20 Reasons To Love Mindfulness (According To Science)Oh mindfulness meditation, how do we love thee? Let us count the ways. Even though the academic research on mindfulness meditation isn’t as robust as, say, nutrition or exercise, there is a reason why it’s been around for literally thousands of years.
Monsanto Protection Act put GM companies above the federal courtsMonsanto and the US farm biotech industry wield legendary power. A revolving door allows corporate chiefs to switch to top posts in the Food and Drug Administration and other agencies; US embassies around the world push GM technology onto dissenting countries; government subsidies back corporate research; federal regulators do largely as the industry wants; the companies pay millions of dollars a year to lobby politicians; conservative thinktanks combat any political opposition; the courts enforce corporate patents on seeds; and the consumer is denied labels or information.
‘Illegal we do immediately; unconstitutional takes a little longer’: Kissinger in new mass WikiLeaks document release – RT NewsWikiLeaks has published the ‘Kissinger Cables’: its largest public release of documents in nearly a year, totaling some 1.7 million classified files, including information on the US’s secret diplomatic history. A variety of files have been collected and collated, including from congressional correspondence, intelligence reports, and cables.
Arizona pushes to have gold as legal tender – RT USACan the paper dollar be any more worthless? Some lawmakers in Arizona think so, and are hoping that gold and silver will soon be counted as legal tender. As evident by last week’s dismal jobs report, the effects of the recession are still apparent across the United States: the labor force participation rate in the US has hit a three-decade low, and unemployment remains stagnant at close to the 8 percent mark.
The Science of Going Within, Part I: Exploring the Neurobiological Basis of Shabd Yoga Meditation, Andrea Diem-Lane and David LaneDavid Christopher Lane, Ph.D. Professor of Philosophy, Mt. San Antonio College Lecturer in Religious Studies, California State University, Long Beach Author of Exposing Cults: When the Skeptical Mind Confronts the Mystical (New York and London: Garland Publishers, 1994) and The Radhasoami Tradition: A Critical History of Guru Succession (New York and London: Garland Publishers, 1992).
States Fight Back Against MERS Mortgage FraudMERS: The Center of the Mortgage Scam A prominent economist said about the 2008 financial crisis: “At the root of the crisis we find the largest financial swindle in world history”, where “counterfeit” mortgages were “laundered” by the banks.
Environmentalist jailed over blog post – RT USAAn environmentalist from the United States has been sent back to prison – and his friends and family say it’s because he spoke up about the government’s attempts to silence activists just like him.
Aldous Huxley Describes The Ultimate Revolution | DisinformationIf we were in fact drawing closer to the scenario he describes fifty years ago, what would the drug in question be? Aldous Huxley, speaking at U.C. Berkeley in 1962, outlines his vision for the ‘ultimate revolution’, a scientific dictatorship where people will be conditioned to enjoy their servitude, and will pose little opposition to the ‘ruling oligarchy’, as he puts it.
Banks Roused by the CFPB’s Database of ComplaintsWhen the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in January 2012 proposed creating a free, public database of consumer complaints against credit-card issuers, financial firms urged officials to reconsider. In letters to the agency, trade groups argued that doing so would expose trade secrets and breach customer privacy.
Report: Ohio courts illegally jailing the poorCOLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Several courts in are illegally jailing people because they are too poor to pay their debts and often deny defendants a hearing to determine if they’re financially capable of paying what they owe, according to an investigation released Thursday by the Ohio chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.
Everything You Need to Know (So Far) About the Largest Leak of Offshore Financial Secrets in HistoryThe Twitterati (and presumably a bevy of bankers) went astir today after a small DC watchdog began systematically leaking millions of financial secrets about offshore companies. Here’s why you should care. What is this “Offshore Leaks” thing everyone’s freaking out about?
Reclaiming the American Republic from the corruption of election funding | KurzweilAIThere is a corruption at the heart of American politics, caused by the dependence of Congressional candidates on funding from the tiniest percentage of citizens That’s the argument at the core of a new just-posted TED talk by legal scholar Lawrence Lessig (video below).
Google Fights U.S. National Security Probe Data DemandGoogle Inc (GOOG)., operator of the world’s largest search engine, is challenging a demand by the U.S. government for private user information in a national security probe, according to a court filing. It “appears” to be the first time a major communications company is pushing back after getting a so-called National Security Letter, said the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an Internet privacy group.
Prudential Sues Bank of America for ‘Racketeering’ – TheStreetNEW YORK ( TheStreet) — Prudential Financial has sued Bank of America , alleging the bank and Merrill Lynch engaged in “racketeering” in connection with mortgage-backed securities sales, according to a Reuters blog post. Prudential spokesman Bob DeFillippo confirmed the insurer “did bring an action against Bank of America that concerns residential mortgage backed securities,” but offered no further comment.
‘We’re Going to Have a Crisis’: David Stockman’s Stark Warning for AmericaDavid Stockman, formerly a leading conservative Reaganite, now blames some of the economic program that he once supported for the 2008 meltdown and sluggish recovery. But liberal Democrats who may be excited about a Stockman defection will be sorely disappointed: His critique of the Obama economic program is just as strong as what he says about his erstwhile friends in the Republican Party.
The People’s BankHow did deep-red North Dakota end up with the nation’s most populist financial institution?
Bank of America to pay $165 million to settle lawsuitThe association has filed similar lawsuits against other banks and has won a combined $171 million in settlements from Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and HSBC. It still has lawsuits pending against Barclays, Credit Suisse, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, RBS, UBS and others.
MBIA Wins Ruling on Loan Buybacks in Bank of America LawsuitMBIA Inc., the bond insurer suing Bank of America Corp. to recover losses tied to mortgage loans, won an appeals court ruling that the lender could be required to repurchase securitized loans even if they arenât in default.
‘You must own a gun’: Georgia town passes mandatory firearms law – RT USAA small southern American town makes the Second Amendment right of US citizens to bear arms an obligatory duty. Welcome to Nelson, Georgia, a rural town about 50 miles (80 km) north of Atlanta that passed on Monday the ‘Family Protection Ordinance’, which requires the head of each household to own a gun and ammunition.