Forgive me, dear readers.
Ever since Mike Adams, the crank who runs and “alternative health” empire and a website with as much traffic as the NIH website, started targeting me two months ago with a series of libelous posts, I haven’t mentioned him much, for the simple reason that I don’t want to drive any traffic his way. Also, after his having posted 25(!) articles targeting me over the last two months, the most recent just this weekend, I realized that addressing him directly is too much like wrestling a pig in mud. You get dirty, and the pig likes it. However, yesterday, Adams outdid himself in a way that I had never seen before and in so doing revealed that families of patients wronged by a different kind of quack than the alternative medicine quacks usually discussed here recognize an opportunist when they see one. Adams’ reaction to these patients’ rejection of his offered “help” provided me with the most deliciously intense sensation of schadenfreude I can recall feeling in a long time.
The “different kind of quack” to whom I refer is Dr. Farid Fata. Dr. Fata, as you might recall, is an oncologist who was caught three years ago scamming Medicare and Medicaid by administering chemotherapy to patients for far longer than they needed it or even by administering chemotherapy to patients who didn’t need chemotherapy at all, some of whom didn’t even have cancer. Incredibly, he pulled in tens of millions of dollars a year with his scam. Fortunately, Dr. Fata was convicted and locked up for a very long time, never to practice medicine again. Unfortunately, there are still a lot of patients who were harmed by Dr. Fata out there, and the legal proceedings on behalf of these patients seeking compensation continue to grind on three years later.
The most frustrating thing about Adams’ tirades against me have not been his actual tirades. After all, that he saw fit to post 25 attacks against me in a little more than two months is something that a skeptic can only view as a badge of honor, regardless of the problems it causes. To be called insane, brain damaged (due to vaccines, of course), and basically the ruler of health topics on Wikipedia (I'm not even an editor there) by Mike Adams is a badge of honor. It means that, over the years, I've really been effective in countering Adams' lies; otherwise he wouldn't bother with me. Even Adams’ explicit attempts to drag my cancer center’s name through the mud in his rants against it, his intent obviously to prod my cancer center leadership into pressuring me into shutting up—to its credit, it hasn't done so—wasn't anything I haven't experienced before, albeit not to this degree. No, what’s been most despicable is that, over and over, Adams has tried to link me with the evil that is Dr. Fata. Never mind that I never met the man, much less worked with him. Never mind that Dr. Fata never had privileges at my cancer center. Never mind that I have nothing but contempt for Dr. Fata for what he has done and publicly expressed that contempt when he was first arrested. Unfortunately, another reason for my contempt is that Fata could not have provided a more useful greedy, chemotherapy-pushing villain for cancer quacks every where to point to if he had tried. Dr. Fata is the living embodiment of everything Mike Adams rants about the "cancer industry"; so it's not a surprise that Adams loves to try to use him to attack science-based medicine and sell his supplements.
Given that I'm not exactly a famous or highly influential figure, I don't know why Adams singled me out for more relentless attacks than pretty much anyone other than Kevin Folta and Paul Offit. Whatever the reason, Adams has been relentless in trying to link my name to Dr. Fata. This, perhaps, will allow you to understand why I found Adams’ latest post, Health Ranger threatened by Dr. Fata chemotherapy victims group after attempting to donate immune-boosting nutritional supplements to its members, so hilarious. I must admit to laughing out loud when I came to Adams' statement, "This is not a satire piece." The story begins 8 weeks ago or so, when Adams, perhaps inspired by me, perhaps not (I don’t know, although at the time he was in the middle of his first, most intensive wave of attacks on me), decided that he would offer to Dr. Fata’s patients his Nutrition Rescue Vitamin C from his Natural News Store in powder or capsule form, which he advertises as “100% non-GMO, China-free vitamin C sourced from Scotland,” all, to “boost the immune systems” of patients “harmed” by chemotherapy. It was an obvious publicity stunt, with Adams claiming that vitamin C would reverse the adverse effects of chemotherapy on the body.
So what happened? This:
File this in the category of "no good deed goes unpunished." After making a nationwide pledge to donate large volumes of immune-supporting vitamin C dietary supplements to victims of Dr. Farid Fata's criminal cancer treatment fraud, I have now been directly threatened by the delusional leaders of the Patients and Families Treated by Dr. Fata group for daring to offer humanitarian assistance to their members.
Over the last eight weeks, since announcing my Nutrition Rescue donation program, myself and my staff have been repeatedly and persistently attempting to donate over $20,000 worth of non-GMO, laboratory verified vitamin C dietary supplements to victims of Dr. Farid Fata, the criminal cancer doctor now serving 45 years in prison for committing massive medical fraud.
Despite my long track record of making huge non-profit donations to victims all around the world (see the timeline and links below), the response to our attempted donations from the self-proclaimed "leaders" of the Dr. Fata victims group has been nothing short of sheer derision bordering on psychopathic lunacy. Today the leaders of the group hilariously threatened to report me to the FBI for daring to try to donate nutritional supplements to them.
Again, forgive me, dear readers, if I can’t help but note the irony here, given that Adams reported me to the FBI and my state attorney general two months ago for...what? Don’t ask. It was incredibly ridiculous. Now Adams is complaining when someone threatened to report him to the FBI? Delicious. I’ve never met any of the leaders of this group, but now I sure as heck would like to. As much as they’ve suffered at the hands of the quack Dr. Fata, they appear not to have lost their appreciation for science- and evidence-based medicine.
Of course, this being Mike Adams, he just can’t leave well enough alone and let it go, even though that's exactly what he should have done. These are, after all, patients and families who have suffered enormously at the hands of a greedy and evil doctor. Some died as a result. In other words, they are exactly the same sort of people whom Adams claims to champion with his "natural healing" advocacy. Even if they refused him, if Adams really cared about them the way he claims that he does, the correct thing for him to do would have been to keep his big fat trap shut. Is that what he did? Come on! This is Mike Adams we're talking about! Let’s just put it this way. Adams brags about his “long track record of year after year of making very large donations of food, nutrition and food education grants to children, expectant mothers, families in developing nations and victims right here in the United States” and how he had “reached out with a sense of compassion, healing and a selfless attempt to help fellow brothers and sisters who had been victimized by a treacherous cancer fraudster,” and then in the same paragraph refers to Dr. Fata's patients, cancer patients who have suffered enormously because of his fraud, the “bedrock of victimhood insanity” and of exhibiting behavior bordering on "psychopathic lunacy." Stay classy, Mike. Stay classy.
Adams isn’t finished, though:
These cancer fraud victims, you see, have been told by some ignorant doctor that vitamin C is worthless. And they've been so brain damaged by Dr. Fata that they still believe whatever medical lies brainwashed doctors tell them. Nobody has told them that chemotherapy strips vitamin C and other nutrients from the body leaving patients in a state of nutritional deficiency. They aren't interested in hearing that. They just want to be victims for as long as possible, it seems, while attacking and threatening anyone who might actually try to help them.
It makes me genuinely wonder: Just how badly did Dr. Fata's illegal chemotherapy damage these people, anyway? (Seriously, that's not a flippant insult. I am genuinely concerned that "chemo brain" side effects have damaged the brains of these people beyond any ability to reason, and I don't know how to help them anymore...)
And keep in mind that if McDonald's had offered to donate $20,000 in Chicken McNuggets to this group, they would have no doubt welcomed it with open arms, celebrating the McDonald's corporation as being "compassionate" to cancer fraud victims.
I’m not that doctor who told Dr. Fata’s victims that vitamin C is useless for the simple reason that I’ve never met any of them. However, if any of them had approached me, I would have told her that Adams was massively overselling any potential benefits of vitamin C and, also, to run, not walk, away from him. Notice, though, how it’s not enough to refer to Dr. Fata’s victims as the “bedrock of victimhood insanity,” but Adams has to say they are brain damaged due to the chemotherapy they received. He is just that narcissistic. He really can’t imagine that someone who isn’t insane and/or brain damaged would turn him down. He really can’t imagine that someone who isn’t insane or brain damaged would see through his offer, which appeared to me to be nothing more than some very obvious self-promotion, a means of promoting himself and his website by attacking the “cancer industry” and doing something that can be sold as doing something good for Dr. Fata’s victims. He really can't believe that anyone who isn't insane or brain damaged would disagree with him in any substantive way.
Of course, it never occurs to Adams that these are people who have been horribly wronged. They trusted Dr. Fata, and he betrayed them. Some have had family members die because of their trust in Dr. Fata. No doubt, since then, they’ve likely been approached by all manner of opportunists and fraudsters with glib promises. It would be not be the least bit surprising (to me, at least) if they were very cautious about people approaching them for anything—even to the point of being a little paranoid, because they don’t want to be victimized again or even just taken advantage of or used as a promotional tool. It would be completely understandable if that were true. One has to wonder how Adams approached them. Reading between the lines, it sounds as though he and his staff were relentless, which to me would send up red flags right there. Also, if you’ve ever seen Adams in his videos, you know he puts out a creepy vibe that instantly makes one not want to trust him. Whatever happened, I’d be very curious to hear the other side of the story.
Not satisfied with calling the victims of a cancer fraudster insane and brain damaged for having had the temerity to turn down his offer, Adams next pivots to urging the members to get rid of the leaders of their group, referring to the victims of Dr. Fata as a cult:
Some people just want to be victims, it turns out. Or they want to rule over victims they can control. It's sick, demented and even cult-like in its influence over whatever human victims can be preyed upon. For whatever reason, the cancer industry seems to attract the most sick-minded victim predators of all, which is exactly why Dr. Farid Fata was able to get away with earning millions of dollars by exploiting innocent patient victims in the first place. Somehow, the cancer industry just seems to attract people who are willing to play an active role in their own victimization... and I really don't get it. Doesn't compute!
And then actively trying to shame leaders of a group of cancer patients defrauded by a greedy cancer quack before lecturing them that they should be thanking him for being such a fantastically generous guy:
To those leading the Dr. Farid Fata victims group, you should be ashamed of yourselves. You are fools -- if not psychopaths -- and you betray the interests of the 1400 victims you falsely claim to be assisting. You have taken 1400 victims of the cancer industry fraudsters and have made it worse for them. Do you have no ethics or morals whatsoever?
Funny, but that’s exactly the same question I’d ask Adams to his face if I were ever to meet him. I'd ask the same thing of Adams' sycophantic followers, most of whom are agreeing with him totally in the comments, one of them even going so far as to write, "I'm thinking they may feel that if they are "cured," they will have no Lawsuit..." (Again, stay classy, there.) Unfortunately, I know what the answer is, given Adams' willingness to attack cancer patients defrauded by Dr. Fata because they appear to have seen through his “generosity.” In fact, it’s hard for me to decide who is worse: Dr. Fata or Mike Adams.
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Oh how I laughed.
MIke must be struggling to sell his Vitamin C to his marks. This might be because I am able to find an alternative brand of Non-GM Vitamin C for a third of the cost of Mike's.
Sadly, I haven't been able to find any suppliers of GM Vitamin C to compare prices.
False dichotomy. Adams is just a little more circumspect in who he cripples and kills.
China-free vitamin C
Contains no crockery. That is good to know.
myself and my staff have been repeatedly and persistently attempting to donate
I think that's called "stalking". Also, injury to grammar.
And keep in mind that if McDonald’s had offered to donate $20,000 in Chicken McNuggets to this group, they would have no doubt welcomed it with open arms
When Adams' decisive argument consists of imagining how his opponents would respond in a hypothetical situation, and condemning them for behaviour he imagined, he invites comparisons with a Dollies' Tea Party, where he can be sure of controlling all sides of the conversation.
the response to our attempted donations from the self-proclaimed “leaders” of the Dr. Fata victims group has been nothing short of sheer derision bordering on psychopathic lunacy
It is not clear what Mr Adams intends the word "derision" to mean here... he seems to believe that it means "bewildering, hostile irrationality".
It is almost as if he has been on the receiving end of derision so often that for him it has acquired a negative meaning, far removed from the way the rest of us understand it.
"Non-GMO vitamin C"
C'mon, Mike. Show us the difference between your vitamin C and GMO-derived vitamin C. Apart from the price.
Be it mercury, chemtrails, GMOs or cancer chemo, these drugs seem to have the innate ability to specifically target the brain centers responsible for "seeing that Mike Adams is right" *. The victims are otherwise mostly functional human beings.
* a.k.a. the gullibility center.
I can't help but enjoy the irony of Mike accusing someone else of running a cult.
But, but, Lenny, it was made in Scotland and everything, so it must be the proper good stuff...
China-free? OK, but is it also Scottish-free?
Does it come with bagpipes, plaids, rocks from the LHC (Large Hadrien Collider), or European treaties?
The tea party I have in mind is the one involving the Mad Hatter and the March Hare.
I wonder if it is a malaprop for (or Autocorrect's interpretation of his mangling of) "delusion". The insanity reference supports this idea. But I can't rule out a case of "I don't think that word means what you think it means."
How is he still a thing? How do people read this type of self-serving shit and still support him? Jesus.
I am fairly sure Adams would be right about the low levels of vitamin C since it is a water soluble vitamin and needs to be replaced regularly. And since (in my limited experience) chemo receiving cancer patients are, as a group, less likely to be eating anything, they may indeed need vitamins.
.
But wait. Is there a science based way to determine the need? Why yes, there is.
.
And if Adam's states his vitamins are lab certified, do you suppose he means his lab? With all that equipment he clearly doesn't know how to use? Lab certified to make him wealthy.
As I mentioned in a comment in another thread, I think this was more than a NonCompos News publicity stunt. It was part of a familiar pharma tactic of giving out "free" samples in hopes of drumming up future business* - the very same tactic NN has condemned.
*from the sort of people who can be flimflammed into thinking it's worth paying a big premium to get "non-GMO" vitamin C tested in Mr. Proficient's Super-Duper Laboratory (with real glassware and everything).
@ MikeMa
That's true, but the people on the receiving end of Mikey's gifts*are former patients of Farid Fata and the patients' relatives.
I suppose those who did really have cancer may still be under chemotherapy today, but unless I missed something (e.g. lingering effects of Fata's chemo courses, like loss of appetite), most of these people aren't anymore on chemo, and thus would likely have resumed a normal diet with all the vitamins they need.
(I hope?)
* Timeo Adamo et dona ferentes
Well, assuming a chemo patient requires vitamin C I'd wager there are better ways than what Mike provides. Say few organges or maybe lemons if you are into that? Or some other fruits/veggies rich in the stuff. And that'd be even better, since those are natural!
Ah. Sorry for double post, but I realize I was unclear. I meant that lack of vitamin C can be provided from foods now, that they are done with curation, since as Helianthus rightly points out Mike's marks are former chemo patients/families.
Please pardon the blunder.
Well, that was a disgusting thing to read about.
Is narcissism a non-GMO vitamin C injury?
Shame on Adams for thinking that cancer patients are weak, mind or body. Or that their support systems are simple-minded fools flailing at any quack remedy thrown their way.
Adams' history of successful predatory marketing seems to have hit a wall. Good.
I wasn't going to respond to any of his attacking, however I want EVERYONE to know he NEVER approached our group! We happen to come across it 1 day. We NEVER threatened him either.
That's all I am going to say about this @##!!
I'm someone that may be called a 'leader' in the Patients and Families Treated by dr fata. That article written by Mike Adams is riddled with lies and the contempt he spewed for victims standing up and not allowing themselves to be victimized by more scum was shocking and appalling. He is the lowest of scum. We are fortunate to have a friend in our Attorney General's office who has been a liaison in communicating with this self-proclaimed health ranger.
sheer derision
Presumably while expressing their scorn and contempt for Mike, they were laughing (metaphorically) in his face?
Oops missed closing quote.
Sounds like I have a new market for my patented magic rock that is guaranteed to keep Orac and friends away. I should send him an offer to donate this wonderful magic rock, a $15,000,000,000.00 value, to him for only the shipping costs.
There is truly no depths some folks won't stoop to.
So, for the want of a mailing list of those who were mistreated by a quack with chemotherapy, Adams has gone asscorbic. And he has the gall to offer something without any clinical evidence of a definite clinical benefit to those he seeks to target. Reminds me of those accounts of missionaries and others who, for one reason and another, duped the indigenous tribes of the Americas. After the Indians realized the falsehoods of the claims, it seldom ended well for the perpetrators.
That man gets more charming with every post doesn't he? How sad for him that his act of selfless compassion was met with derision and rejection. Clearly there is something very wrong with these so-called victims who don't even want to get well if they reject Mike Adams as the messiah of natural health. Or perhaps he's just the messiah now given his forays into political postings?
If the vitamin C is from Scotland though then he should really give it back given their stereotypically famous lack of fruit and veg.
I'm sure the Fata victims group rejected Ranger's Vitamin C immune system booster because, well, nothing really good comes for free, and they're all already purchasing the much, much better immune booster Truehope OLE™. Tony Stephan's been giving them a 'Health Freedom Activist' discount.
Speaking of Truehope, Mike Adams might want to invest in some EMPowerplus Advanced.
I think we should reward Mike's attempt at a good deed by offering to donate a couple bottles of EMPowerplus Advanced™ to him as a humanitarian gesture. After all, the guy's a victim, having been driven to serious mental illness by the devious, mysterious all-powerful Orac, who's attacks are enough to drive anyone stark raving mad.
(with apologies to Vogon poets everywhere)
The Health Ranger's plans went awry
when Fata's victims he did shrewdly espy,
for having learned of his ill repute
his offer they did dispute,
having well learned that once burned, twice shy.
Sayeth the goon:
The truth value of this statement can be somewhat enhanced by exchanging the word 'cancer' for 'supplement' and 'Dr Farid Fata' for 'Mike Adams'.
Naturally (see what I did there?), Mr. Adams, great, modest humanitarian that he is, when confronted by the obstinacy of this group's leaders in their refusal of his generous donation of his own products, quietly offered to give them $20,000 in cash for their cause. I am sure the check is in the mail.
" ... was able to get away with earning millions of dollars by exploiting innocent patient victims in the first place. Somehow, the cancer industry just seems to attract people who are willing to play an active role in their own victimization…"
Oh, the irony.
This link doesn't seem to address the claim. I'm wondering because this Detroit News item reports that "despite Maunglay's belief that Fata likely treated other healthy patients for cancer, only two are known: Flagg and another patient, who sought a second opinion after Fata's arrest in 2013."
Geraldine & Donna (#19 and #20):
That's Mike Adams' MO. He attacks. One of his favorite things to do after a celebrity dies of cancer is to write a rant about how it was actually the chemotherapy that killed the celebrity, and if that celebrity had just undergone "natural therapies" he or she would be alive today. He did it after Patrick Swayze's death. He did it after Tony Snow's death. Oddly enough, he didn't do it after Robin Gibb's death. (Robin Gibb consulted a naturopath before the end.) As for me, he has been posting a string of downright libelous articles about me (and my cancer center) since April.
I can think of a few other names that could replace Dr. Fata's in that sentence and it would be at least as true. Stanislaw Burzynski comes to mind.
Of course, Adams is in a business where he scams a bunch of money (I'm sure his revenue if not his profits are in the millions) from innocent patient victims, so this is a case of the pot calling the kettle black.
Bob B.:
If you really want to give up all hope on humanity, read the comments after any NN posting by Mikey, especially this one. It's packed with readers saying "you go, Mike" and several who have tried to "counsel" family and friends on "natural cures" for cancer but NOBODY WILL LISTEN and instead they line up to obediently take the mustard gas chemo and nukes their murderous doctors insist upon, so said doctors can pay fort their yachts and mansions.
One especially frightening comment is from someone with a basement full of Rife machines, oxygen concentrators (that's a new one on me) and other gadgets and gizmos that all cure cancer but he can't convince his loved ones.
Yeah, but of all the comments there the one that disgusted me the most was the guy who said that the reason that the victims of Dr. Fata won't take Mikey up on his offer is that they don't want to get better because then they couldn't sue and collect a big payout. Then, after that comment, others agreed and went even further! It's enough to make the baby Jesus cry.
Oh, of course there are always tons of conspiracy nut job comments on ANY subject on NN. Or it's a false flag. Everything is filtered through the same distorted lens.
You're right though: that "insurance payout" line of thinking is especially disgusting and offensive. I haven't seen many of the follow-ups (I only looked at comments once, fairly early on after it was posted) but I'll put a hazmat suit on and venture into the cesspool later.
I hope the two commenters above from the Fata victims group publish some kind of public statement or rebuttal to Mikey's rantings, similar to what they posted here. Just to set the record straight.
This one's pretty rich:
I take it that the final nine words are meant to be read in isolation despite the construction without "as well as."
" That's Adams' MO." - Orac
Right.
Since I also follow the other sickening ghoul ( @ prn) I should add that he does the same with the added insult that
if a celebrity is reported to be ill - and not just with cancer but ANYTHING whatsoever-
he asks if anyone in his IMMENSE audience knows the person or his/ her family/ workers personally so he can assist them and give them life-saving information/ protocols.
Usually, as a follow-up ( or when the person in question dies) he notes that he offered help but s/he refused because the regime was too intense or that s/he enjoyed bad food/ drink/ habits too much to embark upon the path of purity and wisdom ( or s/he was controlled by others).
Most recently the name of Ali was mentioned and previously, singers like James Brown and Prince and athletes like Arthur Ashe were as well. Many.many actors and other celebrities too.
re Mikey-
did you notice how he claims that he's a Native American? That connects to another rant wherein he says he should claim special racial status or suchlike to get ADVANTAGES like black people do.
^ Oh, and it appears that $88,000 doesn't actually buy much LivingFuel "superfood." I have half a mind to drop a line to the Hays County Food Bank to see how Mikey's promised donation went over.
^^ Perhaps best of all (emphasis in original):
"Adams is a person of color whose descendents include Africans and American Indians."
Yes, descendents.
NN is hardly alone in this regard. Many comment sites, particularly newspapers but many others as well, are wretched hives of scum and villainy that make Mos Eisley look like a high-rent district. Most of these don't descend to the level of the "insurance payment" comments on Mike's post, but it happens often enough that yes, you need a hazmat suit to read the comments.
Which is why I'm glad other people here read those comments so I don't have to. My low tolerance for internet idiocy is enough of a problem as it is. A man's got to know his limitations.
Then why is he wasting his time on supplement scams and the like? Since he apparently has a time machine, there are plenty of ways he should be able to make real money in ways that are both easier and more ethical.
Who's left to be sued? Fata's assets have been liquidated into the victim compensation fund.
Readers interested in the quality of Mike's commenters should read those under his recent screed about ' 50% surviving'
“100% non-GMO, China-free vitamin C sourced from Scotland,”
I live in Scotland, but I can't recall seeing any vast spreads of orange groves anywhere around here. So I went a-googling, and discovered that I live just an hour's drive from the Western world's only ascorbic acid factory. Full of rosy-cheeked Scottish peasants cheerfully juicing organically-grown Scolttish fruits, no doubt.
Based on what I learned in my disaster management course, if Mikey sent supplements to developing countries (and that's a big if), they probably ended up with a lot of the other useless stuff that gets donated by people with good intentions: in a garbage heap.
Also, doesn't vitamin C degrade in the presence of oxygen? Wouldn't supplements go bad pretty quickly?
If you accepted this donation; this probably would have been part of the language:
By accepting this generous donation you agree to: a monthly subscription of Vit C (only $29.95) and a tube of our non-GMO lube (sourced from O'Reilly's down the street) for only $19.95. You will also be charged $9.95 shipping and handling for each bottle or tube delivered. Please provide your credit card information below.
We all know what the lube is for.
the Organic Consumers Association, the Cornucopia Institute, the Autism Media Channel and several other compassionate organizations that help those in need.
Hey, lobbyists and astro-turfers may only be writing themselves pay-cheques, but they have needs too, which they are helping themselves with.
We all know what the lube is for.
Slippery-slope arguments?
"Also, doesn’t vitamin C degrade in the presence of oxygen? "
Yup. It is a reducing agent. The oxidation rate will be low for firmly-pressed tablets kept in a closed bottle at moderate humidity. Since most of these vitamin C "supplements" are in pills that are vastly in excess of a useful dose, there's lots of room for degradation. I discovered a few 250 mg vitamin C tabs in a nearly empty bottle in the back of my kitchen cupboard. They were probably 10-15 years old and just a bit yellowed at the surface, but still distinctly acid. I also discovered it is now apparently impossible to find C in tabs of less than 500 mg.
Given that it has been almost two years since Fata entered his plea, it strikes me as extremely unlikely that anyone he treated is still vitamin C deficient as any real or imagined result of the treatment.
@ Justatech #46
As a dry powder, various forms of vitamin C seem stable enough. Ascorbic acid itself seems stable over 3 years at room temperature (25°C). Source: efsa
Once in water, and/or if heated, vitamin C is indeed going to oxidize very rapidly. The same powder mentioned above last only one year if put at 40°C.
tl;dr: If the vitamins, the excipient and the packaging are of a good quality, shelf life should not be an issue.
Now, given the high level of quality control of the food supplement industry, I'm sure there is no need to worry...
Oh, double post. Doug beat me to it.
Although it might be ridiculous, I would like to know what the HR reported you to the FBI for. And yes, he spouts a lot of nonsense.
Dammit Denice#44, I went and read that article and its comment section. The stupid, it burns.
Though I do love seeing all these idiots insist that when (not if) the world falls apart, they will be amongst the lucky few to survive. I guess a survivalist version of Dunning-Kreuger.
@loslofutura:
See:
http://bit.ly/295KCho
http://bit.ly/20g6lVf
WOW, that is the strangest press release/legal complaint I have ever seen. Yep, flat crazy and malicious. Thank you for providing the links.
Narad, #40:
I think they meant to say "decedents".
After looking in on the pages of the Death Ranger, I found I needed several doses of Scottish-sourced Vitamin ETOH to recover.
I think our friend the Wealth Ranger has probably overdosed on the same.
"Adams is a person of color whose descendents include Africans and American Indians."
There was an accident with a contraceptive and a time machine.
Adams is a person of color
If Saruman is to be believed, white is all the colours.
Orac: "@loslofutura: See:"
Adams has done a redirect and/or replaced both links with "The Top Ten Scientific... whatever" page he has. I managed to get to one of the intended pages, I don't know how long that will last:
http://www.naturalnews.com/053751_David_Gorski_conspiracy_allegations_F…
Obviously Adams does not stand strongly behind what he wrote.
I think this is a lot simpler than avoiding a huckster or medicine versus quackery.
The Dr. Fata Patients Support Group is a support group, a legal support group. If it has an office, it is not a warehouse. "Health Ranger" offered to donate a thousand (or more) bottles of vitamin. That's at least two hundred cases. Where does one store all that? How does one distribute that?
A support group is not a drug store. Let "Health Ranger" go lick his narcissistic wounds.
"Your comment is awaiting moderation."
Of course it has, it included an actual NN site. The TinyURLs provided for NN sites were redirected by Adams to his "The Top Ten Scientific... whatever" page, which is obviously nonsense.
I managed to get to one of the sites that Adams was trying to hide. He hid it for good reason, because he knows that the folks who frequent RI would immediately know he is an idiot, and would wonder if they wandered into a1990s GeoCities website. It is seriously that bad.
Well, D'ur:
"Check out my photo at the top of this article. See my forehead? It's RED. That's how my skin appears all the time because I am a person of color, of Native American Indian heritage."
"I managed to get to one of the sites that Adams was trying to hide"
And the second one showed up due to Google's "autofill" feature. Woot! Adams is an idiot who believes in demons only generated by his demented mind.
It is almost entertaining, until you realize how many deluded fools actually believe what he writes... and sells.
I have no idea what your last two comments are about, but there is this thing called the "Wayback Machine."
Narad, it has to do with with Adams realizing both TinyURLs were getting traffic to two very embarrassing websites. So he used his "skills" to redirect them elsewhere.
I only notice because I am on the West coast and noticed. The guy is an idiot who cannot stand by what he wrote. So he took the two websites in Orac's comment and redirected them to a really self serving stupid website.
Also, not everyone knows about the "Wayback Machine" accessible through archive.org (by the way Adams knows how to bypass that).
Sorry about the bad grammar, it is bedtime.. and Narad, you are two time zones earlier than me!
AAArgh... corrected version... "and Narad, you are two time zoneslater than me!"
It is 11pm (bedtime) here, and should be 1am for you on the next day! Are you a vampire?
I think you are giving Mike Adams too much credit. I am not sure he has enough awareness to feel embarrassed by anything he writes.
After a while he re-directs incoming traffic to certain pages on his website, regardless of where that traffic is coming from. Over the years it has been to a variety of pages that seem to have only one thing in common: they are promoting some activity of Mike Adams that he thinks he can make money from. For the last couple of years, these have been to pages about his various 'scientific' adventures.
There seems to be little rhyme or reason to this as far as I can tell. Eventually traffic to most of articles Adams writes will be re-directed.
This statement by Adams is pretty funny.
I suppose it would only serve to make him a martyr, but I believe those articles deserve legal action... I have no knowledge of US law, but here the stuff he wrote would be enough to press criminal charges against him or to sue.
Also I am awed by Morton's Demon in action here. How come his fans don't see discrepancy between articles full of ad hominem and calling Orac "mentaly ill", "psychopatic monster" while at the same time painting Mike as victim of a cyber bullying... It is beyond me.
Use Archive.com or Google cache to get from those links from here. I forgot about the redirect and should have provided such a link. No time now. Gotta leave for work. Maybe later.
Here they are:
https://web.archive.org/web/20160421120016/http://www.naturalnews.com/0…
https://web.archive.org/web/20160511173230/http://www.naturalnews.com/0…
I used Archive.org links from the Wayback Machine, to bypass the redirect thing. Apparently Adams has some sort of redirect set up for any incoming links from this site. I had forgotten about that.
Criminal charges? Nope. Libel? I thought about it and did consult lawyers. Here's the problem with that. It would be very difficult (and expensive) to win, and Adams is very rich. Moreover, there's the Streisand effect to think about. But that's not all. From other sources of information and his showing on my not-so-super-secret other blog with a one word comment ("discovery"), I've become very suspicious that Adams has been trying to provoke me to sue him and that's what he wants. Never be like Jon Snow in "Battle of the Bastards" and do what the enemy wants you to do. Don't let yourself be provoked into taking rash action.
"I’ve become very suspicious that Adams has been trying to provoke me to sue him and that’s what he wants."
That's pretty obvious. It would also be unusual for someone to try this on without first taking action to try to safeguard his own assets and render himself "judgment-proof" in the event things went pear-shaped in court, as they often do. Adams boasts that:
"Those who threaten to sue me also soon discover that I am not an easy lawsuit target, for a variety of reasons that shall remain undisclosed in a public forum."
This is not a matter to try to settle through the vagaries of defamation law, and I suspect the FBI would be rolling their eyes at Adams' complaint. But hopefully other agencies such as the IRS are taking notice.
Mrs Grimble@45: "Full of rosy-cheeked Scottish peasants cheerfully juicing organically-grown Scolttish fruits, no doubt."
Rubbish. Nothing grows in Scotland that's not embalmed in old sheep guts and pre-used Tennent's. I'm sure Mikey's Soylent C is no different.
As for what else the Scots have given the world:
Deep-fried Mars Bars
KKK
… I believe that's the lot. (After last week we're keeping all the Malts.)
…so possibly not his best sales pitch either, all things on balance.
Perhaps our gracious and magnanimous host (tm) will not have to worry much about Mikey's derisive articles because the Health Stranger is now going after Whole Foods!
Interestingly, his own bio ( @ healthranger.com) says that he isn't much involved in the social scene but he can be spotted in Austin's Whole Foods.
@ has:
And they produce cashmere scarves for Burberry.
Hang the Mars bars.
As for what else the Scots have given the world:
Irn-Bru!
I just read SD Wells's article of the 25th ( if that is the one about him that Orac meant ) and does he get it wrong!
In 2012, a commenter ( eventually corrected by the minions) suggested that sceptics pretend to be anti-vaxxers or suchlike and write wacky ideas**.
The writer is mis-identified as Orac.
It wasn't.
I was there.
Orac didn't like it.
I suppose Mikey's crew imagines that their audience will never check up on their stories.
I really 'enjoy' how the sources quoted are mostly Mike with a real one tossed in for variety.
** actually, wackier than is the norm for them
Maybe a polite request for a retraction would be respectfully entertained.
And maybe a raccoon will reveal to me the secret of eternal life.*
*one that has an odd resemblance to Kary Mullis.
herr doktor bimler@79:
Technically we didn't give it; it's just what comes out naturally after all the Tennent's.
Yep. I thought about deleting that comment after Adams picked up on it, but then I realized that leaving it alone would be better because any person not drinking the Natural News Kool Aid would see right away that I didn't say that and that I most definitely did not approve.
I actually have one more legal question (the explanation why our gracious host won't be pursuing any action himself was along the lines of what I was expecting).
Assuming that the alleged denunciation of Orac to FBI happened. Are there any consequences Mike can suffer for filing frivolous complaint? I mean anything that could happen ex officio.
I suppose he's cunning enough to submit his allegations in a way that would avoid any such consequences, but this still boggles the mind. Where I'm at we have article in penal code that penalizes false accusations of a crime. Could one hope that he slipped and will get slapped by something similar?
Since I don't read the tabloids or loon website "news" very much, is it a common tactic to dump an unattributed quote into the middle of an article denouncing someone, in hopes of deluding readers into thinking their target said it?
Maybe the authors of such sleaze think they've libel-proofed themselves by doing that, but when piled on top of outright lies, you'd think that such insinuation would just be adding fuel to the fire.
@ Dangerous Bacon:
I've noticed that woo-meisters mix up quotes, data, attributions, dates, names, conclusions and just about everything else. Then they purely confabulate.
For excellent examples, go to prn.fm which features anti-vax articles by the Woo-meister General.
-btw- the spoken recitatives are even worse than the written.
"Are there any consequences Mike can suffer for filing a frivolous complaint?"
Whether or not this violates some law, the FBI probably gets dozens of those a day, and does nothing about any of them, as they have higher priority uses for the available time of their agents. Just because something illegal is reported to the authorities doesn't mean they do anything. The U.S. Postmaster General's office, for example, doesn't investigate mail fraud unless/until a certain (high) level of $$ is involved. (I found this out the hard way after being bilked for over $3K on an eBay auction back in the Meg Whitman days. Even though several other buyers fell for the same scam, running the total take to well over $10K, this wasn't even close to getting the feds attention.)
Just a heads up for our host: there was another nasty, libellous smear piece in NN today where he was called a murderer, mentally deranged, etc. but the post included his employer's information with an appeal to NN readers to flood the hospital with calls to get Dr. G. fired:
"We here at Natural News demand an investigation by those who employ this psychopathic, schizophrenic surgeon who is still operating, while taking breaks to blog hate crimes on the internet. If you would like to help end this madness by this multiple personality medical doctor, let your voice be heard and make contact by email or phone at the following:
info@karmanos.org
Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute
4100 John R Street
Detroit, MI 48201
(313) 966-8527
1-800-527-6266"
A question for the US-based legal beagles (I"m looking at you, Narad): at what point does free speech end and harassment begin? I'm sure the busy, hardworking dedicated staff at Dr. G.'s hospital have much better things to do than deal with Mikey's lunatic flying monkeys...
Woo Fighter:
While I am by no stretch of the imagination an attorney (Let's just say I've been told by one that I have a too-creative interpretation of statute.), it looks to me to be libelous, and actionable, since the intention is to cause actual harm. Since our beloved box of blinking lights would probably qualify as a public figure or limited-purpose public figure, the threshold of what constitutes defamation is higher. It needs to be shown that the person accused acted with actual malice, meaning that it's either intentional falsehood or reckless disregard for the truth.
However you slice it, Orac, if you're not already talking to an attorney, you should be.
Well, we know he's still reading RI.*
*while getting dedicated staffers to explain the big words to him.
You're referring to some line between criminality and civil liability? Not happening. I recommend this as a backgrounder.
"...the post included his employer’s information with an appeal to NN readers to flood the hospital with calls to get Dr. G. fired"
Unbelievable. This isn't politics. However if it were, I would be happy to email his employer to let them know what I think of his work on the web.
Regarding the free speech issue. Is his plan to let one of his minions take the fall if they choose to start making ridiculous calls/emails to his employer. At some point that could become harassment, no?
A timely and possibly relevant article:
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/3295/why-haven-t-tabloids-been…
Pretty sure Hulk Hogan bodyslammed/sued Gawker to death, no?
Dinosaurs also had cancer.
http://www.health24.com/Medical/Cancer/News/dinosaurs-got-tumours-too-2…
On the benefits of a healthy lifestyle:
http://www.newyorker.com/cartoons/bob-mankoff/cave-cuisine
Especially recommended is the first illustration.
Because this is the most recent supplement related post, I'll note this here.
The September 2016 issue of Consumer Reports has a cover article on Supplements A Complete Guide to Safety.
It's actually reasonably good, talks about the problems of the DSHEA, and lists 15 supplements to avoid:
Aconite
Caffeine powder
Chaparral
Coltsfoot
Comfrey
Germander
Greater Celandine
Green Tea Extract Powder
Kava
Lobelia
Methylsinephrine
Pennyroyal Oil
Red Yeast Rice
Usnic Acid
Yohimbe
Risks include:
paralysis, heart problems, possibly death
seizures, cardiac arrest
kidney problems, liver damage
exacerbate Parkinson's and depression
nerve damage
hair loss
etc.
It mentioned a 2015 NEJM article that weight-loss supplements were responsible for 25% of supplement related emergency room visits.
From 2008 to 2011, the GAO found the FDA received 6307 reports of health problems including more than 1000 serious injuries and 92 deaths.
http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/earliest-cancer-ever-discovered-…
Mike Adams is an unmitigated Con artist, which are typically sociopaths, and since he has buckets of money from the gullible he bilks he can afford to be a major wanker and reap no repercussions. He is the poster boy for the damage that can be done by allowing the supplement industry to continue completely unregulated.