France approves soda tax

Just in...Does Washington dare do likewise?

"France's top constitutional body on Wednesday approved a
new tax on sugary drinks that aims to fight obesity while
giving a boost to state coffers.

"...The new soda tax is...part of the government's fight against obesity...
it was passed in parliament last week.

"The tax has been slammed by beverage firms including Coca-Cola,
which in September said it was suspending a planned 17-million-euro
investment at a plant in the south of France in "a symbolic protest
against a tax that punishes our company and stigmatises our products." 

Maybe some folks would be better off if sugary drinks were more stigmatized
than they are. Jim, my HVAC contractor, recently told me he'd lost 45 lbs, all
belly fat, after giving up his 10-sodas-a-day habit.

10 sodas per day?  Really?  

DrugCite Tells You Side Effects of Medicine and...

Just in from LifeHacker...

DrugCite is a useful database of information about the
prescription and over-the-counter medication, allowing you to
look up the possible side effects of specific drugs and see
statistics about their reported problems.

If you were to look up the allergy medicine Allegra, you'd find that
the highest number of problems with the drug were reported
around 2005, and that the majority of problems were neurological.
DrugCite provides simple graphs that break down the number of
reported issues related to the medicine in question and
cross-reference that information to provide other useful statistics.
More here...

Since some of us are so desperate for the relief a drug or medication
offers, it's natural to turn a blind eye to side effects.  Until it's too late.

There are alternatives.  Sometimes the fix is worse than the problem.

"No magnesium stearate," she said

I've learned that some people search out
the Pops online for what's NOT in them.

Last week, a lady ordered a case of pops (10 boxes) because,
"I want something with no magnesium stearate."

Here's what else is not in the Pops...

All these ingredients on p 2 here, btw, are in the #1 selling,
industrial multivitamin in the USA.

Sometimes it's what's not in a product that draws a person to it.

That's what she said.

MD: Use Supplements Made from Whole Foods

Here's an MD who's on to something:

If you aren’t getting the vitamins and minerals your body needs from the foods you eat, it’s time to consider taking a supplement.


Dr. Tanya Edwards, an expert in integrative medicine at the Cleveland Clinic, says your supplement sequence should include a multivitamin made from whole foods.


“A multivitamin that’s made with whole foods is one that is made with fruits and vegetables, so it’s more than natural vitamins versus synthetic vitamins,” Edwards said.

Read more...

Synthetic vitamins and multis have been a source of health problems for years. 
Here's how to tell if your supplements are synthetic.  Get out the bottle and check against these ingredients (Click on image to make it legible):

That's from Dr. Heidi.

Anyway, that's why, for the last 6 years, I've been using the multis she (Dr. Heidi) designed. 

I don't want to make my body worse with my daily multis, but better. (Still size 8, too, 30 years after college.)

What's in them?  Check out the cool 77 Ingredients.  Sexberries included.
That's why I love them and can't stop yakking about them. 

Fat Kid Webinar

Did you see Dr. Heidi's webinar,

        "If Healthy Food Is So Great, How Come I'm Still Fat?"

First 45 minutes: hear the secret story about Dr. Heidi's
success after she reconsidered a strategy she'd pooh poohed for years...

Second 40 minutes: Q and A with audience...Enjoy!

Is Bill Clinton's New Diet For You?

August 25, 2011...

"The former president, known for his love of burgers,
barbecue and junk food, has gone from a meat lover to
a vegan, the strictest form of a vegetarian diet. He says
he eats fruits, vegetables and beans, but no red meat,
chicken or dairy." See here.

Clinton's regime is exactly the opposite of my diet.
I eat nearly all fish, chicken, red meats and dairy (cheeses, kefir, yogurt and goat milk). And I have almost no fruits or beans.

I got it from my old friend, nutritionist and Harvard Ed.D. Dr. Heidi

I have lived by her eating principles for 15 years.
I'm over 55, super-fit and in awesome health. Plus I wear the
same size pants as I did in college. I run up a mountain 5 days a week - 4 mile round trip.

Can Clinton's diet and my diet both be "right"?

(Professor Heidi teaches both sets of eating principles to future
nutritionists at a university near Berkeley, CA.)

Dr Heidi told me,

"I agree with Clinton shunning those foods," she says.
"I'd never never eat red meats, dairy, fish or chicken
from the usual industrial food sources."

The fish she recommends is wild, not farmed. My dairy is raw,
not pasteurized. (If you want it you can find it. Legal, too.) My fish
and meats all come from local farmers. 100% grass-fed beef.
I eat nothing from the big bad industrial feed lots (which is
what supermarkets offer).

So, readers, there IS a step in-between total abstinence and
bad health if you love those foods like I do: Get the clean ones. Never
ever eat the industrialized stuff.

P.S. In a neat twiest, Dr. Heidi's a vegan part of the year, too. When she does her ER juice fasting cycle. Some folks call that her Detox cycle.

Cellphone Radiation May Cause Cancer, Advisory Panel Says

From the New York Times...
A World Health Organization panel has concluded that cellphones are “possibly carcinogenic,’’ putting the popular devices in the same category as certain dry cleaning chemicals and pesticides, as a potential threat to human health.

The finding, from the agency’s International Agency for Research on Cancer, adds to concerns among a small but growing group of experts about the health effects of low levels of radiation emitted by cellphones. The panel, which consisted of 31 scientists from 14 countries, was led by Dr. Jonathan M. Samet, a physician and epidemiologist at the University of Southern California and a member of President Obama’s National Cancer Advisory Board. MORE HERE.

Young beauty or young stress?

Have you heard? Walmart offers new makeup line for 8-12-year-olds. See here.

Does this tell an eight-year-old little girl that she doesn't look good enough the way she is?

Could this obsession with looking good - as defined by make-up manufacturers and their ad men - be a reason young girls are stressed out so early? And what about their mothers?

Do You Eat At Taco Bell?

You might want to reconsider. Along with the usual fast food-grade quality, they've now been sued because their beef, when tested, is just 35% beef. 65% is other "stuff."

Attorney Dee Miles said attorneys had Taco Bell’s “meat mixture” tested and found it contained less that 35 percent beef.

The lawsuit is not money motivated, which is what makes it worth reporting.

"The lawsuit on behalf of Taco Bell customer and California resident Amanda Obney does not seek monetary damages, but asks the court to order Taco Bell to be honest in its advertising.

'We are asking that they stop saying that they are selling beef,' Miles said." See here.

New slogan: "We sell a great tasting food-like substance, inspired by real food."

Pain drugs are poisoning you, says FDA

Just in from the venerable New York Times...

"WASHINGTON — The government announced Thursday that it would sharply restrict some of the nation’s most popular prescription painkillers, saying they cause many patients to poison themselves with overdoses of the drug acetaminophen." See the rest of this dreary report here. (In case, here's the PDF.)

How can the decision makers at the FDA live with themselves knowing they are poisoning their own citizens? Perhaps they don't use the drugs themselves?

Like dairy farmers - who drink their milk raw. But you and your family can only get the super-processed, super-pasteurized and nutrition-less "milk". Because that's what big dairy makes. So they have successfully scared good people away from what they don't sell - wonderful raw goat and cow milk (for dairy drinkers, of whom I am one.)

Whose side is the FDA on, anyway?

They used to insist the world was flat too, remember? And those who who didn't believe that and dared to speak up - well look what they did to Galileo.