Ralph welcomes back medical journalist and New York Times bestselling author, Jean Carper, to elaborate on her latest book, “100 LIFE OR DEATH FOODS: A Scientific Guide to Which Foods Prolong Life or Kill You Prematurely.” Plus, the latest news about Boeing and the UAW.
One more. I'm generally in favor of the protests. But what took them so long? The Israeli government has been doing this for years.
I'm generally an America first guy.
So I wonder why people aren't protesting against the food that's poisoning us? Or where are all the protestors are to support parents struggling to put a roof over their children's heads? Why aren't people protesting in support of the millions of Americans facing catastrophic financial problems because of medical bills? Why aren't people protesting against monopolies?
Why aren't people protesting against what Ralph has been talking and writing about for years now???
Thanks for covering the crackdown on student protests. Most discussions of them have focused on proverbial trees (campuses) while ignoring the forest (bipartisan authoritarianism). I wrote more about these themes at https://shahidbuttar.substack.com/p/the-empire-strikes-back
Why aren't students protesting against corporate control, our healthcare system, corrupt government, the issues that Ralph has been talking and writing about for years?
It'll be a great time in America when millions are in streets showing solidarity for higher wages, universal healthcare, subsidies for broccoli instead of junk food. When millions are in the streets protesting against monopolies, AI, and what Corey Doctrow talks about -- the "Enshittification of Everything".
To be fair, students are in fact protesting all of those things, and movements among them have been have been doing so for decades. I was active in the Occupy movement, for example, which was widely derided by co-opted journalists precisely for having an expansive set of intersecting concerns. I wrote at some length about the parallels between that moment and now at https://shahidbuttar.substack.com/p/history-might-not-repeat-but-it-certainly
We've been Whole Food Plant Based since 5-1-15. Can't say enough, how great it's been for us and countless others. BTW. It's highly patriotic to eat this way and it's not political. In fact as this piece lays out, a WFPB lifestyle aligns with conservatism.
Why isn’t plant-based nutrition being championed by the political right?
We live this lifestyle for a few reasons - our health, the health of the planet, and the health, wealth, and prosperity of others. We save money, the food we eat tastes great.
Not for everyone; genetic and family background need to be respected regarding dietary choices. Health seems to be more about avoiding unhealthy things; the Greek ideal of moderation in all things. "Plant-based" diets are not particularly idealistic, in many ways the avoidance of healthy dairy products, quality fish like good sardines and anchovies can set you up for other problems. Abstemiousness and systematic undereating do a lot for health together with proper exercise.
As a longtime vegan, I found the wrap-up a more interesting part of the program, but that does not detract from the presentation on healthy-unhealthy foods. I’m finding that my Substack posts on the repression of protest against the Gaza genocide are not getting as much attention as other posts. This was true of today’s post “Jackboot on Protest” at Howie’s Substack.
A great show with much in the way of vital information. A couple of important additional things I would like to add. First of all read the Blue Zone books. I like the fact that their life style allows for some flexibility. About 95 % of their diet is plant based which gives room for a turkey at Thanksgiving. It is also important to know that the Blue Zone residents not only live longer but are much healthier into their later years. They get a pass on such things as incapacitating strokes and other slow declines. They stay active and easier in the end. It is also important to recognize that there are other factors besides nutrition involved in longevity, Again the Blue Zone studies came up with I think 6 or 8 components that are factors in living a long healthy life- things like having exercise built into you life style, having a mechanism for relaxation, a religious belief, social interaction and support, etc. It is the whole package that works. Read these books for real guidance.
Another good resource I can recommend is Doctor Milton Mills who works for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. PCRM is an organization of around 12,000 doctors who emphasize "preventive medicine". They do this by promoting a plant based diet. I had the pleasure of hearing Dr. Mills in person give his lecture ob human anatomy. He does a fascinating comparison of human anatomy with mammal carnivores, omnivores, and herbivores. His conclusions are absolute and beyond a shadow of doubt in that we are herbivores. I have given talks about this and usually start out by asking if anyone has ever seen a human chase down a smaller animal and kill it with their jaws. So far no one has. In comparison to animal that have evolved to eat meat we don't run very fast, our jaws are week, our canine teeth are level with our other seed grinding teeth, and our senses of smell and hearing are weak. Of grater importance are things like the fact that our stomach acid is too weak to kill bad bacteria and our control of fire came late in human evolution. Meat eating animals have a short intestinal tract while herbivores have a multiple times longer tract. It takes a lot of fiber to keep things moving through a long intestinal tract and animal products have no fiber. Having that meat hanging around in there is hazardous to a person's health. Colon cancer is the number 4 killer in the US and the number 2 killer among Alaskan natives. Our nearest relatives in the animal world, the chimpanses and great apes are primarily plant eaters. And , of course all that saturated fat plugs a person's blood vessels up and causes heart disease and diabetes. Remember Bill Clinton, our president who liked to jog his fat legs down to McDonald's for a big mac. After double bypass surgery he went to the Cleveland Clinic to see Dr Esylstine, author of that great book, How to Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease," and Bill is still alive, looking better, and can probably still get it up. All because he went vegan. You can find Dr. Milton Mills on Youtube for more details. No charge for all this good medical advice. I hope it helps someone out there. There is something really powerful and satisfying about taking control of your own health.
Jean Carper misspoke when she said, “White bread is made from unrefined grains…”. She meant refined grains. The .pdf transcription has this error as well.
Advocating for the virtues of whole grain bread is nothing new. It goes WAY back to Sylvester Graham (1794-1851).
Check last week's episode for my comment on this episode about how we feed democracy politicians poisoned with big money and how we can feed democracy healthy small donor politicians to get better results.
Then read Ralph's recent blog on The Summer of Student Activism.
Ralph wraps it up making a good point saying "Change Congress and you change America. That is leverage."
But issuing a summons to try to get the big money politicians to do what they have already told you they won't do when they took the big money is not going to change Congress anymore than the letters, phone calls and emails that are ignored.
There is no leverage there.
So where is the leverage?
In the voting booth.
If Ralph helps to organize citizens to demand small donor candidates and enforce that demand with our votes in 2024 just 10% national participation can begin to change Congress in 2026 with many small donor politicians on the ballot in the primaries and general election in 2026.
As around 90% of congressional districts are gerrymandered so that only one candidates can win in the general election in 2024 most citizens can participate in this voting strategy without affecting the already decided 2024 outcome in their district by casting a write in vote to register a vote against the big money candidates on the 2024 ballot and to create and demonstrate demand for small donor candidates in 2026.
With 10% national participation there will some districts below 10% and some districts above the 10% average.
In a district that for several election cycles has consistently been voting 60% for Republicans and 40% Democrats (give or take a percentage point or two) were to be split in 2024 55%-30% with 15% casting a write in vote demanding small donor candidates it could inspire a politician to run a small donor campaign in the 2026 Democratic primary in that district. It works the same in a 60-40 Democratic district.
The non-gerrymandered party token big money candidate in a district can often only get 8-10% of general election voters to vote for them in the primary. A small donor candidate that can get 10-12% of general election voters to vote for them in the primary can win the primary and can change that 60-40 in the 2026 general election to a 50-50 split.
THAT is leverage.
I disagree with Ralph' s statement that "Our government is fueling an empire producing disasters that are conducted in the name of the powerless American people...".
It's not that our government is not fueling an empire producing disasters that are conducted in the name of the American people, but citizens are not powerless.
The power to change Congress is in our votes.
Please Ralph, explain how using this power to to demand small donor candidates will not work or help organize citizens to use their votes in 2024 to create the leverage to elect some small donor candidates in 2026 and more in 2028 that will actually show up to town halls with a mere invitation rather than continuing to elect big money politicians that will ignore a toothless summons.
Some useful health advice here. However I find these types of "studies" to be more anecdotal than anything. I have an older brother dealing with the hideous consequences of mouth cancer and their horrific treatments; a lot more needs to be said about preventative measures. He went on a plant based style diet when the family history was Midwestern, healthy dairy and meats. I lost a friend to cancer who had had atherosclerosis and stents who had gone on a plant-based diet a year or so before and got diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer and did not last long. Don't make radical changes when balanced diets have served you well! Organic butter, free range beef, quality yoghurt all do a lot for the health. Green tea extract is one thing that shrinks inoperable brain tumors and there are plenty of studies on that; Japanese cancer rates are quite low.
Please read what Mahatma Gandhi wrote in his "Guide to Health"; it really is timeless and together with some of the best natural healing modern wisdom we have, it would be invaluable to avoid much human misery if people took it to heart: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/40373/40373-h/40373-h.htm
Howdy,
One more. I'm generally in favor of the protests. But what took them so long? The Israeli government has been doing this for years.
I'm generally an America first guy.
So I wonder why people aren't protesting against the food that's poisoning us? Or where are all the protestors are to support parents struggling to put a roof over their children's heads? Why aren't people protesting in support of the millions of Americans facing catastrophic financial problems because of medical bills? Why aren't people protesting against monopolies?
Why aren't people protesting against what Ralph has been talking and writing about for years now???
###
Or as I would put it: Why aren't people protesting against incremental genocide?
Thanks for covering the crackdown on student protests. Most discussions of them have focused on proverbial trees (campuses) while ignoring the forest (bipartisan authoritarianism). I wrote more about these themes at https://shahidbuttar.substack.com/p/the-empire-strikes-back
Did you see my comment above?
Why aren't students protesting against corporate control, our healthcare system, corrupt government, the issues that Ralph has been talking and writing about for years?
It'll be a great time in America when millions are in streets showing solidarity for higher wages, universal healthcare, subsidies for broccoli instead of junk food. When millions are in the streets protesting against monopolies, AI, and what Corey Doctrow talks about -- the "Enshittification of Everything".
To be fair, students are in fact protesting all of those things, and movements among them have been have been doing so for decades. I was active in the Occupy movement, for example, which was widely derided by co-opted journalists precisely for having an expansive set of intersecting concerns. I wrote at some length about the parallels between that moment and now at https://shahidbuttar.substack.com/p/history-might-not-repeat-but-it-certainly
Let's hope to what I think is your point, that the student protests lead to more people rising up.
So what about eggs? The so-called "perfect" food. HA! Each egg you eat is actually like a cholesterol bomb. 62% per egg!!!!
Get the book and find out.
OK, I can live to 110! Maybe!
I’d take this advice with a grain of salt, but I want to live longer.
Thank you for this.
We've been Whole Food Plant Based since 5-1-15. Can't say enough, how great it's been for us and countless others. BTW. It's highly patriotic to eat this way and it's not political. In fact as this piece lays out, a WFPB lifestyle aligns with conservatism.
Why isn’t plant-based nutrition being championed by the political right?
https://mailchi.mp/93ddf763867b/righteating-17752242?e=f796f04d1d
Another great book is How Not To Die, by Dr. Michael Greger:
https://nutritionfacts.org/book/how-not-to-die/
We live this lifestyle for a few reasons - our health, the health of the planet, and the health, wealth, and prosperity of others. We save money, the food we eat tastes great.
####
Not for everyone; genetic and family background need to be respected regarding dietary choices. Health seems to be more about avoiding unhealthy things; the Greek ideal of moderation in all things. "Plant-based" diets are not particularly idealistic, in many ways the avoidance of healthy dairy products, quality fish like good sardines and anchovies can set you up for other problems. Abstemiousness and systematic undereating do a lot for health together with proper exercise.
As a longtime vegan, I found the wrap-up a more interesting part of the program, but that does not detract from the presentation on healthy-unhealthy foods. I’m finding that my Substack posts on the repression of protest against the Gaza genocide are not getting as much attention as other posts. This was true of today’s post “Jackboot on Protest” at Howie’s Substack.
A great show with much in the way of vital information. A couple of important additional things I would like to add. First of all read the Blue Zone books. I like the fact that their life style allows for some flexibility. About 95 % of their diet is plant based which gives room for a turkey at Thanksgiving. It is also important to know that the Blue Zone residents not only live longer but are much healthier into their later years. They get a pass on such things as incapacitating strokes and other slow declines. They stay active and easier in the end. It is also important to recognize that there are other factors besides nutrition involved in longevity, Again the Blue Zone studies came up with I think 6 or 8 components that are factors in living a long healthy life- things like having exercise built into you life style, having a mechanism for relaxation, a religious belief, social interaction and support, etc. It is the whole package that works. Read these books for real guidance.
Another good resource I can recommend is Doctor Milton Mills who works for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. PCRM is an organization of around 12,000 doctors who emphasize "preventive medicine". They do this by promoting a plant based diet. I had the pleasure of hearing Dr. Mills in person give his lecture ob human anatomy. He does a fascinating comparison of human anatomy with mammal carnivores, omnivores, and herbivores. His conclusions are absolute and beyond a shadow of doubt in that we are herbivores. I have given talks about this and usually start out by asking if anyone has ever seen a human chase down a smaller animal and kill it with their jaws. So far no one has. In comparison to animal that have evolved to eat meat we don't run very fast, our jaws are week, our canine teeth are level with our other seed grinding teeth, and our senses of smell and hearing are weak. Of grater importance are things like the fact that our stomach acid is too weak to kill bad bacteria and our control of fire came late in human evolution. Meat eating animals have a short intestinal tract while herbivores have a multiple times longer tract. It takes a lot of fiber to keep things moving through a long intestinal tract and animal products have no fiber. Having that meat hanging around in there is hazardous to a person's health. Colon cancer is the number 4 killer in the US and the number 2 killer among Alaskan natives. Our nearest relatives in the animal world, the chimpanses and great apes are primarily plant eaters. And , of course all that saturated fat plugs a person's blood vessels up and causes heart disease and diabetes. Remember Bill Clinton, our president who liked to jog his fat legs down to McDonald's for a big mac. After double bypass surgery he went to the Cleveland Clinic to see Dr Esylstine, author of that great book, How to Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease," and Bill is still alive, looking better, and can probably still get it up. All because he went vegan. You can find Dr. Milton Mills on Youtube for more details. No charge for all this good medical advice. I hope it helps someone out there. There is something really powerful and satisfying about taking control of your own health.
Jean Carper also misspoke when she was speaking about calories. The .pdf transcription remedied it.
Jean Carper misspoke when she said, “White bread is made from unrefined grains…”. She meant refined grains. The .pdf transcription has this error as well.
Advocating for the virtues of whole grain bread is nothing new. It goes WAY back to Sylvester Graham (1794-1851).
Check last week's episode for my comment on this episode about how we feed democracy politicians poisoned with big money and how we can feed democracy healthy small donor politicians to get better results.
Then read Ralph's recent blog on The Summer of Student Activism.
Ralph wraps it up making a good point saying "Change Congress and you change America. That is leverage."
But issuing a summons to try to get the big money politicians to do what they have already told you they won't do when they took the big money is not going to change Congress anymore than the letters, phone calls and emails that are ignored.
There is no leverage there.
So where is the leverage?
In the voting booth.
If Ralph helps to organize citizens to demand small donor candidates and enforce that demand with our votes in 2024 just 10% national participation can begin to change Congress in 2026 with many small donor politicians on the ballot in the primaries and general election in 2026.
As around 90% of congressional districts are gerrymandered so that only one candidates can win in the general election in 2024 most citizens can participate in this voting strategy without affecting the already decided 2024 outcome in their district by casting a write in vote to register a vote against the big money candidates on the 2024 ballot and to create and demonstrate demand for small donor candidates in 2026.
With 10% national participation there will some districts below 10% and some districts above the 10% average.
In a district that for several election cycles has consistently been voting 60% for Republicans and 40% Democrats (give or take a percentage point or two) were to be split in 2024 55%-30% with 15% casting a write in vote demanding small donor candidates it could inspire a politician to run a small donor campaign in the 2026 Democratic primary in that district. It works the same in a 60-40 Democratic district.
The non-gerrymandered party token big money candidate in a district can often only get 8-10% of general election voters to vote for them in the primary. A small donor candidate that can get 10-12% of general election voters to vote for them in the primary can win the primary and can change that 60-40 in the 2026 general election to a 50-50 split.
THAT is leverage.
I disagree with Ralph' s statement that "Our government is fueling an empire producing disasters that are conducted in the name of the powerless American people...".
It's not that our government is not fueling an empire producing disasters that are conducted in the name of the American people, but citizens are not powerless.
The power to change Congress is in our votes.
Please Ralph, explain how using this power to to demand small donor candidates will not work or help organize citizens to use their votes in 2024 to create the leverage to elect some small donor candidates in 2026 and more in 2028 that will actually show up to town halls with a mere invitation rather than continuing to elect big money politicians that will ignore a toothless summons.
Some useful health advice here. However I find these types of "studies" to be more anecdotal than anything. I have an older brother dealing with the hideous consequences of mouth cancer and their horrific treatments; a lot more needs to be said about preventative measures. He went on a plant based style diet when the family history was Midwestern, healthy dairy and meats. I lost a friend to cancer who had had atherosclerosis and stents who had gone on a plant-based diet a year or so before and got diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer and did not last long. Don't make radical changes when balanced diets have served you well! Organic butter, free range beef, quality yoghurt all do a lot for the health. Green tea extract is one thing that shrinks inoperable brain tumors and there are plenty of studies on that; Japanese cancer rates are quite low.
Please read what Mahatma Gandhi wrote in his "Guide to Health"; it really is timeless and together with some of the best natural healing modern wisdom we have, it would be invaluable to avoid much human misery if people took it to heart: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/40373/40373-h/40373-h.htm