As I have mentioned recently, the situation in NATO occupied Kosovo is quickly deteriorating (see here and here). NATO’s humiliation in the Ukraine is pushing NATO leaders to try to
So now we are 50 days into this Special Military Operation (SMO) and right in between the end of the first phase and the beginning of the second one. So
An article in yesterday’s Washington Post warns that hate crimes are one the rise: Note the “divisive presidential election.” And you should worry: “The total marked an increase of six percent from 2019 and the most since 2008, when 7,783 hate crimes were reported. . . . The number of hate crimes reported has increased...
By now we all know that Jeff Bezos has a rocket ship. This is obviously very big news, bigger even than the new Jack Ryan show everyone is talking about (the title is everywhere). In America it may no longer be reasonable to expect something silly, like an increase in wages or a return to 1970s levels of real estate purchasing power, much less a functioning transit system in our capital city. But this is still a great country, one in which any person with a high net worth but mysteriously little taxable income can do anything he sets his mind to.
Naturally Bezos is very excited about his big achievement. What’s more, he says he is grateful to all of Amazon’s customers and employees for having “paid for this.” This was very big of him. It is certainly true that if thousands of employees did not spend their days letting computer watches track how long it takes them to pee, down to the exact microsecond, and inputting the averages into a spreadsheet for review by their supervisors, he would not be able to approximate c. 1957 Soviet space capability in his backyard.
I couldn’t help but feel that he ought to have gone further and given all the shuttered mom and pop hardware stores and the millions of East Asian sweatshop workers a shout-out as well, along with four successive Departments of Justice who have allowed him to engage in dumping and other obvious violations of antitrust law with impunity. But that’s just me.
Still, let’s not distract ourselves from the real nature of the achievement. Bezos has built his own mini NASA for fun. Think about the possibilities this opens up for other rich people. Maybe Bill Gates will create a fully workable toy IRS or a private navy to guard the private island that he owned, at least until recently (some of his friends have had them too, if I recall correctly). In turn Tim Cook will respond with an exact replica of the Department of Agriculture, complete with workers to inspect his play meat. Donald Trump was already briefly in charge of the nuclear codes, so it’s hardly a stretch to imagine him inviting some Iranians down to Mar-a-Lago. I myself can’t wait for the Oprah Library of Congress.
We are supposed to be very excited about the fact that what until recently were widely considered functions of the state are now the province of these hero-entrepreneurs. We haven’t got a government capable of doing very much—in fact, one of our two major political parties is founded on the premise that it can’t by definition—but we have got private companies whose legal obligations do not extend beyond the maximization of shareholder value in de facto control of the digital communications technologies that ground virtually every function of our national life.
Some public-facing examples of this are obvious (Facebook and Twitter and increasingly even Amazon serving as de facto licensors). But think of the enormous power that Microsoft and its rivals have because they control the cloud systems that make virtually all government activity possible or the consulting firms who “design” what they call “solutions” for bureaucrats who cannot be bothered to run their own agencies or the federally funded research corporations whose PowerPoints ultimately determine both the interpretation and the implementation of legislation written by lobbyists. The leverage is all in one direction.
Ever since Jimmy Carter’s break-up of the old postwar consensus on the mixed economy—strict government regulation of oil, airlines, banking, trucking, and other crucial sectors—we have not really had a theory of the state in this country. In the old days right-wingers thought of the government as an impediment; now it is just one more “client,” a customer on whose behalf business is doing “dynamic” things like “engagement” in “progressive-strategic theme areas.”
It’s not just that the state has been subsumed into commerce. It’s that everything has been. At the same time that the actually meaningful sphere of activity belonging to the state decreased, so did the portion once occupied by the real private sphere, i.e., family life. This is the ultimate legacy of the so-called gig economy. Everyone who owns a house or an apartment is encouraged to be a hotelier. Everyone with a car is a potential cab driver or a courier for some phone-based delivery service. Pictures of one’s children shared with millions of strangers can be monetized. The most basic human communications are “content.” We rate and review our neighbors the same way that audiophile magazines used to do stereo equipment.
This, I think, is how we should try to make sense of what Bezos is really doing. He has no choice. Earth has exhausted his ambitions, which is why the next step (as he admitted the other day) is intergalactic shipping containers bringing you T-shirts from Martian factories. Who says there are no worlds left to conquer?
Nathaniel Popper, reporting for The New York Times: One by one, they left. Some quit. Others were fired. All were Black. The 15 people worked at Coinbase, the most valuable U.S. cryptocurrency start-up, where they represented roughly three-quarters of the Black employees at the 600-person company. Before leaving in late 2018 and early 2019, at least 11 of them informed the human resources department or their managers about what they said was racist or discriminatory treatment, five people with knowledge of the situation said. One of the employees was Alysa Butler, 25, who worked in recruiting. During her time at Coinbase, she said, she told her manager several times about how he and others excluded her from meetings and conversations, making her feel invisible. "Most people of color working in tech know that there's a diversity problem," said Ms. Butler, who resigned in April 2019. "But I've never experienced anything like Coinbase."
In Silicon Valley, where entrepreneurs and investors often preach high-minded missions and style themselves as management gurus, Coinbase has held itself up as a model. Since the start-up was founded in 2012, Brian Armstrong, the chief executive, has assembled memos and blog posts about how he built the $8 billion company's culture with distinct hiring and training practices. That has won him acclaim among influential venture capitalists and executives. But according to 23 current and former Coinbase employees, five of whom spoke on the record, as well as internal documents and recordings of conversations, the start-up has long struggled with its management of Black employees. One Black employee said her manager suggested in front of colleagues that she was dealing drugs and carrying a gun, trading on racist stereotypes. Another said a co-worker at a recruiting meeting broadly described Black employees as less capable. Still another said managers spoke down to her and her Black colleagues, adding that they were passed over for promotions in favor of less experienced white employees. The accumulation of incidents, they said, led to the wave of departures. On Wednesday, before publication of this article, Emilie Choi, Coinbase's chief operating officer, wrote an email to employees to preemptively question the article's accuracy and said, "We know the story will recount episodes that will be difficult for employees to read." The company
posted the email to its public blog. "As Brian shared with the ColorBlock ERG this morning, we don't care what The New York Times thinks. "
"Red" (Morgan Freeman): "Hope is a dangerous thing my friend, it can kill a man…" Andy (Tim Robbins): "Remember, Red. Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies." ~ The Shawshank Redemption (1994) Two futures lie before us. Like the classic visions of late-Old Testament prophets, contemporary … Continue reading "Dual Paths in Dark Times: Despair or Hope for Antiwar Dreamers"
The poisonous fruits of “maximum pressure.” Barbara Slavin explains the destructive effects of the Trump administration’s economic war on Iran.
Stop the sanctions madness, Senator Rubio. Dan Drezner tells us why Rubio’s threats against the Solomon Islands are an absurd overreaction.
Iranian students barred from boarding U.S.-bound flights. The Davis Enterprisereports on a number of cases of Iranian students with valid student visas being turned away from their flights to the U.S.
by Ramin Mazaheri for The Saker Blog Like illegally jailed PressTV anchor Marzieh Hashemi, I am a journalist at Iran’s PressTV and also a dual-citizen of Iran and the US,
. . .the pilgrimage was based on the historical detective work that Fr. Dwight Longenecker produced in his book Mystery of the Magi: The Quest to Identify the Three Wise Men. One of the main points of this intriguing book is to demythologize the story of the Magi & root them in history. Why does this story need demythologizing? . . .
I learned of Soma Cubes years ago and continue to play with the 7 shapes when looking for something to do. They might be compared to Tangrams which are a 2D puzzle while Soma is a 3D puzzle. Soma cubes can be used by all ages as long as they are old enough to appreciate a good puzzle and not eat or choke on the pieces. I’ve built my own puzzle pieces by gluing together 27 dice but there are versions you can purchase on Amazon (this Soma cube ($14) has a deck of 50 cards with shape challenges). Wikipedia has a good description of the game pieces including pictures of the pieces and a few shapes that can be made of them. Search the web for ‘Soma Figures’ and ‘Soma Solutions’ to find shapes to build with your Soma cubes.
NASA announced it will publicly demonstrate a quiet supersonic aircraft near the coastal resort city of Galveston, Texas, to ensure that its prototype really will be barely audible when it crosses the sound barrier. CNN reports: If NASA's experimental project -- formerly known as the X-plane or "Low-Flight Flight Demonstrator" but recently renamed X-59 QueSST -- works, it should help make supersonic flight more economical. From November, NASA will use supersonic F/A-18 Hornet jets over Galveston to mimic the sonic profile of the X-59 while a group of around 500 residents document the noise levels -- if there are any. By performing dives at the speed of sound, the jets will produce two types of sonic boom in order to truly determine the sound they produce on the ground. According to NASA, Galveston was chosen as the testing area as it's located near the Gulf of Mexico, allowing the fighter jets keep louder sonic booms out to sea, while hurling quieter sonic "thumps" into the city. The secret to the plane's noise-reducing ability is its uniquely shaped structure, designed so that supersonic shockwaves don't build up into powerful sonic booms.
US media figures are in the habit of referring to the president of the United States as the “Commander in Chief of the United States” People who do that badly misunderstand the structure of US government as described in the Constitution of the United States. This misunderstanding may have been caused by the disappearance of...
“An epidemic terror seized upon the nations,” wrote Charles Mackay in his 1841 masterpiece, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. “It was a crime imputed with so much ease, and repelled with so much difficulty, that the powerful, whenever they wanted to ruin the weak, and could fix no other imputation upon them, … Continue reading "Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Russiagate"
We introduce Yuri Orlow, a Classical Homeopath from Australia and a truly wonderful and committed human being. http://www.homoeopathyplease.com.au/index.html Here is an overview of what Homeopathy is; http://www.simillimum.com/education/homoeo-faq/general-questions/index.php
Donald Trump is well practiced in the technique of saying or doing something outrageous to attract attention, or to distract attention from something else to which he does not want public attention. Which of these two specific motivations has been most in play has varied during his career, but Trump undoubtedly believes the technique has served him well. It helped to gain him prominence during the early stages of what was then considered a long-shot presidential bid. Later during the campaign, it helped to divert attention from what should have been candidacy-killing revelations such as boasts about groping women. And then in the turbulent opening weeks of his presidency, the attention-diverting ploy, implemented most often through Twitter, has worked again. His most recent major use of the technique was his baseless accusation about his predecessor wire-tapping him. According to an anonymous White House official, following several days in which Trump was mostly in an angry rage, Trump was pleased that his accusation had grabbed headline space away from coverage of his attorney general’s falsehoods about meetings with the Russians.
The outrageousness of whatever it is that Trump says or does is what gives it value. The outrage goes with the attention, and is the key ingredient in getting the attention. This technique is quite different from the practices of most foreign governments and heads of governments, of various political stripes. Most things that governmental leaders may do that are worthy of outrage are hidden or de-emphasized, while the leader endeavors to present a more respectable public face.
The one government that comes to mind that, like Trump, regularly uses provocative and outrageous moves to gain attention is the Kim dynasty in North Korea. While recognizing all the major and obvious differences between the U.S. administration and the degenerate North Korean dictatorship, use of this technique is one similarity. For the North Korean regime, the motivation has been to use moves such as nuclear weapons tests to keep the regime’s demands before the world and help its extortionate attempts to extract food aid or some other kind of support or recognition.
An anonymous reader shares a blog post: There's one thing the Academy possibly didn't consider, or forgot, for this year's winner cards: typography. First, it's legible, you can tell all the letters apart. Second, it's somewhat readable, but the visual weight of "Moonlight" and the producers are equal and blend together. Lastly, even though it is just a winner's card, it's not visually appealing. I think it's fair to say it's objectively bland. That's horrible typography. Of course, anyone could've made the same honest error! You are on television with millions of people around the world watching. You are a little nervous, and you have to read a card. You will most likely read it from top to bottom (visual hierarchy) without questioning whether the card is right. That look on Warren's face was, "This says 'Emma Stone' on it." Faye must've skipped that part and was caught up in the excitement and just blurted out, "La La Land." I don't blame Faye or Warren for this. This was the fault of two entities: whoever was in charge of the design of the winning card (Was it really a design? C'mon), and the unfortunate person who handed them the wrong envelope. A clearly designed card and envelope (don't even get me started on that gold on red envelope) would've prevented this. The blogger, Benjamin Bannister (a creative consultant for old and new media), adds that there were essentially three things wrong with the card in question: Oscars logo need not to be at the top of the card. The category, "Best Acress" was at the bottom, and in small print. And, the winner's name, the main thing that should be read, is the same size as the second line and given equal weight.
If globalism and liquid modernity are the problem, then immigration restriction is cutting off one of the few sources of new citizens who might possible share your views on the priority of faith and family and the importance of religion in providing some moral undercurrent (or restraint) for the state’s actions. Both Putin and Trump appear to be happy to throw a bone to religious conservatives in order for their loyal support, but neither has any respect for human life in the eyes of the state and would happily preside over a fiefdom full of people lost in drugs, alcohol, gambling, or sex as long as they stay in power. There won’t be much civilization left to defend because modernity will continue its corrosive destruction through the institutions we love and believe in– the individualistic atomism that is hollowing out our civilization is a juggernaut that cannot be stopped by an authoritarian state and closed borders.
Refugees and immigrants overwhelmingly hail from cultures that prioritize communal values over individual expression, understand the preeminent value of marriage and family, and see religious devotion as a key process that helps to form virtuous and capable citizens. There are some legitimate differences in politics, theology, or culture, but those values tend to be more superficial when considered in light of the overwhelming overlap in social vision they have with religious conservatives.The conflicts that we might encounter in dealing with Islamic political theology and other foreign ideas might even help sharpen our particular viewpoints and force us to actually describe how we imagine religion informing politics doing rather than shrieking about Supreme Court justices ad nauseum.
He goes on to say:
Whether you want real civilization that is communal instead of individualistic or genuine ideology that governs according to principle rather than power-grabbing, immigrants and refugees are conservatives’ allies.
This is true up to a point, Lord Copper. Let me explain.
I’ve written here that I would a thousand times rather that my next-door neighbors were an observant Muslim family, which by default would mean they shared most of my socially conservative beliefs, than a secular, let-it-all-hang-out American family. It’s all about the kids, really. I could say the same about, say, an observant Catholic or Evangelical immigrant family from Mexico.
But the dynamic changes when we are talking about an entire society. It’s a useful thought experiment to play out in your head, because it forces you to think of what you value socially. I would not want to live in a society that’s majority Muslim, because despite sharing many values, there is not a majority-Muslim country in the world that I would want to live in. Visit? Yes, absolutely. But live in? No, not as an observant Christian, and not as someone who values the Western tradition.
In fact, I would not be eager to live in most countries of the world, other than my own. I fancy that I would enjoy living in the UK, Ireland, and most European countries, but that is because they are close enough to what I’m used to. The older I get, the less likely I am even to consider the possibility of doing so. Hell, I’m not quite fifty, but I’m to the point in my life where I don’t want to live outside of the American South. Austin is as far west as I want to go, and Charlottesville as far north. Don’t ask me why. I don’t owe you an explanation. I prefer what is familiar. Most people do.
Here’s the thing: I enjoy visiting different places, countries, and cultures because they are themselves. If I were Mexican, I would want Mexico to remain Mexican, not turn American. If I were Egyptian, I’d want to walk like an Egyptian, not an American. As an American, I want these people to be proud of their own countries and to keep their own traditions. That doesn’t mean that we don’t have things to learn from each other, or that our own country wouldn’t be improved by adopting this or that law or habit from another country (and vice versa). But I don’t think people should feel it necessary to apologize for wanting to be around people like themselves, and for valuing customs and peoples who are like themselves such that they wish to limit the immigration of those who, in larger numbers, undermine those values and customs.
But if one is a conservative Christian who believes that secular individualism is corrosive of the values one holds dear, shouldn’t one want to import foreigners who are more likely to share one’s values, as a way to shore up the side? It’s easy to see why the answer might be yes, but that overlooks the fact that we are never just one thing. You sometimes see in Orthodox Christian congregations a few American converts who seem to think that having adopted Orthodox Christianity compels them to start thinking of themselves as 19th-century Russian peasants. It’s comic. I am an Orthodox Christian by choice, but I am also an American, and not a Greek or a Slavic American, either. If my country were invaded by soldiers of an Orthodox Christian power, I would shoot at them and not think twice about it.
On the other hand, if I had to choose between my God and my country, I would hope to have the courage to choose my God.
Identity is a very complicated thing, obviously. In January 1994, I was visiting a friend in Oslo, and went to Sunday mass at the city’s Catholic cathedral. My friend, who is not religious, warned me that the church would probably be nearly empty, as most Norwegian churches are these days. It took me longer to get there than I anticipated (Southern boys don’t walk on frozen sidewalks well), and when I opened the church doors, I could barely squeeze in! It was literally packed — and maybe five percent of the congregation was white. They were black Africans, Filipinos, and Asians — all Catholic immigrants. It was a glorious sight, all those people in that church, praising God.
And yet, I can’t say that I would want Oslo to turn into Lagos, Manila, or Saigon any more than I would want Lagos, Manila, or Saigon to turn into Oslo.
Not long ago, on this blog, a reader challenged me when I said that I would rather my children grow up in a non-Western country that is recognizably Christian than in a post-Christian Western country. The reader called BS on me, and you know what? He was right to. Neither one’s culture nor one’s nationality has anything to do with whether or not you find favor in the sight of God … but it’s not negligible either. When my first child was born, we were living in New York City, a city I really loved. The thought, though, of him growing up not knowing Southern American culture really ate at me, and made me view with greater sympathy immigrant parents whose children were becoming Americanized. By immigrating, I’m sure that many, even most, of them had chosen what they believed was the greater good for their children: raising them in America, as opposed to back home, wherever home was.
I am also pretty confident that for most of those immigrant mothers and fathers, the emotional costs exacted by that choice were significant.
I’ve mentioned before on this blog a friend of mine, a Catholic Englishwoman, who with her American husband chose to settle in the US, though they could have lived in England, in part because she wanted her children to have a better chance at holding on to their faith than they would in her highly secularized home country. She told me once that she doesn’t regret the choice, but that she really misses home. I hope that I would have the same courage that she did, in those circumstances. But what if the choice were to stay in England or migrate to a Christian Third World country — that is, one significantly outside of Western culture? Latin America would be easier, for obvious reasons, but what about Africa? Or Asia?
It has been almost 23 years since I saw those Filipino, African, and Vietnamese Catholics worshiping in the Oslo cathedral. I wonder what has become of their children. Have they made Norway more Christian, or has Norway made them more secular? Do their parents regret that their kids are less like their parents, culturally?
There’s no question that the immigration tide to Europe now stands to make Europe on balance more culturally conservative, but less Christian. If I were European, there is no question that I would oppose it, in part because I would find a Muslim-dominated society more of a threat to the future of Christianity in Europe (if it has one) than a secular liberal society, and in part because to bring in more Muslim immigrants (and, to be frank, more immigrants, period) right now is to ask for trouble. But the US is not Europe. Is one immigration policy morally justifiable for American Christians, but not so for European Christians?
Tell me what you think, Christian readers. Are the similarities between immigrants from traditional cultures (Christian and otherwise) and Christians in the US so much greater than the differences as to obviate principled cultural opposition to generous immigration policies? Why or why not? I can’t settle on an answer that satisfies me.
Alerting the press that he would deal with the birther issue at the opening of his new hotel, the Donald, after treating them to an hour of tributes to himself from Medal of Honor recipients, delivered.
“Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it. … President Barack Obama was born in the United States. Period.”
The press went orbital.
“Trump Gives Up a Lie But Refuses to Repent” howled the headline over the lead story in the New York Times.
Its editorial called Donald Trump a “reckless, cynical bully” spreading political poison in an “absurdist presidential campaign,” adding that Trump is the “ultimate mountebank” using a “Big Lie” that “made him the darling of the wing nuts and racists” and “nativist hallucinators.”
You get the drift.
While Trump’s depiction of the birther controversy was … inexact … there was truth in it. Obama’s campaign did charge the Clinton campaign with drawing press attention to that photo of Obama in traditional Somali garb. Apparently, Sid Blumenthal did push a McClatchy bureau chief to search for Obama’s birth records in Kenya.
Tim Kaine was wailing on Sunday about how “painful” Trump’s birtherism has been to African-Americans. And Democrats and the media are pledging not to let it go, but to exploit Trump’s attempt to “delegitimize” Obama’s presidency.
These are crocodile tears. Obama gave the game away Saturday night. At the Black Caucus’s annual gala, says the Washington Post, a “beaming” Obama “gleefully” had the attendees rolling in “laughter” over Trump’s concession. “With just 124 days to go,” mocked Obama, “we got that thing resolved.”
Many news organizations will go along with the game. For many appear to be all in on Clinton’s depiction of half of Trump’s supporters as a “basket of deplorables” who are “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic … haters.”
Yet one wonders. Do the major media understand that in their determination, bordering on desperation, to kill Trump, they are killing their credibility? And as they are losing credibility they are losing the country.
According to a new Gallup poll, distrust of the press has hit an all-time high. Half the nation’s Democrats still trust the media, but only one in three independents and one in seven Republicans, 14 percent, believe the media are truthful, honest, and fair.
When, early in his presidency, Obama jokingly referred to the White House Correspondents Association dinner as his political base, Americans now believe he was not exaggerating the case.
And the more the media vent their detestation of Trump, the more Trump’s supporters revel in their discomfort. “We love him most of all for the enemies he has made,” said backers of Grover Cleveland in 1884. Trump’s folks feel that way about the national press.
America’s media seem utterly lacking in introspection. Do they understand why so many people hate them so? Do they care? Are they so smugly self-righteous and self-regarding they cannot see?
Take the birther issue again. According to a January HuffPost/YouGov poll, an astonishing 53 percent of all Republicans, 30 percent of all independents, and even 10 percent of Democrats still believe Barack Obama was born outside the USA.
What does this say about the persuasiveness of the press?
Indeed, what does it say about the idea that universal suffrage is the best way to determine the leadership of a republic?
In 2016, America faces serious issues—a rising deficit and escalating debt, the explosion of entitlements, the resurgence of Russian power, Chinese military expansionism in the South and East China seas, North Korea’s development of nuclear missiles, and Afghanistan.
Now consider the issues that have transfixed the media this election season:
The birther issue, David Duke, the KKK, a Mexican-American judge, Black Lives Matter, white cops, the “Muslim ban,” the Battle Flag, the “alt-right,” the national anthem, Trump’s refusals to recant his blasphemies against the dogmas of political correctness, or to “apologize.”
What does the continual elevation of such issues, and the acrimony attendant to them, tell us?
America is bitterly and irreparably divided over race, ideology, faith, history, and culture, and Trump’s half of the nation rejects the modernist gospel that America’s diversity and multiculturalism are her greatest treasures.
To the contrary, Trump’s half wants secure borders, “extreme vetting” of immigrants, especially from the Mideast, and foreign and trade policies marked by an “Americanism” that seems to be an antonym for globalism.
They want America to be “great again,” and they believe she was once, and is not now.
No matter who wins in November, America is going to face a divide unseen in decades. If Donald Trump wins, he will confront a resident media more hateful than that which confronted Richard Nixon in 1968.
If Hillary Clinton wins, she will come to office distrusted and disbelieved by most of her countrymen, half of whom she has maligned either as “deplorables” or pitiful souls in need of empathy.
Not for half a century has the idea of “one nation under God, indivisible,” seemed so distant.
From CAGE – CENTER FOR ARCTIC GAS HYDRATE, CLIMATE AND ENVIRONMENT and the unquestionable certainty about the past department: Extreme global warming caused a severe mass extinction of life on Earth 252 million years ago. It took life up to 9 million years to recover. New study finds clues in the Arctic as to why…
Today’s guest post is written by Elle Russ, host of The Primal Blueprint Podcast and author of Primal Blueprint Publishing’s newest upcoming title, The Paleo Thyroid Solution, which is available on Amazon.com. To learn more about Elle, you can visit her website, ElleRuss.com. Elle is not a medical doctor. Her story and advice below are not intended to diagnose, prevent, treat or cure thyroid issues, but instead to serve as a point of discussion between you and your doctor.
Chances are, you or someone you know has suffered from some kind of thyroid dysfunction.
There is a big discrepancy among experts’ estimates of how many thyroid patients exist in the United States. But the common assessment seems to be about 20 million Americans, while some groups estimate 27 million—with 13 million of them undiagnosed. Roughly 200 million people worldwide have some form of thyroid disease, and 60% of those with thyroid disease are undiagnosed and unaware of their condition.
Hypothyroidism, an underactive thyroid disorder and the main subject of The Paleo Thyroid Solution, is disproportionately a woman’s disease. It’s chronically misdiagnosed; doctors often mistake the symptoms of hypothyroidism as symptoms of other conditions, without factoring thyroid dysfunction as a potential cause of those symptoms. Instead, the patient is given a prescription for the misdiagnosed condition (such as high blood pressure or depression)—and the patient remains hypothyroid and continues to deteriorate. Even when properly diagnosed, hypothyroidism is often treated with the wrong combination and/or wrong dosage levels of thyroid hormones along with the widespread unavailability of proper nutritional coaching. Both the absence of treatment and the widespread practice of mistreatment results in unnecessary suffering while creating a platform of disease within the body that eventually leads to other life-threatening conditions, such as diabetes/metabolic syndrome, high blood pressure, depression, miscarriages, infertility, a variety of gynecological disorders, inflammation-related diseases, cancers, and more.
Twice in ten years, I struggled with hypothyroidism—I was slowly dying. I saw and corresponded with over fifty doctors during these two bouts, and no one knew how to help me either time. The reason all of those doctors failed to diagnose me is that they all ordered the same, incorrect blood tests, which is a widespread problem. I could feel my brain and body deteriorating rapidly, and I had developed a variety of other health problems caused by hypothyroidism and the low metabolic rate that goes hand in hand with it. It was frightening to say the least. If my thyroid condition continued to go unresolved longer than it had, I can only imagine the countless medical atrocities that would have ensued. I had already been misdiagnosed with another disease (PCOS, or Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome); I developed a uterine fibroid and a uterine polyp (which later had to be surgically removed); and I had alarmingly low hormone and nutrient levels of all kinds. What else was in store for me? How many more health disasters would I have experienced before I met an extremely premature demise? How many more years of my life would be wasted on this disease? These are the thoughts that motivated me to write The Paleo Thyroid Solution: so I could help save others from the grim reality of undiagnosed and mistreated hypothyroidism.
Ultimately, I took my health into my own hands—and without the assistance of doctors or medical professionals, I solved both bouts of hypothyroidism on my own (one bout was a Reverse T3 problem which is an ever-increasing problem in people who have not had a history of thyroid issues, as well as a growing problem for people on thyroid hormone replacement).
What’s So Important About the Thyroid Gland?
For one, you can’t live without it. Well, technically you can live without the actual gland, but you must give your body what the missing thyroid gland once gave you: thyroid hormones. The reason you cannot stay alive without a thyroid gland—or, more importantly, adequate levels of thyroid hormones—is that the thyroid is the master gland of the human body. The thyroid gland controls the metabolic rate of every organ in the body, from the production and regulation of sex hormones, adrenal hormones, body temperature, growth development, brain function, and heart rate, to every other element that keeps your body functioning. Inadequate or suboptimal levels of thyroid hormones in the human body will ultimately contribute to a miserable existence, likely rampant with diseases and health problems.
What Can You Do to Optimize Your Thyroid Function?
Adopting a paleo/primal lifestyle positively affects everyone’s fat-burning thyroid hormone metabolism more than any other way of eating and more than any other lifestyle strategy. This applies to people who currently don’t have thyroid issues and to people who take thyroid hormone replacement.
Here are four processes of fat-burning metabolism that apply to everyone (people taking thyroid hormone replacement and for people who have no thyroid issues):
The thyroid gland outputs T4 and T3 (or you take thyroid hormone replacement)
Your body converts the T4 into the active, fat-burning T3 hormone
The T3 arrives at work (the cells)
The T3 “punches in” to work (enters/affects the cells)
Why Is T3 So Important?
There is really only one thyroid hormone that we know for a fact is critical to life, and that hormone is called T3 (triiodothyronine). T3 is extremely powerful and is responsible for fat burning, brain function, body temperature, healthy heart rate, healthy blood pressure, physical energy, and more. T3 is energy. Having adequate levels of T3 contributes to lean muscle mass and calorie burning. T3 is what keeps your body temperature at an average of 98.6°F in healthy humans. And if you don’t have enough of it, that can lead to a whole host of hypothyroid problems.
Hypothyroidism Symptoms
I had all but three or four symptoms on this brutally long list. Many hypothyroid symptoms are not visible to others, and oftentimes doctors and family members/friends think these symptoms are in one’s head, somehow fabricated by hypochondriacal tendencies. These symptoms are not only real, they are rampant in people suffering from undiagnosed or mistreated hypothyroidism.
Cold hands/feet and generally being cold regardless of the weather
Insidious weight gain
Inability to lose weight no matter what you do
Weak arms
Low energy and stamina
Serious depression or general malaise
Needing a nap every day
Constipation
Sluggish reflexes or clumsiness
Dry cracked skin on heels, ankles, and elsewhere
Hair feels like straw or like a rubber band when touched or pulled
Hair loss or loss of curliness in curly or wavy hair
Inability to focus and concentrate
Mixing up words in speech (sort of like dyslexia of the mouth) and difficulty finding/remembering words
Lower/deeper voice or scratchy/raspy voice
Brain fog and forgetfulness
Menstrual irregularities such as heavy bleeding, constant bleeding, uterine fibroids/polyps, polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), miserable and long-lasting PMS.
Fibrocystic breasts (also an indication of estrogen dominance)
Itchy inner ears (It’s like trying to scratch an itch that you cannot reach, even with a cotton swab. This one drove me nuts!)
Heavy legs when walking (feels like you are walking with cement legs)
Unhealthy/concerning cholesterol results
Low body temperature
Uncomfortable feeling in the throat/neck area
Digestive problems (gas, abdominal bloating)
Problems at work or the inability to function well at work
Relationship issues with family/friends, romantic partners, etc.
Increased or uncontrollable cravings for sugar and carbohydrates
Allergies (rare allergies are often related to untreated or mistreated Hashimoto’s)
Messy handwriting (Issues with brain-hand-muscle dexterity)
Heart palpitations (Often related to adrenals and/or low iron.)
Restless legs (Often related to low iron.)
Compromised immunity (Getting colds and/or flus more often)
Extended recovery needed after exercise and sore after exercise
Sensitivity to light, sounds, and smells (Often related to adrenals.)
Low or zero sex drive
Moody, sensitive, easily agitated, and feeling overwhelmed by simple everyday tasks
Swelling and inflammation
Puffy eyes and face upon waking – overall puffiness and bloat
Myxedema (Swelling of the skin and underlying tissues is typical of patients with underactive thyroid glands. Discoverable by visual assessment and not being able to pinch a miniscule bit of skin on the outside of your arms, near your shoulders. Instead one is only able to pinch a thick, large portion of skin.)
A growing “tire” of fat around your waist (thyroid and adrenal related)
Headaches
Constant thirst and water won’t quench it
Feeling as if something wrong is happening to your brain, as if you are getting “dumb” and losing your cognitive abilities
Anxiety attacks
How to Get Help and More Information
The Paleo Thyroid Solution dispels outdated, conventional thyroid wisdom still practiced by uninformed doctors, and provides the in-depth guidance necessary to solve hypothyroidism, achieve vibrant health, and optimize thyroid fat-burning hormone metabolism. It contains the only lifestyle and weight loss plan specifically targeted for maximizing thyroid hormone metabolism in harmony with paleo/primal/ancestral health principles.
In The Paleo Thyroid Solution, you will learn:
Paleo protocols for naturally preventing and reversing low thyroid function
The correct blood tests to diagnose hypothyroidism and how to interpret results
How to optimally treat hypothyroidism with thyroid hormone replacement
How to have a doctor diagnose and treat Reverse T3 issues (including T3-only treatment)
How to find a good doctor or help educate your current doctor
How to lose the insidious fat and weight gained from hypothyroidism
An MD’s perspective on why and how doctors are uninformed and still practicing outdated thyroid protocols (in-depth commentary from integrative physician Dr. Gary E. Foresman, MD)
You can order a copy of The Paleo Thyroid Solutionhere.
If you or someone you know is suffering from thyroid issues, just know that there is hope, and don’t believe any doctor who tells you that your symptoms are permanent or something you’ll just “have to deal with” throughout your life. It is my mission to help thyroid sufferers get on the right path to wellness and transform from being fat, foggy, and fatigued to FIT, FOCUSED, and FULL OF LIFE!
Elle Russ
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Today’s guest post is written by Elle Russ, host of The Primal Blueprint Podcast and author of Primal Blueprint Publishing’s newest upcoming title, The Paleo Thyroid Solution, which is available on Amazon.com. To learn more about Elle, you can visit her website, ElleRuss.com. Elle is not a medical doctor. Her story and advice below are not intended to diagnose, prevent, treat or cure thyroid issues, but instead to serve as a point of discussion between you and your doctor.