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But strangely not even Forbes magazine makes much of an effort to distinguish how the billions are made.
. The great truth of capitalism is that it took off only once the European Enlightenment created the great institutions that kept it honest . - the rule of law, a free press, accountability mechanisms, ways of forcing monopolists to give up their ill-gotten gains, creating competitive markets and elections.
. Before that there was tax-farming and the buying and selling of monopolies – rather as in China today.
. The Enlightenment offered the means, however imperfect, to challenge all that.
. The great mistake of the free-market revolution was to argue that all that was needed to make capitalism work was free, lightly regulated and flexible markets – and that institutions imposing ethics, transparency, accountability got in the way.
. We now know better.
. Britain's representation in the Forbes list is particularly depressing.
. Our members include a bunch of property developers, tax-avoiding retail magnates, the Duke of Westminster, a hedge fund manager and Richard Branson.
. Branson is probably the closest we have to a billionaire productive entrepreneur, but his companies are hardly at the forefront of technological innovation or employment generation.
. He glamorises – but does little to grow the economy.
. We do not have one genuinely productive entrepreneur on the list.
. In many respects this forms the heart of the British crisis.
. Our political class bought the proposition that whatever the source of wealth economic progress would follow, celebrating the Mayfair hedge fund manager more than the genuine innovator.
. Watch the British government now fight on behalf of hedge funds against EU regulation.
. Only at the eleventh hour, with some of Lord Mandelson's speeches and initiatives, together with David Cameron commissioning a useful report from the entrepreneur James Dyson, Ingenious Britain, is there any sign of change.
. But it is a deathbed conversion.
. The electorate, angry and bewildered, want a conversation about creating wealth and jobs, rewarding those that do rather than those that speculate and rig markets.
. Instead they are offered platitudes and bromides.
. Guardian
An article that can be read anywhere in the world today as it touches upon our great malaise
A global malaise that accepts that money is God
That where money comes from is no issue
How it is made is of no concern
Wrong
It is of concern
Any planet that cannot understand that undisguised greed is intolerable is in trouble
Greed can only function when money is worshiped above all else
Where money trumps all else
Where money buys all
Where ethics and morals are buried under the greed for money
Greed is out of control on planet earth today
We cannot address our problems when power rests solely with the greedy
With narrowly focused industry pressure groups
Corporate power is rapidly overtaking other pressure groups in the political process
Corporate needs are not the same as those of society at large
Bankers imperatives as we have so recently seen are not ours
Craven politicians are unable or unwilling to stem the tide of interest group demands
Be they of arms manufacturers or cereal makers
Time to look beyond the dizzy figures of personal wealth accumulation and ask just where did it come from?
And just what are you collecting all this money for?
Is it just an addiction?
Or do you like Bill Gates have an answer as to what you are doing this for?
Time we asked some questions about where it all came from
New Study Shows Coconut Oil Protects Against Heart Disease, Diabetes, and Obesity
. A new study published in the scientific journal Lipids demonstrates that coconut oil consumption raises HDL (good) cholesterol, lowers the cholesterol ratio (reducing risk of heart disease), improves blood sugar levels, decreases risk of diabetes, decreases body fat, reduces abdominal circumference, and can aid in fighting overweight and obesity.
A number of previous studies, mostly using fractionated coconut oil (i.e. medium chain triglyceride oil) have demonstrated similar results.
This study, however, measured the effects of various health parameters using ordinary coconut oil.
One of the criticisms skeptics have used to refute the claims for the health benefits of coconut oil is that the majority of the studies didn’t directly test coconut oil but tested fractionated coconut oil, which is also known as MCT oil.
Natural coconut oil contains a total of 10 fatty acids, 63 percent of which are medium or short chain fatty acids.
MCT oil, on the other hand, consists primarily of only two medium chain fatty acids (MCFAs).
When MCT oil is produced, coconut oil is fractionated or divided into the different fatty acids.
All but two, caprylic and capric acids, are removed.
Ironically, when MCT oil is produced, the most important MCFA, lauric acid, is removed.
Even without lauric acid, MCT oil has shown to have many health benefits.
Anti-saturated fat proponents have claimed that the benefits produced by MCT oil cannot be equated with coconut oil.
They acknowledge that the two MCFAs in MCT oil may have health benefits, but that coconut oil, consisting of 10 fatty acids, would not have the same benefits.
This study disproves their claim.
This study verifies previous studies that indicated that coconut oil has anti-inflammatory properties.
This is an important issue because coconut oil critics claim, with little justification, that saturated fats promote inflammation.
This study demonstrates just the opposite.
Once more, it also demonstrates that coconut oil consumption does not promote heart disease and improves cholesterol values.
It provides evidence that coconut oil is heart healthy and should be used to fight off heart disease.
Iceland's Eyjafjoell volcano is emitting between 150,000 and 300,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) per day
. A figure placing it in the same emissions league as a small-to-medium European economy, experts said on Monday.
. All of you out there in America and across the globe who have fought so hard to tackle the hideous enemy of our planet, namely carbon emissions
. You know ....that bogus god you worship of "Climate Change" or "global warming" ....well, I feel it is necessary to inform you of some bad news.
. It really does pain me to have to bring you this disappointing information.
. Are you sitting down?
. Okay, here's the bombshell.
. The current volcanic eruption going on in Iceland, since its first spewing of volcanic ash, has, to this point, NEGATED EVERY SINGLE EFFORT you have made in the past five years to control CO2 emissions on our planet.
. I know, I know.... (group hug)...it's very disheartening to realize that all of the carbon emission savings you have accomplished while suffering the inconvenience and expense of: driving Prius hybrids, buying fabric grocery bags, sitting up til midnight to finish your kid's "The Green Revolution" science project, throwing out all of your non-green cleaning supplies, using only two squares of toilet paper, putting a brick in your toilet tank reservoir, selling your SUV and speedboat, going on vacation to a city park instead of Yosemite, nearly getting hit every day on your bicycle, replacing all of your $1 light bulbs with $10 light bulbs ...
. well, all of those things you have done have all gone down the tubes in just the past few days.
. The volcanic ash emitted into the Earth's atmosphere in the past few days has totally erased every single effort you have made to reduce the evil beast, carbon.
. I'm so sorry.
. And I do wish I had a silver lining to this volcanic ash cloud but the fact of the matter is that the brush fire season across the western U.S.A. will start in about two months and those fires will negate your efforts to reduce carbon in our world for the next two years.
. But hey, grab a Coke, give the world a hug and have a nice day!
. Author not known
The findings of a two-decade-long study at the Ocean Sciences Meeting in Portland, Oregon, US were presented recently and throw up more examples of how human refuse is polluting our oceans
. The work is the conclusion of the longest and most extensive record of plastic marine debris in any ocean basin.
. Scientists and students from the SEA collected plastic and marine debris in fine mesh nets that were towed behind a research vessel.
. We know that many marine organisms are consuming these plastics and we know this has a bad effect on seabirds in particular
. The nets dragged along were half-in and half-out of the water, picking up debris and small marine organisms from the sea surface.
. The researchers carried out 6,100 tows in areas of the Caribbean and the North Atlantic - off the coast of the US.
. More than half of these expeditions revealed floating pieces of plastic on the water surface.
. These were pieces of low-density plastic that are used to make many consumer products, including plastic bags.
.Dr Lavender Law said that the pieces of plastic she and her team picked up in the nets were generally very small - up to 1cm across.
. "We found a region fairly far north in the Atlantic Ocean where this debris appears to be concentrated and remains over long periods of time," she explained.
. "More than 80% of the plastic pieces we collected in the tows were found between 22 and 38 degrees north. So we have a latitude for [where this] rubbish seems to accumulate," she said.
Physician letting blood from a patient. British Library, London.
. Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
. 3000 BC. This mixture of roots and leaves will cure you.
. 2000 BC. Roots don’t work well enough. If you’re sick, sacrifice a goat.
. 0.050 AD. Sacrifice is for pagans! If you want to get well, you must pray.
. 1000 AD. Prayer isn’t enough. Some blood-letting will do you good.
. 1800 AD. Blood-letting weakens the patient. This potion will fix you up.
. 1900 AD. Potions are pure quackery. Here, swallow this pill.
. 1950 AD. Pills don’t work. Now we have antibiotics.
. 2010 AD. Antibiotics can cause more harm than good. . Here, take this mixture of roots and leaves.
. Author unknown
It's not so much that Britain is a bad place to live
It actually isn't, but the way that people are living here isn't right.
It's a half life rather than a full and rewarding one.
It is like people are sleepwalking through life
Not engaged in the major decisions that affect their lives
Life for most of the population is all about just getting by
The country is still beautiful, but getting ever more congested and constrained by walls buildings, hedges and 'keep out' signs
Most people are working five days each week
Then two days off to catch up with domestic things
But it's not really about this that we are writing
It's the way in which life is like sleepwalking for so many
Not involved in anything other than getting by
No firm opinions about anything
Never really thought about life or death
Never really understood how things work
Not bothered really
The famous "They" should do something about it is a perennial feature of British life
The "They" usually referring to government or politicians
Who of course have their own agendas
Comes a time though when the sleepwalking through life becomes uncomfortable
A time like the one we are in now
Little Britain is not unlike other countries
Sleepwalking through life is rapidly fading as an option
Many might not have seen this and rely on being told what to think and do
Sliding through each day watching their seven hours of TV soaps and action films and of course the news or troubles of the day as they might better be called
However the warning signs are all around
Sleepwalking is for the living dead
Those who cannot or will not adapt will go
Sleepwalkers everywhere beware
Sleepwalking through life is becoming more dangerous
Leaving decisions to others be they partners or politicians is not cool
Make your own decisions
Involve yourself in your own life decisions
Those choices affect your life like never before
Choices of vaccinations, GM foods, electronic devices,where to live, what to do
Is what it would take over five years
. To address some of the major issues facing this planet
. And we are not talking about climate change
. We are talking deforestation, drinking water, major soil regeneration and other clear issues troubling our planet
. We spend over $1 trillion a year of so called defense
. It is a no no subject
. Off limits
. No to talking about it that is
. No to even pretending that we can stop this insanity
. The insanity of spending this much on finding better ways to kill each other
. Time to put this subject back into circulation again
. $1 trillion is a lot of money even in today's devalued currencies
. The argument is that humans are incapable of stopping killing each other
. While that might have been true even in our recent past slowly we can see areas of the planet where this is less and less likely . Europe having given the world two world wars is now hopefully pretty much exhausted on the idea of more wars although the former Yugoslavia was pretty savage and brutal
. Insane in many ways
. But then war is literally insane
. Next time some leader wants to go to war for political or any other reason then let him and the other leader fight it out personally
. We will then go along with the peace talks that then must follow
. Even better we go straight to the peace talks
. Oh and something else
. Let us also build into our constitutions that the women of the country have equal votes with the men about going to war
. Men are the one's who usually want war
. Religion is often the pretext
. Commercial gain the hidden objective
. Not too many mothers want to see the hard work of their parentage blown up in some useless war
. Yes it is time to challenge the whole idea of war
. The hidden powers that make money from inciting hatred and violence
. Time to say it as it really is
Fears for crops as shock figures from America show scale of bee catastrophe
. The world may be on the brink of biological disaster after news that a third of US bee colonies did not survive the winter
. Disturbing evidence that honeybees are in terminal decline has emerged from the United States where, for the fourth year in a row, more than a third of colonies have failed to survive the winter.
. The decline of the country's estimated 2.4 million beehives began in 2006, when a phenomenon dubbed colony collapse disorder (CCD) led to the disappearance of hundreds of thousands of colonies.
. Since then more than three million colonies in the US and billions of honeybees worldwide have died and scientists are no nearer to knowing what is causing the catastrophic fall in numbers.
. The number of managed honeybee colonies in the US fell by 33.8% last winter, according to the annual survey by the Apiary Inspectors of America and the US government's Agricultural Research Service (ARS).
. The collapse in the global honeybee population is a major threat to crops.
. It is estimated that a third of everything we eat depends upon honeybee pollination, which means that bees contribute some £26bn to the global economy.
. Potential causes range from parasites, such as the bloodsucking varroa mite, to viral and bacterial infections, pesticides and poor nutrition stemming from intensive farming methods.
. The disappearance of so many colonies has also been dubbed "Mary Celeste syndrome" due to the absence of dead bees in many of the empty hives.
. US scientists have found 121 different pesticides in samples of bees, wax and pollen, lending credence to the notion that pesticides are a key problem.
. We believe that some subtle interactions between nutrition, pesticide exposure and other stressors are converging to kill colonies," said Jeffery Pettis, of the ARS's bee research laboratory.
. A global review of honeybee deaths by the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) reported last week that there was no one single cause, but pointed the finger at the "irresponsible use" of pesticides that may damage bee health and make them more susceptible to diseases.
. Bernard Vallat, the OIE's director-general, warned: "Bees contribute to global food security, and their extinction would represent a terrible biological disaster."
. Dave Hackenberg of Hackenberg Apiaries, the Pennsylvania-based commercial beekeeper who first raised the alarm about CCD, said that last year had been the worst yet for bee losses, with 62% of his 2,600 hives dying between May 2009 and April 2010.
. It's getting worse," he said. "The AIA survey doesn't give you the full picture because it is only measuring losses through the winter. In the summer the bees are exposed to lots of pesticides.
. Farmers mix them together and no one has any idea what the effects might be."
. Pettis agreed that losses in some commercial operations are running at 50% or greater.
. Continued losses of this magnitude are not economically sustainable for commercial beekeepers," he said, adding that a solution may be years away.
. Look at Aids, they have billions in research dollars and a causative agent and still no cure. Research takes time and beehives are complex organisms."
. In the UK it is still too early to judge how Britain's estimated 250,000 honeybee colonies have fared during the long winter. Tim Lovett, president of the British Beekeepers' Association, said: "Anecdotally, it is hugely variable.
. There are reports of some beekeepers losing almost a third of their hives and others losing none."
. Results from a survey of the association's 15,000 members are expected this month.
. John Chapple, chairman of the London Beekeepers' Association, put losses among his 150 members at between a fifth and a quarter.
. Eight of his 36 hives across the capital did not survive. There are still a lot of mysterious disappearances, he said. We are no nearer to knowing what is causing them.
. Bee farmers in Scotland have reported losses on the American scale for the past three years. Andrew Scarlett, a Perthshire-based bee farmer and honey packer, lost 80% of his 1,200 hives this winter.
. But he attributed the massive decline to a virulent bacterial infection that quickly spread because of a lack of bee inspectors, coupled with sustained poor weather that prevented honeybees from building up sufficient pollen and nectar stores.
. The government's National Bee Unit has always denied the existence of CCD in Britain, despite honeybee losses of 20% during the winter of 2008-09 and close to a third the previous year.
. It attributes the demise to the varroa mite – which is found in almost every UK hive – and rainy summers that stop bees foraging for food.
. In a hard-hitting report last year, the National Audit Office suggested that amateur beekeepers who failed to spot diseases in bees were a threat to honeybees' survival and called for the National Bee Unit to carry out more inspections and train more beekeepers.
. Last summer MPs on the influential cross-party public accounts committee called on the government to fund more research into what it called the "alarming" decline of honeybees.
. The Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has contributed £2.5m towards a £10m fund for research on pollinators.
. The public accounts committee has called for a significant proportion of this funding to be "ring-fenced" for honeybees.
. Decisions on which research projects to back are expected this month.
. Why bees matter
. Flowering plants require insects for pollination.
. The most effective is the honeybee, which pollinates 90 commercial crops worldwide.
. As well as most fruits and vegetables – including apples, oranges, strawberries, onions and carrots – they pollinate nuts, sunflowers and oil-seed rape.
. Coffee, soya beans, clovers – like alfafa, which is used for cattle feed – and even cotton are all dependent on honeybee pollination to increase yields.
. In the UK alone, honeybee pollination is valued at £200m.
. Mankind has been managing and transporting bees for centuries to pollinate food and produce honey, nature's natural sweetener and antiseptic.
. Their extinction would mean not only a colourless, meatless diet of cereals and rice, and cottonless clothes, but a landscape without orchards, allotments and meadows of wildflowers – and the collapse of the food chain that sustains wild birds and animals.
. Alison Benjamin - The Observer
. We care about bees because they are so important to our health and well being
. Sadly we see the same thing happening to bees as we see happening to humans
. The irresponsible mixing of pesticides is for sure having an impact on bees
. Mobile phone and other electronic emissions certainly cannot be helping
. Pollution by other means is an element in their disappearance
Increasing destruction of habitat
Now look at humans
The irresponsible cocktails of pharmaceuticals given to so many humans today
Mobile phones and other electronic emissions certainly do damage to human brains
Pollution of food by GM additions that have not been measured over time are probably dangerous to humans
Increasing destruction of trees and habitat are not helpful to human survival
Human male and female fertility are declining
What a mess!
For your knowledge bees are not indigenous to planet earth
They were a gift to us and when they go it will be a sad day for humanity as we cannot replace them
Bees are irreplaceable
Why not think of taking up some bee activity yourself this summer?
