Hey, Gimme A Beer…I’m Protecting My Bones!

Alcohol:  2 Servings A Day Can Increase Bone Density

Beer...The New Health Food!

In an epidemiological study of men and post-menopausal women primarily over 60 years of age, regular moderate alcohol intake was associated with greater bone mineral density (BMD).

Researchers at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging (USDA HNRCA) at Tufts University found associations were strongest for beer and wine and, importantly, BMD was significantly lower in men drinking more than two servings of liquor per day.

The results suggest that regular moderate consumption of beer or wine may have protective effects on bone, but that heavy drinking may contribute to bone loss.

"Excuse please, it's time for me to take my medication."

“Previous research suggests that moderate alcohol consumption in older men and post-menopausal women may protect against BMD loss, a major risk factor for osteoporosis,” said Katherine L. Tucker, PhD, corresponding author and director of the Dietary Assessment and Epidemiology Research Program at the USDA HNRCA.

The 2005 Dietary Guidelines issued by the federal government defines moderate alcohol consumption as one drink per day for women and two drinks per day for men.  (Read more.)

One beer. I'm allowed 2 per day.

B.S. Report–My bones are so, so well “protected.”  Remember though, be responsible…don’t “over-protect” your bones.  In this instance, it’s great to be a man…we get 2 drinks.

How bad will it get?

From the Wall Street Journal

Central questions these days are how severe will the U.S. economic downturn be and how long will it last?

Some see a 20% chance of "Depression."

The most serious concern is that the downturn will become something worse than the largest recession of the post-World War II period — 1982, when real per capita GDP fell by 3% and the unemployment rate peaked at nearly 11%. Could we even experience a depression (defined as a decline in per-person GDP or consumption by 10% or more)?

The U.S. macroeconomy has been so tame for so long that it’s impossible to get an accurate reading about depression odds just from the U.S. data. My approach uses long-term data for many countries and takes into account the historical linkages between depressions and stock-market crashes. (The research is described in “Stock-Market Crashes and Depressions,” a working paper Jose Ursua and I wrote for the National Bureau of Economic Research last month.)

The bottom line is that there is ample reason to worry about slipping into a depression. There is a roughly one-in-five chance that U.S. GDP and consumption will fall by 10% or more, something not seen since the early 1930s.  (Read more.)

B.S. Report–This recession can be turned around if we take proper economic steps.  So far, we’ve done exactly the wrong things, at least from an historical perspective.  Raising taxes and dramatically increasing spending is not a formula that leads to ending recessions…rather, it tends to exacerbate them–and cause an inflationary cycle to boot.

But things are not nearly as bad as they were during the “Great Depression.”  That’s not to say we can’t get them that bad–if that is the goal.  And that very well may be President Obama’s goal.

His worldview is such that he has disdain for private economic activity; he has a view that government should run everything.  He is a Marxist-Socialist.  He has been telling us from the earliest days of his campaign that he wants to “fundamentally” change America.  He’s on his way to doing exactly that.

Russian Scholar Predicts U.S. Will Collapse Next Year…Well, At Least He Gives Us A Year

MOSCOW —  If you’re inclined to believe Igor Panarin, and the Kremlin wouldn’t mind if you did, then President Barack Obama will order martial law this year, the U.S. will split into six rump-states before 2011, and Russia and China will become the backbones of a new world order.

"Nothing against the U.S., but you're finished!"

Panarin might be easy to ignore but for the fact that he is a dean at the Foreign Ministry’s school for future diplomats and a regular on Russia’s state-guided TV channels. And his predictions fit into the anti-American story line of the Kremlin leadership.

“There is a high probability that the collapse of the United States will occur by 2010,” Panarin told dozens of students, professors and diplomats Tuesday at the Diplomatic Academy — a lecture the ministry pointedly invited The Associated Press and other foreign media to attend.

The prediction from Panarin, a former spokesman for Russia’s Federal Space Agency and reportedly an ex-KGB analyst, meshes with the negative view of the U.S. that has been flowing from the Kremlin in recent years, in particular from Vladimir Putin.

Putin, the former president who is now prime minister, has likened the United States to Nazi Germany’s Third Reich and blames Washington for the global financial crisis that has pounded the Russian economy.

Panarin didn’t give many specifics on what underlies his analysis, mostly citing newspapers, magazines and other open sources.

He also noted he had been predicting the demise of the world’s wealthiest country for more than a decade now.

But he said the recent economic turmoil in the U.S. and other “social and cultural phenomena” led him to nail down a specific timeframe for “The End” — when the United States will break up into six autonomous regions and Alaska will revert to Russian control.

B.S. Report–I’m far from an optimist, but even I don’t see us collapsing by next year.  Panarin has been predicting that we would collapse in 2010 for a decade now…but finally he’s being taken seriously.

Why not?  He now has the secret weapon to bring about the fall of the U.S.–President Barack Hussein Obama.  Panarin must look at Obama as his own personal gold-mine.  Obama has done more to bring about chaos in the world in just 6 weeks than nearly any other person in history.

Here Kitty, Kitty, Kitty…Yuck, You’re One Ugly Cat!

He’d be a strong contender for the most hideous cat in the world.

Ugly Bat Boy is bald all over  – apart from one patch of shaggy, unkempt fur around his neck.

Staff at the veterinary hospital where the eight-year-old moggie lives have even been forced to put up fliers saying he’s perfectly normal  – just unattractive.

"Well hello there, beautiful!"

They claim he makes up for his terrible looks by having inner beauty and a nice disposition.

He’s also turned into something of a tourist attraction in Exeter, New Hampshire, America.

‘People come in and take pictures of him on their cell phones,’ staff member Christie Hartnett said.

‘He’s just great. The impression from clients that come in is he’s not real because he just sits so still.

‘When he does move, he scares them, but they still think he’s mesmerizing.’

Ugly and his sister, who only survived a few weeks, were both born without fur.

And although he may not look like an ordinary cat, staff at the hospital say he behaves exactly like every other feline they’ve ever known.

He loves attention and is very friendly.

Terrorist Deported To Sudan After Completing His Sentence

NEW YORK – A Black September terrorist convicted of placing three powerful car bombs in New York City in 1973 has been sent to Sudan after completing his sentence and being deported by the U.S. government.

Khalid Al-Jawary, 63, was flown out of Denver International Airport on Thursday and arrived Tuesday in Khartoum, said Carl Rusnok, a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesman.

So long, bomber. Enjoy the Sudan.

Details of his deportation were released to The Associated Press after Al-Jawary’s federal escorts had safely left the volatile country.

Al-Jawary ended up in Sudan after Algeria initially agreed to accept him but then reversed course, setting off a scramble to find a country that would take the aging terrorist. It’s unclear why Algeria decided against taking Al-Jawary.

Al-Jawary wanted to be deported to Jordan, where his family lives, but that country apparently would not allow him entry. Federal officials said he had dual citizenship with Jordan and Iraq.

Al-Jawary was released last week from the federal Supermax maximum-security prison in Florence, Colo., and placed in immigration officials’ custody after serving about half of his 30-year sentence.

B.S. Report–This is how I think we should treat all convicted terrorists…maybe even other criminals as well.  (Just the first 3:00 minutes.)

Cool Customers! Couple Drives 100 Miles With Spitting Cobra In The Car

Snake Wrapped Itself Around His Leg While He Was Driving

A couple drove 170 kilometres (100 miles) from South Africa’s famous Kruger National Park with a highly venomous spitting cobra in their car, the Beeld newspaper reported on Wednesday.

Gordon Parratt, 69, felt the 85-centimetre (33-inch) long snake wind itself around his leg while he was driving.

"Take me to the Jakarta zoo...and make it snappy!"

At first he thought an insect had brushed his leg and swiped it away, but when he looked down he saw the snake next to his left foot, the report said.

“Fortunately I’m not the panicky type. My wife immediately put her feet up on the dashboard,” said Parratt.

The Pretoria couple made several stops to remove the snake but could not find it, until it wrapped itself around Parratt’s leg.

“Its head came up to my knee,” he said.

Finally the couple managed to call a snake expert to remove the cobra, the report said.

19-year-old woman finds dog tag lost in Times Square and returns it to owner 66 years later!

Joe Farish in 1944 in Europe

From Palm Beach Gossip, Jose Lambiet’s Page2live.com

At first, West Palm Beach lawyer Joe Farish didn’t remember losing his U.S. Army dog tag.

March 1943 was, after all, a lifetime ago.

So as his little rectangular piece of metal laid somewhere near Times Square, maybe underground for a while, hundreds of millions celebrated New Year’s Eve there 66 times.

Millions more welcomed back the troops after World War II in 1945; feted the moon-walking astronauts of Apollo 11 in 1969; showerered the Yankees with love after 17 World Series wins; and cried, as the square’s big screen showed the Sept. 11 attacks just to the southwest.

Back in 1943, Farish was a world away. He fought the Nazis through Africa and Europe, all along wearing his replacement tag on a shoestring around his neck. He came back in one piece, finished law school at the University of Florida and returned to the Palm Beach County of his youth. Here, he became one of the most successful lawyers of his generation and a judge.

Then Friday Farish, who at 87 still works daily in his downtown office, received the strangest call ever. It was from a young woman he never met, and the odds they’d be talking were probably much lower than winning the lottery.

Sydney Rector and her boyfriend, Steven Tyska, found the dog tag.

“Mr. Farish,” 19-year-old Sydney Rector said from her home in the Bronx, “I think I may have found your dog tag.”

Said Farish: “I didn’t believe it at first. I asked her to read the stuff on it, and each time she was reading something, I was more sure it was mine.”

Rector gave Farish his childhood address, 283 Cordova Road in West Palm Beach’s El Cid, where he hasn’t lived there since 1942. Blood type, A, was his indeed. Date of birth? 7-16-21. Correct. Serial number: 0462566. Right on.
And his contact in case he was killed on the battlefield: his mom.  (Read more.)

Re-united with his dog tag.

Oops, our mistake…I’ll get rid of that for you–abortion clinic owner threw out live baby!

Botched Procedure Leads To Dumping Of Live Baby

MIAMI – An abortion clinic owner is accused of delivering a live baby during a botched procedure and then throwing the infant away.

Belkis Gonzalez, 42, was arrested Tuesday and charged with practicing medicine without a license and tampering with evidence, both felonies, said Ed Griffith, a spokesman for the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s office. If found guilty, Gonzalez would face at least a year in prison and up to 15 years.

The teenage mother, Sycloria Williams, has filed a lawsuit alleging that Gonzalez knocked the infant off the chair where she had given birth, and then scooped the baby, placenta and afterbirth into a red plastic biohazard bag, and threw it out.

The clinic’s doctor, Dr. Pierre Jean-Jacque Renelique, had been scheduled to perform the procedure, but Williams went into labor after being given drugs to dilate her cervix and waiting for hours for Renelique to arrive, the suit said. The doctor has said he had been on his way to the Hialeah clinic when he was called to treat another patient who was bleeding.  (Read more.)

B.S. Report–Whatever your thoughts are on abortion…this is very wrong.  No murder charges were filed because the “baby” was too young to survive (only 23 weeks).  I suspect the ultimate sentence for Gonzalez and the doctor will be surprisingly light.

Buchanan: “We are not on the road to Socialism, we’ve arrived!”

Obama Deficit Is Already 4 Times As Large As GW Bush

By Patrick Buchanan                                                                                            Investor’s Business Daily Editorial

Patrick Buchanan

Welcome To Socialism!

In his campaign and inaugural address, Barack Obama cast himself as a moderate man seeking common ground with conservatives.

Yet his budget calls for the radical restructuring of the U.S. economy, a sweeping redistribution of power and wealth to government and Democratic constituencies. It is a declaration of war on the right.

The real Obama has stood up and lived up to his ranking as the most left-wing member of the Senate.

Barack has no mandate for this. He was even behind John McCain when the decisive event that gave him the presidency occurred — the September collapse of Lehman Bros. and the market crash.

Republicans are under no obligation to render bipartisan support to this statist coup d’etat. For what is going down is a leftist power grab that is anathema to their principles and philosophy.

Where the U.S. government usually consumes 21% of gross domestic product, this Obama budget spends 28% in 2009 and runs a deficit of $1.75 trillion, or 12.7% of GDP. That is four times the largest deficit of George W. Bush and twice as large a share of the economy as any deficit run since World War II.

Add that 28% of GDP spent by the U.S. government to the 12% spent by states, counties and cities, and government will consume 40% of the economy in 2009.

We are not “headed down the road to socialism.” We are there.  (Read more.)

B.S. Report–I know alot of people can’t stand Patrick Buchanan (I’m not a big fan of him myself) but few people would say that he’s ignorant, or that he doesn’t often have keen insights.

I don’t see anything in this editorial that I can take issue with–I’m not 100% certain about his statistics, although I’ve heard similar numbers bandied about from both sides of the aisle.

But the crux of Buchanan’s article is spot-on:  what we’re seeing is an unprecedented presidential power-grab, and we need to fight him every step of the way.

Today In History

On this day, March 4th

1789–Government under the Constitution officially begins as the first session of Congress is held.  George Washington is unanimously “selected” first President of the United States.

This once revered document used to be the "law of the land."

1861–Abraham Lincoln, our 16th President, is inaugurated.

1888–Notre Dame Football Coach, Knute Rockne is born.

1933–Franklin Delano Roosevelt is inaugurated as our 32nd President.  Some of us might also say that Government under the Constitution officially ends.

1938–“The Lone Ranger” movie serial is released.

1966–John Lennon of the Beatles says they are “more popular than Jesus Christ,” setting off a firestorm of protests around the world…he later apologized.