Do we really need chemical soaps?

Pat Macpherson, Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly; John Donvan (onpoint.wbur.org)

It's not "magic" -- Nature can make us beautiful: money saved on safe, natural cleaners

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Are we really too clean? (On Point)

New York Times: My No-Soap, No-Shampoo, [Probiotic]-Rich Hygiene Experiment — “My skin began to change for the better. It actually became softer and smoother, rather than dry and flaky, as though a sauna’s worth of humidity had penetrated my winter-hardened shell. 

Plastics, nano-ingredients pollute

And my complexion, prone to hormone-related breakouts, was clear. For the first time ever, my pores seemed to shrink. As I took my morning “shower” — a three-minute rinse in a bathroom devoid of hygiene products — I remembered all the antibiotics I took as a teenager to quell my acne. How funny it would be if adding [good, probiotic] bacteria were the answer all along.”

4 dead in Mission Viejo murder-suicide

CNN: Minnesota issues ban on [toxic] antibacterial ingredient – “The health effects of [industrial chemical toxin] triclosan for humans are still unclear. Some studies suggest that the chemical could be linked to antibiotic resistance, but evidence is mixed, and the Environmental Protection Agency says more research is needed to evaluate risk. There is some evidence that long-term exposure to some ingredients in antibacterial products, including triclosan, “could pose health risks, such as bacterial resistance or hormonal effects,” according to the FDA.”

Isla Vista rampage: UCSB mourns

San Francisco Chronicle: Pfizer joins Second Genome for microbiome study — “Scientists have developed several theories about the roles that different gut bacteria play in the ways that the body breaks down and uses nutrients and vitamins, processes they suspect relate to metabolic disease. For example, microbiome transplant [poop-transplant] studies have suggested that the introduction of specific microbes can effectively drive weight loss or gain.” More

What to do if iPhone hacked, locked

• Left Forum 2014
• Isla Vista murder spree: Victim's father: "She was everybody's daughter" [so you have to feel and think like I do because I'm her father]
• VIDEO: Sarah Palin hates Katie Couric
• Were “Titanosaurs” BIGGEST dinosaurs ever? (EarthFiles.com, May 18, 2014) “Given the size of these bones, which surpass any of the previously known giant animals, the new dinosaur is the largest animal known that walked on Earth. Standing with its neck up, it was about 20 meters high -- equal to a 7-story building.”  - Diego Pol, Ph.D., Argentinian paleontologist
• Diane Keaton on beauty (WBUR)
• Misogyny and Murder: Unpacking killing in Cali

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  Mourn: She was everybody's daughter

  "I was being forced to teach in a way I did not believe in," May 29, 2014: A former longtime Massachusetts public school teacher tells us why she’s left her classroom after 20 years of changing educational standards [to "common core" atrocity].
• We remember Maya Angelou: heroes and sheores [heroines]
• Egypt's Elections: Islamists, Liberals, Generals
• Obi's 'Yes We Can,' 'Change,' 'Hope': Modi's India