March 29, 2024

The Power Hour

Knowledge is Power

Today's News: December 31, 2018

World News

China Builds Massive Radio Antenna Facility to Communicate With Submarines

Sputnik – China has constructed a massive radio antenna facility covering more than 1,000 square miles at a secret location inside the country’s borders, according to researchers linked to the project.

The radio antenna project has come under scrutiny because the wave types emitted by the Wireless Electromagnetic Method (WEM) project, namely extremely low frequency (ELF) radio waves, are considered “possibly carcinogenic to humans” by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.

Venice to charge day-trippers for access

AP – A measure in Italy’s 2019 budget law will allow the local government in Venice to charge day-trippers for access to the city’s historic center as a way to help defray the considerable costs of maintaining a popular tourist destination built on water, the mayor said.
Venice Mayor Luigi Brugnaro said late Sunday on Twitter that the new visitors’ tax would “allow us to manage the city better and to keep it clean” and “allow Venetians to live with more decorum.”

‘Bandits’ kill 10 troops along Niger-Nigeria border

Al Jazeera – The two countries had launched a joint operation against criminal gangs in Niger’s Maradi region over the weekend.

12,000 police on duty in Paris as ‘yellow vests’ call protests.

AFP – Nearly 150,000 police are set to be on duty around France on New Year’s Eve when “yellow vest” protesters have called for another round of anti-government demonstrations.

U.S. News, Politics & Government

House Dems’ plan to end shutdown is likely DOA

Politico – House Democrats will propose a two-part plan to reopen the federal government once they take power on Thursday, according to multiple Democratic aides. The proposal, however, won’t provide President Donald Trump with his much sought-after border money boost.

Their plan would fund the Department of Homeland Security until Feb. 8, and all other closed agencies — such as Transportation, Commerce and Agriculture — for the rest of the fiscal year through Sept. 30.

Democrats intend to vote on the plan Thursday, the same day they officially wrest control of the House from Republicans. But the Senate won’t accept the measures absent an unlikely presidential endorsement.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has made clear that the chamber will only vote on a bill that has Trump’s full support. Don Stewart, a spokesman for McConnell, reiterated that stance when asked about Pelosi’s plans on Monday.

“It’s simple: The Senate is not going to send something to the president that he won’t sign” Stewart said.

Police chief admits there isn’t Zika in meth after Facebook post goes viral

Yahoo – After some confusion, a police chief in Louisiana said a viral Facebook post about meth being contaminated with the Zika virus was a stunt meant to draw attention to a nationwide drug epidemic.

The Harahan Police Department never had reason to believe Zika, a mosquito-born virus, was able to contaminate meth. And, despite the department’s offer, it has no way to test for Zika in meth.

The department posted a notice to its Facebook page on Saturday saying meth “in any area of Louisiana” might be “contaminated with the Zika virus.” It said people who bring their methamphetamine to their local police department or call police to come to their home will receive a “free” test.

Harahan Police Chief Tim Walker said Sunday that the post about the “test,” which garnered over 5,4000 shares and was criticized as concerning by the mayor of Harahan, was fake and only meant to raise awareness of nationwide drug abuse, The New Orleans Advocate reports. Walker said other police departments in Alabama, Ohio and New Jersey have posted similar “warnings” in the past.

The Advocate reports as of Sunday afternoon, no one had contacted the police department for a Zika meth test.

Elizabeth Warren leads Democrats’ 2020 contenders — in bad timing

Fox – For the second time in less than three months, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., made major news at a bizarre time. In mid-October, when the country was focused on the midterm elections, Warren released a video on her Native American ancestry that failed in spectacular fashion. Monday, as America prepares to ring in 2019, Warren launched a 2020 presidential exploratory committee, also via video release. The verdict on her latest endeavor is still out, but there are red flags waving, and they all come back to the issue of timing.

By launching first, Warren gets ahead of the rest of the salivating pack of Democratic presidential hopefuls. In an ideal world, being first in would lead to a bounce from a cycle of flattering news coverage. But it’s New Year’s Eve, and most people are focused on anything but presidential politics. Plus, the early reviews from the press are far from flattering, littered with references to her unproven claims of Native American ancestry. In their write-up of Warren’s video, the Associated Press described her clean-up efforts as “widely panned,” while NPR noted that Cherokee Nation called her DNA testing “useless.”

‘National Hero’ Trump Blasts Establishment Media for Ignoring Success Against ISIS

Western Journal – President Donald Trump zinged the establishment media bias against him on Monday by noting that any other president who brought troops home alive after achieving their mission would be proclaimed a “national hero.” In mid-December, the White House announced that U.S. troops would be coming home from Syria.

GOP lawmaker suggests Trump use some of his own money to help pay for border wall

The Hill – Rep. Walter Jones (R-N.C.) said that President Trump should considering tapping into his personal funds to help pay for a wall along the southern border.

“If Mexico isn’t going to be made to pay for a wall, that means funds must be found internally,” Walter said in a statement Friday.

Economy & Business

Oil prices edge up, but set for first annual drop since 2015

Reuters – Oil prices ended with full-year losses for the first time since 2015, after a desultory fourth quarter that saw buyers flee the market over growing worries about a supply glut and mixed signals related to renewed U.S. sanctions on Iran.

Trump Uses Obama’s Own Home Against Him in Brilliant Border Wall Argument

Western Journal – To anyone with a sliver of logic rattling around in their brains, the importance of border security should be readily apparent.

It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that one of the biggest reasons President Donald Trump won the 2016 election is because border security was one of his biggest campaigning points.

Despite the fact that it’s so logical and clearly something many Americans want, leftists have long had some inexplicable problem with anything involving border security or a potential wall.

The liberal actor Peter Fonda was slammed as a “domestic terrorist” by the National Border Patrol Council for incendiary comments he made about the men and women who try to enforce border security.

Late night “comedian” Jimmy Kimmel basically equated Americans who supported border security to uneducated meth addicts.

The lunacy of the left truly knows no bounds. But amid the hysteria, Trump noticed something that leftists like Fonda, Kimmel and former President Barack Obama might have a hard time explaining.

“President and Mrs. Obama built/has a ten foot Wall around their D.C. mansion/compound,” Trump tweeted on Sunday. “I agree, totally necessary for their safety and security. The U.S. needs the same thing, slightly larger version!”

Say what you will about Trump, but his expertise when it comes to subtle trolling is undeniable.

China Factory activity shrinks for the first time in 2 years

AP – hina’s factory activity shrank in December for the first time in more than two years, an official survey showed Monday, intensifying pressure on Beijing to reverse an economic slowdown as it enters trade talks with the Trump administration.

The purchasing managers’ index of the National Bureau of Statistics and an industry group, the China Federation of Logistics & Purchasing, fell to 49.4 from November’s 50.0 on a 100-point scale. Any reading below 50 shows that activity is contracting. The December figure was the lowest since February 2016 and the first drop since July 2016.

Energy & Environment

China says ready to work with USA

BBC – China has said it is “ready to work” with the US, suggesting progress in trade talks between the two countries.

It said it would be willing to work with the US to “implement the important consensus” reached at December’s G20.

At the Buenos Aires summit the two countries agreed to suspend new trade tariffs for 90 days to allow for talks.

China’s statement comes after President Donald Trump tweeted “big progress” was being made in relations after a call with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Mysterious swamp cancer killing ponies on island famous for them

Delmarva.now – The remaining four Chincoteague ponies afflicted with swamp cancer, the mysterious disease that killed three other ponies this year, were euthanized, officials announced Friday.

The announcement marked the end of a months-long battle with a fungus-like disease that leaves ponies with lesions on their bodies and can be very painful.

Denise Bowden, spokesperson for the Chincoteague Volunteer Fire Company, which manages the ponies, announced in a Facebook post that although the ponies “received the very best care money could buy,” the decision was ultimately made to put them down.

The four remaining ponies euthanized were Shadow, Lightning, Calceti’n and Elusive Star, Bowden said. Their ages and ownership are not known at this time.

“They had surgeries, more medicine than you can imagine, round-the-clock care and lots and lots of love and attention,” Bowden wrote. “They just couldn’t fight this off and before we let them suffer any more than they have been, we feel the right decision was made.”

Science & Technology

NASA spacecraft hurtles toward tiny, icy world beyond Pluto

AP – The NASA spacecraft that yielded the first close-up views of Pluto hurtled toward a New Year’s Day rendezvous with a tiny, icy world a billion miles farther out, in what would make it the most distant cosmic body ever explored by humankind.

New Horizons was on course to fly past the mysterious, primitive object nicknamed Ultima Thule at 12:33 a.m. Tuesday. The close encounter comes 3½ years after the probe’s swing past Pluto, which until now was the farthest object visited by a spacecraft from Earth.

Health

Mycotoxins: The Hidden Hormone Danger In Our Food Supply

GreenMedInfo – Over 30 years ago, scientists observed mycotoxin contaminated animal feed (grains) interfering with normal sexual development in young female pigs, resulting in estrogenic syndromes and precocious puberty. More recent human research in the U.S. is confirms that the contamination of our food supply with fungal toxins is adversely affecting the sexual development of young girls.

Grains, once considered the foundation of the USDA’s “food pyramid” (and still a key component of its updated “food plate”), have recently come under scrutiny due to their purported evolutionary incompatibility (e.g. Paleo and/or ancestral diets), their co-option by biotech and agricultural corporations (e.g. Monsanto/Bayer’s Franken-Corn), as well as the fact that they convert to “sugar” within the body, to name but a few of a growing list of concerns. But there may be a more ancient problem affecting all grains, including both organic and conventional varieties, that Nature herself produces, and

New medical treatment imbues older adults with “teen blood” harvested from youth… vampirism about to become mainstream “medicine”

NaturalNews – In a shocking turn of events, the mainstream media is now openly admitting that the “elite” are spending top dollar to obtain infusions of “young blood” from teenagers, which they believe contains some kind of fountain of youth.

Reports indicate that a new clinical trial known as “ambrosia” is testing the effects of young blood, which contains special growth factors not found in older blood that some believe can help to reverse the aging process.

“There are pretty much people from most states, people from overseas, people from Europe and Australia,” revealed Dr. Jesse Karmazin, who’s working on the project, to CBS Philadelphia about the types of participants involved in the trial.

Those who obtain the blood transfusions from young people are being paid $8,000 to see how it affects them – and if all is a success as Dr. Karmazin hopes, then he plans to start an entire business selling young blood for profit.

In explaining what he claims he’s already observed in test rats, those given the transfusions apparently saw a reversal in the aging process.

“Their brains are younger, their hearts,” he stated. “Their hair, if it was gray, it turns dark again.”

Italian style coffee found to significantly reduce the likelihood of prostate cancer

NaturalNews – Three cups of coffee a day might just keep prostate cancer away — but only if it’s prepared Italian style. A story on EurekAlert.org reports on a new study that has found that coffee prepared in the Italian way — no coffee filters and with very high temperatures and pressure — lowered the risk for prostate cancer by 53 percent in participants who drank more than three cups of coffee a day.

Around 7,000 men from Italy’s Molise region participated in the study, which was published in the International Journal of Cancer. The participants were observed for an average of four years. The researchers point to caffeine as the main component that helped prevent prostate cancer. Apart from observing participants, the researchers also lab-tested coffee extracts — both caffeinated and decaffeinated — on prostate cancer cells. The tests revealed that only the caffeinated extract slowed the growth and metastasis of cancer cells, allowing the researchers to conclude that the cancer-fighting properties of coffee is due to the caffeine, and not the drink’s other components.

The study noted that the Italian method of preparing coffee may result in a cup that contains a higher amount of bioactive substances, which may be the reason why Italian coffee is more potent against prostate cancer than coffee prepared via other methods.

Prostate cancer, according to the American Cancer Society, is the most common cancer among American men. On average, one man in seven will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in his lifetime. It is also among the leading causes of cancer-related deaths in American men, just behind lung and colorectal cancer.

9 Health Benefits of Glutathione

Care2 – Glutathione: What Is It?

Glutathione is a natural compound that is found in all of your cells. It is a potent antioxidant that helps destroy harmful free radicals before they can do damage to your cells, tissues and organs. It is made up of three amino acids, which are the building blocks of protein: cystine, glutamic acid and glycine.

Health Benefits of Supplementing with Glutathione

Here are 9 health reasons to supplement with glutathione:

Glutathione Protects Cells, Tissues and Organs from Damage: Because glutathione is a powerful antioxidant, it works to protect your body from damage from free radicals.

It Protects against Fatty Liver Disease: Research in the medical journal BMC Gastroenterology found that glutathione protects the liver against non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

It Treats Autism: The claims are certainly true when it comes to using glutathione for the treatment of autism spectrum disorders. Research published in Medical Science Monitor found that glutathione effectively treated the effects of autism-related conditions.

Glutathione Treats Colitis: Research in the journal Digestive and Liver Disease found that glutathione helped to repair colon damage found in conditions like ulcerative colitis.

The Nutrient May Help Protect against Parkinson’s Disease: Research published in the journal Free Radical Biology and Medicine, glutathione was found to help protect the brain cells involved in Parkinson’s disease.

It May Help in the Treatment of Asthma: While there is little research on the use of glutathione in the treatment of asthma, the condition is one in which low antioxidants may play a role. Due to glutathione’s antioxidant capabilities, it may be beneficial to asthmatics.

It May Help Psoriasis: A small study published in The Journal of Clinical and Aesthetic Dermatology found that glutathione was beneficial in the treatment of the skin condition psoriasis.

Glutathione Deficiency May Be Linked to Cancer: In a study mentioned in the online health publication Healthline.com, a glutathione deficiency may be linked to cancer, therefore restoring glutathione may also help to prevent and treat cancer.

It Helps Reduce Insulin Resistance: In a study by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine, scientists found that glutathione supplementation helped address insulin resistance, a condition in which the body stops responding to insulin and which is often linked to diabetes and obesity.

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