Free Republic

This past weekend I did some personal undercover work at a local CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) fundraiser. I made off with a pocket handbook containing some deeply disturbing instructions to their members. I would like everyone to read it. It will only be available at this link until the end of the week so I suggest downloading it and distributing it to all who are concerned:http://www.unitedamericancommittee.org/cairguide.gif-JP United American Committeehttp://www.UnitedAmericanCommittee.org info@unitedamericancommittee.org

Mother Sheehan jumps the shark, at (where else?) MichaelMoore.com. (Hat tip: protein wisdom.) I don't care if a human being is black, brown, white, yellow or pink. I don't care if a human being is Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, or pagan. I don't care what flag a person salutes: if a human being is hungry, then it is up to another human being to feed him/her. George Bush needs to stop talking, admit the mistakes of his all around failed administration, pull our troops out of occupied New Orleans and Iraq, and excuse his self from power. The only way...

<p>'We are waging a nuclear war in Iraq right now. That country is contaminated. It will be contaminated for practically eternity now'...</p>

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. INDIANAPOLIS - DaimlerChrysler AG will close its Indianapolis foundry and eliminate 881 jobs by Sept. 30, reducing the automaker's once formidable Indiana manufacturing presence to just the city of Kokomo. DaimlerChrysler recently notified the Indiana Department of Workforce Development of the closure under the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification, or WARN, Act. The law requires employers to give 60 days notice before certain plant closings and layoffs. The loss of 881 jobs is the largest in Indiana under WARN this year. A provision in the four-year labor agreement struck by the...

Today on Face the Nation, Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean thoughtfully laid out the Democratic Party's positive agenda for America in four simple words: we can do better. He answered tough questions from host Bob Schieffer and the Washington Post's John Harris on a number different topics, including: Iraq: "The question is, what is a reasonable way to get out? And that's - we have no answers from the President on that at all. He keeps - his Administration appears divided. Some of the generals have said we can withdraw some of the troops, perhaps as many as 30,000...

Watching the Economy Crumble Paul Craig Roberts Wednesday, Aug. 10, 2005 The United States continues its descent into the Third World, but you would never know it from news reports of the Bureau of Labor Statistics' July payroll jobs release. The media give a bare-bones jobs report that is misleading. The public heard that 207,000 jobs were created in July. If not a reassuring figure, at least it is not a disturbing one. On the surface, things look to be pretty much OK. It is when you look into the composition of these jobs that the concern arises. Of the...

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) mandated a new warning label be added to antidepressants more than a year ago, cautioning physicians to pay close attention to patients taking the drugs for signs of suicidal behavior. Now the agency issued its second (much stronger) warning, urging the monitoring of adults who use antidepressants for signs of suicidal thoughts and deepening depression.FDA's New AdvisoryThe new warning, which is applicable to children and adults, was in the wake of recent studies that linked suicidal behavior in adults to their use of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), the most commonly prescribed class of...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. As data gathered in the real world of international rivalry continues to show an expanding U.S. trade deficit that will likely hit $700 billion this year (up from $617 billion last year), a great wailing is heard from the Defenders of Free Trade. Their libertarian economic faith is immune to facts, either from present observation or historical experience. That's what makes it a secular religion. Nothing better reveals its reliance on superstition and ignorance than how readily its adherents resort to falsehoods to defend its dogma. Consider two recent columns that...

In the long run, the critical question for Democrats may turn out to be not what Party Chairman Howard Dean is doing, but what he isn't doing. The answer to the first question is easy. What he's doing is what he has become know for: shooting from the lip. This is, after all, the man who went from front-runner to also-ran in a matter of weeks, on the strength of a series of mistakes that convinced the most liberal Democratic voters in America that the guy was not ready for primetime. The much-remembered "Dean scream" came after he lost, not...

Barney Frank, the Democratic Representative to Congress from Newton, Massachusetts keeps it gay in Philadelphia where he got to the bottom of things with rising political star Mike Evans. You might say that Barney is a "hands on" politician. Frank, who is openly homosexual, got caught blatantly fondling an up-and-coming politician's buttocks at a public event. According to gay weekly the Washington Blade, the frisky Frank was escorting rising gay politico Mike Evans into the VIP section at Philadelphia's Equality Forum when he boldly seized the opportunity to cop a feel from the younger man. The tush-grabbery was caught by...

An AP Story that ran in USA Today said that Weise posted information about his own mental state in the months before he killed nine people and himself. But the story failed to note that his comments included favorable references to using marijuana or MJ. Weise said, "MJ is my gal of choice." A March 25 Washington Post article by Blaine Harden and Dana Hedgpeth said Weise had serious mental problems but ignored the pot connection. A March 24 Post article by Ceci Connolly and Dana Hedgpeth described "a deeply disturbed youth who had been treated for depression in a...

I keep waiting for someone to notice the way the rash of school shootings the U.S. has experienced has coincided with the massive program of drugging "over-active" students or those deemed to have an "attention deficit." Medicating students has replaced counseling. On December 1, 1997, Michael Carneal, a troubled 14-year-old, killed three students and wounded five others at Heath High School in West Paducah, Kentucky. In 1998, there were three events in which boys, one as young as 11, killed classmates and teachers. Most notorious is the April 20, 1999 Columbine High School massacre by two boys, Eric Harris, 18,...

Judge Greer has accomplished a coup: He commandeered local cops to repel a state agency (Family and Children Services) and Jeb's state police. And what happens to him for usurping extra-judicial authority? nothing. He's allowed to continue the killing process, with a bizarre zeal to see Terri Schiavo die. Michael will be rid of her, and recipient, likely of book and TV movie deals, from a Hollywood that is pushing assisted suicide as the cause du jour. Greer thumbs nose at Congress; what happens? Nothing. The man shows signs of lunacy - - - is he fiddling with metal balls,...

Polaris Jeff Weise, whose rampage killed 10 people, took antidepressants. RED LAKE, Minn., March 25 - In their sleepless search for answers, the family of Jeff Weise, the teenager who killed nine people and then himself, says it is left wondering about the drugs he was prescribed for his waves of depression. On Friday, as Tammy Lussier prepared to bury Mr. Weise, who was her nephew, and her father, who was among those he killed, she found herself looking back over the last year, she said, when Mr. Weise began taking the antidepressant Prozac after a suicide attempt that...

Following the teen shootings in Minnesota, Fred de Sam Lazaro of Twin Cities Public Television visits the Red Lake Indian Reservation to see how the community is coping. Then, two school safety analysts discuss detecting warning signs of teen violence. FRED DE SAM LAZARO: A remote, reclusive community in northern Minnesota, the Red Lake Reservation has cut itself off even more since the shootings. The anguish of the 5,000 or so Ojibwa Indians who live here has been mostly kept from the public. The media has been denied free access. We were offered one glimpse of a community's distress with...

The Washington Timeswww.washingtontimes.com School shooter took mood-altering drugBy Joyce Howard PriceTHE WASHINGTON TIMESPublished March 25, 2005 The teen who went on a deadly shooting rampage at a Minnesota high school Monday was on Prozac, adding to the list of youths involved in similar crimes who were taking antidepressants or other mood-altering medications.     But medical experts say the role the drugs played in the school shootings is debatable.     "When you look at the school shooters, some were on Luvox, Prozac, Ritalin, and Paxil. These are mood elevators, but they can push up the psyche and can cause agitation," said Robert...

"He was taking the antidepressant Prozac and at least once was hospitalized for suicidal tendencies, said Gayle Downwind, a cultural coordinator at Red Lake Middle School, who taught Weise. It was not uncommon for Weise to spend at least one night a week at her home. "He considered my house a safe place to be," she said."

Report: Accused School Shooter Was On Prozac WEB EXTRA: Red Lake Coverage. Mar 24, 2005 6:47 am US/Central Red Lake, Minn. (AP) The teenager accused of killing nine people and then himself on the Red Lake Indian Reservation was apparently struggling with depression. A cultural coordinator at Red Lake Middle School told the Washington Post that Jeffrey Weise was taking the anti-depressant Prozac and was hospitalized for suicidal tendencies at least once. A bus driver for a local health center told the paper he once drove Weise 60 miles to a psychiatric ward in Thief River Falls. The boy's grandmother...

STEVENSVILLE, Mont. - Patrick Spaulding, 17, was the star of his basketball team, an honor student and one of the most popular boys in his class at Stevensville High School here in western Montana. Bill Tipps, 83, was devoted to his wife of 62 years, Louise, who had developed diabetes and who he feared would need to have her leg amputated. Ron Malensek, 42, owned several small businesses, collected guns and called his wife "Princess." All three died of a single gunshot wound to the head in this valley below the snow-covered Bitterroot Mountains. All three pulled the trigger themselves....

A few weeks ago, when former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean declared his intention to run for chairman of the Democratic National Committee, news reports had the general tone of "Get this, that crazy scream guy is back, and he wants to run the party." Now, days before the vote, his victory is a "fait accompli." How did this happen? Are Democrats suicidally crazy? Wait. That's too easy. Let me rephrase the question. Why are Democrats suicidally crazy? The conventional rap against Dean as DNC chairman is essentially the same as the conventional rap against him as presidential candidate a year...

  An anonymous source sent confidential drug company documents that had been missing for more than 10 years to the British Medical Journal. The documents, which suggest a link between Prozac (fluoxetine, made by Eli Lilly) and suicide attempts and violence, will be reviewed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The documents went missing during a 1994 product liability suit. They include reviews and memos indicating that as far back as the 1980s, Eli Lilly officials were not only aware that Prozac had side effects, but also they attempted to minimize those negative effects.The liability suit surrounded...

Last year was an especially bad one for the pharmaceutical industry, which experienced controversies over how drug studies are disclosed and the implosion of the painkiller Vioxx. Now, as a result of the recent publication of an article about the antidepressant Prozac, it appears that the staid, usually methodical world of medical journals could suffer its own black eye. "...As it turns out, some of the Eli Lilly documents, which the BMJ said it received from an anonymous source, have been circulating for years. And, Lilly officials said, the BMJ and its reporter declined to provide the company with copies...

LONDON, Dec. 20 - One year after British drug regulators advised against prescribing a new generation of antidepressants, except Prozac, for depressed adolescents, British doctors say they are in a frustrating bind. Warned away from using the antidepressants, they are recommending psychotherapy for their young patients instead. But under the British health system, depressed teenagers face a six- to nine-month waiting list for psychotherapy, a situation unlikely to improve in the short term. "On the ground, we feel very much abandoned," said Dr. Dick Churchill, a general practitioner and senior lecturer at Nottingham University. "The advice seems to be these...

LONDON (AP) -- A British medical journal said Friday that it had given U.S. regulators confidential drug company documents suggesting a link between the popular anti-depressant Prozac and a heightened risk of suicide attempts and violence. The British Medical Journal reported in its Jan. 1 issue that documents it had received from an anonymous source indicated that Prozac's manufacturer, Eli Lilly & Co., was aware in the 1980s that the drug could have potentially troubling side-effects. The journal said the documents, reportedly missing for a decade, had formed part of a 1994 lawsuit against Eli Lilly on behalf of victims...

Home Help Search Archive Feedback Table of Contents Author Keyword(s) Vol Page [Advanced] BMJ  2005;330:7 (1 January), doi:10.1136/bmj.330.7481.7 Extract of this article PDF of this article Email this article to a friend Respond to this article Download to Citation Manager Search Medline for articles by: Lenzer, J. Alert me when: New articles cite this article News FDA to review "missing" drug company documents Jeanne Lenzer New York The US Food and Drug Administration has agreed to review confidential drug company documents that went missing during a controversial product liability suit more than 10 years ago. The documents appear to suggest a link...

LONDON, Friday, Dec. 31 (Reuters) - The British Medical Journal said on Friday it had sent documents to health regulators in the United States that it said appear to suggest a link between the antidepressant drug Prozac and suicidal behavior. The journal said an anonymous source had provided "missing documents" relating to clinical trials of the drug, made by Eli Lilly & Company. It said the documents had been lost during a product liability suit in 1994. They included reviews and memos that appeared to show Eli Lilly officials were aware in the 1980's that the drug, whose generic name...

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - Authorities say three years ago, Christopher Pittman, then 12, shot his grandparents as they slept because they had scolded him for fighting. But Christopher's father, Joe Pittman, thinks his son killed because his sense of right and wrong was clouded by the anti-depressant Zoloft. Joe Pittman spoke out against the drug in a Food and Drug Administration hearing early this year. The boy, who had threatened suicide, was put on the drug three weeks before the slayings, and his dose was doubled just two days earlier. Joe Pittman's hands shook as he read his son's confession...

Looking back, Mark and Cheryl Miller would have done a lot of things differently with their 13-year-old son, Matt. They probably would never have left Lenexa, Kan. They would have sent him to a different school, and they certainly would have chosen a different therapist. But most of all, they wouldn't have given him Zoloft. ''It's not a pleasant thing living with the thought that you had a hand in your son's death,'' Mark Miller told me recently. ''Making him take those pills was done out of love for Matt, but it was still the wrong thing to do.'' We...

Truthfully, I really wasn't gloating these past few days. Probably they caught me smiling and laughing a bit, though. Yeah, I had to go into the city (90% liberal) and visit with the Democrats. Couldn't resist. I wanted to actually see the sad faces for myself, up close and live. Local Democrats have been a glum lot these past few days. Many are still grumbling. On Capitol Hill, Democrats were whining like Valley Girls at a sorority party that ran out of wine, pointing fingers at their leaders and talking about making war against the Republicans. Liberal Hill-Rats must have...

It's that time again, folks. This is our time to send all the liberals searching for their Prozac. It's time we extract our pound of retribution from each of their socialist hides. And the best way to do that is to vote straight Republican. Unfortunately, we rejected some of the most Constitutionally oriented candidates in the primary process. No matter, though. We can still work with those we have running. The Republicans are, after all, an electable bunch. Sure, I can nit-pick and find problems with most of them. Nevertheless, collectively, the Republicans are fielding a pretty good group --...

Snip: Earlier at the Eugene event, a small group of protesters interrupted Heinz Kerry. The protesters, students at the University of Oregon, tore up Kerry-Edwards signs and pulled Bush-Cheney posters from their pockets, beginning chants of “Four more years.” Heinz Kerry responded sharply: “Four more weeks.” “I’m glad these people can come here to protest,” she said, “though not too politely. In my country (referring to her childhood in Mozambique, Africa) they would have been put in jail. I will always stand up for the right of those who differ with me to express their opinions. But please, do it...

Few drugs inspire more animosity among people who don’t use them than Prozac and its antidepressant cousins. On the one hand, they’re derisively described as “happy pills,” capable of slapping a smiley face on anyone. Actually, decades of research have shown that only those suffering true clinical depression benefit from them. Even then, the pills merely bring patients up to the level of non-depressed persons. A second, contradictory claim is that the pills don’t work at all, except psychosomatically. Every so often a researcher releases an analysis of clinical drug trials that purportedly shows that antidepressants are little more effective...

Doctor's parents allege violence of boy was caused by antidepressant The parents of a physician allegedly shot to death by his 10-year-old son are suing the maker of Prozac, blaming the boy's violent behavior on the side effects of the widely prescribed antidepressant. The adverse side effects of Prozac "created a mental state in which he (the boy) suffered "emotional lability (instability), agitation, depersonalization, hostility and mania leading to violence on the day that his father was killed," the lawsuit says. The lawsuit also names the boy's mother, Deborah Geisler, and her husband, Matthew Swanson, as defendants, contending that the...

Last week, a federal advisory panel urged regulators to warn parents that antidepressant drugs not only increase the risk of suicide in some children, but that most have a poor track record in curing their disease. The recommendation came after a yearlong debate over whether the drugs are as safe and effective as advertised. It was based on evidence that a small minority of children show increased signs of suicidal behavior when taking the drugs. Through it all, one of the drugs seemed somehow above the fray: Prozac. Although the warning is recommended for Prozac as well as other drugs,...

FEDERAL health experts are completely missing the point in calling for "stronger warning labels" on anti-depressants administered to children. They should be studying why Americans are so eager to hand control of their children's lives to the therapeutic community. American society has embraced a potpourri of psychobabble in which the care and maintenance of our "psyche" becomes paramount. Brain power no longer matters as much as feelings and self-esteem. And when that "inner child" is threatened by the vagaries of life — we medicate it back to equilibrium.

Smoking marijuana, the federal government constantly reminds us, is dangerous in every way. It impairs cognitive functioning, makes you high, and, because it’s smoked, is a demon in a bong hit—and so on. A counterargument is that pot has helped thousands of cancer and AIDS patients, for example, contend with side effects of their illnesses and treatments. There is also evidence that marijuana works for some psychiatric disorders as well, principally depression and bipolar disorder. Among some people, pot is jokingly referred to as “green Prozac.” The problem is you can’t legally take a toke for psychiatric diagnoses. “I think...

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CHICAGO, Aug. 17 (AP) - Combining drugs with talk therapy works best in treating depressed adolescents, the first large study of its kind has found. The results reflect what studies of adults have found: that treating the disease requires more than relying on pills for a quick fix. Although the study found that psychotherapy combined with Prozac works better than either method alone in treating adolescent depression, including reducing suicidal thoughts, it did not resolve questions about potential links between some antidepressants and suicidal thoughts and behavior in children. A co-author of the study, John Curry of...

Last week, Juliet Eilperin reported in the Washington Post(1) that "House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) would like to abolish the Internal Revenue Service and replace the current tax system with either a flat tax, a national sales tax or a value-added tax." As reported, Hastert suggests that a new tax system would increase productivity and "double the economy" over the next 15 years. "All of a sudden, the problem of what future generations owe in Social Security and Medicare won't seem so daunting anymore," The Post reports Hastert wrote. "People ask me if I'm really calling for the elimination...

Perhaps you recall the line from "Dr. Strangelove," Stanley Kubrick's film - now 40 years old - about nuclear war and fluoridation. "As human beings," Gen. Jack D. Ripper says to Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake, "you and I need fresh pure water to replenish our precious bodily fluids." Hard to imagine what General Ripper would have thought of the recent announcement by Britain's Environment Agency that it had found traces of the antidepressant drug Prozac in rivers and groundwater. The idea of someone dumping mood-altering pharmaceuticals into the water supply sounds suitably Strangelovian. But the source in this case is...

Drugs Linked to More Suicides Among Children, Unpublished Analysis Says Six months after the Food and Drug Administration withheld an internal finding that antidepressant medications were associated with an increased risk of suicide among children, a second staff analysis has arrived at the same conclusion. The agency has not publicly disclosed either report, despite growing pressure from critics and Congress. Agency officials say they do not plan to discuss the data until a scheduled meeting in September, which would come nine months after British authorities warned physicians not to prescribe Paxil, Zoloft, Celexa and similar drugs to depressed children, and...

It should make us happy, but environmentalists are deeply alarmed: Prozac, the anti-depression drug, is being taken in such large quantities that it can now be found in Britain's drinking water. Environmentalists are calling for an urgent investigation into the revelations, describing the build-up of the antidepressant as 'hidden mass medication'. The Environment Agency has revealed that Prozac is building up both in river systems and groundwater used for drinking supplies. The government's chief environment watchdog recently held a series of meetings with the pharmaceutical industry to discuss any repercussions for human health or the ecosystem. The discovery raises fresh...

Live Convention Video, 7 - 9 p.m. ET• Jesse Jackson• Mayor Martin O'Malley (Baltimore)• N.M. Secretary of Education Veronica Garcia• Rep. Greg Meeks (N.Y.)• Sen. Harry Reid (Nev.)• Rep. Dennis Kucinich (Ohio)• Rep. Elijah Cummings (Md.)• Retired Marine Lt. Col. Steve Brozak, candidate for House in New Jersey• Al Sharpton• Sen. Bob Graham (Fla.)• Gov. Ed Rendell (Pa.)• Gov. Bill Richardson (N.M.)Live Convention Video, 9 - 11 p.m. ET• Gov. Jennifer Granholm (Mich.)• Retired Lt. General Claudia Kennedy• Retired General John Shalikashvili, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff• Cate Edwards• Elizabeth Edwards• Sen. John Edwards• Presidential Nomination Roll...

Amid an international debate about the side effects of drugs taken for depression, a large-scale analysis of British medical records has found little difference in rates of suicidal behavior among patients given some of the most commonly prescribed medications. The risk is highest when patients begin taking the drugs, as doctors have long suspected, and tapers off quickly after that. The study, which is being reported today in the Journal of the American Medical Association, found no evidence that withdrawal from the drugs put patients at an increased risk of suicide. The analysis, conducted and financed by the Boston University...

PHOENIX, June 1 — In the midst of a worldwide debate on whether depressed children should be treated with antidepressant drugs like Prozac, a landmark government-financed study has found that Prozac helps teenagers overcome depression far better than talk therapy. But a combination of the two treatments, the study found, produced the best result. The study, sponsored by the National Institute of Mental Health, was the first to compare psychotherapy and drug treatment for depressed adolescents. Statistically, the researchers found, talk therapy — in which a patient discusses problems with a therapist — was by itself no more effective in...

Pediatricians and family physicians should not prescribe antidepressants for depressed children and adolescents because the drugs barely work and their side effects are often significant, Australian researchers have concluded. The researchers analyzed data from five published trials of three antidepressants, Prozac, Zoloft and Paxil, in depressed patients under age 18. They found that the drugs offered only a "very modest" benefit over placebos. At the same time, the drugs carry significant risks, the researchers said in their report, published in today's issue of the British medical journal BMJ. "If the drugs were highly advantageous over placebo, then you'd live with...

Few places in the United States will be more affected by the national debate over antidepressants than Utah, where a good many medicine cabinets are stocked with depression busters. But it may take more than a pill to cure the headaches caused by the Food and Drug Administration's decision last week to ask manufacturers to put suicide warning labels on 10 antidepressants. Utahns who say antidepressants are dangerous lauded the move. Local psychiatrists, however, warned the labels could scare off people who need the drugs. "There are many physicians that think there's a great benefit from these medications," said Fred...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Patients on some popular antidepressants should be closely monitored for warning signs of suicide, the government warned Monday in asking the makers of 10 drugs to add the caution to their labels. Although the Food and Drug Administration's investigation into the possible suicide connection initially focused on children given the drugs, its warning is aimed at both adult and pediatric use of the pills to alleviate depression. It isn't clear yet that the drugs actually do lead to suicide, the FDA stressed. After all, depression itself can lead to suicide. But until that is settled, advisers to...

Check your local listings for airtimes. (Current show is updated every weekday at 5pm EST.) HEALTH Health Experts Warn of Antidepressant Dangers for Children, Teens By Darla SittonCBN News Producer In America, Prozac is the only drug the FDA has "approved" for pediatric depression. CBN.com – (CBN News) - As many as one in eight adolescents suffers from clinical depression. And these kids are often treated with anti-depressant drugs that have been tested and approved for adult use. But the drugs may not be safe for children. Corey Baadsgaard doesn't remember storming into his honors English class with a...

Curing Chronic Illness Can Be Used To Destroy Either Political Party Ladies and Gentlemen: I present to you the world's longest running, and greatest, medical blunder, the cures for incurable diseases, and the Second Coming of Christ. There are 120 million American's with chronic illness. In 1997, researchers at Yale University were studying the clustering of autoimmune disorders in 84 families with Antiphospholipid Antibody Syndrome (APLA). They stated then that if they knew what caused APLA they would know a lot more about many of the other chronic illnesses. At the same time, I was searching the Internet for information...

<p>A toxicology test will determine whether narcotics played a role in the suicide of a 19-year-old woman who was participating in clinical trials for a new drug that Eli Lilly and Co. hopes to launch this year.</p> <p>Traci Johnson, Bensalem, Pa., hanged herself Saturday night in the Lilly Laboratory for Clinical Research by tying a scarf to a bathroom shower rod, according to the Indianapolis Police Department.</p>