I researched aspartame after my own experience. Not only did I occasionally have various nervous spells, which at that time I did not think at all related to drinking diet Cokes, but I kept gaining weight even though I watched my food intake AND exercised.
In the late 90's I gave up diet drinks and lost 20 pounds. Then I started drinking them again and over the next 5 years I picked up 25 pounds. I hit 200 pounds last July and decided enough was enough. So I gave up all meat (beef, chicken, pork) all fried foods and snacks AND all diet drinks, all aspartame.
I lost 35 pounds since last August 1. I know I can't isolate the elimination of aspartame as the key reason for this weight loss, BUT I was not eating all that much meat or fried foods anyway. Also, I have had NONE of those nervous-type feelings that I used to while drinking diets.
This article is a synopsis of hundreds of pages--out of THOUSANDS AND THOUSANDS out there. I have no doubt from my own experience and this history that this is a substance that should never have been allowed in our foods or beverages. Rfd
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A POISON BY ANY OTHER NAME
Would you take poison if it had a healthy sounding name, came in trusted products and had a “good housekeeping” type seal of approval? You’re doing just that if you use Nutrasweet, Equal or any of the thousands of famous products containing Aspartame.
Years of research and thousands of complaints filed with the FDA bear witness to the horrors of Aspartame. It causes brain tumors, psychiatric and behavioral disorders, memory loss, depression, headaches, rashes, asthma, seizures, insulin-resistant diabetes, blindness and obesity.
And a just-released report in the European Journal of Clinical Oncology proves Aspartame causes leukemia and lymphoma in rats. The report concludes with a call “…for urgent re-examination of permissible exposure levels of Aspartame in both food and beverages, especially to protect children.”
Renowned neurosurgeon Dr. Russell Blaylock M.D. said, "The new study should terrify mothers and all those consuming aspartame sweetened products. Both of these malignancies have increased significantly in this country since the widespread use of aspartame.”
Dieters hoping to lose weight are perversely GAINING it instead. Aspartame affects metabolism so we don’t burn off calories that end up being stored as fat. It also lowers the brain’s output of serotonin, the substance that causes us to feel “full” after eating, thus we eat even more.
The late Dr. M. Adrian Gross, former senior FDA toxicologist, stated in his testimony before Congress, "Beyond a shadow of a doubt, aspartame triggers brain tumors" and, "therefore, by allowing aspartame to be placed on the market, the FDA has violated the Delaney Amendment… And if the FDA violates its own law, who is left to protect the public?"
Aspartame’s approval is the tragic, but all to common sacrifice of our greater public interest to profit, power and greed. In textbook style it shows the corruption from within by self-interested politicians and their corporate masters that continues to this very day.
It started in 1965 when Searle developed Aspartame as an ulcer drug. A Searle scientist discovered its sweet taste after licking it from his finger. Searle foresaw the much bigger profits to be made by using this new chemical as a food additive sweetener than the more limited use as an ulcer drug.
Searle’s own initial tests showed Aspartame produced holes and tumors in the brains of mice, epileptic seizures in monkeys and converted by animals into dangerous substances, including formaldehyde. But Searle falsified their test results and disposed of the most damaging evidence.
The FDA pursued criminal charges against Searle for this flagrant violation. But the government’s prosecutors, Samuel Skinner and William Conlon, failed to bring it to the grand jury. In typical revolving door fashion, the foot dragging prosecutors then joined the law firm defending Searle.
But even accepting Searle’s doctored results as presented, Dr. Gross said, “… it still emerges that the rate of brain tumors amongst the animals exposed to it (aspartame) vastly exceeds that for animals not exposed to it and such excess is very highly significant. What this says is that there cannot be any reasonable, or even shadow of a doubt that aspartame had caused such an increase in the incidence of brain tumors.”
So the FDA refused to approve Aspartame throughout the Ford and Carter Administrations. But two significant events happened. First, Donald Rumsfeld became president of Searle in 1977 with the express goal of getting Nutrasweet on the market.
Then Ronald Reagan was elected President in 1980. Rumsfeld joined the Reagan transition team. The second day upon taking office Reagan, by executive order, suspended all action of the FDA. One month later he appointed Arthur Hayes as the new Chairman.
Just five months later Hayes overruled FDA advisors and approved aspartame for dry foods. In November 1983 he approved it for beverages. Hayes, under fire for accepting corporate gifts, left the FDA that same month and joined Searle’s public relations firm. Rumsfeld eventually got a $12 million bonus. And the complaints started pouring in.
Within a year of Aspartame’s test marketing release, over 10,000 complaints of dizziness, blurred vision, headaches, and seizures hit the FDA. The Centers for Disease Control found that the symptoms in approximately 25% of the complainants had stopped and then restarted in a corresponding manner with aspartame consumption and withdrawal.
In this same period the human incidence of brain tumors had soared by 10%. None of this bothered the FDA’s Deputy Commissioner, who left the FDA two years later to become vice-president of clinical research for Searle.
That would explain why 100% of all the Searle-financed studies from 1985 to 1995 found no problem with Nutrasweet, while 100% of non-industry financed research raised questions.
Most damning is the soft drink industry’s own statement to Congress in 1983 opposing Aspartame. The National Soft Drink Association petition to Congress against the approval of aspartame was published in the May 7, 1985, Congressional Record: "Searle has not met its burdens under section 409 . . . to demonstrate that aspartame is safe and functional for use in soft drinks . . .. The extensive deficiencies in the stability studies conducted by Searle to demonstrate that aspartame and its degradation products [methyl alcohol, formaldehyde, formic acid, diketopiperazine, etc] are safe in soft drinks intended to be sold in the United States, render these studies inadequate and unreliable. "
So why would they later embrace as a sweetener that which they earlier correctly labeled a toxic poison? And why would Commissioner Hayes unilaterally overrule longstanding FDA opposition and approve the identical Aspartame formula that had been rejected under three previous administrations?
Profit, power and greed. And it’s happening again with Splenda, which is nothing more than chlorinated sugar. Biochemist Dr. James Bowen explains that "Just like aspartame…sucralose also failed in clinical trials with animals.” It affects metabolism and leads to organ damage.
This frequent and open sell-out of our welfare to big money is destroying our faith in government and eroding our democracy. It will only stop when we insist on leaders who make paramount the greater public interest.
Some call this corruption “free market capitalism.” But like “Nutrasweet” it is a label that can’t hide the poison beneath.
Respectfully submitted, Richard F. Dawahare 7/20/05
Friday, July 22, 2005
Thursday, July 07, 2005
Patriarchal Dominance & the 4th of July
Patriarchal Dominance & the 4th of July
Patriarchal dominance. My identity is so consumed with my last name that I often forget there are three other ancestral lines that have equal standing in my genetic makeup. The Rashid family reunion, my maternal grandmother’s line, is a yearly reminder of this.
The Rashids emigrated in the early 1900’s from Lebanon to various points in the Midwest, settling in both the cities and rural areas from Kansas to Michigan. This year’s reunion, from which I just returned, was in Washington D.C. (Bethesda, Md to be more accurate).
There is something special about being in Washington during the 4th of July weekend. All the sights seem to ooze forth a little extra meaning. none more than the starting point for Friday’s excursion, Arlington Cemetery.
The open-air trolley dropped us at the JFK memorial. Very touching, with Jackie buried next to President Kennedy on his right and his pre-deceased son, Patrick, on his left. His most famous and moving quotes were etched in the huge concrete veranda. In a separate area to the left was a similar memorial to Robert Kennedy. Tears welled as the song “Abraham, Martin and John” came to mind.
From there to the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. It is amazing how precise and focused these soldiers are. A guard’s waist can be no larger than 29” WITH the uniform on, so these young men were really “cut.”
The trolley driver pointed out various tombs and markers of famous military men and their role in either freeing, defining or preserving our nation. This was on my mind as we next visited the Vietnam, Lincoln and WWII Memorials.
Concrete and marbled magnificence, all of them! I mused that all the main sights of Washington, of our country’s most cherished heroes, of the 4th itself were forged from military might, from unimaginable courage and willpower.
Blazing 95-degree heat with sauna-like humidity intensified their impact. Being without sunglasses I viewed these sights through severely squinted sweat-soaked eyes. I could literally FEEL “the bombs bursting in air” that led to independence, democracy, acceptance of the world’s “tired and huddled masses” like my forbears, who in turned served in WWII, and thus to my standing on that very spot on this very day.
I naturally wondered about the war in Iraq. Would its future monument be one to a desperate nation-saving, back-to-the-wall life or death struggle? Or would it, like the Vietnam Memorial, be one that honors the valiant soldiers who courageously answered an errant call of duty.
The next day’s visit to the FDR memorial was a soul-confirming perspective on our nation’s past, present and hopeful future. Sitting on the banks of the Potomac, the FDR’s memorial is a peaceful setting. The sculpted concrete walls bear his resounding principles and are segmented into the eras of his four terms of office.
In his first term FDR confronted the nations collapse following the crash and Depression, but his optimism helped see us through. “We have nothing to fear but fear itself,” and he proclaimed government responsibility for fostering the Four Freedoms: of speech and worship and from want and fear.
Then this timely gem from his second Inaugural Address: "The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much it is whether we provide enough for those who have little."
While FDR successfully faced domestic insecurity his first two terms, in his third he led the nation against Germany and Japan, axis foes determined to crush us. “Yesterday, December 7, 1941—a date which will live in infamy--the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.”
Clarity. Nations with the world’s strongest militaries declared war on us, and we had no choice but to do or die. No wonder our boys were itchin’ to enlist! “No matter how long it may take for us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.”
It struck me that our wars fought for real protection, with a high moral purpose and undisputed clarity were the ones in which we DID prevail. Iraq, like Vietnam, is absolutely NONE of that. FDR would never have warred so unnecessarily for as he said, “I have seen war…I hate war.”
Most relevant for our future FDR nails it: “The structure of world peace cannot be the work of one man or one party or one nation. It must be a peace which rests on the cooperative effort of the whole world.”
FDR’s memorial reminded me that while our military might is the most visible of our country’s ancestral line, it is but one key enabler. Equally important are the values inherent within our social contract, the “united we stand” proposition that FDR saw as the government’s prime responsibility to foster.
Without that we may never have been able to withstand the axis powers. We would never have created the world’s strongest middle class nor become the beacon of leadership for the world to emulate.
Paternal dominance is mental. Memorials and reunions remind us of our whole story, our reality.
RFD 7/7/05
Patriarchal dominance. My identity is so consumed with my last name that I often forget there are three other ancestral lines that have equal standing in my genetic makeup. The Rashid family reunion, my maternal grandmother’s line, is a yearly reminder of this.
The Rashids emigrated in the early 1900’s from Lebanon to various points in the Midwest, settling in both the cities and rural areas from Kansas to Michigan. This year’s reunion, from which I just returned, was in Washington D.C. (Bethesda, Md to be more accurate).
There is something special about being in Washington during the 4th of July weekend. All the sights seem to ooze forth a little extra meaning. none more than the starting point for Friday’s excursion, Arlington Cemetery.
The open-air trolley dropped us at the JFK memorial. Very touching, with Jackie buried next to President Kennedy on his right and his pre-deceased son, Patrick, on his left. His most famous and moving quotes were etched in the huge concrete veranda. In a separate area to the left was a similar memorial to Robert Kennedy. Tears welled as the song “Abraham, Martin and John” came to mind.
From there to the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. It is amazing how precise and focused these soldiers are. A guard’s waist can be no larger than 29” WITH the uniform on, so these young men were really “cut.”
The trolley driver pointed out various tombs and markers of famous military men and their role in either freeing, defining or preserving our nation. This was on my mind as we next visited the Vietnam, Lincoln and WWII Memorials.
Concrete and marbled magnificence, all of them! I mused that all the main sights of Washington, of our country’s most cherished heroes, of the 4th itself were forged from military might, from unimaginable courage and willpower.
Blazing 95-degree heat with sauna-like humidity intensified their impact. Being without sunglasses I viewed these sights through severely squinted sweat-soaked eyes. I could literally FEEL “the bombs bursting in air” that led to independence, democracy, acceptance of the world’s “tired and huddled masses” like my forbears, who in turned served in WWII, and thus to my standing on that very spot on this very day.
I naturally wondered about the war in Iraq. Would its future monument be one to a desperate nation-saving, back-to-the-wall life or death struggle? Or would it, like the Vietnam Memorial, be one that honors the valiant soldiers who courageously answered an errant call of duty.
The next day’s visit to the FDR memorial was a soul-confirming perspective on our nation’s past, present and hopeful future. Sitting on the banks of the Potomac, the FDR’s memorial is a peaceful setting. The sculpted concrete walls bear his resounding principles and are segmented into the eras of his four terms of office.
In his first term FDR confronted the nations collapse following the crash and Depression, but his optimism helped see us through. “We have nothing to fear but fear itself,” and he proclaimed government responsibility for fostering the Four Freedoms: of speech and worship and from want and fear.
Then this timely gem from his second Inaugural Address: "The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much it is whether we provide enough for those who have little."
While FDR successfully faced domestic insecurity his first two terms, in his third he led the nation against Germany and Japan, axis foes determined to crush us. “Yesterday, December 7, 1941—a date which will live in infamy--the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.”
Clarity. Nations with the world’s strongest militaries declared war on us, and we had no choice but to do or die. No wonder our boys were itchin’ to enlist! “No matter how long it may take for us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.”
It struck me that our wars fought for real protection, with a high moral purpose and undisputed clarity were the ones in which we DID prevail. Iraq, like Vietnam, is absolutely NONE of that. FDR would never have warred so unnecessarily for as he said, “I have seen war…I hate war.”
Most relevant for our future FDR nails it: “The structure of world peace cannot be the work of one man or one party or one nation. It must be a peace which rests on the cooperative effort of the whole world.”
FDR’s memorial reminded me that while our military might is the most visible of our country’s ancestral line, it is but one key enabler. Equally important are the values inherent within our social contract, the “united we stand” proposition that FDR saw as the government’s prime responsibility to foster.
Without that we may never have been able to withstand the axis powers. We would never have created the world’s strongest middle class nor become the beacon of leadership for the world to emulate.
Paternal dominance is mental. Memorials and reunions remind us of our whole story, our reality.
RFD 7/7/05
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