I wanted to talk about modern propaganda for my final blog post, todays propaganda isn't like it was in the fourtys. todays propaganda outlet is the media. Almost all of our media outlets are guilty of this but the worst offender is fox news which is nothing more than a propaganda outlet for the Republican party, for some clear examples have a look at my blog post "lies and deception in our media" that I posted in febuary, for now here are some modern re-itterations of some propaganda posters and below is a letter written by the founder and ceo of the TIDES foundation, he wrote the letter to fox news and other advertisers on Fox.

Tides Foundation CEO Drummond Pike's full letter to Fox News advertisers:

Dear Fox Advertiser,

I am writing to ask your company to take a simple step that may well save lives in the future. And it is not unimportant that taking this action will remove your company and its products from any connection to what could very likely be an unpleasant tragedy, should things remain as they are today. On behalf of my organization, and many others like it, I ask that you cease advertising on the Fox News Channel.

This is neither a hollow request, nor one rhetorically made. There is an urgency to it born of our own direct experience as the target of a would-be assassin inspired by Fox's Glenn Beck Show.

On July 19th of this year, I arrived at our San Francisco office to learn that a misguided person carrying numerous guns and body armor had been on his way to start a "revolution" by murdering my colleagues and me. The Oakland Police Department called to tell us that, following a 12 minute shootout with the California Highway Patrol, law enforcement officials arrested an assailant who had targeted the Tides Foundation, an organization which I founded and currently serve as CEO, and the ACLU for violence. To say we were "shocked" does not adequately describe our reaction. Imagine, for a moment, that you were us and, had it not been for a sharp eyed highway patrolman, a heavily armed man in full body armor would have made it to your office with the intent to kill you and your colleagues. His motive? Apparently, it was because the charitable, nonpartisan programs we run are deemed part of a conspiracy to undermine America and the capitalist system, which is hogwash.

Although not a political organization, the Tides Foundation has been a frequent target of misinformation, propaganda, and outright lies by Fox News' Glenn Beck. Since his arrival at Fox in early 2009, Beck has repeatedly vilified Tides, suggesting we are intent on "creat[ing] a mass organization to seize power." He accuses the foundation of indoctrination and says we are "involved in some of the nastiest of the nasty." Beck tells viewers that Tides has "funneled" money to "some of the most extreme groups on the left" and that our mission is to "warp your children's brains and make sure they know how evil capitalism is." In total, prior to the attempted rampage, Beck had attacked the Tides Foundation 29 times. On September 28th, more than a month after the shooting, Beck reiterated his focus on the Tides Foundation, warning, "I'm coming for you." In jailhouse interviews, the gunman confessed he views Beck as a "schoolteacher" who "blew my mind." My would-be killer admitted that Beck "give[s] you every ounce of evidence you could possibly need" to commit violence.

Beck is a self-described "Progressive Hunter" who relies on violent rhetoric. Do you really think that the millions of Americans who describe themselves as "progressive" need to be "hunted down"? If so, to what end?

For hours every day on radio and television, Beck pits American against American, telling his audience that our country is under attack by a demonic Nazi-like regime seeking to destroy all that is great about America while insisting it's up to his viewers to resist and revolt. He warned his audience that "these are the most dangerous two years of our republic. Because in the end, in revolutions, the real dangerous killers show up." Beck even compared our government to vampires while instructing his viewers to "drive a stake through the heart of the bloodsuckers" and pretended to poison Speaker Pelosi on television. A few months later, Gregory Giusti was was arrested for repeatedly threatening House Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- including threatening to destroy her home -- because he was upset over health care reform. The man's mother told a local news station he listens to those with "really radical ideas," adding, "I'd say Fox News or all of those that are really radical."

When I started the Tides organizations 35 years ago, I did so in the very American belief that ordinary citizens had a role to play in our democratic process. It was, I thought, the responsibility of everyone to become engaged in our civic life, and for years we've worked with thousands of Americans to do just that. And, while we support progressive values and goals, we respect the rights and voices of those with whom we disagree on issues. Never in our history have we tolerated employees or grantees that support those who would do harm to others. By supporting Fox News Channel, you and your company are risking your reputation and good standing because they are doing just this.

As you may know, a coordinated advertiser boycott by Media Matters and Color of Change, an online civil rights group, has caused Glenn Beck's Fox News show to lose over 100 sponsors. Despite the campaign's success, Fox insists it has had no impact on the channel's profitability because the overall demand for advertisements on Fox has remained stable. Companies are still paying to advertise on Fox News, but their ads are simply moved to a different time of day. Thus, businesses that pay to broadcast commercials on Fox News are subsidizing Glenn Beck's television show by continuing to pump money into the network. It has become clear that the only way to stop supporting Beck is to stop supporting Fox News.

I respectfully request that you bring this matter of your company's sponsorship of hate speech leading to violence to the attention of your fellow directors as soon as possible. I believe no responsible company should advertise on Fox News due to its recent and on-going deplorable conduct.

While we may agree to disagree about the role our citizens and our government should play in promoting social justice and the common good, there should be no disagreement about what constitutes integrity and professionalism and responsibility in discourse - even when allowing for and encouraging contending diverse opinions intelligently argued. This is not a partisan issue. It's an American issue. No one, left, right or center, wants to see another Oklahoma City.

The next "assassin" may succeed, and if so, there will be blood on many hands. The choice is yours. Please join my call to do the right thing in this regard and put Fox News at arm's length from your company by halting your advertising with them.

Sincerely,

Drummond Pike

CEO and Founder, Tides

Homeopathy, the biggest scam in natural medicine

Homeopathy aka, the biggest scam in “natural” remedies
Homeopathy the notion that symptoms of disease can be cured by extremely small amounts of substances that produce similar symptoms in healthy people when administered in large amounts. Homeopathy was started in the late 1700’s by the German doctor Samuel Hahnemann, he was very disturbed by the common practice in those days of bloodletting, or leaching, which appeared to do more harm than good. He thought that the bloodletting was to “balance” the body of disturbances. It was after these experiences that he developed his “law of similars” which as stated above is if a healthy person takes a large quantity of a substance and it produces an effect similar to that of a symptom of some illness then if you gave a incredibly small amount of that same substance to a ill person then it would cure them of their illness. His thought was that a disease was just a disturbance in the body’s ability to heal itself and it would only need a little stimulation to jump start the healing process. The funniest part of homeopathy is part of its basis which is Hahnemann’s “law of infinitesimals” in which he theorized that the smaller and more dilute the dose the more powerful the effect, which is of course just the opposite of what the dose-response relationship that pharmacologists demonstrate on a daily basis. Hahnemann thought that when you dilute a solution of let’s say morning glory extract into 100 parts of water and then shake it up and add 1/10th of that to another 100 parts of water that you somehow in the shaking of the solution (known as sucussed) that you “energized” the essence of the ingredients and retain all of the benefits of the original strength solution.
Let’s look at some numbers. On homeopathic products that you buy at new frontiers you will often see something on the list of ingredients that says something like HPUS 5x dilution of clemantis vitalba, but what does a 5x dilution really mean. Homeopathic products are made from minerals, botanical substances, and several other sources. If the original substance is soluble, one part is diluted with either nine or ninety-nine parts of distilled water and/or alcohol and shaken vigorously (succussed); if insoluble, it is finely ground and pulverized in similar proportions with powdered lactose (milk sugar). One part of the diluted medicine is then further diluted, and the process is repeated until the desired concentration is reached. Dilutions of 1 to 10 are designated by the Roman numeral X (1X = 1/10, 3X = 1/1,000, 6X = 1/1,000,000). Similarly, dilutions of 1 to 100 are designated by the Roman numeral C (1C = 1/100, 3C = 1/1,000,000, and so on). Most remedies today range from 6X to 30X, but products of 30C or more are marketed.
A 30X dilution means that the original substance has been diluted 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times. Assuming that a cubic centimeter of water contains 15 drops, this number is greater than the number of drops of water that would fill a container more than 50 times the size of the Earth. Imagine placing a drop of red dye into such a container so that it disperses evenly. Homeopathy's "law of infinitesimals" is the equivalent of saying that any drop of water subsequently removed from that container will possess an essence of redness. Robert L. Park, Ph.D., a prominent physicist who is executive director of The American Physical Society, has noted that since the least amount of a substance in a solution is one molecule, a 30C solution would have to have at least one molecule of the original substance dissolved in a minimum of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 molecules of water. This would require a container more than 30,000,000,000 times the size of the Earth. Furthermore the laws of chemistry do actually show that there is a point in dilution where the original substance is no longer present, this limit is known as Avogadro’s number and in homeopathic terms it is equivalent to 24x or 12c, at this level of dilution the odds of there being one molecule of the original substance is a 50/50 shot and more dilute than 24x it is virtually impossible for there to be anything other than water and alcohol and contaminants introduced during the shaking and transferring of the solution.
Here is an example of pure greed and ignorance. Oscillococcinum, a 200C (or 400x) product "for the relief of colds and flu-like symptoms," involves "dilutions" that are even more ridiculous than what you normally see at new frontiers. Its "active ingredient" is prepared by incubating small amounts of a freshly killed duck's liver and heart for 40 days. The resultant solution is then filtered, freeze-dried, rehydrated, repeatedly diluted, and impregnated into sugar granules. If a single molecule of the duck's heart or liver were to survive the dilution, its concentration would be 1 in 100200. This huge number, which has 400 zeroes, is vastly greater than the estimated number of molecules in the universe (about one googol, which is a 1 followed by 100 zeroes). In its February 17, 1997, issue, U.S. News & World Report noted that only one duck per year is needed to manufacture the product, which had total sales of $20 million in 1996. The magazine dubbed that unlucky bird "the $20-million duck."
Finally the last problem with homeopathic is their status as a drug. This situation is the result of two circumstances. First, the 1938 Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, which was shepherded through Congress by a homeopathic physician who was a senator, recognizes as drugs all substances included in the Homeopathic Pharmacopeia of the United States (hence the HPUS symbol on all homeopathic packages). Second, the FDA has not held homeopathic products to the same standards as other drugs. Today they are marketed in health-food stores, in pharmacies, in practitioner offices, by multilevel distributors, through the mail, and on the Internet.

chemical

the video and lyrics below are from rapper Apathy, he makes a good point about all the chemicals that are added to literally everything we consume.




Creep with me, as I crawl through your bloodstream
Dirty as the bathroom in New York club scenes
A chemical river that flows through veins of drug fiends
Ob-scene, un-clean, love between teens
It's chemical, phlegm that I spit, adrenaline kicks
Flow through your body, make it stressful as shit
What they inject in meat, and the food you eat
Nowadays make you lazy and wanna go to sleep
Chemicals seep in dirt, work deep in earth
Spin babies in the womb feet first at birth
Leaves embryonic fluid polluted and kids stupid
Fruit juice diluted, your drinkin water putrid
The chemicals, heroin, built to be American
Pussies puke blood, baby mamas miscarriage-in
Additives, preservatives, add to my nervousness
Bad when it surfaces, the madness is murderous



It's probably the reason I'm havin panic attacks
Can't manage to relax, got me brandishin gats
Paranoid thinkin everybody's plannin a trap
It's just a chemical inside me I managed to tap
And now there's fiends smokin it, this weed's soaked in it
It's more than just trees with a little coke in it
A Pandora's Box, stop, don't open it
The euphoric feelin revealin the opiate
Back when I was little and they had me on Ritalin
I was chillin, literally, zombie-type feelin
Addicted to caffeine like some sort of crack fiend
Let it pulse through my veins like powerful vaccines
You're dependent - toothpaste, soap, deodorant
A chemical addiction without even knowin it
You listenin right now? Your body is holdin it
A chemical dependency, no way to get over it


Anthrax, death threats, X enhance sex
Steroids effects pecs, abs and biceps
Advil relieves pain, trees deceive brains
Just add a little chemical, you start to see thangs
Water filled with fluoride'll fix up your teeth
Hormones are gettin pumped in pigs, chicken and beef
Alcohol slurs words, Mydol controls birds
Xanax calms your nerves if your brain's disturbed
Vitamin C for health to take care of yourself
And you can even cure AIDS if you got enough wealth
Food coloring tricks you, glucose addicts you
All the dirty shit in food is why your clothes don't fit you
Red Bull pumps your energy, weed fucks with memory
Coke mixed with Hennessy turns friends to enemies
Pills to stop pregnancies, slow the flow steadily
Incredible, we're based on a chemical dependency