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The Zika virus is likely to spread across nearly all of the Americas, the World Health Organization has warned. The infection, which causes symptoms including mild fever, conjunctivitis and headache, has already been found in 21 countries in the Caribbean, North and South America. It has been linked to thousands of babies being born with underdeveloped brains and some countries have advised women not to get pregnant. No treatment or vaccine is available. The virus was first detected in 1947 in monkeys in Africa. There have since been small, short-lived outbreaks in people on the continent, parts of Asia and...

The currency's decline is having a pronounced effect on Canadians' grocery bills. As Bloomberg reminds us, Canada imports around 80% of its fresh fruits and vegetables. When the loonie slides, prices for those good soar. "With lower-income households tending to spend a larger portion of income on food, this side effect of a soft currency brings them the most acute stress," Bloomberg continues. Of course with the layoffs piling up, you can expect more households to fall into the "lower-income" category where they will have to struggle to afford things like $3 cucumbers, $8 cauliflower, and $15 Frosted Flakes. Have...

The new genetic analysis takes aim at the theory that just one founding group settled the Americas =========================================================================================================== Brazil's Surui people, like the man pictured above, share ancestry with indigenous Australians, new evidence suggests. (PAULO WHITAKER/Reuters/Corbis) ==================================================================================================================== More than 15,000 years ago, humans began crossing a land bridge called Beringia that connected their native home in Eurasia to modern-day Alaska. Who knows what the journey entailed or what motivated them to leave, but once they arrived, they spread southward across the Americas. The prevailing theory is that the first Americans arrived in a single wave, and all Native American populations...

Some people in the Brazilian Amazon are very distant relations of indigenous Australians, New Guineans and other Australasians, two groups of scientists who conducted detailed genetic analyses reported Tuesday. But the researchers disagree on the source of that ancestry. The connection is ancient, all agree, and attributable to Eurasian migrants to the Americas who had some Australasian ancestry, the scientists said. But one group said the evidence is clear that two different populations came from Siberia to settle the Americas 15,000 or more years ago. The other scientific team says there was only one founding population from which all indigenous...

Rising Turkish Menace: U.S. and NATO Ally Wants Islamic Advance in Latin America By Julio Severo The president of Turkey has re-written history by claiming Muslim explorers, not Christopher Columbus, discovered America. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan Recep Tayyip Erdogan, chief of America’s NATO ally, said November 15 that Islamic sailors found the New World in 1178. He said, “Muslims discovered America in 1178, not Christopher Columbus.” Turkey is the only Islamic nation in the NATO. His theory — which is supported only by Islamic historians — came to light in a televised speech during an Istanbul summit of...

Indian DNA links to 6 'founding mothers' By MALCOLM RITTER, AP Science Writer NEW YORK - Nearly all of today's Native Americans in North, Central and South America can trace part of their ancestry to six women whose descendants immigrated around 20,000 years ago, a DNA study suggests. Those women left a particular DNA legacy that persists to today in about 95 percent of Native Americans, researchers said. The finding does not mean that only these six women gave rise to the migrants who crossed into North America from Asia in the initial populating of the continent, said study co-author...

The study, based on DNA analysis of corn cobs dating back over 4,000 years, provides the most comprehensive tracking to date of the origin and evolution of maize in the Southwest and settles a long debate over whether maize moved via an upland or coastal route into the U.S. Study findings, which also show how climatic and cultural impacts influenced the genetic makeup of maize, will be reported Jan. 8 in the journal Nature Plants. The study compared DNA from archaeological samples from the U.S. Southwest to that from traditional maize varieties in Mexico, looking for genetic similarities that would...

Pope Francis canonizes Three New Saints of the Americas Left to right: Sts. Francois de [Montmorency-]Laval, José de Anchieta, and Marie de l’IncarnationPope Francis canonizes Three New Saints of the AmericasBy Michael J. Miller | CWR BlogFrom the Vatican Information Service:Vatican City, 3 April 2014 (VIS) – [On Thursday] morning the Holy Father Francis received in audience Cardinal Angelo Amato, S.D.B., prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, during which he extended the liturgical cult of the following Blesseds to the Universal Church, inscribing them in the book of Saints:- Francois de [Montmorency-]Laval, French bishop of Quebec,...

Freshman Rep. Vance McAllister (R-La.), who touted his Christian values while campaigning, says he is the man seen in a grainy video, passionately kissing a woman in his office two days before Christmas. He said, "There’s no doubt I’ve fallen short and I’m asking for forgiveness"

Two Americas The Democrats are right, there are two Americas. The America that works, and the America that doesn’t. The America that contributes, and the America that doesn’t. It’s not the haves and the have nots, it’s the dos and the don’ts. That is the rationale of thievery. The other guy has it, you want it, Obama will take it for you. Vote Democrat.

The Africa Pivot: America’s New Battleground

Skipper Jimmy Spithill and Oracle Team USA won the 34th America's Cup today in one of the greatest comebacks in sports history. Spithill steered Oracle's space-age, 72-foot catamaran to its eighth straight victory, speeding past Dean Barker and Emirates Team New Zealand in the winner-take-all Race 19 on San Francisco Bay to keep the oldest trophy in international sports in the United States. All but defeated a week ago, the 34-year-old Australian and his international crew twice rallied from seven-point deficits to win 9-8 Wednesday.

Yesterday was a dark day for America. Delegates to a national Boy Scouts of America (BSA) meeting in Texas apparently voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to validate homosexuality among boys. We are outraged. This is a betrayal of the highest magnitude. It's a betrayal of the boys in the Scouts' care. It's a betrayal of trusting parents. It's a betrayal of a 103-year-old institution that has molded millions of boys into men. It's a betrayal of truth and honor. Finally, it's a betrayal of God, in Whose name the organization furthered the priceless worth of being morally straight. The immoral campaign...

Employees of Obama donor Leo Hindery Jr.’s media conglomerate Intermedia Partners, which now owns most of the top gun-culture media outlets in the country, believe that Hindery plans to gut and destroy all of them as part of a business plan that has already led to numerous layoffs and the virtual shuttering of prominent television production facilities in Minnesota and Montana. Hindery, an Obama donor who was considered for secretary of commerce job in the Obama administration, is managing partner of Intermedia Partners. The New York-based media private equity fund owns Intermedia Outdoor Holdings, which publishes 17 hunting, fishing, and...

"IRAN SPY NETWORK 30,000 STRONG Pentagon report: Iranian intelligence linked to spying, terror attacks" SNIPPET: "Iran’s intelligence service includes 30,000 people who are engaged in covert and clandestine activities that range from spying to stealing technology to terrorist bombings and assassination, according to a Pentagon report." SNIPPET: "“MOIS provides financial, material, technological, or other support services to Hamas, Hezbollah, and al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), all designated terrorist organizations under U.S. Executive Order 13224,” the report said. The spy service operates in all areas where Iran has interests, including Afghanistan, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Central Asia, Africa, Austria, Azerbaijan, Croatia, France,...

Recent scientific findings date their arrival earlier than ever thought, sparking hot debate among archaeologists For much of its length, the slow-moving Aucilla River in northern Florida flows underground, tunneling through bedrock limestone. But here and there it surfaces, and preserved in those inky ponds lie secrets of the first Americans.For years adventurous divers had hunted fossils and artifacts in the sinkholes of the Aucilla about an hour east of Tallahassee. They found stone arrowheads and the bones of extinct mammals such as mammoth, mastodon and the American ice age horse.Then, in the 1980s, archaeologists from the Florida Museum of...

It’s hard to uphold a reputation as a devoutly religious terrorist group if you make millions selling cocaine. Just ask Hezbollah. Last month, the US government filed suit against a number of American and Lebanese businesses that allegedly helped bankroll the Lebanese terrorist group. The civil indictment in Manhattan blew the lid off a vast criminal network that included money-laundering, cocaine deals and more — including 30 US car dealerships that helped the group launder cash. As one investigator quipped, Hezbollah is the “Gambinos on steroids.” The indictment charges Hezbollah kingpin Ayman Joumaa with smuggling more than 100 tons of...

Drug Enforcement Administration agents have raided an Oklahoma car dealership that the government suspects may be one of about 30 such businesses in the U.S. involved in funding the terrorist group Hezbollah. DEA agents say the car lot of Ace Auto Leasing in Tulsa is part of a huge network that is selling cars and drugs -- and then using the money to support terrorism against the U.S., myfoxphoenix.com reports. During Friday's raid, agents could be seen carryout out filing cabinets and other items. They also questioned employees and took inventory. "They're making big time money and it's going right...

The media's so full of it. Over the past few weeks, the wife and I have been re-watching the brilliant HBO drama, "The Wire." The show's fifth and final season focuses on the plight of "The Baltimore Sun," as the daily newspaper deals with a collapsing business model in the age of the inter-webs. One of the story's subplots involves a reporter with ambitions to someday work for the "The New York Times" or "The Washington Post." He's a bit overly ambitious, though, and ends up falsifying quotes and sources in order to make a name for himself. One of...

Fausta, a longtime compatriot, just posted the following missive. I am considering ceasing to blog on politics. For eight years I have posted on serious issues taking place in our hemisphere that affect our everyday lives, and, to be honest, I’ve about had it. Every post on Latin America takes time researching sources from the country in Spanish, French or Portuguese, plus English-language reports. And what for? The American media and the American public would care more if the Iranians were making deals with Martians than they care if Hezbollah makes deals with the Zetas right in our own country....