The Weekly Watch

Fit for Survival?

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As individuals and as a species we don't seem fit. Perhaps we've arrived at our evolutionary dead end, but who knows, our species is very adaptable. Now as individuals, we all know we'll reach an end point. To my mind, the question is with what quality of life. My partner often asks, "Why are we so lucky?". There has been some luck and tricks of fate, but some of our quality of life is due to planning...doing without so that now we have enough to be comfortable. We also had the foresight to buy property when it was fairly inexpensive. Taking care of our health has paid dividends... we have no big medical issues. Others in the US are not so fortunate. The health of so many is poor and is one reason US COVID outcomes have been the world's worse. Now, we can go forward making better choices as individuals. I wish we could do the same for the society, but so many road blocks impede real progress. So are we fit to survive? Will we evolve?

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Most death and illness is being driven by poor diets. We've been told to eat the wrong things. Conversely, we can cure many chronic disease simply by changing our diets. Corporate capture is real, and here is yet another example of how big food and big pharma conspire to maximize profits at peoples expense. Here's some of my favorite doctors, journalists, and dietary scientists to explain. Fat Fiction reveals how the United States government relied on questionable evidence to support one of the most damaging public health recommendations in the history of our country: the “low fat diet.” This is over an hour and a half, but you can watch over a couple of sessions.

Well Worth your time. Nothing new to regular WW readers, but it is very well done.

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The US is leading the way, but we're not alone.
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For a few years my hypothesis has been that obesity was driven by increasing carb consumption, but Chris Knobbe has me thinking the problem is seed (vegetable) oils. His evidence is quite convincing. This is 46 minutes and worth every second, IMO.

Big food is using tobacco's play book...addiction. "Bet you can't eat just one". Processed and fast food is designed to make you want more...then just blame people for not eating less and exercising more. The calorie in vs out model isn't correct, and doesn't work for long term weight loss. Different foods evoke different hormone responses. For example, 100 calories of oreo cookies spike blood sugar and insulin, but a 100 calories of salmon does not. Our physiology utilizes foods differently, so a calorie isn't a calorie except on a lab bench. It is what we eat that is the issue. There are many approaches to a healthy diet, sadly the recommended food pyramid isn't one of them.

So what do we eat since the guidelines are so flawed? This is an excellent answer...
(3 min - but the entire 15 min is good)

0:00 The strength of the US dietary guideline’s evidence
2:20 The problem with this observational study
6:17 Healthy user bias as a statistical artifact
11:11 The evidence shouldn’t be used to make recommendations
12:17 How do we know what to eat?

Here's a couple of other reasonable approaches to diet.

Sten covers hormonal response to various foods as well as suggesting several tricks including ideas like Apple Cider Vinegar, MCT oil, walking, meditation, and more.

Here are 10 things that will melt your belly fat off quickly. What is great is they are all natural and healthy ways to lose weight and reduce your waist line.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ax-WEtLBUd4 (21 min)

Ken Berry suggests eating what he calls a proper human diet. The most long lived people have eaten many types of diets from primarily meat and milk, to diets based on a type of sweet potato, to fish, blubber, and seal meat. Here's his take...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwagCofBDj8 (23 min)

So why don't people understand and use healthy diets? These doctors describe their experiences in an interesting Q&A session. It is way too long at 2+ hours, but just the first couple of questions explains the difficulties doctors and scientists have to both conduct and relay dietary studies. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rpy2Y01o6hs

It is about much more than body image, Obesity is highly correlated to a variety of diseases, including COVID.

There are many bad health outcomes as the US obesity epidemic has progressed. Diabetes primary among them.

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Diabetes:
Type 2 diabetes can be reversed naturally, but only if you understand the basics of how type 2 diabetes became an epidemic and what were the causal factors. Dr. Jason Fung explains why the diet is the most important factor in type 2 diabetes and how we can use dietary methods to reverse type 2 diabetes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFJ_TwGAxlQ (11 min)
Jason uses diet combined with fasting to obtain his results. His patients tell many more stories of reversal on his channel. See https://thefastingmethod.com​​ for more.

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The reduction in tobacco as well as new heart surgical procedures has helped to lower heart disease as seen in the graph. I smoked tobacco for years, but about 2000, I lost two good friends (and fellow smokers) to lung cancer. One of them told me, "I tried to quit for years, but when the doctor told me I had stage four lung cancer it was easy to get off cigarettes". That inspired me to quit tobacco, which required some effort, but now 20 something years later the monkey is entirely off my back and tobacco never crosses my mind. So if you're a smoker, I get it.

Dietary changes have helped with and even reversed many chronic diseases like diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and dementia. I'll list some sources for each one in case you have interest in a particular disease.

Heart disease:
Primary Causes of Heart Disease - Ivor Cummins & Dr Jeffry Gerber
Research shows that adhering to four simple behaviors can prevent 80% of heart disease. They are: not smoking, exercising 3.5 hours a week, eating a healthy diet, and maintaining a healthy weight. Unfortunately, fewer than 3% of Americans meet this criteria. And while traditional medicine relies mainly on medication to treat and prevent heart disease, we know that the way you eat, how much you exercise, how you manage stress, and minimizing your exposure to environmental toxins can all be much more effective levers for treating and reducing the risk of heart disease.
Dr. Hyman sits down with Dr. Cindy Geyer to discuss the Functional Medicine approach to treating heart disease. (44 min)

Cancer:

The SURPRISING SCIENCE Behind PREVENTING CANCER! | (1.3 hours)
William Li & Jason Fung

The right diet is so imperative in preventing cancer or during the healing process. This is in large part because of the role insulin plays in cancer; insulin acts as a growth factor in the body, which is one of the reasons too much insulin leads to obesity. It’s also why insulin will support the growth of cancer cells. Recent research is now revealing the connection between insulin resistance and cancer, what you can eat to prevent cancer, and much more.

Prof. Robert Lustig - 'Sugar, metabolic syndrome, and cancer' (57 min)

Dr. Lustig has fostered a global discussion of metabolic health and nutrition, exposing some of the leading myths that underlie the current pandemic of diet-related disease. He believes the food business, by pushing processed food loaded with sugar, has hacked our bodies and minds to pursue pleasure instead of happiness; fostering today’s epidemics of addiction and depression. Yet by focusing on real food, we can beat the odds against sugar, processed food, obesity, and disease.

Dementia
EAT THESE FOODS To Prevent ALZHEIMER'S & DEMENTIA | (47 min)
David Perlmutter & Mark Hyman

A poor diet affects our brains in more ways than one. What we eat influences everything from our mood, ability to focus, and memory to our tiniest gut friends—microbes—and how well they function and fight off invaders. Dr. Perlmutter and I discuss the power of eating the right kinds of carbs for supporting the gut-brain connection and how certain dietary interventions, like including healthy fats such as MCT oil, can boost cognition.

An internationally recognized expert in the mechanisms of neurodegenerative diseases, Dr. Dale Bredesen’s career has been guided by a simple idea: that Alzheimer’s as we know it is not just preventable, but reversible. Dr. Bredesen’s dedicated pursuit of the science that makes this a reality has placed him at the vanguard of neurological research.
Here's his 10 min TED talk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzJSCttlQmc

All of these dietary approaches have two primary things in common.
Get away from sugar and avoid processed seed oil.
No one speaks to the dangers of sugar better than Dr Robert Lustig. His 1.5 hour somewhat technical presentation Sugar: The Bitter Truth has had over 14 million views.
Here's a 32 minute discussion about how sugar has hacked the American mind through addiction.

UCSF endocrinologist Dr. Robert Lustig explores how industry has contributed to a culture of addiction, depression and chronic disease. Always provocative, Lustig reveals the science that drives these states of mind and offers solutions we can use.

Death by sugar?
Everybody Who Eats Needs To Hear This Warning | David Perlmutter on Health Theory (54 min)
part 2 (53 min)

More on Processed oils...
Visit the factory to see the problem...
The $100 Billion Dollar Ingredient making your Food Toxic - (28 min)

And more on the history of how these oils came into our diet.
Nina Teicholz - 'Vegetable Oils: The Unknown Story' (36 min)

Big pharma plays a role as well as big food...

Here's another of my health heroes calling out big pharma.
Cholesterol lowering is fraud says Cardiologist

Did you see the recent hype on the latest cholesterol-lowering confection from Pharma? No data whatsoever to suggest it will improve heart disease outcomes, but UK NICE body has pronounced that billions will be spent on it regardless?

Dr Aseem Malhotra FRCP, Consultant Cardiologist, Professor of Evidence Based Medicine and
Chairman of the Public Health Collaboration said,
https://thefatemperor.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Press-release-Chole...

“What we witnessed take place in the news a few weeks ago was in my view nothing short of a brilliant PR stunt carried out by the pharmaceutical industry supported by scientists with personal or institutional financial ties to manufacturers of the drug with no counter view on the science or media exposure of their flagrant conflicts of interest. Media headlines suggested that 30,000 lives could be saved over 10 years from this drug when current evidence reveals not a single life would be saved nor a single heart attack or stroke prevented. If NICE approve this drug it will be a victory of marketing over science, and not what’s in the best interest of patients, the public or the NHS. The totality of evidence reveals that lowering LDL-cholesterol has no clear relationship with preventing heart attacks, strokes or death and the lower is certainly not better with an association with very low levels of LDL-C with increased mortality. This unscientific obsession with lowering LDL-C as a primary focus in preventing and managing heart disease needs to stop. This decades long mass experiment has failed. It’s time to stop falling for the great cholesterol con”

The #1 Killer - and they’re treating it ALL wrong. Excellent explanation of Cholesterol.
According to the CDC around 655,000 Americans die of heart disease EVERY YEAR – and it’s been that way for the last 80 years.

Time stamps of topics...
Why standard cholesterol tests can have almost ZERO indication on your health – and the much more accurate test you should ask your doctor about (this could save a life!) (2:00)
The cholesterol LIE most people have believed for years – and what you NEED to know about cholesterol and your health (4:30)
The surprising truth about statin drugs – and the heart health plan I try first with most patients (ask your doctor if it might work for you) (9:00)
The #1 driver of heart disease (and almost ALL other serious illness) – and how avoiding it may help you live a longer, healthier life (17:00)
Why the term “pre-diabetes” is total nonsense – and what this diagnosis really reveals about your health (22:00)
What insulin resistance really means, how it happens in the body, and the first step to supporting HEALTHY insulin levels(28:00)
Why finding health goes beyond a better diet and more exercise – and how THIS could matter just as much (30:00)
Why I LOVE this lesser-known cooking oil, how I use it, and the best place to find it(43:00)

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COVID has created a lens to see the dysfunction of the US health system. I'm particularly concerned about the societal impact especially with children. Kids in particular are being negatively effected by COVID. Since the pandemic, US Children have become even more obese. Bless their little hearts, give them another piece of candy, or more ice cream, or how about a honey bun?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrMFyVeRReU (8 min)
Megyn discusses her kids school experience, and wonders about the social implications. I think the deleterious effect of our approach dealing with COVID has been worse for the children, and as a result will play out over decades.

Why wasn't this guidance promoted from the start? 2-3 minutes provides the message.
Rarely have I agreed with DR FAUCI more than THIS…

I like gardening to stay in tune with nature, my food, and my sanity. Jim talks about his mistakes and how gardening helps to shape attitude and well being. (10 min)

Gardening isn't for everybody, but there are market gardeners in almost every community. If you don't garden you might want to build a relationship with small scale local producers. Why?

The UN is holding it's food summit this week, but it is corporate interests sitting at the table.
How big corporations and Bill Gates took over the UN food Summit

Large corporations and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation took over the United Nations Food Systems Summit, abandoning small farmers on behalf of Big Ag companies, endangering food sovereignty.

(9 min)

TPTB understand if they control food, they control people. Add in FedCoin or some digital currency so they can track your food (and all other) purchases, and we have an even more dystopian world. They have already used advertising, capture of government regulators, and processed food addiction to control our diets.
Highly processed foods form bulk of U.S. youths' diets
Most "fast food" is highly processed and has become increasingly common.
During 2013–2016, 36.6% of adults consumed fast food on a given day.

Be proactive friends ... eat well, sleep well, get out and take walks, and chill instead of stress. If you have friends struggling with a health issue you might want to send them the film up at the very top...or even this entire discussion.
Well no matter how healthy we are, life has a natural progression from cradle to grave. I hope you are able to enjoy your journey! Happy Sunday.

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Comments

Good compendium on the connection between diet and health!

some interesting observations:

it will be a victory of marketing over science

Corporate capture is real, and here is yet another example of how big food and big pharma conspire to maximize profits at peoples expense.

They have already used advertising, capture of government regulators, and processed food addiction to control our diets.

Is our children learning? -- GW Bush

Once again, it is the responsibility of the individual to decide what is right and wrong, healthy or not. Misleading guidelines only seem to confuse the issues.

Home grown thinking is under rated IMO.
Life is not all that is advertised.
Mind your wants because something wants your mind. Wink

Enjoy your Sunday!

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Lookout's picture

@QMS

Just now getting to 50 degrees. Beautiful blue sky is nice this time of year. Less water vapor in the atmosphere.

I too like the idea of homegrown thinking. Like home grown food, we need more of it.

Thanks for the song and good cheer. Have a great day!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

@Lookout Still, "I Like NY in June, how about you?" rather than "Autumn in NY." I'm loving it.

For anybody who got a little confused as I did, Olives are fruits not vegetables,and olive oil is the only thing I cook with. no butter, even on dishes I used to prefer with butter. My taste buds have changed over the years.

Peace Train and what a spectacular rendition this video is, makes me long for my totally optimistic self. Pretty much gone now.

Pleasant day, everybody. Grab them while we still can.

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NYCVG

Lookout's picture

@NYCVG

...can be good or bad. Most years here it is dry and crunchy, but this is the first dry week coming up in months. Hope the rain does not just shut down. It will be what it will be.

Yeah, I also fear the opportunity to catch the Peace Train has come and gone, but I still like to ponder the notion. My favorite version is Dolly and Ladysmith
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-hyEKIdJWM

We too use EVOO, but not for high heat frying...turns it to transfat. Coconut is my go to oil for high heat. We use grassfed butter in a variety of ways.

And from another thread...consider making Kale chips. Sounds weird but they are so good!
These kale chips are foolproof. By baking at a low temperature for a longer period of time, the kale gets crispy without browning or burning, yielding perfect chips every time.

June in fall doesn't sound too bad to me. Usually in Nov. we have a warm spell often called Indian Summer. Enjoy the city, weather, and cooking!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Lookout's picture

This came across my feed. These playing for change pieces are fun, IMO.
Hope you enjoy it too...

Wishing us all a ride on the peace train.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

It's a beautiful morning here, hope it is the same in your neck of the woods.
Thanks for all the great info. I have a busy day ahead but look forward to delving into this later.

You posted a cover of a tune by Peggy Seeger last week. I didn't know her but went looking. [video:[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mduyyXhwLzE]]

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Lookout's picture

@randtntx
And was very influenced by her half brother, Pete. However, I've not explored much of her music.
http://www.peggyseeger.com/

Hope you enjoy your day. Thanks for the visit and the songs!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

@Lookout , I'm enjoying her music.

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@randtntx

She showed up from time to time at our local Peace Vigil on Sundays here in RI. Cool lady.

Edit: Sorry, the lady that lives around here is actually Mika Seeger, daughter of Pete and Toshi.
She is a ceramic artist and partially a musician.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mika_Seeger

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@QMS , sounds like an impressive and talented family. TY.

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Just for shits and giggles, I did a quick search on the best high viscosity oils for the 2 or 3 times a year when olive oil won't do, and lo and behold! Every medical group on my 5 minute search recommended corn oil.
A cured patient is a lost customer.
Weather is wonderful in east Texas. Glad the summer temperatures are over for the year.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Lookout's picture

@on the cusp

It isn't easy to write in such a way that connects the dots. The misinformation on health, diet, COVID, and on and on is the same con game time after time. The Science Gods speak and we must obey!!!
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I continue to cycle back to corporate capture again and again. Think for yourself.

Brett's advice in the Guidelines clip above clearly advocates for trying things to see how it affects your health. That is sadly our position. Do your own research on yourself. So much of the advice we get is actually killing us...both from propaganda push and pull (by suppression and denigration).

Thanks for the visit. We're packing getting ready for our beach venture next week.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

@Lookout That makes us think about returning to Gulf Shores. Hmmm...
have a great time, pal.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Lookout's picture

@on the cusp

more next week. Stay tuned.

I stated it poorly in my comment to you above. Perhaps this is clearer. I find it difficult to weave the strands of all the con games to illustrate the way in which across many domains they use the same effective strategies again and again.

Have a great week and we'll visit again next weekend.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

@Lookout in online research. One has to dig deep for opinions and data that are not msm propaganda.
The more contrary voices are censored, the more I suspicion there is an agenda at work against us, not for us.
Let's make a bet: I bet Filipino nurses will start arriving at the new NYC low wage jobs within a week from 9/28/21. Bet the weeks and month long visa aps are done in mere minutes.
I bet $1.00.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Lookout's picture

@on the cusp

I bet you are right, and though I can afford a buck, I don't like to throw them away (unless it really helps someone).

My buddy, a traveling nurse is weighing his winter options. He's an ICU nurse at a premium now. He did well last year but it was stressful as you can imagine. More power to him.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Lookout's picture

looks chilly there.
Not Fade Away - Grateful Dead / Buddy Holly cover by Reina del Cid and Toni Lindgren
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYUOzXVz9kM]

We spent the past week in Alaska taking in the beautiful sights and recording some videos there. We had this campsite pretty much to ourselves, so we felt free to have a little jam around the fire to this tune, originally by Buddy Holly but covered here more in the style of the Grateful Dead.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

ggersh's picture

eat healthy and make the right choices

But it appears that in NYC that's criminal....UFB

What kind of evil have we devolved into.

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I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

Lookout's picture

@ggersh

All about more for me and my share holders...the hell with you.

Why destroy food? The worst should have been you can't sell it, and then they could give it away and put up a donation box. That's the trick in the house concert biz anyway. Common sense sure ain't common.

Thanks for the story and visit!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

enhydra lutris's picture

Plenty beaucoups to absorb there, so I've clipped it to work on throughout the week and no doubt to refer back to sporadically off and on.

A bit cooler here today, and leaves and apples continue to fall. The cleanup requirements will only accelerate over the next month or two, but the oranges are starting to ripen nicely, so there will be offsets. Getting ready for a house guest with included mini-holiday down to Pismo which is accelerating the psychological pace at which tempus is fugiting. (that plus assorted stuff which is incidentally piling up because it can. Hah!

Nice cartoons throughout, but I couldn't help that the central figure in the Traditional human development graphic is wearing heels. Traditional indeed. Wink

be well and have a good one

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

Lookout's picture

@enhydra lutris

and enjoy your visit next week. We have a friend due in a couple of weeks. Visiting has been so odd during the pandemic (now endemic) outbreak.

We're going to a small gathering on the mountain brow this evening. It will be chilly outdoors. Not staying long, we're on the road for a few hours tomorrow.

That last cartoon in a woman's lifespan rather than human evolution...hence the high heels.

“After all, Ginger Rogers did everything that Fred Astaire did. She just did it backwards and in high heels.”

Enjoy the apples and oranges and have a great week!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

CB's picture

@enhydra lutris
of her life when she is most fertile.

The wearing of high heels was once thought to make a woman's legs and gait more sexually attractive. But studies have shown that high heeled shoes change a woman’s lumbar curvature inward so that the angle of the buttocks approaches the ideal of 45 deg. This would signify that the woman is capable of shifting the weight of her pregnancy back over her hips and so was able to travel and forage competently for much of her pregnancy. Therefore she was the better choice for sexual attraction and subsequent selection.

From personal experience, I would place my bets that it was definitely a man who drew that picture subconsciously. Blush

Lumbar curvature: a previously undiscovered standard of attractiveness
Abstract

This paper reports independent studies supporting the proposal that human standards of attractiveness reflect the output of psychological adaptations to detect fitness-relevant traits...

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CB's picture

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Lookout's picture

@CB

He has taught me lots of things...as have you....like the reason for high heels. Who knew?

Now I once did research on why men wear neckties. After all they serve no purpose. Developed in Victorian times they were to cover button holes because they were suggestive...like covering the legs of furniture at the time. The tie trend in the states started in CA and spread east.

High heels and ties are not my cup of tea, but hey each to their own.

Here's hoping we both avoid dementia, and eat our way to good health!

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

zed2's picture

That the real blight was the Neoliberalism which is still killing poor people in the UK today.As some links I posted showed a few years later, twice since Black 1847 they repeated the income driven genocides in India. Churhills comments left us no doubt, the British were as guilty of genoce as hitler, Stalin and the neoliberal ideology should be deposed friom uits present global capture of global economic governance. Democracy must be restored and it must become real democracy, dump political parties especially ones that quell true democracy with fake politics and politics of oligarchy.

Continuing to export food all that horrible time as entire families were dropping like fllies. Unless we oust these neoliberals from government we will be next.Americans are not vaccinated from starvation, nobody is.

As Indians starved by the tens of millions. While part of the richest nation in the world.

What is it in the neoliberal madness that leads to these genocides?
[Video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAj_2b_-aQI]

Governments cant be allowed to interfere with the market price variations. People who stockpiled essentials should be allowed to milk them for the maximal profits with no limits.

---This cult has long ruled the US, since 1995 its been the law of the land.. thanks to the WTO.

We must restore democracy which cannot happen as long as we remain participating in the WTO. All the dishonest neoliberals are guilty of undermining our democracy with their 1995 coup, they really should pay a price for their insider deals to loot the nation and their shameless lying to all of us.. More than a million poor Americans have died before their time because of that signature on the deceitful URAA on December 8, 1994. Which made it impossible to fix our healthcare system. That was more than 26 years ago. Those excess deaths add up to more than a million excess deaths - And they have lied to us the entire time, as hundreds died each day.

Don't let them destroy all the affordable housing and push the people of our nation out into the streets.

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