On The Edge Of War: The Latest Russian And Ukraine Troop Movements
Blacklisted News
May 3, 2014
Source: Zero Hedge
If Putin needed a pretext to finally drive across the Ukraine border, he got it today following first the death of nearly 40 pro-Russian protesters in Odessa during a confrontation between pro-Russia and pro-Kiev forces, and then, what appears to be a storming in progress right now by the Ukraine national guard of yet another separatist-controlled city in east Ukraine: Kramatorsk.
According to RT, Ukraine’s National Guard is storming the eastern town of Kramatorsk even as it has also resumed its special operation in Slavyansk, where two soldiers have been killed.
“The assault is starting now,” a Kramatorsk self-defense activist has told RIA Novosti by phone. Another activist told the news agency that the National Guard opened fire on self-defense forces.
Dozens have been killed or injured in Kramatorsk, a doctor told RIA Novosti. The medic added that the fighting has now stopped and all of those injured have been taken to hospitals in Kramatorsk and Slavyansk. At least two died on the way to the hospital, she said.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian military’s special operation has resumed in the nearby town of Slavyansk. The headquarters of the people’s self-defense is under snipers’ fire, according to Itar-Tass. There are reports of injuries among protesters.
Recall that Putin has made it very clear that all the Kremlin needs to green light an operation in Ukraine is a pretext of “self-defense” for the pro-Russian citizens currently there being attacked by the local military, something which if the tables were turned, would have been classified as a civil war by the impartial western media.
So what does the theater of operations look like should Russia finally get involved?
The Washington Post is publishing a new map that shows, using information from the Royal United Services Institute, recent troop movements in the region. The graphic illustrates how military exercises conducted by Russia have left a big build-up of troops on Ukraine’s border. It also shows Ukraine’s own military moves to its borders with Russia and Moldova’s Russian-dominated enclave, Transnistria.
[hat tip: What Really Happened]
Family sues California deputies who beat and pepper sprayed man with Down syndrome — video included
The Raw Story
May 3, 2014
A California family filed suit in Vista Superior Court Thursday alleging that in December of 2012, county sheriff’s deputies brutalized their son and brother, 21-year-old Antonio Martinez, who has Down Syndrome and functions at the level of a 7-year-old.
The San Diego Union-Tribune reported that Martinez’s two sisters and father are suing for unspecified damages, alleging battery, negligence, false arrest, civil rights violations, and emotional distress.
On the night of December 18, 2012, Deputy Jeffrey Guy was responding to a domestic disturbance call when he caught sight of Martinez, who was flipping up the hood of his sweatshirt while walking to his family’s bakery.
Guy ordered the 4-foot-11 Martinez to stop, but Martinez continued to walk in the direction of the bakery. According to the lawsuit, Guy then confronted Martinez and “unloaded a canister of highly irritating pepper spray into Tony’s face and eyes,” then drove him to the ground and beat him with a tactical baton.
[…CONTINUE READING THIS ARTICLE and see the included video]
[hat tip: WhatReallyHappened]
VIDEO — Kramatorsk Op: City encircled, fighting raging, reports of shooting at civilians
RT
May 3, 2014
APC can be seen rolling through the streets of Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine. Reports are coming of several deaths.
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Poorly Designed Meta-Analysis on Homeopathy Fails to Prove Anything
The Truther Girls’ Blog
Apr 16, 2014
I recently found my friends posting the following article about a meta-analysis ‘proving’ that homeopathy doesn’t work. This was followed by comments like ‘I love science’ and ‘surprise, surprise’, and equating a degree in homeopathy with a degree in baloney. But what has this meta-analysis really proven and where is the real baloney?
The conclusions of the meta-analysis were that:
‘“No good-quality, well-designed studies with enough participants for a meaningful result reported either that homeopathy caused greater health improvements than a substance with no effect on the health condition (placebo), or that homeopathy caused health improvements equal to those of another treatment,” the report’s summary states.
Read more at http://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/meta-study-confirms-homeopathy-doesnt-work#JbvdfGJSQxZ17fMD.99
HP versus Pharma: Two Very Different Approaches to Medicine
One key issue here may be what the allopathic scientific community considers to be ‘good quality, well designed studies’. The standard one-size-fits-all methodology used for testing pharmaceutical drugs would inherently be inadequate for a study on any homeopathic drug except for commercial preparations sold for specific ailments, which are known to be the least effective homeopathic treatments.
This is because homeopathy is an entirely different system of medicine, with an approach that is opposite to that of chemical pharmaceutical treatments. Confused? I will try to explain.
In standard clinical trials with pharmaceutical agents, a specific chemical drug is tested in a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled study. This is necessary to determine the specific effectiveness of that product for any given ailment, while eliminating bias in the recipients and those administering the drug. It must be tested against a placebo because the simple act of believing you are taking a remedy can have an effect on your physical condition, so that aspect has to be factored in for consideration. The person administering the drug and studying its effects must not know who has taken it and who has taken a placebo, or they may be subject to biased reporting. It is understood that each drug is being studied for a specific desired effect which, if it is effective, it should have on a substantial proportion of recipients. Everyone gets the same drug for the same illness. It’s a one-size-fits-all approach.
Homeopathy is fundamentally different in that treatment takes into consideration not only a specific, targeted ailment, but also the person as a whole: their constitution, their life and medical history, physical traits, personality, temperament, habits and tendencies and anything else that can be used to build as complete a picture of the individual as possible. There are thousands of remedies to choose from, made from everything in nature from minerals, to plant materials, to animal sources. Many remedies can be used to address a specific ailment such as a skin problem or anxiety, but the homeopath chooses the one that is best matched to the person as a whole. For example, a person whose anxiety comes on with dizziness would receive a different remedy than a person whose attacks come on with sweating. A person with a social, sanguine disposition would receive a different remedy than a shy, withdrawn individual.
Homeopathic Specifics
There are homeopathic remedies known as ‘specifics’, which are used to treat specific ailments such as cocculus for nausea or aconite for fever, but even in the cases where these are used, dosing strength (potency) and frequency are tailored to the individual based on their constitution. A person with a frail constitution would receive a lower potency than a person with a robust one. Some pharmaceutical medications interfere with the effectiveness of HP remedies, and some people do not respond to HP or take longer to respond. Once you understand how this system works, it is easy to see how it would be impossible to judge the value of homeopathy as a whole with a standard one-size-fits all approach for any given homeopathic remedy or administration procedure.
Now let’s look at the new meta-analysis, which you can see here:
The above meta-analysis reviewed a number of meta-analyses and a number of individual conditions for which these had reviewed the effectiveness of HP.
Evidence Shows Homeopathy for Ottitis Media As Effective as Standard Treatment and Better than Placebo- But That’s Still Not Proof Enough
If you look at the data on HP treatment of otitis media (ear infections), you will find that the results were that:
In all studies with comparison to standard treatment with antibiotics, there was found to be no difference in treatment outcomes for pain, duration of illness, and improvement in hearing loss. In other words, HP was as effective as standard treatment. In studies against placebo, evidence was found in favor of homeopathic treatment. Evidence was also found in favor of HP versus standard treatment when it came to a couple of specific outcome measures.
Still, it was concluded that there is not enough evidence to recommend HP treatment. This is not the same as having proven that homeopathy does not work.
Let’s look at one of the contibuting meta-analyses that did not find evidence in favor of HP. Altunc et al (2007) which examined HP treatment of ‘childhood and adolescent ailments’ including ADHD (section 4.2.4 in the document), and concluded that “the evidence from rigorous clinical trials of any type of therapeutic or preventive intervention testing homeopathy for childhood and adolescence ailments is not convincing enough for recommendations in any condition”. (Altunc et al (2007)
What did they actually analyze? They looked at data from 16 studies on nine different ailments and noted that ‘with the exception of ADHD and diarrhoea (three primary studies each), no condition was assessed in more than two double-blind Level II studies.’ In other words, they took together data from studies on nine different conditions, on the majority of which no more than one or two studies had been done, lumped them all together, and concluded that there was not enough convincing evidence that homeopathic practice was effective. It seems to me that, from the outset, the design of this study was bound to fail to produce conclusive results of any kind.
There was one study included each on warts, conjunctivitis, otitis media, post-operative pain-agitation syndrome, two each on asthma, recurrent URTI (upper respiratory tract infections) and adenoid vegetation, and three on asthma and ADHD.
Can you imagine if a meta-analysis examined this number of studies on this number of various conditions, treated with different pharmaceutical agents, and concluded that there is not enough evidence to convince them that pharmaceutical drugs have any effect? It would be laughable.
Let’s look at the data they included on studies with ADHD, which was one of the two condition for which three studies were considered (although I would hardly call an examination of three studies a meta-analysis). These include Frei et al, 2005, Freitas et al, 1995, and Jacobs et al, 2005. Two out of three of these studies showed intergroup differences in favor of the effectiveness of HP over placebo.
Jacobs et al, 2005: This study found no intergroup differences and included ‘43 children with confirmed ADHD diagnosis (computerised Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children) with mean age of 9 years. 9 participants were already taking
stimulant medication but still displaying symptoms (n=5 active, n=4 placebo)’. Description is from Cochrane Review.
Stimulants are well-known to interfere with the action of homeopathic treatment for ADHD. Even if the child is not presently on stimulants, having previously been treated with them can affect how well they will respond and how long it will take to get a response. Including some kids who were on Ritalin during the trial would be a bit like including subjects who are on Suboxone in a trial on opiate painkillers, the effects of which this medication is known to nullify.
Odessa Massacre Pushes Ukraine to the Edge
by Tony Cartalucci
New Eastern Outlook
May 3, 2014
Western headlines have attempted to spin into ambiguity the death of over 30 anti-fascist Ukrainian protesters cornered and burned to death in the Trade Unions House in the southern port city of Odessa. The arson was carried out by Neo-Nazi mobs loyal to the unelected regime now occupying Kiev.
Both the London Guardian and the BBC attempted in their coverage to make the perpetrators and circumstances as ambiguous as possible before revealing paragraphs down that pro-regime mobs had indeed torched the building. And even still, the Western press has attempted to omit the presence of Right Sector, the militant wing of the current regime charged with carrying out political intimidation and violence against Kiev’s opponents.
Odessa, north of pro-Russian Crimea, and far west of where clashes are now taking place in eastern Ukraine, has also been a point of contention between Kiev and Ukrainians who refuse to recognize the unelected regime’s authority.
Right Sector, a Neo-Nazi militant group who spearheaded the so-called “Euromaidan” protests, has been visibly operating in Odessa in recent weeks. It’s primary role has been to attack and intimidate political opponents planning to run in upcoming elections. It was therefore already present an well established in Odessa ahead of the attack on the Trade Unions House resulting in dozens of deaths in a single day, and as part of a wider campaign to put down multiplying unrest erupting across the country.
Right Sector can be identified by its members openly wearing Nazi insignia, as well as carrying crimson and black banners. Mobs supporting the Svoboda party are also present among recent clashes, wearing yellow armbands with the Nazi wolfangel symbol upon them.
For NATO – War or Nothing?
The clashes in Odessa in the south and Slavyansk in the east, appear to some to be part of an escalating conflict meant to lure neighboring Russia into a direct conflict with the NATO-backed regime in Kiev. While this is possible, a repeat of the 2008 Georgia-South Ossetia War would most likely take place, with superior Russian forces quickly overwhelming Ukrainian troops and leaving Kiev vulnerable to inevitable regime change.
Immensely unpopular and wholly illegitimate, the regime in Kiev stands little chance in any upcoming election. It is also faced with the self-imposed economic ruination of Ukraine, after willfully accepting IMF conditions which include crippling austerity measures that will only further diminish the regime’s support and stability.
With a socioeconomically hobbled Ukraine still reeling from the loss of Crimea, the “Ukraine” the US and EU had invested in through their “Euromaidan” putsch, no longer exists. With anti-fascist, pro-Russian sentiment running high across what remains of Ukraine (and around the world), and an unpopular regime teetering precariously in Kiev, the West appears instead, intent on burning the country rather than leave it a stable and beneficial neighbor for Russia.
World Affairs Journal has recently lamented in an article titled, “Beyond Crimea: What Vladimir Putin Really Wants,” that:
Ukraine is lost. At least lost as many of us had once imagined it—as a potential member of the European Union and, perhaps one day, of NATO.
This sentiment has been repeated across NATO’s corporate-funded think-tank, the Atlantic Council which recently hosted its “Europe Whole and Free” forum – where the expansion of both the European Union and NATO were the focus. The disruption of this expansion, and perhaps even the threat of its reversal appears to weigh foremost on the minds of Western policy makers.
Creating a disaster along Russia’s borders in Ukraine, while attempting to make progress elsewhere, and thus alleviating itself from the promises it made the regime in Kiev upon its accession to power to “rebuild” Ukraine’s troubled economy, appears to be the current agenda.
Responsibility to Protect?
The United States had used the “responsibility to protect” doctrine as cover for regime change in Libya, and attempted regime change in Syria. All the while it was fabricating atrocities to sway public opinion, it was in reality fueling sectarian extremists who were in reality carrying out the crimes against humanity the West was accusing Libya and Syria of perpetrating in fiction. This formula has been spun around in Ukraine.
Now the West is expending resources to cover up atrocities to prevent the “responsibility to protect” from being invoked against them. The massacre in Odessa would have been marked as a turning point by the West for military intervention had it not been their own proxies who carried it out. Instead, the US has claimed, according to the BBC, that ongoing violence carried out by the regime in Kiev is “proportionate and reasonable.”
With the West not only covering up the atrocities being carried out by the regime in Kiev, but in fact aiding and abetting them, the violence will only escalate further. Beyond Odessa, helicopter gunships, armored columns, and special forces have been sent by Kiev into eastern Ukraine and are attempting to overrun and occupy towns and cities that refuse to recognize the unelected regime. This includes the city of Slavyansk where deaths have been reported on both sides and military aircraft have been shot down.
Ukraine is being pushed to the edge of a much larger and destructive conflict that if started, may be difficult to stop. If the West commits to a proxy war and has been able to mobilize enough militants to carry it out, it can leave Ukraine a destabilized failed state Russia may spend years managing. Russia’s attempts to deescalate the conflict have been met only by belligerence from the West. Its patience, and the patience of pro-Russian factions in Ukraine may be the only factor that helps push Ukraine back from that edge.
Tony Cartalucci, Bangkok-based geopolitical researcher and writer, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.
VIDEO — Molotovs, stun grenades in Ukraine’s Odessa as pro- and anti-Maidan rallies clash
RT
May 2, 2014
Injuries have been reported as hundreds of people from rival rallies clash in Ukraine’s port-city of Odessa. A pro-unity demonstration, which included nationalists and football fans, ran into a rally preaching greater autonomy for the regions – READ MORE http://on.rt.com/rh364u
[related RT videos:
- Fierce street battles in Odessa, Ukraine as pro- & anti-Kiev demos clash
- Slavyanks self-defenders guard barricades, prepare for ‘Kiev offensive’
- Ukraine army helicopter flying low over Slavyanks during ‘special op’
- Ukraine troops storm east Slavyansk with helicopters, APCs ]
Courtesy: Lera Ivashkina https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnW1…
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Woman Kidnapped, Strip Searched, and Thrown in a Cage for an Unpaid Parking Ticket — video included
by Matt Savoy
The Free Thought Project
May 2, 2014
The nature of the state is simple; with a monopoly on the use of force, your compliance with their laws, no matter how arbitrary, will be mandated and upheld with the threat or use of violence.
The police, while ostensibly there for you protection, is a facet of this institution reliant on the use of violence to maintain its monopoly. The majority of police departments have become nothing but revenue collection agencies, enforcing arbitrary laws written for victimless crimes.
Consider this example, while it may sound extreme, it is the standard procedure of the escalation of violence to achieve state compliance. A police officer, also known as revenue collection agent, sees you without your seat-belt on. You are pulled over and told that you must now pay them money as the state claims the ability to steal money from yo
u for capricious reasons that they refer to as “laws.”
If you refuse to be extorted in such an overt manner and do not pay this racketeering gang of thieves, their next step is to elevate their use of force; you will now be kidnapped and thrown in a cage.
When these armed thugs bust into your home in the middle of the night to kidnap you for not paying them because they saw you without your seat-belt on, and you resist, they will assert their ‘just authority’ and end your life.
As you lie there in a pool of you and your spouse’s blood, the last thought that goes through your head is, “Wow, these guys are really adamant about stealing money from folks for not causing harm to anyone.”
Yes it seems wild and crazy, but the reality of the situation remains; the escalation of violence is the only means by which the state maintains its “authority” over you and forces your compliance.
PN 