Smoking increases the risk of suicide

Smoking increases the risk of SUICIDE: Nicotine in cigarettes may 'trigger or exacerbate mental health problems'

• Previous research has shown a link between suicide and smoking
• Was thought because people suffering psychiatric disorders tend to smoke
• But new study suggests chemicals in cigarettes are to blame
• Found U.S. states with stricter anti-smoking policies had lower suicide rates
• In states with more lax laws, suicide rates increased

Smokers are more likely to commit suicide than those who never take up the habit - and the chemicals in cigarettes may be to blame.

Previous research has indicated that smokers are more likely to take their own lives - but it was thought this was because people with psychiatric disorders also tend to smoke.  

Now new research suggests the nicotine in tobacco could trigger psychiatric disorders - or make them more severe. 

The study compared U.S. states that have increased tobacco taxes and banned smoking in public to those that have not.

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Suicide rates in the U.S. declined in states that enforced higher taxes on cigarettes and stricter policies to limit smoking in public places - and increased in those that were more lenient. Map shows the range of state cigarette taxes from the lowest (lightest blue) to the highest (darkest blue)

Suicide rates were lower in states that were 'anti-tobacco', the researchers from Washington University, St. Louis, discovered. 

Those that had increased tobacco taxes and banned smoking in public places between 1990 and 2004 had saw suicide rates decline by up to 15 per cent compared to the national average. 

Since, then states such as New York, Illinois and California have enforced smoking bans in public places.

The conclusions were drawn after analsying the different smoking policies adopted by different states, such as approaches to taxing cigarettes and limiting when and where people could smoke.

  

More...

• The dangers of THIRD hand smoke: Dangerous chemicals can lurk in house dust, curtains and armchairs - even in homes where no-one smokes
• Drivers face £10,000 fine if a PASSENGER starts smoking in a car carrying children

Using statistical methods, the researchers compared rates of suicide in states with stricter tobacco policies to rates in states with more lenient laws and lower taxes. 

They say their findings show more policies to limit smoking should be introduced for mental health reasons as well as physical. 

Richard Grucza, assistant professor of psychiatry at the university, said: 'Although scientists have known for years that people who smoke have a higher risk for suicide, they had assumed the risk was related to the psychiatric disorders that affect many smokers. 

'These new findings, however, suggest smoking may increase the risk for psychiatric disorders, or make them more severe, which, in turn, can influence suicide risk.

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One theory is that the nicotine in tobacco could trigger psychiatric disorders - or make them more severe

'We really need to look more closely at the effects of smoking and nicotine, not only on physical health but on mental health, too.

'We don't know exactly how smoking influences suicide risk. It could be that it affects depression or increases addiction to other substances. The numbers show it clearly does something.'

Nicotine is likely to be the key culprit, he added.

'Like any other addicting drug, people start using nicotine to feel good, but eventually they need it to feel normal. And as with other drugs, that chronic use can contribute to depression or anxiety, and that could help to explain the link to suicide.

'If you're not a smoker, or not likely ever to become a smoker, then your suicide risk shouldn't be influenced by tobacco policies.

'So the fact that we saw this influence among people who likely were smokers supports the idea that smoking itself is linked to suicide - rather than some other factor related to policy.

The research was published in the journal Nicotine & Tobacco Research.

dailymail.co.uk 17 July 2014

Cigarettes are a drug, kill, yet totally lawful, as they are produced by corporations, whereas the more natural alternative called 'chop chop' that does not contain all the added chemicals is illegal.

Within 20 years, NASA expects to confirm ‘we are not alone’ and find the first traces of alien life

100 MILLION worlds may hold alien life in our galaxy. Now NASA has detailed exactly how it expects to find the first inhabited planet other than our own within our lifetimes. 
 
“Just imagine the moment, when we find potential signatures of life. Imagine the moment when the world wakes up and the human race realises that its long loneliness in time and space may be over — the possibility we’re no longer alone in the universe,” Matt Mountain, director and Webb telescope scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore said this morning.

That moment, he believes, is likely to be within the next 20 years.

A meeting was held at NASA’s Washington headquarters this morning to detail international efforts aimed at finding life out there.

The presentation detailed NASA’s road map for the search for life in the universe, involving a series of current and future telescopes.

“Sometime in the near future, people will be able to point to a star and say, ‘that star has a planet like Earth’,” Sara Seager, professor of planetary science and physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, told the gathering of NASA and affiliated planet hunters.

Planet hunters ... John Grunsfeld, John Mather, Sara Seager, Dave Gallagher and Matt Mountain discuss "the scientific and technological road map that will lead to the discovery of potentially habitable worlds among the stars".

 

The meeting comes after a group of international astronomers and astrobiologists published new research assessing the possibility of complex life on other worlds.

Their estimate — described as conservative — calculates 100 million worlds in our own galaxy are able to sustain complex alien life. That’s from among the 17 billion Earth-sized worlds believed to be spinning around the Milky Way’s 100 billion stars.

“I think in the next 20 years we will find out if we are not alone in the universe,” NASA Astronomer Kevin Hand said yesterday.

The planet hunt has been picking up pace in recent years. What started as ground-based radio observatories and telescopes has already moved to space-based facilities such as the Hubble, Kepler and Spitzer telescopes.

What they can tell is limited, but revealing: They can determine if a planet is the right distance from a start to hold liquid water.

This is the “Goldilocks Zone”, where conditions are “not to cold, not too hot — just right” for life as we know it.

 

Not too hot, not too cold — just right ... This NASA artist's conception illustrates Kepler-22b, a planet known to comfortably circle in the habitable zone of a sun-like star.

 

So far, the few “best contenders” for life are believed to have conditions little better than that found on Jupiter’s moon, Europa

But NASA has now detailed a new generation of telescopes being built on the ground and being sent into orbit in the search for “Earth 2.0”.

Much of its hopes for finding evidence of life is being placed in the Transiting Exoplanet Surveying Satellite (TESS), due to be launched in 2017, the James Webb Space Telescope in 2018 and two further as-yet-unfunded projects scheduled for the next decade.

These telescopes will not only find and position a planet, they are hoped to provide clues as to their atmospheric make-up and greatly refine what we have already inferred.

In particular, they’ll be looking for water. But they’ll also be looking for other signs.

“Chemicals in our atmosphere like methane and oxygen would quickly combine meaning
something has to be replenishing them, so if we find these in another world’s atmosphere
we have a clue that something is creating it,” Australian astronomer Dr Alan Duffy, Research Fellow at the Swinburne University of Technology, said this morning. “This might not be life but it’s a first clue.”

 

Eye on space ... An artist's concept depicts NASA's Kepler mission's smallest habitable zone planet. Seen in the foreground is Kepler-62f, a super-Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of a star smaller and cooler than the sun, located about 1200 light-years from Earth in the constellation Lyra.
 

The success of the planet-hunting program has produced phenomenal results in recent years.

Since its launch in 2009, the Kepler telescope shook up the astronomy community with its discovery of more than 5000 potential exoplanets, of which more than 1700 have been confirmed.

“This technology we are using to explore exoplanets is real,” said John Grunsfeld, astronaut and associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. “The James Webb Space Telescope and the next advances are happening now. These are not dreams — this is what we do at NASA.”

This decade has seen the discovery of more and more super Earths, which are rocky planets that are larger and heftier than Earth. Finding smaller planets, the Earth twins, is a tougher challenge
Kepler was the first to pinpoint planets known to be within the “Goldilocks Zone”, and indicates most worlds at that range are generally less than three-times the size of Earth.

“What we didn’t know five years ago is that perhaps 10 to 20 per cent of stars around us have Earth-size planets in the habitable zone,” says Matt Mountain, director and Webb telescope scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. “It’s within our grasp to pull off a discovery that will change the world forever.”

Originally published as The best contenders for Earth 2.0

heraldsun.com.au 15 July 2014

Preparing the masses that there are Extra Terrestrials in existence?

Sheriffs office response template letter

Exposing the corrupt Sheriff's Office

In Victoria, Australia, when people are faced with a letter from the 'sheriff' that alleges there are outstanding warrants as a result of unpaid 'fines' the letter follows a template of which there are a couple of variations. One variation is illustrated below:

Once a response letter is written to the Sheriff's Office asking for clarification or any proof of an alleged warrant, the response is not from the Sheriff's Office as per original letter, but from another unknown entity called Civic Compliance Victoria (CCV).

From a contractual point of view, a simple analogy regarding communications is that if one communicates with company A (e.g. a Fish and Chips premises) then company A lawfully has to respond, but rather one obtains a letter from company B (e.g. Butcher Shop) which is totally irrelevant to the communication between the person and the original company A.

ANY communication with the sheriff's office is met with a template response from CCV (Civic Compliance Victoria), alleging that one has responded with a template response, even if it originated as an original response. See illustration below:

Let there be no mistake about it that the persons running around the state of Victoria, that call themselves as 'sheriffs' are in fact committing a crime.

Although their actions are unlawful, they are supported by the treasonous police 'force' of Victoria, and as a result the people of Victoria have real consequences of theft of monies, cars clamped, etc.  

The judiciary is well aware of this grand scale fraud and supports those unlawful actions.

NOTE:

• The Infringements Act 2006, where most fines are drawn from is in breach of Sect 71 - 80 of the Constitution, therefore invalid.

• Sheriff's Office (Victoria) has the ABN of 32 790 228 959

• CCV (Civic Compliance Victoria) is a registered trademark, has no ABN, and is not registered as a business, as it is neither a business nor company nor trading name therefore not legible to conduct business under Australian consumer laws.

• No so called sheriff can actually provide a 'lawful' warrant.

Royal Family granted new right of secrecy

Letters, emails and documents relating to the monarch, her heir and the second in line to the throne will no longer be disclosed even if they are in the public interest.

Sweeping changes to the Freedom of Information Act will reverse advances which had briefly shone a light on the royal finances – including an attempt by the Queen to use a state poverty fund to heat Buckingham Palace – and which had threatened to force the disclosure of the Prince of Wales's prolific correspondence with ministers.

Lobbying and correspondence from junior staff working for the Royal Household and Prince Charles will now be held back from disclosure. Buckingham Palace confirmed that it had consulted with the Coalition Government over the change in the law. The Government buried the plan for "added protection" for the Royal Family in the small print of plans called "opening up public bodies to public scrutiny".

Maurice Frankel, head of the Campaign for Freedom of Information, said that since the change referred to communications written on behalf of the Queen and Prince Charles it might be possible for "park keepers working in the royal parks" to be spared public scrutiny of their letters written to local authorities.

The decision to push through the changes also raises questions about the sincerity of the Liberal Democrats' commitment to government transparency. In opposition, senior Liberal Democrats frequently lined up to champion the Freedom of Information Act after it came into force in 2005.

Ian Davidson, a former member of Parliament's Public Accounts Committee (PAC), told The Independent: "I'm astonished that the Government should find time to seek to cover up royal finances. When I was on the PAC what we wanted was more disclosure not less.

"Every time we examined royal finances we found extravagance and indulgence as well as abuse of expenses by junior royals.

"Everywhere we looked, there were savings to be made for the Government. This sends the wrong message about public disclosure and accountability."

Paul Flynn, another member of the committee, described the special protection for the Royals as "indefensible". He said: "I don't think it serves the interests of the public or the Royal Family very well."
Mr Frankel said he believed that Prince Charles was the driving force behind the new law.

"The heir to the throne has written letters to government departments in an attempt to influence policy," he said.

"He clearly does not want these to get into the public domain."

Later this month, lawyers for the Cabinet Office, backed by Prince Charles, will go to court to continue to resist Freedom of Information requests of ministers to publish letters written to them by the Prince of Wales.
A spokesman for Buckingham Palace said that the change to the law was necessary because the Freedom of Information Act had failed to protect the constitutional position of the monarch and the heir to the throne. He explained that the sovereign has the right and duty to be consulted, to encourage and warn the government, and by extension, the heir to the throne had the constitutional right and duty to prepare himself for the role of King.

"This constitutional position relies on confidentiality, so that all such correspondence remains confidential," he said.

But he said that change would also mean that correspondence not covered by the absolute exemption would be made public 10 years earlier than under the current disclosure rules.

The Palace's position was backed by Professor Vernon Bogdanor, research professor at King's College London.

He told The Independent: "The essence of constitutional monarchy is that the Queen and other members of the Royal Family remain politically neutral. The Queen meets the Prime Minister once a week, when both are in London, to discuss government policy.

"The heir to the throne has the right, and perhaps the duty, to question ministers on policy so as to prepare himself for the throne. Such discussions are only possible if they remain confidential. Otherwise the neutrality of the Queen and of the Prince of Wales could be undermined.

"When the Queen meets the Prime Minister, no one else is present – not even the Queen's Private Secretary. For this reason, it is right that the Royal Family should be exempt from FOI."

The Government claimed that the thrust of the changes announced yesterday would make it "easier for people to use FOI to find and use information about the public bodies they rely on and their taxes pay for".
The Ministry of Justice intends to increase the number of organisations to which FOI requests can be made, bringing in bodies such as the Association of Chief Police Officers, the Financial Services Ombudsman, and the higher education admissions body UCAS, and also all companies wholly owned by any number of public authorities.

In the public interest? The stories they didn't want us to know
 
*In 2004 the Queen asked ministers for a poverty handout to help heat her palaces but was rebuffed because they feared it would be a public relations disaster. Royal aides were told that the £60m worth of energy-saving grants were aimed at families on low incomes and if the money was given to Buckingham Palace instead of housing associations or hospitals it could lead to "adverse publicity" for the Queen and the government.
 
*A "financial memorandum" formalising the relationship between the sovereign and ministers set out tough terms on how the Queen can spend the £38.2m handed over by Parliament each year to pay for her staff and occupied palaces.
 
*The Queen requested more public money to pay for the upkeep of her crumbling palaces while allowing minor royals and courtiers to live in rent-free accommodation.
 
*As early as 2004 Sir Alan Reid, the Keeper of the Privy Purse, had unsuccessfully put the case to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport for a substantial increase in the £15m-a-year grant to maintain royal buildings.
 
*The Palace planned to go ahead with refurbishing and renting the apartment of Diana, Princess of Wales at Kensington Palace after it had lain empty since her death in 1997.
 
*A letter exchange revealed a tussle over who has control of £2.5m gained from the sale of Kensington Palace land. Ministers said it belonged to the state, while Buckingham Palace said it belonged to the Queen.

independent.co.uk 14 July 2014

This is an example of how the criminal governments are protecting the criminal elite, in this case being the English Royal Family.

What crimes against humanity / mankind are they really concealing?
 

Private eyes are watching Victoria’s police force as claims of bullying are probed

Victorian Police Department Commissioner Graham Ashton speaks to the media.

 

PRIVATE investigators are being used to pursue “bullying” and other claims in the corridors of power of Victoria’s police force. 

Julie Baker-Smith and Associates is routinely hired by Victoria Police to conduct confidential investigations, with six invoices for work commissioned by Deputy Commissioner Specialist Operations Graham Ashton and the Deputy Commissioner Strategy Lucinda Nolan since July, 2012. A seventh job commissioned by the force’s Western Region was subsequently cancelled.

In one case, JBSA spent six months investigating a number of claims of “inappropriate behaviour” by an executive officer working in the office of Assistant Commissioner Road Policing Robert Hill.

The $18,000 probe concluded in May last year but the force refuses to release the findings, saying none of the allegations was substantiated “and accordingly there have been no criminal or disciplinary charges as a result”.

JBSA promotes itself as a “niche investigations consultancy practising exclusively in sensitive HR issues management”.

It says its all-female investigators are of the “highest standing” but are not lawyers or HR professionals and “do not come from a police culture”.

“Your sensitive employment issues are dealt with urgently, discreetly, comprehensively and analytically, and are concluded with a confidential report tailored to your specific requirements,” the firm’s website says.

According to documents obtained under Freedom of Information laws, JBSA was called in to conduct “fresh investigations of the allegations of inappropriate behaviour” in Mr Hill’s office.

The force refuses to say what the alleged behaviour involved, although the documents make it clear there were several instances of “alleged bullying conduct”.

Just three heavily censored pages from the 286-page report were released to the Herald Sun under FoI. Access to a separate 33-page executive summary was denied in full.

At the conclusion of its investigation JBSA reported to Mr Hill that its instructions had been to conduct a “fresh” investigation and determine whether each allegation “occurred, did not occur, or cannot be substantiated”.

JBSA said it was also told its investigation should include any allegations against the alleged perpetrator involving other police members but did not extend to other actions such as preferential treatment, not the conduct of other police members.

It also reported its probe had been delayed for a number of reasons, including the time it took to contact other complainants and obtain their original statements.

Insp Ian Geddes said there was no statutory obligation to undertake such reviews but it was considered “best practice” in circumstances where the nature of the complaint and the individuals involved warranted.
“It is a subjective assessment as to whether this process is undertaken,” he said.

Insp Geddes said JBSA had been “engaged randomly” from the State Services Authority Panel list of approved independent review officers.

JBSA says it has undertaken some 500 investigations of public sector misconduct, complaints and Whistleblower matters for the Public Sector Standards Commissioner.

Company spokesman Peter Richards said: “We are not at liberty to discuss any relationship JBSA has with any client, and in saying so I do not acknowledge, nor should it be inferred by this response, that the Victoria Police is or has ever been a client of JBSA.”

heraldsun.com.au 14 July 2014

Victoria Police are in fact criminal thugs, where there is much more crime committed by Victoria Police than is being reported by the corporate media.

Victoria Police are involved in corporate crimes ranging from white collar banking fraud, extortion to just plain theft.

This all seems to be supported by the legal system and Australia's Admiralty / Maritime court system.

Commonwealth Ombudsman highlights serious failings in Australia’s child support system

The corporate media labelled this article as:

Deadbeat dads dodge child support

Nothing can be further from the truth regarding the inaccuracy of the reporting in relation to 'child support'.

The majority of Australian's should be aware of the term 'child custody' in relation to your children.

This term is in relation to the parents being 'custodians' of their children, where the state actually owns them.

Another fact (deliberately?) omitted by the corporate media is that taxation the way that it is payed currently to the company called the ATO (Australian Tax Office) is

• unlawful

• totally voluntary

Inaccurate or misleading reporting is deliberate in order to perpetuate the fraud and cover up the fraud of the criminal elite.

The 'child support' agency CANNOT lawfully make anyone (father or mother) pay support or maintenance against that persons wishes.

Recordings of telephone conversations with staff confirm that the staff know about this. 

Another organised crime racket by the business known as the government.


The full article is as follows:

Stuck in the middle ... The number of complaints to the Child Support agency peaked at almost 3000 in 1996. Picture: Thinkstock Source: Supplied

 

SEPARATED parents are avoiding lodging tax returns — for up to a decade — a bid to shield themselves from paying thousands of dollars in child-support payments. 

The Commonwealth Ombudsmen has catalogued a series of “systemic problems” in Australia’s child support system, some of which are leaving parents caring for children significantly out of pocket.

Worrying examples of clerical errors, computer system problems, failures by staff to act on information and botched administration are laid bare in a submission to the Abbott government’s parliamentary inquiry into the child support regime.

Commonwealth Ombudsman Colin Neave, who received 1700 complaints about the system last year alone, has told the government he is raising these examples to “highlight areas for potential improvement, rather than to suggest that there is any large scale failure in administration”.

His submission details more than 20 examples where the Child Support agency has let down Australian parents, including;

• A failure by the Child Support to “take an active role” in establishing the correct income of a father who owed child support but failed to submit his tax return for ten years, resulting in his partner receiving lower than appropriate payments.

• The agency’s failure to set up wage and salary deductions on the repeated request of a mother who was owed more than $5,000 in child support payments, despite being provided with information about where the her former partner worked and his pay slip number, until the Ombudsman intervened in the case.

Report ... Social Services Minister Kevin Andrews. Source: News Corp Australia

 

• A clerical error by a Child Support staff member in misreading a file resulted in the agency failing to collect money on behalf of a mother who was owed $12,000 in child support payments and had informed the government repeatedly over the course of 18 months where her children’s father was working.

• A failure by Child Support staff to report for prosecution the case of an employer who was deducting child support payments from an employee but not transferring them in full to Child Support. More worryingly, the agency continued to keep the arrangements in place.

The report to Social Services Minister Kevin Andrews’ inquiry reveals the Ombudsman frequently receives complaints from recipients of child support payments that the figure used to assess their ex-partner’s income is too low, in some cases because parents are not submitting their tax returns.

While the submission notes that Child Support has no power to force a customer to lodge his or her tax return, it says, “we are concerned that Child Support does not appear to maintain an interest in the action that the Australian Tax Office takes in response to these referred cases.”

Mr Neave also write in his submission: “we consider that it is vital that Child Support is seen as effective, but fair in its efforts to assess and collect child support payments”.

“In our view, the integrity of the scheme will be undermined by community perceptions that people can readily avoid their responsibilities,” he says.

The number of complaints to the Child Support agency peaked at almost 3000 in 1996.