Monday, March 31, 2008

Insanity Plea, or How to Deny Everything

So, we have the CDC, AAP, FDA, AMA, and SCA (Society for Creative Analysis, otherwise known as mainstream media) marketing the hell out of the genetics/better diagnosis angle for the cause of autism. Where are these people getting these ideas?

First, there has to be money to allow for the 'studies' being touted that assure the public that autism isn't also caused by the one thing that makes BILLIONS of dollars each year for a certain private sector industry. Then there has to be a way to keep mouths shut, more money to keep the talkers quiet. Oh yeah, if all the experts work for us, then they can't really speak against us. Problem is, we need people who are experts running the alphabet soup agencies.

Hmm, so what we do is rotate our employees through the government positions, get them to approve funding for the things we want, (like getting the government to purchase billions of dollars worth of medicines that aren't tested for safety or if they actually solve a particular problem) deny any possible negligence, and get the other branches of the government to approve laws that keep the public from suing us. Then rotate them back into the corporate fold, give them raises based on how well they did keeping the business working. Rinse and repeat.

Along comes the Patriot Act! Yay Patriot Act! Yay! We can sneak a BUNCH of legislation into that whopper of a bill and no one will look twice since we all want to be safe from terrorists, and anyone who actually wants to read the bill must be anti-american or a terrorist, so there. . .

Can you sense the sarcasm here!? The folks over at Naked Authors are all about sarcasm too.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Follow the Money

Okay, we've established the fact that my son regressed into autism. We've established that the recovery of my son is very expensive. Hmm, I guess we haven't established that yet.

My wife and I are both educated professionals. She has an MBA and I have been working in IT and graphic arts for more than 10 years and have an AAB and a Occupational Associates Degree, (which is basically a trade certificate). Right now, I'm working, (we've swapped off every few years to allow each other a break) and I make a fair amount of money. With what we spend on my son's treatments, supplements, and therapies, we're barely making ends meet. Can't give more specifics, but we don't have a retirement plan, only have emergency insurance for my son, (haven't found an insurance plan that covers ANY of our therapies, treatments, or supplements), basic insurance for me, (free with the company I'm with, but again doesn't cover most of the things we do to stay healthy), and my wife is flying without insurance at ALL! No 401K, no IRAs, about $500 in savings, give or take, we live paycheck to paycheck.

Now, as my son gets better, we've been able to give up some of his supplements, but most of the time, we just end up having to get something new that replaces the last thing, or we have to have some other therapy or procedure that costs thousands of dollars, (he's got to have dental work done now because his teeth are having problems, which will cost us around $3000).

Okay, so we're not completely broke, but this is expensive. I've also been reading "The Chelation Kid" a comic about a family with a boy on the spectrum. They've got the same issues we've got, but are having even worse problems paying the bills!

So let's move on to the whole Biomedical vs. Genetic issue. Follow the money!

First, for those in the cheap seats, here's the issue:

On the Biomedical side there are parents that believe the Autism has a biomedical cause, namely mercury, but I'm going to expand that to general environmental toxicity or in easy words, I think we're pooping in our own drinking water. This includes mercury in ANY form, which spews from coal-fired power plants, gets used in vaccinations via Thimerisol, (hence the vaccine issue), is in all of those new efficient light bulbs, and is used in the creation of munitions for our military, (mercury fulminate). Aluminum, which is used to 'whiten' all your white foods, like cream cheese, white american cheese they use at Subway, etc. If the food needs whitened, it has aluminum or titanium, (or both) in it.

Really.

Let's see. . . oh yeah. . . antimony, used in fire retardant for furniture, including baby mattresses. . . yep yours too. Look it up. It's right next to Arsenic on the periodic table. Hell, pull out an old chemistry book, flip to that periodic table and start reading off the elements, if you can read it, it's being used somewhere in the average household. Oh yeah, arsenic, used in treated lumber to keep bugs out. I'm not lying!

If you don't believe me, start reading labels!

On the other side is the CDC, FDA, (insert lots of acronym agencies here) and Legislative and Executive Branch of our government, (they get their own mention because they have been creating laws based on information from the other agencies). The official stance of our government is that Autism is caused genetically, and that the increase in diagnosis of cases in Autism is the wider definition of Autism and a wider recognition of the symptoms.

Huh?

So, another way for the government to say this is that we are experiencing a genetic epidemic. We'll look at the numbers for the epidemic in a minute.

If it's that the recognition has gone up, why not tell us where all of the 30 to 50 year old Autistic people that should exist are hidden if it's just better diagnosis. . .

Okay, the numbers for the genetic epidemic. . . hmm. . . wait, aren't those the same numbers collected by the CDC? Can we take a peek at those numbers? No? Why not?

Most of the key people working at the CDC have come from Pharmaceutical Companies! That's like making the executives from tobacco companies pay for their own research into the causes of cancer! Wait. . . didn't we do that already?

What about putting auto manufacturers in charge of safety testing their own vehicles! Wait. . .

I know. . . how about putting the inmates in charge of the mental hospital? Wait. . .

Saturday, March 8, 2008

David Kirby's Article on Huffington Post

I had to interject this so that the few people that read this blog can check out some news from our world.


Posted March 7, 2008 01:33 PM (EST)
A big autism bomb went off yesterday, about how US medical personnel had determined that vaccines had aggravated a little girl's mitochondrial disorder, resulting in autism. Now, the American people are left to interpret what it all means.
Here is a handy guide. You can:

A) Blindly trust what government officials are saying (or not saying)

or

B) Invest 30 minutes in the future of your nation's young people (do it now, over a nice, warm latte!) and go Google for yourself.

OPTION A:

Yesterday, Dr Paul E. Jarris, Executive Director of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials (ASTHO) sent an email to his colleague, Anna DeBlois, on how officials should respond to the glaring headlines emanating from Atlanta.

"You may have seen the recent media interest in a vaccine-autism lawsuit which was settled by the federal government," he wrote. Apparently, someone in the federal government had reached Dr. Jarris and told him to pass on the following (internal) explanation:

The case was settled because the vaccine worsened the child's underlying and previously undiagnosed disorder, causing impaired brain function. These symptoms of impaired brain function then led to an autism spectrum disorder. The federal government maintains that vaccines do not cause autism, and that this case does not indicate any change in their position on the issue.


TRANSLATION (An Anti-Syllogism): "Vaccines cause brain impairment, and brain impairments cause autism. Therefore vaccines do not cause autism."

Meanwhile yesterday, back in Washington, Bush administration officials would not comment on the case, saying they needed permission, "from the person who submitted the information" to the court.

TRANSLATION (Auto-Censorship): "We really, really want to explain WHY we folded like a tent without so much as a whisper of a defense, but that would require asking permission from our lawyer (the DOJ), which we are unwilling to do.

And most recently, CDC Director Julie Gerberding told the media that the American people need to "set aside this very isolated, unusual situation," even though "the court apparently made the decision that it is fair to say that vaccinations may have been one of the precipitators."

TRANSLATION: (Middlebrow Bureaucratese) "I am either an exceedingly ignorant, untruthful or misleading Director, because there is no evidence at all that this situation is 'isolated and unusual' (indeed, the evidence points to the opposite), and because the court 'decision' was not made by the court at all, but rather by medical doctors who work for the US Secretary of Health and Human Services," otherwise known as Dr. Gerberding's boss.

OPTION B)

Google "autism and mitochondria," (96,900 hits) and then Google "mercury and mitochondria," (169,000 hits) and draw your own, informed conclusions.

Now, enjoy your coffee (and your good citizenship).

PS: The next time someone tells you that this girl does not have autism, but only the "symptoms" of autism, you tell them that the definition of autism is having the symptoms of autism. Period. Hannah Poling has autism as defined by every medical book, on every shelf, in every library -- including at the colleges where all these government officials received their degrees.