Walgreens Accused Of Scamming Taxpayers

Freedumb, Freedumb, Read All About It! In a world of exploding human population, with its myriad needs, wants and desires, the economy keeps falling, with more and more working people around the world, poorer, lacking basic needs and going hungry. Freakohnomics: The new 21st Century Supply & Demand Economics - absolute greed, absolute power brings on absolute madness - Turns into Freakohnomics gone berserk. Or mafia economics by deliberate Design - the greater the need, the higher the price of all commodities required to sustain Life. The Outcome, economic strangulation and workaholic enslavement of a people was not designed by the lord thy God, nor is it Nature's Law, nor a scientific law

The Deadly Dangers of a Mis-informed, Dis-informed & Un-informed Population, Ultimately to Itself, History Provides Ample Evidence.

The Solution: The Promise of New Energy Systems & Beyond Oil

Evaporates the Problem: The ill designed "Corporism: The Systemic Disease that Destroys Civilization." when lacking a Bill of Rights for Human Life

Mild shock and disbelief barely registered in the nation of the most productive, overworked, underpaid, underinsured, vacation deprived, low paid slave/workers in the world, as they watched their bridges fall down along with their retirement savings in equity & stocks, while their taxes, gas, energy and food costs continued skyrocketing to uncharted realms and many continue to lose their homes and go hungry; as the masses stagnated in unmovable traffic, and government departments threatened to close due to lack of funds - On the bright side, the worldwide corporate 2% greedy guts, individually, had aplenty, more wealth than 30 nations combined, apiece.... irrelevant to who is paying for their errors (as in subprime loans).

As common sense in science is lost with the continued stagnation of our energy base and deep troubling theoretical foundational issues in physics, so too, Civilization's Survival Parameters fly out of sight, out of mind, along with the values and morals inherent within new scientific understanding which new energy systems would reveal. Scientific Stagnation bodes an ill wind to evolution, sustainability, and survival as "cycles of humiliation, dumbing us down, violence, and Unrestrained Corporate Greed prompting resource wars with nuclear finality" join hands with global warming and ecological imbalance to precipitate the historical "rise and fall of civilization" - a Tsunami accelerating toward us with a far more spectacular event than the legends and myths of 'Atlantis and Lemuria"........ had more people known that Energy from Corn (or going backwards to a dimwitted concept of radioactive nuclear power application ) sounded a wee bit kindergartenish and senile for the twenty first century......the Future may have had a chance.




Walgreens Accused Of Scamming Taxpayers
CHICAGO, June 13, 2008
(CBS) It's America's biggest drugstore chain. “Beyond the reach of cell phones and superhighways, there’s a place called ‘perfect,’” rings the familiar ad for Walgreens. In a perfect world, however, Walgreens wouldn't be accused of ripping off taxpayers. But we're nowhere near perfect. CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports. Michael Behn, a former federal prosecutor, said, “The pharmacies nationwide had a pill flipping scheme.” Behn helped expose how Walgreens exploited a Medicaid loophole. To save taxpayer dollars, Medicaid limits how much it pays for popular forms of drugs. But it doesn't bother to set price-ceilings on rarely-used versions. Take generic Zantac, or ranitidine, for example. The antacid is a huge seller in tablet form. Medicaid limits payment to 34 cents apiece. The same drug as capsules has no price-ceiling because it was so rarely-prescribed. Medicaid pays $1.25 each. Walgreens figured it could pocket millions by switching patients from tablets to capsules. Behn explained to Attkisson, “These are the ranitidine capsules.” “This is what was being prescribed?” Attkisson asked, pointing to the tablets. “And this is what was being given?” pointing to the capsules. Behn replied, “Correct. At three times or more the cost to taxpayers,” Behn answered. The scheme was blown wide open by a whistleblower, a pharmacist who doesn’t want to appear on camera. He said Walgreens rigged its computers to automatically switch to the most expensive type of pill. “The only way in which a computer system could switch from a tablet and a capsule, is if someone went in and manipulated the computer system,” Behn said. Attkisson asked, “And the fact that this was done nationwide indicates this was a corporate policy?” Behn responded, “That’s what we alleged.” By gaming the system, Walgreens managed to change over almost all Medicaid customers from cheap generic Zantac tablets to pricy capsules. In Florida alone, it cost taxpayers an extra $1.2 million the first year. And the pill-switching went on for several years nationwide, including other prescriptions: generic Prozac (fluoxetine) for depression, and generic Eldepryl (selegiline) for Parkinson's. Walgreens denies wrongdoing and declined to be interviewed. But they recently agreed to pay back the government more than $35 million. And they're not the only ones. CVS and Omnicare quietly settled similar cases coughing up $86 million more. The whole pill-flipping episode proves just how imperfect some drugstore chains can be.
MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc.

U.N. Issues Warning on Food Crisis

Freedumb, Freedumb, Read All About It! In a world of exploding human population, with its myriad needs, wants and desires, the economy keeps falling, with more and more working people around the world, poorer, lacking basic needs and going hungry. Freakohnomics: The new 21st Century Supply & Demand Economics - absolute greed, absolute power brings on absolute madness - Turns into Freakohnomics gone berserk. Or mafia economics by deliberate Design - the greater the need, the higher the price of all commodities required to sustain Life. The Outcome, economic strangulation and workaholic enslavement of a people was not designed by the lord thy God, nor is it Nature's Law, nor a scientific law

The Deadly Dangers of a Mis-informed, Dis-informed & Un-informed Population, Ultimately to Itself, History Provides Ample Evidence.

The Solution: The Promise of New Energy Systems & Beyond Oil

Evaporates the Problem: The ill designed "Corporism: The Systemic Disease that Destroys Civilization." when lacking a Bill of Rights for Human Life

Mild shock and disbelief barely registered in the nation of the most productive, overworked, underpaid, underinsured, vacation deprived, low paid slave/workers in the world, as they watched their bridges fall down along with their retirement savings in equity & stocks, while their taxes, gas, energy and food costs continued skyrocketing to uncharted realms and many continue to lose their homes and go hungry; as the masses stagnated in unmovable traffic, and government departments threatened to close due to lack of funds - On the bright side, the worldwide corporate 2% greedy guts, individually, had aplenty, more wealth than 30 nations combined, apiece.... irrelevant to who is paying for their errors (as in subprime loans).

As common sense in science is lost with the continued stagnation of our energy base and deep troubling theoretical foundational issues in physics, so too, Civilization's Survival Parameters fly out of sight, out of mind, along with the values and morals inherent within new scientific understanding which new energy systems would reveal. Scientific Stagnation bodes an ill wind to evolution, sustainability, and survival as "cycles of humiliation, dumbing us down, violence, and Unrestrained Corporate Greed prompting resource wars with nuclear finality" join hands with global warming and ecological imbalance to precipitate the historical "rise and fall of civilization" - a Tsunami accelerating toward us with a far more spectacular event than the legends and myths of 'Atlantis and Lemuria"........ had more people known that Energy from Corn (or going backwards to a dimwitted concept of radioactive nuclear power application ) sounded a wee bit kindergartenish and senile for the twenty first century......the Future may have had a chance.



June 4, 2008

U.N. Issues Warning on Food Crisis

UN Says Solving Food Crisis Could Cost $30 Billion

By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL and ANDREW MARTIN
ROME — Resolving the global food crisis could cost as much as $30 billion a year and wealthier nations are doing little to help the developing world face the problem, United Nations officials said Tuesday.
At a U.N. food summit attended by dozens of world leaders, Jacques Diouf, head of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, opened the meeting by sharply criticizing wealthy nations who he said were cutting back on agriculture programs for the world’s poor and ignoring deforestation — while spending billions on carbon markets, subsidies for farmers and biofuel production.
“The developing countries did in fact forge policies, strategies and programs that — if they had received appropriate funding — would have given us world food security,” Mr. Diouf, said, adding that international community finally began to mobilize to help after images of food riots and starvation emerged in the media. He said there had been plenty of meetings on the need for anti-hunger programs and agricultural development in poor nations in the last decade but not enough money to make them a reality.
Another major debate that emerged at the conference was the role of biofuels in producing food shortages. The U.S. delegation here maintains that only 2 to 3 percent of food price rises were attributable to the biofuel boom. The U.N., however, said the impact was much greater. Biofuel production affects food prices because farmers in many countries have switched from growing crops for food to growing crops for fuel.
Mr. Diouf criticized policies like those in the United States that subsidize growing crops for energy.
“Nobody understands how $11 to $12 billion a year subsidies in 2006 and protective tariff policies have the effect of diverting 100 million tons of cereals from human consumption, mostly to satisfy the thirst for fuel for vehicles,” Mr. Diouf said.
But Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the president of Brazil, pointed out that some biofuels could provide a solution to world hunger if properly deployed. In Brazil, where biofuel is made from sugar cane, the industry has provided jobs for poor people as well as sustainable fuel, he said.
The idea that biofuels have cause the world hunger crisis was “an oversimplification” and “an affront that does not stand up to serious discussion,” Mr. da Silva said.
He instead blamed the high cost of food on high fuel prices: “It offends me to see fingers pointed at biofuels, when the fingers are coated in oil and coal.”
There was little disagreement about how to resolve the spiraling costs of food and its impact on the world’s poor: more food aid to feed the world’s hungry, additional seeds and fertilizer for poor farmers, fewer export bans and tariffs that restrict the flow of trade, and more research to improve crop yields. The problem now is convincing wealthy nations to pay for it, estimated to cost as much as $30 billion a year.
Ban Ki-moon, the secretary general of the United Nations, appealed for financial support from wealthy nations to immediately provide more food aid and to help poor countries grow more food. He noted that several governments and global institutions have already pledged additional financial support to deal with the food crisis.
In addition, the United States and some other countries have suggested that genetically modified crops could play a key role in helping poor nations to grow more food, a position that some governments and non-profit groups strongly oppose. The United States is by far the world’s leading producer of genetically modified crops and seeds.
At the Circus Maximus, across from the conference site, ActionAid, an international anti-poverty group, unfurled a banner saying “Stop Profiting from Hunger — Right to Food Now.”

Oil crisis dominates G8 meeting

Freedumb, Freedumb, Read All About It! In a world of exploding human population, with its myriad needs, wants and desires, the economy keeps falling, with more and more working people around the world, poorer, lacking basic needs and going hungry. Freakohnomics: The new 21st Century Supply & Demand Economics - absolute greed, absolute power brings on absolute madness - Turns into Freakohnomics gone berserk. Or mafia economics by deliberate Design - the greater the need, the higher the price of all commodities required to sustain Life. The Outcome, economic strangulation and workaholic enslavement of a people was not designed by the lord thy God, nor is it Nature's Law, nor a scientific law

The Deadly Dangers of a Mis-informed, Dis-informed & Un-informed Population, Ultimately to Itself, History Provides Ample Evidence.

The Solution: The Promise of New Energy Systems & Beyond Oil

Evaporates the Problem: The ill designed "Corporism: The Systemic Disease that Destroys Civilization." when lacking a Bill of Rights for Human Life

Mild shock and disbelief barely registered in the nation of the most productive, overworked, underpaid, underinsured, vacation deprived, low paid slave/workers in the world, as they watched their bridges fall down along with their retirement savings in equity & stocks, while their taxes, gas, energy and food costs continued skyrocketing to uncharted realms and many continue to lose their homes and go hungry; as the masses stagnated in unmovable traffic, and government departments threatened to close due to lack of funds - On the bright side, the worldwide corporate 2% greedy guts, individually, had aplenty, more wealth than 30 nations combined, apiece.... irrelevant to who is paying for their errors (as in subprime loans).

As common sense in science is lost with the continued stagnation of our energy base and deep troubling theoretical foundational issues in physics, so too, Civilization's Survival Parameters fly out of sight, out of mind, along with the values and morals inherent within new scientific understanding which new energy systems would reveal. Scientific Stagnation bodes an ill wind to evolution, sustainability, and survival as "cycles of humiliation, dumbing us down, violence, and Unrestrained Corporate Greed prompting resource wars with nuclear finality" join hands with global warming and ecological imbalance to precipitate the historical "rise and fall of civilization" - a Tsunami accelerating toward us with a far more spectacular event than the legends and myths of 'Atlantis and Lemuria"........ had more people known that Energy from Corn (or going backwards to a dimwitted concept of radioactive nuclear power application ) sounded a wee bit kindergartenish and senile for the twenty first century......the Future may have had a chance.



Oil crisis dominates G8 meeting

Published: 2008/06/08 15:40:27 GMT

The energy ministers of the world's leading industrialised nations have met in Japan amid fears soaring oil prices could damage the global economy.
The Group of Eight (G8) organisation met two days after a record one-day jump in crude oil to $139 a barrel.
Efficiency, shared technology and the promotion of alternative power sources were high on the agenda.
But disagreements surfaced on fuel subsidies, which the US and others feel have helped boost prices.
Strategic stocks
The meeting took place in Aomori, on the northern edge of Japan's main Honshu island.
Business Secretary John Hutton, who represented Britain at the meeting, called for an increase in oil production to push prices down.
He added that Britain and other Western countries need to help developing nations reduce the environmental impact of their energy use.
On Saturday, five key energy-consuming nations, the United States, China, Japan, India and South Korea, all called on oil producers to increase output to try to control the soaring prices.
The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) has said no new decision will be made until its meeting in Vienna in 9 September.
US Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said: "It's not good for producing nations to see the US struggling economically. They depend on us to be a significant engine in world economic activity."
Later, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said a "blowtorch" needed to be applied to OPEC to urge the cartel to increase production.
The ministers of the five nations meeting on Saturday also agreed on other issues such as developing clean energy technologies, improving efficiency and on better cooperation in strategic oil stocks.
However, sharp differences emerged on fuel subsidies.
The BBC's Chris Hogg in Tokyo says heavy fuel subsidies are used throughout the developing world to try to ease the burden on the poorest in society.
Mr Bodman said the subsidies in China and India had helped drive demand and so increase prices.
"We know demand is increasing because a lot of nations are still subsidising oil, which ought to stop," he said.
India insists there is no agreement to remove the subsidies altogether.
Its representative at the talks on Saturday said the country was not ready to move to a position where the market decided the price its citizens should pay for oil.
China also made clear it had no time frame for moving towards lower subsidies, saying they needed to consider carefully how removing them might affect the country's social and political stability.
Mr Bodman said even quick action at the Aomori talks might not bring immediate benefits.
"This has been a long time in coming... this is going to take a long time to accomplish."
The Aomori talks herald a full meeting of G8 leaders on Japan's northernmost Hokkaido island in July.
Friday's spike in oil prices coincided with a dollar slump, plummeting share prices on Wall Street and US unemployment suffering its biggest rise in 20 years.
Some analysts have suggested that prices would reach as high as $200 a barrel during the next 18 months.
The benchmark light, sweet crude oil is more than twice the price it was a year ago.
Story from BBC NEWS:http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/business/7442170.stmPublished: 2008/06/08 15:40:27 GMTBBC MMVIII