angiEmedia

I’ve been meaning to publish a review of Welcome Back Pluto: Understanding, Preventing, and Overcoming Parental Alienation for some time now. Having watched it myself and with some children who are targets of parental alienation, I think it is a very helpful video for most kids who are at risk for alienation but who have not yet been totally turned against parent they are being encouraged to hate.

There are a lot of positive reviews of this video on Amazon, I’d encourage you to read them. Instead of simply rehashing the universally positive general comments about the video, I’m going to outline chapter by chapter what you’ll see when you watch it so you can better understand what Dr. Warshak is trying to accomplish with this video.

Chapter 1 – What is Alienation?

This first chapter explains what parental alienation is and what it isn’t. It makes it clear that even though it sounds like it has something to do with space aliens, it has nothing to do with this. It explains alienation in the general sense, that people can hate a person, their government, or their family. It breaks down the level of alienation in levels via the terms disillusioned, alienated, and estranged. It also explains that alienation can be realistic, such as when somebody has been very cruel for a long time, or unrealistic when the rejected person was once loved but now is not despite not having done anything to justify this.

I often use the term “target parent” to refer to what the video calls the “rejected parent”, in part because I’ve observed that such parents are often not only targeted for alienation but also for defamation, false accusations, harassment, intimidation, and more by the parties who are out to harm them and the children’s relationships with them.
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If you’ve been shopping for a color laser printer, take a look at the Brother MFC-9840CDW Color Laser Multi-Function Center with Wireless Networking. This model includes duplex color printing, scanning, copying, and faxing plus Ethernet and wireless 802.11b/g and USB interfaces. The scanner works with paper sizes up to legal paper, unlike most low-cost all-in-one devices. Buy.com is currently selling it for $549.99* including free shipping, about $100 to $150 less than typical prices.

We previously reviewed the Brother MFC-9840CDW a year ago. See that review for more information. Customers of Buy.com rated this model with a 4.5 out of 5.0 score for all four categories of value, performance, ease of use, and overall satisfaction.

*Prices are subject to change according to the terms of use of the respective websites.

For anyone who hasn’t read Taken into Custody: The War Against Fatherhood, Marriage, and the Family, I just finished it and highly recommend it. Many are familiar with Professor Stephen Baskerville’s basic theories and some have read excerpts from the book. Published in 2007, this book is a comprehensive and up-to-date description of the enormity of the problems endemic to the current tyrannical status of the judicial system as a whole, not merely family court. It is an extraordinary work.

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We sometimes get emails from our readers asking about the mix of information on our web site. Some readers wonder why we write about topics that seemingly have nothing to do with each other. Many of our readers are interested in the family law abuse and judicial corruption stories, others appreciate the coverage of health topics, and yet others find the stories about police abuse tactics match their own experiences. But what do they all have in common? The answer is they are all tied together by the involvement of government in abusing its duties to the public to uphold the law, avoiding conflicts of interest and bias, and staying away from corruption. In this article, I’ll be comparing examples of what I’ve learned about the abusive conduct of the FDA with the abusive conduct of family law courts. They are both excellent examples of how the United States has strayed a long distance down a very dark road that leads to becoming an abusive totalitarian state that views its citizens as slaves to be controlled for its own profit and power.

Violating Civil and Human Rights For Job Security, Power, and Profit

We prominently feature stories of abuse, corruption, and persecution by out of control government intent on building job security and power by crushing opponents and inventing fictional “crimes” and “crises” to “justify” their abuses and budgets. They commonly do all of this and more not only in violation of the law but also against any reasonable norm for moral and ethical behaviors for governments and government employees. While our readers may be familiar with the pattern of government abuse and corruption in their own experiences or those of family and friends who have been badly harmed by it, they may not be familiar with similar trangressions in other areas.
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N-Acetylcysteine (NAC) is an inexpensive and highly absorbable form of the amino acid cysteine which has numerous health benefits. Previously, I’ve written about several applications for NAC:

• As a preventive measure against the common cold and flu infections
  (see Preventive Measures for Swine Flu)
• Helping prevent liver damage from Tylenol
  (see Health Risks from Tylenol, Acetaminophen, and Paracetamol)
• Detoxifying the body of the mercury from dental fillings, predatory fish, and high fructose corn syrup (see High Fructose Corn Syrup is Dangerous for Many Reasons)
• Aid for mental health conditions such as OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) and trichotillomania which is a surprisingly common compulsive behavior involving hair-pulling (see N-Acetylcysteine (NAC) Reduces Hair Pulling Compulsion and May Also Be Useful for OCD)

Furthermore, there is solid evidence that NAC helps boost the body’s levels of glutathione, one of the main antioxidants produced by the body. In particular, glutathione is critical to liver health. Many people suffer from elevated homocysteine levels, an amino acid that is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. Several studies indicate that NAC can significantly lower homocysteine levels. Finally, if you sometimes drink alcohol and get a hangover, you’ll be interested to know that NAC plus vitamin B1 (thiamine) may help the body reduce the severity of hangovers. There are many other lesser known uses for NAC. I’ll discuss more of these at the end of the article.

Available Forms of NAC

NAC is often sold in capsule form containing 600 mg per capsule, but the bulk powder form of the supplement can be much less expensive. NAC is also the primary ingredient in some pharmaceutical products including a product called Mucomyst that is used to treat mucus build-up by inhalation of a sterile liquid solution of NAC.

This article reviews the 1Fast400 N-Acetyl-Cysteine, NAC sold in bulk powder form. It is priced less than 1/2 the price of the 600 mg capsules from inexpensive reputable makers such as Puritan’s Pride and NOW Foods. Thus the bulk powder form of NAC is a good choice for people who use large quantities of it. Such people might include those with families with several people who use it for general health, immune system boosting, detoxification from mercury and heavy metals, and especially people who use it for mental health care applications similar to clinical testing being done with dosages of 2000 mg per day or more.
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The Five Love Languages of Children truly is a great and important book for every parent to read. It explains the five different approaches of providing love to a child and teaches parents to recognize and speak their child’s love language. By speaking the right love language, Moms and Dads can avoid many parenting issues and pitfalls by effectively connecting with their children and redirect their efforts to building family relationships that are filled with mutual and genuine respect, affection and commitment. Parents who read the book will also learn much about themselves, understand what their own love language is, and thereby improve relationships with their spouse or partner and even their own parents.

Apart from the basic physical needs of food, shelter and clothing, every child needs unconditional love; love that accepts and affirms a child for simply being who they are, not for what they do. Without unconditional love, a child will wither emotionally and can become stunted for life by feelings of inadequacy, fear, anger and resentment.
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Until you have personal experience of divorce and child custody litigation, it would be difficult to understand or appreciate what Alec Baldwin (with Mark Tabb) writes about in his book A Promise to Ourselves: A Journey Through Fatherhood and Divorce.

Many, I think, would consider his book as being some far-fetched Hollywood gossip and a way to gain more celebrity status, or even a way to defend his case and blame it on the ex. I suppose it’s hard not to be influenced by the roles actors play in movies and what you read in trashy magazines and newspapers. To me, Alec Baldwin certainly doesn’t have the “nice guy” reputation — if anything, it’s more like the “womanizer”. Then again, Kim Basinger is no angel, either.
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Personality Disorder Awareness Network is now selling a children’s book entitled An Umbrella for Alex. It is the first book we’ve seen intended for children with a parent afflicted with Borderline Personality Disorder. The book is described as:

An Umbrella for Alex

PDAN is proud to announce the publication of its first book, “An Umbrella for Alex,” by Rachel Rashkin, MS. It tells the story of how a young boy learns to understand and cope with his mother’s BPD illness.

Written to be read with a therapist or parent, the book reassures affected children that they did not cause and are mot responsible for a BPD parent’s volatile behavior.

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Especially notable features:

• duplex printing
• duplex scanning
• built-in 802.11b/g wireless and wired 10/100Mbps Ethernet interfaces

Summary

As color laser printers have dropped in price, they have become very common in small businesses and even homes. We’re particularly enamored by the all-in-one variety which combines the laser printer with a scanner and copier and fax features in one space-saving unit. That’s FOUR different machines rolled into ONE!

(July 2010 update: While stocks last – Brother MFC-9840CDW Color Laser Multi-Function Center with Wireless Networking – $549.99 plus free shipping from Buy.com)

One of the most feature-rich and price-competitive manufacturers of such color laser all-in-ones is Brother. Here at angiemedia, we’ve been using our Brother MFC-9840CDW for over a year. We’ve been very pleased with the print speed, quality, and flexibility of the device. We primarily use it for scanning and color printing, using monochrome laser printers for our more common black and white print jobs as they generally have cheaper toner cartridges for a lower operational cost.

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