Men Are Getting Weaker — Because We’re Not Raising Men

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If you’re the average Millennial male, your dad is stronger than you are. In fact, you may not be stronger than the average Millennial female. You’re exactly the kind of person who in generations past had your milk money confiscated every day — who got swirlied in the middle-school bathroom. The very idea of manual labor is alien to you, and even if you were asked to help, say, build a back porch, the task would exhaust you to the point of uselessness. Welcome to the new, post-masculine reality.

This morning, the Washington Post highlighted a study showing that the grip strength of a sample of college men had declined significantly between 1985 and 2016. Indeed, the grip strength of the sample of college men had declined so much — from 117 pounds of force to 98 — that it now matched that of older Millennial women. In other words, the average college male had no more hand strength than a 30-year-old mom.

Yes, I know it’s only one study. Yes, I know that grip strength is but one measure of overall physical fitness. But as the Post noted, these findings are consistent with other studies showing kids are less fit today. (For example, it takes children 90 seconds longer to run a mile than it did 30 years ago.) Simply put, we’re getting soft — and no cohort is getting softer faster than college men. (Read more from “Men Are Getting Weaker — Because We’re Not Raising Men” HERE)

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Another Travel Fiasco Courtesy of the TSA

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I have long been a believer that, in most cases, a private company will do a more effective and efficient job than any government agency charged with the same task. My recent travel experience solidified that belief.

It all started out with a half-empty water bottle at Ronald Reagan National Airport just outside the District of Columbia.

I had checked in the night before, checked my bag at the curbside when I arrived, and now had a full hour to go through security. With Congress gone since late July and much of the District emptied out until Labor Day, I didn’t expect long security lines. I was right. I breezed through in two minutes, until…

Like many airline passengers, I had forgotten to take my plastic bottle of water out of my bag before placing it on the moving belt for security screening. So, naturally, the screener pulled my bag and after I waltzed through the body image scanner with no hiccups, I joined the Transportation Security Administration agent assigned to check my bag.

As I suspected, the water bottle was the culprit but he still had to do a mandatory chemical test of my bag. That’s when they take those little black sticks with swatches on the end and rub them over your belongings, or sometimes the palms of your hands, and then run them through a machine. Fairly routine. Except this time my swatch sent off an alarm. No noise, just a flashing “Alarm” text on the machine’s computer screen. So, they tried again. Same response.

That meant I qualified for a full-body pat-down. I know people who have gone ballistic when asked to have that done, but I go along as I’ve got nothing to hide and I just want to get my purse and get to my gate. Nope. After the pat-down, they do a chemical test on me and my swatches send off the alarm too.

We’re now about 15 minutes and five (yes, five) TSA agents into this little drama. The screener, the guy who first checked my bag, the female TSA agent who was assigned to do the pat-down, the TSA agent who had checked my ID and boarding pass were all there, along with another agent who, as best as I could tell, was simply assigned to stand next to me and make small talk and make sure I didn’t go anywhere.

The agents do another chemical test and decide they need to do another full-body pat-down. They want to do this one in private, assign a new female TSA agent to do it, but tell the original one to also attend as a witness. When I come back out, there is now a manager involved and they are calling the head of something—I could never get the official title—who was supposedly the only person at Reagan airport who could come check my chemical tests and figure out what was going on.

Twenty minutes later, and with no sense of urgency, he arrives. So here we, meaning me and now up to eight TSA agents, go again. Now they are taking out my items one by one to run through the screener—my two lipsticks, eyeshadow, computer power cord, jewelry bag, wallet, sunglasses, etc. Not sure why the original crew didn’t do that, but at this point it was clear most of these folks, bless their hearts, probably had this job because it is one of the few that requires no problem-solving skills or ability to act with speed, and where, heaven knows, customer satisfaction is found nowhere on a personnel review form.

Four gray TSA bins, each holding a few of my items, are then whisked off by no less than three TSA agents (that’s right, it took three people to carry four bins holding heavy-duty items like makeup and hand sanitizer) to a back room. I’m told nothing. For another 15 minutes I sit, not asking too many questions because I still have hope against hope that I might make my flight and don’t want to do anything to take one of these whiz kids off their game.

Now, 55 minutes into this whole process, the back room door opens, out come all my bins and items and I’m told I’m free to go. Dumping everything into my bag and grabbing my shoes, which I had not been allowed to put on, I race barefoot to the gate.

Alas, it was not meant to be. I missed my flight.

The only positive, or so I thought, was that now I’d have time to go back and check in with the TSA folks to find out exactly what it was that caused the problem. I hadn’t taken the time to do so when they finally gave me the all-clear because I just wanted to get to the gate. But now, in an attempt to not relive this experience in the future, I was determined to find out what shampoo I had used or lotion I was wearing that sent their chemical sensors into a frenzy.

No such luck. They can’t tell you that. When I got back to the TSA area, I found the agent who had been the original screener and asked him if he had been told what had caused the problem. “I can’t tell you,” was his response. “It’s a chemical but I’m not allowed to tell you what kind.”

I prodded further, “You mean you know what it is, you must have concluded it wasn’t dangerous because you all finally let me go, but you can’t tell me so that I make sure not to wear it again or have it in my bag again?”

Mr. TSA Agent: “Right. Sorry.”

So how many TSA agents did it take to make me miss my flight yet give no explanation as to why or what to do different next time around?

I lost count.

My story apparently isn’t unique. A man putting on his shoes after coming through security and sitting on the bench next to me as I was working on this article said the exact same thing happened to his wife last summer, except that in her case it turned out she wasn’t sporting some odd lotion or perfume, the machine had simply malfunctioned multiple times. Too bad she missed her international flight while they figured that out.

I wonder if her story, or mine, would have been different if more U.S. airports did what most European airports do, use private screeners. Since 2001, something called the Screening Partnership Program has existed that allows for U.S. airports to contract with private screeners as opposed to using those assigned by the TSA.

A study by the House Transportation Committee found that $1 billion could be saved over five years if America’s 35 largest airports used private screeners. My Heritage Foundation colleague David Inserra has pointed out that “with smaller overhead costs and lower levels of attrition, the screening program is likely a financial boon for most airports.” He also says those airports report improved customer service.

So why do roughly only 20 U.S. airports make use of the private screening option? Because the Obama administration, in one of its “go around the laws we don’t like” moves, suspended the program in 2011 (Congress rightly later reinstated it), because it can take up to four years for an airport to get approval due to government bureaucracy, and because the TSA and its unionized workforce has no interest in competing with the private sector.

The reality is that air travel need not be the fiasco it has become. Congress can rein in the TSA by streamlining the process to hire private screeners and forbidding the unionization of its employees.

Until then, maybe you shouldn’t shower before your flights. (For more from the author of “Another Travel Fiasco Courtesy of the TSA” please click HERE)

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Critics: Scientists Blowing Smoke on ‘Chemtrail’ Study

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New scientific data claiming to prove once and for all that “chemtrails” left in the sky by commercial jetliners are mere water vapor is not convincing those who believe something more nefarious is at work in the skies overhead.

Nearly 17 percent of people in an international survey said they believed the existence of a secret government program to spray harmful contaminants into the atmosphere from airplanes. They call them “chemtrails” or ‘”covert geoengineering,” and many websites show purported evidence of widespread chemical spraying linked to harmful impacts on human health and the environment.

The charges led to the first peer-reviewed study published on the subject, and a panel of 77 scientists found they are not the result of governments covertly conducting experiments on the public, WND reported earlier this week . . .

Rather than “chemtrails,” say the researchers, they are actually “contrails,” which is short for condensation that produces water vapor that freezes around aerosols in the aircraft exhaust.

The scientists said they didn’t expect their research to convince the “diehards” who believe in government “conspiracies” but rather sought to provide data for those who hadn’t formed an opinion on the issue. (Read more from “Critics: Scientists Blowing Smoke on ‘Chemtrail’ Study” HERE)

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High Risk of Modern Slavery in Nearly 60 Percent of Countries, Global Index Finds

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Almost 60 percent of countries are at high risk of using slave labor in their supply chains, according to a new global index launched on Thursday, which also ranked North Korea as having the worst record of slave labor in the world.

By assessing incidents of human trafficking or slavery, national laws, and the quality of law enforcement across 198 countries, risk analytics company Verisk Maplecroft found that 115 countries were at high or extreme risk of using slaves.

“Few countries in the world are actually immune to modern slavery,” said Alex Channer, lead analyst for human rights research at Verisk Maplecroft.

Nearly 46 million people around the world are living as slaves, forced to work in factories, mines and farms, sold for sex, trapped in debt bondage or born into servitude, according to the 2016 Global Slavery Index by rights group Walk Free Foundation.

Modern slavery has become a catch-all term to describe human trafficking, forced labor, debt bondage, sex trafficking, forced marriage and other slave-like exploitation. (Read more from “High Risk of Modern Slavery in Nearly 60 Percent of Countries, Global Index Finds” HERE)

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China: New Discovery Supplies Evidence of Biblical Flood

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Some scientists are calling a discovery in China’s Yellow River Valley evidence that supports a biblical flood.

OneNewsNow.com reports that archaeologists recently uncovered bones of children in the Yellow River Valley. The children appear to have been trapped by a massive flood. The bones have been dated to around 2,000 B.C., which is consistent with when scientists and historians believe the biblical account of Noah’s flood occurred.

Prominent biblical apologist and scientist Ken Ham, who is also the head of the Creation Museum and the newly-opened Ark Encounter attraction, noted that China, like many cultures, has a story of a great flood.

“Whether it’s the American Indians or the Fijians, Hawaiians, the Eskimos, Australian Aborigines … back to the Babylonians, there are flood legends in cultures all over the world,” Ham explained.

“And this particular flood legend from China – when you read it – it talks about it was basically a global flood, the way it was described … and there was a man in particular associated with that flood,” he continued. (Read more from “China: New Discovery Supplies Evidence of Biblical Flood” HERE)

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THE FUTURE OF CRIME: The Drone Era, Part I

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Drones have taken over the hobbyist world by storm.

Drone tech has been driven by a strange confluence of improvements in miniaturization (nano-technology), increased transistor density, and materials science.

While the majority of drone applications appear to be in more traditional ventures such as aerial photography and exploration, a little-discussed aspect relates to how drones could be leveraged for criminal activities.

Likewise, for firms focused on security, there will be a growing need to create drone countermeasures.

What am I talking about?

Imagine a jewelry store in a high-end mall. Foot traffic is heavy. An off-duty police officer provides a visible security presence.

But a police officer and alert employees are no match for a drone.

Equipped with a tiny, high-def camera and painted to match the color scheme of the store, the drone is designed to surveil the store from outside. When an opportune time arises — say, when a tray of diamond engagement rings is left unattended, the attacker sends in the drone.

Using a small hook the drone rips through the air and grabs a couple of the juicier rings and exfiltrates them lickety-split.

Countermeasures?

Electronic countermeasures could be employed to suppress remote-control frequencies.

A much simpler — but not too classy — method might be “Magic Mesh”, the screen “door” that opens and closes using magnets as seen on TV!.

This would prevent a tiny drone from insertion and exfiltration without exquisite timing.

With that said, I have a range of ideas regarding criminal activities that could be accomplished using drones and robots. I’ll share them from time to time.

It’s important for law enforcement and physical security firms to think about the ramifications of these technology advances. A significant business opportunity lies in the countermeasures. (For more from the author of “THE FUTURE OF CRIME: The Drone Era, Part I” please click HERE)

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Terminally Ill Man Set to Undergo World’s First Head Transplant Says Doc Announcing Plans Soon

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In Russia, 30-year-old Valery Spiridonov will be flying to the United States to meet the doctor who plans to perform the world’s first head transplant on him. During the operation, Italian surgeon, Dr. Sergio Canavero, intends to completely remove Spiridonov’s head and reattached it to a healthy body . . .

Now, Spiridonov says Canavero will be announcing the plans soon:

Today, the 31-year-old is wheelchair reliant due to a muscle-wasting disease, announced his neurosurgeon would explain how the plan was progressing in September.

Mr Spiridonov says he is ready to put his trust in controversial surgeon Dr Sergio Canavero who claims he can cut off his head and attach it to a healthy body.

Neither the exact date or location have been chosen yet, but the world first procedure is aimed to take place in December 2017.
And speaking at a press conference, he said his Italian surgeon – dubbed Dr Frankenstein – will reveal more soon.

(Read more from “Terminally Ill Man Set to Undergo World’s First Head Transplant Says Doc Announcing Plans Soon” HERE)

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NIH Proposes Funding Human-Animal Hybrids

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The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is proposing a new rule that would lift the ban on federally funding experiments on human stem cells that splice them with animal embryos to create human-animal hybrids.

The federal government put a moratorium on funding the creation of such hybrids, known as chimeras, back in September 2015. The proposed rule would lift that ban for two specific types of hybrid-creation research.

Christian journalist Rod Dreher points out that the head of NIH is (widely proclaimed) evangelical Francis Collins. Dreher’s take: “Christian-run agency embraces pig-man.”

“On his watch, the NIH is going to create living creatures that are part human, part animal,” Dreher says.

As The New York Times so gently put it, “The idea of human cells developing inside an animal embryo and forming, in effect, a human-animal chimera, has alarmed some people.”

Indeed.

Leon Kass’s bioethics council, vindicated yet again: https://t.co/sU6DXDPmqT

“Scientists would never” line is always a farce.

— Jonathan Coppage (@JonCoppage) August 4, 2016

Catholic priest and blogger Father Matthew Schneider notes that the NIH is currently soliciting feedback on the proposed rule. His view: “It’s beyond immoral not only to allow but fund human-animal hybrids.”

My #ThursdayThoughts: Making animal-human hybrids & experimenting on them raises so many ethical problems… yet the NIH wants to fund it.

— Fr Matthew Schneider (@FrMatthewLC) August 4, 2016

Bioethicist Wesley J. Smith says that our science sector does not uphold the intrinsic dignity of human life, and “we can’t trust our regulatory bodies — which can be more controlled by the sectors they are supposed to regulate than the other way around — to maintain strict boundaries.”

“Another problem is that society generally doesn’t seem to care much,” Smith said. “If you tell many people that biotechnology will cure their Uncle Charlie’s Parkinson’s disease, they won’t give much of a fig about the moral ramifications.”

According to Smith, we’re already on our way down this slippery slope.

I don’t think this work can be stopped. But identifying the lines that should not — and will not — be crossed is an urgent need so that legally enforceable standards can be delineated. I just don’t see anyone currently in power within the symbiotically connected science, government and big business sectors much interested in giving such work more than placating lip service at the moment.

The NIH is taking comments through September 4. (For more from the author of “NIH Proposes Funding Human-Animal Hybrids” please click HERE)

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The Dirty Little Secret Pot Pushers Don’t Want You to Know About

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States have passed so-called “medical marijuana” laws under the theory that pot has medicinal benefits that can’t be produced by other, legal means.

But what if there was a Food and Drug Administration-approved drug that gave you all the benefits of the active ingredients in marijuana, such as tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) or cannabidiol?

What if that drug had been rigorously tested through clinical trials to make sure that it worked as promised, was properly dosed, and had no unanticipated side effects?

And what if you could get that lawful drug from your doctor in pill or liquid form?

And what if there were three such different FDA-approved drugs, and two more on the FDA-approved fast track?

Would it surprise you to know there already are three FDA-approved THC drugs and that at least five more are on the way? We suspect so, because the pot pushers—those that push smoked and edible marijuana as “medicine”—don’t want you to know about these safe alternatives.

Some of those FDA-approved drugs have been around since the 1980s.

That’s right—the dirty little secret they hide from you is that you don’t have to smoke marijuana, eat it in a brownie, or chew it in a marijuana-laced gummy bear to reap the medicinal benefits of THC.

The three FDA-approved drugs are Marinol, Cesamet, and Syndros. Drugs like Syndros show great promise for countering today’s dangerous “medical marijuana” movement.

In early July, the FDA approved Syndros as the first orally administered liquid form of THC. Like Marinol, the original oral cannabinoid to gain FDA approval in 1985, Syndros treats anorexia associated with weight loss in patients with AIDS, as well as nausea and vomiting caused by cancer chemotherapy.

Epidiolex is one drug currently on the FDA fast track. According to a recent press release from GW Pharmaceuticals, a study of 171 randomized patients suffering from Lennox-Gastaut and Dravet syndromes found that Epidiolex decreased seizure occurrence, was relatively well tolerated among patients, and generated no unexpected adverse effects.

Other cannabinoid-based medications on the international market today include Cesamet, another synthetic drug that treats nausea and vomiting stemming from chemotherapy; Cannador, which is currently used in Europe and has demonstrated potential to relieve multiple sclerosis symptoms and postoperative pain management; and Sativex, another GW Pharmaceuticals drug on the FDA fast track that treats spasticity caused by multiple sclerosis.

Since these are all medical cannabinoids, they do not require smoking. They are also safer to use because levels of THC can be monitored.

Knowing these safer alternatives exist, ask yourself: Why? Why have the pot pushers kept this secret and why don’t they want you to know this?

“The medicinal marijuana system in this country has become a bad joke, an affront to the concept of safe and reliable medicine, defying the standards that we have come to expect from the medical establishment,” Dr. Kevin Sabet, former senior adviser to President Barack Obama’s drug policy office, wrote in his book, “Reefer Sanity: Seven Great Myths About Marijuana.”

We can thank Ed Rosenthal and Richard Cowan for creating the current public perception of the so-called “medical marijuana” marketplace.

In a video filmed many years ago, which we highlighted in this 2010 blog post, Rosenthal (former editor of High Times magazine) and Cowan (former director of NORML—the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Law) joked about the nationwide “scam” they started. They realized that if they convinced enough people that smoking marijuana was “medical marijuana,” that would be the beginning of a movement toward full legalization.

“Once there’s medical access, if we continue to do what we have to do and we will, then we’ll get full legalization,” Cowan explained.

“I have to tell you that I also use marijuana medically,” Rosenthal joked. “I have a latent glaucoma which has never been diagnosed, and the reason why its never been diagnosed is because I’ve been treating it.”

But, according to Rosenthal, pleasure trumps any medicinal benefit he should derive from marijuana anyway.

“There is a reason why I do use it,” he said. “And that’s because I like to get high. Marijuana is fun.”

Sabet acknowledges that THC has potential therapeutic effects, but these do not come from smoking pot. (We don’t light any of our FDA-approved medicine on fire and smoke it, after all).

With the average strength of marijuana being five to six times what it was in the 1960s and 70s, the repercussions of marijuana and legalizing it are more evident than before. Some of these include higher risks of motor vehicle accidents, heart attacks, and impaired immune systems and short-term memories. Evidently, the pot pushers don’t want you to know this truth.

“America is being sold a false dichotomy: ‘We can either stick to our current failed policies, or we can try a ‘new approach’ with legalization,” Sabet said. “Sadly, this kind of black-and-white thinking conceals the fact that there are better, more effective ways than either legalization or incarceration to deal with this complex issue.”

Cannabinoid-based drugs are better alternatives because they reap the benefits of marijuana’s therapeutic components safely, as well as have the potential to become FDA approved if they aren’t already.

So the next time a pot pusher encourages a state to enact so-called “medical marijuana” laws, or goes for full legalization in violation of federal law, ask them: Why are they pushing an unsafe, untested product instead of pushing FDA-approved THC? (For more from the author of “The Dirty Little Secret Pot Pushers Don’t Want You to Know About” please click HERE)

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Governor Issues Announcement – Zika Virus Spreading in This U.S. State

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Governor Rick Scott, (R, Fla.), has announced that the number of people with the Zika virus in the state of Florida has risen from 4 to 14.

The Florida Department of Health maintains that the outbreak is confined to a small area of Miami-Dade county, a place known as the Wynwood arts district.

The district has a number of areas where water can collect and serve as a breeding ground for mosquitoes.

When a woman is infected with Zika during pregnancy, the virus can cause numerous, serious birth defects.

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, “there is no vaccine or medicine for Zika.”

The CDC states that there are four common symptoms of the virus including fever, rash, joint pain, and conjunctivitis (red eyes).

The center also notes that the infection can be spread through mosquito bites, from a pregnant woman to her child, from sex, and likely from blood transfusions.

There has also been level 2 alert issued for travel to Brazil, where there has been an outbreak of the virus.

Gov. Scott announced, “Following today’s announcement, I have requested that the CDC activate their emergency response team to assist DOH in their investigation, research, and sample collection efforts. Their team will consist of public health experts whose role is to augment our response efforts to confirmed local transmissions of the Zika virus.”

More than 200 individuals in Miami-Dade and Broward counties have been tested for the virus. Authorities report these individuals live or work near those who likely picked up the disease from mosquitoes.

Two women and twelve men have been identified to likely have the virus. (For more from the author of “Governor Issues Announcement – Zika Virus Spreading in This U.S. State” please click HERE)

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