Erin Brockovich Speaks Out on Water Fluoridation

After a great deal of research and personal thought, I am opposed to the continued policy and practice of drinking water fluoridation; I believe this harmful practice must be ended immediately. Public drinking water is a basic human right; and its systematic use as a dispensary of a substance for medical purposes is deplorable.

Shocking revelations are surfacing in the growing scandal; real harm from fluoride affects people of all races and ages, but one of the especially shocking aspects of the scandal is how dental and government officials responded when The Lillie Center for Energy & Health Studies publicized the science showing disproportionate fluoride harm to the African American community. Minority community and civil rights leaders have been speaking out, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s niece Alveda King. Ms. King recently posted on my Facebook page that I should keep shining the light on Fluoridegate. Ms. King also called for public hearings, and I agree: it’s time for meaningful public hearings. There are numerous documents and aspects to this scandal that investigative bodies and investigative journalists will want to examine.

Now is the time for professional and consumer advocacy groups that have blindly lent their name to support drinking water fluoridation to rescind that permission. How many of them actually conducted their own reviews before allowing their name to be used? And now is the time to ask the hard questions about the nature of the relationship between trade groups, our surgeon generals, and other government officials concerning drinking water fluoridation.

As a mother and grandmother, I am concerned about families in fluoridated communities using fluoridated drinking water from their tap to mix infant milk formula. I am concerned that the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences has designated kidney patients, children, diabetics and seniors as “susceptible subpopulations” that are especially vulnerable to harm from ingested fluorides. How can we in good conscience give susceptible persons an uncontrolled amount of fluorides in water? I also strongly support Drinking water utility professionals, many I know many deplore and feel guilty about the idea of dispensing medication through drinking water and working with the dangerous fluoridation chemicals.

Drinking water fluoridation takes away people’s freedom to choose what they take into their bodies. Low income families may not have the financial means to avoid over dosing with their drinking water.

I call for four avenues of action:

1. An immediate repeal of all laws that require or enable fluoridation.
2. Holding of Fluoridegate hearings at both national and state levels.
3. For professional associations and advocacy groups to rescind allowing their names to be used to support drinking water fluoridation.
4. For key research to immediately begin on how to safely remove fluorides that have accumulated in people’s bones and pineal glands.

My career has been about making people aware of harmful exposures and the deception that often accompanies those exposures. Drinking water fluoridation is harmful, we’ve been deceived to believe it is safe, and with new found knowledge we must all act now to stop it.

Source: Erin’s Facebook Page.

More about Erin Brockavich from the Gazette’s website.

Can Drinking Alkaline Water Keep You Extra-Hydrated And Disease-Free?

by Molly Shea,  Assistant Editor, Yahoo Health

 Can Trendy Alkaline Water Cure What Ails You?

Gazette Introductory Note:  This piece calmly dismisses the basic assumption of sellers of the products called “alkalizers” or “ionizers”  that the human body needs large amounts of very alkaline water to maintain its health.  The key idea is expressed in the statement that the body does quite well at maintaining water’s pH balance.  It has been doing this for eons without the help of radically treated water or the $2000 machines being sold to produce it.  The fact is that the body must have water at a very specific pH level and it has perfected the way of achieving that level quite without the help of special bottled water or costly electronic gadgets. Truth is, the pH level of the water we drink seems to have no effect at all on the body’s ability to get the pH of the water it uses exactly right.–Hardly Waite.

Water is nature’s perfect beverage. Hydrating, calorie-free, and readily available, the simple drink is as good as it gets for ensuring proper functioning of all your body’s organs. But what if there was a different water, an even more hydrating liquid that goes farther to keep you healthy and thriving?

That’s the premise behind alkaline water, a version of H2O with a pH level higher than 7. (A pH above 7 is considered alkaline, while a pH lower than 7 is acidic — normal water typically has a pH of 7).The thinking is this: Maintaining a bodily pH level of 7.4 is key to optimum health. Because so many foods in the modern diet are considered acidic, drinking water with a higher pH than normal can help your body stay alkaline and disease-free, improving all aspects of health. Proponents call it a better form of hydration, and some drink alkaline water exclusively.

The water comes in two forms: “natural” alkaline water, gathered from areas like Hawaii’s volcanic regions, or “artificial” alkaline water, which is ionized by a machine or made by adding an alkalizing salt to normal water.

Where The Trend Began:

While water with extra benefits has been revered for ages, the specialty bottled water industry has boomed in just recent years. “People are drawn to something that impacts the body’s pH [levels]. Whether it’s placebo or fact, people feel that drinking alkaline water will help them get healthier,” says Richard Medina Jr., co-founder of L.A. Distributing Company, a New Age snack and beverage distributor. Even Mark Wahlberg and Puff Daddy got into the game in 2013 co-founding “Aqua Hydrate,” a brand of alkaline water that they tout as a natural hangover cure.

But for all its celebrity sparkle and dramatic claims, can drinking alkaline water actually make you any healthier?

What The Science Says:

As alluring as it sounds, the answer is no, says Stanley Goldfarb, MD, hydration expert and professor at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. “If you drink a lot of alkaline water, all you’re going to do is pee out a huge amount of alkaline material. There really is no rationale for this,” Goldfarb explains. Yes, maintaining the right pH balance is important, but your body does that on its own — no fancy water required.

“What people need to appreciate is that the body is designed to maintain its equilibrium in the face of whatever you take in,” Goldfarb explains. “We are designed to maintain the pH of our bodies in an extraordinarily specific range. We have so many defense mechanisms to prevent an accumulation of alkaline that drinking alkaline water will have little effect.”

As for claims that alkaline water can hydrate better than normal water, delivering vitamins and minerals to your body more rapidly and efficiently — those just don’t hold up. There are no studies that prove that drinking alkaline water is any more hydrating than your average tap, filtered, or bottled water, and any claims that it does so fly in the face of hydration research, says Goldfarb. “When it comes to… whether you’re taking in acid or alkaline, it really makes no difference,” he says.

But as much as alkaline water’s benefits have likely been overblown, so too have any potential side effects. Some warn against drinking too much alkaline water, for fear that it could lead to alkalosis — when your body’s pH level is too high, causing confusion, headaches, vomiting and more. According to Goldfarb, there’s very little chance that drinking alkaline water, even if you’re drinking it exclusively, could lead to any internal issues. “It’s not to say that you can’t overwhelm your system, but it’s rare.” That said, says Goldfarb, “if you have a disease, the answer changes, so I’m hesitant to say oh, no, drink what you want, [but in general] it won’t make a difference.”

As for whether water that’s naturally alkaline is any better than water that’s artificially alkalized, Goldfarb doesn’t see the evidence. “There’s no difference between natural and unnatural alkaline—it really doesn’t matter.”

The Verdict:

There are some situations where the pH level of the water you consume does impact your health, Goldfarb explains. “For example, [for] some people who have kidney disease, their bodies cannot rid themselves of acid as quickly as others. If you’re prone to kidney stones, then acidity might be a problem.” A study did suggest that drinking water with a pH of 8.8 (which is more alkaline) can help relieve symptoms of acid reflux, when it’s done as part of a doctor-approved treatment plan. Those exceptions aside, swilling alkaline water won’t make much of a difference.

If you love the taste of a certain water and have some extra money to blow, spending it on pricey aqua isn’t the worst thing you could do. Just turn a wary eye to health claims and don’t expect any magic.

Source: Yahoo Health.

Pure Water Gazette Fair Use Statement

Why Almond Farmers Aren’t the Water Enemy

by Brad Gleason

A quarter-century ago, when I first started farming the fertile ground of western Fresno County, my crop was cotton.

I wasn’t alone. Back then, the San Joaquin Valley had more than 1 million acres of white gold. Federal water cost me — hard to believe today — only $25 an acre-foot. And there was plenty of it. My neighbors and I irrigated inefficiently by sprinkler and furrow.

But I knew then that cotton wasn’t a sustainable crop for California. It could grow almost anywhere, and there was a surplus of it. Plus, cotton growers got a rather considerable payment from the federal government. Those double subsidies — cheap water and price supports — gave cotton growers a black eye. We were portrayed, with some justification, as the greedy farmers of Fresno’s west side.

So my farming partner and I decided in 1989 to plant our first almond trees on 40 acres outside Coalinga. Almonds were a higher-value crop, and there were no crop subsidies for nuts, which was a good thing for the American taxpayer. Also, if the price of water rose — and it certainly did — almonds produced a higher return to offset that cost.

In the years since, we have planted thousands more acres of almonds and pistachios. Once again, we’re not alone. Up and down the valley, orchards of nuts now exceed 1 million acres. Only 200,000 acres still grow cotton. And where furrows once dominated, you’ll find the precision of drip irrigation.

But now we’re the bad guys again. Article after article in newspapers, magazines and online put nut growers in a bad light related to the drought. The whole equation seems to be reduced to a single number wielded by our critics: It takes one gallon of water to grow one nut.

Boy, that sounds wasteful. It’s a figure designed to outrage, and it does the trick.

But looking at the societal value of producing food only by gallons of water used is silly, if not absurd. My fellow growers of other crops calculate that it takes about 168 gallons of water to produce a single watermelon. And 50 gallons for a cantaloupe. That head of broccoli that you feel good about serving to your child? Thirty-five gallons. A single ear of corn requires roughly 40 gallons.

I planted my almonds based on a contract with the federal government to deliver surface water from Northern California. I didn’t anticipate the contractual supply dropping to zero for two straight years; I didn’t foresee having to dig wells deeper into the earth of my farm to pump groundwater to make up the difference. Yes, almonds are a “permanent” crop with a life span of 18 to 20 years, and they don’t offer me the easy option of fallowing orchards in drought as some vegetable farmers have done. But let me point out that my almond trees are a lot less permanent than the houses that continue to get built in California on the same dwindling water supply.

Drive across the expanse of farmland around us and you’ll be hard pressed to find a puddle. That’s not because of the lack of rain. That’s because of the efficiency of irrigation. Out here, every gallon of water is measured from ditch to drip line.

With the curtailment of federal water deliveries, farmers are paying, on average, $1,000 an acre-foot for any surface water piped in on the open market. So you can bet that we’re not using a drop more than we need to keep our trees alive and productive.

I’m proud to be a farmer of almonds and pistachios. We produce something real and healthful that contributes mightily to the economy of California. Last year, farm gate sales for nuts alone topped $7 billion in our state. The export market is healthy and so is domestic consumption. Ask the county tax assessor what the rising value of nut acreage has meant for the tax rolls, and you’re likely to get a big smile.

Some of the old-timers still remember when this stretch of Fresno County belonged to the horned toad, jack rabbit and tumbleweed. Just as the architects of the Central Valley Project envisioned, water and man’s ingenuity turned the middle of California into the world’s most productive agricultural region.

Over time, farmers have adapted to answer the demands of water shortage, new crops, cities and fish, and I know we’ll continue to adapt as California confronts a new era of limits. But demonizing us — and what we grow — is no way to meet the challenge. We’re not the bad guys.

Source: LA Times.

 Why God Created the Deep, Deep Ocean, and Where Is Adolf Hitler Today?

Excerpted from The City of God by E. L Doctorow

Have you ever wondered why Nature  created  the “lightless, airless ocean bottom” with its tons of pressure per square inch, its outrageously ugly creatures, its “living tube worms and anglerfish, sea spiders, whipnoses” . . . hanging around in the soundless deep blackness, “their mouths agape and tentacles upheld to catch the flocculent dead matter drifting like snow from the blue and green ocean above?”  Well, according to one of the characters of novelist E. L. Doctorow, it’s all part of a Plan.–Hardly Waite.

 Hatchetfish from the Deep, Deep, Deep Ocean

This is all part of the Universal Plan.

We are instructed that life does not require air or warmth. We are instructed that whatever condition God provides, some sort of creature will invent itself to live in it. There is no fixed morphology for living things. No necessary condition for life. Thousands of unknown plant and animal beings are living in the deepest canyons of the black, cold water and they have their own movies. Their biomass is far in excess of our own sunlit and air-breathing plant and animal life. At the very bottom of the sea are smoking vents of hydrogen sulfide gases in which bacteria are pleased to flourish. And feeding upon these are warty bivalves and viscous, gummy jellies and spiny eels with the amazing ability to fluoresce when they are attacked or need to illuminate their prey. God has a reason for all this. There is one fish, the hatchet, which skulks about in the deep darkness with protuberant eyes on the top of its homed head and the ability to electrically light its anus to blind predators sneaking up behind it. The electric anus, however, is not an innate feature. It comes from a colony of luminescent bacteria that house themselves symbiotically in the fish’s asshole. And there is a Purpose in this as well which we haven’t yet ascertained. But if you believe God’s divine judgment and you countenance reincarnation, then it may be reasonably assumed that a certain bacterium living in the anus of a particularly ancient hatchetfish at the bottom of the ocean is the recycled and fully sentient soul of Adolf Hitler glimmering miserably through the cloacal muck in which he is periodically bathed and nourished.

Hatchetfish, Front View. Adolph Hitler Is Visible only from the Other End.