Monday, May 20, 2019



Large glass of fruit juice a day increases risk of premature death, research suggests

The academic journal referenced appears to be this one. It's a parade of a small number of studies with inconsistent and weak effects so is essentially speculative.

And the conclusions are contra-indicated by other studies.  We read elsewhere for instance: 

"Compared with no consumption, pure fruit juice consumption up to 7 glasses/week – but not consumption of ≥8 glasses – was significantly associated with reduced risk of CVD and CHD, with HR from 0·83 (95 % CI 0·73, 0·95) to 0·88 (95 % CI 0·80, 0·97). Consumption of 1–4 and 4–8 glasses/week was significantly associated with lower risk of stroke with HR of 0·80 (95 % CI 0·64, 0·99) and 0·76 (95 % CI 0·61, 0·94), respectively"

So is fruit juice beneficial or harmful?  Take your pick!



Fruit juice could be even worse for the health than drinking cola and lemonade, US research suggests. The study of 13,000 adults found that a 12 oz glass of juice a day could increase the risk of early death by almost a quarter.

Experts said the fructose content of such drinks could be driving up insulin resistance and stimulating hormones that promotes fat deposition around the waist. Both can lead to a greater chance of heart disease and diabetes.

The new research, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), compared, for the first time, 100 per cent fruit juices with sugar-sweetened beverages such as cola and lemonade.

It found that higher death rates were associated with consumption of all sugary drinks.

A daily 12 oz (340ml) glass of a sugar-sweetened drink such as cola was linked to a 6 per cent increased risk of early death over the six year study.

And drinking an extra fruit juice of the same volume was linked to a 24 per cent rise in premature mortality.

Researchers from Emory University in Atlanta and Cornell University in New York, said the impact did not seem to stem just from the impact of the drinks on obesity, as the findings were adjusted to take account of this.

However, the study was observational, so it could not demonstrate that the drinks caused the increased health risks.

During an average follow-up of six years, there were 1,000 deaths from any cause. Participants had an average age of 64 at the start of the study.

British scientists said the findings were important.

They said many people drank too many juices and smoothies, disregarding their high sugar content, when they would be better eating pieces of fruit, which are more filling.

The NHS recommends a maximum of one portion of 150 ml of fruit juice daily, as part of “5 a day”.

Typically, people in the study got 8.4 per cent of their calorie intake each day from sugar-sweetened drinks and 4 per cent from 100 per cent fruit juice.

Dr Gunter Kuhnle, associate professor in nutrition and health at the University of Reading, said: "This is a very important study, especially as fruit juices are often seen as a 'healthy' alternative to sugar-sweetened beverages, even though they often contain much more sugar (especially smoothies).

"Fruit juices are a poor replacement for actual fruit consumption, in particular as they can be much more easily over-consumed,” he said.

"In the UK, the general recommendation is that a 150ml glass of fruit juice can provide one of the five-a-day, but not more.

"This is less than half of the amount found in this study to result in a modest increase in mortality, so there is no suggestion from this study that one glass a day is problematic,” he said.

Dr Alison Tedstone, chief nutritionist at Public Health England, said: “This study is a reminder that consuming sugary drinks can contribute to dental caries, increased calories, weight gain, and associated ill health.

“Current advice is to swap sugary drinks for water, lower fat milks and lower sugar or diet drinks.  While fruit and vegetable juices can contribute to one of your 5 A Day, it’s important to limit juice and smoothies to a total of 150 mls each day as they can still contain high amounts of sugar.”

SOURCE  






Mass: Jewish community centers torched at  Arlington, Needham

Authorities are investigating whether three acts of arson at Jewish institutions in Arlington and Needham within the past week are related, in what appear to be the latest in a troubling string of anti-Semitic incidents around the United States and world that have drawn widespread condemnation.

The home of Rabbi Avi Bukiet at the Chabad Center for Jewish Life Arlington-Belmont in Arlington was targeted by an arsonist on May 11 and again on Thursday, while another fire was intentionally set at the Chabad Jewish Center in Needham about one hour later Thursday night, officials said.

All three were quickly extinguished, and state Fire Marshal Peter J. Ostroskey's office described them as "arson fires."

The Arlington fires targeted "not just a Jewish center" but also "our personal family," Bukiet said at a news conference Friday with his wife, Luna, local officials, and leaders of the local Jewish community. Acknowledging that "we are hurting," Bukiet said his family is heartened by the support they have received, has no plans to move, and vowed not to be intimidated.

"It just shows us that we are in a community where we want to stay, where we plan on staying, and where we plan on thriving," Bukiet said. "We will forever hold that message up to the community around us. We will persevere with their help, and with God's help."

Rabbi Mendy Krinsky of the Needham Chabad center said that while damage from the fire Thursday night was minimal, the incident was "very concerning." His wife, Chanie, said in a post on Facebook that she "woke my kids and jumped into the car" to keep them warm and protected.

As in Arlington, the Needham Chabad received an "unbelievable outpouring of love and support from all directions," Krinsky said, and he added: "We're not going to be deterred."

The regional director of the Anti-Defamation League of New England sent a notice on the eve of Shabbat Friday suggesting Jewish institutions "take added precautions and exhibit a high degree of vigilance."

"Attacking any place of worship is a despicable act, but since these buildings are also family homes where children live, eat, and play, we consider the apparent attacks to be extremely serious," Robert Trestan said in his letter.

Appearing at the news conference, Trestan said the ADL has contributed toward the $20,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of anyone responsible for the fires.

Anti-Semitic violence has been rising sharply over the past several years, a disturbing trend that includes the deadliest attack on Jewish people in the United States ever, the October 2018 shooting at a temple in Pittsburgh that killed 11 worshipers. Earlier this month the ADL released its Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents that counted 144 incidents in Massachusetts in 2018, the second highest on record, surpassed only by 2017 when there were 177.

The first fire started around 11 p.m. last Saturday at the rear of the Arlington center, which houses the Bukiet family and hosts Hebrew classes and religious services. Acting Arlington Police Chief Julie Flaherty said the small fire was quickly extinguished, but a second one broke out at the rear of the residence around 9 p.m. Thursday. Flaherty said an officer used a fire extinguisher to put that one out, limiting the damage to an exterior shingle.

Flaherty said police have released video footage of a suspicious person leaving the area Saturday and urged anyone with information about the case to contact law enforcement.

The fire at the Needham Chabad center broke out not much later Thursday night, and Ostroskey's office said that blaze was "intentionally set." Needham police Chief John Schlittler said his officers and Arlington police are reviewing whether the fires are connected.

Chabad houses are the center of religious and social life of the Lubavitch Hasidic movement. The Chabad Center for Jewish Life Arlington-Belmont describes itself as "a place where Judaism is celebrated joyfully and meaningfully, where Judaism sheds relevant perspective to our daily lives," according to its website.

The Chabad Jewish Center in Needham has worshipers from suburban communities including Needham, Dedham, Dover, and Westwood, and says on its website that it is "dedicated to serving the Jewish community with Ahavas Yisroel - an unconditional love and concern for every Jew, regardless of age, background, affiliation, or level of observance."

SOURCE  






David Limbaugh: Democrats Unhinged Over Alabama's Abortion Bill

Alabama's mostly Republican lawmakers and governor passed a strong abortion ban this week, and liberals are fit to be tied.

"Today, I signed into law the Alabama Human Life Protection Act, a bill that was approved by overwhelming majorities in both chambers of the legislature," said Gov. Kay Ivey. "To the bill's many supporters, this legislation stands as a powerful testament to Alabamians' deeply held belief that every life is precious and that every life is a sacred gift from God."

In today's secular culture, the governor's invocation of God is almost as bold as signing the bill into law. But it's gratifying that some public officials are willing to observe that respect for life is fundamentally a spiritual issue.

I'm sure many leftists are horrified at the reference to God, but they have their hands full hyperventilating over the strictness of the law itself, and so, they will probably let this slide for now. The bill prohibits abortion except when the life of the mother is in jeopardy or the unborn child has a "lethal anomaly." The bill makes it a felony for doctors to perform or attempt to perform an abortion.

In her statement, Ivey acknowledged that the law might not be constitutional under the Supreme Court's notorious 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion in all 50 states. But she noted that the bill's sponsors hope the bill will prompt the court to revisit this issue.

Not to be unduly pessimistic, but frankly, I'm not sure why Democrats are so exercised. Justices Roberts and Kavanaugh have both expressed their abiding respect for longstanding Supreme Court precedent, apparently even if, like Roe, its rationale was manufactured out of whole cloth. The court's decision was not only egregious in substance — inventing a constitutional right to abortion out of imaginary language in the Constitution creatively referred to as "emanations" and "penumbras"; its effect on society was just as bad.

Before the decision, the issue of abortion was the prerogative of the individual states, determined democratically by their duly elected representatives. The court's fiat was not only erroneous on its face; it tyrannically divested the authority of the states. This federal judicial travesty sparked national acrimony over abortion. Judicial tyranny, where it occurs, is just as bad as executive despotism.

Here we are almost 50 years later, and the court still hasn't overturned Roe. But when any of the sovereign states dares to pass a law outside Roe's parameters, liberals become unhinged, huffing hysterically about the state's audacity to deviate from the court's ruling.

Yet every day, liberals around the nation enact measures they know violate existing constitutional precedent with the undisguised intent that they serve as test cases and that courts, under relentless pressure from their activism, will change the law. When liberals do it, it's noble activism; when conservatives do it, it's anarchy.

The Guardian, for example, framed the Alabama law in racial and gender terms. Why not? That's what liberals do. It's almost all they know anymore. "These 25 Republicans — all white men — just voted to ban abortion in Alabama," the headline reads. The law, according to the article, "will disproportionately affect black and poor women, because they are more likely to seek abortions, and less likely to have resources to obtain an abortion out-of-state."

Not once did the article allude to the only innocent party in the equation: the unborn baby. Nor did it mention that America's abominably liberal abortion laws result in the grossly disproportionate killing of innocent black babies. Pro-life leaders in the black community have said that "the most dangerous place for an African-American is in the womb" and that abortion "is the most institutionalized form of racism" in America.

Planned Parenthood, the left's favorite abortion factory, was outraged at the bill. "Today is a dark day for women in Alabama and across the country," said Staci Fox, CEO of Planned Parenthood Southeast. "Banning abortion is horrible ... We will take this to court and ensure abortion remains safe and legal and accessible in the state of Alabama." She forgot "profitable."

Democratic leaders were seemingly in a competition over who could condemn the law most harshly. Hillary Clinton said it is an example of "appalling attacks on women's lives and fundamental freedoms." We can safely infer that she was not factoring in the female babies' lives the law would protect. Sen. Elizabeth Warren said the "ban is dangerous and exceptionally cruel." She did not comment on whether the law is cruel to the unborn babies. Warren and Sen. Kamala Harris both noted that the law is an attack on Roe v. Wade.

Yes, that's kind of the point, and Alabama's Republicans are admitting it. Isn't it about time the court revisited Roe in earnest? What these Democrats don't say is that their best hope of preserving existing abortion law is for the court to affirm its lawless 1973 decision, either through some newly created legal fiction or in almost-idolatrous fidelity to long-standing but screamingly bad precedent.

As I say, I doubt the court, even as currently constituted, will overrule Roe outright, but it would be a glorious day for America, and for God's innocent unborn babies, if it were to do so.

SOURCE  






Why freedom of speech should apply to Google, Facebook and the internet

“But, it’s a private company.”

It’s a familiar argument. Bring up the problem of Google, Facebook and Twitter suppressing conservative speech and many conservatives will retort that it’s a free market. The big dot com monopolies created their own companies, didn’t they? And we wouldn’t want government regulation of business.

In a FOX Business editorial, Iain Murray writes that breaking up dot coms like Google would be "a repudiation of conservative principles". He argues that "Twitter is a private company" and that "there is no positive right to free speech on Twitter or any other private venue."

“The same goes for the president’s attacks on Google and the complaints of conservative censorship," Diane Katz writes at the Heritage Institute. "These private enterprises are not obligated to abide any sort of partisan fairness doctrine."

The talking point that Google, Facebook and Twitter are private companies that can discriminate as they please on their private platforms, and that the First Amendment doesn’t apply, is in the air everywhere.

But it overlooks two very simple facts.

The driving force behind the censorship of conservatives isn’t a handful of tech tycoons. It’s elected officials. Senator Kamala Harris offered an example of that in a recent speech where she declared that she would "hold social media platforms accountable" if they contained "hate" or "misinformation".

“Misinformation” is a well-known euphemism among Democrats and the media for conservative political content. It was originally known as “fake news” before President Trump hijacked the term to refer to the media. The recent Poynter list of “unreliable” sites was stacked with conservative sites. Lists like these aren’t hypothetical. Poynter runs the International Fact Checking Network which had been empowered by Facebook and other sites to deplatform conservative content through its ‘fact checks’.

All of this got underway in response to claims by Hillary Clinton and her allies that “fake news” had cost her the election and represented a grave attack on our democracy. The call was quickly taken up by Democrats in the House and the Senate. It’s been commented on supportively by powerful Clinton allies in the tech industry, like Eric Schmidt, the former chairman of Google.

Dot coms like Facebook are cracking down on conservatives as an explicit response to pressure from elected government officials. That’s not the voluntary behavior of private companies. When Facebook deletes conservatives in response to threats of regulatory action from Senate Democrats, its censors are acting as government agents while engaging in viewpoint discrimination.

Free market conservatives can argue that Facebook should have the right to discriminate against conservatives. But do they really want to argue that Senate Democrats should have the right to compel private companies to censor conservatives?

What’s the difference between that and a totalitarian state?

It might, arguably, be legal for your landlord to kick you out of your house because he doesn’t like the fact that you’re a Republican. But is it legal for him to do so on orders from Senator Kamala Harris?

Defending abusive behavior like that is a desecration of the free market.

The second fact is that the internet is not the work of a handful of aspiring entrepreneurs who built it out of thin air using nothing but their talent, brains and nimble fingers.

The internet was the work of DARPA. That stands for Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. DARPA is part of the Department of Defense. DARPA had funded the creation of the core technologies that made the internet possible. The origins of the internet go back to DARPA's Arpanet.

Nor did the story end once the internet had entered every home.

Where did Google come from? "The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine," the original paper by Sergey Brin and Larry Page, the co-founders of Google, reveals support from the National Science Foundation, DARPA, and even NASA.

Harvard’s computer science department, where Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg learned to play with the toys that turned him into a billionaire, has also wallowed in DARPA cash. Not to mention funds from a variety of other DOD and Federal science agencies.

Taxpayer sank a fortune into developing a public marketplace where ideas are exchanged, and political advocacy and economic activity takes place. That marketplace doesn’t belong to Google, Amazon or Facebook. And when those monopolies take a stranglehold on the marketplace, squeezing out conservatives from being able to participate, they’re undermining our rights and freedoms.

"A right of free correspondence between citizen and citizen on their joint interests, whether public or private and under whatsoever laws these interests arise (to wit: of the State, of Congress, of France, Spain, or Turkey), is a natural right," Thomas Jefferson argued.

There should be a high barrier for any company seeking to interfere with the marketplace of ideas in which the right of free correspondence is practiced.

Critics of regulating dot com monopolies have made valid points.

Regulating Google or Facebook as a public utility is dangerous. And their argument that giving government the power to control content on these platforms would backfire is sensible.

Any solution to the problem should not be based on expanding government control.

But there are two answers.

First, companies that engage in viewpoint discrimination in response to government pressure are acting as government agents. When a pattern of viewpoint discrimination manifests itself on the platform controlled by a monopoly, a civil rights investigation should examine what role government officials played in instigating the suppression of a particular point of view.

Liberals have abandoned the Public Forum Doctrine, once a popular ACLU theme, while embracing censorship. But if the Doctrine could apply to a shopping mall, it certainly applies to the internet.

In Packingham v. North Carolina, the Supreme Court's decision found that, "A fundamental principle of the First Amendment is that all persons have access to places where they can speak and listen."

The Packingham case dealt with government interference, but when monopolies silence conservatives on behalf of government actors, they are fulfilling the same role as an ISP that suspends a customer in response to a law.

When dot com monopolies get so big that being banned from their platforms effectively neutralizes political activity, press activity and political speech, then they’re public forums.

Second, rights are threatened by any sufficiently large organization or entity, not just government. Government has traditionally been the most powerful such organization, but the natural rights that our country was founded on are equally immune to every organization. Governments, as the Declaration of Independence asserts, exist as part of a social contract to secure these rights for its citizens.

Government secures these rights, first and foremost, against itself. (Our system effectively exists to answer the question of who watches the watchers.) But it also secures them against foreign powers, a crisis that the Declaration of Independence was written to meet, and against domestic organizations, criminal or political, whether it’s the Communist Party or ISIS, that seek to rob Americans of their rights.

A country in which freedom of speech effectively did not exist, even though it remained a technical right, would not be America. A government that allowed such a thing would have no right to exist.

Only a government whose citizens enjoy the rights of free men legally justifies is existence.

If a private company took control of all the roads and closed them to conservatives every Election Day, elections would become a mockery and the resulting government would be an illegitimate tyranny.

That’s the crisis that conservatives face with the internet.

Protecting freedom of speech does not abandon conservative principles, it secures them. There are no conservative principles without freedom of speech. A free market nation without freedom of speech isn’t a conservative country. It’s an oligarchy. That’s the state of affairs on the internet.

Conservatives should beware of blindly enlisting in leftist efforts to take regulatory control of companies like Facebook. The result would be a deeper and more pervasive form of censorship than exists today. But neither should they imagine that the ‘free market side of history’ will automatically fix the problem.

As the internet has devolved from its origins in academia to a set of handheld devices controlled by one of two companies, and then to a set of smart assistants controlled by one of two companies, it has become far less open. Even if Google were to lose its monopoly, Silicon Valley hosts a politicized workforce which allies with the media to compel any rising new company to toe the same line.

And if that fails, there are always House and Senate hearings and harder laws coming out of Europe.

We have an existing useful toolset to draw on, from anti-trust laws to civil rights investigations to the Public Forum Doctrine. This will be a challenging process, but we must remember through it all, that we have a right to freedom of speech on the internet. Our tax dollars, invested over generations, built this system. It does not belong to the Left. Or, for that matter, the Right. It belongs to all of us.

SOURCE  

*************************

Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the  incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of  other countries.  The only real difference, however, is how much power they have.  In America, their power is limited by democracy.  To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already  very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges.  They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did:  None.  So look to the colleges to see  what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way.  It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH,   EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and  DISSECTING LEFTISM.   My Home Pages are here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  Email me (John Ray) here

***************************


No comments: