defining rationing for ideological convenience, trains and things change, cyanobacteria could serve as drug template
August 29, 2009 at 2:46 pm | In culture, photography, photoshop, science | Leave a CommentWe Ration. We Ration. We Ration. We Ration.
“Look at Canada,” says Charles Krauthammer. “Look at Britain. They got hooked; now they ration. So will we.”
So do we. This is not an arguable proposition. It is not a difference of opinion, or a conversation about semantics. We ration. We ration without discussion, remorse or concern. We ration health care the way we ration other goods: We make it too expensive for everyone to afford.
…I’ve used these numbers before, but let’s repeat them. A 2001 survey by the policy journal Health Affairs found that 38 percent of Britons and 27 percent of Canadians reported waiting four months or more for elective surgery. Among Americans, that number was only 5 percent. This, Americans will tell you, is the true measure of our system’s performance. We have our problems. But at least we don’t sit in some European purgatory languishing without our treatments. That’s rationing.
There is, however, a flip side to that. The very same survey also looked at cost problems among residents of different countries: 24 percent of Americans reported that they did not get medical care because of cost. Twenty-six percent said they didn’t fill a prescription. And 22 percent said they didn’t get a test or treatment. In Britain and Canada, only about 6 percent of respondents reported that costs had limited their access to care.
The numbers are almost mirror images of each other.
By ‘we’ Klein means that segment of the health-care market in the U.S. that is driven by profit, not necessarily the best outcome for the patient. Its kinda important to make the distinction between the corporate health-care portion of medical care dispensing versus public care such as federal and state employees (a combination of private/public), Medicare ( government run) and military health-care ( government run) and smaller programs public programs like SCHIPP for children. A libertarian says that Ezra is confused,
Like most left-leaning folks, Klein clearly doesn’t know the definition of rationing. Take this one from Britannica:
Government allocation of scarce resources and consumer goods, usually adopted during wars, famines, or other national emergencies.
Klein evidently thinks that market outcomes that he dislikes mean that government should step in and impose outcomes that he does like. All right, let’s admit it; the health insurance market and the rest of health care are royally screwed up as a result of decades of government interventions and mandates.
What would worshipers of the great god Freemarketisalwaysrightus do without using a semantic crack to drive their Hummer through. When the god Freemarketisalwaysrightus rations health-care that is not rationing that is the always cuddly and wise judgment of a higher power whose mysteries only the chosen shall understand. When non-profit (or in the case of Canada, negotiated profits) entitites ask that someone wait a month for elective surgery, now that is rationing.
Its also to the shame of this nation that we have regulated the medical profession and hospitals – all those certifications, testing, inspections and diplomas. Everyone stop leaning on the door to paradise, behind which they keep their unregulated Perfection, health-care would be cheap and everyone would have it. The monks of libertarians are woefully shy about providing historical models/ data/ history for that system, but like many religious cults, one guesses their secret knowledge is not to be gazed upon by heretics.
Earlier this year Dick Cheney claimed secret documents at the CIA would prove that he and George had no choice but to break long established law and torture people. Said documents are released and prove that asking prisoners questions gets answers, but fails to support Cheney’s torture fetish. The broadcast media in particular has provided yet another round of breath taking insight. Cheney’s torture claims debunked; will the media say so? by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR).
CBS Evening News (8/25/09), reporter Bob Orr said: “The once-secret documents do support the claims of former Vice President Dick Cheney that harsh interrogations at times did work. Interviews with prisoners helped the U.S. capture other terror suspects and thwart potential attacks, including Al-Qaeda plots to attack the U.S. consulate in Karachi and fly an airplane into California’s tallest building.” The problem is, whatever one makes of the CIA’s argument that their interrogations yielded valuable intelligence, there’s nothing in the documents newly available to the public–and to CBS–that actually argues this intelligence was produced by the torture techniques like waterboarding that Cheney so publicly defended.
Marine biomedicine researchers decode structure of promising sea compound
Scripps scientists collected cyanobacteria, tiny photosynthetic sea organisms, in Hoia Bay off Papua New Guinea in 2002 and recently discovered that the bacteria produce a compound with a structure previously unseen in biomedicine.
The compound, which the researchers have dubbed hoiamide A, offers a novel template for drug development.
“We have seen some of hoiamide A’s features in other molecules, but separately,” said Alban Pereira, a postdoctoral researcher in Scripps’ CMBB and a paper coauthor. “We believe this new template may be important because it’s showing different mechanisms of action different ways to interact with neurons, possibly with a good therapeutic effect for such diseases as epilepsy, hypoxia-ischemia and several neurodegenerative disorders.”
In pharmacological tests conducted at Creighton University, Hoiamide A was shown to interact with the same important therapeutic target as analgesic, antiarrhythmic, antiepileptic and neuroprotective drugs.
This is basic government funded research. Regardless of one’s income, race, religion or politics you might benefit some day. Hoiamide A looks as though it can make adjustments to nerve cells at the macromolecule level which could be good news for those suffering from impaired mental cognition or difficult to control pain.
spinology
August 27, 2009 at 1:38 pm | In culture, economic, environmental, journalism, photoshop | Leave a Comment
But you, dear reader, are indulging right now in activity that is equally as polluting as air travel: using a computer.
According to a report published by the Climate Group, a think-tank based in London, computers, printers, mobile phones and the widgets that accompany them account for the emission of 830m tonnes of carbon dioxide around the world in 2007. That is about 2% of the estimated total of emissions from human activity. And that is the same as the aviation industry’s contribution. According to the report, about a quarter of the emissions in question are generated by the manufacture of computers and so forth. The rest come from their use.
The Economist claims as its general editorial goal to “to take part in a severe contest between intelligence, which presses forward, and an unworthy, timid ignorance obstructing our progress.” They’re pro free trade and globalization. In general I’m free trade and pro a certain type of globalization – a globalization in trade and manufacturing tempered by concern for human rights and the environment. The hell is in the details as they say. Since so many of The Economists readers are well educated and hold decision making positions in the private and public sector, they’re to be ignored at some risk. This article by itself is nothing major, but is typical of some of the ankle biting they frequently do in regards to global warming. Its difficult to tell if the writer of the above editorial is lying or just lazy.
Let’s assume the numbers they’re using from The Climate Group are correct. They fail to acknowledge that the energy used by computers and other human activities are be supplemented with or replaced by greener energy. California’s private electric utilities have to generate 20% of their electricity by means of solar, wind or geothermal energy by 2010. Many industries in California, including the high environmental impact construction sector, have pledged to cut their emissions by 20 to 50 percent in the next ten years. We’re unlikely to see comparable improvement in jet emissions or conservation of fossil fuels in the aviation industry. Perhaps making a graph before hand comparing the estimated emissions of human activity versus the airline industry would have helped. Excepting increased energy usage due to population growth the Economists writer would have seen a steady tread downward on computers and related activities, if we’re successful in meeting state and country goals for conversion to green energy and conservation – the use of LED lighting alone could reduce energy consumption, and the companion emissions, for lighting nationwide by 29%. We’re not likely to see such savings in commercial jet travel. Part of the Economist’s argument is we’re just as well off using jets as staying at home and using networks to do our work; and the snark at people buying carbon offsets comes off as more an advocacy of waste and decadence then what the writer seems to think is some great insight into how the world uses energy. Its almost and apples and oranges comparison.
In a few hundred words The Economist says what could have been said in one sentence – Why bother, f*ck carbon offsets. Which, one assumes, would be how they define intellectual and progress.
goodbye summer. the text courtesy langston hughes.
proof. just as i predicted and backed up by this recently released document from the CIA, that great pioneer of aviation Amelia Earhart did not go missing, but was kidnapped by Venusian pirates. Dick Cheney’s claim that the CIA had documents that prove torture was absolutely necessary in order to save lives has not worked out so well, CIA Documents Provide Little Cover for Cheney Claims. Neither has Bernie Goldberg’s claim that George W. Bush served honorably in the TANG,
Indeed, there is a set of facts about Bush’s service that is irrefutable: Lt. Bush did refuse an order to take a required physical, and he was suspended for “failing to perform up to standards”. Moreover, the sequence of events that failure set in motion eventually ensured that Bush did not fulfill the entirety of his military obligation.
When Texas has their special textbooks that contain the truth and nut’n but the truth, no doubt Cheney, Bush and Goldberg will be in the chapter entitled America’s Biggest Serial Liars.
There Are More Slaves Today Than at Any Time in Human History
One hundred forty-three years after passage of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and 60 years after Article 4 of the U.N.’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights banned slavery and the slave trade worldwide, there are more slaves than at any time in human history — 27 million.
Benjamin Skinner is careful to point out its unfortunately not as simple as one person being owned by another. Such a glaring circumstance would make it a little easier to stop modern slavery,
I want to be very clear what I mean when I say the word slavery. If you look it up in Webster’s dictionary, the first definition is “drudgery or toil.” It’s become a metaphor for undue hardship, because we assume that once you legally abolish something, it no longer exists. But as a matter of reality for up to 27 million people in the world, slaves are those forced to work, held through fraud, under threat of violence, for no pay beyond subsistence. It’s a very spare definition.
TM: Whose definition is that?
BS: Kevin Bales’s. [His Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy was nominated for the 1999 Pulitzer Prize, and he is the president of Free the Slaves ] I’m glad you asked because he’s not given enough credit. He originally came up with the number 27 million, and it’s subsequently been buttressed by international labor organization studies.
college and subversion, the conservative war on history, carla gugino’s ankle tattoo
August 25, 2009 at 1:10 pm | In Philosophy & Religion, culture, history, photoshop | Leave a CommentTags: tattoos
Thinking back to elementary school and my first memories of learning history, it was my perception that historical events and outcomes had an inevitability about them. Partly my fault, but no small part of blame goes to history text books that are watered down and contain oft repeated inaccuracies. People and events take on a foggy fairy tale quality, just ripe for idolatry. It did not take long for me to figure out that western civilization is composed as much of resistance to change as it is revolutions and progress. Progress and enlightenment are incredibility slow in comparison to the leaps in knowledge made through science, mathematics and philosophy. What takes the masses so long to catch up. This lag time is not a quaint issue of our our past. From a recent Gallup Poll,
As far as you know, does the earth revolve around the sun, or does the sun revolve around the earth?
Earth revolves around the sun 79%
Sun revolves around the earth 18
No opinion 3
That 79% is great. Politicians of any persuasion dream of approval numbers that high. Yet in a nation of approximately 320 million that 18% represents about 58 million people. Education is the key. Or maybe not, Study shows how college major and religious faith affect each other
College students who major in the social sciences and humanities are likely to become less religious, while those majoring in education are likely to become more religious.
But students majoring in biology and physical sciences remain just about as religious as they were when they started college.
[ ]…The authors theorize that three powerful streams of thought interact with choice of college majors to amplify the impact on religiosity. These are science, developmentalism (the belief in progress), and postmodernism (the belief that everything is relative).
“There are important differences among the college majors in world views and overall philosophies of life,” Kimball said. “At the same time, students recognize to some degree the differences among majors and chose a major based, at least in part, on religiosity.
“Our results suggest that it is Postmodernism, not Science, that is the bête noir of religiosity. One reason may be that the key ideas of Postmodernism are newer than the key scientific ideas that challenge religion. For example, religions have had 150 years to develop resistance or tolerance for the late 19th century idea of Evolution, but much less time to develop resistance or tolerance for the key ideas of Postmodernism, which gained great strength over the course of the 20th century.”
The notion that colleges are hotbeds of subversive intellectualism takes hit. Those that tnded not to be dogmatic tend to stay that way or become less so. Those that religious, though not necessarily politically conservative tend to stay away from fields of study that challenge their beliefs. I remember that my science instructors rarely spoke in terms that were a direct assault on religion. Literature on the other hand, paradoxically, like the writings of religious figures like Martin Luther and Thomas Aquinas, along with studying writing directly from religious texts made one aware of contradictions in those writings. Contradictions, inconsistencies and phenomenon that do not correspond to modern experience tend to raise doubts about absolute transcendence. A science instructor can teach about Brownian motion, the first law of thermodynamics or the theory of gravity and still not be cultivating doubt in one’s religious beliefs. At least not to the point where they cannot be rationalized away. Also note the researchers remark “religions have had 150 years to develop resistance”. One of mankind’s more dubious gifts, the ability to resist progress by way of making up some convoluted apologetics for facts that do not fit one’s beliefs. Real progress does not seem to march forward, but takes tiny steps with frequent setbacks.
I was reading this post Revisionist History, Texas Style – at Bad Attitudes about the Texas State Board of Education and their desire to properly indoctrinate high school students, “Texas high school students would learn about such significant individuals and milestones of conservative politics as Newt Gingrich and the rise of the Moral Majority — but nothing about liberals.” The conservative mindset sees the injection of of dubious figures as a continuation of the history as a hierarchy of great persons. Such conservatives may not get the desired effect. Not that such strong possibilities will persuade them otherwise. One of the commenters mentions this book by Richard Rosenfeld, American Aurora
For reporting on certain congressmen’s less than professional behavior (spitting, insults, etc), congress bars the paper from the floor of both houses. The Aurora gets shoved into the balconies of congress, far above the whispers of congressman that Bache so often reported on without approval from the House Speaker. Congress marks the Aurora as a troublemaker. This begins the first section of the book, where the Aurora accuses president Adams of wanting to be king of the United States. More than mere conjecture or metaphor spurned this accusation. Adams presented his idea of “titles” to Congress on May 9, 1789. He suggested a verbose title for the president: “His Highness, the President of the United States of America and Protector of the Rights of the Same.” Along with this, he proposed that the president and all senators should hold their offices for life. These ideas deeply disturbed Bache, and the exposure of Adams’ goals became a predominant goal of his paper. In addition, Bache accused the Adams administration of purposefully alienating France. The Aurora and other news sources of 1789 reported on the terrifying prospect of a French invasion of the United States. It never happened, and Bache yelled foul from his printing press. The more he yelled the more the Adams administration responded. The Sedition Act, supposedly created to silence the Aurora, came before Congress and passed in 1789. On top of that the the Alien Bill also passed, which enabled the president to deport any illegal alien without trial. Bache argued the unconstitutionality of both Acts. The inevitable arrest came soon after. Bache posted bail for trial for indictment under the Sedition Act.
President Washington, Jefferson and other founders mentioned in the book have been reduced to faint impressions in our modern text books and thus the public mind. Many already know Newt as the corrupt philanderer. A truth that he is not likely to shake with time. He’s already what BA refers to as a plastic icon. Let’s say a nice glossed up portrait of Newt or Phyllis Schlafly makes it into the history texts. Not all kids take well to being indoctrinated. What’s the teacher’s supposed to reply to questions about Newt’s pay for play shenanigans or when they ask why Schafly thinks its a woman’s place to be servile to men.
home on the range,famous journalist catches up to the curve, green rocket fuel
August 23, 2009 at 3:32 pm | In environmental, photography, photoshop, science | Leave a CommentTags: journalism
There is some truth to the complaint by mainstream media that some bloggers ride on the work produced by traditional journalism - the truth is a little more complicated. Blogs that are personal journals or family endeavors aside, blogs are like retail stores. We do not all sell milk. Our product, motivations and standards vary. Even the ones that rely heavily on breaking news, the “parasitic” blogs, frequently offer up some eye opening insights into how the report missed some basic facts, played games with semantics, i.e. torture and enhanced interrogation or committed the sin of omission – its frequently what NBC or The Washington Post do not say in reporting a story that is infuriating. One of the not so great aspects of blogtopia is the slightly desperate blogger. Those that want to be a player and constantly try to be the first to break a story or more often spin a story in a certain way. Its the blogging equivalent of trying too hard to be popular in high school. That in mind its interesting to read Thomas L. Friedman’s latest column at the NYT looking a lot like a desperate blogger. He talks a good game and will no doubt get a subject that needs attention a brighter spotlight, but he’s behind the curve as far as breaking crises, Connecting Nature’s Dots
Unfortunately, he added, “the speed at which humans have improved technology since the Industrial Revolution has attracted so many people to towns and cities and provided them with ‘processed’ natural resources” that our innate ability to make all these connections “may be disappearing as fast as biodiversity.”
Which leads to the point of this column. We’re trying to deal with a whole array of integrated problems — climate change, energy, biodiversity loss, poverty alleviation and the need to grow enough food to feed the planet — separately. The poverty fighters resent the climate-change folks; climate folks hold summits without reference to biodiversity; the food advocates resist the biodiversity protectors.
They all need to go on safari together.
“We need to stop thinking about these issues in isolation — each with its own champion, constituency and agenda — and deal with them in an integrated way, the way they actually occur on the ground,” argued Glenn Prickett, senior vice president with Conservation International.
Conservation International was founded in 1987. I’m glad that were finally able to get Tom’s attention. Friedman, known for the semi-famous Friedman unit is or was a neoliberal who thought occupying Iraq was a keen idea, but he takes a lot of flak from the far Right for various issues such as acknowledging the environment is in dire straights and the U.S. needs to break its oil addiction. He’s the mildly obnoxious guy at the meeting that you find, unfortunately, is on your side about two thirds of the time.
I’m not the sustainable food/slow food blogger I swear. Time just happens to have a story up about the issues that Tom has discovered and untold bloggers have written about, Getting Real About the High Price of Cheap Food
But we don’t have the luxury of philosophizing about food. With the exhaustion of the soil, the impact of global warming and the inevitably rising price of oil — which will affect everything from fertilizer to supermarket electricity bills — our industrial style of food production will end sooner or later. As the developing world grows richer, hundreds of millions of people will want to shift to the same calorie-heavy, protein-rich diet that has made Americans so unhealthy — demand for meat and poultry worldwide is set to rise 25% by 2015 — but the earth can no longer deliver. Unless Americans radically rethink the way they grow and consume food, they face a future of eroded farmland, hollowed-out countryside, scarier germs, higher health costs — and bland taste. Sustainable food has an élitist reputation, but each of us depends on the soil, animals and plants — and as every farmer knows, if you don’t take care of your land, it can’t take care of you.
ARLINGTON, Va. — The Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) and NASA recently announced the launch of an environmentally-friendly, safe propellant comprised of aluminum powder and water ice (ALICE).
For better or worse we’re not going to Mars for a while, but if and when we do they think astronauts might be able to manufacture this fuel when they get there.
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