Friday, December 10, 2010

Extending Tax Breaks for the Wealthy

We have to make a lot of noise NOW!
Obama is either the worst negotiator in the world or he is a weak man.
During the 70's we got Nixon to pass a lot of bills he didn't want to which were a great benefit to all of you.
We, the people, are losing ground.
We need to yell loud and clear to stop the giveaway to the rich/corporations. (why does the average person think they are getting something out of this? We are losing everything: jobs, education, health care, social security, our way of life. Kids are going to school in full winter gear because there is no heat. Are we crazy?
Let's take this next week - Dec 10 - 17 - to tell as many people as you can to EMAIL or WRITE or CALL every politician they can. If you can, donate to move-on or other organizations working towards the same goal.
Start with the President and work your way down to your local politicians.
If we make enough noise, we might get some results or at least some movement from our elected politicians.
If you have time, write the news commentators (Fox, MSNBC, CNN)
MAKE SOME NOISE BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE.
Judith
PS I don't care what your politics are. I can't believe you want the Corporations and Billionaires to get extended tax breaks. Are any of us ever going to make $5,000,000 in one year? (We would be very fortunate to make it in our lifetime)
PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD.

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Tamiflu and Rumsfeld

SHOULD ELECTED/APPOINTED OFFICIALS (of former elected/appointed officials) BE ALLOWED TO PROFIT FROM THE PUBLIC TRUST?

Who Owns the Rights on Tamiflu: Rumsfeld To Profit From Bird Flu Hoax

by Michel Chossudovsky

Global Research, October 26, 2005

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We bring to the attention of Global Research readers this important commentary by Dr.Joseph Mercola.

The fundamental issue is who owns the intellectual property rights over Tamiflu. The media reports suggest that the Swiss pharmaceutical company Roche will make billions.

While the drug is produced by Roche, it was developed by Gilead Sciences Inc.which owns the intellectual property rights. Gilead, which has maintained a low profile, has outsourced the production to Roche.

Donald Rumsfeld was appointed Chairman of Gilead Sciences, Inc. in 1997, a position which he held in the years prior to becoming Secretary of Defense.in the Bush adminstration. Rumsfeld had been on the Board of Directors from the establishment of Gilead in 1987.

As confirmed in a company press statement in 1997, Donald H. Rumsfeld assumed the position of Chairman, of GILEAD: :

"Gilead is fortunate to have had Don Rumsfeld as a stalwart board member since the company's earliest days, and we are very pleased that he has accepted the Chairmanship," Dr. Riordan said. "He has played an important role in helping to build and steer the company. His broad experience in leadership positions in both industry and government will serve us well as Gilead continues to build its commercial presence."

According to company statement: Gilead Science Inc "has been active in the development of inhibitors for the potential treatment and prevention of viral influenza and protease inhibitors for the potential treatment of HIV"

"The Company's research and development efforts encompass three interrelated programs: small molecule antivirals, cardiovascular therapeutics and genetic code blockers for cancer and other diseases. Gilead's expertise in each of these areas has also resulted in the discovery and development of non-nucleotide product candidates, including neuraminidase inhibitors for the potential treatment and prevention of viral influenza and protease inhibitors for the potential treatment of HIV"

Also find below an article published in the SF Chronicle, which points to the relationship between GILEAD and Roche in relation to the Rights over Tami Flu.

Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, 26 Oct 2005

Who Owns the rights on Tamiflu

by Joseph Mercola

www.mercola.com

Finally, the pieces of the puzzle start to add up. Not long ago, President Bush sought to instill panic in this country by telling us a minimum of 200,000 people will die from the avian flu pandemic, but it could be as bad as 2 million deaths in this country alone.

This hoax is then used to justify the immediate purchase of 80 million doses of Tamiflu, a worthless drug that in no way shape or form treats the avian flu, but only decreases the amount of days one is sick and can actually contribute to the virus having more lethal mutations.

So the U.S. placed an order for 20 million doses of this worthless drug at a price of $100 per dose. That comes to a staggering $2 billion.

We are being told that Roche manufactures Tamiflu and, in a recent New York Times article, they were battling whether or not they would allow generic drug companies to help increase their production.

But if you dig further you will find that a drug was actually developed by a company called Gilead that 10 years ago gave Roche the exclusive rights to market and sell Tamiflu.

Ahh, The Plot Thickens...

If you read the link below from Gilead, you'll discover Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was made the chairman of Gilead in 1997.

Since Rumsfeld holds major portions of stock in Gilead, he will handsomely profit from the scare tactics of the government that is being used to justify the purchase of $2 billion of Tamiflu.

TEXT OF 1997 PRESS RELEASE BY GILEAD SCIENCE INC

Donald H. Rumsfeld Named Chairman of Gilead Sciences

Foster City, CA, January 3, 1997 - Gilead Sciences Inc. (Nasdaq: GILD) today announced that board member Donald H. Rumsfeld will assume the position of Chairman, effective immediately. Mr. Rumsfeld succeeds Michael L. Riordan, M.D., who founded Gilead in 1987 and has served as Chairman since 1993. Dr. Riordan will continue to serve as a director on the board.

"In my years with Gilead, I have witnessed the evolution of one of the industry's premier biotechnology companies," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "Michael Riordan's founding vision and enormous accomplishments are evident in the VISTIDE® product approval, deep pipeline and talented team that will continue to move Gilead to develop novel treatments for viral diseases."

Mr. Rumsfeld, who joined Gilead as a director in 1988, is currently in private business and is distinguished for his accomplishments in both industry and government. Mr. Rumsfeld served as chief executive officer of G.D. Searle, a worldwide pharmaceutical company, from 1977 to 1985. During this time, his stewardship of Searle earned him awards as the Outstanding Chief Executive Officer in the pharmaceutical industry in 1980 and 1981. He also served as chairman and chief executive of General Instrument Corporation, a diversified electronics company and world leader in broadband and all digital high definition television technology.

A graduate of Princeton University, Mr. Rumsfeld has served in numerous positions of public service, including four terms in the U.S. Congress, U.S. Ambassador to NATO, White House Chief of Staff and as the 13th Secretary of Defense. In 1977, Mr. Rumsfeld was awarded the nation's highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

In addition to Gilead, Mr. Rumsfeld presently serves as an advisor to several companies and as a member of the board of directors of ABB AB; Gulfstream Aerospace Corp.; Kellogg; Metricom, Inc.; Sears, Roebuck and Co. and Tribune Company. Mr. Rumsfeld's current civic activities include service on the board of trustees of the Eisenhower Exchange Fellowship, Freedom House and the RAND Corporation.

Dr. Riordan will continue to assist the company with strategic direction through his involvement on the board of directors. Since founding the company in 1987, Riordan has overseen Gilead's evolution to a leading biotechnology company with its first approved product and a diversified pipeline of antiviral therapies.

"Michael Riordan's vision and leadership have guided Gilead from a start-up to a commercial company, and we are pleased to rely on his continued counsel as an active board member," John C. Martin, Ph.D., President and Chief Executive Officer of Gilead said. "Over the past several years, I have enjoyed working with Don Rumsfeld as an active director and look forward to his new role as Chairman as we continue to build the Gilead business."

Gilead Sciences is a leader in the discovery and development of a new class of human therapeutics based on nucleotides, the building blocks of DNA and RNA. In 1996, Gilead's first product, VISTIDE (cidofovir injection), was cleared by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration for the treatment of cytomegalovirus (CMV) retinitis in patients with AIDS. Gilead has other nucleotide product candidates in human testing for the potential treatment of viral diseases caused by CMV, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), hepatitis B virus, herpes simplex virus and human papillomavirus.

The Company's research and development efforts encompass three interrelated programs: small molecule antivirals, cardiovascular therapeutics and genetic code blockers for cancer and other diseases. Gilead's expertise in each of these areas has also resulted in the discovery and development of non-nucleotide product candidates, including neuraminidase inhibitors for the potential treatment and prevention of viral influenza and protease inhibitors for the potential treatment of HIV

link to original press prelease Gilead Sciences Inc

Biotech firm wants to regain control of avian flu drug

Gilead says deal with Roche Inc. threatens Tamiflu's production

Sabin Russell, Chronicle Medical Writer

Friday, June 24, 2005

Citing "ongoing neglect of the product," a Bay Area biotech company is attempting to reclaim control of Tamiflu, an antiviral drug it sold to Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche Inc. that has since emerged as the world's only practical weapon against a potential pandemic of avian flu.

The Foster City-based Gilead Sciences, best known for its AIDS drug Viread, notified Roche on Thursday that it was terminating the 1996 agreement that gave the Swiss company exclusive rights to make and sell Tamiflu.

Gilead executives disclosed that they have been peppering Roche with complaints about its marketing of Tamiflu for five years, and that manufacturing glitches have been responsible for earlier shortages of a drug now deemed vitally important to public health.

Formerly a lackluster seller in the market for drugs to treat influenza, Tamiflu has become a valuable commodity since December 2003, when scientists became alarmed that a new flu strain that primarily killed chickens in Southeast Asia was starting to kill people who lived in close proximity to the birds.

In April, Roche reported its first quarter sales of Tamiflu quadrupled to $330 million.

Michel Chossudovsky is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Michel Chossudovsky

We are being Scammed as well as Scanned.

So now we have to all go through body scanners if we want to travel by air. But DID YOU KNOW who is benefiting from the sale of these scanners? Read below article or google it yourself to verify. We are not only being SCANNED, we are being SCAMMED!

Homeland Security Secretary Linked to Body Scanner Manufacturer

January 5, 2010 by Andrew
Filed under Government

Sunday, February 14, 2010

A Heart to Heart talk: Dr McDougall and President Clinton

Dr McDougall has sent out another appeal to President Bill Clinton. Most likely, President Clinton will ignore this and end up with more medical problems. But YOU don't have to ignore it. Read the open letter and give your feedback. JB

: http://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2010other/news/clinton.htm

McDougall Breaking News

An Invitation for Bill Clinton to Attend the McDougall Program

Dear 42nd President William Jefferson Clinton:

With all their good intentions, and the use of sophisticated, expensive technologies, your doctors are allowing your heart disease to progress as if it were a runaway train destined for a wreck. Your cardiologist, Dr. Allan Schwartz, at New York Presbyterian Hospital is telling you further blockage is the normal course of your disease, and your diet and lifestyle are not involved. Medical experts expressing their opinion in the news since your surgery are misleading the public into believing that the proper management of this disease is through constant surveillance and repeated surgical interventions. This is big business talking, and in addition to mismanagement of your personal care, one result will be an increase in the already more than one million angioplasties and 500 thousand bypass surgeries performed annually in the US.

Recall your first painful encounter with the heart surgery business on September 3, 2004 when you were hospitalized following an episode of chest pain. You had quadruple bypass surgery three days later. A couple of days ago, on Thursday, February 11, 2010, you needed the heart surgeons again. You had two bare metal stents placed in your heart following a few of days of mild chest discomfort. This history will continue to repeat itself until you seriously change your eating habits and get these meddling doctors out of your life. You are missing another “teaching moment” and bypassing another chance to change health and healthcare in America.

In a letter I sent to you the day following your hospitalization in 2004, I pleaded with you to refuse bypass surgery. I told you that bypass surgery does not save lives in most cases, and I warned you of the brain damage you would suffer from being on the heart-lung bypass machine. Likely you did not read that letter. Following your quadruple bypass you were a noticeably different man. Your sometimes-irrational behavior during Hillary Clinton’s campaign was in part due to your surgically-induced mental decline. I sent another letter in the spring of 2008 apologizing for the harm my colleagues caused you and their failure to offer you intensive medical therapy founded on a healthy diet. I believe you received that letter or read the Wall Street Journal article that followed about your brain damage. Since you became aware of your functional loss you have seemed to me to be in much better control when before the public.

I am taking the opportunity in this letter to try to help you again. By helping one of our country’s greatest statesmen, I may be able to help other heart patients (which happens to include most adults following the Western diet). This is my third attempt, but likely not my last, because, after all, your heart doctors (Dean Ornish, MD being an outstanding exception) believe your disease is unstoppable. Remember what they said: they are going to manage your future health by constant surveillance and repeated surgical interventions. These well-educated professionals are dead wrong on how to care for a patient such as you.

In order for you to stop having false hope you need to be told that heart surgery, including bypass surgery and angioplasty with or without stents, does not save lives in the vast majority of cases. You have not been fixed by either procedure. The reason for this is that the bypass surgeons and cardiologists are operating on the stable hard fibrous plaques that do not kill people. Why do they operate on nonlethal lesions? Because they can. These large fibrous stable plaques, which have been present for years, if not decades, are visible by technologies like angiograms and heart scans. Once visualized, they become targets for knives, grafts, sutures, and catheters.

The disease that really kills is largely invisible to your doctors. Tiny festering sores that rupture cause heart attacks, and the deaths that follow these heart attacks in nearly half the cases. In order to understand the underlying problem, think about pustules or pimples rupturing on a teenager’s face, but in this case the deadly activity is inside your arteries. In medical terminology, these tiny sores are called “volatile plaques.” When they pop, substances generally referred to as “products of injury” are released. The body’s response is to form a blood clot to cover up the wound (similar to the blood clot that forms when you cut your hand with a knife). If the blood clot (called a thrombus) is large enough, then the flow in the entire heart artery can be blocked off. The heart muscle that lies distal to this sudden blockage usually dies—and that is how a heart attack occurs.

Why do heart surgeons not operate on the killing part of this disease? Because they can’t. They cannot see these tiny festering sores with current technology. Even if they could see these “silent killers,” they have no surgical techniques to stop them from exploding. The only solution is to allow the body to heal your steadily-progressing disease by making serious dietary changes. (Medications, such as aspirin and statins, when judiciously used, can be of benefit as well.)

I realize you were frightened by the chest discomfort on both occasions (2004 and 2010). Fortunately, changing to a healthy low-fat diet (like the Pritikin, McDougall, Ornish, or Esselstyn Diets) reduces the intensity and/or stops the chest pains very quickly. Improvement in blood flow begins with the first good meal. In a matter of hours the blood naturally thins and a blood clot is less likely to form if a volatile plaque does rupture (aspirin helps too). Spontaneous healing is a powerful force — within the first week the risk of pustule rupture is greatly reduced. In a matter of months, reversal of artery disease can be seen by current technologies (angiograms and PET scans).

The truths I have given you are indisputable and most of your doctors are well aware of the solid research behind what I have told you. Your problem now is the same as everyone else’s: making the change. This is not easy, especially when you have almost no conservative medical support. If you do not change you can expect your future to be more like the past, but probably worse, because you are getting older. So for your sake, and all those who benefit from your work, I invite you to attend the next 10-day, live-in, McDougall Program in Santa Rosa, California, March 19 to 28, 2010. You can call me at (800) 941-7111. In this short time together, I promise we will change your life dramatically for the better. When that happens I will stop writing you these cautionary letters, which so far have accurately predicted your future.

Sincerely,

John McDougall, MD
http://www.drmcdougall.com/

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