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Everything is rigged: from medicine to politics to finance

NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

Dear readers: Here’s a good article that will help many of you who read so many ‘news’ online, the newspapers and TV, to be able to fact-check if the story is real or if it is fake. And this includes most areas in our lives, including . It was written by Kasim Khan, the owner of Educate, Inspire, Change (EIC).

Everything Is Rigged: From medicine to politics to finance…You are living in a fabricated fairy tale

by Kasim Khan

The temptation to think that what you are living may be a lie is too big to ignore. In fact, things should always be under close scrutiny of your intellect and reasoning capabilities instead of blind acceptance and submission.

These lies can vary anywhere from your close ones telling white lies so that you don’t feel bad about something to the government and the media lying to you about life changing issues, such as health, education, politics and terrorism.

The main thing we are going to focus is the big lies you are being told. These lies can cause irreparable damage to some people and they shouldn’t be avoided and forgiven.

1. The media (media bias and false information)

It’s not a rare occurrence that most of the lies you will get to hear are those presented by the media. Although one of the five core principles of journalism is ‘truth and accuracy’, you will not find the media’s cover-up stories, misinformation and abuse of out-of-context information rare.

Many of the stories you have read turned out to be utter lies that had nothing to do with fairness and honesty. Just from last year, could see the ‘cooked’ Reuters Poll, clearly misinforming a lot of readers, and if you decide to explore similar fairy tales, we will give you some links below.

Mass media fabricated stories are most often the result of media bias. When such thing happens, you can put these six types of media bias in your knowledge base. Sometimes, knowing this information will help you recognize bias without using a fact checking site.

In other times though, you will need to see if the story you are reading is written from a medium which uses a fact checker, the most popular being the Pinocchio Test. The Washington Post, for example, state that they use a fact checker in accordance with the International Fact-Checking Network.
You can also check websites such as FactCheck and Media Bias/Fact Check.

However, sometimes you can’t trust anything. Even though the media can fabricate stories, in many of the cases the stories are just retold statements made by others who chose to lie.

2. Food, health and the environment

How would you feel to know that you’ve been fed poison through food, medicine and the air? Since the mass media is the only means through which information can get to you, it is only fair to mention them here.

The media won’t tell you this, because in these cases, they choose to lean on the words of ‘official statements’ or ‘scientific research and reports’ or to simply ignore certain discoveries and truths.

Such was the case of Cannabis and stories stating ‘the deadly effects of Marijuana’. As an example, an article by the Daily Mail leans on claims made by a person with an anti-cannabis background.

Another clue you can notice that this might be a biased article is that is has no sources stated, although it doesn’t report on an interview, but on a so called ‘Expert’s devastating 20-year study’.

However, the mainstream media won’t tell you about the healing properties of cannabis and how useful it can be for society in many aspects, not only health. They are not paid for it.

Have you ever heard a large news organization report on the destructive effects of GMO? Try for yourself!

Go on Google and write ‘GMO Harms bees’ or ‘Destructive effects of GMO’ and tell us which major news organization comes in the results.

The answer is: none.

This is the same for MANY stories that are worth more attention than that which is given to the Cardashians or to some ludicrous attention to rich and famous people or some blatant arguments between politicians.

Many of these stories don’t come from the mainstream media, but can emerge in various different websites. Note that EVEN THEN you will need to check if the story is well supported with facts and arguments. The thing is that the facts are out there and everyone keen on finding them will succeed.

The general public, though, shouldn’t be blamed for accepting such notions as plausible and normal, and this is no thanks to education.

3. Education

There is a saying which goes: If you want to destroy a country, destroy its education. Education is the foundation to every society, as it teaches the people to be a part of society. Education can be directed in such way to leave people in total ignorance of what is really important.

Education shapes society. This means that its shape will dictate the shape of society. You can see examples of prospering societies that have decided to turn their educational systems to havens for knowledge and individual development. The smartest and most advanced societies invest in proper education which nowadays is far from what education may seem to many other countries.

So how is the education like in most countries? A classroom with an army-like precise order in seating, teaching and testing will produce the same individuals who try to conform to a society which tells them what to do, instructs them on what is good and bad and leads their lives while they are unaware of all of that.

These classrooms provide no free space for critical thinking, except for controlled forms of critical thinking which is instructed against a certain truth (so that it remains hidden).

Speaking of presenting the truth, many countries decide to shape their educational materials to their preference. You haven’t learned of genocides on the indigenous Americans in school, nor have you learned anything about Nikola Tesla.

4. The Government and Corporations

The governments are those who represent the people. Lucky for them or not, some of these people have some very deep pockets. The root of the problems doesn’t start from the government. For a person to become a part of the government, he/she needs a lot of finance, and this won’t come from the regular people. The best backers for politicians are the wealthiest corporations, such as pharmaceutical companies, electrical and oil companies and similar giants in their industries.

What the backer asks in return is complete protection and clearance for every crime against humanity they intend to commit. Such was the case with cannabis, which was shunned for so many years despite the truth. Another case is the hidden truth about Nikola Tesla’s idea for wireless electricity. The list goes on and on. Monsanto, Oil, Terrorism and many more are topics you should reconsider looking into.

These lies are impregnated in the fabric of society on a daily basis. The government chooses the education, the media, the social media, science and everything you can think of.

While you can’t change some things overnight, the one thing you can change is what to trust in. Always look at things with scrutiny. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t trust anything you hear, but you should always start with a neutral mind and build your attitude towards information as you discover new information on the way.

Top foods to avoid with high blood pressure

by Alex Jordon

In America, almost one in three adults are living with high blood pressure, that’s why the topic of dietary recommendations for high blood pressure is becoming more and more popular these days. What causes high blood pressure? Normally not consuming enough vegetables and fruits can result in a high sodium intake and low potassium intake, which can contribute to developing high blood pressure. So with high blood pressure, you are recommended to have a diet low in sodium and fat, avoid these foods:

• Pickles
Pickles are super low in calories and fat, and are also high in vitamin K, which helps your blood clot after the injury, that’s great. But they are loaded with sodium, one medium pickle provides more than 570mg of sodium, that’s more than 1/3 of the daily recommended needs. So if you’re with high blood pressure, limit your pickle intake.

• Sauerkraut
Sauerkraut is with several health benefits, including providing vitamin C and K, iron and a good amount of fiber, and it also boosts your immune system, but you should limit the amount you eat, or choose low-sodium brands, as a half cup of it has more than 460 mg of sodium, 19% of your recommended daily intake.

• Bacon
Bacon is not only delicious, it’s also like other pork products, contains B-vitamins (vitamin B1, B2, B3, B6, B12), vitamin D as well as the minerals zinc, iron and magnesium, which are all essential for a positive health body. But why most people feel afraid to eat it? As it’s super high in sodium, three slices contain around 270 mg of sodium and 4.5 grams of fat, so it’s wise to try turkey bacon for lower sodium intake instead of the salty&fatty pork bacon.

• Whole milk
When you’re trying to build muscle, whole milk is your best choice, it provides more fat than you need, a one cup serving of whole milk contains 8 grams of fat. While if you are living with high blood pressure, try using 2% milk, or even better-skim milk, as the saturated fats whole milk contains are bad for you and may lead to heart disease.

• Donuts
People like donuts, for its sweet taste, but they are not good for your health. A single donut can provide more than 300 calories and 12 grams of fat, as they’re fried, means you’re getting lots of saturated and trans fat, which can increase your risk of heart disease.

• Ramen noodles
Ramen noodles are popular among college students all over the world, as they’re inexpensive and so convenient. However, it’s not a healthy choice as they’re lack of nutrients and with lots of unhealthy components. One package of ramen provides 14 grams of fat, including 6 grams of saturated fat, and 1731 grams of sodium, more than 70 perent of the recommended daily needs! In fact, the flavor packet contains most of the sodium, so to reduce sodium intake, it’s better to not add the flavor packet.

• Alcohol
Drinking too much alcohol may raise your blood pressure to unhealthy levels, and alcohol can damage the walls of blood vessels. For people with high blood pressure, avoid alcohol totally or drink in moderation. Moderate drinking is generally considered to be:

One drink for men age more than 65 per day
Two drinks for men younger than age 65 per day
One drink for women of any age per day
A drink is 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine or 1.5 ounces of 80-proof distilled spirits.

If you have high blood pressure, limit eating these above foods and focusing on low-sodium foods can help. Some good choices are: potassium-rich bananas, salt-free seasonings, potassium-packed white potatoes, fresh fish, nutrient-packed lima beans, iron-rich spinach, omega-3 fatty acids-rich flaxseed. By Natural News.

Border wall divides lands, but not culture

Adrian Florido faces the border wall as he step-dances on the tarima during the Fandango Fronterizo. Behind him, musicians strum on their 8-stringed jaranas.

A wall bars the physical passage of people in a park near San Diego— but music scales that barrier

by George B. Sánchez-Tello

This article first appeared in High Country News before the Election.

The musicians stand in a circle bisected by a steel wall. Divided, they play together: strumming acoustic instruments, singing call and response verses, and dancing in a communal celebration called fandango. Staged at Friendship Park, outside San Diego and situated at the edge of an 800-acre nature preserve, the only thing out of place is the wall.

The wall is chain link and steel mesh standing nearly 20 feet; its empty spaces were filled with rebar and more steel over time. The wall slopes down the bluffs, away from the park and into the surf.

The rhetorical centerpiece of Donald J. Trump’s bid to become the next president, the wall that runs through Friendship Park marks the border between the United States and Mexico. After the end of the U.S.-Mexican War, it was here in 1849 that the international boundary first began to take shape. For most of its existence, the site was open to anyone, from either side, to wander and picnic, but the barriers evolved over time. Today, the U.S. Border Patrol limits public visitation on the U.S. side of Friendship Park to between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays.

A literal imposition of federal policy, the wall bars the physical passage of people in a park meant to join countries and cultures. But the music scales that barrier.

The Fandango Fronterizo, like other events held at Friendship Park, may present an opportunity for federal agencies to engage Latinos, whose record of attendance on federal land is historically low. As U.S. public land agencies attempt to attract Latinos, there have been efforts to recognize and preserve places of cultural importance to Latinos.

“If (public land agencies) want to work with us, they need to recognize different relationships with land and different cultural histories. The fandango is a perfect example,” explains Jose G. Gonzalez, founder of Latino Outdoors, which connects Latinos to public land. “What is happening is what they are asking – diversity in the use and experience of land. It’s about expanding the understanding of culture and traditions connected to the land.”

Marce Graudiņš, founder and director of Azul, a Latino organization working to protect the coasts and oceans, suggests agencies also look at cultural events and offer support that doesn’t alter the gathering.

In addition to the fandango, Friendship Park hosts other events: Border church, were religious services are led on one side of the border and observed on both. There are legal clinics, allowing immigration attorneys to give advice to those on the other side of the border. There are Latin American celebrations, such as Las Posadas, a pre-Christmas ritual, and Día del Nino, a holiday that honors children. During this year’s Día del Nino, a gate in the wall opened for 20 minutes, allowing six families to briefly reunite.

“Whether it’s closed or not, it’s a portal,” explains Graudiņš, who grew up in Tijuana, near Friendship Park. “Whether physical, cultural, religious, psychic or spiritual, there are connections there.” 

To enter Friendship Park, musicians in the U.S. pass through a retractable gate. Border agents lounge nearby. Signs warn of constant surveillance. Rules, in both English and Spanish, declare nothing may be passed through, over, or under the fence. The park may be closed at Border Patrol discretion. Despite the intimidation, men and women make music.

“It is a powerful moment to will the border out of existence for a span of two to three hours. The music, dance, and poetry of fandango in and through community has the ability to do this,” explains Martha Gonzalez, an assistant professor at SCRIPPS/Claremont College and vocalist for the Grammy award-winning Chicano group Quetzal. “But this is a culminating effect of what continues to happen once a month in many spaces across the country on both sides of the border.” 

Friendship Park celebrates its 45th anniversary on Aug. 20. Fandango is a centuries-old gathering from the rural, Mexican Gulf Coast where villagers play traditional music called Son Jarocho. Musicians form the fandango in a circle. At the center lay a raised, percussive platform, where dancers tap out the rhythm. Songs can last up to an hour. While there are standard verses, choruses and form, the art of Son Jarocho unfolds through improvisation of lyric, music and dance. Similarly, at Friendship Park, the fandango adapts. Musicians form a circle, half in the U.S. and the other in Mexico.

The fandango held on Memorial Day requires six months of planning by an organizing committee comprised of volunteers and musicians on both sides of the border, as well as negotiation with the Border Patrol and the California Department of Parks and Recreation. A time-consuming journey is required to participate. Musicians travel to Border Field State Park. The journey reverses modern travel: exit Interstate 5 at Dairy Mart Road, pass Smuggler Gulch onto the two-lane Monument Road, and park in an unpaved lot. Then walk a dirt trail. Food, drink and instrument must be carried.

Other than the soft crunch of earth underfoot, it is a quiet trail. The only sounds are the buzz of flies, occasional scamper of rabbits, or a hawk’s cry overhead. The trail runs west through the preserve and toward the beach. In the span of a single mile, the scenery changes drastically from ankle-height scrub to coastal groves.

From the beach, musicians march more than half a mile south to a path along the bluffs. The path rises above the shore to Monument Mesa, where a small plain spreads out, shaded by a solitary tree. Friendship Park lies at the southern end of the mesa. “The walk is peaceful and calming, especially before entering such a militarized space,” explains Crystal Gonzalez, a Los Angeles master gardener and musician.

Like Gonzalez, hundreds travel to Friendship Park and the wall annually to participate in the fandango. Their presence is noticeable. As the fandango concludes, a quartet of Latinos ride horseback through the preserve. In Spanish, the guide asks about the crowd: There are more people this day than he has ever seen in the park.

George B. Sánchez-Tello was born and raised in Los Angeles’ San Gabriel Valley. He earned his master’s degree from California State University, Northridge, in 2012, where his thesis looked at the social use of Son Jarocho among Chicanas and Chicanos in the Los Angeles area. He tweets @SanchezTello
Note: This story has been updated to reflect who organizes the concert. It’s a committee, not Border Angels and Friends of Friendship Park.

It’s worse than you think – América, here’s why it is time to start paying attention

by Claire Bernish

A confluence of negative repercussions from decades of absurd errors we should have known better than to make is now upon us, and it appears — in electing, or tacitly allowing the election of, Donald Trump — fascism will be our ‘reward.’

Enough with finger-pointing, too, because who got us into this mess matters little when examining the rather dismal specter of past totalitarianism presently rearing its citrus complected, moppish head. And the humor in this farcical chain of events is being fast supplanted by horrific portents in brazenly xonophobic attacks committed by Trump’s misguided flock — from the nascent moments following the announcement of his presumed victory.

That said, the election to president of a reality TV host smacked bewildered Hillary Clinton supporters and anti-fascists with the flat hand of alarm — and now both groups seem to hold lighters to the fuse of civil war.

America, this will not end well — at least, not without our intervention.

Thanks to over a decade of self-congratulatory Big Government, the outgoing president is forking over unprecedented powers of executive control — as well as the perilous potential for grave abuse independent media and academia Cassandras have been shrieking about for some time.

Like Cassandra, those somber admonitions went unheeded as so much tin-foiled garbage — and, yet, iterations of a quick devolution into chaos mark precisely where we are, just four days post-election.

The heedless disappearing of the country’s manufacturing jobs and expanding slave-wage workforce under the Obama administration alienated vast swaths of the populace — lower income families of every race. Trump’s capitalizing on growing racial and religious tension made him a convenient poster child for the disenfranchisement of a so-called White America — racism, latently harbored for decades, finds facile footing when wide economic disparity has no single, precise cause.

Corporatism, however, so engulfs every facet of government as to be indistinguishable, and — that the monster of neoliberal corporate plutocracy has not been restrained in growth — many Americans saw abandoning this system as the only conceivable course, consequences be damned.

Thus, this sinking ship of empire will slip under with a billionaire megalomaniac — having zero qualifications — at the helm. Perhaps it’s ultimately for the best, but to be sure, this will not be a smooth transition for the traditionally-bellicose, outward reaching nation as domestic unrest could easily spiral into widescale violence.

Further, the untenable but growing prospect of fascism’s sprouting seeds cannot be ignored.

“It is very similar to late Weimar Germany,” Noam Chomsky told Chris Hedges a full six years ago, long before the elections jarred the observation into imperative perspective. “The parallels are striking. There was also tremendous disillusionment with the parliamentary system. The most striking fact about Weimar was not that the Nazis managed to destroy the Social Democrats and the Communists, but that the traditional parties, the Conservative and Liberal parties, were hated and disappeared. It left a vacuum which the Nazis very cleverly and intelligently managed to take over.”

However, in his comparison, Chomsky seemed to foretell precisely where the country actively charted its course, noting, “The United States is extremely lucky that no honest, charismatic figure has arisen.

“Every charismatic figure is such an obvious crook that he destroys himself, like [Joseph] McCarthy or [Richard] Nixon or the evangelist preachers,” he continued. “If somebody comes along who is charismatic and honest, this country is in real trouble because of the frustration, disillusionment, the justified anger and the absence of any coherent response. What are people supposed to think if someone says ‘I have got an answer: We have an enemy’?
There it was the Jews. Here it will be the illegal immigrants and the blacks. We will be told that white males are a persecuted minority. We will be told we have to defend ourselves and the honor of the nation. Military force will be exalted. People will be beaten up. This could become an overwhelming force. And if it happens, it will be more dangerous than Germany. The United States is the world power. Germany was powerful but had more powerful antagonists. I don’t think all this is very far away. If the polls are accurate, it is not the Republicans but the right-wing Republicans, the crazed Republicans, who will sweep the next election.”

It isn’t difficult to summon the obvious likeness to Donald Trump and the cult of personality doggedly determined he constitutes a golden god to save America from the perils of globalism — and the putative dangers presented by anyone daring to not be white, patriotic, nationalist, and Christian.

True to form, perhaps, as Trump began rising in the polls this election cycle, seemingly paranoid collations between the demagogue and Adolf Hitler became so commonplace as to comprise the stuff of jokes — dismissively downplaying the keen accuracy in the Cassandra-like prophecy. This isn’t to say Hillary Clinton didn’t present alarming possibilities in her own right, just that — domestically speaking — a Trump presidency proffers particular perils which should not be devalued.

“The rot of our failed democracy vomited up a con artist who was a creation of the mass media,” Hedges writes, “first playing a fictional master of the universe on a reality television show and later a politician as vaudevillian. Trump pulled in advertising dollars and ratings. Truth and reality were irrelevant. Only when he got the nomination did the mass media see their Frankenstein as a threat, but by then it was too late. If there is one vapid group that is hated even more than the liberal class, it is the corporate press. The more it attacked Trump, the better Trump looked.”

Charisma has a time-honored niche as place-filler in the shambles of failed states. This is, after all, how despots garner incredible power — it isn’t robbed from us in broad daylight, that power is willingly handed over by a desperate population looking for its savior.

To wit, the greatest danger with Trump exists in his blindly devoted following — who either have or have not misinterpreted xenophobic overtones — the president-elect will have the tools of a despot’s mad fantasy at his disposal in January.

Consider the criminal lack of foresight of the Bush and Obama administrations in expanding State control over civilians, from the indefinite detention clause of the NDAA to the increasingly sophisticated surveillance state; the placement of a standing army through a now-militarized police force, to the criminalization of dissent. If he were to exercise the power of the executive in the same manner Obama has throughout his eight-year tenure, Trump’s executive orders would curtail even more severely our remaining precious liberties.

Further still, the real estate mogul’s astonishing penchant to feed from the unhinged furies of his supporters evidences terrifying consequences for minorities, journalists, and anyone harboring contrary political ideologies.

This is not meant to be alarmist in nature, only informative to direct all of us to remember historical cycles of empire — and that, so far, the United States and its citizenry might as well be reading from a script.

Continuing down this precarious path unaware the world has been here countless times before would be akin to enabling cruise control and falling asleep at the wheel. It’s dangerous. It’s inadvisable. And it’s going to happen unless cooler heads prevail and recognize that this fight shouldn’t be between us — but instead should focus on our shared battle against a potentially treacherous future.

No, Donald Trump isn’t Hitler — but donning blinders to the similarities is a most criminal foolishness, indeed.

For many Americans, Mexico is their second home

But the number of residents’ permits issued declined sharply last year, and many are undocumented

by the El Reportero’s wire services

Many United States citizens are opting for longer and even permanent stays in Mexico, evidence of which can be seen in the more than 72,000 residency permits granted between 2014 and 2016 by the federal government.

But the numbers have been declining: permits issued in 2016 were one-third fewer than two years before.

And figures published by various Mexican media outlets suggest that a huge majority of American expats in Mexico live here illegally.

Be it for business, leisure or retirement, Americans have made their homes in beach paradises, colonial towns or the cities. The chief destinations — those chosen by 60 percent of expats to reside in temporarily or permanently — were in the states of Jalisco, Mexico City, Baja California, Baja California Sur, Quintana Roo and Guanajuato during those years.

Close to one-third of applicants had decided to extend their stay for over a year, indicating that their residency is basically permanent. In 2014, 42 percent of applications in Baja California Sur were in that category.

But the number of applicants has declined. In 2014 there were 29,286 residents’ permits granted. Last year, that number plummeted to 19,617.

On the other hand, more states joined the list of those where applicants wished to have permanent resident status. There were only three states — Zacatecas, Nayarit and Baja California — where more than half the permits issued were of the permanent kind in 2014.

By 2016, the list was eight states long, having grown to include Durango, Colima, Baja California Sur, Michoacán, Sonora and Guerrero, while Zacatecas dropped off.

Meanwhile, various recent reports have indicated that between 739,000 and 1 million Americans live in Mexico, the majority illegally.

Reports have quoted U.S. State Department estimates that 1 million U.S. expats live in Mexico and that 934,698 do so without documentation. Another report said Mexico’s statistics agency, in its between-census estimates of 2015, said there were 739,168 Americans living in Mexico, but only 65,302 of them had the required documentation from the National Immigration Institute.

The vice-president of the Executive Council of Global Enterprises, an association representing the interests of multinational companies with a presence in Mexico, estimates that more than half of American expats in Mexico are living here illegally.

They are people who arrived with a tourist card and stayed, said Andrés Rozental.

According to International Living, a web portal that specializes in retirement destinations and information, says “One million Americans can’t be wrong,” estimating that that is the number of American expats in Mexico.

It says the most popular destinations are Lake Chapala, San Miguel de Allende, Puerto Vallarta, Baja California Sur (Todos Santos, Loreto and La Paz), Mazatlán, Huatulco, Puerto Escondido, Mérida and the Mayan Riviera.

El Informador (sp), Excélsior (sp), Imagen Radio (sp) contributed to this story.

Mexico concerns by US proposal to separate detained families

Mexico’s government has informed the United States its concern over the US plan to separate families from deportations, the Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray stated.

Foreign Minister Luis Videgaray held in the Senate their ‘concern’ that ‘they will separate families.’

After meeting with the coordinators of the political parties represented in the Senate, Luis Videgaray said in a press conference that the US authorities were told about that this measure could cause ‘irreversible harm to many Mexican families with no identity papers in the United States’.

‘We hope that the Mexican government’s opinion will have a bearing on this announced decision,’ he said.

He also said that the 50 consulates and embassies are already working with legal advocacy centers for those Mexicans residing in the United States with no identity papers. (Prensa Latina contributed to this story).

Back to the Picture Gallery presents artist and curator Martha Castrillo’s exhibition

by Marvin Ramírez

In a warm and cozy art exhibition, Servio Gómez, proprietary of Back to the Picture, hosted a special opening reception of artist and curator Martha Castrillo Cheng’s exhibition of 18 different artists from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds in the Mission District of San Francisco.

An enthusiast SF resident originally from Nicaragua, Castrillo, who originally studied interior design and psychology at SF State University and now a consummated painted and curator, invites those art lovers to come enjoy her displayed art at Back to the Picture Gallery, at 934 Valencia St, at 20th St.

You will be able to see works of artists of the category of MCCLA art teacher Calixto Robles, of brothers André and Gabriel Castrillo, of renowned world traveler Nicaraguan-Chinese photographer Robert Siu, and Myrna Funes, (who is not a cousin of El Salvador former president Mauricio Funes as it was previously reported), Antonio Huerta, Rich Nyhagen, Felipe Acosta, Alejandra Blum, Vladimir Cuevas, José Islas Colin, Marlene Jahoor, Kevin Lu, Jason Mecier, Mark Nestra and Dan Stingle.

They are being exhibited now until March 12. Don’t miss it! Back to the Picture, 934 Valencia St., between 20th and 21st Streets. For more
call Derek Hargrove, gallery general manager at (415) 826-2321.

7th Annual San Jose Jazz Winter Fest 2017

San Jose Jazz proudly announces the official Winter Fest 2017 lineup: Roy Ayers, Donny McCaslin, The Cookers, Wallace Roney, Villalobos Brothers, Ben Allison & Think Free, Huntertones, Kim Nalley and Kalil Wilson, Mary Stallings, Natalie Cressman, Ron E. Beck Soul Revue, Reva DeVito, CME, Mark PLSTK, Shea Butter, Chale Brown, Troker, Jazz Organ Fellowship with Akiko Tsuruga and Tony Monaco, The Eulipions Jazz Sessions, Silvestre Martínez, and some of the Bay Area’s premier youth jazz ensembles.

Within the heart of Silicon Valley, San Jose Jazz Winter Fest 2017, the Jazz Beyond series, co-curated with local production house Universal Grammar, presents buzzy young stars pushing the boundaries of jazz, soul and hip-hop and the Next Gen performances showcase top regional student jazz ensembles and offer up master classes.

Coming up from now through March 3, 2017, San Jose Jazz presents its 7th Annual SJZ Winter Fest 2017, featuring more than 25 concerts in downtown San Jose, Saratoga and Palo Alto.

Now thru Friday, March 3, 2017, at Cafe Stritch, The Continental, Schultz Cultural Arts Hall at Oshman Family JCC (Palo Alto), Trianon Theatre, MACLA, Café Pink House (Saratoga), Poor House Bistro, Hedley and other venues in Downtown San Jose. Event Info: sanjosejazz.org/winterfest. Tickets: $10 – $65.

Five continents of fashion and fantasy

Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts (MCCLA) 40th Anniversary celebration will kick off with a retrospective show of costumes, designed by Mario Chacon, award-winning, Salvadoran designer. Spanning a creative career of over 50 years, the costumes will be presented in a runway show on Saturday, March 11 at 7 p.m. in the Theater.

Also, Join us for the reception afterwards with music by the trio “El Guajiro.”

Models, representing the diversity of the community, will showcase a lavish line-up of 75 one of a kind costumes, including Historical, Ethic and Carnaval styles.

Mario is highly regarded in the Mission District for the many fantasy costumes that he has designed and produced for numerous Carnaval San Francisco contingents over the years.

Mario Chacón studied architecture in El Salvador, but a costume design program at City College of Los Angeles ignited his passion for fashion and design. Mario’s designs have been featured at the deYoung Museum and are on permanent display in San Salvador. His most recent exhibition is in Santa Tecla, El Salvador, a historic town outside the capital.

Luis Echegoyen, pioneer of Bay Area Latin television, will host the show. Immediately following the show there will be a meet-and-greet in the Gallery on the 2nd floor providing an opportunity to talk to the designer and mingle with the costumed models.

FASHION SHOW on Saturday, March 11, at 7 p.m. Theater | RSVP on Eventbrite.

María Elena Salinas to be inducted into Nab Broadcasting Hall of Fame

by the El Reportero’s news service

Award-winning journalist and co-anchor of Noticiero Univision María Elena Salinas will be inducted into the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Broadcasting Hall of Fame at the 2017 NAB Show Television Luncheon on Monday, April 24 in Las Vegas.

Salinas began her journalism career in 1981 as a reporter, anchor and public affairs host at Univision’s KMEX-34 in Los Angeles. Her daily reporting to the growing Hispanic community in Southern California led to her joining Jorge Ramos as co-anchor of the national Spanish language news program Noticiero Univision in 1987.

In 2015, Salinas received a Peabody Award, Walter Cronkite Award, an Emmy and Gracie for her documentary special “Entre el abandono y el rechazo” (Between Abandonment and Rejection), a prime-time report on the exodus of Central American children to the United States. In 2016, she was the recipient of the Mickey Leland Humanitarian award, and in 2012, she became the first Latina to receive an Emmy Award for Lifetime Achievement from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

Iran reiterates criticism of Trump by praising Oscar for The Salesman

Iran received today the Oscar won by director Asghar Farhadi with ‘’The Salesman’’ as another triumph for his cinematography and an occasion to lash out at US President Donald Trump’’s immigration policy.

In addition to the specialized press, all news media – printed, radio, television and digital – echoed the award given by the Hollywood Academy to the Best Foreign Language Film today (yesterday in Los Angeles), but above all, they highlighted the message of Farhadi.

The Persian director explained that his absence at the ceremony was ‘out of respect for the people of my country and those six other nations who have been disrespected by the inhuman law that prohibits the entry of immigrants to the United States,’ alluding to a recent and controversial decision by Trump.

Following a provision by the White House new tenant, the United States issued a visa veto for citizens of Iran and six other Muslim-majority countries, sparking widespread criticism from human rights organizations, social activists, and religious circles.
‘Dividing the world into the us and our enemies categories creates fear,’ said Farhadi, who already won a golden statuette in 2012 in the same category for his film ‘A Separation’ (2011).

His message was read to the public by two Iranian-Americans who represented the director at the 89th Academy Awards, Anousheh Ansari, the first engineer female space tourist, and Professor Firouz Naderi, former Director of Solar Systems Exploration at NASA.

Farhadi added that the stance of the new US Republican administration is ‘a dishonest justification for aggression and war. These wars prevent democracy and human rights in countries that have been the victims of aggression.’

Meanwhile, sources in Tehran hailed the second laureate for Iranian filmmaking, particularly for Farhadi, but honored his position announced on Jan. 29 of refusing to travel to Hollywood, even if he was granted an exception to the presidential order.

While Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif was proud of the Oscar Award and the position of the film director, former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (2005-2013) issued an open letter to Trump, blaming him for his immigration policy, Middle East interventionism and treatment to women.

Are you ready for four years of ball-busting?

by Jim Goad

This essay is intended solely for our male readership. Our three female readers can sit this one out. Go bake us a pie or knit us a sweater or something.

Men: If Hillary Clinton had won, you might as well lop off your testicles with a meat cleaver and ship them parcel post to Washington, DC. Either that, or you can wait until the new Queen Bee’s Castration Squad knocks down your door and leaves your groin as flat and smooth as a Barbie Doll’s crotch. Get ready to have a vagina spot-welded onto where you used to have a penis.

You think I’m kidding, don’t you?

Consider this: Many idiotic American voters pulled the lever for Obama in 2008, thinking he’d usher in a “post-racial America” rather than a “most racial America.” But instead of eight years of racial healing, we were bludgeoned with ceaseless disparagement of All Things White. If Clinton were to win, the focus will shift toward All Things Male.

Consider that women are four times as plentiful as blacks; it has been my experience that they are also 100 times more vengeful. If anyone at this point is stupid enough to think that electing a woman because she’s a woman will improve relations between the sexes, you deserve to be publicly gelded on a Pay-Per-View special by a female pygmy named Sappho X.

“Angry women may put Hillary over the top in order that she can put men at the bottom.”

As a man, you should be concerned that millions of American women would walk into polling precincts on Tuesday, wrap their gummy labia firmly around the lever, and yank it hard for Hillary Clinton’s cold womb. I suspect they won’t be doing it out of a love for other women—H. L.
Mencken famously said that no one hates women as much as other women—but due to lingering, stinking, lifelong hatred for the male of the species.

Do they hate men because men actively oppress them? I think not. I think they hate men because men are dumb enough to submit to such endlessly ball-shriveling hectoring. They hate men because men are so supremely stupid, they actually think that women are oppressed in this society.

I firmly believe that ideas such as “patriarchy,” “rape culture,” and “women are second-class citizens” are sick jokes concocted by cackling shrews who don’t believe a word of it but who are keenly aware of what gullible, submissive boobs most men tend to be.

I also believe that most women are keenly aware that society bends over backwards to treat them better than men.

After all, women live longer—as the joke goes, “Men die younger than women because they want to.”

Women may not make as much money as men, but that’s because they don’t work as much. And they certainly don’t see anything unfair or “sexist” about leaving nearly all of the most dangerous jobs to the boys. But they definitely spend more money than men, and it’s estimated that over the next decade, they will control a staggering two-thirds of all consumer wealth in the US. For the most part, men have been relegated to the role of worker drones—they are here to provide and then die. And if there’s a woman willing to take the job, then men are simply here to die.

For all the yippety-yap you hear about racial disparities in criminal sentencing, the gender gap is six times as wide. Whereas male offenders are merely considered “evil,” women are thought to have “emotional problems” and are far more likely to receive counseling than they are to be tossed in a cage.

But still, that’s not quite enough unfairness for some women. A mannish twat writing in the Washington Post two years ago argued that women should never be put in jail—for anything.

Just as all criticism of Obama for the past eight years has been rerouted and redefined as “racism,” the press is already falsely branding all untoward sentiments regarding Hillary Clinton as “misogyny.”

A gay man writing for The New York Times whines about “Hillary’s Male Tormentors,” whose ranks allegedly include not only Newt Gingrich and Donald Trump, but also Anthony Weiner and…Bill Clinton.

Writing for The Nation, the supremely hideous Katha Pollitt frames the election as a heroic mission wherein Hillary Clinton vanquishes “Badly Behaved” men.

That doesn’t sound like a drive for equality to me; it sounds like a lust for vengeance.

A girl recently texted me about a female friend of hers who’s getting married:

She doesn’t want a loving respectful relationship with a husband – she wants reparations from men. She told me probably about a month ago something like, “I’m not trying to turn a kitten into a lion but you have to learn to be an apex predator – be mean to men…it’s your birthright.”

I was in Brooklyn to cover the election in various capacities. That night I chanced upon this sign near a subway stop:
WARNING…NEW YORK CITY GIRLS WILL KILL YOU

I’m sure I will be dismissed as paranoid and uptight for suspecting that this sign is a wee bit more than a joke. But I will be dismissed by precisely the same people who’d shit their diapers and call the police if the word “GIRLS” had been swapped out with “BOYS.”

The air is thick with misandry. Can you smell it? Angry women could’ve put Hillary over the top in order that she could put men at the bottom.
And it won’t be about equality—it’ll be about reparations.

Animosity between the sexes is natural rather than a “social construct.” It is so pervasive that it may be genetically hardwired. But in the current climate, such animosity is only being encouraged in one direction, while it is demonized in the other. When people talk about “sexism,” it’s as if galloping misandry doesn’t exist.

If you even remark on the double standard, they cackle that you’re a “scared little boy” and they’ve “touched a nerve.”

Gender shouldn’t be an issue in this election or any other. But if women insist on making it one, men would be wise to follow suit.

And in the nightmare scenario if she had won, men would have also been wise to heed the advice of dead gay junkie William S. Burroughs:
Find yourself in a matriarchy walk don’t run to the nearest frontier.

Inside the invisible government: war, propaganda, Clinton & Trump

NOTE FROM THE EDITOR

To those who have heard rumors that there are plans from a small group of wealthy people called the ‘elite,’ to reduce the population in the US and the world. This article, written by F. William Engdahl, which is the transcript of an interview, illustrates some of those claims. Hope you will enjoy reading it. – MR

Genetics are the new eugenics: How GMO’s reduce the human population

by F. William Engdahl

The following is from an interview transcript

Last year, we had a series of mergers in the agribusiness’ GMO-corporations worldwide. This has created an alarming concentration of corporate power in the hands of basically three corporate groups.

The first one is Bayer AG of Germany, which made a friendly takeover of Monsanto. The reason for this was that Monsanto became identified in the public mind as pure evil and everything bad about GMO’s, which was accurate. This became a burden on the whole GMO project. So, Bayer stepped in, which has a friendly image of an aspirin, harmless, nice company, but in fact is the company that invented heroin in the 1880’s and made gas for the ovens of Auschwitz during WWII. It’s one of the dirtiest agribusiness companies in the world with a series of homicides and pesticides that killed off bee colonies and many other things that are essential to life and to nature.

ChemChina – China State Chemical giant – for some reason took over Swiss Syngenta, which makes weed-killers.

Then, Dow Chemicals and DuPont merged their GMO businesses together.

So, we have three gigantic corporate groups worldwide controlling the genetically-modified part of the human food chain. As dangerous as the GMO crops are and the more they sell, it is becoming more and more obvious that they are the chemicals that by contract must be applied to those GMO seeds by the corporations. They demand that if you buy roundup ready soybeans or corn, you must use Monsanto (now Bayer) roundup.

Therefore, this is giving more corporate power to the GMO industry than ever before and that’s an alarming trend. They are putting pressure on the bureaucracy in Brussels. One example: there was a massive public campaign against the renewal of the license of the European Commission for Glyphosate. Glyphosate is the most widely used weed-killer in the world. Glyphosate is the main ingredient in Monsanto’s roundup. The other ingredients are Monsanto’s corporate secret, but the combination of them is one of the most deadly weed-killers.

The World Health Organization’s body responsible for assessing genetic dangers made a ruling the last year that Glyphosate was a probable cancer-causing agent.

The license came up for automatic renewal last year – a 15-year license. The EU commission for health was prepared to automatically renew it for 15 years. The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), which is responsible allegedly for the health and safety of European citizens, recommended approval based on a German study by the German Food Safety Agency that was simply lifted 100% from studies given by the private corporation Monsanto! So, the whole chain was corrupt from the beginning and all the information was rigged. In reality tests have shown that in minuscule concentrations, lower than in recommended levels in Europe and in the US, Glyphosate causes kidney disease, liver disease, and other illnesses that are potentially fatal.

Now, Glyphosate has shown up in urine tests, in urban drinking water, in gardens, in ground water and so forth. And that gets into the system of childbearing women, for example, with embryo. It’s all in this!

The EU commission, despite a million petitions – this is a record setting – and despite recommendations from leading scientists around the world to not renew the license, made a compromise under huge industry pressure and renewed it for 18 months. Why did they renew it for that time? Because at the end of 18 months, they were told by Bayer and Monsanto that the takeover of those two giant corporations will be completed and Bayer is going to replace Glyphosate with another, likely more deadly toxin, but not so well-known as Glyphosate. So, they simply bought time. And that is just one example.

This agenda of GMO is not about the health and safety; it’s not about increasing crop yields – that’s a lie that has been proven in repeated tests in North America and all around the world. Crop yields for farmers, using GMO plants, may increase slightly for the first 1-2 harvest years, but ultimately decline after 3-4 years. And not only that! We’ve been promised by Monsanto and other GMO giants that the use of chemicals will be less, because of these “wonderful” traits that GMO plants resist. In fact, the weeds become resistant and you have super weeds, which are 5-6 feet in a height and choke out everything. It’s a catastrophe. So, farmers end up using added weed killers to kill the super weeds. This whole mad playing around with the genetic makeup of nature is a disaster from the beginning.

The real agenda of GMO, which I have documented in great detail in my book “Seeds of Destruction”, comes from the Rockefeller Foundation. It comes out of the 1920s-1930s Eugenics movement. The Rockefeller Foundation during the 1930’s, right up to the outbreak of World War II when it became politically embracing too, financed the Nazi Eugenics experiments of Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in Berlin and in Munich. Why did they do this? Their goal was the elimination of what they called “undesirable eaters”. That is called population reduction.

After the war, the head of the American Eugenic Society, who was a good friend of John D. Rockefeller, at the annual conference of the American Eugenic Society said: “From today, the new name of eugenics is genetics”. Moreover, if you keep that in mind – genetic engineering, the Human Genome Project and so forth – they all are scientific frauds. Russian scientists have proven that the entire Genome Project utterly disregarded 98% of the scientifically valuable data in favor of 2 percent  that was completely nonsense and a waste of billions of dollars.

Therefore, they have been obsessed with the idea of how to reduce human population in a way that would not be so obvious as simply going out and carrying out mass-sterilization.

Actually, they have done that in Central America together with the World Health Organization by giving certain vaccines that they cooked-up to have abortive effects. Therefore, the women of child-bearing age in Central America were given these vaccines against tetanus. The organization of the Catholic Church became suspicious because the shots were given only to women, not to men. And they found that there was buried in the vaccine an abortive effect that made it impossible for women to conceive and bear children. This is all covert population reduction.

These are the Western patriarchs who believe they are the gods, sitting on the throne with great dignity, controlling mankind. I think they are a bunch of fools, but they have this agenda of genetic manipulation. It’s against nature, it’s chemically unstable. And I have to congratulate the Russian Federation that they had the courage and the moral concern for their own population to ban GMO cultivation across Russia. That was a step forward for mankind. I would hope that Russia will use its influence to get China to do the similar thing, because their agriculture is in dire need of some healthy Russian input. But this step by Russia to make a GMO-free agriculture is a great step for mankind.

The original source of this article is Katehon

Sleep disorders: symptoms, causes and treatments

by Dr. Serge Gregoire

Sleep is a vital part of our physical and mental well-being but unfortunately, thousands of people suffer from a variety of sleep disorders.  Some can be very mild and barely noticed by the effected person such as snoring or grinding of the teeth while asleep.  Others can be much more severe and even dangerous such as the type of sleep disorders that interfere with breathing or that cause a person to fall asleep at random times beyond their control.

Symptoms:

Disorder sleep symptoms can range from small, minor symptoms to much more severe and troublesome.  Here is a list of some of the more common sleep disorders and their symptoms.

Restless Leg Syndrome: As the name suggests this disorder is characterized by involuntary jerky leg movements that can make falling asleep difficult.

Bruxism: This disorder involves a clenching of the jaw or grinding your teeth while you are asleep and is often not noticed by the person suffering from the disorder

Sleepwalking: Perhaps one of the most well-known sleep disorders, this disorder sleep symptom involves walking or performing other routine activities such as getting dressed or making breakfast while in a sleep state.  Again, the sleepwalker is unaware of their actions.

Narcolepsy: One of the more serious and dangerous of the sleep disorders; those who suffer from Narcolepsy may fall asleep while performing regular activities such as talking or driving.  It is characterized by an uncontrollable urge to sleep regardless of how much rest you may have gotten the night before.

Insomnia: Restlessness or an inability to fall asleep.  This can be mild and occasional or severe and reoccurring.

Sleep Apnea:  This is one of the other more worrisome of the sleep disorders.  This disorder’s sleep symptom can be somewhat frightening since it involves a pause or a stop in breathing while asleep.

These are but just a handful of the some of the more widely known sleep disorders; however, there are dozens of others that you may want to learn about.

Causes:

Sleep disorders stem from a variety of causes including physical pain such as back pain, pain from a recent injury, neck pain, and headaches.  Stress and anxiety can also be leading causes of sleep disorders.  Hormonal changes due to pregnancy, the onset of menopause, or menstruation can also be factors that interfere with normal sleep.  The side effects of various medications can lead to sleep disorders as can some medical conditions such as sciatica and endocrine imbalances.  Environmental noise and distractions can also be culprits in stealing your sleep.

Treatments:

Sleep disorders have a variety of treatments from using aromatherapy oils blended to aid sleep, for example by using one of the sleep mists that you can spray your linens with before you go to bed to help you relax.  A variety of herbal remedies using chamomile and other herbs can be effective.  When stress and anxiety are causing the disorder’s sleep symptom, learning relaxation and stress management techniques can often have a great effect on your ability to get much needed sleep.  Some disorders are more severe and may require medication and treatment by a physician.  So if you feel that you are suffering from a sleep disorder and one of the standard remedies do not seem to help, consult your healthcare provider.

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