oldenough2burmom: Everyone — after you’re done taking pictures...

Sit down and STFU. Your hypocrisy is showing.

This is to point out the hypocrisy of the people who should know better, but instead they choose to ignore what's right. If you can't understand how people would be FOR a health care system that discriminates based on pre-existing conditions. If you can't understand people who want less government but then want to legislate their religious beliefs to interfere with abortions and gay marriage. If you can't understand the ignorance behind those who say that global warming is a myth cuz they have snow where they live. If the fact that racism, sexism, misogyny and homophobia is still prevalent and still exists to this day blows your mind. If you don't understand why Michael Vick (rightfully so) went to jail for dog fighting, but it's ok for Sarah Palin to hunt on national TV. If people who throw their compostables and recyclables all in the garbage cuz they're too lazy piss you off. If you think that giving tax cuts to the richest 2% of America makes a total of ZERO economic sense. If you can't stand Fox News, the Westboro Baptist Church, National Organization for marriage and the following people: Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter, Sarah Palin, Christine O'Donnell, Rand Paul, Michelle Bachmann, Sharron Angle, Tucker Carlson, Maggie Gallagher, Brian Brown, Ken Buck, John Boehner, Pat Robertson, Shirley Phelps, Fred Phelps (and co.) and Michael Vick. If you love The Young Turks, MSNBC, Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann, Anthony Weiner and Bernie Frank. If you think Meghan McCain should consider becoming a democrat cuz she's just way too awesome to be a republican. If you think Glenn Beck should finally be off the air. If you think violent rhetoric does in fact influence people and should not be allowed on any side. If you think that Politicians should not be bought and should base their decisions on the over-all good of the citizens. If you just outright cannot understand the Republicans and why crazy unreasonable people still get a say in Politics, this place is for you. Although it's more like a stfuconservatives wanna be ;) LOL
I'm a Canadian with a passion for American politics, so I don't know everything about everything. Embarrassingly enough, I know more about American politics than I do my own, I'm working on it though.

-Chanty

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Arkansas Senate passes bill to ban abortions after 20 weeks

LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas | Mon Feb 18, 2013 6:41pm EST

LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas (Reuters) - The Republican-controlled Arkansas state Senate approved a measure on Monday to ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy except in the case of rape, incest or to save the mother's life.

The Pain Capable Unborn Child Protection Act passed the Senate, 25-7, with amendments that allowed for the exemptions in the case of rape or incest. An earlier version of the bill that passed the Republican-controlled House allowed exemptions only for pregnancies that threatened the mother's life.

The bill, which shortens the existing limit of 25 weeks, now returns to the House for consideration of the Senate amendment.

Democratic Governor Mike Beebe has not said whether he would sign the bill into law.

Seven U.S. states have laws that restrict or ban abortion after the 20-week mark and similar laws approved in Arizona and Georgia are facing legal challenges.

Late-term abortions remain relatively rare. Most of the recent state laws banning most abortions after 20 weeks are based on hotly debated medical research suggesting a fetus feels pain starting at 20 weeks of gestation.

(Reporting by Suzi Parker; Editing by Daniel Trotta and Dale Hudson)

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British shoppers saying nay to meat after horse scandal

People shop at a supermarket in London February 16, 2013. Nearly half of British consumers said they would avoid buying meat from supermarkets affected by the horsemeat scandal, according to a survey this month for Retail Week magazine.

Credit: Reuters/Luke MacGregor

By Clare Hutchison and Alice Baghdjian

LONDON | Mon Feb 18, 2013 12:30pm EST

LONDON (Reuters) - The discovery of horsemeat in products sold as beef has shocked many British consumers into buying less meat, a survey showed on Monday.

The furor, which erupted in Ireland last month and then spread quickly across Europe, has led to ready meals being pulled from supermarket shelves and damaged people's confidence in the food on their plate.

It also raised concerns over food labeling and the complex supply chain across the European Union, putting pressure on governments to explain lapses in quality control.

A fifth of adults said they had started buying less meat after traces of horse DNA were found in some products, according to the poll conducted by Consumer Intelligence research company.

"Our findings show that this scandal has really hit consumers hard, be it through having to change their shopping habits or altering the fundamentals of their diet," David Black, a spokesman for Consumer Intelligence, said.

The online poll, conducted on February 14-15, questioned more than 2,200 adults on their spending habits following the horsemeat scandal. It gave no specific figures on how much meat people were buying, focusing only on broader trends.

More than 65 percent of respondents said they trusted food labels less as a result.

"(Brands) will have to put in place really stringent ways of checking that what's being delivered and what's on the label is indeed what's in there," Black said.

In the month since horsemeat was first identified in Irish beefburgers, no one is yet reported to have fallen ill from eating horse but many supermarkets and fast food chains are already struggling to save their reputations.

Governments across Europe have stressed that horsemeat poses little or no health risk, although some carcasses have been found tainted with a painkiller given to racehorses but banned for human consumption.

Environment secretary Owen Paterson, who met British retailers earlier in the day for talks on how to restore consumer confidence, said Britain was closely cooperating with European countries to investigate what happened.

"Looking ahead, there was absolute determination in the industry to restore confidence in their products," he said in televised remarks. "We look forward to meeting on a regular basis to absolutely make it clear that when consumers buy a product they get what they bought."

British retailers now expect the vast majority of tests on processed beef products to be completed by February 22, according to the British Retail Consortium.

LOCAL BUTCHERS

More than 60 percent of adults surveyed said they would now buy meat from their local butchers, the poll said, while a quarter of adults said they would now buy more joints, chops or steaks instead of processed meat.

Michael Suleyman, who owns a family-run butchers' shop in Brixton, London, said more customers appeared concerned although for now there had not been any difference in sales figures.

"We have seen people panicking and asking us lots of questions like 'where do you get your meat from?'," Suleyman, 51, told Reuters. "We assure our customers by showing them the meat and mincing it for them in front of their eyes."

But with inflation running above central bank targets and an uncertain job market, the spending power of British consumers has been eroded in recent years and, for some, buying more expensive meat is not an option.

Nearly a fifth of respondents said they wanted buy less processed meat such as ready-meals, but could not afford to.

At a London branch of Britain's biggest retailer, Tesco, which found horse DNA in some of its own-brand frozen spaghetti bolognese meals last week, consumers were still buying meat products.

"I've got nothing against horse meat," said Sean Cosgrove, 39, a local government employee. "I think you're being ambitious if you expect top quality meat in those products anyway."

(Writing by Alice Baghdjian and Maria Golovnina; Additional reporting by James Davey and Neil Maidment; Editing by Michael Roddy)

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Evidence lacking on how to help kids after trauma

By Genevra Pittman

NEW YORK | Wed Feb 13, 2013 4:58pm EST

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - There's no good evidence to say what types of treatment might help ward off anxiety and stress disorders in kids and teens exposed to traumatic events, according to a new analysis.

Researchers said that a few psychological interventions, including talk therapy and school-based programs, "appear promising" for helping young people cope with the kind of trauma stemming from accidents, mass shootings and natural disasters. But so far, there are too many holes in the data to know what to recommend for children's long-term health and wellbeing, according to Meera Viswanathan from RTI International in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, and her colleagues.

Nicole Nugent, who has studied stress disorders in kids at Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, said one difficulty is that children get exposed to many different types of trauma, and as a result have many different treatment needs.

Nonetheless, "We can't just say, ‘Let's just not address it until we know more about the interventions that are effective,'" Nugent, who wasn't involved in the new review, told Reuters Health.

"One thing that we know doesn't work is nothing," she said.

"Something horrible happens, and (kids) think, ‘If I don't think about it, if I don't talk about it, it will go away.' And that absolutely doesn't happen."

So-called nonrelational trauma is different from interpersonal trauma, which stems from acts committed by a person the child knows, such as sexual abuse or maltreatment by a friend or family member.

The young victim in the recent Alabama hostage drama, a six-year-old known only as Ethan, who was held in an underground bunker for six days, could have suffered nonrelational trauma because he didn't have a prior relationship with his kidnapper, Viswanathan said.

In an interview today on the "Dr. Phil" television show, Ethan's mother talked about the boy's emotional state since being rescued, including his difficulty sleeping - a symptom common among both kids and adults following trauma.

Viswanathan's team analyzed 25 studies in which children who had been exposed to nonrelational trauma were assigned to a particular treatment intervention or a comparison group.

Depending on the trial, some of those children were already experiencing anxiety and other symptoms related to the trauma.

Treatment programs varied in their methods - from medication to talk therapy - as well as in their intensity and how long they lasted.

None of the studies testing medications such as antidepressants found they had a positive effect on children's mental health, according to the findings published Monday in Pediatrics.

On the other hand, youth who went through some type of talk therapy tended to do better than others who weren't treated at all - though Viswanathan called that pattern a "weak signal."

Researchers said some of what has been learned helping children who experience interpersonal trauma can be applied to young survivors of accidents and natural disasters as well.

"In the absence of other evidence," Viswanathan told Reuters Health, "certainly don't ignore the problem. Provide children with the support that can be available, and also tailor it for the needs of the children."

She urged for more research looking at how kids respond to nonrelational trauma, in particular.

"Sadly, the shootings in Newtown are unlikely to be the last that we see, and we don't want to be in a position that we wish we had better evidence" on how to help children move on.

SOURCE: bit.ly/XAOQ3Z Pediatrics, online February 11, 2013.

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