The benefits of Probiotics

February 7, 2021

The amount of money Americans spend on probiotics has tripled over the last decade. It’s become a billion dollar business — as growing research shows this so-called “good bacteria” can make us healthier. All of us have trillions of bacteria — good and bad — in our stomach, but life can sometimes take a toll on the good stuff.

“When we’re under stress or take antibiotics or eat certain foods that we shouldn’t be eating all the time, then we destroy that natural good defense mechanism that we have,” said Dr. Linda McClintock, Medical Director of Age-less Medicine in Tampa.

Dr. McClintock encourages her patients to take probiotics to add good bacteria to their system. She’s seen it help with many conditions — from urinary tract infections, acid reflux, immunity and digestion. Her patient Rose Rosanelli says it worked for her. “I didn’t really have bloating. I didn’t have gas. I didn’t have the negative things that tend to go with when you’re not digesting properly,” said Rosanelli.

Probiotics have also been shown to help with certain skin conditions like acne, eczema and rosacea. Dermatologists are encouraged by early research. Click here to read more from the American Academy of Dermatology.

With the growing awareness of the benefits of probiotics in the US, we’re seeing more foods on the shelves promoting them. The key is fermented food — everything from pickles to sauerkraut and miso soup and yogurt – all good natural ways to get probiotics.

If you’re not eating enough pro-biotic foods, supplements packed with millions of friendly bacteria can offer similar benefits.

What’s in your Chicken?

Alan

February 7, 2021

The next time you pick up some nice plump chicken or turkey breasts at the supermarket, labeled “All Natural,” look further and see if it is also “enhanced.”
Sounds good, right? Well, not so fast.

USDA regulations allow poultry suppliers to “enhance” their products with injections of salt and water and still call them “all natural.” This additional salt water does add flavor to the meat, and makes it look nice and plump, but at a cost to your health and budget.

Too much salt in your diet can be a serious detriment to your health. According to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, the maximum recommended daily amount of sodium you should consume is no more than 2300 milligrams (that’s 2.3 grams) for healthy adults, and only 1500 milligrams of sodium if you are diabetic, have high blood pressure or kidney problems, or are African-American, middle aged or older.

A serving of “enhanced” poultry can have up to 540 milligrams of added salt. For a healthy young adult, that amounts to about 25% of your recommended maximum intake. For those in risk categories, it is 36% of your recommended allowance. Not noticing that the chicken thighs you have purchased (or consumed at a fast food restaurant) are already eating up much of your recommended maximum can easily lead to dangerous levels of sodium in your diet.

Hidden Salt in “All Natural“

Yet how many people know that “all natural” and “enhanced” chicken or turkey have these large amounts of hidden salt?

In addition, whatever price per pound you are paying for that poultry includes extra salt and water, about 15% of its total weight. It has been estimated that Americans are paying more than $2 billion per year for this salt water in their chicken consumption. Turkey is also often sold “enhanced,” adding more to this yearly cost to consumers for what is mostly water.

Only “organic” chicken and chicken that is not labeled “enhanced” do not have this injected salt.

So carefully look at that package of poultry you are thinking of buying. Is it “enhanced?” Can you afford the extra sodium in your diet? Does paying for all that salty water make sense?

There are other ways the poultry we eat is enhanced in one way or another. Over the past 80 years American full grown turkeys have increased from an average size of 13 pounds to 29 pounds, due to selective breading for bigger and bigger birds. All this growth, particularly in their breasts, has made it impossible for most full grown male turkeys to have sex with females, giving rise to the widespread need for artificial insemination of poultry. But that’s a whole ‘nuther story.

Top 10 Pet Poisons

Alan

February 7, 2021

Human medications topped the list of pet toxins for the third year in a row, according to a new list released by the ASPCA. In 2020, the ASPCA’s 24-hour poison control hotline fielded more than 167,000 phone calls about pets exposed to common household toxins and other potentially poisonous substances.

Here are the 10 most common poisons that affected our furry friends last year. A few highlights of their findings include:

Accidental ingestion of human medications accounted for 25 percent of all calls to the ASPCA in 2010. The most common culprits included antidepressants and over-the-counter medications, such as ibuprofen and acetaminophen.

Approximately 20 percent of all calls concerned insecticides commonly used for flea control. Our feline friends are especially vulnerable to the misapplication of spot-on flea and tick products.

Baits used to kill mice and rats can be deadly if ingested by pets. Many rodenticides are grain-based, which attracts not only rodents, but dogs and cats, too, and can cause seizures, internal bleeding or kidney failure.

Some of the most delicious people food, including grapes, raisins and garlic, can be poisonous to pets. Grapes and raisins can cause kidney failure in dogs, while onions and garlic can cause anemia if ingested in sufficient amounts.

Household plants may keep your house green and your air clean, but some can cause serious gastrointestinal problems for companion animals. Please visit our list of pet-safe plants before your next trip to the nursery.

If you suspect your pet has ingested something toxic, you’re advised to call your vet or the ASPCA’s 24-hour poison control hotline at (888) 426-4435. To read the complete list of the top 10 pet toxins of 2021, visit ASPCA online.

Search engine allows users to spy on webcams

Aimee

February 7, 2021

An Internet search engine has launched a brand-new feature that allows users to spy on unsuspecting people much like the NSA does.

Shodan brands itself as the first search engine for Internet-connected devices, including web-cams, nanny cams, security systems and routers.

It allows users to see devices that are connected to the Internet, where they’re located and who is using them, making any unsecured devices vulnerable.

Judge Andrew Napolitano explained on “Shepard Smith Reporting” that the only way to stop this new software is by using encryption.

“This is, in my view, the strongest argument in favor of encryption, even though the government condemns encryption, because it says it makes law enforcement’s work too difficult,” Judge Napolitano said.

“It does. It is the job of the Constitution to make law enforcement’s work difficult, so that it will respect people’s private lives and personal liberties.”

The cameras are vulnerable because they use the Real Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP, port 554) to share video but have no password authentication in place.

And this from zdnet.com

“In some ways, Shodan is a voyeur’s dream. A quick scan either through paid or free membership using terms such as port:554 has_screenshot:true reveals cameras installed in places ranging from car parks in Japan to bars in France, private lounges in Korea to rabbit cages in Germany.”

As reported by Ars Technica, you can use the vulnerable cam feed to find everything from “marijuana plantations, back rooms of banks, children, kitchens, living rooms, garages, front gardens, back gardens, ski slopes, swimming pools, colleges and schools, laboratories, and cash register cameras in retail stores.””

Christian Radio in Great Falls

Alan

February 7, 2021

Great Falls has a wide variety of different Christian churches that represent the different faiths of it citizens. If you become disillusioned with one church, you can just pick some other church to go to. It is America after all and choice is a freedom we all seem to enjoy.

While on the subject of choice I can’t help but come away with the notion that choice can trip up the every day Christian in so many ways. Can you choose to follow Christ? Of course you can. But since when does following Christ involve a money back guarantee on your Nutri System diet, or involve bemoaning constantly the government run amuck? Where’s the good news of the Gospel in all of this?

Feeling all warm and fuzzy I suppose is a good thing. We’ve made the right investment choices for our future, we’re thin and fit, and we all hate the government — Yes, we’re all ready for the archangel to blow his trumpet on the final day knowing that we’ve made all of the right choices with regard to our physical worldly life. We’re all ready for heaven and we’re all quite confident that Christ would surely be proud of us for all of our wise “choices”.

Christian radio in Great Falls is really rather disappointing in that it has devolved into some sort of quasi commercial political genre that seems to be using the bible for profit and fear mongering.

So the government is fairly worthless. Since when have true Christians ever lived under a non-oppressive government? Any Christian worth his or her salt already knows about governments. They don’t have to be told by a political pundant about how bad the government might be. The Bible already spells out the parts about the government well enough if one were to take the time out of their day to actually read it.

World governments are assigned by God for His glory. Governments are what they are, right, wrong, or otherwise, we all need to have faith and trust that the Lord knows exactly what He’s doing, even though it might not appear to us at the time that any of this makes sense. Why would we ever question the glory of God? Why would we ever reject the things that God has ordained? Didn’t Christ instruct us to “Render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s”? But yet here we are, listening to Christian radio actively railing against that which God has ordained.

As far as weight loss is concerned. Do you really think that “man” can accomplish health better than Christ could? Living by faith might involve actually trusting Christ to do the right thing when it comes down to your health. It’s actually all right to wait on the Lord you know. Even in spite of the fact that these bodies of ours will fade away, Christ still want’s us to be happy and healthy while we’re here. If one were to live by the Word and by Faith, one wouldn’t be finding his or herself running off to Nutri-Systems in the first place, because he or she would already be doing the right thing according to Christ.

Being told what to eat, what to wear, and how to pray by the mandates of men is a total non-starter, and may, in the end, prevent one from ever experiencing the glory of the Lord on the last day. The mandates of men are totally worthless. If you were ever curious to know what Christ thought of religious institutions, all you have to do is read His opinion’s on the Pharisee’s. Not too unlike when Christ walked the earth, the religious institutions of our day are full of hypocritically self-righteous persons. God is no respecter of persons, so it only stands to good reason that God is no respecter of man made institutions either.

Instilling doubt and fear via the Christian radio isn’t quite the end-all that Christian radio programmers seem think it is, unless it’s being done intentionally for the sole benefit of the programmers themselves (it’s more of a worldly business model). Sure, doubt and fear are big money makers … Even the government knows this. But doubt and fear has nothing to do with the bidding of Christ.

Doubt and fear are things of the world. Christian radio these days has more to do with the riches of the world than it does with the riches of heaven me thinks. A suggested donation is all fine and well and all, but the message without the faith does absolutely nothing — Christian radio depends more on it’s donors than it does the faith that might be required to assist with the over all costs (Christian radio has more faith in it’s donors than it does in Christ to help in footing the bill). One shouldn’t ever have to “ask” for money. The message should be as pure as the Spirit itself, and it’s through the Spirit that prompts true believers to assist in supporting and propagating that message.

When the message becomes so confusing and convoluted that one finds his or herself having to ask for money, then it might be time to bag it all and go off to do something else.

Teaching is a huge responsibility —

“My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment” (James 3:1).

The message should never be a forced issue. There is no “hurry it the hell up” when it comes to the Spirit. Christ walks us through our own short comings as we go — It’s a process that each of us can only experience on a personal level. No two people are in exactly the same spot on any given day. Recognizing the things of the world is one of the first things Christ helps with. In order to know Christ, you have to know the world (Christ always gives you both sides of the story, and He keeps you well informed on both).

It’s unfortunate that Christian radio in Great Falls is the way it is. It’s unfortunate that there might be the many out there that truly want to know the truth but instead are bombarded by Nutri System commercials and a never ending barrage of lets all gang up and hate on the government. The purity of the message is lost on all of the worldly opinions of those who might be desiring to teach, but can’t quite get it done due to succumbing to the world and all of it’s distractions (like money for instance).