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Thread: Dumbing Down

  1. #11
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    Dumbing Down Award of the month

    Goes to US President George W.

    No one can say they didn't see it coming
    - Salon.com

    In 2001, FEMA warned that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one
    of the three most likely disasters in the U.S. But the Bush
    administration cut New Orleans flood control funding by 44 percent
    to pay for the Iraq war.

    Biblical in its uncontrolled rage and scope, Hurricane Katrina has
    left millions of Americans to scavenge for food and shelter and
    hundreds to thousands reportedly dead. With its main levee broken,
    the evacuated city of New Orleans has become part of the Gulf of
    Mexico. But the damage wrought by the hurricane may not entirely be
    the result of an act of nature.

    A year ago the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed to study how
    New Orleans could be protected from a catastrophic hurricane, but
    the Bush administration ordered that the research not be undertaken.
    After a flood killed six people in 1995, Congress created the
    Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, in which the Corps
    of Engineers strengthened and renovated levees and pumping stations.

    In early 2001, the Federal Emergency Management Agency issued a
    report stating that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the
    three most likely disasters in U.S., including a terrorist attack on
    New York City. But by 2003 the federal funding for the flood
    control project essentially dried up as it was drained into the Iraq
    war.

    In 2004, the Bush administration cut the Corps of Engineers' request
    for holding back the waters of New Orleans' Lake Pontchartrain by
    more than 80 percent. Additional cuts at the beginning of this year
    (for a total reduction in funding of 44.2 percent since 2001) forced
    the Corps to impose a hiring freeze. The Senate had debated adding
    funds for fixing New Orleans levees, but it was too late.
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  2. #12
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    *** Dumb criminal acts

    The below is indeed criminal to allow this to happen to your
    children.

    Damaging children for the sake of profits
    - Evelyn Pringle

    TeenScreen is planting the seed of mental illness in the minds of
    children. School kids are being conned into taking a survey full of
    loaded questions and the results are being used to convince parents
    their children are mentally ill and need dangerous brain-damaging
    drugs.

    All children at times feel depressed or different from others, or
    not smart enough, or not good-looking enough. This is normal
    adolescent thinking. The TeenScreen survey asks whether the child
    has ever felt this way and phrases questions to solicit one answer,
    yes. It takes advantage of impressionable kids when it raises
    questions about normal feelings.

    After taking a survey that suggests they are abnormal, the next
    thing you know, Susie and Tommie will go running to the teacher
    saying, "You know, now that you mention it, I do have these thoughts
    and feelings, I must be mentally ill."

    Mission accomplished. Two new customers. All the survey had to do
    was plant the idea in Susie and Tommie's mind.

    The Bush appointed New Freedoms Commission on Mental Health issued a
    report in July 2003 urging the screening of school children in all
    50 states and chose TeenScreen as the model program to ensure that
    all youth receive a mental health check-up before graduating.

    The New Freedom Commission also recommended a drug treatment program
    based on the Texas Medication Algorithm Project (TMAP), which
    requires doctors to prescribe specific psychiatric drugs, including
    atypical anti-psychotics and antidepressants known as the Selective
    Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors [SSRIs] that can lead children to
    commit suicide or other violent acts.

    The truth is the New Freedom Commission serves as the hub for a
    grand profiteering scheme involving the Bush administration, federal
    and local government officials, and drug companies to broaden the
    market for the sale of expensive but lethal drugs. If all goes
    according to plan, it will generate millions of new prescription
    drug customers.

    For example, pharma reaped great rewards in Colorado where over 350
    youths were screened at a homeless shelter using the TeenScreen
    survey. It determined that over 50 percent of the kids were at risk
    of suicide and 71 percent screened positive for psychiatric
    disorders.

    Common sense would tell a person that kids at a homeless shelter
    might be suffering due to logical reasons such as not eating or
    sleeping properly. But you can bet that the TeenScreen squad
    marched these homeless kids right over to the nearest Medicaid
    office to line up funding to cover the cost of their newly
    prescribed drugs. Never mind that they don't have a bed to sleep in
    or a dinner table to eat at. Put them on magic pills and life will
    be grand.

    TeenScreen is being used to push drugs on a population of kids who,
    in the eyes of many experts, are already overmedicated. An
    estimated 10 million children in the US are now taking mind-altering
    drugs that have documented side-effects of suicidal ideation, mania,
    psychosis, and future drug dependence.

    Carol Boyd, director of the Institute for Research on Women and
    Gender at the University of Michigan, surveyed 1,017 middle and high
    school students in a Detroit-area public school district and found
    that almost half of the children had legitimate prescriptions for
    Ritalin and other psychiatric medications.

    More kids on drugs are showing up for college. The University of
    Mary Washington reports that a record 24 percent of students using
    the school's Psychological Services program are taking some sort
    psychotropic medication that is capable of influencing a person's
    mental functioning.

    The demand for services for 2004 2005 has risen 150 percent over
    last year, according to Psychological Services director Barb Wagar.
    The medications students are usually on are SSRIs, such as Prozac,
    Paxil, and Zoloft, for depression; Xanax for anxiety, and Ritalin or
    Adderall for attention disorders, Wagar reports.

    According Bernard Chirico, vice president for student affairs and
    dean of students, this is also a national trend. "Nationally there
    has been a 91 percent increase in students at college counseling
    taking psychotropics between 1998 and 2003," he said.

    On January 13, WebMD Medical News reported the findings of a
    government study that showed more Americans than ever are being
    treated for substance abuse, depression, and other mental health
    disorders, but the treatment they are getting is increasingly
    limited to prescription drugs alone.

    The study assessed changing patterns in the treatment of mental
    illnesses from the mid-1990s to 2001, and determined that mental
    health drug costs rose 20 percent each year.

    According to economist Samuel H Zuvekas, PhD, who conducted the
    analysis, about 80 percent of the growth in expenditures can be
    explained by the increase in the use of SSRIs and other
    antidepressants, and high-priced schizophrenia drugs called
    "atypical antipsychotics," like Risperdal, Zyprexa, and Geodon.

    The atypicals, which are also now being used to treat bipolar and
    anxiety disorders, cost roughly $8 a day, about 100 times more than
    the older antipsychotic drug, Haldol, the study noted.

    Front Groups as Funnels

    TeenScreen's promotional materials and websites say it's not
    supported or affiliated with any pharmaceutical companies. What a
    joke.

    Laurie Flynn is at the helm of TeenScreen. Prior to her current
    job, her salary was paid by drug companies for 16 years while she
    was the top dog of the most prominent industry-backed front group of
    all time, the National Alliance of Mental Illness (NAMI). A group
    dedicated solely to promoting and selling as many pills as humanly
    possible.

    The pharmaceutical industry has long funneled money through front
    groups like NAMI, which, in turn, provide funding for marketing
    campaigns.

    According to Dr Peter Breggin, psychiatrist and founder of the
    International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology,
    "These groups hold national meetings that bring together drug
    advocates to talk directly to consumers. They also put out
    newsletters and other information that praise medications.
    Sometimes they actively suppress viewpoints that are critical of
    drugs for example, by discouraging the media from airing opposing
    viewpoints."

    Flynn is also the author of an article, titled "Before Their Time:
    Preventing Teen Suicide," in which she states: "The TeenScreen
    Program developed 10 years ago by Columbia University and offered in
    partnership with the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill helps
    communities across the nation identify teens with mental illness who
    might be at risk for suicide."

    It's kind of hard to dispute the charge that NAMI is a funnel for
    drug money since its website lists "Corporate Partners, Grants, and
    Foundations," as Abbott, AstraZoneca, Bristol-Meyers-Squibb, Eli
    Lilly, Forest Lab, Glaxo-Smith-Kline, Jannsen, McNeil, Pfizer, and
    Wyeth.

    So if TeenScreen is being "offered in partnership," with the NAMI,
    it stands to reason that drug money is involved.

    Laurie McGuire, second in command of the TeenScreen project, gave a
    speech at the annual NAMI national convention, and explained the
    need to con kids and their parents into taking the survey. She told
    the audience that while only around 54 percent of parents would
    consent to the screening, when children themselves were asked,
    nearly 98 percent agreed to the idea of being screened.

    "Getting the kids to buy in is such an essential thing because for
    the most part, you're distributing the consent forms to the kids to
    bring home to their parents and bring them back. So you have to get
    their buy in, you have to get them interested in it," McGuire said.

    TeenScreen also recommends bribing kids with movie passes or gift
    certificates for pizza parlors.

    Passive Consent is another trick TeenScreen uses to get around the
    law which requires obtaining a valid parental consent. Passive
    consent requires parents to return a form only if they do not want
    their child to participate in the screening. In Oregon, one NAMI
    member complained that consent forms were being returned with a
    large "NO" scribbled across the paper.

    The problem is, even with passive consent, parents still have to
    agree to seek mental health treatment their children.

    At the convention, NAMI members were told of the need to "loop" the
    kids to a mental health provider. The importance of getting kids to
    that first appointment was stressed. They were told that sometimes
    that might entail calling insurance companies to get the information
    on where to go and what is covered, and sometimes it would mean
    picking kids up and driving them to the first appointment.

    Before the meeting ended, McGuire passed a notebook around the
    audience to solicit names of NAMI members who would be willing to be
    respond if there were a parental uprising against TeenScreen in
    their community. She explained that they might be asked to write a
    letter to the editor or go to a school board meeting, things like
    that.

    TeenScreen has many supporting front groups listed in its
    informational material. Another example of a funnel is the
    Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance which reports pharma
    financial backing equal to 53 percent of all revenue. According to
    its 2001 annual report, drug companies which donate between $150,000
    and $499,999, include Abbot, Bristol-Meyers-Squibb, Eli Lilly,
    Pfizer, Glaxo-Kline, and Janssen. In addition, nearly all of the
    other major drug makers donate a lesser amount.

    Another favorite mantra by TeenScreen officials is that the program
    is free and it doesn't get any government money. Well, something
    went haywire with the "free" mental health check-up business
    because, according to a July 11 article in the Peoria Illinois
    Journal Star, in Brimfield Illinois, "organizing the system and
    employing a part-time counselor specifically for the program is
    estimated to cost about $100 per student."

    Overall, the "Brimfield High School program alone will cost around
    $20,000 for the first semester," the Journal wrote.

    Let me repeat that so taxpayers "get it," that is $20,000 tax
    dollars per semester to run this marketing scheme for pharma.

    In Florida, according to a June 5, 2003, Weekly Planet article, Gwen
    Luney, assistant superintendent for supportive services for the
    Hillsborough County Schools, said TeenScreen would cost the school
    district roughly $200,000 a year.

    Drugging Kids with Lethal Medications

    On June 18, 2003, GlaxoSmithKline issued a warning to British
    physicians against the use of Paxil in children, and acknowledged
    its failure in clinical trials "to demonstrate efficacy in major
    depressive disorders and doubling the rate of reported adverse
    events including suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts compared to
    placebo."

    On December 18, 2003, Eli Lilly issued letters to British healthcare
    professionals, indicating that Prozac is not recommended for
    children for any use.

    The results of a recent study conducted at the Ottawa Health
    Research Institute were published in the February 2005 British
    Medical Journal. The study reviewed over 700 clinical trials
    involving 87,650 patients, and provided an all-inclusive look at the
    suicide risk with SSRIs, because it counted suicide attempts by
    subjects treated for a variety of conditions in addition to
    depression, including panic disorder, bulimia, and sexual
    dysfunction.

    The study determined that patients taking SSRIs are more than twice
    as likely to attempt suicide as patients given placebos. The fact
    that there is an increased risk of suicide attempts for patients who
    were not depressed and were being treated for other kinds of
    disorders is highly significant.

    Most of the drugs being pushed on kids are not approved for kids,
    but even if they were, it wouldn't mean much. What most people
    don't realize is that to gain FDA approval, a company is not
    required to prove that a new drug is safer or more effective than an
    older drug. All it has to do is show that a drug provided better
    results than a placebo in short-term trials of often only 6 to 8
    weeks, with a statistically significant group of patients, according
    to Bob Whitaker, investigative journalist and author of Mad In
    America.

    We know these drugs are very dangerous. Nevertheless, there has
    been a very large increase in the numbers of children placed on
    SSRIs in the United States. Not only that, the fastest growing
    segment of users are age 0 5, reported Dr John Breeding, PhD,
    Director of Texans For Safer Education, and author of, The Necessity
    of Unproductivity and Madness, and The Wildest Colts Make The Best
    Horses, during testimony to the Texas House Select Committee, on
    October 4, 2004.

    He called for a ban on the use of SSRIs for children and warned,
    "SSRIs are extremely harmful and addictive; and can cause or
    exacerbate suicidal or homicidal tendencies; withdrawal is painful
    and dangerous."

    Psychiatrist Peter Breggin, a court-qualified medical expert, and
    author of books, Talking Back to Prozac and The Anti-Depressant Fact
    Book, The Ritalin Fact Book, warns about the life-long damage a
    label of mentally illness can cause.

    "There is nothing worse that you can do to a human being in America
    today than give them a mental illness kind of label and tell them
    they need drugs and these children are 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 years-old
    being treated in this manner," Breggin reports.

    Besides causing suicide, enough evidence now exists to prove that
    legally prescribed drugs have played a major role in the senseless
    acts of violence by school-age children all around the country in
    recent years. Little attention has been given to the FDA's
    additional warning that certain behaviors are "known to be
    associated with these drugs," including "anxiety, agitation, panic
    attacks, insomnia, irritability, hostility, impulsivity, akathisia
    (severe restlessness), hypomania, and mania," according to Breggin.

    For more than a decade, he said, "I have documented in books and
    scientific reports how this stimulation or activation profile can
    lead to out-of-control behavior, including violence."

    "From agitation and hostility to impulsivity and mania, the FDA's
    litany of antidepressant-induced behaviors is identical to that of
    PCP, methamphetamine and cocaine drugs known to cause aggression and
    violence," he warns.

    "One clinical trial showed a rate of 6 percent manic reactions for
    depressed children on Prozac," he reported, "None developed mania on
    a sugar pill."

    Bob Whitaker explained what's happening to people who use these
    powerful psychiatric drugs, during an interview in the August 2005
    edition of Street Spirit. "All these drugs may curb a target
    symptom slightly more effectively than a placebo does for a short
    period of time, say six weeks," he said. However, "what you find
    with every class of these psychiatric drugs is a worsening of the
    target symptom of depression or psychosis or anxiety over the long
    term."

    And he added, "You see a fairly significant percentage of patients
    where new and more severe psychiatric symptoms are triggered by the
    drug itself."

    So then, "instead of just dealing with depression, they're dealing
    with mania or psychotic symptoms," he said.

    "They're now said to be bipolar and they're given an antipsychotic
    to go along with the antidepressant; and, at that point, they're
    moving down the path to chronic disability," Bob told Street Spirit.

    It's brilliant from the capitalist point of view, Whitaker pointed
    out, "you take a kid, and you turn them into a customer, and
    hopefully a lifelong customer."

    "Unfortunately, the cost is dishonesty in our scientific literature,
    the corruption of the FDA, and the absolute harm done to children in
    this country drawn into this system, and an increase of 150,000
    newly disabled people every year in the United States for the last
    17 years, he said, "That's an incredible record of harm done."

    In July 2004, the Journal of the American Medical Association
    reported that during treatment with SSRIs, there was a
    "significantly higher risk of suicide and suicidal thoughts" during
    the first nine days of treatment and that children who were first
    starting treatment were four times more likely to think about
    suicide, and 38 times more likely to commit suicide. It also noted
    that children as young as five have committed suicide while taking
    these drugs.

    Something apparently happened between then and now because the AMA
    recently did an abrupt turn around. On June 21, a MedPage headline
    read, "AMA Supports Use of SSRIs for Treating Teen Depression."

    Experts in the field are outraged. Dr Ann Blake Tracy, executive
    director of the International Coalition For Drug Awareness, and
    author of Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? reacted strongly, "clearly
    there is no logical or sane excuse whatsoever for a doctor who
    professes to care about the well being of his patients to stand
    behind a group of drugs known to increase suicide by double," she
    said.

    "It took us two decades to get the FDA to even issue what little bit
    of warning they gave with the black box placement on
    antidepressants," Dr Tracy explained, "and then because prescribing
    is down by 10 percent when it should be down by at least 90 percent,
    they are upset enough to make a move like this?"

    "Of course," she reasoned, "this would be a necessary move to help
    push Bush's TeenScreen Program through the school system, which is
    the most likely reason for this seemingly insane move by the AMA.
    That is a program that will really bring in the business for them."

    Never-Ending Cycle of Profits

    Before we focus screening efforts on the children, I think we should
    screen all members of the Bush administration, and all officials at
    the FDA and CDC, to find out what happened to their consciences.
    Lets figure out how these people could allow pharma to push lethal
    drugs on kids and inject poisonous vaccines into a generation of
    children, without exhibiting any sign of guilt or remorse
    whatsoever.

    In February 2005, Canadian regulators ordered the drug Adderall,
    used to treat attention deficit disorders, off the market after it
    was linked to 20 sudden deaths and a dozen strokes, 14 of which were
    children.

    The dramatic growth in the number of children labeled as having
    Attention Deficit Disorders is man-made. Recent studies have shown
    that exposure to the mercury-based preservative, thimerosal,
    contained in childhood vaccines until recently, not only causes
    autism but can also result in a host of other neurological
    disorders.

    And government regulatory officials knew about the harm vaccines
    were causing from a study they conducted in 1999.

    According to a leaked transcript from a secret meeting of a CDC
    (Centers for Disease Control) advisory committee in June 2000, upon
    reviewing the study on the link between thimerosal-vaccines and the
    rise in neurological disorders in children, Bill Weil, a
    pediatrician, warned the committee, "There are just a host of
    neurodevelopmental data that would suggest that we've got a serious
    problem. . . . The number of kids getting help in special
    education is growing nationally and state by state at a rate we have
    not seen before."

    Committee member Robert Brent, a pediatrician from Thomas Jefferson
    University, stated: "The medical/legal findings in this study,
    causal or not, are horrendous. . ."

    "If an allegation was made that a child's neurobehavioral findings
    were caused by thimerosal-containing vaccines, you could readily
    find a junk scientist who would support the claim with 'a reasonable
    degree of certainty.'" Brent said, "But you will not find a
    scientist with any integrity who would say the reverse with the data
    that is available. . . . So we are in a bad position from the
    standpoint of defending any lawsuits if they were initiated, and I
    am concerned."

    The CDC knows its in trouble for its part in the cover-up. Excerpt
    from pages 281 282 of the book, Evidence of Harm by David Kirby,
    describes an October 2003 visit by Dr Mark Geier, David Geier and
    Vale Krenik to the CDC Vaccine Safety Datalink in Georgia. The VSD
    monitor probably gave them more information than her superiors
    intended.

    The monitor told the Geiers that she had been running VSD data on
    thimerosal for quite some time and knew the numbers inside out. She
    was assigned to look at the most recent data, checking to see what
    the rates for autism were doing. She was asked to determine if the
    numbers of diagnoses had begun to decline, especially in the younger
    children. If so, this would implicate thimerosal, which began to be
    phased out in 2000.

    "'The autism numbers are going down,'" she said. "'We're watching
    them drop.'"

    An independent study conducted by Geiers, using the CDC's VSD data,
    has determined that the risk of autism increased significantly with
    each additional 25 micrograms of mercury exposure, and that children
    who received three mercury-containing DTaP shots had an increased
    risk of autism nearly 27 times that of kids who got three
    mercury-free vaccines.
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