Michael Cohen: A Suspicious Man With Suspicions

Posted: 2/27/2019

Today, was the great day many have been longing for: Michael Cohen’s testimony under oath before a committee of the U.S. Congress.

From his testimony (excerpted from here; emphasis added):

1. “... Mr. Trump did not directly tell me to lie to Congress. That’s not how he operates. In conversations we had during the campaign, at the same time I was actively negotiating in Russia for him, he would look me in the eye and tell me there’s no Russian business, and then go on to lie to the American people by saying the same thing. In his way, he was telling me to lie ...”
   (Why was Mr. sleaze negotiating in Russia as he claims?)
2. “... Mr. Trump’s personal lawyers reviewed and edited my statement to Congress about the timing of the Moscow Tower negotiations before I gave it ...”
   (Cohen is ultimately responsible for whatever he said before Congress)
3. “... Questions have been raised about whether I know of direct evidence that Mr. Trump or his campaign colluded with Russia. I do not, and I want to be clear. But, I have my suspicions. ...”

I think, this sorry, sleazy attorney made a laughing stock out of himself. This man is so pathetic that he belongs behind bars! Let’s see whether he writes his memoirs while in jail for three years!

On the same day, Cohen was debarred by the New York state Supreme Court in Manhattan. “A five-judge panel found that Cohen, who began a three-day stretch of congressional testimony on Tuesday, should be disbarred for his federal conviction for having previously made false statements to Congress, the decision said”. What an impeccable timing!

If the Democrats have any modicum of sincerity and ethics they should stop this testimony ASAP and dismiss anything this former attorney has testified!

This is so hilarious! Makes my day!

Reality is often so much better than fiction! You cannot come up with this even if you tried hard!

Wikipedia Blacklists Liberty

Posted: 2/27/2019  Updated: 2/28/2019

Update Of 2/28/2019

I also contacted The Library of Economics and Liberty by e-mail and they confirmed that they have been blacklisted for some time. They have made efforts to correct this, but Wikipedia refuses to cease blacklisting them. I was also told that even individuals affiliated with the Library are blacklisted by Wikipedia.  

Original Post

I could not believe my eyes, I was truly shocked just a moment ago when I discovered that Wikipedia puts a certain, well known website of classical liberty minded publications on a blacklist!

This is the article that I was just reviewing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welfare_definition_of_economics. See the first listed reference for this article.

I captured the blacklisting here:

The blacklisted website, i.e. econlib.org, is the well established, respected, and highly regarded The Library of Economics and Liberty. It is a website, where one can read e.g. major and minor works of economics and philosophy. Before the Internet, while The Library was a book publisher, one could buy reprinted first editions of many books that were hard to find or where out of print.

Finally Speed Up And Simplify The Drug Approval Process

Posted: 2/24/2019

I would strongly argue that over the past 10-20 years, we made so enormous progress in our understanding of drugs and biology that the lengthy, expensive drug approval processes could be dramatically shortened and simplified. This would among other things save many lives and make drugs cheaper!

Here is just one most recent example of advances that could help speed up the drug approval process:  Engineered miniature kidneys come of age: Method for growing kidney organoids under flow enhances their vascularization and maturation, increasing their potential for drug testing and regenerative medicine ( dated February 11, 2019)

David: From Slingshot To Moonshot

Posted: 2/22/2019

It is an extraordinary event that tiny Israel just successfully launched a mission to Moon. Only a few nations (4 to be exact) have achieved this.

Not only that Israel also demonstrates that private space exploration is at least as good as government sponsored space missions. I would even argue that the heavy and rather domineering government involvement in the past has actually considerably retarded space exploration and its potential for humanity!

The Expanding Mental Disorder Profession

Posted: 2/11/2019

Trigger

Just read Why it’s key to identify preschoolers with anxiety and depression New research shows these kids have mental and physical problems as they grow older

In this article, we learn that young children were subjected to a few carefully selected and rather narrowly crafted and blunt experiments to determine early onset of anxiety and depression. My hunch is that these few experiments are rather crude to make such far reaching judgments! More longitudinal studies and more observation are called for!

A Few Observations

1. There is a huge conflict of interest affecting in particular the mental disorder profession (psychologists, psychiatrists, neurologists etc.), but something similar applies to other medical professions as well
2. The more humans, this profession identifies as having mental disorders, the more money flows their way, the more prestige, fame, and stature they gain, the more such professionals we need and so forth. A nice self feeding, reinforcing process (or a vicious spiral)
3. I would argue since Sigmund Freud, the mental disorder profession has attempted to declare as many members of society to be suffering from some mental disorder as possible
4. Do members of the mental disorder profession exploit their authority as trusted specialists? I would say yes! Lay people are kind of left to rely on their pronouncements
5. If it is to some extent true that a disproportionate number of the members of the mental disorder profession are their own best patients (self treatment), then would these members not feel better if they are not isolated case, but that many humans share their fate?
6. Like ADHD or autism spectrum disorders, anxiety and depression are very much in the eye of the beholder. All these disorders are difficult to specify and measure. Their diagnosis was expanded dramatically over the past decades. More and more children and adults have been diagnosed as having one of these disorders
7. To what extent are e.g. anxiety and depression just part of the normal range of human behavior and mental condition? To my knowledge, there are still no hard facts or diagnostic tests to determine if and when a human being (adolescent or adult) has a mental disorder so severe and clinical that requires treatment

Severe Depression Is Finally Loosing Its Grip

Posted: 2/10/2019  Updated: 3/22/2019

Update Of 3/22/2019

Just read When neurons are out of shape, antidepressants may not work (Source 1, published 3/22/2019; 2) here is a partially corresponding Salk Institute news release: When Neurons Get The Blues: Hyperactive Brain Cells May Be To Blame When Antidepressants Don'T Work published 1/31/2019; 3) here is the underlying original research paper Altered serotonergic circuitry in SSRI-resistant major depressive disorder patient-derived neurons published 3/22/2019)

Looks like the Salk Institute may have found an explanation why a significant number of patients do not respond to the most commonly prescribed antidepressants selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressants a.k.a. SSRI resistance.  

Some pertinent quotes (emphasis added):

1. “... When serotonin was present, some neurons derived from SSRI non-responders had significantly higher activity on average compared to the neurons of healthy individuals or SSRI responders. ...” (Source 2)
2. “... two particular serotonin receptors (out of seven known in the human brain), 5-HT2A and 5-HT7. When these receptors were blocked with a chemical compound, the neurons of non-responders were no longer hyperactive in the presence of serotonin ...” (Source 2)
3. “... serotonergic neurons exhibited altered neurite growth and morphology downstream of lowered expression of key Protocadherin alpha genes as compared to healthy controls” (Source 3)
4. “... intrinsic differences in serotonergic neuron morphology and the resulting circuitry may contribute to SSRI resistance in MDD [major depressive disorder] patients”

Original Post

Just read this great article: Brain-zapping implants that fight depression are inching closer to reality Researchers are resetting the part of the brain that can shift mood

This article is very comprehensive, has quite a bit of historical context, covers several treatment methods, contains intuitive graphics, and much more. Highly recommendable!

We have to be very grateful to those patients with epilepsy who participated in this research. Thanks to these patients we will be seeing a lot more insights about the workings of our brain in the months and years to come. This is very exciting!

For lack of time, I keep this post very short.

Caroline Of Ansbach Enlightenment

Posted: 2/9/2019

Recently, I watched this great video documentary by Lucy Worsley (Source 1) where I learnt some interesting things about Caroline of Ansbach.

With some exaggeration, I might compare this Queen of Great Britain with Frederick the Great of Prussia, except that Caroline preceded Frederick in promoting ideas of enlightenment or the monarch being the first servant of the state (German: erster Diener des Staates). Not least, it helped that she was German.

Here are some achievements of Caroline (Source 2 unless noted otherwise; emphasis added):

1. She rejected suitors
2. “Caroline was known for her political influence, which she exercised through and for [Robert] Walpole … Caroline advised her husband to retain Walpole as the leading minister.”
   Perhaps, her influence was seen even so dominant as to overshadow her husband as e.g. expressed in this famous satire of the time: “You may strut, dapper George, but 'twill all be in vain, We all know 'tis Queen Caroline, not you, that reign”
3. “Caroline had absorbed the liberal opinions of her mentor, Queen Sophia Charlotte of Prussia, and supported clemency for the Jacobites (supporters of the rival Stuart claim to the throne), freedom of the press, and freedom of speech in Parliament.”
4. “An investigation into the penal system uncovered widespread abuses, including cruel treatment and conspiracy in the escape of wealthy convicts. Caroline pressed Walpole for reform, largely unsuccessfully”
5. “As queen, she continued to surround herself with artists, writers and intellectuals.  ... supervised a more naturalistic design of the royal gardens by William Kent and Charles Bridgeman. In 1728, she rediscovered sets of sketches by Leonardo da Vinci and Hans Holbein that had been hidden in a drawer since the reign of William III.”
6. “As regent, Caroline considered the reprieve of Captain John Porteous [(by the way, the John Porteous story is quite a story in itself)], who had been convicted of murder in Edinburgh.”
7. “Queen Caroline, consort of George II, had been friend and patron to [Georg Friedrich] Handel for more than thirty years when she died in 1737. An accomplished amateur musician herself ...” (Source 4)
8. Here is how Georg Friedrich Handel’s expressed his devotion to or praise of Caroline: “She put on righteousness and it clothed her; her judgment was a robe and a diadem (Job 29:14) … She delivered the poor that cried, the fatherless and him that had none to help him (Job 29:12). Kindness, meekness and comfort were her tongue (Sirach 36:23); if there was any virtue, and if there was any praise, she thought on those things (Philippians 4:8).” (Source 4, 5)
9. “Lady Mary Wortley Montagu defied convention most memorably by introducing smallpox inoculation to Western medicine after witnessing it during her travels and stay in the Ottoman Empire. … Lady Mary was eager to spare her children, thus, in March 1718 she had her nearly five-year-old son, Edward, inoculated with the help of Embassy surgeon Charles Maitland … In April 1721, when a smallpox epidemic struck England, she had her daughter inoculated by Maitland, the same physician who had inoculated her son at the Embassy in Turkey, and publicised the event. … she persuaded Caroline of Ansbach to test the treatment. In August 1721, seven prisoners at Newgate Prison awaiting execution were offered the chance to undergo variolation instead of execution: they all survived and were released. Controversy over smallpox inoculation intensified; however, Caroline, Princess of Wales was convinced. The Princess's two daughters were successfully inoculated in April 1722 by French-born surgeon Claudius Amyand.[” (Source 3)
10. “... she sent her son ["Look, there he goes—that wretch!—that villain!—I wish the ground would open this moment and sink the monster to the lowest hole in hell!"] a message [in her final hours] of forgiveness through Walpole”

Sources:

1. The First Georgians The German Kings Who Made Britain Episode 2 with Lucy Worsley
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caroline_of_Ansbach
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Mary_Wortley_Montagu
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ways_of_Zion_Do_Mourn_/_Funeral_Anthem_for_Queen_Caroline
5. G.F. HÄNDEL: "The ways of Zion do mourn" HWV 264, Les Arts Florissants

NASA Is A Major Perpetrator And Purveyor Of The Global Warming Hoax

Posted: 2/8/2019  Updated: 2/9/2019

Update Of 2/9/2019

Have you ever tried to raise a concern with the leadership of NASA as a citizen? Well, you can’t! The contact form of NASA is useless (Source 5; you can ask NASA about how to become an astronaut). The fairly new administrator of NASA, i.e. Jim Bridenstine, does not publish his e-mail address (Source 4). However, Mr. Bridenstine publishes his Twitter account (Source 3, 4). I would have contacted him by email to tell him to stop this hoax at NASA!

Another purveyor and perpetrator of the Global Warming hoax is Berkeley Earth (Source 6) for similar reasons as NASA. Just to give you a taste of their distortions: “Climate Fast Facts

"urban heat island" effect is real, but it has not had a significant impact on global temperatures since 1950.” (emphasis added) The urban heat island is much more than real it has a huge impact on surface temperature measurement (see my blog post here).

Original Post

Like an annual, quasi religious ritual, NASA again announced that 2018 was the hottest year on record, the fourth hottest year in a row. In 2018, the global annual average temperature rose by 0.8 degrees Celsius.

This is utter, pure, and contemptible demagoguery by NASA:

1. A 0.8 degree increase is well within the margin of error or uncertainty given that this is a global average. NASA does not even bother to publish the margin of error (Source 1)
2. NASA only uses “surface temperature”. This is a serious and devastating sampling bias. It is well known that for example air or high altitude temperatures do not confirm this hottest year nonsense
3. We also know that surface temperature measuring stations were systematically and deliberately eliminated, if they reported too cool temperatures (e.g. Climate Gate)
4. We do not learn how NASA accounts for the pervasive heat island effect (see my blog post here)
5. NASA employs a seriously flawed methodology: “global surface temperature relative to 1951-1980 average temperatures”. Why would NASA pick such a short reference period? Don’t we have data that goes back to about 1880? Was there not a Global Cooling scare  in the 1970s before the Global Warming scare became en vogue? “By the 1970s, scientists were becoming increasingly aware that estimates of global temperatures showed cooling since 1945” (Source 2) Does this not suggest that NASA deliberately chose 1951-1980 because it contains a period of global cooling?
6. I am sure more could be listed here ...

Sadly, it appears that NASA is complicit in the deception of the general public by massaging and torturing data to produce the Global Warming hoax!

It is high time for President Trump to stop this nonsense and drain the swamp!

Sources:

1. https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/global-temperature/
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_cooling
3. https://twitter.com/JimBridenstine
4. https://www.nasa.gov/content/nasa-administrator-bridenstine
5. https://www.nasa.gov/content/submit-a-question-for-nasa
6. http://berkeleyearth.org/summary-of-findings/