taking comments from the complainants into account before finalizing the outcome.”

The interview, which took place on March 19, saw the minister make a number of contestable claims which political groups say went unchallenged.

These include Ya’alon’s claim that Palestinians “enjoy already political independence. They have their own political system, government, parliament, municipalities and so forth. And we are happy with it. We don’t want to govern them whatsoever.”

On its website, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) said Montague failed to raise a number of obvious counterpoints, including the point that “Palestinians don’t have political independence. They live under occupation and, in Gaza, under siege.”

The PSC also said: “In the West Bank, Israel arrests and detains Palestinian MPs, often without charge or trial. West Bank Palestinians’ taxes are collected by Israel and then handed to the Palestinian Authority.

“Israel regularly withholds the tax revenue from the PA when it goes against its wishes.”

One of the most prominent complaints came from filmmaker and activist Ken Loach. His letter, sent via the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, read: “You understand, I’m sure, that this interview is a serious breach of the requirement for impartiality. Unlike all other Today interviews, the minister was allowed to speak without challenge. Why?”

“You and your interviewer have seriously betrayed your obligation to report impartially and to challenge assertions that are unsustainable.”

In March, BBC Director-General Lord Hall said reporting on the Israel-Palestine conflict was “tough,” but insisted the corporation aimed to be balanced in its coverage.

Hall added that the broadcaster was committed to its coverage of the Middle East, including Israel and Palestine.

Speaking before a 200-person audience at ORT UK’s business breakfast on Tuesday, the BBC boss said: “It is hard … tough. We do aim to give as impartial coverage as [best] we can across the period.”

“I do not want you to doubt for one second our commitment to the coverage of Israel and Palestine – but also the wider Middle East,” he said.

An independent review of the BBC’s Israel-Palestine coverage published in 2006 found the corporation offered an “incomplete” and “misleading” picture of the conflict.

Chaired by Sir Quentin Thomas, the report said the BBC failed to “convey adequately the disparity in the Israeli and Palestinian experience, reflecting the fact that one side is in control and the other lives under occupation.”

June 3, 2015 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Illegal Occupation, Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Nuclear Weapons Proliferation: Made in the USA

By JOHN LaFORGE | CounterPunch | May 27, 2015

The United States is perhaps the principle nuclear weapons proliferator in the world today, openly flouting binding provisions of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). Article I of the treaty forbids signers from transferring nuclear weapons to other states, and Article II prohibits signers from receiving nuclear weapons from other states.

As the UN Review Conference of the NPT was finishing its month-long deliberations in New York last week, the US delegation distracted attention from its own violations using its standard Red Herring warnings about Iran and North Korea — the former without a single nuclear weapon, and the latter with 8-to-10 (according to those reliable weapons spotters at the CIA) but with no means of delivering them.

The NPT’s prohibitions and obligations were re-affirmed and clarified by the world’s highest judicial body in its July 1996 Advisory Opinion on the legal status of the threat or use of nuclear weapons. The International Court of Justice said in this famous decision that the NPT’s binding promises not to transfer or receive nuclear weapons are unqualified, unequivocal, unambiguous and absolute. For these reasons, US violations are easy to illustrate.

Nuclear Missiles “Leased” to British Navy

The US “leases” submarine-launched intercontinental ballistic missiles (SLBMs) to Britain for use on its four giant Trident submarines. We’ve done this for two decades. The British subs travel across the Atlantic to pick up the US-made missiles at Kings Bay Naval base in Georgia.

Helping to ensure that US proliferation involves only of the most verifiably terrible nuclear weapons, a senior staff engineer at Lockheed Martin in California is currently responsible for planning, coordinating and carrying out development and production of the “UK Trident Mk4A [warhead] Reentry Systems as part of the UK Trident Weapons System ‘Life Extension program.’” This, according to John Ainslie of the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, which closely watchdogs the British Tridents — all of which are based in Scotland, much to the chagrin of the Scots.

Even the W76 warheads that arm the US-owned missiles leased to England have parts made in United States. The warheads use a Gas Transfer System (GTS) which stores tritium — the radioactive form of hydrogen that puts the “H” in H-bomb — and the GTS injects tritium into the plutonium warhead or “pit.” All the GTS devices used in Britain’s Trident warheads are manufactured in the United States. They are then either sold to the Royals or given away in exchange for an undisclosed quid pro quo.

David Webb, the current Chair of the British Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament reported during the NPT Review Conference, and later confirmed in an email to Nukewatch, that the Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico announced, in March 2011, that it had conducted “the first W76 United Kingdom trials test” at its Weapons Evaluation and Test Laboratory (WETL) in New Mexico, and that this had “provided qualification data critical to the UK [United Kingdom] implementation of the W76-1.” The W76 is a 100 kiloton H-bomb designed for the so-called D-4 and D-5 Trident missiles. One of the centrifuges at Sandia’s WETL simulates the ballistic trajectory of the W76 “reentry-vehicle” or warhead. This deep and complex collusion between the US and the UK could be called Proliferation Plus.

The majority of the Royal Navy’s Trident warheads are manufactured at England’s Aldermaston nuclear weapons complex, allowing both the Washington and London to claim they are in compliance with the NPT.

US H-bombs Deployed in Five NATO Countries

An even clearer violation of the NPT is the US deployment of between 184 and 200 thermonuclear gravity bombs, called B61, in five European countries — Belgium, The Netherlands, Italy, Turkey and Germany. “Nuclear sharing agreements” with these equal partners in the NPT — all of whom declare that they are “non-nuclear states” — openly defy both Article I and Article II of the treaty.

The US is the only country in the world that deploys nuclear weapons to other countries, and in the case of the five nuclear sharing partners, the US Air Force even trains Italian, German, Belgian, Turkish and Dutch pilots in the use of the B61s in their own warplanes — should the President ever order such a thing. Still, the US government regularly lectures other states about their international law violations, boundary pushing and destabilizing actions.

With so much a stake, it is intriguing that diplomats at the UN are too polite to confront US defiance of the NPT, even when the extension and enforcement of it is on the table. As Henry Thoreau said, “The broadest and most prevalent error requires the most disinterested virtue to sustain it.”

 

May 27, 2015 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Abuse Survivor Speaks Out: “Cops Stood Guard as I was Raped by Politicians as a Child”

By Matt Agorist | The Free Thought Project | May 26, 2015

Staffordshire, Eng — An abuse survivor has bravely broken her silence to tell her horrific childhood story. In an interview with Sky News, Esther Baker, 32, explained how she and other children were raped by politicians as uniformed police officers stood guard.

“I got the feeling very much that they were protecting somebody, that they were with one of the men,” said Baker.

“One of them (police officers) I knew from church. There were a few occasions where they would be in uniform, and I kind of knew, I learnt that when they were in uniform that it was going to be a rough night,” she explained. “On occasion they would – they would sort of join in.”

During one of the incidents, Baker recalls that she was able to run away, only to be chased down and caught by a police officer. Apparently the police officer was apologetic as he carried her back to the rapist politicians. He must have “just been doing his job.”

“There was one that I can remember, one of the times I tried to run away and tried to get away from them and he came after me, caught up with me and he was carrying me back to where the rest of them were and he said he was sorry,” she said.

Baker explained how she and other children around the age of 6 were often brought to various properties and given alcohol and then raped by judges and lords.

This poor young girl thought the rape was normal. Since everyone called these men “lords,” she thought they were doing God’s work.

“I don’t quite know how to explain. I was brought up in a religious household and one thing that kept me so sure that what they were doing was right was that there were references to people, Lords and a judge,” she said. “I picked up on those names because I thought one of them must have been God because one of them was ‘Our Lord.’”

“I just thought that they were on God’s authority.”

Now that Baker has courageously come forward, despite the deadly threats she received and the police being involved, authorities are claiming that they will investigate her claims thoroughly.

“I always swore I would never go near the police again – never. I was scared because it feels like, yeah, they are going to know I have said something so the only way I can now protect myself is now to tell,” Baker said. “I just hope others will do the same. That is the only way we are going to be safe.”

Sadly Baker’s story is not an isolated one.

Jessa Dillow-Crisp recently testified at the Colorado State Capitol, during Human Trafficking Awareness and Advocacy Day, about the horrible experiences that she had in her past.

She was unable to report the abuse or go to the police because there were a number of police officers who were involved in her kidnapping and abuse.

“There was gang raping, the police officer who handcuffed me and raped me, told me I would be put in jail if I opened my voice,” she said.

May 26, 2015 Posted by | Corruption, Timeless or most popular, Video | , | Leave a comment

A Nuclear Weapons Ban Emerging?

By ROBERT F. DODGE | CounterPunch | May 26, 2015

Every moment of every day, all of humanity is held hostage by the nuclear nine.  The nine nuclear nations are made up of the P5 permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and their illegitimate nuclear wannabes Israel, North Korea, India and Pakistan, spawned by the mythological theory of deterrence. This theory has fueled the nuclear arms race since its inception wherein if one nation has one nuclear weapon, its adversary needs two and so on to the point that the world now has 15,700 nuclear weapons wired for immediate use and planetary destruction with no end in sight. This inaction continues despite the 45-year legal commitment of the nuclear nations to work toward complete nuclear abolition. In fact just the opposite is happening with the U.S. proposing to spend $1 Trillion on nuclear weapons “modernization” over the next 30 years, fueling the “deterrent” response of every other nuclear state to do likewise.

This critical state of affairs comes as the 189 signatory nations to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) concluded the month long Review Conference at the U.N. in New York. The conference was officially a failure due to the refusal of the nuclear weapons states to present or even support real steps toward disarmament. The nuclear gang demonstrates an unwillingness to recognize the peril that the planet faces at the end of their nuclear gun; they continue to gamble on the future of humanity. Presenting a charade of concern, they blamed each other and bogged down in discussions over a glossary of terms while the hand of the nuclear Armageddon clock continues to move ever forward.

The nuclear weapons states have chosen to live in a vacuum, one void of leadership. They hoard suicidal nuclear weapons stockpiles and ignore recent scientific evidence of the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons that we now realize makes these weapons even more dangerous than we thought before. They fail to recognize that this evidence must be the basis for prohibiting and eliminating them.

Fortunately there is one powerful and positive response coming out of the NPT Review Conference. The Non-Nuclear Weapons States, representing a majority of people living on the planet, frustrated and threatened by the nuclear nations, have come together and demanded a legal ban on nuclear weapons like the ban on every other weapon of mass destruction from chemical to biologic and landmines. Their voices are rising up. Following a pledge by Austria in December 2014 to fill the legal gap necessary to ban these weapons, 107 nations have joined them at the U.N. this month.  That commitment means finding a legal instrument that would prohibit and eliminate nuclear weapons. Such a ban will make these weapons illegal and will stigmatize any nation that continues to have these weapons as being outside of international law.

Costa Rica’s closing NPT remarks noted, ”Democracy has not come to the NPT but Democracy has come to nuclear weapons disarmament.” The nuclear weapons states have failed to demonstrate any leadership toward total disarmament and in fact have no intention of doing so.  They must now step aside and allow the majority of the nations to come together and work collectively for their future and the future of humanity. John Loretz of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons said, “The nuclear-armed states are on the wrong side of history, the wrong side of morality, and the wrong side of the future. The ban treaty is coming, and then they will be indisputably on the wrong side of the law. And they have no one to blame but themselves.”

“History honors only the brave,” declared Costa Rica. “Now is the time to work for what is to come, the world we want and deserve.”

Ray Acheson of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom says, “Those who reject nuclear weapons must have the courage of their convictions to move ahead without the nuclear-armed states, to take back ground from the violent few who purport to run the world, and build a new reality of human security and global justice.”

Robert F. Dodge, M.D., is a practicing family physician, writes for PeaceVoice, and serves on the boards of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, Beyond War, Physicians for Social Responsibility Los Angeles, and Citizens for Peaceful Resolutions.

May 26, 2015 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , | Leave a comment

US blocks nuclear disarmament document over Israel, Moscow fumes

RT | May 23, 2015

Washington has blocked the final document of a UN conference that reviewed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, accusing Egypt of manipulating the gathering to target Israel. Moscow has slammed the US for rendering the four-week meeting futile.

The 9th international conference was held in New York from April 27 until May 22. A total of 162 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) participant states were in attendance. These conferences are held every five years to assess the worldwide disarmament process.

The blocked document included a plan to establish a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East. To do this, Egypt, who first proposed such a zone in 1980, suggested a regional UN conference on banning weapons of mass destruction. The gathering would have no pre-determined agenda and would go ahead with or without the presence of Israel.

This was stonewalled by the US, with Washington representative Rose Gottemoeller saying the final document reviewed on Friday was “incompatible with our longstanding policies.”

She accused Egypt and other Arab supporters of the nuclear-free zone of being “not willing to let go of these unrealistic and unworkable conditions,” AP reports.

Israel, which is an observer, but not a participant of the NPT, is widely believed to have the Middle East’s only nuclear arsenal, which it has neither confirmed nor denied. It is also a close ally of the US.

Egypt expressed its disappointment and said: “This will have consequences in front of the Arab world and public opinion.”

Washington’s position was backed by the UK and Canada, ultimately sinking the proposal which had to be approved by all countries.

Russia, for its part, said it was committed to nuclear non-proliferation and saw similar commitment from most other participants.

“The vast majority of the delegations have noted that the treaty remains a ‘cornerstone’ of international security and stability, and serves their interests,” a Russian Foreign Ministry statement said. “Participant countries have confirmed their readiness to comply with their obligations under the NPT.”

“We regretfully acknowledge that because of the positions of the US, Britain and Canada, we could not adopt the final document which included provisions on fulfilling the 1995 resolution on creating a Middle East zone free of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction.” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

It added, however, that Russia still has faith in the Treaty: “Despite such an outcome of the conference, the Russian Federation is ready to continue cooperating with other countries to help strengthen the NPT, provide its wholesomeness and viability.”

The failure of this conference means the next one can only be held in 2020.

May 23, 2015 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Four Banks Guilty of Currency Manipulation but, as Usual, No One’s Going to Jail

By Steve Straehley and Noel Brinkerhoff | AllGov | May 22, 2015

Four major banks—Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Barclays, and the Royal Bank of Scotland—have agreed to plead guilty in a Connecticut federal court to conspiring to manipulate the price of U.S. dollars and euros exchanged in the foreign currency market. But instead of sending those responsible for the crimes to prison, various government entities are fining the institutions a total of about $5.5 billion, the cost of which the banks will pass on to shareholders.

“For more than five years, traders in ‘The Cartel’ used a private electronic chat room to manipulate the spot market’s exchange rate between euros and dollars using coded language to conceal their collusion,” Attorney General Loretta Lynch said in announcing the settlements Wednesday morning.

In one of the chatroom conversations, a Barclays employee said: “If you ain’t cheating, you ain’t trying.”

Lynch said the currency manipulation “inflated the banks’ profits while harming countless consumers, investors and institutions around the globe — from pension funds to major corporations, and including the banks’ own customers.”

The Justice Department also announced that a fifth bank, Switzerland’s UBS, pleaded guilty to manipulating the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) and will pay a total of $545 million in fines, according to USA Today.

Legally, guilty pleas such as these would mean the banks would be restricted from conducting certain kinds of business, according to ThinkProgress. However the banks, as they have consistently in the past in other cases, received waivers from the Securities and Exchange Commission to continue business as usual.

The settlement by Lynch’s Justice Department follows the pattern of her predecessor, Eric Holder, who was criticized for not punishing Wall Street enough for its greedy and reckless behavior that caused the 2008 financial crisis.

To Learn More:

Banks to Pay Billions to Settle Charges (by Lorraine Bailey and Dan McCue, Courthouse News Service )

5 Banks Guilty of Rate-Rigging, Pay More than $5B (by Kevin McCoy and Kevin Johnson, USA Today )

Rigging of Foreign Exchange Market Makes Felons of Top Banks (by Michael Corkery and Ben Protess, New York Times )

Megabanks Fined $2 Billion For Criminal Activity, Will Be Able To Continue Business As Usual (by Alan Pyke, ThinkProgress )

Five Major Banks Agree to Parent-Level Guilty Pleas (U.S. Department of Justice)

Big Banks Fined Billions in Foreign Currency Scandal (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov )

World’s Biggest Banks in Fresh Crosshairs of U.S. Justice Department…But Will Anyone Go to Jail? (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov )

May 22, 2015 Posted by | Corruption | , , | Leave a comment

Psychiatric drugs kill 500k+ Western adults annually, few positive benefits – leading scientist

RT | May 13, 2015

Psychiatric drugs lead to the deaths of over 500,000 people aged 65 and over annually in the West, a Danish scientist says. He warns the benefits of these drugs are “minimal,” and have been vastly overstated.

Research director at Denmark’s Nordic Cochrane Centre, Professor Peter Gøtzsche, says the use of most antidepressants and dementia drugs could be halted without inflicting harm on patients. The Danish scientist’s views were published in the British Medical Journal on Tuesday.

His scathing analysis will likely prove controversial among traditional medics. However, concern is mounting among doctors and scientists worldwide that psychiatric medication is doing more harm than good. In particular, they say antipsychotic drugs have been over-prescribed to many dementia patients in a bid to calm agitated behavior.

Gøtzsche warns psychiatric drugs kill patients year in year out, and hold few positive benefits. He says in excess of half a million citizens across the Western world aged 65 and over die annually as a result of taking these drugs.

“Their benefits would need to be colossal to justify this, but they are minimal,” he writes.

“Given their lack of benefit, I estimate we could stop almost all psychotropic drugs without causing harm.”

Gøtzsche, who is also a clinical trials expert, says drug trials funded by big pharmaceutical companies tend to produce biased results because many patients took other medication prior to the tests.

He says patients cease taking the old drugs and then experience a phase of withdrawal prior to taking the trial pharmaceuticals, which appear highly beneficial at first.

The Danish professor also warns fatalities from suicides in clinical trials are significantly under-reported.

In the case of antidepressants venlafaxine and fluoxetine, Gøtzsche casts doubt over their efficacy. He said depression lifts in placebo groups given fake tablets almost as promptly as groups who partake in official clinical tests.

He also stressed the results of trials of drugs used to treat schizophrenia are disconcerting, while those for ADHD are ambiguous.

Commenting on the negative side effects of such pharmaceutical drugs, Gøtzsche argued the “short-term relief” appears to be replaced by “long term harm.”

“Animal studies strongly suggest that these drugs can produce brain damage, which is probably the case for all psychotropic drugs,” he said.

“Given their lack of benefit, I estimate we could stop almost all psychotropic drugs without causing harm – by dropping all antidepressants, ADHD drugs and dementia drugs … and using only a fraction of the antipsychotics and benzodiazepines we currently use.”

“This would lead to healthier and more long-lived populations.”

Gøtzsche says psychotropic drugs are “immensely harmful” if used for prolonged periods.

“They should almost exclusively be used in acute situations and always with a firm plan for tapering off, which can be difficult for many patients,” he adds.

Gøtzsche’s views are sharply contradicted by many experts in the field of mental health. But others, including a diverse group of medical experts and institutions affiliated with the Nordic Cochrane Centre, argue otherwise. The Nordic Cochrane Centre is an independent research hub dedicated to scrutinizing and monitoring the effects of health care.

The debate on psychiatric drugs has gathered momentum in recent times. In the discussion, published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), Gøtzsche’s arguments are contradicted by Professor of Mood Disorders Allan Young and John Crace. Crace, himself a psychiatric patient, writes for the Guardian.

Crace and Young say a broad body of research indicates the drugs are effective and that they are just as helpful as drugs for other ailments. They also argue mental health conditions are the fifth most significant contributor to disabilities worldwide.

While Gøtzsche stresses clinical trials bankrolled by pharma giants churn out skewered results, Young and Crace say the efficacy and safety of psychiatric medication continues to be monitored after research trials come to a close.

However, both Young and Crace acknowledge concern over the side effects and effectiveness of psychiatric medication.

“For some critics, the onus often seems to be on the drug needing to prove innocence from causing harm rather than a balanced approach to evaluating the available evidence,” they write.

“Whether concerns are genuine or an expression of prejudice is not clear, but over time many concerns have been found to be overinflated.”

The BMJ discussion is a preamble to the Maudsley debate at Kings College London on Wednesday. The debate takes place three times a year at the university’s Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN).

Wednesday’s debate focuses on the impacts of psychiatric medications, and poses the question of whether they prove more destructive for patients than beneficial.

May 13, 2015 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science | , , , , | Leave a comment

Cameron to announce new totalitarian laws

RT | May 13, 2015

David Cameron will announce new plans on Wednesday to curb extremist activity and radical hate preachers in his new government’s first State Opening of Parliament, commonly known as the Queen’s Speech.

The prime minister will tell the National Security Council the new measures will give police powers to go to the High Court to request orders to prevent “harmful activities” of individuals who pose a “threat to the functioning of democracy.”

The orders have been revived under the new Tory administration after original plans were vetoed by the Liberal Democrats in March 2014 while they were in coalition.

These measures will focus on reducing the presence of those who incite hatred against gender, race or religion on social media and in print.

They will also target those who perpetrate harmful activities for the “purpose of overthrowing democracy.”

Individuals suspected of disseminating inflammatory material will be subject to a ban on broadcasting and a requirement to submit any publications to websites, in print or on social media to the police in advance.

Added powers given to the police will also allow them to close premises where they believe extremists are being given a platform to influence others.

The Charity Commission will also see its power to root out charities which siphon off funds for extremist activities strengthened.

“For too long, we have been a passively tolerant society, saying to our citizens: as long as you obey the law, we will leave you alone. It’s often meant we have stood neutral between different values. And that’s helped foster a narrative of extremism and grievance,” Cameron will tell the National Security Council.

“This government will conclusively turn the page on this failed approach. As the party of one nation, we will govern as one nation and bring our country together. That means actively promoting certain values.

“Freedom of speech. Freedom of worship. Democracy. The rule of law. Equal rights regardless of race, gender or sexuality.

“We must say to our citizens: this is what defines us as a society.”

Home Secretary Theresa May will say the UK cannot ignore extremism.

“The twisted narrative of extremism cannot be ignored or wished away. This government will challenge those who seek to spread hatred and intolerance by forming a new partnership of every person and organization in this country that wants to defeat the extremists,” she is to state.

The new Tory government will also be free to introduce its new ‘Snoopers’ Charter’, which would allow authorities to monitor records of phones, emails and other metadata, now that they are unencumbered by their former-Lib Dem coalition partners.

May 13, 2015 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , | Leave a comment

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