by the University of Michigan

ANN ARBOR, Michigan.— A new study of expectant mothers suggests that a group of common environmental contaminants called phthalates, which are present in many industrial and consumer products including everyday personal care items, may contribute to the country’s alarming rise in premature births.

Researchers at the University of Michigan School of Public Health found that women who deliver prematurely have, on average, up to three times the phthalate level in their urine compared to women who carry to term.

Professors John Meeker, Rita Loch-Caruso and Howard Hu of the SPH Department of Environmental Health Sciences and collaborators from the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention analyzed data from a larger study directed by Hu, which follows a cohort of Mexican women recruited during pre-natal visits at one of four clinics of the Mexican Institute of Social Security in Mexico City.

Meeker and colleagues looked at data from 60 women: 30 who carried to term and 30 who delivered prematurely (defined as less than 37 weeks gestation).

They analyzed urine samples collected during the third trimester and compared them to the control group who carried to term. They found significantly higher phthalate metabolite levels in the women who delivered prematurely.

Premature birth is a significant risk factor for many health problems in childhood that can persist into adulthood, Meeker says. In the United States, premature births have increased by more than 30 percent since 1981 and by 18 percent since 1990. In 2004, premature births acmúsicacounted for 12.8 percent of live births nationwide.

Premature births, he says, account for one-third of infant deaths in the United States, making it the leading cause of neonatal mortality. Being born too early can also lead to chronic health problems such as blindness, deafness, cerebral palsy, low IQ and more.

Phthalates are commonly used compounds in plastics, personal care products, home furnishings (vinyl flooring, carpeting, paints, etc.) and many other consumer and industrial products. The toxicity varies by specific phthalates or their breakdown products, but past studies show that several phthalates cause reproductive and developmental toxicity in animals.

A couple of human studies have reported associations between phthalates and gestational age, but this is the first known study to look at the relationship between phthalates and premature births, Meeker says.

“We looked at these commonly used compounds found in consumer products based on the growing amount of animal toxicity data and since national human data show that a large proportion of the population are unknowingly exposed,” Meeker said.

“One of the problems for consumers is that you don’t know exactly which products contain phthalates because the products do not have to be labeled accordingly.”

Meeker says the U-M study is a stepping stone to larger and more detailed studies examining the role of phthalates and premature births. The researchers hope to examine a larger population of pregnant women to corroborate these initial study findings, and conduct experimental lab studies to further explore the biological mechanisms of how phthalates work in the body.

The study, “Urinary Phthalate Metabolites in Relation to Preterm Birth in Mexico City,” is available online at: http://www.ehponline.org/docs/2009/0800522/abstract.html. It will appear in a later printed issue of Environmental Health Perspectives.

by José Armas

The S.F.P.D. parked for two days (Tuesday at Mission and 24th) and Thursday at Mission and 16th) their sophisticated mobile command for a whole day. At press time, El Reportero, could not find out exactly what was this type of surveillance truck doing in the Mission, besides looking for small-time drug pushers and winos. (photo by Marvin J. Ramirez)

ALBUQUERQUE — New Mexico is the only Hispanic-majority state in the nation. Latinos make up nearly 57 percent of its students while whites make up 29 percent.

The state’s public schools are failing to educate more than half of those Latino children. Put another way, Latino dropouts number almost exactly the same as all white students in the state.

To confront this looming education tsunami threatening New Mexico’s social and economic future, a number of concerned leaders have formed “The Latino/Hispano Education Improvement Task Force.”

They cite that Latinos make up nearly 70 percent of all of the state’s elementary schools students, foreshadowing the state’s continuing population shift.

Because of this situation, task force members say they’re convinced that the Latino education crisis will grow unless there is intervention to “forge bold and provocative redirection.”

The issue surfaced when the South West Organizing Project (SWOP) pointed out that the recent state legislative session included a bill to create an independent police department within the Albuquerque public school system.

SWOP organizer Emma Sandoval reacted immediately. “We don’t need a police department to be taking money away from educating our kids.’’

With mobilization and organizing by community leaders, the bill was killed in both houses.

Too often the nation’s failure to educate Hispan­ic students is blamed on poverty and their limited English skills. However, Laredo’ Texas—at one time billed as the “Poorest City in the Nation”—has one school district with 96.4 percent Latino enrollment, 71 percent are poor and 48 percent have limited English skills. Yet 87.7 percent of Latinos there receive a high school diploma in four years. In Albuquerque public schools, comprising the largest district in the state, only 37 percent of Latinos graduated in four years.

The Task Force has forged partnerships with statewide grassroots groups, unions, legislators, unions and administrators to sign on to their mission. Recently the group approached Gov.

Bill Richardson asking for endorsement of six initiatives that included declaring a state of crisis, making changes in the Department of Education and funding this community-based task force to train parents and educators throughout the state to redirect schools priorities.

The governor approved all six initiatives, promising stimulus monies to fund the project. Richardson also pledged to make education reform his priority for the remaining 17 months of his tenure as governor.

But, given that New Mexico has risen only from 50th to 48th position among U.S. states in its dropouts rate, there’s still a long ways to go. Task Force member Adrian Pedroza says he hopes that before Richardson’s eight-year term ends, change might finally get started. Hispanic Link.

by the El Reportero’s news services

Daniel Ortega

Nicaragua celebrated on Monday, July 20, 2009, the 30t Anniversary of the Sandinista Revolution.

But for Dora Maria Téllez, her achievements as a Sandinista guerrilla commander 30 years ago earned her a place in the pantheon of Nicaragua’s revolutionary heroes.

But while thousands will flood the streets of Managua tomorrow to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Sandinista victory over the ­dictator Anastasio Somoza, Dora Maria Téllez will stay away.

Ms Téllez is one of a growing number of Sandinistas who have broken with the government of Daniel Ortega as, they say, he completes his transformation from revolutionary to “caudillo” — one of the Latin American despots he once so despised.

“We are nearing a dictatorship,” Ms Téllez told The Times. “He is concentrating power, buying officials, eliminating institutions, creating the conditions to advance his own authoritarian project.All that he needs now is to remain in power,” she said in a reference to Mr Ortega’s plans for constitutional reform allowing him to stand for re-election when his term expires.

“He needs only parliamentary approval to do so,” she noted, adding: “He doesn’t have the votes yet, but he is close. And he will buy the ones he needs.”

(Reported Hannah Strange in Managua in Managua).

Honduras talks break up without deal

On July 19 the mediation talks between the de facto and elected governments of Honduras broke up without an agreement.

The sticking point was the de facto government’s refusal to countenance the return of President Manuel Zelaya as president, even as a president shorn of a lot of his powers and under international supervision.

This hard line looks like a mistake because it enabled the elected president Manuel Zelaya, who has previously fl oundered in the PR battle, to claim that his opponents were “arrogant” and “intransigent”.

Honduras’ de facto leader came under increased pressure on Monday July 20 to hand power back to the ousted president with Europe halting economic aid and top Latin American officials warning of bloodshed if he does not back down.

Efforts to broker an end to the power struggle in Honduras following a June 28 military coup collapsed on Sunday after interim leader Roberto Micheletti rejected a proposal to reinstate overthrown President Manuel Zelaya.

Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, the frustrated peacemaker in the talks, asked both sides to give him until Wednesday to broker a solution to the crisis. But Micheletti, who was appointed by Honduras’ Congress after the coup, appeared unwilling to compromise despite being shunned by foreign governments.

Now come the regional implications of the Honduras coup.

The almost slow-motion coup that led to the elected Zelaya, leaving his palace for the airport and exile in his pyjamas and at gunpoint was condemned by every government

in the region and every multilateral organization that mattered. But, as this is written,

almost three weeks later, Zelaya looks as far from being restored as he was when he was ousted.

However, papers around Latin America have reported that Zelaya has started to organize an insurrection, which according to the Honduran Constitution, said the ousted president, the people has the right to lift up in arms against the illegitimate government.

The European Commission tightened the screws on Micheletti on Monday by suspending all budgetary 5support payments to his government.

It had earmarked 65.5 million euros ($92.73 million) in payments in the 2007-10 period.

As the interim government digs in its heels, more diplomatic and economic sanctions are expected in coming days. Latin American leaders fear violence in the impoverished Central American country unless Micheletti steps aside.

­García battens down the hatches in cabinet reshuffle

Peru’s President Alan García has entrusted the formation of a new cabinet to Javier Velásquez Quesquén, the head of congress and a stalwart member of the ruling Partido Aprista Peruano (PAP), after Yehude Simon presented his irrevocable resignation. Velásquez Quesquén duly appointed seven new ministers while holding on to nine members of Simon’s cabinet. His appointment was roundly condemned by the opposition, trade unions and indigenous groups for failing to address the causes of the regional social protests which brought down Simon. (Latin News and World News contribute to the report.)

­

Major victory for Army warrior questioning Obama’s birthplacenúmero

by Chelsea Schilling © 2009 WorldNetDaily

A U.S. Army Reserve major from Florida scheduled to report for deployment to Afghanistan within days has had his military orders revoked after he argued that he should not be required to serve under a president who has not proven his legitimacy for office.

His attorney, Orly Taitz, confirmed to WND the military has rescinded his impending deployment orders.

“We won! We won before we even arrived,” she said with excitement. “It means that the military has nothing to show for Obama. It means that the military has directly responded by saying Obama is illegitimate – and they cannot fight it. Therefore, they are revoking the order!”

She continued, “They just said, ‘Order revoked.’ No explanation. No reasons – just revoked.”

A hearing on the questions raised by Maj. Stefan Frederick Cook, an engineer who told WND he wants to serve his country in Afghanistan, was scheduled for July 16 at 9:30 a.m.

Join the petition campaign to make President Obama reveal his long-form, hospital-generated birth certificate!

“As an officer in the armed forces of the United States, it is [my] duty to gain clarification on any order we may believe illegal. With that said, if President Obama is found not to be a ‘natural-born citizen,’ he is not eligible to be commander-in-chief,” he told WND only hours after the case was filed.

”[Then] any order coming out of the presidency or his chain of command is illegal. Should I deploy, I would essentially be following an illegal [order]. If I happened to be captured by the enemy in a foreign land, I would not be privy to the Geneva Convention protections,” he said.

The order for the hearing in the federal court for the Middle District of Georgia from U.S. District Judge Clay D. Land said the hearing on the request for a temporary restraining order would be held Thursday.

Want to turn up the pressure to learn the facts? Get your signs and postcards asking for the president’s birth certificate documentation here.

Cook said without a legitimate president as commander-in-chief, members of the U.S. military in overseas actions could be determined to be “war criminals and subject to prosecution.”

He said the vast array of information about Obama that is not available to the public confirms to him that “something is amiss.”

“That and the fact the individual who is occupying the White House has not been entirely truthful with anybody,” he said. “Every time anyone has made an inquiry, it has been either cast aside, it has been maligned, it has been laughed at or just dismissed summarily without further investigation.

“You know what. It would be so simple to solve. Just produce the long-form  document, certificate of live birth,” he said.

He said he was scheduled to report for duty tomorrow, on July 15, to deploy to Afghanistan as part of President Obama’s plan to increase pressure of insurgent forces there.

He told WND he would be prepared for a backlash against him as a military officer, since members of the military swear to uphold and follow their orders. However, he noted that following an illegal order would be just as bad as failing to follow a legal order.

Named as defendants in the case are Col. Wanda Good, Col. Thomas Macdonald, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Obama, described as “de facto president of the United States.

According to the court filing, Cook affirmed when he joined the military, he took the following oath: “I, Stefan Frederick Cook, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the president of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to the regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.”

According to the claim, “Plaintiff submits that it is implicit though not expressly stated that an officer is and should be subject to court-martial, 1because he will be derelict

in the performance of his duties, if he does not inquire as to the lawfulness, ­the legality, the legitimacy of the orders which he has received, whether those orders are specific or general.“

The military courts offer no option for raising the question, so he turned to civilian courts to consider “a question of paramount constitutional and legal importance: the validity of the chain of command under a president whose election, eligibility, and constitutional status appear open to serious question.”

“Barack Hussein Obama, in order to prove his constitutional eligibility to serve as president, basically needs only produce a single unique historical document for the Plaintiff’s inspection and authentication: namely, the ‘long-form’ birth certificate which will confirm whether Barack Hussein Obama was in fact born to parents who were both citizens of the United States in Honolulu, Hawaii, in or about 1961,” explains the complaint.

Taitz said she will attend the hearing to amend the temporary restraining order to an injunction because more members of the military have joined the cause.

“We are going to be asking for release of Obama’s records because now this completely undermines the military.

It revoked this order, but it can come up with another order tomorrow.

It can come up with orders for other people,” she said. “Am I going to be flying around the country 1,000 times and paying the fees every time they issue an order?”

Taitz said the issue “must be resolved immediately,” and she will continue working to ensure Obama proves he is eligible for office.

“We’re going to be asking the judge to issue an order for Obama to provide his vital records to show he is legitimately president,” she said.

“We’re going to say, we have orders every day, and we’ll have revocations every day.

This issue has to be decided.”

She said there cannot be any harm to the president if he is legitimately holding office.

“If he is legitimate, then his vital records will prove it,” Taitz said. “If he is illegitimate,

then he should not have been there in the first place.”

Asked what this decision means for every other serviceman who objects to deployment under a president who has not proven he is eligible for office, Taitz responded: “Now, we can have each and every member of the military – each and every enlistee and officer – file something similar saying ‘I will not take orders until Obama is legitimately vetted.’”

Multiple questions have been raised about what that would mean to the 2008 election, to the orders and laws Obama has signed and other issues, including whether he then is a valid commander-in-chief of the military.

The question over Obama’s eligibility now also is being raised on billboards nationwide.