Friday, December 20, 2013

World Food Supply Threat

In case you have been asleep in Sleeping Beauty's castle for a century or so, there are other threats, besides climate change, to our future world supply and our freedom and life itself. 

One of these other threats to all of the above is the Monsanto Corporation. 

"How", you might ask, "Can a mere chemical corporation be such a threat to our food supply, freedom and our lives"?

One of the names for this threat by Monsanto, is called, "frankenseeds". Monsanto is not satisfied with the money they already make. They make more by making genetically altered seed for food crops. Part of the alterations they make to the seeds is by making them pesticide and herbicide resistant. 

This does not sound that sinister at first. The nastiness of this Monsanto tactic takes a bit to really understand how bad it is. 

By making the seeds resistant to pesticides and herbicides, farmers are forced to spray the H out of their crops in order to compete with other farmers.

You may already dislike eating lots of pesticides on your food because of well-known health risks. The sneaky part about the herbicide resistance is that since the plants are resistant to herbicides, Monsanto can sell enormously larger amounts of herbicides. This kills off the weeds that are not resistant to herbicides. Some weeds that are already somewhat resistant to herbicides reproduce and make bigger and stronger weeds, which allows Monsanto to sell even more herbicides. Monsanto makes stronger herbicides and more herbicide resistant food seeds.... and so on.

There are several delayed bombs in this Monsanto approach. One is that it can take a lifetime on longer to begin to fully understand the health damage caused by eating chemicals. The US Food and Drug Administration, or FDA, does not test for effects that take that long, not even close.

Another delayed Monsanto bomb is the genetic changes in the food plants they develop to be resistant to their herbicide and pesticide chemicals. Genetic materials from all sorts of plants and animals are used to make the Monsanto Frankenseeds. Rattlesnakes, insects, and lots of other unsavory things can turn up in Frankenseeds. 

Even if you don't mind what kinds of genetic materials show up on your plate, your own body and those of your children and grandchildren may not be happy.

Every generation of people has more people in it who have allergies than the last generation. There are no labels on Frankenseeds to let you know that it has genetic material in it from something that you are allergic to. 

Some people are so allergic to a particular food that they go into anaphylactic shock when they eat even a tiny amount of that food. Some people who are allergic to peanuts can die from eating something that is prepared in a factory that ever made food with peanuts in it. 

Allergies to a particular food like peanuts can get worse with time. Someone can have only a slight problem when they eat the peanuts or other allergen and have a worse problem every time they eat something with the allergen in it. This can continue until they go into anaphylactic shock. 

Here is the definition of anaphylactic shock: Anaphylaxis 
Definition
Anaphylaxis is a rapidly progressing, life-threatening allergic reaction.
Description
Anaphylaxis is a type of allergic reaction, in which the immune system responds to otherwise harmless substances from the environment. Unlike other allergic reactions, however, anaphylaxis can kill. Reaction may begin within minutes or even seconds of exposure, and rapidly progress to cause airway constriction, skin and intestinal irritation, and altered heart rhythms. In severe cases, it can result in complete airway obstruction, shock, and death.

This definition comes from this site: http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Anaphylaxis

There is more about anaphylactic shock on the same page in case you want to find out more.

As if all the above is not bad enough, there is an even greater danger to us, our freedom and our lives. That is random genetic changes in plants. 

Pollen from a Frankenseed can be carried by the wind, or insects or birds to other plants that are not Frankenseeds. You can be minding your own business eating organic broccoli and go into anaphylactic shock because it was exposed to a bee that buzzed into a field of Frankenseeds with, who knows what genetic material in them.

One of the sneakiest bad effects of Frankenseeds is to our freedom. Monsanto and other nasty giant companies are busy patenting their seeds. They can sue you for growing plants that have their patented genetic material from their Frankenseeds in them. They have done this to organic farmers whose seeds were contaminated with pollen from the Frankenseeds planted nearby. Many organic farmers have been put out of business by lawsuits of this sort. 

This is only the beginning. The Frankenseeds are engineered to be sterile. This means you can not save seed and grow more next year. Every year you have to buy more Frankenseeds from Monsanto and their buddies. 

What do you think will happen to the price of seeds and food as more and more people are forced out of business and Monsanto and their buddies are the only ones left?

Thursday, December 12, 2013

Medicinal Herb Use In the Bible

Most Christians are unaware that Gd told us all over the Bible that he made herbs to heal our ailments and that we are meant to use them for that purpose. 

Please feel free to ignore this post if you are not Christian. It is intended for Christians who only like things they can find in the Bible. 

I don't have any problem with only liking what you find in Gd's Word. I just think it is not a good idea to be that way if you don't bother to find out what is in Gd's Word. The stuff in Gd's Word about herbs starts in Genesis, but the part that caught my attention about it comes later. 

It was where Daniel and three other young Hebrew men were held prisoner by the Babylonians. The Hebrew men did not want to be defiled by eating and drinking the rich food and drinks of the Babylonians. They asked to eat plain vegetables and drink water instead. 

The Babylonian in charge of their care let them demonstrate the effectiveness of their chosen diet for ten days. After the ten day test period, the four young Hebrew prisoners had gained more weight and looked healthier than those who ate the usual Babylonian diet.

The Bible verse that convinced me to study this matter more was Psalms 104: verse 14. "He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, and vegetation for the service of man, That he may bring food from the earth. This is from the New King James translation of the Bible. Looking this up in Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible is difficult. 

This is because Nelson's 1982 NKJV says "vegetation", which is not listed in Strongs. I was able to find it in Strongs by looking up "service", which is in the same verse. Service, in Strong's has the word, "herbs" instead of vegetation for the same verse. :Herbs, in that verse, is listed as word number 6212 in the Hebrew dictionary part of Strong's.

Herb, as word number 6212 in Strongs, says: " 'eseb, eh'seb; from an unused root meaning, to glisten (or be green); grass (or any tender shoot):- grass, herb.

I will tell you that the word, "herb" is listed in Strong's 19 times and the word, "herbs" is listed 18 times. The reason I tell you this is because words in the Bible can give you an idea of their importance to Gd by how many times they are used. This is quite a bit compared to many other words.

If you honestly care about knowing what Gd wants to tell you, it is a heads up, when a word is mentioned as often as, "herb" or "herbs". 

I have mentioned that it is good to know about medicinal uses of herbs for emergency preparedness, but I like to use them all the time. I don't simply stash herbs in some corner for emergency use only. Part of my reason for this is because of what I have read and studied about them in the Bible.

Another part of my reason for using herbs all the time is that they work. They cause less side effects and problems than pharmaceutical drugs and have additional health benefits. Herbs may be less flashy and quick than pharmaceutical drugs, but they can cure things that drugs do not cure.

Herbs are cheaper than drugs most of the time and you can usually grow them yourself. When you grow something yourself, you know exactly what is in it or on it. That can stop a lot of problems.

The more processed a food or other substance is, that you ingest, the more chance there is that you could have problems from it.

The most memorable example of the problems from drugs is Thalidomide, for me. I am old enough to remember a lot of the hullabaloo from the horrible problems Thalidomide caused.

It was a drug given by MDs to pregnant women to cure headaches. Many or all of the babies born to those pregnant women who used Thalidomide, were born with horrible birth defects. Some only had small parts missing, but some had no arms or legs.

Herbs can cause problems, but it is usually due to user error. Herbs are slow and gentle and if you have bothered to study the ones you choose to use, they are pretty safe compared to drugs.