Boston Tea Party and Ron Paul?

On December 16^th, 1773, American colonists entered Boston Harbor and climbed aboard British ships. Once aboard, the colonists proceeded to throw all the crates of tea overboard in protest to being taxed without being represented in Parliament. Large amounts of American colonists also began to boycott tea imported by the British government or their companies. Some believe that these actions helped stem the American Revolution a few years later.

Fast forward 234 years and you will find a tea party of another kind. Ron Paul, a Republican candidate popular on the Internet, has organized a fund raising campaign. The goal is to gather donations from citizens around the country interested in changing how America operates.

Ron Paul is on record for wanting to pull the troops out of foreign wars (i.e. Iraq and Afghanistan), tighten our borders and above all, reduce government involvement in our lives. He feels the government places too many restrictions on our daily lives and looks to the Constitution as his reference.

At the time of this writing, Ron Paul's “tea party” has raised over $1.4 MILLION dollars. These donations come from average citizens looking to change America to begin a new trend of defending our own borders with our own military, remove troops from other countries, reduce government involvement, and protect our environment.

If you feel like these are policies that affect you and are important to you, then you should consider contributing to Ron Paul's campaign to protect the American way of life and our liberties.

Sound Barrier Broken

Prior to 1947, not many thought that the sound barrier could be broken. Many believed that it was a barrier that could not be surpassed; that is until Bell created the X-1. Chuck Yeager was selected as the pilot of the X-1 after Bell's own test pilot demanded money (presumably for insurance) before flying.

While I do believe it takes great skill to fly an airplane, I don't like to give that much credit to Chuck Yeager. If it wasn't him flying the plane, it would have been someone else. If the X-1 were to have crashed, then another aircraft would have been built and another pilot used. I see the technology here as the big winner, but a lot of people look past that.

Many other pilots and planes went on to compete as the fastest in the world, but on this day in history in 1947, the X-1 was king.

Murder by Tylenol

Mary Kellerman, a 12-year old of Elk Grove Village, Illinois, woke up early and complained to her parents of a sore throat and runny nose. They gave her an Extra-Strength Tylenol Capsule and retreated back to bed. They arose at 7 a.m. to find their daughter collapsed on the bathroom floor. She was pronounced dead after being immediately taken to the hospital.

It was September 29, 1982. The day had barely begun in the greater Chicago area and it had already claimed the life of a little girl. This was just the beginning to what would later be labeled a tragedy.

Paramedics had arrived on the scene at the residence of Adam Janus, a postal worker, to find him barely clinging to life. He was rushed to the hospital and the attempts to resuscitate him failed. Mr. Janus had become the second victim to what would labeled the Tylenol Crisis.

By October 1st, there had been a total of seven deaths related to Tylenol, including two relatives of Adam Janus. Authorities and medical officials were able to ascertain that all the deaths involved the popular pain killer Tylenol.

Upon further investigation, it was found that the bottles of Tylenol that led to the deaths contained cyanide. Investigators found that certain bottles had been tampered with and placed back on the shelves of certain stores. Johnson & Johnson, Tylenol's parent company, proceeded with an expensive recall of all its products.

Because of all this tragedy, the FDA mandated anti-tamper measures be implemented on all over-the-counter medication. With the help of product consultant Calle & Company, Tylenol released the invention of Gelcaps, which were effectively tamper-proof capsules.

Tylenol took a big hit in sales due to the product tampering, but was able to overcome with effective pricing and marketing. The investigators were not as lucky; the culprit of the tampering was never found.