The people are preparing for ......

Sunday was a nice day for me.  I sell my dip mixes and smoked almonds at the farmers markets around town, and on Sundays, I go to the one out in the community called Ahwatukee.  This market is a true community market, a bunch of hippy types set the market up, and they are all happy to donate their time and energy to the market for the opportunity to be part of something bigger, something important, something community.  Very noble, very nice.  Yeah, I may have long hair, but I'm not a hippy.  I sell at the markets to make money and to get customers for my traveling chef business.  Hippys, sheesh.  To each his own though, and this is something that this, and really all communities across AmeriKa need more of.  Participation in community projects and more of a reliance on locally produced food products.

After the market on Sunday, I drove to Peoria and met with 30 people in the community center at a mobile home park there.  These people are all part of a Meetup.com group that are prepping for the upcoming collapse of the basic economy of this country.  They wanted me to teach them how to use a pressure cooker to can excess produce from their home gardens.  I'm not making this up.  Some of my cigar smoking buddies out there think that I am a bit off the wall when I tell them that this country is headed for a complete breakdown in the social and economic systems and it is happening very soon.  They don't believe me when I tell them that the discovery of Genetically Modified Wheat in the fields in Oregon is going to destroy the world.  But then they also read my entries here and tell me the stuff about beef makes them hungry for more, not less.  So much for the thinking of most AmeriKans.  These people, from all walks of life, sat there in the hot community room and asked pertinent questions, gave markedly interesting feedback and were genuinely interested in learning how to preserve their own food products for home use because they truly believe that the food system in AmeriKa is broken, and it will collapse before it gets fixed.  So they all garden, they all are preparing.  They all seem to have it together.

Good luck to them.  They are all on the road to success, and they have the mind set that gives them a headstart on the economic collapse when it happens.  And good luck to my friends that think I'm nuts. I hope the McD's of the world continue to provide the nutritious and wonderful foods they do now at prices that you can afford just so you won't starve to death. 

FrankenFish - new reports, verification of the fears, but still just the tip of the iceberg of trouble.

Why do humans want to play god?  My ex-wife believed herself to be godlike. She was certain she was without fault, and that her commands should be obeyed without question just as though they were commands from above.  And she is just the lowliest most miserable of humans, I can't imagine what it would be like to be around and to know those that have a little bit of genetic training and millions of dollars of gene splicing equipment at their disposal.  What kind of godlike manners and affectations do they possess?   My ex was UNBEARABLE to be around, what must the heads of Monsanto be like?  Or for that matter, and for this discussion, the heads of the gene tech company, Aqua Bounty. 

Makes me wonder about the personal lives of gene scientists.  Do they all gather around certain bars and talk smack to each other?  "Hey man, so what if you put a simple Bt toxin gene into corn, anyone can splice genes into plants.  Want to try some REAL work, try splicing live animal DNA.  Man you guys think your hot stuff, we are the BOMB!"  "Yeah, big deal, anyone can clone a sheep and it doesn't take any smarts to mix fish together.  Just get you some salmon eggs from the bait store and scramble them and something might turn up."   Yeah, smack from nerdy scientists is pretty boring.

Anyway, the news is not that good for the world at large when we look at what is going on with the newest monstrosity from the scientists that don't have real personalities or ever seem to think about anyone else other than themselves and their ability to make money for their masters.  Frankenfish are in the news again, and it doesn't look good.  It seems that there is a new report out about these abominations, and from the Canadian group, The Royal Society.  Now I know that Monsanto and other gene tech companies hate it when scientific groups publish reports with conclusions that are markedly different from what they want the world to think about Genetically Modified crops; the ever popular Seralini Report is one such example.  A very well respected group of scientists did the unthinkable, they fed GM crops to rats over the course of two years and found out that most of the test subjects ended up with some rather nasty health problems.  Monsanto found that the best thing for them to do was to attack the credibility of the conclusions, the methods, and the scientists.  Oh yeah, they even questioned the use of the strain of rats used, even though Seralini used the same strain that Monsanto uses in their 60 day feeding studies that showed no deleterious effects whatsoever.  These are the same tactics that all gene tech companies use when presented with evidence that they don't quite have a grasp yet on their scientists playtime pretending to be god.

It remains to be seen what will happen when Aqua Bounty responds to the Canadian Royal Society report recommending that the new genetically modified salmon NOT be allowed to by approved and that they should not be allowed to be grown anywhere near the wild.  Their conclusions are somewhat ominous and are pretty specific.  They have found that GM salmon can, and will cross breed with brown trout in the wild and that the new interspecies mutant fish will take over and dominate the native species in streams and rivers throughout Canada and the US decimating native populations and doing, at this time, UNKNOWN damage to the ecology of the environment.  (The Royal Society Report)  

What are the heads of spin at Aqua Bounty going to say about this?

To this day, I have not yet found any research being done about the problem that I predict will happen if these FrankenFish are released into the environment.  I don't know if no one has even thought that this might be possible and so haven't tried to determine the likelihood, or maybe they did and are just doing the normal business approved thing, and covering it up.  My fear is HGT.  Horizontal Gene Transfer.  We know this happens.  We have proof it happens.  Even though Monsanto denies it, it happens.  HGT is when the specific genes inserted into the targeted species migrate, or transfer, to other species.  What has been documented is that when human beings eat GM soy and corn, then the genes inserted into those crops have been found as part of the genetic makeup of bacteria living in the intestinal tract of the test subjects.  That means that if you eat GM corn, then the genes to make Bt toxin are probably in the bacteria in your gut and are doing what the scientists at Monsanto want them to do, and that is, make more Bt toxin.  Right there in your system, a little Bt toxin factory making the stuff for your system to absorb.  I want to know if the same thing will happen to anything that eats the Genetically Modified salmon.

What happens when the FrankenSalmon escape and take over native populations of fish.  we know that the fish grow faster and bigger, but what about those that eat the fish?  Will the inserted genes that produce the fish growth hormones become fixed in the bacteria living in the guts of any animal that eats the fish?  Will bears, that eat a lot of salmon, soon have genetically modified fish growth hormone producing bacteria pumping their systems with ever more growth hormone?  Will they grow, bigger, faster, and scarier?  Will we have twenty foot tall bears, huge predatory birds, giant ants, and an ecosystem that is a nightmare of creatures out of storybooks?  And all with the root cause being people wanting to play god without the proper training. 

Think about the smack at the local bar then, "Man you guys, they found a thirty-one foot tall grizzly bear yesterday, you boys really outdid yourself on that one.  Killed forty people on a rampage, wo ho, way to go boys, what's the death toll at now?"  "Yeah so.  I heard that you gene plant boys just got your Bt corn definitively tied to the increase in cancer, thirty million deaths now attributed to your crap.  You're sooo much worse then us."

Yeah, nerdy scientist smack is pretty pathetic. 

the FDA, the Senate, Monsanto and GM foods, the way it is.

I wrote about this a couple of days ago.  The Bill of Rights guarantees the right of each state to pass laws that protect the population of the state.  Monsanto doesn't believe in the Bill of Rights.  The company, in its wondrous belief in its godlike ability to create life and make money; believes that if they, through whatever methods necessary, acquire the favor, and votes, of the majority of Senators, they can have them pass legislation that circumvents the Bill of Rights. 

the Sanders Amendment (S.AMDT.965) was added to specifically insure that all states have the right, as expressed in the Bill of Rights to pass state laws to protect the health and welfare of citizens of that state.  These 71 senators voted against that amendment, specifically at the behest of Monsanto.  This letter from Consumer Reports lists the reasons why GM foods need to be labeled, and why they fail so completely.
(the letter itself)


The 71 senators
  Alexander (R-TN)
  Ayotte (R-NH)
  Baldwin (D-WI)
  Barrasso (R-WY)
  Baucus (D-MT)
  Blunt (R-MO)
  Boozman (R-AR)
  Brown (D-OH)
  Burr (R-NC)
  Carper (D-DE)
  Casey (D-PA)
  Chambliss (R-GA)
  Coats (R-IN)
  Coburn (R-OK)
  Cochran (R-MS)
  Collins (R-ME)
  Coons (D-DE)
  Corker (R-TN)
  Cornyn (R-TX)
  Cowan (D-MA)
  Crapo (R-ID)
  Cruz (R-TX)
  Donnelly (D-IN)
  Durbin (D-IL)
  Enzi (R-WY)
  Fischer (R-NE)
  Franken (D-MN)
  Gillibrand (D-NY)
  Graham (R-SC)
  Grassley (R-IA)
  Hagan (D-NC)
  Harkin (D-IA)
  Hatch (R-UT)
  Heitkamp (D-ND)
  Heller (R-NV)
  Hoeven (R-ND)
  Inhofe (R-OK)
  Isakson (R-GA)
  Johanns (R-NE)
  Johnson (D-SD)
  Johnson (R-WI)
  Kaine (D-VA)
  Kirk (R-IL)
  Klobuchar (D-MN)
  Landrieu (D-LA)
  Lee (R-UT)
  Levin (D-MI)
  McCain (R-AZ)
  McCaskill (D-MO)
  McConnell (R-KY)
  Menendez (D-NJ)
  Moran (R-KS)
  Nelson (D-FL)
  Paul (R-KY)
  Portman (R-OH)
  Pryor (D-AR)
  Risch (R-ID)
  Roberts (R-KS)
  Rubio (R-FL)
  Scott (R-SC)
  Sessions (R-AL)
  Shaheen (D-NH)
  Shelby (R-AL)
  Stabenow (D-MI)
  Thune (R-SD)
  Toomey (R-PA)
  Udall (D-CO)
  Vitter (R-LA)
  Warner (D-VA)
  Warren (D-MA)
  Wicker (R-MS)

These senators all voted against an amendment that would insure that states, and ultimately, every citizen remained protected by the Bill of Rights and the Constitution of these United States.  When senators vote to remove OUR RIGHTS, and they vote that way at the request of a business that has time and again shown themselves to utilize unscrupulous and illegal business tactics; then what other rights will elected representative give away next.

Ultimately you and every citizen out there has the ability to control how the senate runs.  It isn't hard, whatever state you re in, vote out all of the senators listed above, they have proven themselves to put the needs of big business above your rights as a citizen.  

Poop, I always thought it was nasty stuff, I was wrong, it seems to be the food of the future.

Potty training for a child is one of those things that either goes well, or doesn't.  Some kids seem to take off right away and they understand the concept, and everything goes smoothly.  Others, well, it is difficult to get a little baby to understand that the crap coming out of their butts is bad, and it should stay in the potty chair and not play with it.  The pet dog poops, and that is always fun to play with, and when the neighbor cat poops, the dog loves to eat the tasty little morsels.  But conveying the concept of poop is bad to toddlers, is an exercise in frustration at times.  Eventually, most grow, and their bathroom duties become habit, and poop is relegated to that one sanitary receptacle in the home where it can be disposed of, and forgotten about.  That is, unless your child grows up to be a rancher.  Ranchers have a different view of poop.  Poop is good food.

Yep, poop, not human poop, but chicken poop.  Right now in AmeriKa, about two million TONS of chicken waste are gathered up from the floors of industrialized chicken coops that are used to raise thousands and thousands of chickens; then it is fed to cows.  There just seems to be so much of the stuff that using it to fertilize fields is just not a viable option.  Well, that and the huge amounts of ARSENIC in the chicken poop from the additives that the chicken farmers add to make them grow faster and attempt to cut down on disease outbreaks (which are EXTREMELY prevalent in CAFO chicken farms).  All that makes chicken poop a very poor and risky fertilizer.  Just ask the rice farmers in Louisiana, Texas and Mississippi that can no longer grow rice on their fields because of the arsenic contamination from using chicken manure for years.  Quite a few lawsuits going on right now from those farmers because they are not allowed to sell their crops because the chicken poop used as fertilizer contained so much of the stuff the fields can't be used for crops for human consumption, EVER!  But it seems that arsenic laced chicken poop is fine to feed to dairy and beef cattle.  Arsenic is not a problem with those that need a cheap feed.  Long term degenerative arsenic toxicity is not a problem as steers fed the stuff are slaughtered long before they croak.  So what if the meat has traces of arsenic in it, as long as no one dies, and as long as everyone does it, then if you get sick, and your hair falls out from arsenic poisoning, you can't sue any one rancher, because they all feed poop to their cattle.

Chicken manure feed contains a lot of stuff.  First off, it contains litter.  This is generally a wheat or oat straw that is put on the floors of the huge chicken barns to absorb the manure.  Then there is the poop.  We'll come back to that.  There is also a whole lot of feathers, feed that the chickens dropped while eating, dead rodents, bits of trash and rocks, nails etc.  Overall, not a bad fertilizer, except for the contents of the poop itself.  Back in the 1940's. someone discovered that if you add some arsenic to the feed of pigs and chickens, then you could crowd them together in smaller spaces, and they would grow a bit faster and get sick a little less.  The thing is, if the pigs and chickens have chronic degenerative problems, it doesn't matter, because they are killed and humans eat their meat.  Here is the Johns Hopkins report on arsenic levels in chicken meat (Report on Arsenic)  I can't ever imagine what the thought processes are for anyone that approves the use of arsenic as an additive for animals that end of being fed to humans.  This is from the Feds own website (FEDS and Arsenic)  " Chronic arsenic toxicity results in multisystem diseases. Arsenic is a well documented human carcinogen affecting numerous organs."  But yet, the FDA allows it to be used as an additive in chicken feed to this day.  Isn't that odd, I thought the FDA was out to protect the health of AmeriKans from toxic additives to food.  Well they are, except in cases where big businesses make a lot of money.  You can view most of the postings here on my blog to get an idea of the kind of protection that we miserable peons are afforded by the FDA.

Chicken manure also has the wonderful addition of high amounts of antibiotics in it.  It is a pretty well known fact that 80% of the antibiotics manufactured in the country find their way into animal feed.  One of the main reasons that we have so many varieties of antibiotic resistant bacteria in our world today.  It makes them grow a bit faster, and is used as a prophylaxis against the HUGE numbers of diseases that infect animals that are kept confined in small spaces and fed some rather disgusting things instead of real food.  Some of the things that chickens are fed include, cracked corn, wheat mill middlings, spent brewers grains, ground spinal columns from cows, ground bone meal and organs from cattle slaughterhouses, hide tanning wastes, canola seed meal treated with lye, and some other grains, notably sorghum and rice hulls.  Oh yeah, most commercial rice products also have arsenic in them.  Sort of a revolving cycle.  The thing is, that because no one wants to admit that the feeding of canola byproducts is what probably caused the huge mad cow disease scare back in the eighties, the Feds have instituted a really unique procedure for keeping mad cow disease out of the general population.  It is pretty simple, any cow that is over 30 months old when slaughtered, the brain and spinal column are not to be used for human food.  Simple huh?  So they grind them up and feed them to chickens.  And when the chickens poop it all out, it goes to feed the cows. This is a practice that the USDA says that they shouldn't do to prevent mad cow disease even though they themselves claim no one knows what causes it.  (USDA and FSIS on BSE) 

January first of this year, Maryland became the first state to enact a consumer protection law that outlaws the use of arsenic in the feed of chickens and pigs.  The state is looking at the good of the many over the ability of a few businesses to make money.  Wait a second, according to Monsanto, a state can't enact laws to protect their citizens, or at least that is what they want to happen and are desperately trying to get all of their senators and congresspeople to pass a federal law that takes away the state's rights to do that very thing. Somehow, this whole process is just scary to me.  I want real healthy food, big business wants to provide food to me that is, well, questionable at best.  If I get sick with any number of degenerative diseases from eating that food, I can't sue them, because ALL of the food manufacturers provide that crap to us.  How do I single out one specific provider of crap to sue.  I can't.  I shouldn't have to.  Our food system is broken here in AmeriKa.  Kudos to Maryland for taking a step toward better health for their citizens.  Let's all remember how our representatives voted when it came to protecting us every November.  I think that crap is crap, and poop shouldn't be on any menu. 

And thus it begins, soon British Petroleum will bill all Gulf residents for money they didn't make on the oil they spilled.

Well, I said it would happen, and it is.  The contamination of the wheat crop in Oregon has brought a huge industry to its knees.  Japan, South Korea have canceled orders for AmeriKan wheat.  Russia, one of the largest buyers of wheat, has announced that it will test all wheat before purchase.  The European Union has urged all members to test ANY wheat shipments for GM contamination before accepting the product.  Wheat futures, have dropped like the proverbial stone.  Farmers throughout the wheat belt in AmeriKa are bracing themselves for bankruptcy.  I bet a lot are wondering if they can plow in their wheat and plant something else before it gets too late.  The problem is, what else can they plant.  There are no commercially available crops that are NOT Genetically Modified.  Monsanto bought up all the seed companies two decades ago and they only offer GM seeds to farmers.  Awe, I shouldn't say that, there are a couple of independent ones out there, ones that market to home gardeners.  Can you imagine planting a thousand acres from those little paper envelopes of seeds?

Well, it is time to fight back, get Monsanto to pay for what they have done.  Back on January 10th, two farmers in Saskatchewan filed a class action lawsuit against Monsanto and Aventis.  the subject of the lawsuit, genetic pollution.  They claim that as certified organic farmers, they are unable to grow organic canola because the genetic pollution from Genetically Modified canola has spread to every farm and every crop everywhere.  Thus there is no possible way for them to continue to grow organic canola and to capture the higher priced market that exists for that product.  Monsanto and Aventis have destroyed their livelihood.  The farmers charge that Monsanto and Aventis were aware that it was IMPOSSIBLE to contain the genetic material in the modified canola and that the consequences of their actions were predicted.  And here is the big one, at that time, back in January, they also filed a cease and desist order to prevent Monsanto from planting ANY GM wheat as wheat is the cornerstone crop in the prairie culture and that introducing a crop that will infect commercial crops with unwanted and detrimental GM genes is a certainty that will destroy the market for organic farming.

And it seems to have become a reality now hasn't it.  GM wheat is out on the loose.

Yesterday a Kansas farmer filed a class action lawsuit against Monsanto.  For destroying the international market for the wheat that he grows.  His lawsuit claims that Monsanto did knowingly allow the contamination of the commercial wheat crop by failing to follow proper procedures for containment of the test crops.  That Monsanto was aware of the potential for genetic contamination is a certainty, in fact Monsanto has used that very problem to their advantage on over 400 lawsuits that the huge corporation has filed against small time farmers that have had Genetically Modified pollen from GM crops infect farmer's fields.  Then, when the supposedly non-GM crops showed the patented genes when tested and Monsanto sued the farmers for patent infringement, and won.

Yeah, Monsanto knows their crops cannot be contained.  They are counting on it.

Monsanto issued a statement in response to the lawsuit, they stated that they will take a vigorous defense against the lawsuit and take no responsibility whatsoever for the genetic contamination of the commercial wheat crop.  It is back to their old philosophy that if our shit contaminates your crops on your farm then that is your fault for capturing the wind blown pollen with your crops that Monsanto did not create.  So the concept of Monsanto seems to be, buy our seed to begin with and that way you don't have to worry about genetic contamination, it will already be contaminated and we will have made money.

What a concept.  Can you imagine what would happen if British Petroleum would have sent bills to all the states and all the local people that lived on the coasts and all the fishermen that made a living fishing the Gulf and the bill was for the gas that BP spilled and ended up polluting everything.  What would you do if you got a bill from BP for the raw oil that could have made BP money had they not spilled it?  Is that stupid?  Well, yeah.  But is it any different from Monsanto suing farmers that plant non GM crops that after planting get infected with GM pollen from neighboring fields and claiming those farmers STOLE genetic patented crops?  Last Saturday, I was at the Farmers Market on North Central and Northern Ave and was telling every customer about my blog, and about the wonderful March Against Monsanto going on.  Sooooooo many people had no idea what or who Monsanto was, or why it is needed.  This is why. 

OH NO, please don't talk about vaccines again Chef Roy, PLEASE!

Sheesh, okay.  I won't talk about the actual vaccines themselves.  On January 16 of this year, the Institute of Medicine made their report available, regarding vaccines.  (IOM Brief)  In this brief of the full report, the IOM states, "....no evidence of major safety concerns associated with adherence to the childhood immunization schedule, which should help to reassure a diverse group of stakeholders..."  ie. corporations that manufacture vaccines, and companies that distribute vaccines, and pediatricians that actually give the vaccines that are paid for by patient insurance plans. Reassurances from the IOM is just another dollar in their pockets, but then we all knew that.  Reality has little to do with the needs of the populace.  Not when money is involved. 

Oh yeah, this is the same organization, the IOM, that now tells us that the average sodium intake of 3400 mg per adult is fine, and that the Guidelines for American Diets put out by the US government are silly, and that reducing your intake to the recommended 1500 mg is not necessary.     And this tidbit, "...is no evidence on health outcomes to support treating population subgroups differently from the general US population."  Meaning that anyone over 50, or any African Americans should have the same sodium intake as everyone else, meaning 2500 mg or the standard at this time, 3400 mg. per day.  (PDF Read last paragraph)

Oh, and yeah, the IOM is also the same group of people that two years ago made the outrageous claim that any person between 1 and 70 only needs about 600 I.U. of Vitamin D to be healthy, and that there are virtually NO deficiencies known to exist in America.  (PDF again, last paragraph)  This is what they claim, "...evidence however does not support other benefits for Vitamin D...)  other than in the utilization of calcium.   Really, this is their conclusion.

Oh, and yeah, the IOM actually feels that taking supplements of Vitamin C and Vitamin E along with the rather well researched mineral selenium are not necessary.  In fact dietary amounts of these nutrients are in large enough quantities in the Standard American Diet as to make supplementation unnecessary and that, "At the present time, there is no resolution of the possible impact of these nutrients or food components on chronic disease."  So that there is no need to take these supplements.  They will not help prevent diseases of any sort.  (IOM on Vit C and E)

Oh, and yeah, the IOM are the people that firmly believe that the AmeriKan school lunch standards ar too restrictive, and that the whole grain standard for cereals for containing 51% whole grain should not be applied to whole grain bread as it now is.  Bread is not cereal and cost effectiveness would be better served if whole grain breads contained LESS than 51% whole grain.  (page 9 of report)  And in the same report, this bit of info, "...there's no scientific proof that high fructose corn syrup deserves the blame for obesity more than sugar.... at this time there is insufficient evidence to restrict the use of high fructose corn syrup..."

Hey, I make mistakes.  I voted for Obama, (in 2008 he promised to have a federal law for labeling GMO foods) I married that woman, (YIKES) and I have done some other things, dated the woman with the vestigial penis being at the top.  But I am just a guy, I have no authority, no HUGE sums of money coming in to pay me to write this blog and attempt to get the eyes of the populace filled with clarity and visions of truth.  I think vaccines, especially for infants, are a quick way to long term illnesses and degenerative problems.  The big guys say they are a good thing.  They say a lot of other stuff that just isn't true.

Magic Beans and snake oil

All right, it's true, I spend an inordinate amount of time staring at my computer screen.  I read a lot.  I research every topic that I write about, and I see stuff.  I see a lot of stuff on the internet, good, and weird.  And I am overloaded with ads for miracles.  The absolute miracle to loose weight, look and feel younger, harder and stronger erections, better sex, regain muscle loss, rejuvenate stagnate brain function, reverse bone loss, eliminate arthritis, uncurl your toes, stretch your fingers and empty your pockets of cash.  Oh, sorry, that last one is a side effect of the desire to fulfill any of the other benefits without proper diet or exercise.  I have news for everyone, there are no magic beans.  No snake oil, no benefits without work.  It just doesn't happen.

I suppose that if someone wanted to, and could find some medical professionals that have no scruples (shouldn't be hard) you could have them put you into an induced coma for 2 months and you would lose a lot of weight.  My old friend Gary went through that very thing, unintentionally, and he lost over a hundred pounds.  The bad part was the hanging saggy skin and no muscle tone so he couldn't stand up; but the thing is that it worked.  There is a magic bean, just not exactly a very favorable outcome.  I couldn't do it though, a couple months without watching the Big Bang Theory, that in itself would be a major deciding point for me.  Well, that and the not able to walk or even stand up on your own.  But this method has the same attractive marketing claims as many of the magic beans on the market, "Clinically Tested!"   Relax, fade away, forget about work, diet, exercise and lose weight like magic!  Indeed, the proverbial "Magic Beans" of life, weight loss without work, coma.

The thing is, that people actually believe all this stuff.  And it amazes me.  I have a friend that is addicted to pyramid schemes..  She has people tell her about them, she puts all her money into them, they promise her money in amounts that are hundreds of times what her investment was, and of course, she never gets anything out of them.  She has been in about fourteen of them at my last count.  FTC has shut down a few of them, the others just have these weird rules about if you don't recruit other people into the scheme, then they won't pay out anything.  Makes sense to me, that's how the whole Ponzi system works.  But she is ever hopeful, still holding out that the Hourly Revenue Share site will pay her thousands as promised.  And that the Travel Ventures International will award her the private jet.  And I still love her anyway, even when she tries to get me to buy the vitamin supplements from a company that she is an affiliate with that are three times the price of better and higher quality ones that don't sell through multi level marketing.  And all of her choices have all that incredible marketing tool added to their description "Clinically Tested and Proven"

Maybe it is all about marketing.  Advertising.  If you think about it, Chia Pets sold millions.  Chi chi chi Chia.  Who doesn't remember that?  I remember in my thirties, my mother giving me a Chia Pet as a Christmas gift.  I stared at it, and she then rattled off the theme song.  Sigh, my mom.  She would probably be putting all her money into pyramid schemes as well if she had ever looked at a computer.  When she was alive though, computers were far beyond her ability to experience the hype available.  Anyway, it must in fact be marketing that gets people to do things that are so blatantly stupid.  The visual stimulation of models of both sexes as they work out, play volleyball or whatever, and eyeball each other suggestively, is indeed mighty powerful stimulus.  And it is all possible by taking a tiny pill packed with tea extract and seaweed.  Or all you have to do is sprinkle powder on your regular meals.  All kinds of silly things that when done, will result in YOU being lighter, ripped, sexier, and never having to go to a gym or give up drinking coke or eating potato chips by the huge bagful.

Magic beans and snake oil.

Free money.

Buyer Beware, use your brains, magic beans and free money don't exist.  Chia pets still do though.