- Live Fearlessly, Compassionately and Honestly
 
ICELAND RANKS NO. 1 
BEST PLACE IN THE WORLD FOR WOMEN TO LIVE 
(Iceland is in 1st place for 3rd consecutive year)
“A world where women make up less than 20% of the global decision-makers,” says Klaus Schwab, founder and chairman of the World Economic Forum, “is a world that is missing a huge opportunity for growth and ignoring an untapped reservoir of potential.”
Forbes online website reports, "To determine the best and worst countries for women’s equality, the group considered 14 variables in four categories: women’s access to basic and higher education; women’s health and survival by measures of life expectancy and sex ratio; equality of economic opportunity and participation; and political empowerment."
ICELAND
Picture
Iceland by Counties
At the top of the list, Iceland is ranked No. 1 for the third consecutive year. It is the top-ranked nation in women’s educational attainment and political representation. As one of the first countries to give women the right to vote in 1915, Iceland currently has 43% female parliament members and has had a female head of state for 18 of the past 50 years. Current Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir was appointed in 2009. With 81% of women in the workforce, Iceland also features one of the narrowest labor force participation gaps.
Picture
Great hiking areas throughout Iceland
Nordic nations consistently rank at the top of the list. Norway (No. 2), Finland (No. 3), Sweden (No. 4) and Denmark (No. 7) have been featured in the top-10 every year since the report’s launch in 2006. All Nordic countries reached near 100% literacy for both sexes, feature near parity in all levels of education and return that investment in the workforce. The nations each have generous paid maternity and paternity leave policies. In Sweden, women are offered 480 days of maternity time. Source: Forbes
 The Philippines (No. 8), Lesotho (No. 9) and South Africa (No. 14) beat out the United States
At No. 17, the U.S. continues to improve in the rankings–up from No. 31 in 2009–but hasn’t yet climbed to a top-10 slot. Because GDP is not a factor in the index, countries are ranked based only on the equality of resource distribution rather than the amount of resources. Perhaps surprising to some, the Philippines (No. 8), Lesotho (No. 9) and South Africa (No. 14) beat out the wealthy nation.

The U.S. features low scores in women’s political representation, with just 17% of women in political clout positions and no female heads of state on record, and a continuing wage gap for similar work. The U.S. is ranked No. 68 in pay equality—despite laws in place to enforce equal pay for equal work. Zahidi says the wage disparity creates a significant downward pull on the nation’s standing.

At the bottom of the list, the worst countries for gender quality are Saudi Arabia (No. 131), Mali (No. 132), Pakistan (No. 133), Chad (No. 134) and Yemen (No. 135). These low-scorers have been featured at or near the bottom since the list began. “They are not investing in their women,” says Zahidi, “and there are major barriers to be able to enter leadership and politics.”

Source: Forbes
Since Iceland makes the Number 1 spot in the world for women to live, I thought I would do some research on Iceland and let readers know a little bit about this country. I knew very little until I undertook this delightful assignment. I've included some photos of the scenery, some geography, a bit on culture and things to do in Iceland. I encourage others to explore for themselves but this will give a brief overview with links to more in depth information.
"Iceland has a population of about 320,000 and a total area of 103,000 km2 (39,769 sq mi).[10] The capital and the largest city is Reykjavík,[11] with the surrounding areas in the southwestern region of the country being home to two-thirds of the country's population. Iceland is volcanically and geologically active. The interior mainly consists of a plateau characterised by sand fields, mountains and glaciers, while manyglacial rivers flow to the sea through the lowlands. Iceland is warmed by the Gulf Stream and has a temperate climate despite a high latitude just outside the Arctic Circle." wikipedia
Picture
CLICK IMAGE GO TO WEBSITE WITH MORE ON ICELAND
Picture
click to go to the website about the Icelandic horse
The Icelandic Horse straight from  http://www.iceland.is/the-big-picture/nature-environment/vegitation-wildlife/icelandic-horse/

"The Icelandic horse is a small breed of horse that has evolved in isolation in Iceland. Archaeological finds in Norway, where the Icelandic horse is descended from, have revealed that the Icelandic horse belongs to an ancient race that died out in other parts in Europe but survived in Iceland for 1100 years without crossbreeding. It has gradually developed into several strains. The most important of these are the Svaðastaðir strain and the Hornafjörður strain. Horses from Svaðastaðir are considered to have a more attractive gait and to be more dainty and frisky; while those from Hornafjörður are larger, and have greater endurance and courage.

The Icelandic horse is small, weighing between 330 and 380 kilograms (730 and 840 lb) and standing an average of 132 to 142 cm (52 to 56 inches) high. It has a spirited temperament and a large personality. It comes in a wide variety of colors, and the Icelandic language includes more than 100 names for various colors and color patterns of the Icelandic horse. 

The Icelandic, as it is commonly called, is known for its sure-footedness and ability to cross rough terrain. It displays two gaits in addition to the typical walk, trot, and canter/gallop commonly displayed by other breeds. The first additional gait is a four-beat lateral ambling gait known as the tölt. This is known for its explosive acceleration and speed; it is also comfortable and ground-covering. The breed also performs a pace called a skeið, "flying pace". It is used in pacing races, and is fast and smooth, with some horses able to reach up to 50 km/h (30 mph). It is not a gait for long-distance travel. 

The Icelandic horse is long-lived and hardy and has become very popular internationally. A sizable population exists in Europe and North America. In their native country they have few diseases; and as a result Icelandic law prevents horses from being imported into the country and exported animals are not allowed to return." Source:
 http://www.iceland.is/the-big-picture/nature-environment/vegitation-wildlife/icelandic-horse/

Picture
CLICK FOR HISTORY OF THE ICELAND HORSE
"Horses probably came to Scandinavia form Asia, and the horses there are the descendants of the mongolian horse. The icelandic horse is the descendant of the horses that were in Norway in the time of the vikings.

Iceland was settled between 874 AD and 935 AD. The settlers came in open boats and brought their lifestock with them. Before that, Iceland’s biggest mammal was the arctic fox. The settlers vere very often indipendent people that didn’t want to be ruled by the norwegian king, thus moving to this island without any kings. The settlers couldn’t take many animals with them .." READ FULL ARTICLE

Picture
Interesting history about sorcery and witches
Below is a photo inside the Husavik phallus museum of Sigurður Hjartasson, Iceland
Picture
Penis Museum in Iceland by Husavik_Phallusmuseum.jpg‎ POSTED ON WIKIPEDIA
LONDON -- In life, Pall Arason was an attention-seeker. In death, the 95-year-old Icelander's pickled penis will be the main attraction at one of the world's most bizarre museums.

Sigurdur Hjartarson, who runs the Phallological Museum in the tiny Icelandic fishing town of Husavik, says Arason's organ will help complete his extensive collection of whale, seal, bear, and other mammalian members.

The museum has been open since 1997 but Hjartarson has long waited for a human specimen to round out his display.

Hjartarson says that Arason, a friend, agreed to help by having his penis donated after his death.

The medical director of Akureyri Hospital said Tuesday that the operation was carried out in January under the supervision of a doctor at a local morgue. Source: Wikipedia

Here's an excerpt of the interview with Saudi Princess Ameerah Al-Taweel in Forbes: 
In September of 2011, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah ruled that the nation’s women would be allowed, for the first time, to vote and run in local elections beginning in 2015. However, Saudi women are still denied the basic rights to drive and to leave the country without permission.

In a rare interview with the U.S. media, Saudi Princess Ameerah Al-Taweel sat down with me on Thursday to discuss the status of women in her country. As the wife of Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Alsaud, King Abdullah’s nephew and the world’s 26th richest person—the largest individual shareholder of Citigroup—the 28-year-old royal doesn’t just sit on the sidelines. She is the vice chair of the Alwaleed Bin Talal Foundation and an outspoken advocate for Saudi women’s rights.
READ MORE

 
 
Straight from http://www.nongmoproject.org website: "For consumers, it can be difficult to stay up-to-date on food ingredients that are at-risk of being genetically modified, as the list of at-risk agricultural ingredients is frequently changing. As part of the Non-GMO Project’s commitment to informed consumer choice, we work diligently to maintain an accurate list of risk ingredients." LEARN MORE
Picture
click to go this website and learn more about GMO
Picture
CLICK TO READ MORE
 
 
Impressive!
 
 
You can do something good by not doing something. 
That's the beauty of boycotts. Don't buy diamonds. Now that's 
real love. Love of humankind in the kindest and wisest of ways.
Picture
CLICK TO SIGN THE PETITION AND TO LEARN MORE
 
 
 Press Release7 December 2011 
Tribunal verdict vs. 6 agrochemical TNCs hailed, 
urgent action on recommendations urged 

Pesticide Action Network (PAN) International hailed the verdict of the Permanent People’s Tribunal (PPT) against the world’s six largest agrochemical companies Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer, Dow Chemical, DuPont and BASF after a historic four-day session that culminated in Bangalore, India yesterday.

Victims and survivors of the pesticide industry from all over the world, represented by PAN International, testified before a distinguished international jury to indict the “Big 6” for human rights violations. Based on evidence presented before it, the Tribunal found the Defendant agrochemical TNCs “responsible for gross, widespread and systematic violations of the right to health and life, economic, social and cultural rights, as well as of civil and political rights, and women and children’s rights.” (see the verdict here)

The Tribunal also found agrochemical TNCs responsible for violation of indigenous peoples’ human rights, and further found that “their systematic acts of corporate governance have caused avoidable catastrophic risks, increasing the prospects of extinction of biodiversity, including species whose continued existence is necessary for reproduction of human life.”

Sarojeni Rengam, PAN Asia Pacific Executive Director, said that the Tribunal’s verdict is a victory for peoples who have been most affected by the Big 6’s control over food and agriculture. “We are elated with the verdict. It affirms what people all over the world already know and are experiencing: that the pesticide industry is to blame and should be held accountable for the systematic poisoning of human health and the environment, loss of food sovereignty and self-determination, and increased world hunger and poverty,” she said.

The PPT, founded in 1979 in Italy, is an international opinion tribunal that looks into complaints of human rights violations. Borne out of the tribunals on the Vietnam War and Latin American dictatorships, the PPT has held 37 sessions so far using the rigorous conventional court format. While its verdicts are not legally binding, these can set precedent for future legal actions against Defendants, and can pressure governments and institutions.

Jurors for the PPT Session on Agrochemical TNCs are Indian legal scholar Upendra Baxi, British scientist Dr. Ricarda Steinbrecher, African environmental lawyer Ibrahima Ly, German economist Elmar Altvater, Italian professor Paolo Ramazotti, and PPT Secretary General Dr. Gianni Tognoni.(see profile of jury here)

The Tribunal said that the home States of the Big 6 (US, Switzerland, and Germany), have “failed to comply with their internationally accepted responsibility to promote and protect human rights,” by not adequately regulating, monitoring and disciplining these corporations. The Tribunal further said that these States have “unjustifiably promoted a double standard approach prohibiting the production of hazardous chemicals at home while allowing their own TNCs unrestrained license for these enterprises in other States, especially of the Global South.” 

The Tribunal also found host States responsible for failure to protect the human rights of its citizens by offering “magic carpet type hospitality” to agrochemical TNCs and therefore not adequately protecting social movement activists or independent scientists from harassment, not limiting the “global corporate ownership of knowledge production in universities and related research sites,” “not recognizing the value of indigenous knowledge and social relationships they create and sustain,” and “not fully pursuing alternative and less hazardous forms of agricultural production without having learnt the full lessons from the First Green Revolution.”

The Tribunal also found that the policies of World Trade Organization in relation to Intellectual Property Rights are “not balanced with any sincere regard for the grave long-term hazards to humans and nature already posed by the activities of agribusiness and agrochemical industries.” International financial institutions, named in the indictment as the International Monetary Fund-World Bank, do not follow “a strict regime of human rights conditionalities” and “have yet to develop policies concerning their support for hazardous manufacture, application or process,” said the Tribunal.

The Tribunal recommended that national governments should “prosecute the Defendant agrochemical companies in terms of criminal liability rather than civil liability.” It also urged governments to take action to “restructure international law” to ensure the accountability of transnational corporations, to “accept a less heavy burden of proof on the victims and to fully commit to and legislate for the precautionary principle,” and “to prevent TNCs from directly or indirectly harassing and intimidating scientists, farmers and human rights and environmental defenders.”

It also urged international organizations and intergovernmental institutions to uphold human rights and the welfare of populations, and protect of biodiversity and ecosystems by subordinating the interests of corporations pursuing patents. 

“The Tribunal’s recommendations must immediately be acted upon, for they echo what civil society and people’s organizations have been demanding for a very long time. The prosecution of the Big 6 must be started to bring justice to fruition for the thousands of victims and survivors of the pesticide industry. The precautionary principle must be put into place and the patent regime abolished, as recommended by the Tribunal. That is the only way to stop these human rights violations, which continue every day without impunity,” said Rengam.

Rengam further added that the Tribunal just marks the beginning of an escalated international people’s movement against agrochemical TNCs, which is now armed with a powerful verdict that can be used in every part of the world. “The next step towards justice and liberation from the Big 6’s control will be determined by the people’s unity, strength, and determination to stand up against corporate greed and aggression, just as was shown in this victorious PPT Session,” she concluded.
 
 
 
 
"Some people think that the Federal Reserve Banks are United States Government 
institutions. They are private monopolies which prey upon the people of these 
United States for the benefit of themselves and their foreign customers; foreign 
and domestic speculators and swindlers; and rich and predatory money lenders."

– The Honorable Louis McFadden, 

Chairman of the House Banking and Currency Committee in the 1930s


"The powers of financial capitalism had a far-reaching plan, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole...Their secret is that they have annexed from governments, monarchies, and republics the power to create the world's money..." THE MONEY MASTERS is a 3 1/2 hour non-fiction, historical documentary that traces the origins of the political power structure that rules our nation and the world today. The modern political power structure has its roots in the hidden manipulation and accumulation of gold and other forms of money. The development of fractional reserve banking practices in the 17th century brought to a cunning sophistication the secret techniques initially used by goldsmiths fraudulently to accumulate wealth. With the formation of the privately-owned Bank of England in 1694, the yoke of economic slaver...all »
Picture
image originally from wikipedia w/o quote
Members of the Federal Reserve Board as of December 2011:
Ben S. Bernanke
Chairman
Janet L. Yellen
Vice Chair
Elizabeth A. Duke

Daniel K. Tarullo
Sarah Bloom Raskin
Picture
image originally from wikipedi w/o quote
 
 
A CRITICALLY IMPORTANT DOCUMENTARY ON 
THE USE OF PRESCRIPTION DRUGS PRESCRIBED FOR CHILDREN
"In the absence of any objective medical tests to determine who has ADD or ADHD, doctors rely in part on standardized assessments and the impressions of teachers and guardians while the they administer leave little room for other causes or aggravating factors, such as diet, or environment. Hence, diagnosing a child or adolescent with ADD or ADHD is often the outcome, although no organic basis for either disease has yet to be clinically proven. Psychiatrists may then prescribe psychotropic drugs for the children without first without making it clear to parents that these medications can have severe side-effects including insomnia, loss of appetite, headaches, psychotic symptoms and even potentially fatal adverse reactions, such as cardiac arrhythmia. And yet, despite these dangers, many school systems actually work with government agencies to force parents to drug their children, threatening those who refuse with the prospect of having their children taken from the home unless they cooperate."
 
 
Picture
CLICK THE IMAGE TO CONTINUE READING THIS ILLUMINATING ARTICLE
Picture
CLICK ABOVE OR BELOW TO READ BOTH ARTICLES
Picture
THIS IS THE REPORT ON MEDITATION BENEFITS ON CNN - CLICK TO READ THE ARTICLE