Make it stop

EPA to raise limits for radiation exposure while Canada turns off fallout detectors

(naturalnews.com) The mass radioactive contamination of our planet is now under way thanks to the astonishing actions taking place at the Fukushima nuclear facility in Japan. As of last night, TEPCO announced it is releasing 10,000 tons of radioactive water directly into the Pacific Ocean. That 2.4 million gallons of planetary poison being dumped directly into the ocean.

This water is being released because they have run out of places to keep it on land. It’s too deadly to transport anywhere else, and all the storage pools around Fukushima are already overflowing. So they’re dumping it into the ocean, then calling it “safe” because they claim the ocean will “disperse” all the radiation and make it harmless.

But because there’s more radioactive water being produced every day at Fukushima, this process of releasing radioactive water into the ocean could theoretically continue for years, easily making Fukushima the worst nuclear disaster in the history of our world.

Quick, fudge the numbers before anybody notices!

Fukushima, you see, is doing to the Pacific Ocean what BP and the Deepwater Horizon did to the Gulf of Mexico last summer. Except that in the case of Fukushima, that radiation doesn’t just disappear with the help of millions of gallons of toxic chemicals. Nope, that radiation sticks around for decades.

So what to do? If you’re the United States Environment Protection Agency, there’s only one option: Declare radiation to be safe!

Yes indeed, friends, we have reached a moment of comedic insanity at the EPA, where those in charge of protecting the environment are hastily rewriting the definition of “radioactive contamination” in order to make sure that whatever fallout reaches the United States falls under the new limits of “safe” radiation.

The EPA maintains a set of so-called “Protective Action Guides” (PAGs). These PAGs are being quickly revised to radically increase the allowable levels of iodine-131 (a radioactive isotope) to anywhere from 3,000 to 100,000 times the currently allowable levels.

New robot can pick up globs of sticky stuff with no mess

Looks like there is a thin rolling conveyor on the contact surface. Very clever!

Timeline of recent mysterious bird, fish deaths – Mike Adams

From  Natural News

12.13.10 – Thousands of dead barramundi fish wash up in Australia, unknown causes (http://www.themorningbulletin.com.a…)

12.15.10 – Thousands of dead fish wash ashore on Florida beach, blamed on cold weather (http://www.cfnews13.com/article/new…)

12.17.10 – Dead fish wash ashore at lake beach in Indiana, blamed on winter storms (http://www.wndu.com/localnews/headl…)

12.18.10 – Thousands of dead fish turn up in bay in Philippines, unknown causes (http://globalnation.inquirer.net/ce…)

12.22.10 – More than a hundred dead pelicans turn up in North Carolina, unknown causes (http://www.carteretnewstimes.com/ar…)

12.23.10 – Hundreds of dead sea creatures wash ashore in South Carolina, blamed on cold water (http://www.abcnews4.com/Global/stor…)

12.23.10 – Ten tons of mostly dead fish found in fishing net in New Zealand, unknown causes (http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/loc…)

12.27.10 – Scores of dead fish wash ashore in a lake in Haiti, unknown causes (http://www.france24.com/en/20101227…)

12.28.10 – 70 bats found dead in Tucson, Ariz., unknown causes (http://www.azcentral.com/news/artic…)

12.29.10 – Dozens of fish found dead in San Antonio, Texas, unknown causes (http://www.ksat.com/news/26316464/d…)

12.31.10 – 5,000+ birds found dead in Arkansas, suffering from massive trauma and blood clots (http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/01/03/ar…)

01.03.11 – 100,000+ dead drum fish found in Arkansas river, unknown causes (http://www.todaysthv.com/news/local…)

01.03.11 – Dozens of dead birds show up in a woman’s backyard in Kentucky, unknown causes (http://www.wpsdlocal6.com/news/loca…)

01.03.11 – Tens of thousands of dead fish wash ashore in Chesapeake Bay, Md., blamed on cold water (http://www.wbaltv.com/r/26357581/de…)

01.03.11 – 100 tons of dead fish wash ashore in Brazil, unknown causes (http://www.care2.com/greenliving/10…)

01.04.11 – Several dead manatees found on Florida coast, unknown causes (http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news…)

01.04.11 – Thousands of dead fish wash up on creek in Florida, unknown causes (http://www.wftv.com/news/26367953/d…)

01.04.11 – Hundreds of dead fish was ashore on St. Clair River in Ontario, Can., unknown causes (http://www.torontosun.com/news/cana…)

01.04.11 – Hundreds of dead black birds found on highway in Louisiana, suffering from internal injuries and blood clots (http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/11…)

01.05.11 – Hundreds of dead birds found on highway in Texas, unknown causes (http://www.ktre.com/global/story.as…)

01.05.11 – Large amount of dead fish wash up on New Zealand beaches, unknown causes (http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/a…)

01.05.11 – Up to 100 jackdaw birds found dead on road in Sweden, unknown causes (http://www.thelocal.se/31262/20110105/)

01.06.11 – 40,000+ dead Devil crabs washed ashore in the U.K., unknown causes (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503543_…)

01.07.11 – More than 1,000 dead turtle doves found in Italy, unknown causes (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor…)

01.10.11 – Countless fish found dead in U.K. brook, unknown causes (http://www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/…)

01.11.11 – Thousands of gizzard shad fish float to the top of Lake Michigan and wash up on the shores near Chicago, blamed on cold weather (http://www.hispanicallyspeakingnews…)

NaturalNews will continue to cover this story in the days ahead. Watch NaturalNews.com for more breaking news on this topic.

Which Veggie Burgers Were Made With a Neurotoxin?

Mother Jones — By Kiera Butler
Mon Apr. 12, 2010 2:30 AM PDT

This is about the time of year when I start keeping packages of veggie burgers in the freezer, just in case of an impromptu barbecue. In the past, I haven’t had much fake meat brand loyalty: I’ve found that once I smother my hunk of textured vegetable protein in barbeque sauce, all soy patties are pretty much created equal. But after reading a recent investigation by the Cornucopia Institute, I’m going to be a lot more picky: The food and agriculture nonprofit found that most non-organic veggie burgers currently on the market are made with the chemical hexane, an EPA-registered air pollutant and neurotoxin.

In order to meet the demands of health-conscious consumers, manufacturers of soy-based fake meat like to make their products have as little fat as possible. The cheapest way to do this is by submerging soybeans in a bath of hexane to separate the oil from the protein. Says Cornucopia Institute senior researcher Charlotte Vallaeys, “If a non-organic product contains a soy protein isolate, soy protein concentrate, or texturized vegetable protein, you can be pretty sure it was made using soy beans that were made with hexane.”

If you’ve heard about hexane before, it was likely in the context of gasoline—the air pollutant is also a byproduct of gas refining. But in 2007, grain processors were responsible for two-thirds of our national hexane emissions. Hexane is hazardous in the factory, too: Workers who have been exposed to it have developed both skin and nervous system disorders. Troubling, then, that the FDA does not monitor or regulate hexane residue in foods. More worrisome still: According to the report, “Nearly every major ingredient in conventional soy-based infant formula is hexane extracted.”

The Cornucopia Institute found that a number of popular veggie burgers were made with hexane. The list (pdf, page 37, and below) is longer than you might think:

Amy’s Kitchen
Boca Burger, conventional
Franklin Farms
Garden Burger
It’s All Good Lightlife
Morningstar Farms
President’s Choice
Taste Above
Trader Joe’s
Yves Veggie Cuisine

Hexane-free products:
Boca Burgers “Made with organic soy”
Helen’s Kitchen
Morningstar “Made with organic”
Superburgers by Turtle Island
Tofurky
Wildwood

Also worth noting: Products labeled “organic” aren’t allowed to contain any hexane-derived ingredients, but that rule doesn’t apply to foods that are labeled “made with organic ingredients.” For more on soy sourcing, plus a list of popular “made with organic ingredients”-labeled protein bars that are made with hexane, read the Cornucopia Institute’s full study, “Behind the Bean.”

McDonalds, public school lunch beef treated with ammonia

New York Times

Eight years ago, federal officials were struggling to remove potentially deadly E. coli from hamburgers when an entrepreneurial company from South Dakota came up with a novel idea: injecting beef with ammonia.

The company, Beef Products Inc., had been looking to expand into the hamburger business with a product made from beef that included fatty trimmings the industry once relegated to pet food and cooking oil. The trimmings were particularly susceptible to contamination, but a study commissioned by the company showed that the ammonia process would kill E. coli as well as salmonella.

Officials at the United States Department of Agriculture endorsed the company’s ammonia treatment, and have said it destroys E. coli “to an undetectable level.” They decided it was so effective that in 2007, when the department began routine testing of meat used in hamburger sold to the general public, they exempted Beef Products.

With the U.S.D.A.’s stamp of approval, the company’s processed beef has become a mainstay in America’s hamburgers. McDonald’s, Burger King and other fast-food giants use it as a component in ground beef, as do grocery chains. The federal school lunch program used an estimated 5.5 million pounds of the processed beef last year alone.

But government and industry records obtained by The New York Times show that in testing for the school lunch program, E. coli and salmonella pathogens have been found dozens of times in Beef Products meat, challenging claims by the company and the U.S.D.A. about the effectiveness of the treatment. Since 2005, E. coli has been found 3 times and salmonella 48 times, including back-to-back incidents in August in which two 27,000-pound batches were found to be contaminated. The meat was caught before reaching lunch-rooms trays.

…

Carol Guzy/Washington Post

Carl S. Custer, a former U.S.D.A. microbiologist, said he and other scientists were concerned that the department had approved the treated beef for sale without obtaining independent validation of the potential safety risk. Another department microbiologist, Gerald Zirnstein, called the processed beef “pink slime” in a 2002 e-mail message to colleagues and said, “I do not consider the stuff to be ground beef, and I consider allowing it in ground beef to be a form of fraudulent labeling.”

One of the toughest hurdles for Beef Products was the Agricultural Marketing Service, the U.S.D.A. division that buys food for school lunches. Officials cited complaints about the odor, and wrote in a 2002 memorandum that they had “to determine if the addition of ammonia to the product is in the best interest to A.M.S. from a quality standpoint.”

“It is our contention,” the memo added, “that product should be labeled accordingly.”

Represented by Dennis R. Johnson, a top lawyer and lobbyist for the meat industry, Beef Products prevailed on the question of whether ammonia should be listed as an ingredient, arguing that the government had just decided against requiring another company to list a chemical used in treating poultry.

School lunch officials said they ultimately agreed to use the treated meat because it shaved about 3 cents off the cost of making a pound of ground beef.