Music as Medicine for the Brain

Neurologists like Oliver Sacks are prescribing it for conditions from Parkinson's and Alzheimer's to stroke and depression
By Matthew Shulman July 17, 2008 RSS Feed Print

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Video: Stroke, Explained

Rande Davis Gedaliah's 2003 diagnosis of Parkinson's was followed by leg spasms, balance problems, difficulty walking, and ultimately a serious fall in the shower. But something remarkable happened when the 60-year-old public speaking coach turned to an oldies station on

her shower radio: She could move her leg with ease, her balance improved, and, she couldn't stop dancing. Now, she puts on her iPod and pumps in Springsteen's "Born in the U.S.A." when she wants to walk quickly; for a slower pace, Queen's "We Are the Champions" does the trick. Music therapy has been practiced for decades as a way to treat neurological conditions from Parkinson's to Alzheimer's to anxiety and depression. Now, advances in neuroscience and brain imaging are revealing what's actually happening in the brain as patients listen to music or play instruments and why the therapy works. "It's been substantiated only in the last year or two that music therapy can help restore the loss of expressive language in patients with aphasia" following brain injury from stroke, says Oliver Sacks, the noted neurologist and professor at Columbia University, who explored the link between music and the brain in his recent book Musicophilia. Beyond improving movement and speech, he says, music can trigger the release of mood-altering brain chemicals and once-lost memories and emotions. Parkinson's and stroke patients benefit, neurologists believe, because the human brain is innately attuned to respond to highly rhythmic music; in fact, says Sacks, our nervous system is unique among mammals in its automatic tendency to go into foot-tapping mode. In Parkinson's patients with bradykinesia, or difficulty initiating movement, it's thought that the music triggers networks of neurons to translate the cadence into organized movement. "We see patients develop something like an auditory timing mechanism," says Concetta Tomaino, cofounder of the Institute for Music and Neurologic Function in New York City. "Someone who is frozen can immediately release and begin walking. Or if they have balance problems, they can coordinate their steps to synchronize with the music," improving their gait and stride. Slow rhythms can ease the muscle bursts and jerky motions of Parkinson's patients with involuntary tremors. Actually playing music, which requires coordinating muscle movements and developing an ear for timing, can also bring dramatic results, says Rick Bausman, a musician and the founder and director of the Martha's Vineyard-based Drum Workshop. The workshop uses traditional drum ensembles, in which groups of participants play percussion pieces, as one form of therapy for patients with a variety of cognitive and physical disabilities, including Parkinson's disease. Bausman teaches participants to play along with traditional Afro-Caribbean beats like the Haitian kongo and Cuban bembe using congas, bongos, and djun-djun drums. "Participants report that their control of physical movement improves after playing the drums, their motion becomes more fluid, they don't shake quite as much, and their tremors seem to calm down," says Bausman. Indeed, research on the effects of music therapy in Parkinson's patients has found motor control to be better in those who participated in group music sessionsimprovisation with pianos, drums, cymbals, and xylophonesthan in people who underwent traditional physical therapy. But gains were no longer evident two months after the sessions ended, so the best results require continued therapy. To stay motivated, Tomaino recommends seeking out both therapeutic drumming groups like Bausman's and social dance classes. Patients can also create music libraries for CDs or MP3 players that can be used to facilitate walking. Because the area of the brain that processes music overlaps with speech networks, neurologists have found that a technique called melodic intonation therapy is effective at retraining patients to

speak by transferring existing neuronal pathways or creating new ones. "Even after a stroke that damages the left side of the brainthe center of speechsome patients can still sing complete lyrics to songs," says Tomaino. With repetition, the therapist can begin removing the music, allowing the patient to speak the song lyrics and eventually substitute regular phrases in their place. "As they try to recall words that have a similar contextual meaning to the lyrics, their word retrieval and speech improves," she says.

Why Women Still Cant Have It All

Its time to stop fooling ourselves, says a woman who left a position of power: the women who have managed to be both mothers and top professionals are superhuman, rich, or self-employed. If we truly believe in equal opportunity for all women, heres what has to change.
inShare3,373 By Anne-Marie Slaughter

Phillip Toledano

EIGHTEEN MONTHS INTO my job as the first woman director of policy planning at the State Department, a foreign-policy dream job that traces its origins back to George Kennan, I found myself in New York, at the United Nations annual assemblage of every foreign minister and head of state in the world. On a Wednesday evening, President and Mrs. Obama hosted a glamorous reception at the American Museum of Natural History. I sipped champagne, greeted foreign dignitaries, and mingled. But I could not stop thinking about my 14-year-old son, who had started eighth grade three weeks earlier and was already resuming what had become his pattern of skipping homework, disrupting classes, failing math, and tuning out any adult who

tried to reach him. Over the summer, we had barely spoken to each otheror, more accurately, he had barely spoken to me. And the previous spring I had received several urgent phone calls invariably on the day of an important meetingthat required me to take the first train from Washington, D.C., where I worked, back to Princeton, New Jersey, where he lived. My husband, who has always done everything possible to support my career, took care of him and his 12-yearold brother during the week; outside of those midweek emergencies, I came home only on weekends.

A debate on career and family See full coverage

As the evening wore on, I ran into a colleague who held a senior position in the White House. She has two sons exactly my sons ages, but she had chosen to move them from California to D.C. when she got her job, which meant her husband commuted back to California regularly. I told her how difficult I was finding it to be away from my son when he clearly needed me. Then I said, When this is over, Im going to write an op-ed titled Women Cant Have It All. She was horrified. You cant write that, she said. You, of all people. What she meant was that such a statement, coming from a high-profile career womana role modelwould be a terrible signal to younger generations of women. By the end of the evening, she had talked me out of it, but for the remainder of my stint in Washington, I was increasingly aware that the feminist beliefs on which I had built my entire career were shifting under my feet. I had always assumed that if I could get a foreign-policy job in the State Department or the White House while my party was in power, I would stay the course as long as I had the opportunity to do work I loved. But in January 2011, when my two-year public-service leave from Princeton University was up, I hurried home as fast as I could. A rude epiphany hit me soon after I got there. When people asked why I had left government, I explained that Id come home not only because of Princetons rules (after two years of leave, you lose your tenure), but also because of my desire to be with my family and my conclusion that juggling high-level government work with the needs of two teenage boys was not possible. I have not exactly left the ranks of full-time career women: I teach a full course load; write regular print and online columns on foreign policy; give 40 to 50 speeches a year; appear regularly on TV and radio; and am working on a new academic book. But I routinely got reactions from other women my age or older that ranged from disappointed (Its such a pity that you had to leave Washington) to condescending (I wouldnt generalize from your experience. Ive never had to compromise, and my kids turned out great). The first set of reactions, with the underlying assumption that my choice was somehow sad or unfortunate, was irksome enough. But it was the second set of reactionsthose implying that my

parenting and/or my commitment to my profession were somehow substandardthat triggered a blind fury. Suddenly, finally, the penny dropped. All my life, Id been on the other side of this exchange. Id been the woman smiling the faintly superior smile while another woman told me she had decided to take some time out or pursue a less competitive career track so that she could spend more time with her family. Id been the woman congratulating herself on her unswerving commitment to the feminist cause, chatting smugly with her dwindling number of college or lawschool friends who had reached and maintained their place on the highest rungs of their profession. Id been the one telling young women at my lectures that you can have it all and do it all, regardless of what field you are in. Which means Id been part, albeit unwittingly, of making millions of women feel that they are to blame if they cannot manage to rise up the ladder as fast as men and also have a family and an active home life (and be thin and beautiful to boot).

VIDEO: Anne-Marie Slaughter talks with Hanna Rosin about the struggles of working mothers.

Last spring, I flew to Oxford to give a public lecture. At the request of a young Rhodes Scholar I know, Id agreed to talk to the Rhodes community about work-family balance. I ended up speaking to a group of about 40 men and women in their mid-20s. What poured out of me was a set of very frank reflections on how unexpectedly hard it was to do the kind of job I wanted to do as a high government official and be the kind of parent I wanted to be, at a demanding time for my children (even though my husband, an academic, was willing to take on the lions share of parenting for the two years I was in Washington). I concluded by saying that my time in office had convinced me that further government service would be very unlikely while my sons were still at home. The audience was rapt, and asked many thoughtful questions. One of the first was from a young woman who began by thanking me for not giving just one more fatuous You can have it all talk. Just about all of the women in that room planned to combine careers and family in some way. But almost all assumed and accepted that they would have to make compromises that the men in their lives were far less likely to have to make. The striking gap between the responses I heard from those young women (and others like them) and the responses I heard from my peers and associates prompted me to write this article. Women of my generation have clung to the feminist credo we were raised with, even as our ranks have been steadily thinned by unresolvable tensions between family and career, because we are determined not to drop the flag for the next generation. But when many members of the younger generation have stopped listening, on the grounds that glibly repeating you can have it all is simply airbrushing reality, it is time to talk. I still strongly believe that women can have it all (and that men can too). I believe that we can have it all at the same time. But not today, not with the way Americas economy and society are currently structured. My experiences over the past three years have forced me to confront a number of uncomfortable facts that need to be widely acknowledgedand quickly changed.

BEFORE MY SERVICE in government, Id spent my career in academia: as a law professor and then as the dean of Princetons Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Both were demanding jobs, but I had the ability to set my own schedule most of the time. I could be with my kids when I needed to be, and still get the work done. I had to travel frequently, but I found I could make up for that with an extended period at home or a family vacation. I knew that I was lucky in my career choice, but I had no idea how lucky until I spent two years in Washington within a rigid bureaucracy, even with bosses as understanding as Hillary Clinton and her chief of staff, Cheryl Mills. My workweek started at 4:20 on Monday morning, when I got up to get the 5:30 train from Trenton to Washington. It ended late on Friday, with the train home. In between, the days were crammed with meetings, and when the meetings stopped, the writing work begana never-ending stream of memos, reports, and comments on other peoples drafts. For two years, I never left the office early enough to go to any stores other than those open 24 hours, which meant that everything from dry cleaning to hair appointments to Christmas shopping had to be done on weekends, amid childrens sporting events, music lessons, family meals, and conference calls. I was entitled to four hours of vacation per pay period, which came to one day of vacation a month. And I had it better than many of my peers in D.C.; Secretary Clinton deliberately came in around 8 a.m. and left around 7 p.m., to allow her close staff to have morning and evening time with their families (although of course she worked earlier and later, from home). In short, the minute I found myself in a job that is typical for the vast majority of working women (and men), working long hours on someone elses schedule, I could no longer be both the parent and the professional I wanted to beat least not with a child experiencing a rocky adolescence. I realized what should have perhaps been obvious: having it all, at least for me, depended almost entirely on what type of job I had. The flip side is the harder truth: having it all was not possible in many types of jobs, including high government officeat least not for very long. I am hardly alone in this realization. Michle Flournoy stepped down after three years as undersecretary of defense for policy, the third-highest job in the department, to spend more time at home with her three children, two of whom are teenagers. Karen Hughes left her position as the counselor to President George W. Bush after a year and a half in Washington to go home to Texas for the sake of her family. Mary Matalin, who spent two years as an assistant to Bush and the counselor to Vice President Dick Cheney before stepping down to spend more time with her daughters, wrote: Having control over your schedule is the only way that women who want to have a career and a family can make it work. Yet the decision to step down from a position of powerto value family over professional advancement, even for a timeis directly at odds with the prevailing social pressures on career professionals in the United States. One phrase says it all about current attitudes toward work and family, particularly among elites. In Washington, leaving to spend time with your family is a euphemism for being fired. This understanding is so ingrained that when Flournoy announced her resignation last December, TheNew York Times covered her decision as follows:

Ms. Flournoys announcement surprised friends and a number of Pentagon officials, but all said they took her reason for resignation at face value and not as a standard Washington excuse for an official who has in reality been forced out. I can absolutely and unequivocally state that her decision to step down has nothing to do with anything other than her commitment to her family, said Doug Wilson, a top Pentagon spokesman. She has loved this job and people here love her.

Think about what this standard Washington excuse implies: it is so unthinkable that an official would actually step down to spend time with his or her family that this must be a cover for something else. How could anyone voluntarily leave the circles of power for the responsibilities of parenthood? Depending on ones vantage point, it is either ironic or maddening that this view abides in the nations capital, despite the ritual commitments to family values that are part of every political campaign. Regardless, this sentiment makes true work-life balance exceptionally difficult. But it cannot change unless top women speak out. Only recently have I begun to appreciate the extent to which many young professional women feel under assault by women my age and older. After I gave a recent speech in New York, several women in their late 60s or early 70s came up to tell me how glad and proud they were to see me speaking as a foreign-policy expert. A couple of them went on, however, to contrast my career with the path being traveled by younger women today. One expressed dismay that many younger women are just not willing to get out there and do it. Said another, unaware of the circumstances of my recent job change: They think they have to choose between having a career and having a family. A similar assumption underlies Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandbergs widely publicized 2011 commencement speech at Barnard, and her earlier TED talk, in which she lamented the dismally small number of women at the top and advised young women not to leave before you leave. When a woman starts thinking about having children, Sandberg said, she doesnt raise her hand anymore She starts leaning back. Although couched in terms of encouragement, Sandbergs exhortation contains more than a note of reproach. We who have made it to the top, or are striving to get there, are essentially saying to the women in the generation behind us: Whats the matter with you? They have an answer that we dont want to hear. After the speech I gave in New York, I went to dinner with a group of 30-somethings. I sat across from two vibrant women, one of whom worked at the UN and the other at a big New York law firm. As nearly always happens in these situations, they soon began asking me about work-life balance. When I told them I was writing this article, the lawyer said, I look for role models and cant find any. She said the women in her firm who had become partners and taken on management positions had made tremendous sacrifices, many of which they dont even seem to realize They take two years off when their kids are young but then work like crazy to get back on track professionally, which means that they see their kids when they are toddlers but not teenagers, or really barely at all. Her friend nodded, mentioning the top professional women she knew, all of whom essentially relied on round-the-clock nannies. Both were very clear that they did not want that life, but could not figure out how to combine professional success and satisfaction with a real commitment to family.

I realize that I am blessed to have been born in the late 1950s instead of the early 1930s, as my mother was, or the beginning of the 20th century, as my grandmothers were. My mother built a successful and rewarding career as a professional artist largely in the years after my brothers and I left homeand after being told in her 20s that she could not go to medical school, as her father had done and her brother would go on to do, because, of course, she was going to get married. I owe my own freedoms and opportunities to the pioneering generation of women ahead of me the women now in their 60s, 70s, and 80s who faced overt sexism of a kind I see only when watching Mad Men, and who knew that the only way to make it as a woman was to act exactly like a man. To admit to, much less act on, maternal longings would have been fatal to their careers. But precisely thanks to their progress, a different kind of conversation is now possible. It is time for women in leadership positions to recognize that although we are still blazing trails and breaking ceilings, many of us are also reinforcing a falsehood: that having it all is, more than anything, a function of personal determination. As Kerry Rubin and Lia Macko, the authors of Midlife Crisis at 30, their cri de coeur for Gen-X and Gen-Y women, put it:
What we discovered in our research is that while the empowerment part of the equation has been loudly celebrated, there has been very little honest discussion among women of our age about the real barriers and flaws that still exist in the system despite the opportunities we inherited.

I am well aware that the majority of American women face problems far greater than any discussed in this article. I am writing for my demographichighly educated, well-off women who are privileged enough to have choices in the first place. We may not have choices about whether to do paid work, as dual incomes have become indispensable. But we have choices about the type and tempo of the work we do. We are the women who could be leading, and who should be equally represented in the leadership ranks. Millions of other working women face much more difficult life circumstances. Some are single mothers; many struggle to find any job; others support husbands who cannot find jobs. Many cope with a work life in which good day care is either unavailable or very expensive; school schedules do not match work schedules; and schools themselves are failing to educate their children. Many of these women are worrying not about having it all, but rather about holding on to what they do have. And although women as a group have made substantial gains in wages, educational attainment, and prestige over the past three decades, the economists Justin Wolfers and Betsey Stevenson have shown that women are less happy today than their predecessors were in 1972, both in absolute terms and relative to men. The best hope for improving the lot of all women, and for closing what Wolfers and Stevenson call a new gender gapmeasured by well-being rather than wagesis to close the leadership gap: to elect a woman president and 50 women senators; to ensure that women are equally represented in the ranks of corporate executives and judicial leaders. Only when women wield power in sufficient numbers will we create a society that genuinely works for all women. That will be a society that works for everyone.

Herbal Hair Loss Remedies Herbal Hair Loss Remedies Herbs have an obvious appeal for many people because it's natural healing mechanisms of the body to support the cause of the problem, rather than simply determining just treating the symptoms. It would be wrong to present herbal remedies for hair loss as a panacea for all victims - however, there is evidence increasingly supporting the idea that some funds offer real hope to many people. Take the case of some of the most popular means to determine whether it is worth a try. Ginkyo biloba - this popular herb is thought to improve blood flow to the brain and skin. Botanists believe that the increased blood flow in the area of the brain brings more nutrients to the hair follicles thus promoting hair regrowth. The recommended dose is 120 160 mg dry extract per day spread over three doses. Green tea (Camellia sinensis) - believes that the catechins in green tea, the enzyme 5-alpha reductase that converts testosterone into hair-unfriendly DHT inhibiting. Therefore believed to be effective in the prevention and treatment of male pattern hair loss. You should drink several cups of green tea each day or take in capsule form as instructed by the manufacturer. He Shou Wu (Polygonum multiflorum) - also known as Fo-Ti has this Chinese herb traditionally used to reduce hair loss. Found in many commercial preparations or tea and capsules. Pygeum (Pygeum africanum) - from the bark of an evergreen tree that looks like green tea derived. It is commonly used to treat prostate problems and male pattern baldness. Users should take 60 to 500 mg per day as tablets or capsules. Saw Palmetto (Serano repens) - this is the current treatment of choice for many men to protect their ability, the prostate, slow hair loss and stimulate hair growth. It is the heart of a large number of commercially prepared hair loss treatments but can easily be obtained in pure form. The recommended dose is one capsule of 160 mg twice daily, but make sure that the ingredients made from the berry extract not the dried berries themselves. Nettle (Urtica dioica) - This was seen as a way to encourage hair loss because of its ability to prevent blocking the conversion of testosterone into DHT. It can be taken as tablets or capsules with an optimal dose of 50-100mg per day. It is particularly effective when combined with pygeum and saw palmetto.

One in Ten Adults Will Have Diabetes One in Ten Adults Will Have Diabetes The International Diabetes Federation predicted one in 10 adults could have diabetes by 2030. The World Health Organization said deaths from diabetes will double by 2030. In explaining concerns over such predictions, a representative of the World Health Organization said most cases of diabetes are Type 2, mainly hit people in middle age, and are linked to weight gain and a sedentary lifestyle. This suggests we can prevent or control diabetes through healthy aging, weight loss, and more activity. The key to healthy aging is a healthy lifestyle. Although a healthy lifestyle includes eating healthy foods and practicing portion control, we must look at all aspects of the physical and mental body. For physical health, consider the eyes, joints, digestive tract, and heart. For mental health examine stress management. Considering the whole body makes possible a body younger than you look. Weight loss, in the medical sense, means a reduction in total body mass. People select a weight-loss program to improve health, fitness, or appearance. If you view weight as number on a scale, you can achieve a reduction through a loss of fluid, body fat, muscle, or a variety of tissues. I have been successful with many diets, yet none created a long-lasting lifestyle change. I lose the weight and then return to previous eating habits. A better approach is to determine your ideal weight and institute nutritional eating habits that permit you to consistently lose one to four pounds per month. Once you reach the weight goal, continue nutritional eating habits with slight changes in quantities and types of foods. Sedentary lifestyle is characterized by an excess amount of sitting at work or home. My generation used the term "couch potato".. We must get out of your chairs, off the couches, or whatever we sit on for long periods of time, and move around. Below are seven suggestions I found helpful: As you consider them, let your creativity run wild for other things you can do.

Get up and move every hour, include standing, stretching, and walking around. Use a headset and walk around during telephone conversations. Take a walk during your lunch hour, outdoors, if possible. Deliver important messages in person rather than sending emails. Take the stairs instead of an elevator. Walk or ride a bike to work. If you drive, park your car at the farthest end of the parking lot. If you just have to watch TV, get up and walk around during the ads, and do some simple exercises.

Living the changes as the months turn to years can make a major difference in a healthy lifestyle. Start your changes today. Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to Facebook Labels: article

Diabetic Breakfast Ideas Diabetic Breakfast Ideas Assuming that happen to be diagnosed with diabetes, must be very disciplined with the foods you eat. It is considered that the conclusion of a diabetic menu clean and healthy is important to you, but also because you must choose the right foods to curb diabetes adapted as best as possible and take into account, the food you eat should be protected of long-term damage done by diabetes that antioxidants that low GI foods. Maintain strict control of these criteria, it is important to carefully choose their dishes, especially breakfast, because it is one of the most important meals of the day. In addition to diabetes breakfast, should emphasize the preservation of the highest values of fitness and wellness, apart from typical examinations to maintain total control of diabetes. He came to breakfast with diabetes, may be surprising for you to keep in mind that food breakfast diabetic breakfast menu for diabetes can be easily created good and exciting. It also indicates that breakfast recipes diabetics are more troublesome, as there may be tried in the past. Nutritious breakfasts with diabetes are achievable if you can add your personal touch and an artistic style to be a little different. Breakfast is recommended for diabetics:

The first and most important thing to remember is that food for diabetics should be "low glycemic index." This indicates that the Revenue diabetes should include foods that do not raise blood glucose quickly and really should be kept low blood sugar level for many hours. It should be noted here that the amino acids have a distinct advantage over processed grains to maintain the level of blood sugar constant. Therefore, the right grain for a person with diabetes would certainly whole-grain barley, oats and whole grain rye to name a few. Diabetes good breakfast idea also may contain peanuts, tomatoes, blueberries, channels of low-fat cheese and apples, bananas, peaches, etc, but the proportions of reality should be advised and managed with a licensed physician. Selection of real estate for diabetic food for breakfast: 1. Diabetic Lunch Menu # 1: Find a single slice of bread that could be grilled to your liking. Apply a teaspoon of margarine on bread, you can put a cup of egg substitute or cheese on toast. If you support something hot and melts in the morning, you can change the cottage cheese / egg substitute cup of oatmeal mixed with a cup of skim milk and may opt for a bit of banana. 2. Two plates of food for diabetics: a cup of fresh blueberries and a cup of whole milk, nonfat or low-fat with them. You can change the blueberry muffin with a little cranberry cake alternating with a glass of whole milk (fat).

3. Three plates of food for diabetics: Take 2 slices of whole grain wheat toast and 2 tablespoons of propagation. peanut butter in them. You can get a cup of tea of coffee (use low fat or fat, if desired) and a few bananas. 4. four. Plates of food for diabetics # 4: Spanish Tortilla: In this small course of diabetes, you may need 5 small potatoes, peeled and chopped, vegetable oil, medium onion, 1 small zucchini, cut from a cup sliced thin green pepper chopped red or mushrooms to 5 on average, 3 eggs, beaten together 5 beaten egg whites, 3 oz shredded low-fat mozzarella cheese, 1 tablespoon low-fat cheese and parmesan pepper garlic salt and herbs to taste.

Once you have organized almost all of these things, you have to preheat to 375 degrees pan and then prepare the potatoes in boiling water until tender. At this point, you want to add cooking spray and heat over medium heat in a nonstick skillet. Shortly after this, you must add the onion until golden and jump and then add the vegetables and saute until finally juicy but not brown. Then beat the eggs and egg whites in moderation, pepper, garlic salt and low fat mozzarella cheese in a bowl and stir the mixture through the egg mixture and cheese into the cooked vegetables. Then you want to add more vegetables and potatoes spray and spread the egg mixture to a child of ten. pie plate or ovenproof skillet. The final phase is almost all about removing the tortilla from the pan, let cool for ten minutes, and cut right at 5 or more rooms. five years. Five diabetic lunch menu #: Caribbean Red Snapper: For this excellent diabetic tasty breakfast food, you may need 2 tablespoons organic olive oil, chopped 1 medium onion, sliced red bell pepper cut Strip cup red pepper, a clove garlic, a cup of dry white wine. Pounds of red snapper (or salmon or chicken white meat) steak, sliced 1 tomato in size, two tablespoons. dice and ripe pitted olives 2 tablespoons. crumbled low-fat cheese or feta cheese low fat ricotta. Once you have done each of these elements is necessary to heat the extra virgin olive oil over medium heat in large skillet. Now is the perfect time to put the paprika, onion, garlic and carrots and stir for a break of 10 minutes. Subsequently, in particular wine and bring to a boil and turn the vegetables to one side of the pan. Now you need to keep the fillets in a single layer in a saucepan and cover the center and cook for five minutes is. Then add the tomatoes and olives and cheese. At present, cover and cook for 3 minutes or until fish is firm but tender. Subsequently, the fish move into the dish and garnish with the sauce and vegetables. Serve with rice. With these ideas incredibly small breakfast for diabetes and diabetes, you certainly can control diabetes and give your palate something to celebrate in, finally. These great-tasting dishes with diabetes can make you feel at all like the breakfast delicious and healthy with diabetes are feasible to do in your kitchen. Here are some tips for diabetes healthy breakfast could help more than more than half. Recommendations balanced breakfast for diabetes:

Avoid packaged and fast foods, which are high in sugar, fat and sugar and low in nutrients.

Eat home-cooked meals so that you are well informed that all factors are used to wash the dishes. Stay away from foods rich in carbohydrates that release their sugars quickly.

Avoid the bread and dough based products. Choose low-glycemic diet index diet high in fiber. Oats, wheat bran and fruits are excellent choices for a feed breakfast selection of diabetes. Stop the bacon and tomatoes, which can cause obesity. Low-fat soft cheese, green pea cakes, club sandwich, buttermilk pancakes, oatmeal, poached eggs, low fat yogurt, tortillas, and may be the best diabetic breakfast meals. Many vegetables can be eaten without restriction. For many other vegetables that are eaten are higher in fiber and low in starch. It's great that consists of different types of salad vegetables, onions, carrots, mushrooms, turnips, green beans, eggplant and garlic (if possible) in the breakfast menus for diabetes. It is better to add the soy sauce and vinegar with spices instead of lettuce minimum. Stop the heavy and flat, alternately, at the restaurant 6-7 times a day in small portions. In addition to these guidelines for diabetes nutritious breakfast, which allows access to other ideas that can support you to control diabetes to some degree. It is vitally important for diabetics to avoid smoking and alcohol consumption. If alcohol can not be free of all is that moderate consumption will advisabale dry wine and brandy. The mineral water is desirable in the tap. The level of blood sugar can be adjusted by the addition of a c. Seasonings tea cinnamon 1 / 2. at each meal. Take a good time for sandwiches properly and avoid watching TV, having a conversation, and to explore newspaper while eating. Check the amount of your diabetes at regular intervals and regularly consult a physician.

Global Warming
By Holli Riebeek Design by Robert Simmon June 3, 2010 Throughout its long history, Earth has warmed and cooled time and again. Climate has changed when the planet received more or less sunlight due to subtle shifts in its orbit, as the atmosphere or surface changed, or when the Suns energy varied. But in the past century, another force has started to influence Earths climate: humanity Previous versions of this article were published in 2007 and 2002. Archived versions are available as PDF files.

(NASA astronaut photograph ISS022-E-6674.) What is Global Warming? Global warming is the unusually rapid increase in Earths average surface temperature over the past century primarily due to the greenhouse gases released by people burning fossil fuels. How Does Todays Warming Compare to Past Climate Change? Earth has experienced climate change in the past without help from humanity. But the current climatic warming is occurring much more rapidly than past warming events. Why Do Scientists Think Current Warming Isnt Natural? In Earths history before the Industrial Revolution, Earths climate changed due to natural causes unrelated to human activity. These natural causes are still in play today, but their influence is too small or they occur too slowly to explain the rapid warming seen in recent decades. How Much More Will Earth Warm? Models predict that as the world consumes ever more fossil fuel, greenhouse gas concentrations will continue to rise, and Earths average surface temperature will rise with them. Based on plausible emission scenarios, average surface temperatures could rise between 2C and 6C by the end of the 21st century. Some of this warming will occur even if future greenhouse gas emissions are reduced, because the Earth system has not yet fully adjusted to environmental changes we have already made. How Will Earth Respond to Warming Temperatures? The impact of global warming is far greater than just increasing temperatures. Warming modifies rainfall patterns, amplifies coastal erosion, lengthens the growing season in some regions, melts ice caps and glaciers, and alters the ranges of some infectious diseases. Some of these changes are already occurring.

Soil erosion threatens to leave Earth hungry

Arable land is turning to desert or to salt at an ever-faster rate, lessening the hope that we can feed our booming population

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inShare0 Email John Vidal Guardian Weekly, Tuesday 14 December 2010 14.00 GMT

Borderline ... farmers in northern China struggle to eke out a living on the fringes of the Gobi desert. Photograph: Frederic J Brown/AFP/Getty Images Within 40 years, there will be around 2 billion more people another China plus India on Earth. Food production will have to increase at least 40%, and most of that will have to be grown on the fertile soils that cover just 11% of the global land surface. There is little new land that can be brought into production, and existing land is being lost and degraded. Annually, says the UN's food and agricultural organisation, 75bn tonnes of soil, the equivalent of nearly 10m hectares of arable land, is lost to erosion, waterlogging and salination; another 20m hectares is abandoned because its soil quality has been degraded. The implications are terrifying. "The world is facing a serious threat of a major food shortage within the next 30 years. We are trying to grow more food on less land while facing increased costs for fertiliser, fuel and a short supply of water," says Professor Keith Goulding, head of sustainable soils at Rothamsted research station and president of the British society of soil science. Lester Brown, president of the Worldwatch Institute in Washington, says it takes between 200 and 1,000 years to renew 2.5cm of soil. "The thin layer of topsoil that covers the planet's land surface is the foundation of civilisation. This soil, typically 6 inches [15cm] or so deep, was formed over long stretches of geological time as new soil formation exceeded the natural rate of

erosion. But sometime within the last century, as human and livestock populations expanded, soil erosion began to exceed new soil formation over large areas." Soil erosion is not a high priority among governments and farmers because it usually occurs so slowly that its cumulative effects take decades to become apparent, says David Pimentel, professor of agricultural sciences at Cornell University. "The removal of 1 millimetre of soil is so small that it goes undetected. But over a 25-year period the loss would be 25mm, which would take about 500 years to replace by natural processes." Soil erosion also leads to lower crop productivity because of loss of water, organic matter and soil nutrients. A 50% reduction in soil organic matter has been found to reduce corn yields by 25%. Countries are losing soil at different rates. The US, which just avoided turning the Great Plains into a dust bowl in the 1930s, is still losing soil 18 times more rapidly than it is forming it. China's desertification may be the worst in the world, Brown says. "Wang Tao, a leading desert scholar, reports that from 1950 to 1975 an average of 600 square miles [1,550 sq km] turned to desert each year. By century's end, nearly 1,400 square miles [3,600 sq km] were going to desert annually. Over the last half-century, some 24,000 villages in northern and western China have been entirely or partly abandoned as a result of being overrun by drifting sand." The problem is highly visible in the grasslands of Africa, the Middle East and central Asia. In 1950, Africa was home to 227 million people and 273 million livestock. By 2007, there were 965 million people and 824 million livestock. Countries are waking up to the problem. The African Union has launched the Green Wall Sahara Initiative to combat desertification across the Sahel. This plan, originally proposed by Olusegun Obasanjo when president of Nigeria, calls for planting 300m trees on 3m hectares in a long band stretching across Africa. Senegal, which is currently losing 50,000 hectares of productive land each year, would anchor the green wall at the west. Modou Fada Diagne, Senegal's environment minister, says, "Instead of waiting for the desert to come to us, we need to attack it." In July 2005, the Moroccan government, responding to severe drought, announced that it was allocating $778m to cancelling farmers' debts and converting cereal-planted areas into less vulnerable olive and fruit orchards. China defends itself against the Gobi desert by planting a 4,480km, belt of trees from outer Beijing through Inner Mongolia. The goal was to plant trees on 10m hectares, but pressures to expand food production appear to have slowed the tree planting. New farming practices are also being introduced. Instead of the traditional practices of ploughing land then harrowing it to prepare the seedbed, farmers drill seeds directly through crop residues into undisturbed soil, controlling weeds with herbicides. In the US, the no-till area went from 7m hectares in 1990 to 27m hectares in 2007. No-till farming has spread rapidly and now covers 26m hectares in Brazil, 20m hectares in Argentina, 13m in Canada and 12m in Australia.

The best hope may lie in the global climate change talks, which have recognised that nearly 30% of all carbon is released from deforestation, the conversion of peat lands and degradation of soils. If agreement can be reached to reward reforestation and conservation, there is some hope that the next 2 billion people may be fed.

An Essay / Article on Floods and Its Prevention

Girish Sharmaa Articles Water is vital to life. No animal or plant life can exist without it. The land will not yield without supply of adequate water. Yet the same water causes havoc and becomes a terror in the form of floods when the rivers overflow their banks due to excessive rains in their catchment areas. In India almost every year floods are common in one part of the country or the other. During rainy season our rivers are swollen and cause disastrous floods which cause heavy destruction to life and property. The swollen rivers inundate fields, destroys crops, house, villages etc. causing loss of human life, cattle population and destruction of property. The water washes away everything that comes in its way. The rivers often change their course submerging large areas of land user water. Floods cause extensive damage. Apart from destroying crops, cattle, houses and all other things coming in its way, floods take away with it the upper fertile crust of land. Many villages are submerged by the flood waters and low lying areas turn into huge lakes. The marooned people have to be evacuated to higher and safer places. Those who cannot be transported, have to be supplied with food etc. through air dropping. Northern and North Eastern parts of country suffer most due to recurrent floods. Kosi and Gandak in Bihar, Ganga, Jamuna and Gomti in Uttar Pradesh and Brahmaputra in Assam bring curse to people residing by their sides almost every year. The rivers in Southern India are not so prone to flood. Floods do not cause immediate damage only, but leave behind many problems for the health and civic authorities. The flood waters take a long time to recede. Even after months, large areas submerged in water appear to be big lakes. Water could either be pumped out or allowed to evaporate in sun. This caused a health hazard. Law and order problems also come up. Malaria, cholera and other diseases sometimes come up as epidemics in flood affected areas. They take a heavy toll of life even after waters have receded. Water logging in vast areas is another problem faced during and after floods. One of the main reasons for recurrent floods in northern and eastern India is heavy rainfall during monsoon seasons for a couple of months. Due to excessive rains all-round, the rivers and their tributaries overflow. More-and-more water from their catchment areas drain into rivers,

resulting in floods. Melting of snow in the Himalayas during summer also causes increased discharged of water in several rivers, flooding the areas which suffer immense loss. Silting the river beds over a period of time, reduces their water flowing capacity, as it constantly reduces its depth. It also results in floods. Sometimes there are huge landslides in the hills and large amount of rocks and other debris fall into river resulting in wide floods. These may be termed as natural cause of floods which are beyond control. During last 50 years or so, vast forest areas of the Himalayas have been cleared by people. The trees have been cut in large numbers. Indiscriminate falling of trees over a period of time has left the mountains barren. When it rains in the high mountains, all water now goes straight to rivers resulting in floods. There is larger melting of snow as well in such areas. In forests, the soil is soft due to trees and their roots. A large amount of water percolates below the surface and becomes available to man as subsoil water. Now, in the absence of trees, this water also passes into rivers resulting in greater damage due to floods and less availability of ground water in future months. This is a man made reason of floods. India has to suffer heavy losses due to floods every year. This is a poor country which can illafford such tremendous losses. It has been assessed that almost 40 million hectares of land is flood prone. Floods in such vast areas cause huge destruction and irreparable loss to our economy. A large sum has to be spent on relief and rescue due to floods and about 6.5 million acres of crop is submerged; more than 20 lakhs cattle heads and a large number of people perish. Most of the damage is caused in the rural areas, though cities are not always spread. Lakhs of people have to witness helplessly the tragedy of having their crops, cattle and homes ruined by surging waters. The principal remedy of recurrent floods is massive afforestation and soil conservation programme throughout the country. A programe to reforest the Himalayas will be a beginning in this direction. The second remedy to curb foods is to trap some of the early monsoon water underground in artesian basins which could be used during dry season. Multi-purpose projects could be taken up, which would not only control floods, but would also augment power supply. Floods are causing damage for last several centuries. After independence, a national programme for effective flood control measure was launched in 1954. As short-term measures, in the Second Five Year Plan, a provision was made for the construction of embankments, improvement of channels, raising the village level, protection of town and cities etc. In the subsequent, consolidation of benefits arising out of executed work and additional works of embankments, river training work etc, have been taken up. During the Sixth Plan, a sum of Rs 1045 Crores was provided for flood relief work. In the Seventh Plan, a sum of Rs 947.39 crores was provided for flood control measures. The need of the day demands action. Only blue-prints and discussions are not going to help, unless and until the Government machineries start implementing those master-plans which are being locked inside dusty Govt. wooden cupboards, from the very day of its origin.

Tsunami in Japan 2011 Japan experienced the worst ever earthquake disaster in its modern history early Friday 11th March, 2011 followed by a deadly tsunami leading to massive destruction in the northern part of the country. Ads by Google Slope Stability Software SLOPE/W, the most used slope stability software in the world. www.geo-slope.com The world admires the resilience of Japan in facing geological instabilities. Although being the best earthquake prepared nations in the world, the most powerful earthquake of Japan (magnitude 8.8) that struck it on Friday 11th March, at 1446 local time (0546 GMT), highlighted the fact that the risks posed by such natural disasters can overthrow any human preparedness. The quake that hit about 400 km (250 miles) north-east of Tokyo, triggered a massive tsunami that swept almost everything that came in its path. The death toll is unclear as the government officials are still trying to figure out the extent of destruction. Buildings, even far away in the Tokyo city shook vigorously. Earthquake and Tsunami Devastate Japan Several reports from Japanese media have cited that a ship carrying hundred people and a train with unknown number of passengers has also gone missing. The tidal waves that accompanied Tsunami were reported to be as huge as 33 foot destroying everything that came in their way. This massive destruction brought memories of the 2004 Tsunami in Asia and alerts were issued across Australia, Philippines, Taiwan, Indonesia and New Zealand. Even in the regions of the Pacific, including areas as far away as South America, US west coast, Canada and Alaska high alert warnings were issued in the wake of Tsunami triggered by the earthquake. "The earthquake has caused major damage in broad areas in northern Japan," Prime Minister Naoto Kan was quoted saying in a news conference. Thousands of people were evacuated from regions surrounding several nuclear power plants that were reported to have faced problems due to the earthquake. As per the Japanese prime minister, all nuclear plants were shut down safely and no radiation leak has been reported in zones affected by the deadly earthquake. The disaster left most of the places in Tokyo in dark as the nuclear power reactors were shut down automatically due to the earthquake. In sections of Kesennuma, Miyagi; a town inhabited by nearly 70,000 people, the situation all night was worsened due to the fire that broke out after the tsunami knocked several vehicles causing oil and gas to leak. Even though Japan has faced several earthquakes in its entire history, this one has been reported to be the most destructive. The extent of destruction is yet to be reported officially; however the earthquake was of horrific scale as the Tsunami waves penetrated several miles inland before they retreated. The video footage of water walls ravishing everything that was coming in their way and the uncontrollable fire erupting in several areas, as captured by various Japanese media news channels is no less than the disasters that is portrayed in Hollywood movies. People who were struck in offices or on roads said to media that walking, even on the streets was similar to crossing the deck of a ship at sea. Certainly, it is impossible to pen down the large-scale destruction that this earthquake has caused to the nation. Hundreds of people have been dead and

many deaths have not yet been officially reported. Previously, Japan had experienced one of the deadliest earthquakes in the 20th century on 1 September 1923. Known as the Great Kanto earthquake, this earthquake hit the Kanto plain, destroying Tokyo and several parts of Yokohama. Nearly 1,40,000 people had died in this worst earthquake measured at 7.9 in magnitude on the Richter scale. Although the earthquake that struck Japan on 11th March is the worst in its history, we can only pray the casualties are minimum. US President Barack Obama and UN Chief, Ban ki-Moon have send their condolences to the victims and their families. The United Nations, European Union, USA and China have come forward to provide relief to the victims of the earthquake. In fact, all major governments of the world are willing to help Japan in this time of loss and grief. Let us come forward to help people of Japan in such trying times. Governments of several other countries must also make a note of the Japan's remarkable disaster readiness. Japan has set gold standards for itself when it comes to emergency preparedness. Almost all the population is trained religiously in drills and other strategies to tackle emergencies. Even the public infrastructure is developed in a way so that natural disasters can cause minimum loss. For instance, even though few nuclear reactors did face problems during the earthquake, they were managed effectively and radiation leaks were not reported. Similarly, there are no words to describe the abilities of Japanese architects and engineers whose efforts have made Japan, one of the best economies of the world. We have seen many countries in past reduced to rubble even due to an earthquake of magnitude between 7 to 7.5. It is only Japan that has been able to withstand such a massive earthquake. I don't deny the fact that the loss due to this earthquake (as we all can see by media coverage) is certainly the biggest-ever but some vital lessons must be learned in this time of crisis from Japan. Effective emergency preparedness and disaster management are some lessons that we can learn from Japanese people, not to mention the qualities of hard work and never say die spirit, for which they have been famous for, since ages. Japan will surely bounce back from the losses with time, as it has always done in the past natural disasters though it may take some time, as the destruction has been on a large scale. As Japan fights with the biggest natural disaster in its history, let us pray for the victims and families who have lost their lives. May the almighty grant each one of us the wisdom and strength to stand the test of such trying circumstances. By Kundan Pandey Last Updated: 9/29/2011 Ads by Google Menangkan 2 Mobil Smart Jangan Lupa Main Gamenya Tiap Hari. Ingat, 2 Mobil Smart Menantimu. sunsilk.co.id/clickthecar Mapping Climate Change Explore This Map of Climate Change and Global Efforts to Combat It. cfr.org/climatemap COP18 UN Conference For the latest news, reports and analysis from COP18 www.rtcc.org Particle Size Measurement Concentrated system. No dilution. Zeta potential optional. Titration

www.Dispersion.com Suspended Sediments Monitor suspended sediments: single point and profile measurements www.aquatecgroup.com Jual Beli Kamera Nikon Pilihan terlengkap aneka kamera, di situs iklan online terbesar! fotografi.tokobagus.com New Magnum Gold IceCream The First Golden Ice Cream In The World Now Available In Indonesia. mymagnum.co.id Read more at Buzzle: http://www.buzzle.com/articles/tsunami-in-japan2011.html

apan earthquake: Tsunami hits north-east

The quake hit at 1446 local time (0546 GMT) and this is how the disaster unfolded Continue reading the main story

Japan quake

Fukushima report: Key points Fukushima glimpse How plant was stabilised What went wrong?

Japan's most powerful earthquake since records began has struck the north-east coast, triggering a massive tsunami. Cars, ships and buildings were swept away by a wall of water after the 8.9-magnitude tremor, which struck about 400km (250 miles) north-east of Tokyo.

A state of emergency has been declared at a nuclear power plant, where pressure has exceeded normal levels. Officials say 350 people are dead and about 500 missing, but it is feared the final death toll will be much higher. In one ward alone in Sendai, a port city in Miyagi prefecture, 200 to 300 bodies were found. The quake was the fifth-largest in the world since 1900 and nearly 8,000 times stronger than the one which devastated Christchurch, New Zealand, last month, said scientists. Thousands of people living near the Fukushima nuclear power plant have been ordered to evacuate. Continue reading the main story

At the scene

Roland Buerk BBC News, Tokyo In the centre of Tokyo many people are spending the night in their offices. But thousands, perhaps millions, chose to walk home. Train services were suspended. Even after the most violent earthquake anyone could remember the crowds were orderly and calm. The devastation is further to the north, along the Pacific coast. There a tsunami triggered by the quake reached 10km (six miles) inland in places carrying houses, buildings, boats and cars with it. In the city of Sendai the police found up to 300 bodies in a single ward. Outside the city in a built-up area a fire blazed across several kilometres. Japan's ground self-defence forces have been deployed, and the government has asked the US military based in the country for help. The scale of destruction from the biggest quake ever recorded in Japan will become clear only at first light. Japanese nuclear officials said pressure inside a boiling water reactor at the plant was running much higher than normal after the cooling system failed. Officials said they might need to deliberately release some radioactive steam to relieve pressure, but that there would be no health risk. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had earlier said the US Air Force had flown emergency coolant to the site.

But US officials later said no coolant had been handed over because the Japanese had decided to handle the situation themselves. The UN's nuclear agency said four nuclear power plants had shut down safely. Measured at 8.9 by the US Geological Survey, it struck at 1446 local time (0546 GMT) at a depth of about 24km. The tsunami rolled across the Pacific at 800km/h (500mph) - as fast as a jetliner - before hitting Hawaii and the US West Coast, but there were no reports of major damage from those regions. Continue reading the main story

Japan quake: video reports Quake: Wave forecast map

Thousands of people were ordered to evacuate coastal areas in the states of California, Oregon and Washington. The biggest waves of more than 6-7ft (about 2m) were recorded near California's Crescent City, said the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre. A tsunami warning extended across the Pacific to North and South America, where many other coastal regions were evacuated, but the alert was later lifted in most parts, including the Philippines, Australia and China. Strong waves hit Japan's Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures, damaging dozens of coastal communities. A 10m wave struck Sendai, deluging farmland and sweeping cars across the airport's runway. Fires broke out in the centre of the city.

Japan's NHK television showed a massive surge of debris-filled water reaching far inland, consuming houses, cars and ships. Motorists could be seen trying to speed away from the wall of water. Continue reading the main story

Start Quote
This is the kind of earthquake that hits once every 100 years Akira Tanaka Restaurant worker

In pictures: Japan quake Production halted at plants Google aids quake victims

In other developments:

Four trains are missing along the coast, says Japan Railways; and a ship carrying 100 people was swept away

Fire has engulfed swathes of the coast in Miyagi prefecture's Kesennuma city, one-third of which is reportedly under water A major explosion hit a petrochemical plant in Sendai; further south a huge blaze swept an oil refinery in Ichihara city, Chiba prefecture Some 1,800 homes are reported to have been destroyed in the city of Minamisoma, Fukushima prefecture A dam burst in north-eastern Fukushima prefecture, sweeping away homes, Kyodo news agency reports At least 20 people were injured in Tokyo when the roof of a hall collapsed on to a graduation ceremony

In a televised address, Prime Minister Naoto Kan extended his sympathy to the victims of the disaster. Continue reading the main story

Deadliest earthquakes
27 July 1976, Tangshan, China: est 655,000 killed, 7.5 12 Jan 2010, Haiti: 222,570 killed, 7.0 8 Oct 2005, Pakistan: 80,361 killed, 7.6 31 May 1970 Chimbote, Peru: 70,000 killed, 7.9 Source: USGS

History of deadly earthquakes How to measure earthquakes Animated guide: Earthquakes Animated guide: Tsunamis

As aftershocks rattled the country, residents and workers in Tokyo rushed outside to gather in parks and open spaces. Many people in the Japanese capital said they had never felt such a powerful earthquake. In central Tokyo, a number of office workers are spending the night in their offices because the lifts have stopped working. "This is the kind of earthquake that hits once every 100 years," said restaurant worker Akira Tanaka. Train services were suspended, stranding millions of commuters in the Japanese capital.

About four million homes in and around Tokyo suffered power cuts.

End the Death Penalty in California

Published: November 5, 2012

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A ballot initiative in California, Proposition 34, gives voters the chance to abolish capital punishment in the state. Initiatives are generally a bad way to make law, but a vote by the people is the only way to overturn the death penalty in California because that was how it was adopted in 1978.
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Times Topic: Capital Punishment

Connect With Us on Twitter For Op-Ed, follow @nytopinion and to hear from the editorial page editor, Andrew Rosenthal, follow @andyrNYT. Statewide polls about the measure have moved favorably toward repeal of the penalty in the past few months, but it is one of the important choices on Tuesday that remains too close to call. We encourage every California voter to support the initiative.

It would shift more than 725 inmates from death row to life in prison without the possibility of parole, and it would reduce by almost one-quarter the number of inmates in the United States waiting to be executed. Passage of the initiative would end a capital punishment system that is almost certainly unconstitutional on the most fundamental basis: many who have received the state death sentence do not rank as the worst of the worst among convicted criminals. California clearly imposes the sentence in ways far broader than the narrow category of the most serious crimes that the Supreme Court has said is allowed by the Constitution. The state penalty is likely unconstitutional for other reasons, too. For example, excessive delays in appointing counsel for appeals and in holding state appeals hearings make the wait for resolution, often in solitary confinement, cruel and inhumane. The measures passage, according to the states legislative analyst, would save the state more than $100 million a year in the first few years and then $130 million a year after that. The savings would come from putting an end to long death penalty trials that require spending on extra lawyers, investigators and experts for both the prosecution and the defense; protracted mandatory appeals that take a decade or more even for those wrongly convicted; and special prison housing that triples the normal costs. The initiative would require that convicted murderers work in prison and put their earnings in a fund for victims families. It would improve public safety by committing $100 million of the expected savings to the investigation of the states high percentage of unsolved rapes (56 percent) and murders (46 percent). California has executed 13 men out of the more than 800 people sentenced to death since the state adopted the penalty by initiative in 1978 (84 inmates on death row have died without being executed). A 2011 study led by Arthur L. Alarcn, a senior judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, found that the state system has cost $4 billion $308 million per execution. Judge Alarcn, who was a pro-death penalty prosecutor, now opposes the penalty as a costly and complete failure. Proposition 34 is backed by federal, state and local government officials, including many in law enforcement and corrections. Its time to shut down the states immoral, barbaric and broken system of capital punishment.

Kentuckys Egregious Death Penalty

Published: October 24, 2012

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The Kentucky Commission on Human Rights voted unanimously last week to recommend that the state abolish the death penalty. There is every reason for Kentucky to take the advice and become the 18th state to prohibit capital punishment.

Connect With Us on Twitter For Op-Ed, follow @nytopinion and to hear from the editorial page editor, Andrew Rosenthal, follow @andyrNYT. The death penalty in Kentucky is colossally unfair, costly and riddled with constitutional error. From 1976 through last year, of the 78 people sentenced to death in the state, 50 had their sentences overturned on appeal, with 15 of those for prosecutorial mistakes or misconduct. In December, a report conducted by the American Bar Association based on a two-year review by a team of lawyers, professors and former members of the State Supreme Court found enormous problems with the states capital system. Kentuckys laws and procedures, the report said, failed to protect the innocent, convict the guilty and ensure the fair and efficient enforcement of criminal law in death penalty cases. For instance, among the states 57 prosecutors offices, some will charge every death-eligible case as a capital case while most others do not. This means that the pursuit of the death penalty in Kentucky is largely arbitrary and capricious, determined by which office happens to be prosecuting the case. Judges presiding over capital trials often give inadequate jury instructions so that almost half of the jurors interviewed in a long-term study did not understand that they could consider mitigating evidence at sentencing, which could allow them to avoid imposing the death penalty. The system does not protect the rights of people with severe mental illnesses who, the United States Supreme Court has said, cannot be sentenced to death. And there are no standards governing the qualifications for lawyers who handle capital cases, with dreadful consequences: 10 of the 78 people sentenced to death had lawyers who were later disbarred.

In 2010, a state court blocked Kentucky from executing anyone because of substantial legal questions regarding the validity of its lethal injection protocol. That ruling alone should be the end of capital punishment. Kentucky can ensure that heinous criminals are no longer threats to society by sentencing them to life without parole. It is time for the state to end the death penalty.
A version of this editorial appeared in print on October 25, 2012, on page A30 of the New York edition with the headline: Kentuckys Egregious Death Penalty.

Promiscuity
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search "Promiscuous" redirects here. For other uses, see Promiscuous (disambiguation). This article is about promiscuity in humans. For promiscuity in other animals, see Animal sexual behaviour. "Putting out" redirects here. For the business method, see putting-out system. Promiscuity, in human sexual behavior, is the practice of casual sex with multiple sexual partners.[1] The term can carry a moral judgement and is viewed in the context of a mainstream social ideal for sexual activity to take place within exclusive committed relationships. A common example of behavior viewed as promiscuous within the mainstream social ideals of many cultures is a one-night stand. What sexual behavior is considered "promiscuous" varies between cultures as does the prevalence of promiscuity, with different standards often being applied to different genders and civil status. Feminists have traditionally argued that there is a significant double standard between how men and women are judged for promiscuity. Historically, stereotypes of the promiscuous woman have tended to be negative, such as "the slut", while male stereotypes have been more varied, some expressing approval, such as "the stud", while others imply societal deviance, such as "a womanizer". One scientific study found that promiscuous men and women are judged equally harshly[2] and both genders express strong preference for sexually conservative partners.[3] Promiscuity is very often portrayed in literature, cinema and television, for example in the popular series Sex and the City. Promiscuity is common in many animal species. Some species have promiscuous mating systems, ranging from polyandry and polygyny to mating systems with no stable relationships where mating between two individuals is a one-time event. Many species form stable pair bonds but still mate with other individuals outside the pair. In biology, incidents of promiscuity in species that form pair bonds are usually called extra-pair copulations.

Promiscuity: A Teen-Age Epidemic

You are here: Student.com Articles Student Health & Sexuality Sexual Health Promiscuity: A Teen-Age Epidemic Related Articles <p>Search, Compare, and Apply for student loans at <a href="http://www.simpletuition.com?brnd=studentcom" title="Simpletuition.com" target="_blank">Simpletuition.com</a>.</p>

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By Kingofjason One of every 3 girls has had sex by age 16, 2 out of 3 by age 18. Two of 3 boys have had sex by age 18. In Illinois, 87 out of every 1000 girls will become pregnant between the ages of 15 and 19. Illinois is ranked 31st in the comparison between pregnancy rates in all 50 states. Many people believe that teens nowadays are way too sexually active. Compared to the decades where teens parents and grandparents were raised, teens growing up in 2004 seem to be less concerned about the negative consequences of unprotected sexual activity. Teens these days are very commonly referred to as a promiscuous age group. Many teens claim that the reasons for having sex at such a young age include peer and social pressure, it feels good, pressure from partner, already lost virginity so might as well keep going, _expression, rebellion, and curiosity. Not only does unprotected sexual activity lead to teen pregnancy, but it also leads to unwanted sexually transmitted diseases, such as gonorrhea, chlamydia, HIV and AIDS, herpes, and syphilis. Teenagers have a higher rate of contracting Gonorrhea than men and women between the ages of 20 to 44 years old. Every single year, three million teens will contract an STD. That is about one fourth of all sexually active teens. One quarter is a very large portion of teenagers who will be affected the rest of their lives by a disease. Gonorrhea is one of the most commonly reported sexually transmitted diseases. Females ages 15 to 19 have the highest rate. Experts have estimated that one in four sexually active teens have Chlamydia, but 75% of infected women and 25% of infected men have no symptoms. HPV, which can lead to cervical cancer, affects almost half of all sexually active teens these days. Twenty percent of these cases will eventually recover, but the remaining eighty percent will be affected for the rest of their lives. Somewhere between 15 and 20 percent of all young men and women will become infected with Herpes before they reach adulthood. In one act of unprotected sex with a partner that is infected, a teenage female has a one percent risk of contracting HIV, a thirty percent chance of getting genital herpes, and a fifty percent chance of getting gonorrhea. I just think that some kids just need to have a little more respect for their bodies and rethink their morals, said a student at Sullivan High School. Abstinence would be the number one best prevention against teen pregnancy and the contraction of sexually transmitted diseases. For those who feel they need to be sexually active, there are other methods of prevention. Condoms, monogamy,

diaphragms, and oral contraceptives are the most popular and effective ways of preventing pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases.

Sexual Promiscuity A National Plague

By Wayne Jackson

After a weary wandering for forty long years, the Hebrew people were preparing to enter Canaan. They encountered pagan forces east of the Jordan river, but resolutely defeated them because the Lord was with his people. When the heathen armies saw that they were unable to resist the power of Jehovah, they decided to pursue another course of action. They sought to corrupt Israel from within. Accordingly, Moabite women came among the people of God, and the Hebrew men sexually indulged themselves with these women likely as a part of idolatrous ceremonies (Numbers 25:1-2). As a result, the Lord sent a plague among his people and 24,000 died on account of their fornication 23,000 of them in a single day (cf. 1 Corinthians 10:8). In this latter passage, Paul warns that this account ought to serve as an example for folks today (vv. 6,11).

Sexploitation Symptoms
The sexual capacity of mankind is not intrinsically evil. It is a part of the divine design for humanity. But its role has prescribed parameters; sexual activity is limited to the marriage relationship. Ever since the late 50s and early 60s especially, America has been on a destructive sexual binge. This degeneracy is manifested in several ways.
Increases Teenage Sexual Activity

Teenage sexual promiscuity is rampant. Encouraged by school programs that distribute birthcontrol devices, only about one in five teenagers will remain chaste in these early years. Some three million teens annually will contract a sexually transmitted disease. Teen pregnancies are at an all time high and many are terminated by abortions.
Domestic Cohabitation

According to the U.S. Census Bureau there are around nine million men and women who are living together intimately withot a marriage covenant. That figure has sky-rocketed tenfold since 1960. The number of unmarried, cohabitating couples has increased by 72% in the last decade.

Marital Infidelity

In some regions of the nation at least, marital infidelity is common. Recent studies have suggested that, on average, in the about-50 age group, some 28% of men and 17% of women have had extramarital relationships. One problem with such polls is that people frequently lie about adulterous affairs. The numbers may be higher.
Acceptance of Homosexuality

There may be no better measure of the plummeting standard of sexual morality in the nation than that of the growing acceptance of homosexual relationships. Studies within the past five years indicate that more than three million people are involved in same sex liaisons. A 1995 poll suggested that 90% of the public believes that society should value all types of families, including the homosexual arrangement. These societal trends are a shocking commentary on the changing face of Americas attitudes and actions regarding sexual activity.

Causes for Americas Sexplosion

The causes for this radical shift in sexual practices are doubtless many and varied. We obviously cannot do full justice to the problem in this brief article. One study of this matter was undertaken in the 1960s by investigative journalist Vance Packard. Over a span of four years, Packard interviewed some 300 professionals psychologists, sociologists, etc. and surveyed approximately 2,000 people relative to progressively changing sex attitudes both in America and Europe. In his book, The Sexual Wilderness, he postulated a number of factors which shaped the sexual shift that occurred in that decade, and which has a lingering effect unto this day. I have combined some of Packards propositions with my own research over the years.
Rationalism

Rationalism is the notion that human reason is perfectly competent to discover and define spiritual belief and practice without any appeal to divine revelation. This ideology grew out of that era known as the Enlightenment, an 18th century movement that reacted to the oppressive influence of the Roman Church during the previous millennium. The Rationalists, inventing their own criteria of judgment, e.g., removing the supernatural elements from Scripture, proceeded to discredit the Bible in the minds of many. A chain reaction resulted eventually. If the Scriptures are not to be trusted in their historical data, why should they be highly regarded in terms of moral restrictions? Accordingly, a gradual rejection of the authority of the Bible arose. The trickle-down effect became apparent as the decades passed. If there is no objective standard to regulate conduct, then every man becomes his own Bible, and moral chaos reigns.

Darwinism

In 1859, Charles Darwin published his book, The Origin of Species. It was wildly popular from the day of its release. The initial edition of 1,025 copies sold out the first day. Though Darwin was still a believer in God at the time, the thesis of the book is that mankind has evolved from a lower form of life. Man is, therefore, basically a naked ape. Others took Darwinism to its logical extension and argued that the evolutionary hypothesis allows one to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist (Dawkins, p. 6). One who has but a modest level of reasoning ability can conclude that if we are but products of the blind forces of nature, then there is no moral standard higher than our own desire. As Darwinism was popularized and accepted in America, there occurred a descent of man in terms of morality. The rules for sexual behavior began to erode.
Scientific Discovery

The march of scientific discovery, wonderful as it has been in many respects, has had negative fallout as well. This is not because science itself is intrinsically evil; rather, it has to do with how men have interpreted nature. As scientific knowledge advanced, more and more it could be seen that there are laws that explain the operations of nature. Increasingly, God was not needed as an explanation for how things work. The idea of a God, therefore, who controls nature, and who is sovereign over mankind, blurred into the background. One of the major fallacies in this line of reasoning, of course, is the fact that these very laws of nature demand a lawgiver. Every effect must have an adequate cause. Moreover, it has become painfully obvious that while science may explain how some things work (e.g., nuclear reactions), it cannot explain how they ought to be employed! Unfortunately, mans sense of scientific achievement has generated in him an attitude of arrogance. If he can control and manipulate certain forces of nature, he ought to be able to regulate his own life in terms of ethics. This ideology has had devastating consequences.
Wars

For much of the past century, on-and-off, to a greater or lesser degree, the United States has been involved in war. World Wars I and II, the Korean conflict, Vietnam, etc., have had a tremendous effect upon society. Packard argues that modern wars have had a deleterious effect upon our nation in several ways (p. 30). First, wars tear families apart and create situations of isolationism and loneliness. Second, wars have forced women to leave the home environment and seek public jobs, which created a sense of independence not previously experienced. Third, modern warfare especially weaponry of mass destruction has contributed to the mood of living for the moment. The idea of living for the intensity of the experience becomes compelling.

Technological Advancement

What a different world it is today from that which our grandparents experienced. In barely a century weve come from the world of kerosene lamps and horse-drawn buggies, to the glittering lights of Vegas, and the era of the supersonic jet. We have more time on our hands and more toys to play with than weve ever known before. For centuries man has been trying to discover some way to separate the recreational aspects of sex from the procreative factor. Beginning in the mid/late 19th century, and continuing to the present, science has helped in achieving that goal. In 1954 two doctors discovered a drug that could be incorporated into a pill which would prevent conception. Within a dozen years, more than 6 million women were on The Pill. A new era of sexual liberation was ushered in to an already ailing society. While there is no intrinsic evil in artificially preventing conception, there is no question but that many have felt freer to engage in intimate promiscuity as a result of birthcontrol techniques. Advancing technology and the industrialization of society also contributed to the decline of those close family relationships that generally characterized rural America. Such changes, of course, were inevitable with the passing of time; nonetheless, there was an effect upon the family unit. In many families both parents left the home to work and an ever-widening gap between parents and children developed. Studies have shown that the phenomenon of family estrangement has contributed to accelerated sexual experiences (Schofield, pp. 224-56). Another aspect of technological progress had to do with the entertainment industry. Packard has an entire chapter titled, The Bombardment of Sexual Stimuli (pp. 51ff). He traces the evolution of the sexual revolution via the cinema screen, beginning principally in the 30s, and accelerating thereafter. The 1940s was the decade of more brazen cleavage exposure, a sign of even more egregious changes to come. When television came along in the late 1940s, it brought sexual visualization right into the home. At least 97% of American homes have access to one or more TV sets. While TV started relatively tame (Rob and Laura, of the Dick Van Dyke show, sleeping in twin beds), there is now a constant stream of sexually explicit language, nudity, licentious situations, etc. Easy access to hard-core video and the pornography of the internet have added to the sordid mixture. When men and women allow their minds to become saturated with these stimuli, there is bound to be a lifestyle effect. Jesus said that sexual sins begin in the heart [mind] (Mark 7:20-23; cf. Proverbs 4:23). When human minds become sexual sewers, can the corruption of society be far behind?
Cultural Shifts

Several cultural changes have contributed to the new sexual frontier. We can but touch upon a few brief points.

First, a gradual chasm has developed between the publics theoretical faith and a practical connection with personal conduct. Numerous people entertain the notion that one may hold a religious impulse or urge, but that such has no significant relevance to the manner of his life. This disconnect accommodates sexual looseness. Second, youngsters become sexually sensitive at progressively tender ages. Anatomically mature dolls, makeup for preteens, sexually accented dress for little girls, etc., puts our youth on the fast track much quicker than once was the case. Third, the independence that youngsters were gradually allowed drastically changed during the early decades of the last century. Now, many young people have a car by the time theyre old enough to secure a drivers license. They date at younger ages, and have little (if any) supervision or limits as to where they may go, or what they may do. With developing hormones, time on their hands, money, and raw exposure to the crudest images imaginable, is it any wonder that our maturing youth have undergone a metamorphosis?

Is There Any Turning Back?

It would be easy to lapse into a depressive state, and throw up ones hands in despair. After all, there are few societies like ancient Nineveh that do an about-face practically overnight (Jonah 3:5ff). It generally takes a tragedy perhaps even a dramatic collapse to get a nations attention. Our own recent mini-revival of religious fervor, in the wake of September 11, 2001, reflects only a ripple of spiritual interest, when there needs to be a cataclysmic turnaround. But the Christian must not despair. Advances can always be made on the individual level. There are still honest and good hearts among the masses. The following recommendations, we are confident, would help remedy the condition of the soul both among young and old in Americas sexual wilderness.
The Bible is Authoritative

There must be a rekindling of conviction relative to the authority of the Bible. Until one is persuaded that he is not a law unto himself, he will not be prone to alter his lifestyle. While one may argue abstractly for the existence of God based upon certain logical conclusions drawn from nature (cf. Romans 1:20), instruction relative to human conduct must come from concrete revelation, namely, the Scriptures. Unless, however, one is persuaded that these documents are from God, and are authoritative for living (2 Timothy 3:16-17), he is adrift in a sea of religious/moral confusion. There is no field of investigation these days more important than a consideration of the various evidences that establish the credibility of the Bible. And there is a famine in the land relative to instruction on this vital theme (cf. Amos 8:11).

Parents must take a greater responsibility in teaching their children the great truths of the Bible. Many youngsters today especially older ones show zero interest in church Bible classes. They refuse to do homework and they laugh at the idea of memory work. Why do such attitudes prevail? Because the home is no longer a place where the Word of God is revered, read, and discussed. Church has taken a back seat to other interests. For many, Christianity has become an occasional weekend exercise to salve the conscience. Such has no power to protect and preserve.
The Power of the Family

Fathers and mothers must attempt to revitalize the closeness of their family relationships. We are so busy that we scarcely have family time for one another any more. Many fathers are on the road constantly and see their families mostly on the weekends. Mothers have their own careers. They are not fulfilled by the domestic roles of wife and mother. Children are placed in day-care centers, farmed out to child-care keepers, etc. Many youngsters are emotionally closer to surrogate parents, to their school teachers, etc., than they are to their own moms and dads. Many of our youth know nothing about a good work ethic and contributing to the welfare of the home as the youngsters of an earlier generation did. Many of our kids are totally sports and entertainment oriented. There is little wonder they are so ill-equipped to make their way in todays world.
Respect for Authority

Not altogether disconnected from the previous point is the reality that many parents need to recapture parental authority, and a supervision of the territory they have surrendered to their offspring. The unparalleled freedom that many children enjoy today borders on the criminal. The fact of the matter is, many parents are afraid of their children. They are afraid that if they are too strict, they will be reported for child abuse either physical or emotional. I personally know of several cases of this very sort. If you do not let me do as I please, youngsters have said, I will report you to the school counsellor. And mind you well, there are those in positions of authority who are quite amenable to such charges. They like nothing better than to create a furor within a fundamentalist, right wing, Christian home. But the fact is, strict discipline and protective control will never work in a home where there is no closeness and affection. Children must know that their parents love them deeply. There must be an emotional bond. Yes, under the best circumstances youngsters will disagree with parental decisions. They will pout and get angry at times. But they will remain under control if the proper restraints are imposed in an atmosphere of genuine, yet firm, warmth.

Conclusion

A better nation begins with better homes, and Christians must lead the way in the battle. Let us each resolve to do the best we can to remedy the distressing conditions of our beloved country.