A Billion Dollar Somali Autism Fraud in Minnesota

By Daniel Greenfield @ Sultan Knish Blog 

The $250 million ‘Feeding Our Future’ free food fraud in which Somali groups stole a quarter of a billion dollars while claiming to feed hundreds of thousands of children who never existed seemed like the biggest case of welfare fraud in Minnesota, but it may be just the beginning.

Somali autism fraud, partly linked to the ‘Feeding Our Future’ scam, may be even bigger and after the FBI raids of autism clinics last December, the scale of it is still being put together.

The pattern in both Somali meals for children and autism treatment for children is similar.

In 2019, Feeding Our Future distributed $3.4 million in taxpayer food aid funds to the non-profits it was sponsoring, In 2020, that shot up to $42 million and then up to $197 million in 2021.

EIDBI autism claims to Medicaid in Minnesota similarly shot up from $3 million in 2018 to $54 million in 2019, $77 million in 2020, $183 million in 2021, $279 million in 2022, $399 million in 2023, and nearing $400 million most of the way through 2024 for a total of over $1.4 billion.

How did autism claims rise from $3 million to $400 million a year in just 4 years?

The number of autism providers shot up 700% from 41 to 328 over 5 years. 1 in 16 Somali four-year-olds (6%) were supposedly suffering from autism leading to a mass demand for services. Somalis had accused the Minnesota Department of Human Services of racism, and protested outside its offices to pressure it into providing funding for the $250 million ‘Feeding Our Future’ and similarly launched a pressure campaign to sign off on the autism fraud.

Somali community groups set up their own autism treatment centers to provide diverse “culturally appropriate programming” and Somali kids were seven times more likely to receive autism treatment than other children. Whistleblowers at the Minnesota Department of Human Services report that 1 in 5 autism centers in the state are now under investigation.

In the 85 investigations, of the 5 closed cases last year, all of them involved Somalis including apparently Sharmarke Issa, the former chair of the Minneapolis Public Housing Authority who pleaded guilty over his involvement in the Feeding Our Future fraud.

Some of the autism clinics double dipped by also signing up to hand out meals to children. Smart Therapy, one of the autism clinics raided by the FBI, received $13 million from Medicaid and also signed up with Feeding Our Future to get ‘reimbursements’ from the government for allegedly feeding 300 kids a day for seven days a week which by 2021 was up to 500 kids.

The emails listed in the federal complaint appeared to be signed by Aisha Hassan, the CEO and President of Smart Therapy. The autism center was allegedly working with S&S Catering, whose owner Qamar Ahmed Hassan, took in $13 million in government money and then wrote checks to a travel agency specializing in Islamic tours of Mecca as part of the Feeding Our Future fraud. It’s unknown if Qamar Hassan and Asha Hassan are related, but a whistleblower told investigators that another Smart Therapy owner was indeed related to Qamar Hassan.

A Smart Therapy whistleblower stated that the employees were teenage family members of the owners with no training, spent all day on their phones, that the children were not autistic, and that their parents were paid to sign them up for ‘treatment’ with envelopes full of cash.

Star Autism Center, also raided by the FBI, billed Medicaid for 21.5 hours of autism therapy from one therapist in one day. Another billed 23 hours of services in a single day. Star’s organizer, Abdinajib Hassan Yussuf, claimed to know nothing. Both centers billed for treatments being provided by its ‘therapists’ while they were in Kenya (which hosts a large Somali migrant population) and Turkey which serves as a center for Islamic terrorist migration. Including ISIS.

It is difficult to know the full scale of the Somali autism fraud, but troublingly DHS Assistant Commissioner Natasha Merz had claimed that the catastrophic growth of the state’s autism program has been “pretty consistent” with other DHS programs including housing and disability funding. That means that the fraud we know could be only the tip of a massive iceberg.

For example, Housing Stabilization Services (HSS) was budgeted at $2.6 million when it was launched in 2020 but by 2024, was expected to hit $120 million. The sheer scale of welfare fraud under the Walz administration is so severe that hundreds of millions of dollars can easily vanish across the board without anyone even noticing because it’s no longer an aberration.

Under Gov. Tim Walz, it’s become routine for welfare programs to shoot up from the millions to the hundreds of millions. “Well, I think you’re always accountable for when things happen, but I think the accountability piece that we’re going to have to try and understand,” Walz replied, when asked about Minnesota’s spiraling welfare fraud crisis. “The question is, in state government, our job is to carry out the programs to try and get the resources to the people who need them.”

While Gov. Walz may act baffled, he and his political allies in the DFL chose to roll money out the door to Somali groups, while eliminating accountability and avoiding any scrutiny out of fear of racism. Between Attorney General Keith X. Ellison and DHS Inspector General Kulani Moti, a former public defender and the daughter of the first ‘Oromo’ immigrant from East Africa to move to Minnesota, sensitivity has been a priority, rigorous enforcement has not.

Somalis were already caught stealing tens of millions of dollars in various unrelated Medicaid health care frauds including $20 million in fraud in 2023 alone. This year there’s already been a Somali $7 million fraud conviction. But without federal investigations, these are just a fraction of the abuses being caught at the state level, even as the massive systematic fraud goes on.

Somali fraud now appears to equal half the budgets for the Twin Cities. How big can the fraud get before Minnesota runs out of money?

Daniel Greenfield is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. This article previously appeared at the Center's Front Page Magazine. Click here to subscribe to my articles. And click here to support my work with a donation.  Thank you for reading.

 

Are COVID 19, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, And Autism Spectrum Disorder Linked?

By Michael D. Shaw March 1, 2020

A guest column by Michael J. Goldberg, MD

At present, there are around 74 million children (age 17 and under) in this country. Using the CDC’s one in 54 statistic, this means that nearly 1.4 million of them are afflicted with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The number is likely rising. ASD is a debilitating condition that renders each child completely dependent on family and/or government services to survive. The annual cost of these services was estimated at $268 billion (for 2015) with $461 billion projected for 2025. As large as these numbers may be, they do not address the emotional and functional devastation wrought on the families of these children, nor the welling threat to national security.

If one looks medically at Chronic Fatigue Syndrome aka Chronic Fatigue and Immune Dysfunction Syndrome (CFS/CFIDS) in adults and ASD in children, it is clear that there are several aspects of immune dysfunction and viral processes creating these conditions, and this observation is supported by many articles and researchers over the years. Regrettably, these concepts have not received the attention they deserve, yet they provide a pathway directly to an understanding of what is happening today with COVID-19.

Consider someone fighting chronic congestion, or a chronic lingering infection. They become a much more vulnerable target for further opportunistic infections. As such, anyone with chronic illness, or background immune or viral stress, also becomes more vulnerable to any other dangerous virus. Could it be that COVID-19 may not be acting strictly as a viral pneumonia? Instead, there is a large triggering of intense immune cascades (as in a series of sequential interactions), and that is the cause of death!

These immune cascades are not limited to COVID-19. They are already happening in many adults and children with CFS, ASD, and other related chronic immune and chronic viral related disorders. This immune disruption in COVID-19 mirrors the childhood missed medical pandemic that has existed for over 37 years. How many friends and family members know children or young adults labeled “autistic” who are not healthy, but are chronically ill, and are suffering multiple immune-related issues without real resolution or treatment? Sadly, over the last three decades, we have created–iatrogenically–a vulnerable, at-risk population.

Following the expenditure of untold hundreds of millions in research during those three decades, there are but two objective findings: First, no researcher can define a single gene or chromosome that explains this childhood disorder. Second, there are additional Immune markers, and immune-related discoveries that researchers speculate are indicative of some new form of immune-connected autism. A more objective conclusion would have been to consider an ASD phenotype. That is, an unidentified immune mediated disease manifesting with autistic-like symptoms.

Evidence of autoimmune factors and chronic viral activation can provide a rapid and complete understanding of how the SARS-CoV-2 virus operates. If one acknowledges the science and logic behind the ideas of complex immune system and viral interactions, then it is much easier to understand the real risks we are facing today, and how to deal with them effectively.

Failing to acknowledge the changing role of viruses has facilitated the explosion of serious diseases, including COVID-19. If we recognize the mistakes our medical system has made, we could begin to reverse the spiraling cost of healthcare, and see a reemergence of private care and preventive medicine.

Recognition of this underlying missed medical pandemic can and will completely change education. We are presently devoting a massive amount of our resources trying to care for, educate, and rehabilitate children whose brains–and very often bodies–are not working properly and are not receptive to learning. Imagine the difference if children were healthy again. Imagine the difference if families became a healthy “nuclear unit” once again. Nothing would be a greater win for our country and our citizens!

As a pediatrician, I passionately believe that now is the time to do everything possible to bring attention to the real problem, come together, and strongly encourage the White House to formally recognize that these ASD children are ill and not mentally defective. The mischaracterization of ASD is enormous with 1:54 children involved, and is much bigger than COVID-19. All of this deserves urgent investigation, focus, and solutions now, to avoid an even bigger crisis in our future.

People are always looking for ways to improve healthcare. Why don’t we start with examining how immune dysfunction and viral load are affecting so many of us?

 

Autism Spectrum Disorder

By Charles Apple

More than 3.5 million Americans live with autism spectrum disorder — a developmental disability that has no blood test, no illness-causing virus, and no cure. Why are so many children diagnosed these days with the disorder and what can be done about it?

Stay informed. Don’t fall for hysterical internet-borne rumors. And get involved with local groups and events that can help spread the word and help provide resources for autistic children and their parents, teachers and support circles...........Forget everthing you’ve ever read or heard about measles or whooping cough vaccine causing autism. It’s not true. The whole thing started with a bogus medical study 21 years ago. ..............To Read More.....

President-Elect Trump, Science, and Healthcare

By Michael D. Shaw @ Shaw's Eco-Logic

With any big election, there is plenty of the “thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.” (Apologies to ABC television writer Stanley Ralph Ross.) In the recent contest, some on the “agony of defeat” side have been weighing in on how Mr. Trump might impact science and healthcare. It’s no secret that British journal Nature has become politicized, and it offers up a few tweets under the title “How scientists reacted to the US election results—Trump victory generates shock, disbelief and fear of funding cuts.”

“This is terrifying for science, research, education, and the future of our planet. I guess it’s time for me to go back to Europe.”

“Good luck with funding. Ps my heart is *breaking* for all the young scientists I helped to teach and raise.”

“I do breast cancer research for my PhD.…Scared not only my future but for the future of research and next years @NIH budget.”

Other sources quoted numerous academic scientists who are concerned that cuts in immigration might stop the flow of foreign slave labor (aka grad students). And, there were many references to Trump’s climate change skepticism; his sympathy to those who link autism to vaccinations; and his unhappiness with the NIH.

Let’s unpack this. There is little doubt that the number of foreign graduate students in the sciences has increased dramatically over the last 30 years. For a variety of reasons, American youth have lost some interest in research science—and it goes beyond the lack of job opportunities. As we have noted in an earlier column, Science has over-promised and under-delivered, and it’s getting more difficult to fool the public.

More than that, greed in the halls of academic science knows no bounds. Its profligate ways are shamelessly aided and abetted by deep-pocketed granting agencies such as NIH. Last year, in an article examining research using fetal tissue, we highlighted colossal NIH grants for projects that quite likely would never have any practical value—beyond a welfare scheme for the universities involved.

As to climate change skepticism, Trump has plenty of company. Many people dispute the science involved; the untold billions spent “studying” the problem; and the highly suspicious concomitant massive UN and government power grab. And, let’s not forget the suffocating elitism inherent in trying to prevent poorer countries from improving their lot with abundant electrical energy and infrastructure development.

One is reminded of Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, commenting on the grand opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway in 1830: “[Railroads will] only encourage the common people to move about needlessly.”

Regarding vaccines/autism, an outright simple connection has been ruled out—at least on an epidemiological basis. And yet, too many correlation/possible causation anecdotes persist. But, where is Science in all this? After all, the ridiculous research of Andrew Wakefield—which attempted to link the MMR vaccine to autism—was published in 1998 in the prestigious journal The Lancet. Notwithstanding its bogus methodology, and a chorus of voices criticizing both the work and Wakefield himself, the article was not retracted until 2010.

More disturbing, perhaps, is that the work of Michael Goldberg MD and others—whereby a neuro-immune origin for autism is proffered—has been painstakingly ignored by most of the medical establishment.

Sadly, since our healthcare system is more aptly described as “disease care,” there is clearly far more money in disease than health. As such, the prospect of lifelong medical intervention for autistic kids makes more business sense to the mandarins of healthcare, than astonishing improvements and even cures, documented by Goldberg. Here and here.

Finally, it must be said that many—if not most—people in science reside on the political left. One explanation is that so many of them derive their livelihoods from government grants. I suggest that they now use their long-idled powers of rational thought to reevaluate their current situation.

Barbara Demeneix Could Link Autism To Touchdown Passes

By Josh Bloom — December 12, 2017



The title speaks for itself Photo: Amazon

Barbara Demeneix, a team leader at The Paris Natural History Museum, certainly has credentials. She earned a Ph.D. in endocrinology and physiology from the University of Calgary, published two books, more than 170 papers, and received a number of awards for her work primarily focused on thyroid function.


That's why it's hard to understand, with such training and experience, how Demeneix became one of the head counselors in the "Endocrine Disruptor Camp," which all but guarantees a certain amount of nuttiness.  Once again that camp does not disappoint chemophobes and homeopaths who think any trace of any chemical does something important. This time she claims we should stop using fireworks because they might cause autism. Hoo boy.

Her reasoning, such as it is, is this:

• Iodine deficiency is linked to autism.
• Fireworks contain ammonium perchlorate. It makes them go boom.
• Perchlorate competes with iodine in the thyroid gland.
• The amount of perchlorate in fireworks is sufficient to result in lower iodine levels. Please. (1)
• Therefore, perchlorate causes autism.

The science is so wrong that it would take me until July 4th to properly explain how nuts it really is. Instead I will be brief and note that events are linked to other events all the time. Sometimes they are real (cigarette smoking causes cancer) and sometimes they are stupid, like that touching receipts with BPA will give you man-boobs. (2) One of the most famous phrases in toxicology is "the dose makes the poison" but Demeneix seems to have forgotten it, so it's no surprise she conveniently also forgets a close second: correlation is not causation.

If we accept Demeneix's claims on fireworks and autism we also should accept this graph:

The sale of organic foods correlates perfectly with the increase in the number of diagnoses of autism. The r value (in this case 0.9971) is a measure of how good the correlation is. It doesn't get any better than this. It is virtually perfect as shown by a table from an article  "How To Interpret a Correlation Coefficient R."

• +0.30. A weak uphill (positive) linear relationship
• +0.50. A moderate uphill (positive) relationship
• +0.70. A strong uphill (positive) linear relationship
• Exactly +1. A perfect uphill (positive) linear relationship.

So, the correlation between organic foods and autism is perfect.

It's still wrong. It is so obviously wrong that Environmental Working Group, one of the Three Stooges of the science world, know it is nonsense. If you examine enough pairs of separate trends graphs like this will turn up simply by coincidence. You don't draw conclusions based on correlation alone. You will screw it up way more times than you'll get it right.

But Demeneix doesn't want to get the science right, she wants to help her friends at Environmental Health News.  It's easy to see if we look at her other statements.

"But while they are a visual delight, fireworks are anything but innocuous. Research has shown that they can cause significant air pollution and the residues they leave behind – including strontium, barium, cobalt and lead – can be highly dangerous."

OK, let's enter this universe. Take a look at the photos below and try to tell me with a straight face how fireworks are a significant contributor to air pollution (and strontium poisoning ????).


Obviously the city on the far left is the U.S., with some of the cleanest air in the world. The two on the right are where actual air pollution is. Stopping fireworks is not going to matter there. 
But she claims a reason for her madness.

"A less-known fact is that fireworks contain significant amounts of perchlorate, a chemical of particular concern because of its potential effects on foetal brain development."

Dozens of chemicals have effects on brain development if the dose is high enough, and those are just the chemicals you can find in organic dinner. But the dose is not high enough, even among people who work with perchlorate much less who see fireworks once a year. A CDC toxicology profile on perchlorate shows this, if Demeneix ever bothered to read it. If thyroid hormones are being affected it's sure not obvious from this document (emphasis mine):

Endocrine Effects. No significant effects on serum levels of TSH [throid-stimulating hormone], total serum thyroxine (TT4), T3, or free thyroxine index (FTI) were found among the ammonium perchlorate workers studied by Gibbs et al. (1998). The mean airborne concentration of perchlorate to which the workers were exposed ranged from 0.02 to 0.63 mg/m3 . The researchers estimated that exposure to airborne perchlorate provided an average cumulative lifetime absorbed dose of up to 0.01 mg perchlorate/kg/day for high-exposure workers. Comparison of pre- and post-shift serum thyroid hormone measurements for individual workers failed to find any evidence of a transient effect associated with daily exposure.
Toxicological Profile For Perchlorates, CDC

Occupational exposure is a key test for determining real harm. If people who work every day with perchlorate are not affected kids are not going to be harmed by a fireworks show.
She then claims

"The lack of either iodine or thyroid hormone during early development, especially the fetal and perinatal periods, results in lower IQ as well as an increased risk of neurodevelopmental disease such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or attention deficit hyperactivity disorders (AD/HD)." 

It's hard to trust anything the endocrine disruptor activists say but autism is multifactorial, so even if this is true, where is the evidence that watching fireworks has any effect on thyroid function?
There isn't any. That doesn't stop her from declaring it omipresent and therefore dangerous (emphasis mine)

"Fireworks are by no means the only source of perchlorate in our environment. Because it’s highly soluble in water and stable, perchlorate can contaminate croplands and be taken up by vegetables and fruits grown there. Foods with the highest documented levels of perchlorate include melons, dairy and leafy vegetables such as spinach and lettuce... But both cows-milk and soy-based infant formulas have been found to contain significant levels of perchlorate as well. Yet soy products are not [an] option, as they contain yet another compound that interferes with thyroid hormone production, genistein. So, soy-fed infants and children are doubly at risk."

Okay, if any of this were accurate we'd all be long dead. Since trace amounts of perchlorate can be found everywhere on earth (Venus too. I think), we can eat nothing, drink nothing and maybe even breathe nothing. And she is also scaring the environmental demographic that is willing to believe her about endocrine disruption - vegetarians and supplement buyers. Genistein is a polyphenol antioxidant found in soy and has been touted as a supplement to prevent half the diseases on earth.

Genistein is an estrogen mimic too. So if half the women in New York are consuming something that will screw up TWO of their endocrine functions, how are they all still walking around?
There is more silliness in Demeneix's article. I haven't even scratched the surface. But the take-home message is that she just hates chemicals and is a master at using the tired old endocrine disruptor canard to scare you about everything and nothing.

It's too bad that Independence Day can't give us independence from ridiculous pseudo-science like this. Still, I promised in the title I could link autism to football touchdowns. So here is what Demeneix can use for her next article:

1. Alcohol consumption is known to cause developmental disorders in babies.
2. Autism is one type of developmental disorder.
3. Beer contains alcohol
4. Beer consumption is linked to watching NFL games.
5. The NFL is more popular when a lot of points are scored.
6. When more games are watched more beer is consumed
7. The number of touchdown passes is linked to the number of points scored and more alcohol consumption.
8. Therefore, touchdown passes cause autism.

Maybe touchdowns should be banned. Field goals do not disrupt your endocrines. But they sure are boring.

NOTES:

(1) This is utter nonsense. The amount of perchlorate that one will be exposed to from watching a fireworks show is vanishingly small.
(2) See: Why I Don't Write About Pottery From the Ming Dynasty

 

 

 

Why identifying ‘autism genes’ is so elusive

Jon Entine & Ben Locwin | July 21, 2017 | Genetic Literacy Project

Vaccines, chemtrails, GMOs, fluoride, chemicals in food, pollution, chemicals in toys?

The public has been watching the train of fear-driven claims about what causes autism as if it’s ready to run off the rails; each time a vocal advocate of one theorized causal factor or treatment comes forward with an emotionally charged explanation, that runaway train is diverted to a different track, confusing the public even more.

The problem with all of these claims is that this train carries a tremendous amount of momentum—social momentum that causes incredible numbers of parents to question proven healthcare and therapy practices and make foolish choices such as under-vaccinating their children. The other problem is that these claims divert public perception from accurate thinking about the actual science behind autism, or more accurately, autism spectrum disorder......To Read More.....

MIT Researcher: Glyphosate Will Cause Half of All Children To Be Autistic by 2025. Yeah, sure.

By Josh Bloom — June 7, 2017 @ American Council on Science and Health

Even MIT is not perfect. In this case, FAR from it

 

Glyphosate, the active herbicide in Roundup, is pretty much always in the news, but it is even more so lately:

• It causes cancer. (A lawsuit against Monsanto)
• The EU says it doesn't cause cancer. 
• It was added to California's Proposition list as a carcinogen. Except it isn't.
• The U.N said that it is “unlikely to pose a carcinogenic risk to humans.” 
• The EU was accused of giving in to Facebook activists on glyphosate.
• There was an association between glyphosate and the decline of Monarch butterfly populations.

All of this is from the news during this past May.

So, I thought it might be a good time to take a look at an oldie, but goodie, courtesy of a staff member at MIT. MIT??? This wasn't about cancer or butterflies. It was about autism, and it is completely nuts.

Back in 2104, Stephanie Seneff, a Senior Research Scientist at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, when speaking at a panel (1) discussing GMOs (she's against them, of course), made the following statement:

“At today’s rate, by 2025, one in two children will be autistic."

OK, anyone with even one working neuron knows that such a claim is nonsense. One-half of children having autism in eight years? Please. But you may not understand the basis of the claim, or why it is nonsense. Let's take a look. There are a few dead giveaways.

One of them is the website on which the article about Dr. Seneff's statement appeared. In about five seconds, things start to make sense.

The Alliance for Natural Health: the epitome of subtlety.

The Alliance for Natural Health, which perhaps should be renamed "The Alliance for Joe Mercola Followers and Other Assorted Screwballs," shows its true colors immediately. Anti-vaccine, anti-GMO, pro supplements. This site is Whole Foods on steroids. You can stop reading now and have a pretty good idea of the validity of Seneff's claim. But, let's keep going anyhow. ” [Seneff] noted that the side effects of autism closely mimic those of glyphosate toxicity, and presented data showing a remarkably consistent correlation. Here is her "proof."

Glyphosate use plotted against the number of autistic children. (IDEA = Individuals with Disabilities Education Act)

Looks pretty impressive, no? And, we all know that correlation is the same as causation, right? Or not. Here are three of examples of other "remarkably consistent correlations." (2)

The use of glyphosate sure does track nicely with the incidence of autism. But, so do these:

Autism is also "caused" by rising college tuition. (Source: Knowing Ourselves)

A word on correlation. If you examine an enormous number of events, perfect correlations between groups of two of them will necessarily be found by sheer chance. Most of them mean nothing. Had Stephanie Seneff looked hard enough may have uncovered other "causes" of autism (3). Perhaps the number of yellow Volkswagens on the road, the daily humidity in Boise, or maybe even the number of paisley ties worn by guys named Steve. Which should you believe?

None of them.

In fact, one prevailing theory about the rise in autism is due to more diagnoses, not more cases. And, David Warmflash, writing for the Genetic Literacy Project, argues that autism is genetic.

Can we now dispose of the correlation argument? (4)

This all fine and good, but two sentences are all that are required to bury this idiocy:

"In addition, as we have previously reported, the number of adverse reactions from vaccines can be correlated as well with autism, though Seneff says it doesn’t correlate quite as closely as with Roundup. The same correlations between applications of glyphosate and autism show up in deaths from senility."

An anti-vaxxer from MIT? There are plenty of other details, but don't waste your time. That is Seneff's specialty.

Notes:

(1) The event was sponsored by the holistic-focused Groton Wellness organization, whose specialists practice: Holistic, Certified Esthetics, Reiki, and Make-up, Biomagnetism, Vibrational Medicine, Massage Therapy & Colon Hydrotherapy, and Biodynamic Medicine. Right away, this place should go on your top 10 list of places to avoid, perhaps right between Syria and Venezuela.
(2) The correlation factor, which is known as "r," is a statistical measurement of the strength of the relationship between two variables on a scatterplot graph. A perfect correlation is when r = 1. When r = 0.7, this is considered to be a strong correlation. The value for the organic food/autism correlation (0.997) is off scale, but still meaningless.
(3) We are routinely exposed to tens of thousands of chemicals in minute amounts. Will there be a similar association between some of these and autism? Almost certainly so.
(4) Autism has also been associated with the absence of parasitic worms, finger length, and wi-fi. But not (to my knowledge) the price of a pallet of Saltines at Costco. Yet.

Researchers have ditched the autism-vaccine theory. Here’s what they think actually causes it.

Genes and the microbiome are some of the most promising leads.

by Julia Belluz@juliaoftoronto julia.belluz@voxmedia.com May 11, 2017

Of all the issues doctors have explored in children’s health, none has been more exhaustively researched than the question of whether vaccines are linked to autism. After hundreds and hundreds of studies in thousands of children, “We can say with almost as much certainty than anybody could ever say that vaccines don’t cause autism,” Mayo Clinic autism researcher Dr. Sunil Mehta told me.

And yet the fear that they do remains stubbornly persistent, as a current measles outbreak in Minnesota shows. The virus is spreading among unvaccinated children — in this case, Somali-Americans in Minneapolis, after anti-vaccine advocates targeted their parents with a misinformation campaign. Now 51 people, most of them children, are very, very ill......But “of all the causes of autism, the thing we know with the greatest certainty is that it’s a very genetic disorder,” said UCSF geneticist and autism researcher Stephan Sanders. “If you look at a child with autism, then look at their siblings, you’ll find the rate of autism is 10 times higher in those siblings than in the general population. This has been looked at in populations of millions.”

Researchers first recognized the genetic underpinnings of the disorder in the 1970s, with studies on twins involving at least one sibling with autism. They found that monozygotic twins (with nearly identical genetics) were more likely to have autism in common than dizygotic (or non-identical) twins who shared less in common genetically....... Not everyone with those genetic mutations has autism — and that’s because researchers believe it’s not mutations alone that cause the disorder.......Researchers agree the MMR vaccine doesn’t cause autism — but the evidence is weak for other triggers after birth......To Read More....

My Take - For years I've attempted to overcome the idea pesticides are a cause of autism and interestingly - now - that's not even being discussed.  One thing I always felt was an important clue that autism was a genetic issue was the fact autism is sexist!  Boys are more likely to suffer from autism than girls. 

That's genetics it seems to me, and that was where I thought researchers should have targeted their efforts.  Unfortunately loons like Wakefield and his loony Hollywood supporters like Robert DeNiro, Jenny McCarthy, Jim Carrey and Oprah Winfrey infected the conversation and slowed the direction of good research. 

When are we going to get real with celebrities and stop listening to the clabber they spew out? I'm a big fan of "question everything", but you don't stop questioning and start answering until all the evidence is in.  The evidence wasn't in because it was fraudulent, and as usual, Hollywood bought into it lock, stock and barrel. 

I wonder if because they're so used to reading, memorizing and mouthing fiction for a living they're incapable of telling the difference any longer.

 

Autism April by Mike Shaw

Autism April—Featuring CMV and HHV-6

 

By Michael D. Shaw April 3, 2017

Another April, another National Autism Awareness Month. The statistics, of course, are appalling. The CDC states that about 1 in 68 children has been identified with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), according to estimates from CDC’s Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring Network. ASD occurs in all racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic groups, and is about 4.5 times more common among boys (1 in 42) than among girls (1 in 189). Consider that this incidence rate has more than doubled since 2000.

In previous articles, we have dealt with the disconnect between what Dr. Leo Kanner—who first described the disorder in 1943—and what now constitutes the diagnostic criteria for the condition. Kanner’s landmark paper, entitled “Autistic Disturbances of Affective Contact,” published in Nervous Child, is both widely cited and assiduously ignored.

Fearless contrarian and pioneering pediatrician Michael J. Goldberg MD has long railed against the conventional approach to autism—and has cured many of these kids. As he says…

“These children present with multiple symptoms that we were trained were medical, but somehow we’re writing it all off as ‘autism’ and ‘psychological.’ It’s impossible for a developmental or genetic disorder to ever become an epidemic, and yet we are condemning these parents and children to no future. I have essentially watched families go to experts around the country, go to leaders around the country, and realize that those experts, those leaders have completely turned their back on these families. They are desperate, they need help, and that’s supposed to be our job as pediatricians.”

“If you throw out autism, then you suddenly realize we have a massive medical epidemic affecting the brains and bodies of these children. It is time we recognize that these children are ill, and have autistic-like symptoms, but do not have autism.”

Which brings us to the human herpesviruses known as CMV (Cytomegalovirus) and HHV-6 (Human herpesvirus 6).

According to learned sources, CMV is ubiquitous and generally asymptomatic in healthy children and adults. Yet, it is also a major cause of morbidity and occasional mortality in newborn infants. Moreover, CMV has been identified as the most important cause of congenital infection in the developed world, that frequently leads to mental retardation and developmental disability.

If this weren’t bad enough, a body of evidence links CMV to a number of adult health problems, including immunosenescence (the age-dependent decrease in immunological competence) and an increased risk of malignancy and vascular disease. As with all human herpesviruses, they establish life-long latency and can become reactivated later in life.

HHV-6, which infects nearly 100% of human beings, typically before the age of three, is another potential baddie—associated with a shocking number of illnesses. We’re talking Hodgkin’s lymphoma, cervical cancer, chronic fatigue syndrome, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, and myocarditis, among many others.

Listen to Dr. Goldberg:

“I was taught as a pediatrician, that when a baby is born severely brain damaged, CMV was one of the organisms you must look for, and rule out.  Imagine my shock when I discovered that up to 1.5% of newborns have CMV—yet explained away as ‘asymptomatic’.”

He further notes that HHV-6 should become inactive and in theory not harmful. But, should it become chronically activated via a stressed immune system, it is known to cause chronic dysfunction and harm over time.

As such, Goldberg asks the medical establishment: Why not acknowledge that the evidence of activated viruses in ASD children is not normal, but rather is consistent with, and is a reflection of, their stressed immune systems?  If so, ASD becomes a medical condition (phenotype) and not DSM autism!

Autism April—a bit more, April 10, 2017

 

Last week’s article generated a fair amount of e-mail—including some pointed questions from my friend Josh Bloom, of the American Council on Science and Health. Most of the questions and comments referred to the remarks and links that featured Michael J. Goldberg, MD.

As such, it seems appropriate to present more of Goldberg’s ideas…

This one comes from April, 2016: As another Autism Awareness Month begins, sadly nothing has changed. Even the March, 2016 publication from the University of Rochester, entitled “The Brain’s Gardeners: Immune Cells ‘Prune’ Connections Between Neurons,” hardly struck a note in the research community. The paper suggests a link between autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and immune dysfunction, whereby the immune system is not correctly pruning the neurons in the brain.
He also laments that an article from 2004, entitled “Neuroglial Activation and Neuroinflammation in the Brain of Patients with Autism,” should have piqued the curiosity of any researcher with an open mind. After all, this work from Johns Hopkins discusses neuro-immune inflammation, and certainly suggests a reasonable etiology for at least some ASD kids.

Indeed, with an explanation for the findings of “too many neurons in the brain of autistic children” the research community still will not admit this is an autoimmune disease, with an autistic phenotype, and not the current psychiatric label of “Autism.”

When it comes to medical/disease origin, the idea of phenotypes is a major clinical reality. A phenotype is a collection of symptoms that reflects how a disease presents, but doesn’t tell you the cause of the disease. For example, a specific group of signs and symptoms presents as “meningitis,” but that doesn’t tell a physician whether it is bacterial, viral, fungal, protozoan, TB, or other.

The 1:68 children are presenting with a phenotype of Autistic / ASD symptoms. But conventional medicine is making the mistaken assumption that the 1:68 phenotypes are all developmental, psychological, genetic, etc. As Goldberg has emphasized, one cannot have an epidemic of a genetic or developmental disorder. He observes: “Science doesn’t change; it can be ignored, or twisted to fit a popular mindset, but it doesn’t change.”

In his blog postings from last year, he reacted to comments from parents of ASD kids (with proper HIPAA-compliant redaction), who described their generally affectionate children, with few motor issues…

Dr. Leo Kanner, who first described infantile autism, stated that the children were never normal, never affectionate, and never had major motor issues. You are all subjected to a new set of subjective criteria to label your children as “Autistic” even though what is being described has nothing to do with the ideas of Dr. Kanner and other psychiatric experts of the 40s, 50s, and 60s.

Goldberg continues: As I was taught in medical school and confirmed at a medical symposium nearly twenty years ago, short of a known, definable degenerative disease, no child can develop normally until 12, 15, 18 months old, have language, lose it, then on good testing show up like a 10-month-old!

A child that has already developed normally past age 15 or 18 months old, cannot exhibit the dysfunctions above, with no objective findings on MRI, EEG, etc., unless a neuro-immune or neuro-infectious disease process is occurring. To keep thinking that the dysfunctions of these children are mental or developmental is beyond comprehension.

The gauntlet thrown down, how will mainstream medicine respond?

Brains of people with autism share distinct genetic ‘signature’

Nicholette Zeliadt | January 26, 2017 | Spectrum

The brains of people with autism show a distinct molecular signature, according to the largest-yet postmortem study of people with the condition. The signature reflects alterations in how genes are pieced together and expressed.  “We can be now fairly certain that this pattern really means something,” says lead researcher Daniel Geschwind, distinguished professor of neurology, psychiatry and human genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles......To Read More....

My Take - Does this mean pesticides don't cause autism?  Oh no!  Can this be true?  Horror or horrors, how can this be true?   Ben Franklin once noted that truth will very patiently wait for us, and truth has consistently proven this about green claims: the greenies are wrong....again!  We need to understand the greenies have come to almost have a monopoly on wrong.  That's history - and that history is incontestable! So why do we listen to these irrational, misanthropic and morally defective people. 

Observations From the Back Row For December 19, 2014.

Political Journalism Endangers Our Survival, By Ileana Johnson 

Journalism in this country, if it ever was completely honest and objective, has become in-your-face political journalism—to be more specific, Democrat Party agenda progressive journalism. Dr. Savage called it "narrative journalism." We often have to consult foreign news to find out what is going on in our own country. We are no longer watching the news when a talking head on location somewhere is trying to explain what happened, what we are seeing, and who is involved to the best of their knowledge. The actual news reporting is very rare. What passes for news is the cable news owners' progressive agenda or the newspapers' affiliation with the Democrat Party. "News" is sensational videotaping and coverage of one event ad nauseam, the glorification of criminals, and of Hollywood stars who pass away from drug overdoses or other unfortunate accidents.....

My Take - It's clear the media is totally corrupt, historically ignorant, and logically challenged. Has it ever been different? No! In days gone by the media, which consisted of newspapers only, lied, postured and supported the same kind of clowns that are in office now. 

 

The only real difference was they were open in their biases. The media managed to convince people by getting a degree in journalism it made them impartial distributors of "truth". That was a lie from the beginning! When I see them continuously spewing out all the leftist claptrap they espouse, in spite of all the historical evidence that shows these views are irrational, misanthropic and morally defective, I have to wonder if they aren't insane. I know they aren't rational, or truthful - but are they sane.

Ted Versus Jeb - 2016 Republican Smackdown?, By The Common Constitutionalist

Exploratory committee my a**. Jeb is in, and aren't we just better for it. I was wondering when a reasonable candidate was going to jump in, and although it does happen, it's pretty rare that a candidate commissions an exploratory committee and doesn't get in the race. As I see it today, there will be one real conservative - Ted Cruz- a few semi to faux-conservatives such as Rand Paul,Scott Walker, and Marco Rubio, and a slew of big government progressives: Jeb, Chris Christie, John Kasich, and probably many others……

Wisconsin State Superintendent of Schools Misrepresents Common Core, By Karen Schroeder

Wisconsin's State Superintendent of Schools, Tony Evers, misrepresents the effect of Common Core Standards through his recent press release, "Higher standards: The right direction for students." Evers promises parents that the implementation of Common Core State Standards will "ready [students] for on-the-job training, an apprenticeship, or coursework at a college or university." Numerous educational experts have identified specific weaknesses in CCSS which will render students unprepared for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM courses) at the college level. Preparation for on-the-job training or an apprenticeship requires students to be skilled in basic math. Because the Common Core Curriculum has returned to the futile discovery and inquiry methods of instruction used in "New Math" or "Modern Math" which failed our children in the 1960s and 1970s, the re-implementation of these methods is once again confusing and frustrating parents and students......

Watch: MarcMorano and Walt Cunningham in contentious debate on UN Climate TV at Lima Summit, By Marc Morano

Apollo 7's Walt Cunningham: 'My background in space science. My doctoral thesis that I was working on was fluctuations in the Earth’s magnetic field. I have no political inhibitions at all, I just think we ought to be honest about this and not be trying to use it to our own ends to try to get money from the government.'

Also see: Apollo Astronaut Slams UN for perpetrating the ‘one of the biggest frauds in the field of science’.

Marc Morano: 'The UN is first and foremost political and they have bastardized science to achieve a political end...The UN claims that they can alter global temperature and storminess and weather events many decades to 100 years into the future. And the United Nations does not have that power -- that is reserved for medieval witchcraft.'…..

Policy-based evidence making, By Matt Ridley

Science is being corrupted by political bias. As somebody who has championed science all his career, carrying a lot of water for the profession against its critics on many issues, I am losing faith. Recent examples of bias and corruption in science are bad enough. What’s worse is the reluctance of scientific leaders to criticise the bad apples. Science as a philosophy is in good health; science as an institution increasingly stinks. The Nuffield Council on Bioethics published a report last week that found evidence of scientists increasingly “employing less rigorous research methods”in response to funding pressures. A 2009 survey found that almost 2 per cent of scientists admitting that they have fabricated results; 14 per cent say that their colleagues have done so.  This month has seen three egregious examples of poor scientific practice. The most recent was the revelation in The Times last week that scientists appeared to scheme to get neonicotinoid pesticides banned, rather than open-mindedly assessing all the evidence. These were supposedly“independent” scientists, yet they were hand in glove with environmental activists who were receiving huge grants from the European Union to lobby it via supposedly independent reports, and they apparently had their conclusions in mind before they gathered the evidence. Documents that have recently come to light show them blatantly setting out to make policy-based evidence, rather than evidence-based policy…......

Mrs. Obama’s Tall Tales of Racialized Victimhood, by Michelle Malkin

Oh, woe is she. In an “exclusive” interview with People magazine this week, first lady Michelle Obama lamented the “sting” of “racist experiences” that she and her husband allegedly still suffer. My message for America’s Marie Antoinette? Cry me a river.  To show how she’s down with The Struggle of post-Ferguson agitators, Mrs. Obama cited a supposedly horrifying incident at a Target store where she was treated, in her paranoid mind, as a subservient. “Even as the first lady,” she bemoaned,“not highly disguised, the only person who came up to me in the store was a woman who asked me to help her take something off a shelf.” A lowly peon asked her for an innocent favor? It’s Jim Crow all over again! ABC News reports that Mrs. Obama said such“incidents are ‘the regular course of life’ for African-Americans and a‘challenge’ for the country to overcome.” Newsflash: Oh, deep in my heart, I do believe that it is part of the“regular course of life” of tall people of all colors (Mrs. Obama is 5-foot-11) to be prevailed upon to reach high on behalf of those of us who are vertically challenged. These are not odious “incidents” of racism between slaves and masters. They’re matters of common courtesy between equals…..

Has the West Lost the Will to Live? by Mark Tapson

When it became too obvious to deny that the hostage crisis in Sydney, Australia was an act of Islamic terrorism, Prime Minister Tony Abbott asked Aussie citizens for calm, saying, “The whole point of politically motivated violence is to scare people out of being themselves. Australia is a peaceful, open and generous society – nothing should ever change that. And that’s why I would urge all Australians today to go about their business as usual.” That’s what a politician is expected to say. But what he should have said is that the time for business-as-usual is over……The West is in decline for a number of reasons, one of which is its cultural capitulation in the face of an ascendant Islamic fundamentalism. It is as if we, or at least our leaders and elites, have lost the cultural will to live. We need to get in touch with a sort of cultural rage, a fierce determination to crush threats to our culture, our values, and our liberty. We need to demonstrate that our tolerance has reached an end, that there will be no more coexistence with an ideology openly dedicated to our destruction. “Never mind normal,” as Jack Engelhard put it. To paraphrase his wish for Israel, for once let our blood “be exceptional and cause for nausea and trembling” among our enemies. Show the jihadists that there will be no more business-as-usual capitulation, and that they can expect us to unleash hell in retaliation for a single drop of Western blood......

Obama’s Bailout for Communist Dictators, byDaniel Greenfield

The Soviet Union did not have to fall. If Carter had won a second term and Mondale had succeeded him, the Communist dictatorship might have received the outside help it needed to survive. And we would still be living under the shadow of the Cold War. Carter couldn’t save the Soviet Union, but he did his best to save Castro, visiting Fidel and Raul in Cuba where the second worst president in American history described his meeting with Castro as a greeting among “old friends”. Raul Castro called Carter “the best of all U.S. presidents.” Obama’s dirty deal with Raul will make the worst president in American history, Castro’s new best friend. Carter couldn’t save Castro, but Obama did. This was not a prisoner exchange. This was a Communist bailout…..

Rasmussen Report

1. Voters See A Sinking America - U.S. voters are less bullish on America's role in the world and see a diminished United States in the decades to come. Read More

2. Homeowners Worry A Bit More About Their Mortgage Payments - The number of homeowners who think they are likely to miss or be late on a mortgage payment in the next few months is at its highest level in over a year. Read More

3. Voters to Obama, Congress: Work Together! - Voters are closely divided over whether the upcoming Congress will be better than the one that is now leaving town, but they believe overwhelmingly that President Obama and the new Congress should work together rather than stand on principle. Read More

4. Voters Want Feds to Cut Spending to Boost Economy

5. Daily Presidential Tracking Poll: 47% Approve of Obama's Performance

My Take - The voters - 47% of whom have brains filled with mush - want the Executive branch and Congress to work together but they never say how that’s to be done when the philosophical divide between them is so enormous. There are those who want to spend far more than we have - all the way until oblivion. A second side merely wants to slow oblivion down, a third group wants to hold expenditures to current levels and a fourth group that wants to reverse to the whole process by cutting expenditures dramatically and dismantling huge sections of an overbearing, intrusive, incompetent, corrupt government that interprets the Constitution in such a way that makes society the servant and they the masters instead of the reverse.

So my question to those who took this poll as part of this idiotic report is this: Who should back down? These voters think the nation is going to hell in a hand basket and 47% like Obama - a number Rasmussen puts out daily which hardly varies - a man who is openly being called the stupidest President in history - saving Jimmy Carter from that distinction. Is it any wonder why I think polls and poll takers are full of it? Is it any wonder I think Jonathan Gruber was right?

Before There Was Common Core! By Rich Kozlovich

Before there was Common Core there was this 1912 8th grade test for Bullett County Schools in Kentucky. I want all Common Core supporters to take this 1912 8th grade test, and then tell me how many 8th graders could pass this test. Remember, this was before the leftists took control of education in the nation and the creation of the Department of Education. Two questions. Were schools more effective before all that interference with local parental control or did they become more effective now with centralized control. This appeared here. And for all those Common Core supporters that take this test and fail it. Gohere for a list of answers.You might also wish to review this 8th grade test from Salina Kansas in 1895.

Local Reporter Explains Why San Francisco Must Endure Free Speech & the Truth about Islamic Jihad, By Pam Geller

Every time my AFDI ads run in San Francisco, city officials and the enemedia get into an uproar. They can’t stand for the truth about Islam and jihad to be told — and apparently, the little totalitarians don’t understand why it is even allowed to be told. So here, Liza Veale of KALW explains to San Francisco leftists that unfortunately, there is this thing called free speech:

Junk study by Harvard School of Public Health tries to link pollution and autism: fails miserably, American Council on Science and Health

Regular readers of our Dispatch know that our scientists have little respect for the typically-junk reports published in Environmental Health Perspective, and the same goes for authors based at the Harvard School of Public Health. The journal and the academic center often seem to have the same goal: ignore or flout or distort the rules of science and sound statistics whenever needed to promote their anti-chemical, anti-technology agendas. They have struck again with a remarkable pseudo-analysis of air pollution’s alleged link to autism…….“Over and over again, we see this type of phony, pseudo-quantitative junk being passed off as a putative link or association between factors that is simply not grounded in science, the study’s own data, or even common sense. But this author, Weisskopf, went beyond the fringe when he said this: ‘One of the unique aspects of the study we did is that it provides an even stronger piece of evidence for there being a causal effect…It’s really the pollution doing it.’ He gives away his clear bias and abandonment of any semblance of science: no observational/retrospective study can allow a ‘cause-and-effect’ inference, even a strong, solid study. And this is the antithesis of a strong study: it’s based on sand and smoke and mirrors, fully committed to its agenda.”

Only 45% of UN Member-States Back Iran Human Rights Measure; Cuba Leads the Opposition, By Patrick Goodenough

The U.N. General Assembly (UNGA) on Thursday passed an annual resolution condemning human rights abuses in Iran, but fewer than half the world’s nations supported the measure, marking the third consecutive year in which the number of countries voting in favor fell.....The resolution was introduced earlier this year by Canada on behalf of a group of mostly Western democracies.  The 35 countries which opposed the resolution fell into three broad categories – Islamic states; communist, leftist or other authoritarian regimes; and two Asian democracies with “non-aligned” tendencies (India and Indonesia).....Leading the opposition.... was Cuba, whose delegate charged that the “toxic practices and double standards and selectivity” contained in the measures “violate human rights.”.....“These resolutions are intended to harm developing countries, and they are politically motivated and have absolutely nothing to do with the defense of human rights and contribute nothing to that cause,”..... The same UNGA session.....dealt with a resolution on “the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination” – which contains language criticizing Israel over the security barrier it built between areas under its control and those administered by the Palestinian Authority in a bid to deter suicide bombings. The measure passed by a huge vote: 180-7.....Before the end of December, the UNGA will also pass another nine resolutions critical of Israel. During a committee stage last month all nine were adopted by overwhelming margins......Israel was criticized in at least 32 resolutions between 2009 and mid-2014.....

More 'Tolerance' From Stalinist Universities, By David Limbaugh
Honestly, sometimes leftist thought police surprise even me, not so much with their unreasonableness, extremism and tyrannical tactics but with their brazenness in openly showing who they are. Each new day's headlines trump yesterday's. A few weeks ago, Fox News' Todd Starnes reported on a Marquette University student's encounter with his ethics instructor. The professor, Cheryl Abbate, was leading her "Theory of Ethics" class in a discussion about the application of philosophical theories to controversial political issues. Among the issues listed on the blackboard were gay rights, gun rights and the death penalty. Professor Abbate removed gay rights from the list before the discussion began, with the summary explanation, "We all agree on this." This puzzled the student, as he certainly did not agree with his instructor's view on the issue and believed it should have been open for discussion along with the other issues. He approached Abbate after class and expressed his opinion that the class should have been allowed to discuss gay rights...... His complaint with university officials went nowhere.....Marquette professor John McAdams learned about the incident and expressed his strong disapproval on his blog, Marquette Warrior. McAdams wrote: "Like the rest of academia, Marquette is less and less a real university. And when gay marriage cannot be discussed, certainly not a Catholic university."....McAdams received a letter from the dean relieving him of his teaching duties, saying he was under investigation and banned from campus.....The enemies of liberty and tolerance continue their scorched-earth oppression of their political opponents under the fraudulent banners of tolerance and liberty — and it is truly sickening and highly disturbing.

How Congress Snuck Changes to U.S. Environmental Policy into the New Budget Bill, By Joshua A. Krisch and Josh Fischman

It took 1,603 pages of legalese to keep the U.S. government running for another year. That is the length of the 2015 Fiscal Year Omnibus Appropriations Bill, which was approved by the Senate on Saturday to appropriate $1.01 trillion dollars for most federal agencies and departments through September 2015. The bill is on Pres. Obama’s desk waiting for his signature. It is not all about dollars. Congress also loaded the bill with special instructions, called policy riders, which dictate how government funds must be spent. Because the bill was rushed through just before the government ran out of money, and Congressional leaders did not want another government shutdown if the bill did not pass, lawmakers seized the opportunity to tack on controversial riders that might otherwise have been debated. A lot of those 11th-hour mandates will affect science and environmental policy. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, for example, got $8.1 billion. That’s $60 million less than last year and the agency now has to operate at its smallest budget since 1989. But even that money comes with conditions. Although agriculture is a major source of atmospheric methane, Congress forbade the EPA from using its funds to require farmers to report greenhouse gas emissions from “manure management systems.” And the agency is no longer permitted to regulate farm ponds and irrigation ditches under the Clean Water Act.

Dr. Ozvorkian gets busted again. You are better off flipping a coin.  Posted by the American Council on Science and Health

When Dr. Oz eventually goes to the magic fat burner in the sky, he may reflect upon the past few months and conclude that there may have been better times in his professional life. The former golden boy of TV medicine has not really contributed all that much to public health, but he has inadvertently revived a previously-defunct science: alchemy. Defying all rules of chemistry, he seems to have stumbled upon a way to actually transform elements! Except in this case, the transformation hasn’t been lead to gold. It is more like gold to tin.  And, as anyone with a passable knowledge of chemistry will tell you, gold does not tarnish. But tin certainly does, although maybe not as quickly as Oz’s reputation. And it is all self-inflicted. His “slump” began in earnest back in June, when he was turned into cat food by Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO) during a hearing at which he was tricked into believing that he was testifying about making dietary supplements safer. It didn’t exactly turn out that way, as ACSH’s Dr. Josh Bloom noted in his Science 2.0 piece entitled “The Lizard of Oz Takes His Own Medicine.”.......

 And Finally: This is a joke that’s been floating around but worth repeating.

 A public school teacher was arrested today at John F. Kennedy International airport as he attempted to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a compass, a slide-rule and a calculator. At a morning press conference, Attorney General Eric Holder said he believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-Gebra movement. He did not identify the man, who has been charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.  'Al-Gebra is a problem for us', the Attorney General said. 'They derive solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in search of absolute values.' They use secret code names like "X" and "Y" and refer to themselves as "unknowns" but we have determined that they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country. As the Greek philosopher Isosceles used to say, "There are 3 sides to every triangle."

When asked to comment on the arrest, President Obama said, "If God had wanted us to have better weapons of math instruction, He would have given us more fingers and toes." White House aides told reporters they could not recall a more intelligent or profound statement by the President.   It is believed that another Nobel Prize will follow.

Have a good weekend all!

Rich