Pat Shannan's MUSINGS
The Politics of Medicine
The thrust of this issue revealing alternative health methods reminded me of a personal revelation regarding news media cooperation with government control that happened during the middle of the last decade.
There was a new and innovative nutrition marketing company that exploded on the American networking scene in early 1986, named United Sciences of America. The marketing technique was unique in that they were the first to use videotapes in their sales package. These included presentations from the absolute top of the American medical profession who had written and spoken publicly about the value of good nutrition - such as a Harvard professor touting the evils of sugar and even Dr. Michael DeBakey, the famed heart surgeon. These tapes proved to be valuable sales tools for the USA marketing team.
Then in November of that year, Roger Mudd and Connie Chung, who were anchoring a "60 Minutes" type magazine show on NBC, came on with what could be described as nothing less than a "hatchet job" - attacking "vitamin pills" in general and USA in particular. Amazingly, the 25-minute smear included interviews with some of the very same doctors who were on the sales video. Only this time they were actually down-playing the value of good nutrition and, lo and behold, the same Harvard professor was now saying that sugar in one's diet really isn't so bad after all.
The TV show was devastating. The company's comptroller told me that the next month's revenues took a 75% hit. By the end of January, the company was out of business and bankrupt.
It was at this time that many of us became aware of the enormous amount of money taken in each year by the medical and pharmaceutical industries and the lengths to which the American Medical Association will stretch in order to preserve its racket.
We should understand that most newsmen do not investigate on their own but report from "facts" that arrive off the wire. Most lawyers are not interested in the law but rather current statutes and supreme court decisions. Similarly, most doctors rely on what they learn from recent medical journals and sales calls from pharmaceutical reps. Unfortunately for the patients, both of these sources of information further educate the doctor along the lines of burning, cutting, poisoning, and pills for a purported cure but seldom mention the inexpensive remedies of prevention. An attempt at explaining some of this to one of them is often stopped short with a down-the-nose look of disdain inaudibly screaming, "Do you know who I am?"
Leo Tolstoy defined this cognitive dissonance as well as any and better than most with:
"I know most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in the explaining to colleagues, which the proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Washington Post has reported that the FBI is preparing for armed rebellion early next year. This reeks of another government-planned incident akin to that in Oklahoma City in 1995. Let us be forewarned and watch with a discerning eye this time. In light of the one-time secret FBI Meggido report virtually labeling all Christians as enemies of the state, we wonder with what creative artifice the devils will formulate their excuse for martial law.
David Bresnahan of World Net Daily says, "A national emergency will be declared because FEMA officials have concluded that there will be more than 50 simultaneous Y2K-related disruptions throughout the country, which will stretch the nation's local, state and national emergency resources to the limit."
DEFINITIONS OF THE MONTH 1. A Democracy: Three wolves and a sheep voting on dinner 2. A Republic: The flock gets to vote for which wolves vote on dinner. 3. A Constitutional Republic: Voting on dinner is expressly forbidden, and the sheep are armed. 4. Federal Government: The faction which fools the sheep into voting for a Democracy. 5. Freedom: Two very hungry wolves looking for dinner and finding a very well-informed and well-armed sheep.
BUMPERSTICKER OF THE MONTH Guns don't kill people --- Postal Workers do.
MODERN DAY MIRANDA WARNING You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say will be misquoted, then used against you.
QUOTE OF THE MILLENIUM `The few who can understand the system (check money and credits) will be so interested in its profits, or so dependent on its favors , that there will be no opposition from that class.' ---Rothschild Brothers of London
COVER-UP OF THE MONTH Last November 13th, thousands of interested Americans tuned into C-Span's Saturday morning telecast expecting to see live coverage of the "Citizen's Summit" in Washington D.C. Instead, all they saw were some old tapes of political filibustering. .Larry Becraft was a speaker at this "Citizens Summit to End the Illegal Operations of the IRS" being held at the National Press Club. A few days later he called to say that they were as surprised and disappointed as everyone else that CSPAN did not cover the event, contrary to the announcement. On Friday, the day before the summit, event promoter Bob Schultz received a phone call from a Department of Justice representative, Joel Gray, inquiring about the nature of the summit and the material to be covered. Although Mr. Schulz thought the call unusual, he placed no additional importance on it at the time. IRS representatives and other government officials were formally invited to attend. None did. Larry said that as expected Bill Benson revealed the name of the person who approached him about not making public his material on the non-ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment, and that the person was Sen. Orin Hatch. The word was that Benson was accusing Hatch of "bribing C-SPAN with a seven figure payoff" not to air the program. We don't know where Benson got his information, and he did not return any of our four phone calls to his home.
It does appear that something strange was going on behind the scenes, in light of the exceptional reception the first one received. C-SPAN told event planners that they had sold more tapes (at $49.95) from the previous Summit in July than from any other program C-SPAN had ever covered. ====================================================================
COLUMN OF THE YEAR From Kimberly, Wilson, New Pittsburgh Courier, Dec. 23, 1998. You Are Not My Leader Frankly, I believe that many black public figures are simply crowned as leaders by a clueless press. The public figure may not have anything of substance to say, but if he or she says it loud enough . . . voila! The press discovers and anoints a new leader. In the midst of all this, and after some pondering, I've developed some personal criteria for deciding whom I will dignify with the title of leader. If you publicly curse the white man for all he has done, yet you yourself have no inkling of what you are going to do, then you are not my leader. If your wealth--or at least your comfortable living standard--is based almost entirely on how much money you can extract from the government in the form of social programs, then you are not my leader. If you make speeches portraying black America as poor, down-and-out and in need of welfare and other handouts, then you are not my leader. If you willfully break the laws of God and man, yet blame whites when you finally get caught, then you are not my leader.