Big Money's Gestapo to Silence and Imprison their Opponents; The Militarization of the US Police and Investigative Arms of the Police State

3 NATO Protesters Charged With “Terrorism” in Chicago — Identical to Other FBI Plots
Cross Posted from the Green is the New Red Blog

by Will Potter on May 21, 2012

in Terrorism Court Cases

Three activists who traveled to Chicago for mass protests against NATO have been arrested and charged with “terrorism” in a case that is representative of a pattern of government misconduct.

This most recent case is nearly identical to the arrests preceding May Day demonstrations just weeks ago, and many others in which the FBI played a critical role in manufacturing “terrorist” plots in order to disrupt and discredit progressive social movements.

Details of the case are sparse, but Brian Church (22), Jared Chase (27), and Brent Betterly (24) were arrested on Wednesday and charged with conspiracy to commit terrorism, providing material support for terrorism and possession of an explosive incendiary device. Two other protesters, Sebastian Senakiewicz and Mark Neiweem, have been arrested on unrelated explosives charges.

The arrests came in the leadup to NATO protests in Chicago. Chicago cops and the FBI warned the public that “self-proclaimed anarchists” were about to attack Barack Obama’s re-election headquarters and the home of Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel with molotov cocktails. As tens of thousands of people took the streets in protest, the terrorism arrests stole headlines and sent a message, both to the movement and to the public.

According to court documents, the FBI and local police began a “covert investigation” in early May. The government says the defendants are “self-proclaimed anarchists, and members of the ‘Black Bloc’ group, who traveled from Florida to the Chicago area in preparation for committing terrorist acts of violence.”

This allegedly includes preparing molotov cocktails along with obtaining a mortar gun, swords, hunting bow, throwing stars, shields, gas masks and brass knuckles. At one point in the investigation, Church allegedly said that if a cop was going to point a gun at him, he would be “pointing one back.”
According to the police, danger to the public was imminent.

However, undercover cops and FBI agents were there, by their own admission, every step of the way. According to defense attorney Michael Deutsch, three undercover cops nicknamed “Nadia,” “Mo” and “Glove” befriended the defendants on May Day. And 2 of 9 people arrested were themselves undercover agents.

“From our information, the so-called incendiary devices and the plans to attack police stations — that’s all coming from the minds of the police informants and not coming from our clients, who are non-violent protesters,” Deutsch said.

PATTERN OF REPRESSION

This case is nearly identical to other high-profile “terrorism” arrests that occurred just prior to mass non-violent protests. For example:

• Cleveland 5 — just a few weeks ago, and days before national May Day protests coordinated by the Occupy movement, the FBI announced the arrest of activists on terrorism charges for plotting to destroy a bridge. FBI informants and undercover agents had a heavy hand in creating the alleged plot.
• RNC 8 — leading up to the 2008 Republican National Convention, 8 local organizers were arrested and charged with “conspiracy to riot in furtherance of terrorism.” Charges were all later reduced to a misdemeanor carrying no jail time.
• Bradley Crowder and David McKay — arrested and accused of “terrorism” days before RNC protests. Activist-turned-informant Brandon Darby coaxed the two into plans for molotov cocktails (for more on this plot, see the excellent documentary Better This World).

All of these cases share key elements:

1. FBI infiltration, and reliance on government informants to manufacture the “plot”

1. Terrorism charges

1. Labeling the defendants “self-proclaimed anarchists” (not only in the press, but in court documents). [Here is a bit more on the demonization of anarchism.]

1. Unveiling the “domestic terrorism” arrests days before key protests

A SHIFT IN INTIMIDATION TACTICS

It’s nothing new to see widespread police misconduct and abuse in the days leading up to high-profile demonstrations. Anyone who has been to a few — whether it’s WTO, World Bank, IMF, or the Democratic and Republican national conventions — can see the pattern.

In the late 90s, this often meant police raids of Indymedia centers, or evictions of community spaces on specious “fire code violations.” Cops take equipment, make a few arrests of “leaders,” and try to remind the rest of the protesters who is in charge.

In the last several years, though, that decades-old model has been transforming. All the old tactics are still there. But now the message is being sent not just through arrests or police violence, but through the FBI working with local cops to infiltrate and disrupt protest groups, provoke and coordinate illegal activity, and then charge some activists with “terrorism.”

The activists arrested in Chicago and Cleveland are going to have a very long, difficult time ahead. It’s important to support them and remind them that they are not alone. But it’s also critical that we recognize that they are not the only targets of these tactics.

These arrests, and many others like them, are not about thwarting a “terrorist plot.” They are preemptive attacks on radical social movements in order to instill fear in protesters (that they too could be targeted) and instill fear in the general public (that the “99 percent” are really “self-proclaimed anarchists” and “terrorists”).

Your Brain On Farming

Got this at Marion's blog.  Click here to read her notes on the new farm bill.

Report from Chesler

A Progress Report

by Phyllis Chesler
May 24, 2012

http://www.phyllis-chesler.com/1087/a-progress-report

Dear Friend and Reader:

Once, when I was young, New York had four seasons and each one lasted a very long time.

Or so it seemed.

Now, there are only two seasons, winter and summer, and just the merest hint of autumn and spring. The hours fly by so fast that time itself seems to be standing still. Whenever I look up from my daily writing, it is always 3pm—where has the day gone?

Although I have been relatively silent in terms of blogging, I have already generated 60,000 words for the new book. The wordsmith-warrior is wounded; I wear Tiger Balm strips on my wrist and arm. And although I read articles from at least twenty newspapers and websites daily, for now, the world has lost its third dimension; only my work is "real."

I will not be speaking at the 92ndY on June 11th. They wanted to reschedule the program for the fall and that is when I will be frenzied and meeting a deadline.

In June, a major new study of mine will appear in Middle East Quarterly. It compares Hindu honor killings in India with Muslim honor killings in Pakistan and the West. There are significant differences between the three types of honor killings which may lead to some new public policy considerations.

Honor killings continue in both the West and globally but so do arrests, trials, and jail terms. Europe is far more advanced than the United States in its understanding that these murders are cold-blooded collaborative conspiracies. European Law enforcement has charged entire families, women as well as men, for conspiring in this crime.

But something else that is new is also happening: Women are testifying against their parents and wives against their husbands—it may take as long as a decade before they gather the courage to do so, but their testimonies have led to convictions in two high profile cold cases in the UK.

As for the election, I do not like how the media and politicians on both sides of the aisle characterize each other. I am especially offended by those Republicans who viscerally despise "feminists" and by those Democrats who viscerally despise "Christian conservatives."

If I were Queen of the Known Universe--citizens would care about substantive issues, not about political figureheads.

(GC Notes:  Something I have been trying to convince feminists about ever since the last election; Hillary worship is as stupid as Obama worship - no politician will save us or lead us; the only way is to organize around single issues and form coalition on that which we can agree. As we abandoned the women of Afghanistan to the Taliban that should be clear now, at last.  We can admire individuals and use them as models but to worship them is a sin; to hear no criticism of their policies is a sin; to deliberately blind yourself to what is right in front of you for illusion's comfort, is a sin.)

A tireless and passionate Zionist whom I know, recently told me that "It is too hard to try and save the Jews. They get in your way. They get in each other's way. As for the Israelis, they don't get it."

I understand exactly what she is saying. I myself am tired of using the same analytic tools and template that I first laid down in 2001-2003 to continue documenting the infernal demonization of the Jews and the Jewish state. I am weary of trying to persuade Jews of…. anything.

Long ago, I was ready to join a team that would pre-empt the Big Lies, outwit them, outrun them, but there is no such Israeli Ministry in charge of The War of Ideas and the American Jewish organizations will never, ever take this on. They are fat cats, living large, and they are far too liberal and far too left. This blinds them to the danger that Israel and Jews face. I have written about this phenomenon so many times in the past. I do not like to spin my wheels—I like to move forward.

There is a listserv group that I am privileged to be a member of which does work in a team-like way in terms of defusing anti-Israel propaganda but they are a grassroots effort of bloggers without any official standing and without a budget.

And now, please allow me to share an ongoing concern. I am an opera lover. I once studied opera. Yes, I sing. But the Metropolitan Opera has shocked and disappointed me. They have increasingly "tarted" up their performances in order to please the masses (not to shock the bourgeoisie). Great divas are ever-so scantily dressed and asked to sing with their legs in the air. (I am not exaggerating).

(GC Notes:  Yeah Phyllis, they have to compete with Tots and Tiaras.)

The new-fangled sets leave something to be desired although the lighting design never fails to please and amaze.

But now hear this: The venerable magazine, Opera News, will no longer carry any reviews of performances at New York's Metropolitan Opera. The young general manager, the brilliant Peter Gelb, cannot bear the withering scorn some of his performances have gotten in their pages. He wants only praise. He and our current President are of the same generation, they are addicted to the sound of applause.

Gelb does not want "criticism," which he experiences as "continuously ripping" into organization the magazine is expected to support.

Here comes Pravda.

Sigh… and now, back to writing.

P.S. The Metropolitan Opera has now, as of today, "backed away" from its decision to bar reviews of its productions in Opera News.

Finally a Real Feminist Roundtable on TV - not just women - feminists speech on TV

For some time I have been watching on MSNBC on Sunday a political talk show hosted by Melissa Harris Perry  I must say if you have not seen it  - tune in.  She had young women, black and white on today and it was terribly beautiful.  Hope - it gave me hope.  One of the very young women on today's show has a blog, The F bomb - check it out.

The second half of the show dealt with women war veterans, a subject close to my heart.  The discussion of sexual assault was so intellectually challenging and excellent as well as the treatment on discharge and the VA.

Watch this show because it is women speaking of the issues important to our freedom and the advancement of women's liberation in 2012..

Stop USDA's dangerous new poultry inspection plan.

Three chickens per second.

Under a new plan proposed by USDA, that's how fast inspectors would have to conduct quality control inspections in poultry factories — six times the current rate.

Worse, USDA's proposed rules privatize these inspections, letting the industry police itself by replacing highly trained USDA food inspectors with poultry facility employees who have no required training

Salmonella in our meat and poultry makes nearly a million people sick every year in the US — it's our number one cause of food-borne illness. USDA's new plan could make the problem even worse, and we have just days to stop it.

Tell the USDA: Don't weaken poultry inspection standards!

Food safety groups are opposing the standards and veteran poultry inspectors are calling them "a big step back," and "a very, very bad idea".

Current rules provide for three inspectors to examine 140 birds per minute. Under the new rules, inspections would speed up to 200 per minute — with only one inspector on the line. Even the professionals say that is way too fast.

With far less time to inspect each chicken, unsanitary, defective poultry meat has a higher chance of making it into our supermarkets. And while USDA says it would save less than $30 million per year on poultry inspection costs, it could cost the agency (and us) far more to deal with potential increases in foodborne illness.

Speeding up the poultry line isn't just hazardous to our health — it's also hazardous to those who work in poultry factories. Poultry workers already have an alarming rate of workplace injury from conditions which include a workplace full sharp objects like knives and scissors, and from the repetitive nature of poultry factory tasks. Speeding up the chicken line will only make conditions even more hazardous

Tell the USDA: Don't weaken poultry inspection standards!

But while food and worker safety will undoubtedly suffer, the new rules are expected to result in a quarter of a billion dollar windfall to poultry companies.

The safety of our food, especially poultry which has such a high incidence of contamination, should be the highest priority of USDA. If their answer is less quality control inspection, more dangerous workplace conditions, and allowing an industry with a horrible safety record to police itself, it's probably time to go back to the drawing board.

Click below to submit a comment to the USDA before the May 29th deadline:
http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/usda_poultry/?r=6888744&id=40316-3494904-SDsfd8x
Thank you for fighting for safe and healthy food.
Elijah Zarlin, Campaign Manager
CREDO Action from Working Assets

1. "Poultry Inspectors Protest Inspection Proposal at USDA," Food Saftey News, April 3, 2012
2. Privatized Meat Inspection Experiment Jeopardizes Food Safety," Food and Water Watch, March 7, 2012
3. Civil rights group: Stop speedup in poultry plants!," People's World, May 10, 2012

Hideous, duplicative and unnecessary experiments at U of WI just to make a quick buck and satisfy sadistic and stupid researchers

Maternal Deprivation Returns to UW-Madison

Please write a letter or three to the editor of the Wisconsin State Journal, Cap Times, and Milwaukee Journal Sentinel about the University of Wisconsin, Madison’s decision to once again deprive baby monkeys of any maternal care.

Maternal deprivation of monkeys hasn’t been approved at the university since the early 1980s. Harry Harlow’s cruel methods should not be resurrected.

For much more about this horrible unethical backward step, visit our webpage on this situation.

Wisconsin State Journal: wsjopine@madison.com
The Cap Times: jkleinmaier@madison.com
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: jsedit@journalsentinel.com
__

The Bitter Grief of Elizabeth Edwards

More from the AP:   
... a former aide testified about how Edwards' wife became distraught when she found out that he was still having an affair with mistress Rielle Hunter.

Elizabeth Edwards "collapsed in a ball" in an airport parking lot and tore off her shirt in a fit of anger, the witness said.

Mrs. Edwards was dying of cancer and had previously discovered her husband's fling with Hunter, a videographer on his presidential campaign, in 2006. She had demanded Hunter be fired and the romance be ended.

Edwards, however, secretly continued the affair, which was reported in the National Enquirer in October 2007.

Christina Reynolds, a communications adviser on Edwards' campaign who was also close to Elizabeth Edwards, told the court about Mrs. Edwards reaction when her suspicions of her husband's continued infidelity were confirmed.

The day after the Enquirer's report was published, Mr. and Mrs. Edwards were en route to the Raleigh airport, but Elizabeth Edwards was pawing at her husband in the car and asking, "Is this what you two do in the car when you are together in New York City?" the court was told.

Edwards stopped the car and got into another vehicle so that they arrived at the airport in separate cars.

Reynolds testified that in October 2007 after the National Enquirer broke the story about Edwards' affair with Rielle Hunter, Elizabeth Edwards confronted the candidate at the Raleigh-Durham International Airport.

"Elizabeth was very upset," Reynolds said. "She stormed off and collapsed into a ball in the parking lot."

[Reynolds] and another staff member helped her into the bathroom of a private hangar.

After collecting herself, Elizabeth Edwards came back into the hangar, found her husband and began yelling. She then pulled off her shirt and bra, leaving herself bare-chested, Reynolds said."You don't see me any more," Reynolds quoted the wife as saying.

Reynolds said Elizabeth told her that Edwards had confessed to the affair in the summer of 2007.

Elizabeth Edwards died in December 2010 after a long battle with cancer.

VEGAN CHEDDAR CHEESE

What the Heck is Nutritional Yeast? by Susan Voisin on October 26, 2011

Of all the ingredients I use in my recipes, the one I get asked about the most is nutritional yeast. I’ve been cooking with it for so long that I forget how strange it must sound to people who are new to vegan cooking. Neither the word “nutritional” nor the word “yeast” conjures up mouthwatering images, but the truth is, it’s one of the few “health food store” ingredients that I wouldn’t want to have to do without–and not because of its nutritional value.

 So what is it, why do I use it, and where can you find it?

What It Is Nutritional yeast is made from a single-celled organism, Saccharomyces Cerevisiae, which is grown on molasses and then harvested, washed, and dried with heat to kill or “deactivate” it. Because it’s inactive, it doesn’t froth or grow like baking yeast does so it has no leavening ability. Don’t worry; no animals are harmed in this process because yeasts are members of the fungi family, like mushrooms, not animals.

Nutritional yeast has such an unappealing name that somebody started calling it “nooch” and the name caught on on the internet.

The brand that most vegans use is Red Star Vegetarian Support Formula because it is a good source of vitamin B12 and contains no whey, an animal product that is used in some other brands. In the U.K., nutritional yeast is sold under the Engevita brand and in Australia as savory yeast flakes.

What It Isn’t

Nutritional yeast is not the same as brewer’s yeast, which is a product of the beer-making process and is very bitter.

It’s also not Torula yeast, which is grown on paper-mill waste and is also not very tasty. And please do not try to substitute active dry yeast or baking yeast, which taste bad and will probably make a huge, frothy mess because their yeasts are alive.

Where Can I Find It?

You probably won’t be able to find nutritional yeast in a typical grocery store. I buy it from the bulk bins at the local natural food store, where it is labeled “Vegetarian Support Formula.”

Larger grocery stores might have Bob’s Red Mill brand in the natural food section. If you can’t find it locally, Amazon has several brands, including Red Star. I use the flaked version of nutritional yeast, but it’s also available in a powder. If you’re using the powder, you will need only about half as much as the flakes.

KEEP READING AT FAT FREE KITCHEN HERE

http://blog.fatfreevegan.com/2011/10/what-the-heck-is-nutritional-yeast.html

FBI Scams Animal Rights Activists in Service of Big Ag. Be Prepared.

FBI Seeks Activist “Liaisons” — Agent Says “We Don’t Just Work for Those Big Companies”

by Will Potter on April 17, 2012

in Surveillance

FBI agents visited an animal rights activist in Minnesota saying that they “don’t just work” for Big Ag corporations, and that they are in search of activist “liaisons.”

Dallas Rising is the program director for the Animal Rights Coalition, an organization in Minneapolis founded in 1980. She was at work when two people walked into the group’s storefront office. “I thought they were going to try to sell me internet service or something,” she says. Then they flipped their badges and said they were with the FBI.

“The guy said ‘Can I talk to you’ and I said ‘No, you can’t,’” she says. She called her boss to confirm that the group would have nothing to do with the FBI, and then asked them to leave.

The agent, who identified himself as Steve Molesky, told Rising that she didn’t need to talk to them, and that they just wanted to say something to her. According to Rising:

“He said, ‘I understand why you would be reluctant to talk to me and I get that, and we, as the FBI, have close relationships with animal enterprises… but we don’t just work for those big companies, we work for all the people.”

Molesky said multiple times that FBI agents “don’t want to stifle anyone’s First Amendment rights,” and that they want to work with her as a “liaison.”

According to Molesky and his partner, Elizabeth Pauling, who said she is an FBI analyst, this would mean that if anyone approached Rising with information about animal welfare violations, she would tell FBI agents about the place of concern so that they could urge the USDA to conduct an investigation.

“Is liaison a new word for informant?” Rising asked. Molesky said no, and that “if Jack and Jill come to you with information, what a liaison would do is let the FBI know where that farm is, while an informant would let the FBI know who Jack and Jill are.” That way, Molesky said, “your concerns are addressed and nobody needs to break the law.”

The visit occurred a week after two other unusual encounters at the Animal Rights Coalition. Someone had called the office saying he knew about a farm in Wisconsin abusing animals and that he wanted help “to get in there” through an Animal Liberation Front style action, Rising says. And just days earlier, a newcomer to an activist training session was asking other attendees how they feel about blowing up buildings and killing people.

In both cases, Rising said the individuals were immediately told that the Animal Rights Coalition was not involved in illegal activity. But the encounters were surprising to local activists because the group is known for organizing non-violent protests, hosting speakers, and coordinating vegan outreach.

The FBI has a long history of using informants to surveil, harass, disrupt, and entrap political activists. As I’ve documented at length on this website, the heavy-handed tactics of the COINTELPRO era have not disappeared — they have been repackaged as counter-terrorism efforts.

This may take the form of threatening activists in hopes they will become informants (as I experienced personally), or attempting to infiltrate vegan potlucks. In the case of Eric McDavid, an undercover FBI informant named “Anna” repeatedly attempted to coerce him and others into illegal activity. He refused, and yet was sentenced to nearly 20 years in prison on conspiracy charges.
So is this emphasis on “liaisons” a reflection of a kinder, gentler FBI?
Not likely.

“Ag Gag” bills have been introduced across the country, and passed in Iowa and Utah, targeting undercover investigators who expose animal welfare abuses on factory farms. As discussed in my recent interview with a current undercover investigator, these activists are at risk — not for underground, ALF sabotage, but for non-violent investigations affiliated with mainstream organizations.

This new emphasis on using liaisons to find out farm names, at a time when investigators are being targeted for videotaping farms, is certainly noteworthy. Minnesota considered its own “Ag Gag” bill recently, co-sponsored by Representative Rod Hamilton — past president and current member of the Minnesota Pork Producers.

In other words, activists should know that there is no such thing as providing the FBI with innocuous information. Drawing a distinction between a “liaison” and an “informant” is clever, but keep in mind that this is the same FBI that says undercover investigators can be prosecuted as terrorists.

The two FBI agents who visiting Dallas Rising attempted to reassure her that they were only interested in fighting criminal activity and terrorism, and that they would protect her First Amendment rights. Her response?

“I said if you really want to help protect our First Amendment rights, you could help overturn the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act.”

Molesky has not returned phone calls for comment.

These FBI agents said they would be “reaching out” to other organizations. If visited by the FBI, know your rights and call an attorney.

HAPPY MAY DAY EVERYBODY!

Almost forgot about May Day.  Worker's Rights Day.  The day we celebrate new life , the babies and the young, the innocent - the day we celebrate beginnings - the blank canvass - all the possibilities existing at once.  And we celebrate the life force as it manifests in plants especially,  that is the pollinators.  This is the month we plant - one week after the full moon in May.  This is the month of the heirloom plant sale at Rotary Gardens.

In France this is St Joan de Arc's Day.  And I love Joan, the prophet, seer, warrior, savior of her people and hero.

Cross post from Rad Fem Hub

My slogan will be intersectional but my trans agenda will be bull shit

by Guest Blogger

Guest Post by Dragon Dyke.

The latest slogan of the trans activists is ‘my feminism will be intersectional or it will be bull shit’. The current trans obsession with intersectionality is a major cause for concern, and a trans co-option of intersectional theory could have disastrous consequences for the political struggles of all subordinate groups.


Trans activists are co-opting political movements and the ultimate trans agenda is to remove the rights of all subordinate groups to self-determination ... I do not believe that most individuals who identify as trans or their allies are consciously planning the depoliticisation of class based oppressions. Trans is a structural and colonising tactic – a tool of the patriarchy, but if you buy into trans theory, that is what you are buying into.

The trans cooption of feminism... to collective self-determination is the beginning of what I believe will end up being a long running movement to co-opt all struggles of subordinate groups. Trans is a growing movement and it is no longer only focused on trans sex and trans gender. New trans movements focus on trans abled and trans ag.  Any day now I am expecting to see the emergence of white men who claim to be trans race.   As with trans genderism, these new trans movements are largely based on the sexual fetishisation of the subordinate group.

The Scope of the trans project and Impact  on all subordinate classes.

The rise of post modernism in the 1990’s contributed thoroughly to the backlash against feminism by perpetuating idea that structural oppression, and hence oppression of women, does not really exist.

According to the pomo’s (postmodernists), power only revolves around individual interactions.

(GC Notes: The post modern theory needs more explanation; what the author means by  the power of individual interaction is not clear to me) 

Transsexualism, which had initially been based on a conservative medical model, emerged later as a tool of the post modern feminist backlash.

Transexualism was the original trans theory, but with the rise of post modernism and queer theory (a sub-theory of post modernism), the concept of ‘gender’ was developed to invisibilise women, and with the spreading of the concept of gender (or jendah, as some rad fems like to put it), the theory of ‘trans gender’ emerged.

Queer theorists and the conservative medical transsexual empire initially had some major political conflict but the two seem to have blended into a mind boggling and utterly confused and contradictory political movement.

The second wave women’s liberationists have been horrified by the impact of this trans movement on a number of levels. The women’s movement was a movement organised by women against male supremacy. (GC notes:  institutionalized patriarchy)

Like other subordinate groups, women in the second wave were able to develop a very clear understanding of who the dominant group were – men.

Women’s space was vital to the movement. But women have been bullied and coerced into accepting members of the dominant group (adult males) into their organising spaces.  The original intentions of feminist and the women’s liberation movement have been fought viciously by post modernists, who advocate for feminism to be a void of nothingness, having no material reality, open to everyone and anyone, with anyone being able to self identify as anything.

(GC Notes:  It is not a question of being open - males can be feminist and can organize as feminists -- feminist label anti feminist and misogynist the groups and individuals which restrict women's rights; as in Feminist for Life; or as in transsexuals who assert role playing fem stereotypes and genitalia is the female essence and attempt to force others to accept their imposture as reality or who as transsexuals and closeted gay men lie about their nature, politics and experience by passing as women or straight.)

So now they think they have accomplished the destruction of the women’s liberation movement (of course we are not going away that easily), what’s next?

Trans -Intersectionality.

It is a very smart move for the post modern trans theorists to jump on the intersectionality band wagon – why? – because they can kill 5 birds the with one stone by coopting several political struggles all in one hit. The development of a trans intersectional movement is already peaking right now.

We now have the emergence of trans ablism, a movement of males (who also happen to almost all be transsexual or transgender identifying), who are claiming that they are disabled people in abled people’s bodies, as described in the story of National Geographic’s “Taboo” : Fake paraplegic.
How long will it be before disability rights advocates, who oppose the trans-ablest agenda, start getting called ‘transphobes’ and bigots and bullied into accepting the delusions of these men and allowing them into activist groups for people with disabilities? From reading the blogs of many of these men, it is clear that they have little intention of actually becoming disabled.

Some are demanding various kinds of surgery, but most are happy with an aid, for example a leg brace or a hearing aid. The obsession these men have with such aids is a cause for concern and likely revolves around a sexual fetish. This trend mirrors trans gender ( born males) who contrary to popular belief often have no intention of actually having any surgery and are content with the fetishisation of things they associate with women, such as wigs, dresses and make up (see http://twanzphobic.wordpress.com/tackle-status/).

Despite this, women who refuse to accept these men as women are punished and shamed.

Lesbians are harassed into accepting them as lesbians and called transphobes for ruling them out as potential sexual partners.

READ THE REST AT THE RADICAL FEMINIST COLLECTIVE'S HUB HERE

SEE ALSO:  The Radical Feminist page on the Occupy Wall Street Movement

Blogger joins with fascist google to round up sheep

Blogger is all new now. I have to learn everything all over again.

It is all to make more money for google which has become the most evil organization on earth. Their aim is to force us to have all our data in one place. I am sure they are working with homeland security just as the phone companies do. I feel like a horse that is being herding into the corrals and then the trucks heading for the slaughterhouse.

Obama made it legal to sell mexican slaughterhouse horse meat in the US.  And google is the blogger slaughterhouse.

MAMBO!

Cross Post from Food Politics - too important for you to ignore

Tired of hearing about beef processing? Try chicken.

Apparently as a result of a need to cut costs, the USDA is changing the way its inspectors oversee chicken processing.

As Dana Milbank of the Washington Post puts it, this is a proposal to allow chicken slaughterhouses to inspect themselves — eliminating those pesky federal monitors who have the annoying habit of taking diseased birds out of the food supply.

Even if the Obama administration were inclined to bring down capitalism with an orgy of overregulation, there isn’t enough money in the budget to enforce the rules on the books. That’s what the chicken fight is about: Spending cuts…are a form of de facto deregulation (my emphasis).

The New York Times account of this policy change notes that inspectors:
had observed numerous instances of poultry plant employees allowing birds contaminated with fecal matter or other substances to pass. And even when the employees try to remove diseased birds, they face reprimands….

The Agriculture Department proposal allows poultry plants to speed up their assembly lines to about 200 birds per minute from 140, hampering any effort to examine birds for defects.

But that’s not all. The Center for Livable Future at Johns Hopkins reports that meal made from chicken by-products (in this case, feathers) contains arsenic and antibiotics such as fluoroquinolones that have been banned by the FDA for use in poultry.

A study published in Environmental Science & Technology found fluoroquinolone antibiotics in 8 of 12 samples of feather meal collected from six states and China.

A second study found arsenic in every sample of feather meal tested.

These findings indicate that poultry producers are using these drugs, even though they are not allowed to.

The U.S. poultry industry raises about 9 billion chickens and 80 million turkeys for human consumption each year. Meal made from their feathers is commonly added to feed for chickens, pigs, cattle, and fish. This could be a reentry route into the human food supply for such drugs.

Nicholas Kristof explains in the New York Times that these studies also found feather meal to contain an antihistamine that is the active ingredient of Benadryl…[and] acetaminophen, the active ingredient in Tylenol. And feather-meal samples from China contained an antidepressant that is the active ingredient in Prozac.

Poultry-growing literature has recommended Benadryl to reduce anxiety among chickens, apparently because stressed chickens have tougher meat and grow more slowly. Tylenol and Prozac presumably serve the same purpose.

Such findings indicate some of the worst problems with industrial poultry production. They result from pressures to produce chickens cheaply. The faster chickens can be pushed to grow, the less feed they consume and the cheaper they are to raise.

I don’t know what the best system for inspection might be, but I’m quite sure that leaving food safety oversight to the discretion of the packers is not a good idea. Neither is speeding up the line. And neither is feeding chickens drugs that can affect human health.

Here is even more evidence for the need for an overhaul of our food safety system.

A single food safety system anyone?

BY Marion Nestle here...

Gloria 's Wake Up Call to Feminists

1929–2012 Adrienne Rich

What Kind of Times Are These

By Adrienne Rich

  

There's a place between two stands of trees where the grass grows uphill

and the old revolutionary road breaks off into shadows

near a meeting-house abandoned by the persecuted

who disappeared into those shadows.

 I've walked there picking mushrooms at the edge of dread, but don't be fooled

this isn't a Russian poem, this is not somewhere else but here,

our country moving closer to its own truth and dread,

its own ways of making people disappear.

  

I won't tell you where the place is, the dark mesh of the woods

meeting the unmarked strip of light—

ghost-ridden crossroads, leafmold paradise:

I know already who wants to buy it, sell it, make it disappear.

And I won't tell you where it is, so why do I tell you

anything? Because you still listen, because in times like these

to have you listen at all, it's necessary

to talk about trees.

“What Kind of Times Are These”. © 2002, 1995 by Adrienne Rich, from The Fact of a Doorframe: Selected Poems 1950-2001 by Adrienne Rich. Used by permission of the author and W.W. Norton, Inc.

 Source: Dark Fields of the Republic: Poems 1991-1995 (W. W. Norton and Company Inc., 1995)

Diving into the Wreck 


First having read the book of myths,
and loaded the camera,
and checked the edge of the knife-blade
and checked the edge of the knife-blade,
I put on
the body-armor of black rubber
the absurd flippers
the grave and awkward mask.


I am having to do this
not like Cousteau with his
assiduous team
aboard the sun-flooded schooner
but here alone.


There is a ladder.
The ladder is always there
hanging innocently
close to the side of the schooner.
We know what it is for,
we who have used it.


Otherwise
it is a piece of maritime floss
some sundry equipment.

I go down.
Rung after rung and still
the oxygen immerses me
the blue light
the clear atoms
of our human air.


I go down.


My flippers cripple me,
I crawl like an insect down the ladder
and there is no one
to tell me when the ocean
will begin.


First the air is blue and then
it is bluer and then green and then
black I am blacking out and yet
my mask is powerful
it pumps my blood with power
the sea is another story
the sea is not a question of power
I have to learn alone
to turn my body without force
in the deep element.


And now: it is easy to forget
what I came for
among so many who have always
lived here
swaying their crenellated fans
between the reefs
and besides
you breathe differently down here.



I came to explore the wreck.
The words are purposes.
The words are maps.


I came to see the damage that was done
and the treasures that prevail.


I stroke the beam of my lamp
slowly along the flank
of something more permanent
than fish or weed

the thing I came for:
the wreck and not the story of the wreck
the thing itself and not the myth
the drowned face always staring
toward the sun
the evidence of damage
worn by salt and sway into this threadbare beauty
the ribs of the disaster
curving their assertion
among the tentative haunters.

This is the place.
And I am here, the mermaid whose dark hair
streams black, the merman in his armored body.
We circle silently
about the wreck
we dive into the hold.
I am she: I am he

whose drowned face sleeps with open eyes
whose breasts still bear the stress
whose silver, copper, vermeil cargo lies
obscurely inside barrels
half-wedged and left to rot
we are the half-destroyed instruments
that once held to a course
the water-eaten log
the fouled compass

We are, I am, you are
by cowardice or courage
the one who find our way
back to this scene
carrying a knife, a camera
a book of myths
in which
our names do not appear

Adrienne Rich dies

Cross posted from  MS here
And a friend of mine, who knew her has also written a beautiful  memory poem here.

A Poem for Adrienne

March 29, 2012 by Marge Piercy · 1 Comment

Another obituary

We were filled with the strong wine
of mutual struggle, one joined loud
and sonorous voice. We carried
each other along revolting, chanting,
cursing, crafting, making all new.

First Muriel, then Audre and Flo,
now Adrienne. I feel like a lone
pine remnant of virgin forest
when my peers have met the ax
and I weep ashes.

Yes, young voices are stirring now
the wind is rising, the sea boils
again, yet I feel age sucking
the marrow from my bones,
the loneliness of memory.

Their voices murmur in my inner
ear but never will I hear them
speak new words and no matter
how I cherish what they gave us
I want more, I still want more.

Copyright 2012 Marge Piercy
Photo of (left to right) Audre Lorde, Meridel Le Sueur and Adrienne Rich (who died March 27, at age 82) in 1980, from Wikimedia Commons

GC Notes: My favorite reading of Rich's was/is  Women and Honor: Some Notes on Lying which shaped my feminism.  I still read it to get centered.
This is what I wrote for Marge:

I am with you Marge Piercy.  Your poetry has been my friend since the 1970's.  We are all still in the sisterhood, although now it is like "Tribes" by Martha Courtot.

"We meet in dying cities,..exchange directions...tips for keeping safe...we meet in temporary country homes, sing songs,exchange stones...and then we leave going in different directions"

************************************************************
At feministe they are trashing Rich, calling her transphobic, as all true feminists are against transsexualism.    If you wonder why FEMINISTS are against it, read this link below as I am tired of giving the boys any more of my time. As for feministe, I knew what they were five years ago. 

Men in Ewes' Clothing : The Stealth Politics of the Transgender Movement compiled by Vancouver Rape Relief and Women’s Shelter

Transsexuals also celebrated the death of Mary Daly and Andrea Dworkin.  The deaths of the second wave clears the path toward their take over of women's space. The reason they are so thuggish in their insistence in being afforded acceptance as "real" women is that they have taken half the money allotted to Women's Studies and they want more.  They want the jobs, and money in academia and all the other areas traditionally held for feminists and woman born women.  They want to take over and present their inauthentic politics - the politics of stereotypes, of gender roles as the politics of women's rights under the banner of intersectionality.   For this they need their pathology accepted and their gender assignment legitimised.   In Women and Honor, Rich discusses lying (passing/posing)  in the way every woman will understand.

And the weaker women among us are bullied into tolerance under the guise of human rights.  Cutting their own throats and the throats of their sisters while glorifying the traditional woman's nurturing and acceptance of the abuser.

Composting is easy for vegans - Veggie and Fruit waste - Banana Skins - Apple Scrapes - Orange Peals

DO NOT USE MEAT OR MEAT PRODUCTS OR ANIMAL FECES!

Free Monkey

Eco Feminist Call to Action on Food Politics!

Cross posted from Marion at Food Politics - go there to comment and DO Comment! Also see Provoked!

The ethics of meat-eating: A feminist issue?

Staunch feminist that I am, I am greatly enjoying the fuss over the all-male judging panel for the New York Times’ contest calling on “carnivores to tell us why it’s ethical to eat meat.”

The Times’ ethicist, Ariel Kaminer, announced the contest in Sunday’s magazine:

So today we announce a nationwide contest for the omnivorous readers of The New York Times. We invite you to make the strongest possible case for this most basic of daily practices.

We have assembled a veritable murderer’s row of judges — some of the most influential thinkers to question or condemn the eating of meat: Peter Singer, Michael Pollan, Mark Bittman, Jonathan Safran Foer and Andrew Light.

In the graduate course in food ethics I taught at NYU a couple of years ago, I had the class read:

• Peter Singer and Jim Mason’s The Ethics of What We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter
• Michael Pollan’s critique of Singer’s views in The Omnivore’s Dilemma
• Jonathan Safran Foer’s critique of Pollan in Eating Animals.

I also had them read a scientific paper on the nutritional benefits of adding meat to the diets of children in developing countries (Whaley et al. J Nutrition 2003;133: 3965s–3971s).

Discussions, to say the least, were lively.

As for the other two: Mark Bittman writes eloquently about ethical issues in food choice for the New York Times. Although I am not familiar with the work of Andrew Light, a quick Google search reveals that he writes about the ethics of climate policy.

All happen to be white men.

On her blog, the “vegan-feminist intellectual” Carol Adams, author of The Sexual Politics of Meat, says:

Here’s the crux of the problem, our culture is heavily invested in the identification of meat eating with manliness…. How could an intelligent woman miss the fact that her own panel of “ethicists” is male-dominated and that such a choice is, itself, an ethical issue?

Michele Simon writes on her blog, Appetite for Profit:

When I asked why all the judges were male, Kaminer replied that she couldn’t find one female expert in food ethics with a fraction of the name recognition of the men. She argued that the famous male judges would bring far more attention to the contest, and in turn get more people to consider the ethics of meat eating.

Full disclosure: Michele puts me first in her list of ten women who should have been considered.
You can see why I am amused, no?

If you want to enter this contest—and please do!—send written entries of no more than 600 words to ethicist@nytimes.com. Entries are due by April 8.
*****************************************************************************

Michele Simon writes on her blog, Appetite for Profit

0 suggestions for female judges for NY Times’ “ethical meat” contest

Posted on March 26, 2012 by Michele

 

Yesterday, I wrote about how the New York Times’ contest for meat eaters is great PR for the meat industry. Upon sending that missive to the Times, I had an email exchange with Ariel Kaminer, the paper’s Ethicist columnist, about various aspects of the contest.

When I asked why all the judges were male, Kaminer replied that she couldn’t find one female expert in food ethics with a fraction of the name recognition of the men. She argued that the famous male judges would bring far more attention to the contest, and in turn get more people to consider the ethics of meat eating.

Really, not one? I can think of a few. I also asked a few colleagues, posted an inquiry to Twitter, and within minutes received several more suggestions.

So here are five pretty well-known worthy women:

1) Marion Nestle, New York University professor and book author, including the seminal Food Politics.
2) Ingrid Newkirk, long-time president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
3) Barbara Kingsolver, author of many books, including Animal, Vegetable, and Miracle.
4) Kathy Freston, of Oprah fame and author of Veganist.
5) Alicia Silverstone, celebrity author of The Kind Diet.

Plus, five less-famous names but still worthy:

6) Carol J. Adams, author of numerous books, including the Sexual Politics of Meat.
7) Colleen Patrick-Goudreau, author of numerous vegan cookbooks.
8) Naomi Starkman, editor-in-chief of Civil Eats.
9) Twilight Greenaway, food editor of Grist.
10) Mary Rothschild, managing editor, Food Safety News.

More at her blog and well worth following the link above...............................

Watching the Republicans commit suicide: Back to Single Payer

So they want to get rid of the individual mandate -- the requirement that everyone must buy health insurance. Supposedly it is unconstitutional to penalize a non activity (refusal to buy insurance) as opposed to regulating activity under the commerce clause.  The penalty (or tax) is $95.00 a year if an individual refuses to buy health insurance.

There is a severability clause in the bill which will allow the other provisions to remain if the individual mandate falls.

So striking the individual mandate does not destroy ObamaCare and all the other provisions are very popular -- pre-existing condition coverage- children on parents insurance until 26 - preventive care coverage - birth control coverage ----

If the mandate is struck, that will just get rid of insurance company coverage for health care  -- you know the insurance guys who raised our premiums by 26% in one year because they had to stop cheating their customers and dropping people when they became ill.

Let it fall and then let Obama can move us into Single Payer as the only way to cover the expense of decent health care in the USA.  Or as second creepier choice, the public option

What is The Public Option?

"A government provided healthcare insurance option. It essentially acts like an insurance company in the market. It was designed to add real competition to a market that has none. As a consumer you could choose to stay private or buy into the public option instead. It was a good idea but the insurance comps hated it as it would hurt their profits. They lobbied to have it removed via the dems and repubs and they won. No public option. Sad day in america"
TeeComedianin reply to dagorian86 1 year ago      

SEE THIS HERE AT WIDDERSHINS:

 " But many single-payer advocates aren’t upset. They are hopeful that the probable destruction of the Health Whatever Bill will lead to the change the system really needs: a bill that truly overhauls the way Americans pay for, and access, health care.  ..."

WI Paul Ryan the liar and hypocrite: $700.00 worth of wine at dinners they buy for him unless the women are watching

There are 12,200 lobbyists in Washington right now. They're raking in $3.3 billion each year from special interests to grease the wheels in Congress.

Republican Congressman Paul Ryan confronted by woman furious he was drinking a 350$ bottle of wine on lobbyist’s dime while advocating medicare cuts; shouting ensues - July 9th, 2011

Paul Ryan (R-WI), a leading advocate of shrinking entitlement spending and the architect of the plan to privatize Medicare, spent Wednesday evening sipping $350 wine with two like-minded conservative economists at the swanky Capitol Hill eatery Bistro Bis.

It was the same night reports started trickling out about President Obama pressing Congressional leaders to consider changes to Social Security and Medicare in exchange for GOP support for targeted tax increases.

The pomp and circumstance surrounding the waiter’s presentation, uncorking and decanting of the pricey Pinot Noir caught the attention of another diner who had already recognized Ryan sitting with two other men nearby.

Susan Feinberg, an associate business professor at Rutgers, was at Bistro Bis celebrating her birthday with her husband that night. When she saw the label on the bottle of Jayer-Gilles 2004 Echezeaux Grand Cru Ryan’s table had ordered, she quickly looked it up on the wine list and saw that it sold for an eye-popping $350, the most expensive wine in the house along with one other with the same pricetag.

Feinberg, an economist by training, was even more appalled when the table ordered a second bottle. She quickly did the math and figured out that the $700 in wine the trio consumed over the course of 90 minutes amounted to more than the entire weekly income of a couple making minimum wage.

“We were just stunned,” said Feinberg, who e-mailed TPM about her encounter later the same evening. “I was an economist so I started doing the envelope calculations and quickly figured out that those two bottles of wine was more than two-income working family making minimum wage earned in a week.”

She was outraged that Ryan was consuming hundreds of dollars in wine while Congress was in the midst of intense debates over whether to cut seniors’ safety net, and she didn’t know whether Ryan or his companions was going to pay for the wine and whether the two men were lobbyists. She snapped a few shots with her cell phone to record the wine purchase.

Feinberg knew if the men were lobbyists, or worked for a firm or company that employs lobbyists, then paying for such expensive wine would be a violation of Congressional ethics rules barring members from accepting anything of value from lobbyists.

Members can also run into trouble if they accept more than $100 per year from anyone – even a friend.

“Basically, you have a situation in which the person who bought the meal says I bought it on the basis of a personal friendship and if it’s under $100, you have to show the history of the relationship and some degree of reciprocity,” said Meredith McGehee of the Campaign Legal Center.

If the gift is more than $100, House rules require members to obtain written determination from the Ethics Committee on whether they can accept it or not.

After ending their meal and paying the check, Feinberg decided to give Ryan a piece of her mind. She approached the table and asked Ryan “how he could live with himself” sipping expensive wine while advocating for cuts to programs for seniors and the poor. Some verbal jousting between Feinberg and the other two men ensued. One of the two men said he had ordered the wine, was drinking it and paying for it. In hearing how much the wine cost, Ryan said only: “Is that how much it was?”

The clash became especially heated when Feinberg asked the men if they were lobbyists.

“F—— her,” one of them replied and stood up in a menacing way, according to Feinberg’s account. Feinberg said her husband then “puffed out his chest” in response before the manager and a waiter came over and Feinberg decided she had said her piece and it was time to leave.

Ryan does not dispute most of the details of Feinberg’s account, although he told TPM the two men are economists, not lobbyists, and characterized Feinberg as “crazy” and possibly drunk. For her part, Feinberg said she believes the economist at the table who got out his seat to challenge her was the one intoxicated.

“It was my birthday, and I’d had half a bottle of great wine with dinner,” she wrote in an e-mail to TPM. “I wasn’t drunk, but I was certainly emboldened to speak my mind.”

The one major aspect of the story in dispute was the topic of conversation at Ryan’s dinner table.
Feinberg said all three men were “droning on loudly during the evening that liberals think that if you’re a millionaire, you have done something wrong.”

Ryan said the discussion focused on monetary policy and QE2, the Federal Reserve’s second round of quantitative easing, i.e. efforts to bolster the economy through the purchase of $600 billion in long-term U.S. Treasury bonds.


TPM caught up with Ryan after a vote outside of the Speaker’s lobby. In further explaining his side of the story, Ryan said he only had one glass of wine out of the two bottles but decided when it came time to pay the bill that he should pay for one of the bottles of wine out of an abundance of caution.

He even produced the receipt for the meal, which you can view here. The receipt shows a charge to Ryan’s credit card for $472 — $392 for his meal and the bottle of wine and a generous $80 tip.
“I didn’t order - they ordered,” Ryan told TPM. “I had one glass, uh, with my water, and when [Feinberg] was talking about how expensive it was, I didn’t even know [the price].”


Ryan said his two “friends” are economists, not lobbyists, but would not give their names to TPM. He said one of the men is an economist “he reads a lot” and the two have conversed before so he invited him to Washington so they could meet.

“I read a lot about this economist. I’ve enjoyed what he’s written. I wanted to pick his
brain … so that’s what we did,” Ryan explained.

When asked more directly whether he thought it was appropriate to be ordering $350 wine while pushing for cuts to benefits for seniors and the poor, Ryan conceded that it’s “stupid” to pay that much for a bottle of wine and said he wouldn’t do so again.

Here’s a partial transcript of the interview.

TPM: …she was saying, is it appropriate for you guys to be ordering that kind of wine $350 dollars-a-bottle?Ryan: “A.) I didn’t order it. B.) I had no idea what it would cost, and C.) …I bought one of these bottles even though I drank a glass, and I always pull my own weight for my meals.”

TPM: That was very smart. … But do you think it’s appropriate now that you know how much the wine cost to be drinking [such expensive wine] when you’re advocating cuts for seniors?

Ryan: “I think it’s stupid to pick up that much for a bottle of wine under any circumstance.”

TPM: But you had to pay for it…

Ryan: “Yeah, I was like this is ridiculous. Who buys wine that expensive? It surprised me, and I think it’s stupid under any circumstance to pay anything close to 100 dollars for a bottle of wine.


 TPM: So you wouldn’t do it again?

Ryan: “Well, of course not, because I think it’s too much money to pay for wine. Yeah, I don’t really know what exactly it cost. It was expensive. But um, 250 maybe it was 250, I don’t really remember.”

Ed. - In the original version of this article TPM mistakenly reported this occurred on Tuesday night rather than Wednesday. This has now been corrected.
Follow this reporter on Twitter: @susancrabtree

SUPPORT RON ZERBAN WHO IS OPPOSING PAUL RYAN

1.   Rob Zerban For Congress

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If you couldn't join us for the kickoff tour or just want to relive Rob's speeches, watch our new video and hear what Rob said to his constituents in the 6 counties ...

Meet Rob - News Articles - Newsroom - Press Releases

2.   Meet Rob | Rob Zerban For Congress

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Meet Rob. [View]. Rob and Cornelia Zerban. Rob learned early how to make the most of his life, and how government can be a partner in creating the American ...

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It is a Happy and Warm Spring Equinox: Women Rising



Whimzikl Endeavors 

Last Year- Cannot Wait!

BEES HAVE A QUEEN AND WORK BY CONSENSUS

OK after one week of searching I FINALLY found the book I loved with all my heart and have been searching for since I foolishly forgot to bookmark it.  From the website LIVING HONESTLY  I present the best Bee Book in the World, BEE INSPIRED by Betsy Seeton.

EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK'S FOREWORD:
"Bee Inspired is an intimate book; you'll be captivated, caught in its spell.
It feels as if you are there in the garden exploring, tiny game-hunting with Betsy,
peering through the lens of her camera. Here we find the rare talent of crisp,
clean writing, along with an eye for composing and taking many of the best
anywhere color photos of bees foraging at blossoms."

Dr. Stephen Buchmann, Co-author, The Forgotten Pollinators and Letters From the Hive

bright orange pollen



She has a book on Lady Bugs too

Be sure to look at her blog -- she has a seies of letter from a Marine about his shelter dog and a video of the day he came home to his dog after his first deployment to Afghanistan.  I am still crying.


FROM JEZEBEL:

Honeybees, as it turns out, are nothing like the mindless, self-sacrificing drones that people will one day turn into once Netflix perfects its instant-streaming brain chip — they can actually be quite outgoing or even, according to a personality study conducted by entomologists at the University of Illinois, a little lazy.

Researchers measured the bee brain's capacity for "thrill" or "novelty-seeking," a trait that insects surprisingly share with humans and other vertebrates. Honeybees that were more likely to get their kicks out of far-flung adventures to flowers all the way on the other side of the yard exhibited distinct gene activity in the molecular pathways associated with thrill-seeking in humans.

Moreover, the research suggests that honeybee communities, previously believed to be rigid colonies of productive, entirely task-minded creatures (bees are communists), are comprised of bees that perform their tasks based on their own peculiar whims. What this means is that bees have personalities, ...

Entomologist Gene Robinson, director of the study, and two colleagues observed the honeybee novelty-seeking trait in two of a colony's most important extroverted tasks: scouting new nesting sites and searching for food. When a colony outgrows its hive, it must find a bigger place to live, and so it sends nest scouts on meandering real estate searches.

These nest scouts, in turn, are 3.4 times more likely than their stolid peers to become food scouts, according to Robinson, who adds that such a reliable behavioral tendency constitutes a "personality trait." The study found that at the molecular level, novelty-seeking bees expressed genes that were linked to proteins and hormones thought to be responsible for novelty-seeking in vertebrates and found that, by blocking dopamine in outgoing bees, they could decrease novelty-seeking activity. Concludes Robinson,

Our results say that novelty-seeking in humans and other vertebrates has parallels in an insect. One can see the same sort of consistent behavioral differences and molecular underpinnings.

So much for the purported simplicity of the animal kingdom....

Robinson and his team studies two behaviors that looked like novelty seeking: scouting for new nest sites and scouting for food. When a colony outgrows its living quarters, the swarm must hunt for a new home.

Around five percent of the swarm goes hunting for new lodgings. These “nest scouts” are around 3.4 times more likely than their peers to also become food scouts, researchers discovered.

“There is a gold standard for personality research and that is if you show the same tendency in different contexts, then that can be called a personality trait,” Robinson said.

In order to understand the molecular basis for these differences, Robinson and his colleagues used whole-genome microarray analysis to look for differences in the activity of thousands of genes in the brains the thrill-seeking and non thrill-seeking bees. They found thousands of differences in gene activity.

In humans and animals, thrill-seeking behavior is thought to be linked to how the brain’s reward system responds. In bees, researchers found lots of differently expressed genes that were linked to proteins and hormones that are linked to novelty-seeking in vertebrates
***********************************************************************

Betsy Seeton :

What might surprise you to learn is how much personality
bees have. I enjoy spending time with individual bees. I also
like watching two or three bees interact. Sometimes they
have little arguments it seems, but usually not for long.

And check out this Bee Book.

Honeybee Democracy: A remarkable and richly illustrated account of scientific discovery, Honeybee Democracy brings together, for the first time, decades of Seeley's pioneering research to tell the amazing story of house hunting and democratic debate among the honeybees.

Honeybees make decisions collectively--and democratically. Every year, faced with the life-or-death problem of choosing and traveling to a new home, honeybees stake everything on a process that includes collective fact-finding, vigorous debate, and consensus building. In fact, as world-renowned animal behaviorist Thomas Seeley reveals, these incredible insects have much to teach us when it comes to collective wisdom and effective decision making.

In the late spring and early summer, as a bee colony becomes overcrowded, a third of the hive stays behind and rears a new queen, while a swarm of thousands departs with the old queen to produce a daughter colony. Seeley describes how these bees evaluate potential nest sites, advertise their discoveries to one another, engage in open deliberation, choose a final site, and navigate together--as a swirling cloud of bees--to their new home.

Seeley investigates how evolution has honed the decision-making methods of honeybees over millions of years, and he considers similarities between the ways that bee swarms and primate brains process information. He concludes that what works well for bees can also work well for people: any decision-making group should consist of individuals with shared interests and mutual respect, a leader's influence should be minimized, debate should be relied upon, diverse solutions should be sought, and the majority should be counted on for a dependable resolution.

An impressive exploration of animal behavior, Honeybee Democracy shows that decision-making groups, whether honeybee or human, can be smarter than even the smartest individuals in them.

******************************************************
HOWEVER:
Solitary Bees
Solitary bees comprise the majority of bees, yet they are unsung heroes of our pollinator world, generally having a far lower profile than either honey or bumblebees.

Yet they are outstanding pollinators, and only during recent years, are they beginning to get the recognition they deserve.

Betsy Seeton

Despite their name, some species do live in a type of social group, with bees building nests close to each other and giving the appearance of a sort of colony.

Many species can easily be mistaken for wasps, hover flies, or even honey bees.

The largest bee in the world is believed to be a Solitary bee – Megachile Pluto, a type of leafcutter bee. However, some are very tiny at just a few millimetres long and at first glance may appear to be merely little black flies!

Here is information about some of the most common species:
More here..........

I am a solitary bee buzz buz buzzzzzzzz

From Bee Inspired

Listen to The Bee Dream from Ariadne by June Rachuy Brindel.

You are standing in the apiary among the hives. The sun is warm and the earth fragrant. Bees are all around you. Their wings reflect the sun. Their hum becomes a voice whispering;

Your body is pollen.
The journey is forever.
Be still.

Show More