MOST PEOPLE DON’T BELIEVE IT, BUT WE ARE RIGHT ON SCHEDULE FOR THE NEXT FINANCIAL CRASH (Source blacklistednews.com) Consider where we stand financially in comparison to previous crash cycles.  For example, the derivatives bubble is 20 percent larger than it was back in 2008, the “too big to fail banks” are 37 percent larger than they were back in 2008 and global debt levels are 40 percent larger than they were back in 2008. In other words, many of our long-term economic problems are a lot worse than they were just prior to the last major financial meltdown. But most people pay such little attention to the fundamentals these days.  All they can see is that little stock market ticker going up and up and up. Other analysts with much stronger credentials than I are issuing similar ominous warnings about what is ahead for the financial markets. For example, Nobel Prize-winning economist Robert Shiller is warning that market valuations are tremendously bloated right now. Shiller, a Yale University professor who is often cited as one of the most influential people in economics and finance in the world, created a metric that compares stock prices with corporate profits. The metric recently climbed above 25. That level has only been surpassed three times since 1881: 1929, 1999 and 2007. Steep market tumbles followed each instance, including the bursting of the dotcom bubble in the early 2000s.

McDonald’s Says Russia Inspecting More Than 200 Outlets (Source Bloomberg) Russian consumer-safety regulators are conducting inspections at more than 200McDonald’s Corp. (MCD) restaurants around the country. Russian courts have temporarily closed nine restaurants, the Oak Brook, Illinois-based company said in a statement on its Russian corporate website. McDonald’s said it disagreed with the decisions and that it will appeal to a higher court. McDonald’s arrived in Soviet-era Russia in 1990 and was seen as a symbol of the nation’s rising prospects, helping open the communist nation to foreign enterprise. While regulators have cited violations of sanitary rules by McDonald’s, the timing and scope of the shutdowns are seen as a response to Western sanctions in Russia. The original restaurant in Moscow’s Pushkin square, which drew long lines when it first opened, is currently shut under the court order. The U.S. and European Union imposed sanctions against Russian companies and officials after President Vladimir Putin annexed Crimea earlier this year, escalating the worst standoff between the two sides since the Cold War. In response to the sanctions, Putin banned $9.5 billion in food imports from Western countries.

Sweden Is Going To Be The First Country In The World Completely Free Of Cash (Source business Insider) A new report shows that four out of five purchases in Sweden are paid for electronically or by card.

The Local reports Swedes are using electronic payments 260 times per person, per year. Electronic payments systems such as Swish are bypassing the need for people to use ATMs for cash, while at street level, even retailers of Sweden’s version of The Big Issue, Situation Stockholm, are accepting card payments.

It’s not a Europe-wide trend, either. In Italy, cash is still king, accounting for three-quarters of all purchases.

While going cash-free comes with an increase in security costs, it’s more than offset by the drop in cash-handling costs. In Sweden, cash-handling costs are estimated to be around $1.2 billion, or 0.3% of the country’s GDP. And according to the Swedish Bankers’ Association, armed robbers are finding themselves out of a job. Just five bank robberies were reported in 2012, Sweden’s lowest rate in 30 years.

Doctors Suggest That Marijuana Can Protect You From Ebola (Source hempforfuture.com)

Cannabinoids in marijuana have gained more and more of a reputation as a way to control and aid one’s immune systems, specifically with diseases that target a body’s natural defense measures against viruses, like HIV. Dr. David B. Allen, medical director of Cannabis Sativa, Inc, and Brad Morehouse, founder of NewCure.org, both believe cannabis can combat Ebola in the same way.First, a rundown on what Ebola is and does, so everyone understands the argument. Ebola is a virus that targets the RNA (which creates proteins) in cells, takes over, then begins to replicate itself. The virus is able to hide itself from virus killing cells by creating indivisibility cloak-like surface proteins, which makes fighting Ebola especially difficult for the body.

Another consequence of Ebola being an RNA virus is that it makes each strain unique to the individual infected, thus making the creation of a widely applicable vaccine incredibly difficult. What makes Ebola deadly is the way in which one’s immune system reacts as time goes on. Aside from creating hemorrhaging and leaking between cells, Ebola primarily kills when a person’s body releases a massive amount of enzymes (a cytokine storm) and an overabundant, and fatal amount, of immune cells being activated. That’s where marijuana comes in as a potential saving grace to those afflicted with Ebola. As Joe Martin points out, cannabis is contains natural antiretrovirals and is also an anti-inflammatory able to reduce the harm to the body caused by a cytokine storm.

Germ-zapping robot Gigi sets its sights on Ebola (Source CNN) Gigi the robot looks like a skinny, harmless cousin of R2-D2, but the machine is a cold-blooded killer for hire, a germ zapper that could become an important weapon in the fight against Ebola. After being wheeled into patient rooms at St. Joseph Hospital, humans clear out, and Gigi begins popping and blasting ultraviolet light that’s 25,000 times more powerful than sunlight in killing contagion. More effective than using cleansing bleach by hand, the UV light touches and cleans all surfaces, including under the bed or between folds on curtains. After five or 10 minutes, the germs’ DNA are so badly damaged that they can’t replicate and they die. The robot is an efficient killer. “We can clean and disinfect a room (by hand) to an 85% level, but when we use the ultraviolet light we can clean that room to 99.9%,” said Dr. Ray Casciari, a pulmonary disease specialist at the hospital. “This is the future of hospitals because 85% is not enough.” Priced at $104,000 each, the robot is one futuristic answer to help kill an Ebola virus that made U.S. history in September when it was diagnosed for the first time on American soil, according to its manufacturer, Xenex Disinfection Services of San Antonio, Texas. In fact, that first U.S. Ebola patient, Thomas Eric Duncan, eventually died in the same Dallas, Texas, hospital where two Xenex robots are now in use, said Mark Stibich, the firm’s co-founder and chief scientific officer.

WHO WARNS UP TO 10,000 EBOLA CASES PER WEEK BY DECEMBER (Source ZERO HEDGE)

With more than 4,400 people dead from Ebola – mainly in West Africa – senior WHO official Bruce Aylward told reporters on Monday that the outbreak was continuing to spread geographically to new districts in the capitals of Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea. As The BBC reports, the WHO says it is alarmed by the number of health workers exposed to the disease and warned the epidemic threatens the “very survival” of societies and could lead to failed states. “Any sense that the great effort that’s been kicked off over the last couple of months is already starting to see an impact, that would be really, really premature,” Aylward said, as WHO further warned the number of new Ebola cases may jump to 10,000 a week by Dec. 1 as the deadly viral infection spreads – “the virus is still moving geographically and still escalating in capitals, and that’s what concerns me.”

US Army withheld promise from Germany that Ebola virus wouldn’t be weaponized (Source RT)

German MFA Deputy Head of Division for Export Control Markus Klinger provided a paper to the US consulate’s Economics Office, “seeking additional assurances related to a proposed export of extremely dangerous pathogens.” Germany subsequently made two follow-up requests and clarifications to the Army, according to the unclassified Wikileaks cable. “This matter concerns the complete genome of viruses such as the Zaire Ebola virus, the Lake Victoria Marburg virus, the Machupo virus and the Lassa virus, which are absolutely among the most dangerous pathogens in the world,” the request notes. The Zaire Ebola virus was the same strain of Ebola virus which has been rampaging through West Africa in recent months. “The delivery would place the recipient in the position of being able to create replicating recombinant infectious species of these viruses,” the cable notes.

City of Houston demands pastors turn over sermons (Source foxnews.com) The city of Houston has issued subpoenas demanding a group of pastors turn over any sermons dealing with homosexuality, gender identity or Annise Parker, the city’s first openly lesbian mayor. And those ministers who fail to comply could be held in contempt of court. ADF, a nationally-known law firm specializing in religious liberty cases, is representing five Houston pastors. They filed a motion in Harris County court to stop the subpoenas arguing they are “overbroad, unduly burdensome, harassing, and vexatious.” “Political and social commentary is not a crime,” Holcomb said. “It is protected by the First Amendment.” The subpoenas are just the latest twist in an ongoing saga over the Houston’s new non-discrimination ordinance. The law, among other things, would allow men to use the ladies room and vice versa.  The city council approved the law in June. Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council, said pastors around the nation should rally around the Houston ministers. “The state is breaching the wall of separation between church and state,” Perkins told me. This is the moment I wrote about in my book, “God Less America.”

Vatican alters draft report translation about gays (Source AP) The Vatican is watering down a ground-breaking overture to gays — but only if they speak English. After a draft report by bishops debating family issues came under criticism from many conservative English-speaking bishops, the Vatican released a new English translation on Thursday. A section initially entitled “Welcoming homosexuals” is now “Providing for homosexual persons,” and the tone of the text is significantly colder. The initial English version — released Monday along with the original — accurately reflected the Italian version in both letter and spirit, and contained a remarkable tone of acceptance to gays. The other translations were similarly faithful to the Italian and didn’t deviate in tone. Conservatives were outraged, and the English was changed. The first English version asked if the church was capable of “welcoming these people, guaranteeing to them a fraternal space in our communities.” The new version asks if the church is “capable of providing for these people, guaranteeing … them … a place of fellowship in our communities.” The first version said homosexual unions can often constitute a “precious support in the life of the partners.” The new one says gay unions often constitute “valuable support in the life of these persons.”

I’m a Hazmat-Trained Hospital Worker: Here’s What No One Is Telling You About Ebola (Source huffingtonpost.com) Ebola is brilliant. It is a superior virus that has evolved and fine-tuned its mechanism of transmission to be near-perfect. That’s why we’re all so terrified. We know we can’t destroy it. All we can do is try to divert it, outrun it. I’ve worked in health care for a few years now. One of the first things I took advantage of was training to become FEMA-certified for hazmat ops in a hospital setting. My rationale for this was that, in my home state of Maine, natural disasters are almost a given. We’re also, though you may not know it, a state that has many major ports that receive hazardous liquids from ships and transport them inland. In the back of my mind, of course, I was aware that any hospital in the world could potentially find itself at the epicenter of a scene from The Hot Zone. That was several years ago. Today I’m thinking, by God, I might actually have to use this training. Mostly, though, I’m aware of just that — that I did receive training. Lots of it. Because you can’t just expect any nurse or any doctor or any health care worker or layperson to understand the deconning procedures by way of some kind of pamphlet or 10-minute training video. Not only is it mentally rigorous, but it’s physically exhausting. PPE, or, personal protective equipment, is sort of a catch-all phrase for the suits, booties, gloves, hoods and in many cases respirators worn by individuals who are entering a hot zone. These suits are incredibly difficult to move in. You are wearing several layers of gloves, which limits your dexterity to basically nil, the hoods limit the scope of your vision — especially your peripheral vision, which all but disappears. The suits are hot – almost unbearably so. The respirator gives you clean air, but not cool air. These suits are for protection, not comfort. Before you even suit up, your vitals need to be taken. You can’t perform in the suit for more than about a half hour at a time — if you make it that long. Heat stroke is almost a given at that point. You have to be fully hydrated and calm before you even step into the suit. By the time you come out of it, and your vitals are taken again, you’re likely to be feeling the impact — you may not have taken more than a few steps in the suit, but you’ll feel like you’ve run a marathon on a 90-degree day. Getting the suit on is easy enough, but it requires team work. Your gloves, all layers of them, are taped to your suit. This provides an extra layer of protection and also limits your movement. There is a very specific way to tape all the way around so that there are no gaps or “tenting” of the tape. If you don’t do this properly, there ends up being more than enough open pockets for contamination to seep in.