Living up to the Lies

Couldn't have said it better

2010-02-18T19:43:00.003-05:00

This editorial by Katha Pollitt says it all.

Where's this guy been?

2010-02-03T19:47:00.004-05:00

Just before the State of the Union address, there were many op-ed pieces about Obama's having been too progressive, or too top-down, not doing enough on the economy, or what-not. I have a different complaint, which was highlighted when I heard him at the House Republican's retreat in Baltimore and again this morning talking to Senate Democrats. He's still saying all the right stuff, even showing real gumption and pointing out the lies. So, I'm wondering whether he's ever actually going to put anyone's nose to the grindstone on any of these important issues? I'm wondering how it is that Joe Lieberman still has an important committee chairmanship, even after he stonewalled the now-likely-not-to-pass health care reform. Where's this version of Obama when he's needed?

Liquid or solid?

2009-09-17T15:47:00.003-04:00

I'm about to do some traveling, which has me thinking (again) about the funny TSA rules regarding liquids. Yogurt is considered a liquid, as are hair creams, toothpaste (it says "paste" right in the name!), and hand lotion. Watermelons, however, are solids.

Rationing and Bureaucracy Abound

2009-08-11T16:06:00.002-04:00

I'm not sure why everyone is up-in-arms about the possibility of a public health plan to compete with the private plans that will remain in place. People seem most worried about 'rationing' of healthcare and the problems that might be associated with having a huge 'bureaucracy' "between you and your doctor". As if those aren't both currently the status quo.

We hear all the time about the situations in which health care is rationed, we just called it something else: "not covered". I am a young, relatively healthy adult, but I have had two notable experiences with a procedure or medication not being covered by my health insurance. The first was when I learned that my chronic jaw pain is caused my a severe misalignment of my teeth. If I'd had some pretty extensive orthodontia when I was a child, this could have been avoided. Plus, orthodontia for children under 18 is covered by most dental insurance, but is not covered for adults. However, as an adult, I would require at least one surgery and years of orthodontia, none of which was covered by either my own medical insurance (through grad school) or my dad's, which also covered me at the time, as an unmarried student under 25 years of age. So, I haven't fixed my mouth and I just deal with it.

My second experience with "rationing" is more minor, but still representative of what most people encounter now and again. My insurance company has a list of medications that it covers. Actually it has three lists - the cheapest covered medications, the medium-priced, and the uber expensive ones. Then there are all the drugs it doesn't cover, including some that have no adequate replacements, apparently. So, I was prescribed a drug for a minor skin condition that wasn't covered and ended having to get my doctor to either prescribe a substitute or write a letter explaining that this was the only effective treatment on the market for this condition. Point being, the insurance companies decide all the time what to pay for and what not to -- rationing.

In addition, we have tons of bureaucracy already. Since I'm focusing on my own personal experiences, I won't go into the way insurance companies will find ways to drop a patient's coverage when the individual is diagnosed with a serious and expensive disease or other bureaucratic ploys. What I know is that I went to an urgent care clinic due to an illness that befell me on a weekend (how dare I get sick on the weekend?!). I specifically went to urgent care, not the emergency room, based on both the not-too-serious nature of my illness and the cost I anticipated for the visit. (My insurer has a higher copay for emergency room visits, which makes sense.) After the visit, I got a very high bill, indicating that I had been charged for emergency care, rather than just urgent care. It took a few months of me calling the hospital and then resending the forms multiple times to get this all straightened out (all the more irksome by the fact that the treatment I received in urgent care didn't help at all and I later learned there was a very effective treatment that wasn't offered to me at the time).

I've been mis-billed for nearly every medical visit in the last few years, always for more than I should owe. I've also had trouble getting the insurance company to process referrals to a specialist, trouble getting anyone to give me a straight answer about what might and might not actually be covered, and so on. These are all examples of the wonderful bureaucracy we all get to enjoy in the current system.

These are just minor complaints and I spend next to nothing for my largely routine medical care (though I am aware my employer pays nearly another 20% of my salary for my medical insurance). I'm just trying to point out that our current system is already rife with those elements that the anti-reformers are arguing will be endemic to any public option. Personally, if the millions of currently uninsured could be privileged enough to deal with these issues, I think they'd probably be thankful.

Man in Space?

2009-07-21T23:21:00.002-04:00

Yesterday was the 40th anniversary of the first time humans walked on the moon. At the time, the achievement was the culmination of intense effort and major technological advances. The event captured the imagination of children and adults worldwide because it inherently changed how we saw ourselves. We believed that we were entering an age of limitless horizons, a technological civilization able to explore beyond our own world. We believed that if we could reach the moon, we could achieve any goal.

On the Colbert Report last night, the physicist Dr. Bob Park argued that we should not continue manned space exploration because vastly more scientific information can be collected more cheaply by robots. With the budgetary constraints placed on NASA, robotic exploration would be the best way to learn more about our physical solar system and universe.

Those of us who were born after the moon landing take near-Earth space travel somewhat for granted. We grew up knowing that the moon was made of rock, with a distinct understanding of what weightlessness in space means and looks like. Certainly images of astronauts bounding across the moon's surface still intrigued us as children, but our conception of ourselves is not truly affected by the possibility of mankind going to Mars. That is why I am somewhat unmoved by the argument that manned missions "capture the imagination" in a way that unmanned missions do not. The only imaginations they really capture are those who wish to themselves go into space, meanwhile many of NASA's currently trained astronauts will never experience space. Americans today take for granted that we could send a man (or woman) to Mars, given enough time, money and energy. NASA seems to be struggling with whether it makes sense to invest these scarce resources in such an endeavor.

However, it must be pointed out that what we might learn by attempting a manned flight to Mars is not fully known. Every new goal we work to achieve will necessarily teach us about ourselves and drive the development of new technologies. That is why we still invest in basic science research and it is why we might still want to consider manned space missions.

I'm not arguing that a manned mission to Mars is the best use of NASA's funds, but I am arguing that what we would learn from such a mission is not necessarily known at this time. It is indeed hard to balance the somewhat quantifiable scientific gains of robotic exploration with the more qualitative and unidentifiable gains of manned expeditions. Of course, if we are going to try to just extend current technologies to reach Mars, we probably won't gain much by sending people there. But, creating new goals for exploration may well be important to drive innovation and further advance our understanding of our universe and ourselves.

High Priest of Song

2009-04-29T20:52:00.008-04:00

I spent an evening a few weeks ago in the presence of the high priest of songwriting, Leonard Cohen. After 15 years away from the stage, about 5 of which were spent at a Zen Buddhist monastery, Cohen was in top form. He began down on one knee in a spot light, singing in his deep, nearly bottomless, voice. His showmanship was excellent, unaffected and almost naïve in his joy at making music. Despite the unfortunate monetary reasons for his tour, he appeared thrilled to be back.

At 75, Cohen is still spry, now down on both knees, now swaying to the beat, now skipping off the stage. He performed for just over three hours, drawing out the encores as an ersatz third set. He covered nearly all of his hits from every decade of his career, mostly maintaining the original interpretations, though he changed a few of the raciest lyrics.

His voice seems to get deeper every year, but when he sang, there was hardly a hint of gravel, which overtakes many smokers' sound. Amazingly, he can still move in the higher register from his youth with apparent ease and smoothness.

Cohen was joined on stage by a group of highly talented musicians and he reveled in them. Much of Cohen's music includes gospel-style backup singers, but to hear him live is to understand that he sees them as singing with him (or perhaps even "over" him, since their voices fill the octaves above his), not behind him. At the end of "Tower of Song" he entreated the three female vocalists to continue repeating their backup "do dum dum" harmony for measure after measure, claiming they were "healing" him.

Along with his songs, Cohen's humor was on full display. He quipped about the myriad antidepressants he has tried over his lifetime. He also made light of his struggle with alcoholism, as a prelude for "That Don't Make It Junk".

Cohen also showcased his fellow musicians, promoting his co-writer and so-called "co-collaborator" Sharon Robinson, who sang "Boogie Street" herself. Late in the show, the Webb sisters sang and played a heart-rending duet of "If It Be Your Will" after Cohen introduced the song and recited the chorus, drawing us to appreciate his lyrics as the poetry they are. Hearing of his struggle to determine whether to meditate or to make music, as we basked in the beauty of his song, I was overcome with gratitude for his choices. I am equally grateful for his continued health - despite the years of smoking that gave him the fathomless deep tones he now produces.

Waving his fedora and holding it to his heart, Cohen acknowledged each member of his band at least three times during the show. His performance was one filled with tenderness and humility. After the final number, the whole group sang an a capella tune, arm's around each other displaying a warmth and camaraderie that can only form when no single person is held above or beyond the others. Cohen then thanked everyone from his sound guy to the truckers and caterers, leaving the impression of a tremendous mensch.

His praise was well-placed, however, as every aspect of the show went off perfectly. The sound was crisp and just the right level to hear every nuance, but still walk away without ringing ears, as is too often the result of a night of rock music. Colored lights set the mood for each song and followed pieces through their many transitions flawlessly and smoothly enough to match, but not overwhelm the music. The whole production was well-crafted to create a sense of intimacy in a large hall.

Overall, it was an honor to hear Cohen perform, to gain a new experience of the words and tunes I knew well, and to spend a few hours in the thrall of great music.

O! President

2008-11-17T07:23:00.003-05:00

I've been too busy to write recently, but in the days before the election I did find time to volunteer for the No on 8 campaign. I'd thought that living in CA, with the state's electoral votes (for now) effectively sewn up in blue, I wouldn't feel that pressing need to spend hours calling strangers on the phone or knocking on doors. But, despite my Marin County aunt's assertions in April that there was no way CA would ban same-sex marriage, the polls were way too close for comfort and there I was, again, dailing away. I guess I waited too long, because the campaign lost and people's rights were taken away.

The passage of Prop 8 (and others like it in 3 other states) really dampened my excitement over Barack Obama's election. While I am in a straight relationship and could marry my boyfriend anytime or place, it pains me to see that a minority can still be discriminated against, by a vote of 52%. Ironically, that is the same percentage of the electorate that Obama won on Nov 4, but in that case, I see a man stepping out from under the history of oppression and discrimination to move us away from those memories. Wow, that last bit is a lot to expect of one man.

In fact, we have all heaped our personal expectations on Obama in a way I've never seen before. Part of this is his invitation to hope. He has asked us to hope and put our faith in him for the change we need. So, we have. Michael Moore strangely suggested that since Obama ran as an anti-war candidate, that if he now increases troop levels in Afghanistan, he would be breaking his campaign promises. I think Moore should have been paying more attention during the campaign, because Obama has never used one lick of pacifist rhetoric. Yes, he was against the war in Iraq, but that's in part because he was for maintaining a war in Afghanistan. He repeatedly promised to do exactly what Moore is now saying he shouldn't.

I think many of us who desperately wants to see the country moving in a new direction have heaped our own expectations on this Presidency. We've forgotten that Obama has already disappointed us idealists. He rejected federal financing of his campaign, once it was clear that he could raise more from small donors (doesn't that phrase call to mind an image of millions of tiny people at tiny computers donating money online?). He voted to renew FISA, lax laws about how and why the government can spy on its people. He hailed the Supreme Court decision that prevents DC from trying to move beyond gun violence. I could go on, but I think the point that he is not going to be all things to all people is made.

However, last night, watching the 60 minutes interview for our new President-elect, I felt a surge of hope. Knowing that he is already working to close Gitmo and end that chapter of torture and inhumanity, I am buoyed to think that Obama might get it mostly right. He might take this economic meltdown as an opportunity to move us toward a clean-energy future. Sure, he'll probably bail out the combustion-engine-or-die Big Three, but hearing him speak with such clarity and intellect, I can hope he will find a way to do that intelligently and with an eye on the future, rather than the past. Yes, he will do things I oppose, but at least I have hope that they will be done based on sound data and reasoning. That is a change that I can believe in.

Adjectivication

2008-08-05T17:30:00.003-04:00

I've heard a number of new, grammatically incorrect, or perhaps correct but still just weird, phrases being used nowadays. I can't be sure, but it seems this has come partly from cable news and sports casters, since they feature this type of language most frequently. I care about how words are used in part because usage often reflects something greater.

My biggest current peeve is the use of nouns as adjectives. It seems like everyone in the media is saying "woman president", though as Grammar Girl points out, no one would say "man president". Instead, normal people would use the word "male" as the adjective.

Using "woman" to describe someone feels like infantilization to me. I know that some references say "woman" can be used as an adjective, but every time I hear someone say "woman golfer" or "woman scientist", I cringe. It's as if the speaker has so little regard for the woman in question, he can't be bothered to figure out the grammatically correct way to refer to her. It says, "this person may be a professional golfer or a world-class scientist, but she is a woman, so don't take her too seriously."

So, don't adjectify! If someone's gender is important enough to merit mention, use an actual adjective.

In Vivo

2008-07-07T17:19:00.002-04:00

I recently attended a meeting that was small, but had a pretty broad scope. I've been to two of these types of meetings, attended both by researchers studying the basic science and those focused on more clinical aspects of the topic. This mix can be very helpful and informative for all attendees, if everyone is willing to listen with an open mind.

I ended up in a conversation with someone on the "other side" of this clinical/basic science divide. I had enjoyed her talk, despite her focus being quite different from my own. In fact, I'd appreciated the opportunity to learn more about some of the more medically relevant aspects of my current field. However, she was complaining that too much of the meeting was focused on the basic research, instead of the more translational or clinical aspects and that she felt out of place (or maybe under-appreciated, despite being invited to give a talk). She also seemed to be deriding the "other side's" mentality with regard to what "in vivo" really means. To biochemists, who are moving from studies in test tubes (usually termed "in vitro"), studies in live cells might be considered "in vivo"; whereas more medically-oriented scientists might only consider a study "in vivo" if whole, live animals are used. Those scientists might even call a study in isolated cells in vitro, thus adding to the confusion and frustration of all.

Piled onto this in vitro/in vivo debate, there were a number of talks by people trying to model the systems of interest with computers (sometimes called in silico). These folks were generally met with contempt by all the researchers who work with the "actual" systems in test tubes, cells, and animals alike! Additionally, those talks were scheduled for an unpopular time slot and were very poorly attended. Of course the modelers generally looked down on the other scientists for their inability or unwillingness to use mathematics. It made for a pretty fractionated group.

Comparing this attitude to my other experience at a similar conference, I was struck by how much the previous meeting had fostered positive interactions among basic researchers and clinicians. There were many M.D.'s at that research meeting and they seemed very excited to learn about the advances in the basic understanding of the system. Similarly, the basic scientists were eager to learn about the new findings in the clinical world. There was a recognition of the interdependence of these types of scientific approaches and a number of collaborations were born out of this meeting.

It seems that recently, as federal funding for science has decreased, I've seen more quarreling among various scientific groups about where the money is going (medical research vs. basic science, or biological science vs. physical sciences, etc.). What seems to be missing sometimes is an appreciation that we are all contributing to the greater overall understanding of our bodies, world, universe, etc. We are all contributing to the improvement of the human experience, just in vastly different ways. It is hard from many of us to see that, though, as we are struggling to maintain funding for our own research. It is also sometimes hard to aside our own narrow intellectual interests to see how our work fits into a larger picture.

I do hope that the next time this meeting is held, the attendees embrace the different approaches to these interesting scientific questions a little more.

Ballot Blahs

2008-06-08T23:12:00.002-04:00

Frustration creeped in this week as I filled out my ballot for the local primary. Since we in California voted in the presidential primary in February, this ballot was thronging with mayoral, local judicial, and state assembly races. And proposals.

I have decided that I hate ballot proposals. As a citizen who loves democracy, it's somewhat surprising that I can hate having a policy put directly to the public. However, ballot proposals are rarely what they seem. They are rarely a simple question of whether you want more money to go to schools. They are written to be intentionally convoluted and they often appear to support an issue, when they are really against it.

This means that even a relatively well-informed person who knows where she stances on the issues will have trouble figuring out which way to vote. Ballot initiatives reflect the state of politics in our country, though. Most initiatives are constructed as a compromise between multiples interested parties. However, unlike the laws hammered out by our politicians, we have no way of knowing what the ultimate outcome will be of voting against a ballot proposal that makes too many compromises.

For instance, in February, California voted on a slew of Native American casino regulations. The main proposals were to allow each of four major tribes to add a huge number of slot machines to existing casinos, the revenue from which would be distributed between the state and a group of other Native American tribes. This proposal was worked out between the major four tribes and the state, but the voter really couldn't tell whether it was fair to the Native tribes concerned, fair to those who were not involved in brokering the deal, or good for the state. The environmental and social impacts of the expanded casinos were dubious as well. So, there seemed to be a lot of compromise involved, but whether the costs were offset by the gains was questionable. What would happen to the tribes and state budget if this initiative were voted down was unclear. Would the tribes be able to re-broker a better deal? Would the environmental impacts of new building be held to higher or lower standards? Without the knowledge of the options on the table, I think it is somewhat unfair to put these measures to voters.

The other type of ballot initiative is the kind that seeks to limit freedoms (recently, abortion and marriage) granted by the constitution and upheld by courts. Apparently, if public sentiment is 50.1% against a personal freedom, even one guaranteed by the constitution, we should all be denied.

Thus, ballot proposals (as they are right now) bug me.

Elitist

2008-05-01T16:04:00.003-04:00

With recent attacks on many aspects of scientific research and education, a new picture of our country is being painted. At least a subsection of the population not only does not value critical thought, but outright resents it. They somehow feel that objective interpretation of data is a threat to them.

One way this anti-intellecualism has manifested itself is in the use of the term "elitist". Being pegged an elitist has become the newest nasty name. Often paired with being "liberal", it seems that an "elitist" is about the worst thing anyone can be nowadays.

Congressman John Duncan (R-TN) displayed this mindset the other day, during a Congressional hearing that exposed the complete failure of abstinence only programs to keep teenagers from having sex (or to decrease the unintended consequences). He said,

“It seems rather elitist to me for people who maybe have degrees in this field to feel that because they’ve studied it somehow they know better than the parents what is best for [their children].”

The Congressman couldn't be clearer that, to him, being well-informed and having the analytical tools to truly comprehend an issue is less important than one's personal beliefs about the issue. It doesn't matter if those beliefs are not based on any data. It doesn't matter if the beliefs lead one far astray of the desired outcome or are in stark contrast to reality. What is important is the belief.

The Mr. Duncan's view is in such contrast to that of reasoned discourse that there is no place for the very basis of scientific understanding in his world. It completely leaves all education and information out in the cold.

This mindset represents very many of the problems in science today. It may have begun with evolution, a quintessential example of a scientific theory, based on hundreds of years of accumulated data, standing in contrast to what people would like to believe, based on religious doctrine. Or it may have sprung from a lack of good basic education, creating a cycle in which the scientifically illiterate propagate illiteracy. Furthermore, as critical thinking becomes the domain of the educated few, the resentment by the many increases. What we now need is a large push against anti-intellectualism, the devaluing of critical analysis and hard data, to right the current course.

Worst for Whom?

2008-04-30T21:40:00.003-04:00

My local radio station repeats the news in brief many times a day, so if I happen to tune in a couple times a day at just the right moments, I will likely hear the same stories multiple times. A few weeks ago I heard, probably five times, that the California legal system is "one of the worst" in the country for businesses. The reporters delivering this bit of news all stressed the "worst" so much and barely even whispered "for businesses", so that the first time I heard it, I actually initially thought this state was bad.

Apparently, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce carries out an annual assessment of this kind of thing. What I want to know is why, if the legal climate is so terrible in California, why does it contribute a full 13% of the total U.S. GDP (according to the International Monetary Fund). Indeed, why is it the largest state economy in the U.S. (and the 7th largest among the free nations)?

What this type of investigation seems to ignore is whether this is good for the people! Apparently, business can handle the expensive lawsuits that aggrieved customers bring in CA. The point of these lawsuits is to prevent businesses from getting away with illegal or dangerous practices. I'd love for the Chamber of Commerce to see whether this 'negative legal climate for business' has led businesses in CA to be more responsible.

Climbing Without a Net

2008-04-04T19:43:00.002-04:00

Having recently read some of Katha Pollitt's essays on the welfare reform (aka Personal Responsibility Act) of the 1990’s, I’ve been thinking about poverty a bit.

I grew up in an upper-middle class family. My parents are both professionals, though neither is the type who makes the huge salaries that, say, a corporate lawyer would. One thing I’ve noticed, in spending time with people of (slightly) different socio-economic backgrounds is that the default assumptions about life and money seem to be different. I’ve always assumed that I would eventually get a job that would allow me the comforts my parents and grandparents had: a house, reliable automobiles, ability to pay for my children’s private educations and extracurricular activities, retirement.

However, I’ve noticed that my friends who grew up in a lower economic class than I do not make these assumptions. Even those who have the same education as I (a professional degree), who are of equal or perhaps greater ability in our chosen professions, and who have as much - if not more - potential for a well-paying professional job do not have this sense of security. Instead, they have a sense that one small mishap could have them sliding down into poverty.

Part of this may be a greater familiarity with just how slippery that slope is, how every perceived boon can become a bust. Part of it is that they anticipate eventually supporting their struggling parents, in addition to themselves and their young families. Certainly, as we are starting out our working lives, they cannot climb the economic ladder as fearlessly, because they do not have a safety net beneath.

As a part of the privileged America, I’m not in contact with many desperately poor people, but I can see that even those in the lower-middle class have a very different experience of the world. I can see how easy it would be to see no way out, to see no hope in leveraging an education to improve one’s situation. People who have been given enough to get started in life are unaware that their privilege tints their view. It’s easy for someone who grew up with books in their home, with parents who provided adequate food, safety, and emotional support, with the idea that wealth was achievable, to wonder why inner city kids don’t just hang up their gang symbols and go to school. It’s harder to wisely take advantage of opportunities, when you’ve started out behind in the game of life.

I wonder what policies the least privileged would enact to give themselves a leg-up?

Biology = Destiny

2008-03-30T08:04:00.002-04:00

Like eating a steak in a fancy restaurant while reading Peter Singer’s arguments for animal rights, I recently read a book of feminist Katha Pollit’s essays, while spending a weekend in a community of ultra-orthodox Jews.

It seems that orthodox religions of all types share one common theme, which is a very strong delineation of gender roles. I had a Mormon once tell me that gender is not a biological phenomenon, but is inherent to your soul. I’m not sure that Judaism goes that far, but there is a strong belief that the genders are inherently different and should live by different rules. (Just two of perhaps a billion examples: men are required to pray three times a day, while women can but do not have to; married women must cover their hair in public, but men do not.)

Not long after this weekend in ultra-orthodox world, I had a beer with a few acquaintances, who are not (to my knowledge) particularly religious. One of the men in the group insisted that men are “better suited” to do certain physically demanding jobs. I pointed out that I know a number of male computer programmers, who were considerably less fit for manual labor than some female athletes. He wouldn’t budge. Biology says men are stronger, period.

Obviously, there are biological differences between men and women: the presence and absence of certain reproductive organs. There are also general trends, like men tend to be taller than women. But, to say only men should change light bulbs, because they are taller, ignores the reality of 6-foot-tall women or men who are 5’3” (I know some of each, so I’m sure they exist). In a recent article in The New York Times Magazine about educating boys and girls separately, Jay Giedd, chief of brain imaging at the Child Psychiatry Branch at N.I.M.H., argued that while there may be general trends indicating differences in girls and boys’ brains, splitting them by gender is no more predictive for learning, than it is for height or other abilities – there will always be some taller girls and shorter boys.

Why are there are still so many people in America today who would rather use gender to make generalizations than recognize the uniqueness of every individual? For such an individualistic society, we are still marginalizing anyone who does not fit neatly into the boxes we have fabricated to contain “female” and “male”. Those born with ambiguous genitalia are the extreme cases, but there are many much milder (or at least less clearly medically-based) and more frequent, examples. At some point, personality and ability must become the real measuring sticks for capability.

Life in Paradise

2008-03-10T19:49:00.000-04:00

I live in paradise. And I don’t much care for it. Maybe I’m wired wrong, or maybe my misery is based in the many extenuating circumstances of my daily life.

When I wake up in the morning, I look out my floor-to-ceiling windows at the horizon where the ocean meets the sky. Palm trees reach upwards like yearning feather-dusters and hummingbirds frequent my feeder all year round. When they’re not on the feeder, the birds chirp proudly from a riot of violently pink bougainvillea just outside my living room.

Despite this warm, flowering landscape, despite the cliffs, beaches, and ocean, I wish I lived somewhere else.

Living in southern California, I’ve become the very antithesis of a weather snob. A place like Michigan comes up in conversation and, shuttering, my companion will point out that "it’s cold there!" I can’t stop my eyes from rolling in reflexive disdain. How lame can a person be, afraid of putting on a coat in the winter? As if scarves and mittens will truly ruin your life.

I miss snow. After the monotony of sunshine and two seasons (socks or no socks), I would gladly trade a thousand sunny days for just one: one magical, gloriously quiet snowy day, fluffy flakes falling on my face, the trees in a shimmering silver coat, the world muffled under white blankets. That day is worth everything.

I miss the rhythm of the world turning in its dance with the sun. Trees sucking the chlorophyll from their leaves, preparing for the cold to come. Tulips pushing tenatiously through the brown, crusty slush of early spring. Then the full-blown riot of life trying to squeeze everything into the short months when the days are long and nights are hot and humid.

Without the seasons changing, I feel unanchored, like a boat floating on a vast, calm sea, with no ripple or shoreline in sight. There is nothing to mark the passing time, almost nothing new to look forward to except more of the same.

“Oh, Boston – it’s cold there!” These people do not know the joy of wool socks. They do not know the sense of belonging in a city because you walk the sidewalks daily. On foot, even strangers are connected, not isolated in the bubble that a vehicle creates. Walking in the winter makes a person appreciate that life is good.

As my father, himself a weather wimp, once said, risking your life every morning, just to clear out your driveway does put things in perspective. I miss perspective.

Leap Year Hopes

2008-03-07T19:10:00.000-05:00

Every four years, we get an extra day. That brief 24-hour span is, for me, a symbol of hope and new opportunities, as well as bitter disappointments. February 29 foreshadows two major events that fall on leap year: the Olympics and US presidential elections.

Since my first memory of the Olympics, I’ve been hooked. Maybe I was lucky to be born in the late ‘70s, in time to watch Mary Lou win the gold medal. I still had newspaper clippings of Retton and Julianne McNamara (gold medalist on bars) decorating my bedroom walls when the ’88 Games came around. The American gymnasts were virtually shut out that year (except Phoebe Mills), but diver Greg Louganis provided plenty of drama and excitment.

The ’96 Olympics brought the American women their first team gold, on home soil, no less. That win was captured by the most indelible moment of Keri Strug’s long elite career. Elated, I walked home after watching that win singing a highly recognizable Queen song.

We all thought we were witnessing the beginning of a lasting US domination, but in 2000 those hopes were dashed as the US didn’t even make it onto the podium. To add insult to injury, all-around hopeful Elise Ray was thwarted by an improperly set vault horse. (Once again, a diving win - Laura Wilkinson’s unlikely gold on 10 m platform - provided a bright spot that year). In gymnastics, the rebound began in 2004 as both men and women took team silver and individual all-around gold. This summer, I’m looking for team gold, too.

Often in Olympic-level gymnastics, we see the two sides of the sport battle it out: power vs. elegance. Mary Lou was the powerhouse to Ekaterina Szabo’s elegance. As the US team has deepend, these rivalries have come between compatriots. In ’92, we saw American fireplug Kim Zmeskal versus lithe, balletic Shannon Miller (though neither won gold that year). At this year’s American Cup, the brawn of Shawn Johnson lost for the first time in major competition to the grace of Nastia Liukin, setting up a battle that will climax in Bejing.

The highs and lows of the Olympics are mirrored in presidential politics. When I was young, I asked my father what the difference was between Democrats and Republicans. He responded that ‘Democrats believe in giving charity, Republicans don’t.’ “Then I’m a Democrat,” I said. At the time, it seemed taxes were the issue, so as explanations suitable for a 9-year old go, Dad did pretty well.

For Democrats, the ‘80s were pretty bleak and the ‘90s brought some desperately needed relief from trickle-down economics. Once again, I’m hoping that 2008 brings relief from this latest plague.

Vaccination frustration

2008-02-21T21:29:00.002-05:00

Eleven children in San Diego have measles, a childhood disease that should have been all but forgotten since the boomers were babies. How did this happen?

None of these children were immunized against this preventable disease. Parents, having read some (sometimes inaccurate) information get scared to vaccinate their children.

Certainly, nothing is 100% safe for everyone. Just like medications, vaccinations do have side effects. However, when polio was ravaging the country, no one doubted that it was worth injecting the attenuated virus into their children, despite the much greater risks than posed by today’s safer, more effective vaccines.

In the age of the Internet, perhaps it is too easy to learn about the minute chance that little Jimmy has an adverse reaction to a vaccine. In addition, there are many theories about the risks of vaccines that do not have scientific evidence to back them up. These potential side effects can certainly be frightening, but they are rarely balanced by considerations of the chances that a child gets the diseases vaccines prevent; diseases responsible for the deaths of many children in previous centuries.

It may seem that there is no longer much risk of contracting these childhood diseases in America. The new cases of measles, however, originated with one child who traveled to Switzerland, bringing the illness back with him. With global travel more accessible than ever, we must be aware that diseases can spread more rapidly, too.

Vaccination is often hailed as the greatest medical advance of the last century. It has eradicated or dramatically reduced some of the most serious diseases we face. This progress is dependent on parents continuing to protect not only their own children, but all people, by vaccination. Without regular childhood vaccination, we are beginning to see epidemics of whooping cough, mumps, as well as the measles. Are small pox, polio, and tetanus next?

The Juno Generation

2008-01-25T13:22:00.000-05:00

In his review of Juno, Fresh Air’s David Edelstein suggested the title character was a new archetype for teenage girls.

Edelstein must not be much of a television-watcher to think that Juno's witty, individualist title character is a completely new phenomenon. Juno is an incarnation of Veronica Mars*, the pixy-sized teen detective with an independent streak and jocular banter that is sometimes straight up and sometimes meant to cover the emotions roiling just under her I-don’t-give-a-damn surface. Throw in a little of Rori Gilmore's rocking side-kick Lane, complete with fast-paced pop culture references and we've seen most everything that defines Juno before. (Never mind that Joss Wheadon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer laid the groundwork for them all.)

This doesn't take anything away from the movie. With her puppy dog eyes and button nose, Ellen Page carries the role of a quirky pregnant teen handily. Her talent has already been recognized with a well-deserved Oscar nomination.

Also on the Oscar short-list is screenwriter Diablo Cody. Many viewers might not remember how independent they felt at age 16, but Cody managed to tap into that experience. Her snappy screenplay feels true, almost comically so.

Juno assumes just the right tone to keep you involved, but slightly detached. It has a vaguely Wes Anderson (Royal Tenenbaums, Rushmore) feel, complete with the use of a colored person - Indian student Vijay - for "color". The movie treads pretty close to the fine line necessary to make a movie about teen pregnancy and broken families fun and funny.

The energetic soundtrack and masterful cartoon cutout opening credits matched the enjoyable lightheartedness of the film. The weakest aspects of the film were the fades to black between scenes. These fadeouts were painfully obvious statements from director Jason Reitman (Thank You for Smoking) explaining exactly what we were supposed to "get" from the scene and thus yanking us out of the story.

Part of what made Juno so real was her relationship to her father (J.K. Simmons) and stepmother (Alison Janney). Janney perfectly captured the complex and difficult love of a stepmother for her teen stepdaughter.

Jason Bateman was convincing as a man who never grew up and couldn't let go of his dreams of rock stardom to grant his wife's dream of motherhood. While Jennifer Garner played some truly wonderful scenes as the yuppy Vanessa Loring, she never portrayed Vanessa's sadness or pain convincingly. Perhaps this is because Reitman and Cody clearly don’t want us to overthink even the most serious issues raised in the movie. Whether that is what makes the movie work or what ruins it is up to you to decide.

*in fact the actor Michael Cera, who's character impregnates Juno, also appeared in an episode of Veronica Mars

Balance of Power

2008-01-21T17:38:00.000-05:00

Women under 40 supposedly don’t like Hilary because they don’t recognize that her struggles as their own. Perhaps that’s because we have stopped struggling. We see ourselves as capable of having nearly any career (though there are still fewer female CEOs than males, fewer female pilots, physics professors, presidents, etc.) and still having a family. We’ve seen it done by our mothers and aunts. We’ve found male partners who (we believe) see us as intellectual equals and who support our career decisions.

So, we’ve just about given up. Thinking we’ve got it all, we’ve stopped short of demanding that our husbands share half the responsibility for our children. As Edward E. Lawler III, co-author of The New American Workplace, said on KPBS’s These Days this morning, “we’ve improved the job opportunities in the US for women more than we’ve improved the willingness of men to share child raising responsibilities.”

I think this is the crux of the issue of balancing work and family. Women are still the main cooks, grocery shoppers, and chauffeurs of the American family. They work the same jobs at 70% the pay and they still have to create the home environment. To me, this is largely because women feel obligated to get these things done. They don’t want to eat mac & cheese or frozen pizza every night and aren’t OK with feeding it to their families. Men might not want these things, per say, but they seem much more willing to accept them. I’m speaking here from my experience with bachelors and divorced men, who as a general rule seem content to live in a way that women generally don’t tolerate.

Now that I’ve said all of this, I should point out that I hate gender generalizations. I hate them because half of the time I don’t fit into the accepted “feminine” category. Mostly I hate them because they are an excuse for why women shouldn’t be treated as equally capable. They point to genetic or other biological differences in the sexes and say “this is why women weaker.” I’m doing the opposite here (and I don’t mean that I’m picking on men instead of women). I’m pointing out that women have been trained, by society, by our mothers and grandmothers, fathers and grandfathers, to feel obligated to take care of the house and kids, no matter what else is going on, while men have been taught that it’s okay to sit on the couch while the women do the cooking and cleaning.

We’re taught this from a young age. Little girls are given baby dolls and cooking sets, teenage girls are expected to help out in the kitchen. Women in their 20’s congregate in the kitchen while the men watch TV on Thanksgiving, waiting to be served the grand meal.

I am reminded of a statement my friend J made about affirmative action. He pointed out that if we truly believe in giving African Americans their share of power, white men must by definition give up some power. J is a very equality-minded guy, so he included women his discussion of the power imbalance. Of course, J was talking about the need for changes in the workplace and college admissions offices. I’m talking about finding a balance of power at home in order to support women’s gains of power at work.

As long as the idea of paternity leave is laughable (as it apparently is to someone at my workplace), women will not be able to achieve true equality in the workplace. It has been documented that women with children are less desirable on the job market than either single women or men with children. Employers implicitly place the added work of a household on women, and we haven’t struggled to place it anywhere else.

Kidney for Sale

2007-12-27T20:13:00.000-05:00

I‘ve seen a number of stories about kidney donation recently. Kidneys are somewhat unique among organs because the donor can be alive. Since we have two kidneys, we can give one away and still go on our merry way. There are a few other bits of the body – liver, lungs, and bone marrow – that we can also donate safely.

In the US it is illegal to buy an organ from a donor. Donors are expected to give the organ for no compensation, except medical and travel expenses associated with the transplant. The waiting lists for organ donation are long and many people spend years plugged into a dialysis machine for many hours a day before their names come to the top.

For those who have the means to buy a kidney, this seems frustratingly unfair. Why rely on people’s sense of altruism when the recipient could simply compensate the donor for their organ? Also, being able to pay back the donor in some way relieves the sense of debt that organ recipients often feel. I understand these sentiments. The problem with this scheme is that only people with the money would get the organs. Few people would just give their kidney away if they can get a few grand (or more) for it.

To work around the problem of only rich people having access, the government could pay donors for their organs. But this still leaves considerable ethical questions open. For instance, it targets people who most need money as ‘donors’. Paid donors might only be donating out of desperation for money. I picture whole families of poor or unemployed people donating their body parts just to pay the rent. While I agree that it would increase the number of available organs and save lives, I’m not sure that the end justifies the means.

Yet, it seems that people who donate organs should be compensated, since they are doing something that helps someone else tremendously. The way it is now, they get nothing but a sense of doing the “right” thing (and maybe the ability to lord their generosity over the recipient forever). However, I don’t see how you can compensate without creating an incentive that is inherently inequitable. That’s the main problem with compensation, it would only really be an incentive to those who are in need.

Instead, we need to start a trend of live organ donation, just like many people give blood. Perhaps we should encourage everyone to consider donating a kidney if they’ve reached age 35 or 40 without major health problems. If it became standard practice for everyone to assess their ability to donate a kidney (or other tissue or organ), more people would do it.

Toxic Plastic

2007-12-21T20:38:00.000-05:00

About four years ago, I bought a blue, wide-mouth polycarbonate bottle at the outdoor sporting store down the street from my work. These bottles were becoming popular and I thought it would be useful. The wide mouth allows me to drink out of it just like a regular glass, allows for easy cleaning and ice cube entry (though it proves difficult in moving vehicles!). The cap seals tightly, too, so never worry about it leaking in my bag. I thought the best feature of all was the polycarbonate plastic, which appeared to be very durable and doesn’t absorb flavors or odors, so water tastes just like water. Plus, I figured that if Nalgene could be trusted to make plastics that do not contaminate my laboratory samples, the plastic in the water bottle is maybe a bit ‘cleaner’ than soft plastic bottles.

Apparently, I was wrong. After drinking nearly liter a day from this bottle for years, I recently learned that these polycarbonate bottles leach bisphenol-A, an endocrine-disrupting chemical, into water. Tests on rodents have shown major health problems linked to bisphenol-A and drinking from polycarbonate bottles under certain circumstances. Cancer, Down’s syndrome, and pregnancy complications are just a few of the health problems associated with bisphenol-A.

The same day that I learned about bisphenol-A, I also learned that many soft plastics, including those in children’s toys, have pthalates in them. This class of chemicals also works on the endocrine system, and has been shown to flow out of the plastic into the air, where they are inhaled and cause health problems. Supposedly, there are no pthalates in soft plastic water bottles, but I am not so confident in the regulation of toxins in our products anymore. It seems that many toxins are given a pass, even when they are known to be harmful at the levels they are present in consumer products. In the European Union, pthalates have already been outlawed, along with a host of other hazardous chemicals that we still use in the U.S.

A few days after learning about toxic plastics, I learned that byproducts like dioxin concentrate in breast milk, in part because of the fatty content of milk. While breast milk carries superior nutrition and many immunological benefits to an infant, poison probably isn’t one of them. Authorities say that breastfeeding is still superior to formula, especially since making baby formula, like most production activities, actually increases the amount of toxins (and greenhouse gasses) in the environment.

Meanwhile, the city I live in just started pouring fluoride into the water, despite the scientific evidence that links fluoride ingestion to decreases in IQ, altered behavior in animals, and altered thyroid function. In fact, it is known that the dental benefits of fluoride are from topical applications, which can be provided by toothpaste. But, San Diego still wants us to drink it.

I think I’m sharing the frustration of those whose pets were poisoned by the combination of melamine and cyanuric acid in their food, or those whose kids have been poisoned by lead in their toys’ paint. It seems that nothing is safe. We’re chalk full of flame-retardants and other carcinogens and there’s no escape.

I can eat organic apples and avoid recombinant bovine growth hormone in my milk, but if I can’t find a non-leaded glass out of which to drink the milk, where am I?

I guess the best any of us can do is avoid the toxins we know about and try to stay informed of new developments. But it’s certainly frustrating to feel like we can’t control our own exposure.

The Mixer

2007-11-30T16:04:00.000-05:00

The KitchenAid mixer. That hallowed appliance hulking in the kitchen corner of my childhood memories. The magical machine that turns a soupy egg into stiff, frothing white peaks in minutes. The brownie maker, with a metal whisk dripping in chocolate batter, ready to be licked clean by my brother and me.

The mixer has always held special significance for me. Owning one meant you were an adult. My grandmother got hers as a wedding gift. But, instead of settling for whichever brand her sister would buy, she took the money intended for the gift and added to it to buy the best brand, the KitchenAid, which runs to this day, some 60 odd years later.

My mother has a mixer that is nearly identical to her mother’s. One of these was repaired and repainted by my grandfather, an engineer who could fix anything. Both are the shade of yellow that was fashionable in the early 70’s, a color that no one would think was a good theme on which to base an entire kitchen, anymore.

The cost of this small appliance was high enough - especially thirty years ago - that most women I know got one when they got married. Perhaps the subtext was, “now that you are starting a family, you must bake.” Or at least, “birthday cakes should be made easier with an electric helper.”

I had always assumed that I would get a mixer when I tied the knot, like my mother and her mother before her. But, when I turned 30, with no wedding plans in sight, my mother offered me a mixer for my birthday. I hesitated, feeling somewhat unworthy, and dreading moving yet another heavy box out of this apartment to the next place in the long line I’ve traced across the country.

As a girl, I’d never been interesting in cooking. I rarely helped my mother in the kitchen and in high school my main source of calories and nutrients was cereal. Once I left the college cafeteria, I started to try to reproduce my mother’s dishes, but was frustrated by her idea of a recipe: a little of this, some of that, cook until it ‘looks done’. It was only after buying a few cookbooks of quick, simple recipes that I started to come into my own in the kitchen. Since then I have become both a food snob and a local produce junkie.

Yet, I held out on this last bastion, this last appliance that for me has always been about married women. Perhaps it was a mistake to tie the mixer to my marital state in my mind. As if the legality of my long-term relationship somehow entitles me to own a nice piece of kitchen equipment. Maybe the mixer is just about being grown up enough to own expensive household items. In that case, why didn’t I break out into hives over buying my fancy stereo receiver, CD disc changer, and speakers? Or the new car I bought when I started graduate school? Those purchases were easy, but even after I began cooking in earnest I wouldn’t buy myself a nice set of knives, despite the pain and frustration caused by my blunt hand-me-downs. It was my mother who bought me good knives, after listening to me whine for a few months.

I am a feminist, struggling for equality in my career and household chores. But I am still mistress of my kitchen, ruling over boyfriend and cat with an iron fist. I oscillate between pride in consciously and healthfully feeding my household, such as it is, and bewilderment that I’ve ended up as the woman in the kitchen (barefoot, no less) while my boyfriend watches football (though I am listening to the game, too).

Just a few days ago, a shiny black KitchenAid mixer arrived on my doorstep. I unpacked it with reverence and placed it in a freshly cleared spot on my counter. I can’t wait to make brownies.

No Country for Old Men

2007-11-20T22:00:00.000-05:00

The newest film from Ethan and Joel Cohen (Millers' Crossing, Raising Arizona, Fargo, The Big Lewbowski, Oh Brother Where Art Thou) reflects everything that these brothers do best. It takes cliché characters - the weathered old sheriff, the serial killer, Texas trailer-trash - and makes them feel fresh and real. The story-line and many aspects of the plot have some glaring flaws, but the intensity of the action and suspense drive the movie forward and help you overlook the problems.

Set in the 1980's Llewelyn Moss stumbles across the dead bodies and a satchel of cash from a drug-deal gone wrong, but the owners of the cash aren't about to let him walk away with it. The standard scenes in hotel rooms abound, including the nearly requisite one with a naked man tweezing shot out of his bloody leg.

Tommy Lee Jones, though seemingly type-cast as the tired west Texas sheriff, pulls off a convincing and captivating performance. Javier Bardem's pompadoured killer is creepy and convincing despite the all-too-familiar character: a man whose moral code is strict, if much different from our own. Josh Brolin is compelling even as his character, Moss, takes the most questionable actions, driven by dubious motives, to move the story forward. Some of the better moments are the ones Moss shares with his wife, played adeptly by Kelly Macdonald. Not surprisingly, Woody Harrelson's brief screen-time brings just a touch of levity, while maintaining the overarching tension.

The Cohen brothers work their magic to give interest and entertainment to what could have been a tired story and overused characters. The masterful camerawork captures expansive views of West Texas and injects suspense into the quietest moments. The sparsity and the arrowpoint accuracy of the dialog interesting characters who bring the clichés to life. The dialog also sparks up just a few glints of humor, welcome witticisms that relieve the tension for those of us not ready to actually watch a series of cold-blooded murders. This isn't a comedy or even a black comedy, but the Cohens don't try to make you empathize much with their victims, either.

The opening monologue and ending are an apparent attempt to analyze violence and crime in our modern society, but the point doesn't seem to come home. It seems as if the movie makers wanted to include these themes from the book, but resisted giving them much weight. This makes the narration by the sheriff at the beginning and end feel a bit out of step with the rest of the movie, except as a bonus cliché - one that the Cohen brothers have used to good effect before.

While this movie isn't even the best one from the Cohens, it's worth a watch.

Revenge of the Amateur

2007-10-17T01:15:00.000-04:00

I don’t totally disagree with Andrew Keen, author of "The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet is Killing Our Culture.” Blogs that are just compilations of news stories gathered from other sources, without crediting or directing the reader to the source, or “news” that the blogger made up, are indeed problematic. Generally, news should come from reputable journalists in the field*.

However, I believe it is good that the Internet is a publicly accessible platform for voices that would otherwise not be heard. I have a few favorite examples. The first is Grammar Girl, Mignon Fogarty, a technical writer with a panache for explaining grammar. Long before she had ad revenues, she produced a very professional podcast of short grammar lessons. GG’s podcast has brought grammar to those not in the know and is now widely used as a teaching tool in classrooms. If all media were controlled by corporations aiming to make money, GG’s podcast would never have been made (who knew a podcast about grammar would be so popular?!). The equalizing nature of Internet made GG’s success possible.

Perhaps an even better example is one of my favorite blogs, FemaleScienceProfessor. It is written by - you guessed it – a female science professor, who is tenured at a large research institution. Despite avidly reading her blog, I don’t know which institution, nor do I know her field of science. This anonymity, afforded by the Internet, allows her to be completely honest about her daily professional experiences. She gives us a rare glimpse into the nitty-gritty of academic life, from the perspective of one of the few established women in the physical sciences. For those in science considering academic positions, the view into her world is illuminating, allowing us to better understand the challenges and joys we would face.

Finally, I must point to the Brain Food Podcast, a terrific science production by Kyle Butler. From what I understand Kyle made this podcast as a college student because he enjoyed explaining science to others. While not yet an “expert”, compared to Nobel Laureates, members of the National Academy, or Pulitzer Prize winning science writers, Kyle was a great podcast host, giving accurate and interesting scientific information to the public. My favorite part of Kyle’s show was when he answered science questions that were posed by listeners.

These are just a few examples of why Keen is wrong. You do not have to be an expert to provide worthwhile, accurate, and interesting information. Since the mainstream media are figuring out how to use the Internet for their own purposes, the presence of a few amateurs is unlikely to bring about the news apocalypse Keen predicts.

Plus, sometimes a video of a skateboarding dog is just what you need.

*Regarding bias in reporting, I will merely point out that plenty of professional ‘news’ outlets spin and twist the facts to suit their corporate owners’ politics. Loss of journalistic integrity began long before the Internet. Furthermore, while the Internet may allow people to avoid opinions with which they disagree, it isn't the only medium that offers such narrow views.

Why the Odyssey Phase

2007-10-10T15:13:00.001-04:00

An interesting Op-Ed in The New York Times said that people in their 20’s and early 30’s are in a different phase of life than the baby boomers were at the same age. This has been termed the “odyssey” phase, characterized by wandering - wandering into and out of jobs, school, and romances.

The article briefly touched on the reasons for this wandering. I think many in the odyssey phase find themselves there out of necessity, due to the long training required for their chosen careers. I know that in my field of science, postdoctoral work was unheard of a few decades ago. Then a few people began doing further research after receiving their Ph.D.s. To remain competitive, others also had to do a ‘postdoc’. Soon it became the norm. As competition and expectations increased, the length of the postdoc grew from one or two years to four or five years.

Postdocs are generally expected to work at a different institution from where they earned their graduate degree. Addtionally, very few institutions grant faculty positions to graduated students or postdocs who have trained at that institution. Therefore, one is expected to move at least 3 times, often across the country. These expectations contribute to the length of time that one is in a transitional period, career-wise, and thus less able to settle down in other areas of life. Science may be an extreme example, but almost every field is becoming increasingly competitive, leading to longer training periods.

Another factor contributing to the odyssey phase is that we spend so much of our adolescence working hard in school and extracurricular activities, competing for college acceptance, that we have not had as much time to explore our social interactions. We are wary of marrying too young, fearing the high divorce rate of our parents. In previous generations, social norms did not allow people to wait or to live together before marriage. Our generation has been encouraged to ‘figure out who we are’ before committing to another person, but as the time to establish a career drags out, so does our identity crisis.

Finally, in years past, a new couple could afford to buy a home, based on their starting salaries. Today, the median house price is well over $200,000 and in places like California, the median is over $500,000. These costs make it harder for a couple to feel financially secure enough to start a family.

We live longer now, allowing for the addition of an “active retirement” phase, before “old age.” So, postponing ‘adulthood’ for a decade does not necessarily have adverse impacts on our long-term goals, since middle age is being shifted, as well. The main problem with postponing adulthood is that some aspect of our bodies’ biology have not shifted quite as much. Women still go into menopause at about 50, and even before that, difficulties in conception and complications in pregnancy increase in the 30’s and 40’s. Often ignored, older men also have higher risks of passing on genetic disorders and can have lower fertility.

It is clear that the odyssey phase is getting longer, for some by choice, but some generation Xers are stuck in it whether they like it or not.

Waste not want not

2007-09-05T17:37:00.000-04:00

I do not have a green thumb. I've recently killed a basil plant and all of my morning glories. My parsley have been stuck at 3 inches tall for over a year. I am constantly wondering whether I'm over-watering or under-watering. Are my plants hungry for some nutrient that isn't in their pots? If they are, what should I feed them? Since I tend to eat organic produce, I really don't want to buy synthetic fertilizer for my plants. I would like to feed my plants something natural and organic, but I no longer have a compost of my own (I was forced to give up my worm bin).

The Whole Foods store near me currently has a section of fertilizers, but some are for lawns and others are for African violets and I have no idea what's what. Plus, they all claim to be natural or organic or great for the world, but I have no idea what the stuff is or where it really came from.

Rather, I didn't until I heard a story on NPR the other day. The story goes something like this: Princeton students were trying unsuccessfully to grow marijuana in their dorms rooms. Finally, one of them tries adding worm castings (aka worm poop), to the pot and voila, the plants are thriving! So, the students drop out of school and start a worm casting business called Terracycle. They sell the tea (liquid) from the worm castings in reused soda bottles collected from schools and other charities (who get a few cents per bottle in return for their collection efforts). Though they haven't yet made a profit, it's all going great. Enter Scotts-MiracleGro.

Scotts-Miracle Gro is suing Terracycle for, among other things, claiming to be better than "a leading synthetic plant food" and having a green and yellow label with a circle and a picture of flowers on it. Now, I agree that companies should have to validate their claims with scientific evidence, but considering that Terracycle, a small company of some 45 employees, is working with Rutgers University agricultural school, it seems likely that they can substantiate their claims.

However, if Terracycle, with effectively no marketshare and few resources, loses the lawsuit to Scotts-Miracle Gro, with $132.7 million in annual profits (not sales, profits), the already tiny eco-conscious plant food market will be even that much smaller.

So, if your plants are hungry, feed them some Terracycle worm tea and support the kind of company that is trying to make something useful from waste, rather than the other way around. Buying good stuff from good companies is the only way that we consumers can encourage goodness in the marketplace.

Democratic YouTube debate

2007-07-24T19:01:00.000-04:00

Last night was another debate for the Democratic presidential primary, sponsored by YouTube and CNN. The questions were all chosen from those submitted by people on YouTube, some addressed to particular candidates and some more general. This format may draw more young people into the political process, but it also gave the affair an undeserved air of citizen participation.

While the questions were presumably posed by regular citizens, CNN and/or YouTube chose the questions. Like every other aspect of the debate, the questions reflected the power that the mainstream media has over the election process. A number of questions dealt with race or gender, as if to point out that the Dems have a few minority candidates, in case no one has noticed yet. Candidates were asked at least twice to demonstrate how they are different from the stereotypical politician, which was difficult for nearly all of them, since they are in fact politicians. There were a reasonable number of questions about Iraq and even one about Darfur.

Notably absent were questions about the environment, health care, or education. The later two issues were specifically raised by the candidates in response to other questions. For instance, Edwards pointed to his plans for education and health care to showcase his commitment to ending poverty, the centerpiece of his campaign. Clinton also brought up the importance of access to healthcare as proof of her advocacy for women. Obama mentioned education funding as a stand-in for reparations to blacks for slavery. Despite the widely acknowledged threat of global climate change, the environment was not mentioned once.

Not only were the chosen YouTube questions a reflection of what CNN deems important, so was the placement of the candidates on the stage. Clinton, Obama, and Edwards took center stage, flanked by Biden, Chris Dodd and Bill Richardson. On the far ends of the stage stood Senator Mike Gravel and Congressman Denis Kucinich. This allowed the 'main' candidates - those who have raised the most money or have the greatest name recognition - to be in the camera's view the most. This arrangement seem rife with intentional metaphor (the idea that Gravel is the most right-leaning and Kucinich the farthest to the left of all the candidates). It also passed the not-so-subliminal message that only the candidates in the middle matter.

The number of questions asked of each candidate and times allowed for response reflected the same message. This was so apparent that moderator Anderson Cooper did not even attempt to argue when Gravel pointed out how little time he had to speak compared with the others (he and Kucinich spoke half as frequently and had half as much time per response compared to the top three in the polls). Additionally, while the candidates were all asked to make YouTube style videos, only those from the top three candidates, along with Chris Dodd's humorous "white hair" sketch, were shown on CNN during the coverage (at least the replayed Pacific Time coverage I watched).

The debates are supposed to be a way to showcase the candidates, allowing voters a chance to get to know their positions. Considering how much more press coverage the candidates who raise the most money get - thus increasing the amount of money they are likely to receive in the future - it is completely unreasonable to focus so exclusively on them during the debates. This hands even more influence to those with money and further diminishes the voices of the people themselves.

The press do not exclude only the Democratic presidential candidates deemed to be less electable, Republican candidates are treated with the same inequality. Indeed, last weekend the New York Times magazine ran a profile of Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul. The article did not just paint him as the radical that he admittedly is, it specifically stated that he cannot and will not be elected. This type of prophecy is self-fullfilling. It is not up to the press to decide and dictate which candidate will win. Their job is to tell us who the candidates are and what their positions are. Perhaps how much money a candidate has raised is newsworthy, but it should not dictate who gets media attention and who does not.

Does Corn Slow Metabolism?

2007-07-22T11:31:00.000-04:00

Corn (maize) takes up a greater amount of the heavier carbon isotope ¹³C from the atmosphere than the predominant ¹²C isotope in the form of CO₂, compared to most other plants*. I’m not sure why, but perhaps it’s because the corn wants to grow faster and therefore doesn’t discriminate as much in its carbon, but there is probably a good reason that most plants actually specifically avoid taking up ¹³C from the air.

It has also been very well established that the rate of chemical reactions (in the body or in a test tube) can be slowed by the presence of a heavier isotope in the starting materials. For instance, if I am trying to break the chemical bond between a ¹²C atom and ¹³C atom, it would break slightly more slowly than would a bond between two ¹²C atoms (and a bond between two ¹³C atoms, even more slowly).

I worked in a lab when I was an undergraduate in which we would make proteins that had nearly 100% ¹³C instead of ¹²C because it allowed us to study those proteins using certain biophysical techniques. We often joked that it would neat to eat a muffin in which all of the carbon was ¹³C. My advisor at the time suggested that it would slow down our metabolisms, perhaps to our detriment.

Studies have shown that Americans have a greater percentage of ¹³C in our bodies than even Mexicans, who call themselves "the people of corn”, because our diets are so heavily based on corn (for more on this, read the first third of “The Omnivore’s Dilemma”). So, I wonder whether the enrichment of ¹³C in the molecules of our bodies is affecting our metabolism in any way. I don’t know that anyone has studied it. There are clear indications that people who eat the highly processed foods that are largely corn-derived are at a higher risk of developing obesity, but that phenomenon is probably more related to the fact that they take in many more calories with far less fiber or nutritional value than humans evolved to do. Additionally, the difference in the rates of chemical reactions involving ¹³C is so small (generally >1.5%) that it probably makes no difference until a large percentage of your total carbon is ¹³C. So, I guess as long as corn can thrive on slightly higher ratios of ¹³C, so can we.

* In case you don’t remember high school chemistry, every atom is made up of electrons (negatively charged sub-atomic particles) that move around a nucleus of protons (positively charged and much more massive) and neutrons (neutral in charge with a similar mass to protons). Each element has an atom with a particular number of protons, but the number of neutrons in the nucleus is actually variable and affects the mass of the atom. Most (~99%) carbon atoms on earth have 6 protons and 6 neutrons, for an overall mass of number 12 (called ¹²C, pronounced "cee twelve"), but about 1% of the earth’s carbon atoms have 7 neutrons and therefore a mass of 13 (called ¹³C). As an aside, carbon dating is based on the radioactive carbon isotope ¹⁴C, which – you guessed it – has 8 neutrons.

Price of a Publication

2007-07-18T19:45:00.000-04:00

My stepsister recently did a century bike ride to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. She raised $4,210 for the Society and really enjoyed her experience. She wants me and our parents to do the ride together next year, which sounds like a lot of fun, but I am not sure I can raise that much money, since most of my friends are graduate students or postdocs who don't make much money.

This got me thinking about how much even a single publication on a single research project costs to produce. That is, how much does it cost to have someone complete enough of a research project to publish the results as a cohesive story?

To find out, I did a back-of-the-envelope (in this case, a piece of scrap paper, actually) calculation based on my own experience. Tuition for a single graduate student for 5.5 years of school is probably about $47,500. That student probably got paid an average of $20,000 a year, which is $110,000 total. They also had health benefits at something like $240 per month, bringing our cost of one student to around $173,200 for their entire graduate career. Postdocs cost about the same per year since they get paid more, but there are no tuition costs for them. So, not including the cost of reagents, equipment, or overhead for the lab space and other facilities, assuming that an average graduate student publishes 3.5 manuscripts, the people-power for a single paper costs about $50,000.

Another way to do this calculation would be to go based on the amount of the average NIH grant (R01): $250,000 a year to the principal investigator (PI), and something like another 50% to the institution for overhead (the requirements vary at different institutions, between ~36 - 80%). If the average PI publishes four papers a year on topics covered by a given grant, each paper costs on average $125,000. Now, some PI's publish much more than that, but I'm assuming that most PI's who publish a lot more often have multiple grants funding a number of different projects.

A single publication is generally not going to cure cancer or any other disease. In fact, while this is an interesting exercise, how many papers are published in a field is not directly relevant to our ability to apply that scientific knowledge to a disease or technology. I just wanted to demonstrate why the societies that raise money to fund biomedical research need SO much money.

Live Earth Concert

2007-07-08T16:33:00.000-04:00

Much like Bono’s Product Red campaign for aid to Africa, I think that Live Earth is a basically good idea. However, it is a campaign that fits comfortably into our consumerist (and celebrity-obsessed) society. There are a number of ironies in both campaigns.

Bono’s campaign was about us buying products to raise money to help people in Africa. What’s ironic about this is that most of the products are made in China and other third-world countries, presumably with low wage and child labor, for a campaign meant to benefit third-world countries. According to the label some of the product red shirts were made in South Africa, which isn’t third world, but iPods are produced in China, though perhaps the tech factories in China aren’t quite like The Gap’s sweatshops there. The Product Red campaign probably did do some good, but it failed to ask those of us in the “first world” to think much about how our actions as consumers affect people in the rest of the world. At least one of the problems with this type of omission is that our actions can and often do perpetuate the poverty of others.

The average consumer of the Red products, however, weren’t necessarily driven by concern for Africa as much as an urge to be “cool”, by wearing the clothes they saw on their favorite celebrities. The montage of larger-than life posters of celebrities draped in Product Red clothing may have driven sales of these products more than any social conscience on the part of the consumer.

Similarly, yesterday’s Live Earth was a parade of celebrities throwing their hats into the ring of environmental activism. The event was an impressive 7-continent concert, played in 11 cities. According to Al Gore, they had the largest concert audience in history, including those who watched on television and online. Viewers and attendees were encouraged to take The Pledge to commit to a few simple actions that would decrease their carbon footprint. The actions covered by The Pledge were riding public transportation or carpooling at least once per week, changing four regular light bulbs to CFLs, shopping for the most energy efficient electronics and appliances, and turning off equipment and lights when they are not in use. These are all nice gestures and if everyone in the world took these actions, there probably would be a noticeable impact. The problem is that none of them ask for any changes in the way we live our lives. Some of these steps actually encourage consuming more goods than we would otherwise.

The television coverage included short pre-commercial animations informing viewers of ways they can reduce their impact on the environment. These suggestions were similar to The Pledge, including the pervasive push to change your incandescent light bulbs to CFLs (a suggestion mentioned at least 5 times throughout the TV coverage) and to buy hybrid vehicles and other energy-saving appliances. There were a few sparing non- (or perhaps even anti-) consumerism messages, decreasing plastic bag usage being the most emphasized. These actions are all pretty good pro-environment steps to take, but they fall within the mainstream message that we don’t have to make more than the smallest changes in our lifestyles to overcome global climate change. Nowhere did we see messages about the huge negative impact of conventional agriculture on the earth. Nor was there mention of the fact that the average item in the grocery store travels 1,500 miles to get there, therefore eating locally will dramatically reduce your carbon footprint. There was no message about the contribution of cows raised for beef and dairy to global greenhouse gases, propagated by our insatiable appetite for BigMacs. These ideas are available somewhere on the Live Earth website, but for the average attendee or viewer, only the baby steps of environmentalism were on display.

Perhaps Live Earth’s approach of suggesting minor and easy changes one can make to save the world is a smart and deliberate one. They are more likely to bring in a wide range of people who can live with these small shifts, thus sewing a seed of consideration for their environmental impact in many more minds.

This is probably the reason for the procession of celebrities talking up their own interest in the environment. Our celebrity-obsessed culture gives their opinions a much greater importance than other people. It also may attract unlikely viewers who lack an innate interest in the environment.

The result, though, is the ironic of participation by rappers Ludacris and Kanye West, whose musical genre often centers on conspicuous consumption with little regard for the environmental or social impact of such a lifestyle. A number of other featured artists such as Madonna, who owns half a dozen homes in London and purportedly lives in one that has at least 8 bedrooms, embody the kind of large carbon-footprint lifestyle that cannot be offset by simply playing a concert promoting environmentalism.

A few celebs lived up to this irony. When NBC host Carson Daly tried to talk up Dave Matthews’ “green” tour bus, Matthews was quick to point out that while the bus does run on biodiesel, derived from growing matter rather than fossil fuels, that it still spews carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Similarly, when Cameron Diaz was praised by the Daly for being “one of the first people” to buy a hybrid car, she modestly stated that she merely bought a first generation hybrid. (Although, perhaps she was just scared of being labeled an environazi.)

Al Gore urged NBC host Ann Curry to look at Live Earth as “the launch” of a new globabl effort to fight global climate change. From that perspective, the event took a baby step toward a more environmentally conscious world.

Minks are animals, too!

2007-06-20T20:17:00.001-04:00

Apparently, the European Union is proposing to ban the trade of cat and dog fur. This is already illegal in the US, but not in Canada. Now, I can see how the idea of wearing a German Shepard coat or a brown tabby
muff might be upsetting to many people, especially in the Western world. I personally haven't ever bought anything made of fur (at least that I know of!) and I find the whole idea of fur repulsive (except perhaps in Alaska or places where it's truly too cold for other materials to keep you warm). But, I think that banning fur only from those animals that are most commonly found as pets in North America and Europe is more than a little strange.

Why is it okay for a mink to be raised and slaughtered for its pelt, but not a dog? This is much like the constructs we build around our meat-eating habits (I am a vegetarian, so I mean "we" in a general sense). Most Americans are fine with eating pork, ham, or bacon, even though pigs are generally considered at least as intelligent as dogs (and some people do keep them as pets - I wonder how many of those folks eat pork?). We have built up an imaginary wall between the animals that we eat or wear and those we keep as companions.

In the end, every step toward not skinning animals just to make a fashion statement is a good one. However, we shouldn't stop at dogs and cats.

GMO Project

2007-03-25T17:07:00.000-04:00

In the early 1940’s some of America’s foremost physicists and engineers worked feverishly on a new project. This project built upon the previous few decades’ burgeoning understanding of the atom, its composition and character. While the Manhattan project scientists undoubtedly were quite aware that they were working to build a massively destructive weapon, but it was not until the first nuclear explosion that they realized what they had created. That scientific pursuit culminated in the devastation of two Japanese cities, killing ~215,000 people. The effects of the atomic bomb did not end there, leading to the Cold War, and now nuclear proliferation threats as international power plays.

The atomic bomb was created because we could. We had just reached a sophisticated understanding of the atom’s structure, the quantum theory of electrons, the particles that compose the nucleus, the nature of chemical bonds and radiation. Human nature and curiosity (combined with the threat of Nazi Germany) drove us to make the bomb, playing with our newfound knowledge. We made the bomb, in large part, because we could.

Today we stand on the cusp of yet another devastating technological step that could change the shape of our world. Since the discovery of DNA as the genetic material, we have learned to interpret and manipulate genes. Now expressing a human gene in a bacterium is a simple matter and takes only a few days of work and expressing it in a mouse takes merely a few months. These abilities allow for research in the biological sciences to proceed much more rapidly than ever before. However, like the Manhattan Project, these technologies can be used in ways that may ravage our natural world. We put new genes into our corn and rice, believing that we are improving upon nature – making super-crops that will feed the world. But, nature is a complex system with checks and balances that we seem only to recognize once they have been destabilized. For all we understand about the building blocks of life, one of the few things we do know about ecosystems is that they evolved to maintain an equilibrium – the right number of herbivorous bugs to keep the grasses in check, the right number of carnivorous bugs to keep the herbivores in check, the right number of soil microbes and plants species and rabbits and deer and wolves.

One of the test explosions of genetic modification was the controversy over monarch butterflies. Some research has suggested that the expression in corn of a compound toxic to insects may affect insects, like monarch butterflies, that do not even eat the corn. These types of results, along with potential emergence of super-bugs, insects that are resistant to the toxin, much the way that antibiotic use as created resistant strains of bacteria, should stand as the warning that we should not create technologies just because we can. Science is the pursuit of understanding, not the pursuit of power. We should rein in our urge to change the world before we truly recognize the large-scale and long-term consequences of our actions.

The Economy is Doing Great!

2007-02-06T15:29:00.000-05:00

Last week, Mr. Bush went to Wall Street to trumpet the great state of our economy. As the Dow sets records left and right, Bush seems to be slowly struggling to understand why Americans are not jumping for joy. Why haven’t we caught on to the fact that he is presiding over a great economy?

Probably because we hear from the same economists who bring us glad tidings of 3.5 percent growth in the last quarter of 2006 warning about the ever-growing record national debt (now about $8.7 trillion), propped up by foreign investments that could be pulled out from under us at any moment. They also warn us about record federal deficit, inflation, the deflating housing market, and the imminent retirement of the baby boomers.

Bush did recognize that most of the recent records, including the recently reported profits of Exxon, don’t seem to be ‘trickling down’, as he’d have hoped. He did point out the staggering gap between CEO and worker’s salaries, but neither he nor the media seem to recognize that to a worker earning the median household income of $46,000 per year, both the President’s “measly” $400,000 salary and the average CEO’s $400 million spell a comfortable life with many perks, while many Americans struggle to heat their homes and keep their cars running. While he peers at the problems of the public, the President does not connect the dots between his actions and the widening earnings gap. Either his shots at the CEO salaries are just lip service or he can’t see that the tax breaks he longs to make permanent benefit himself and the CEOs, but not the average American. Even an increase in the minimum wage, which has been stagnant for nearly a decade, only passed in the Senate this week with billions of dollars of tax breaks for businesses.

Meanwhile, we pay $200 billion each year for the Iraq war. Americans aren’t stupid and it takes more than a few positive numbers to see that most of our books are in the red. So, Mr. Bush and the Fed can point to increases in GDP and other indices, but until we have more money in our pockets, Americans aren’t going to feel richer.

Goodbye Baiji

2006-12-29T23:53:00.000-05:00

Just a note to mourn the loss of the Baiji dolphin from our world. If you've read Douglas Adams' Last Chance to See, you will know that these freshwater dolphins lived only in the Yangtze river in China. Adams describes them well in the book and it was clear even at the time of publication that the baiji were in serious trouble. Now, they are gone.

How many other species will we allow to slip out of existence with little more than a peep?

One Lie or Another

2006-11-09T18:27:00.000-05:00

When put under pressure, Bush lies more often, but not more convincingly. Yesterday, after his ‘gracious’ speech in which he both conceded the resonant defeat of Republicans in the midterm elections and fired Rumsfeld, he fielded a question about why he sat on this personnel change until after the election. The question came from a Washington reporter who had asked him just a week ago whether or not Rumsfeld would be dismissed. Bush had repeated then, as before, that Rumsfeld would remain as long as Bush was in the White House. Only a few days later, Rumsfeld is on the outs and Bush doesn’t quite know how to lie about when this decision was made.

The President claimed that he didn’t want to ‘shake up’ the election with this type of information. This is clearly a lie because dislike and distrust of Mr. Rumsfeld has been increasingly palpable over the years, with innumerable pundits, politicians, military personnel, reporters, etc. on both sides of the aisle calling for his resignation. If Bush and Rove had truly believed that the turnout against the Republicans would be as strong as it was in the midterms, they would have asked Rumsfeld to leave sooner. So, the President lied and claimed that he had been planning to replace Rumsfeld all along, but he had to keep it from the public until the details were worked out.

Did the President lie to the reports last week when he clearly stated his intention to keep Rumsfeld on the job or did he lie later when he said he’d been planning it al along? It is interesting that he announced Rumsfeld’s resignation the same day that he lost his death-grip on all three branches of government. It is also interesting that he announced the resignation for Rumsfeld – reflecting just how much say in the matter Rummy actually had, along with the somewhat desperate tone in the President’s voice as he repeated how he and Rumsfeld came to the decision together. Usually the cabinet members and White House staffers announce their own resignations, along with their unconvincing descriptions of how they’d rather be at home with their wives and kids than running the country.

The most likely lie is that the President was so frightened of what would happen if the Dems-driven Congress and Senate got a hold of the sitting Secretary of Sate that he had to take drastic measures. What strikes me is that even the smart opinion folks the New York Times seem to be buying the President’s admitted lie, that he hadn’t been up front with the media last week, rather than the more likely lie, that he’d been planning this shake-up all along.

This isn’t the first time that Bush Jr. has lied to the American public, and with the winds of power blowing against him, it’s certainly not the last, but it is a transparent one that we don’t have to buy.

Would we miss it? Eating locally

2006-10-16T21:45:00.000-04:00

There has been a lot of press, recently - at least if you are looking for it - about organic and local produce. Michael Pollan's book, The Omnivore's Dilemma, and other publications have stressed that organic produce is not necessarily as 'earth friendly' as local produce. Before I continue, I must admit that while I'm very excited to read his book, having heard interviews with him and read some of his articles, I haven't yet read the book, so anything I say here is based on what I've read about the book. Pollan talks about "Big Organic", the industrial farming of organic foods, a growing trend that contributes to industrialized food processing. As an article I read recently pointed out, you can have certified organic Oreos, but that doesn't make them less of a processed food. High fructose corn syrup from certified organic corn is still a processed sweetener with lots of empty calories. As Pollan points out, a large part of our nation's eating problem is the prevalence of high fructose corn syrup and other processed foods (he calls them "food products") and our overall disconnection to the places where our food is grown. These problems contribute substantially to both our national health problems - the instance of Type II diabetes (the developed, rather than inherited form) in children was virtually unheard of only 15 or 20 years ago - and global climate change.

Michael Pollan is outspoken that the 'answer' to many of our problems, including our recent E. coli-laden spinach crisis, is to return to eating locally-grown foods (preferably organic) from small, sustainable farms. He isn't the first to say this, but the idea hasn't been as widely disseminated as one would expect, considering how many issues it solves. I was surprised, as a relatively well-read environmentalist, when I first read in Barbara Kingsolver's book, Small Wonder, that considerably more fossil fuels are burned to bring my groceries to the store than to take me there (17% of US fossil fuel consumption goes to feeding ourselves, according to Pollan - about 4% of total global fossil fuel use!). I was mostly surprised because I had not heard a lot about this before, even though I had been trying to learn more about how I can lessen my negative impact on the world around me. Since I learned more about the impacts our food chain and dietary choices have on the environment, I have tried to talk about it with other people and I inevitably get the same response. The conversation goes something like this:

friend/acquaintance: "Global warming might be a big problem, but it's not like me
changing my life will make much of a difference. I mean, my car gets decent gas milage and I can't afford a hybrid car."
me: "Well, it turns out that what you eat makes a much larger difference in the burning of fossil fuels. If you just switch to eating more locally-grown foods, rather than buying produce that comes from New Zealand, you would probably have a lot more impact than switching to a hybrid vehicle."
friend/acquaintance: "Yeah, but I live in Minnesota and that would mean that I can only get fresh produce during the summer."
me: "That's not entirely true, plus if you freeze and can the summer produce, you can eat locally grown produce all year round."
friend/acquaintance: "I'd rather buy strawberries in the middle of winter, even if they come from somewhere else."

Now, I don't really have an answer to that last bit. My friends and acquaintances have the right to make their own choices, but when people state outright that they would rather be myopic and live potentially to the detriment of even their own children's lives, I have trouble understanding. I DO understand, though, that people want to eat produce all year round and frozen or canned fruits and vegetables don't really match up, even against the produce that has been picked green in New Zealand, shipped around the world, and then ripened chemically just before it hits the supermarket. However, I wonder, how much would we really miss it? If the choice of apples in spring or strawberries and asparagus in the winter were just not there, would we still be able to eat healthful foods that we enjoy at those less plentiful times of year?

I think the answer is 'yes', for the most part. I think that when we talk about wanting these 'delicacies', it's in the context of an American consumer culture that can buy anything at any time. Americans still wait until Christmas or birthdays to buy gifts, though. The same person who wants out-of-season produce is the one who looks forward to Thanksgiving, with its seasonal squash and root vegetables. He isn't even really aware that part of his food culture is based on the seasonal nature of the foods he loves. Would it be more convenient to be able to get every type of food all year long? Sure, but it probably wouldn't hurt as much as people seem to think to give up some of the most fuel-expensive items on their shopping lists.

The trade-offs would be that we would have to cook more and spend some more time in the kitchen to allow long-term storage of excess produce (canning, freezing, etc). Of course, if we cook more regularly, we might also have more regular family dinners, a daily routine that has diminished significantly with the increasing availability and popularity of on-the-go foods. Studies indicate that such family time is good for children's development and family stability - more positive byproducts of a few simple changes in our consumption habits.

So the question stands, would we miss the nonlocal foods in our stores if we could gain health, family, and a cleaner, safer world for our children and grandchildren?

Cancer

2006-06-14T15:53:00.000-04:00

A few months ago one of my friend announced that she has breast cancer. Now, I'm not yet 30, and although my friend is about a decade my elder, she's still considerably younger than the mean age of cancer patients. She was diagnosed with a relatively rare and aggressive form of breast cancer. She was lucky (or smart - or both) that she caught it early and it appears that her chances of beating it are good.

In the past year, I've known a number of people who have been diagnosed and treated for cancer, including my boyfriends’ grandfather, who died two days ago of cancer. Some cancer patients, like my mom's best friend, can trace the 'cause' of the disease to a genetic predisposition, but many cannot. The scientific community knows so much about cancer: which genes are more often mutated in cancer cells, how the cells are able to avoid the normal cell death process to grow and metastasize so quickly compared to our normal cells, how different types of cancers look under a microscope and respond to different drugs. However, we can't point at a single cause for cancer in general. We can't even pinpoint a single cause for a particular type of cancer. The closest we can come to finding a "cause" for cancer is to learn about the risk-factors. The best example is smoking: a huge risk factor for lung cancer. It is common knowledge that smoking cigarettes is the leading cause of lung cancer (and probably lung cancer deaths), but we all know the stories of the guy who has smoked two packs a day for 70 years and his lungs look clear as day, while the 20-year-old kid who has never smoked a single butt contracts lung cancer. What makes this disease so hard to understand is that the causes are not concentrated in a single product or place, they are in fact extremely widespread, difficult to identify, and the risks associated are difficult to quantify.

So, I wonder how many of the chemicals that we use in our daily lives are contributing to the prevalence of cancer in modern society? What about the pesticides on the fields of conventionally grown produce, which also runs off into the soil and water? What about the pollutants in the air from coal-burning (one of the primary sources of electricity in the US, next to nuclear energy)? There are millions of man-made products, as well as natural materials (mercury is naturally occurring, though perhaps its presence in our atmosphere or in our lakes is not), that may be the cause of cancer in humans. The World Health Organization did a study and published the World Cancer Report in 2003. This study indicated that the Western diet and lifestyle (eating a lot of carbohydrates, fats and animal protein, while not getting a lot of exercise) is itself a risk factor for cancer.

Maybe it’s just me, but it seems that there are more people getting more cancer today than previously in history. Yes, I’m growing up and so are the people around me, thus leading to a greater number of people I personally know who have been affected by the disease. Yes, the general population is aging, as well, thus increasing the rate of cancer. But I argue that there are also more ‘chemicals’* in the world than ever before – more man-made stuff than ever before and that might make more of a difference than we think. In addition, Americans are eating fewer fruits and vegetables, and more refined, highly processed foods than ever before.

I wonder which of these risk factors can be easily avoided? Which of them could be avoided, if we put a little more energy into making our world cleaner and freer of artificially produced chemicals? Which could be we avoid by changing our diet? Just like reducing our daily consumption of fossil fuels is not easy, it is possible, and it may even improve our lifestyle (if we walk or bike to the store instead of driving, we also get more exercise and reduce our risk of heart disease, diabetes, and cancer). And just like lowering the levels of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere, the positive impact of our actions may not be easily quantifiable. But not taking steps to avoid them that may be a risk we can’t afford to take.

For more on my friend Tonua’s cancer, check our her blog "Taming the Savage Breast".

*I put chemicals in quotes, because there is a discrepancy between the societal definition of a “chemical” – my dictionary widget says “a compound or substance that has been purified or prepared, especially artificially” – and the scientific understanding that everything is made up of atoms and molecules which can be chemically defined (my lemonade has glucose, sucrose, ascorbic acid, water, etc. in it). Let’s stick with the artificially produced compounds definition, here.

The Power of Observation

2005-12-25T00:48:00.000-05:00

As 2005 comes to a close, there are two big stories in this week's issue of the journal Science. The first is the annual award for the greatest scientific findings of the year - a celebration of our increased understanding of ourselves and the world we live in. The second is the retraction of papers on stem cell research by Korean scientist Dr. Woo Suk Hwang. The irony of this juxtaposition is tremendous.

The "Breakthrough of the Year" for 2005, according to Science, the peer-reviewed journal published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, is "Evolution in Action". With the sequencing of the chimpanzee genome, scientists were able to compare humans and chimpanzees and show that we are remarkably similar - differing by only about 4% of our total DNA. Further insight into evolution has come from numerous studies on the evolution of new species and the ability of organisms to adapt to different environments.

As science recognizes, once again, that the theory of evolution is at the core of nearly all our biological and medical advancements, the arguments over intelligent design continue in schools across America. A test case in Pennsylvania, Klitzmiller v. Dover, suggests that the arguments against evolution being made based on religious beliefs will not succeed in changing the way science is taught. However, the simple fact that such cases are so numerous is cause for concern. It depicts a public that does not trust the scientific method or scientific discovery. The idea that evolution or global warming are theories accepted by the vast majority of scholars who have devoted their lives to understanding the world appears to carry little weight with the American public today.

It is with this waning respect for scientific thought, or opinion informed by evidence, that the story of a scientist who fakes his data and manages to slip his lies past his colleagues is most disconcerting. Most scientists take great pains to publish only data in which they are confident. Most reviewers read with skepticism, searching for holes in the arguments or indications of inconsistencies. But, it is certainly more difficult to convince the public that consensus in the scientific community has meaning when one of the most respected scientific journals is forced to retract its own publications.

On the other hand, the very act of retraction and further investigation into stem cells, the fact that results can be tested in many laboratories across the world, that falsification can be detected and corrected, illustrates the power of science. Perhaps it is in the light of how dedicated the world's researchers and publishers are to defining the truth based purely on observation that the true value of science can be seen.

Serenity

2005-10-09T00:36:00.000-04:00

For those of you who don't know anything about the movie Serenity that is in theaters now, it's a fabulous movie. It is based on the television show "Firefly" that had a short run about two years ago. But more importantly, it's a Joss Wheaton creation. You may remember Joss as the creator (and sometimes writer and director) of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and its spinoff "Angel". However, this show and movie is quite different from those and I'd say much better. Serenity is more mature and very fresh. It takes the good aspects of shows like "Star Trek" and "Star Wars" and puts a somewhat Western spin, while maintaining a distinctly futuristic feel. This might not sound like it could work, but Joss pulls it off beautifully, with heart and humor.

Of course, I think that the movie would be more fun after having seen the episodes of "Firefly" that came before. But, the movie gives all the most relevant background in the course of the story and one might enjoy it more having never seen the show - especially because the evolution of the characters over the course of the movie would be less predictable.

It won't spoil anything for me to say that my favorite aspect is how we learn, subtlely, what made River who she is when we first meet her. We aren't banged over the head with this theme, which is a tribute to how well that theme integrates with the bigger story.

So rent the DVDs and go see the movie!

Preemptive war

2005-08-14T12:44:00.000-04:00

Even as Mr. Bush made a dubious case for the Iraq war, based largely on fallacious and overstated intelligence, he has taken the opposite tack on the fight against global warming. Mr. Bush's famous mushroom cloud statement represents his eagerness to use any possible doomsday scenario as a case for military action. It's become very clear from the dramatic loss of life that the outcome of this unnecessary war is that both our troops and our country are in much greater danger than they had been before. This is the cost of Mr. Bush's disregard for the truth.

This disregard manifests itself in other ways, as well. While the data on global warming is clear and widely recognized as scientifically sound, Mr. Bush continually states that it's not worth doing anything 'hasty' to reverse these world-wide effects of greenhouse emissions. He merely says that we should continue to study it. Yet, those with expertise in the field have perhaps even more frightening and dire warnings about the consequences of continuing on our current path of greenhouse gas emissions.

Why does the President always seem to be on the wrong side of the truth, to our detriment? Instead of his preemptive war on Iraq, he should be engaging in a preemptive war against global warming - it would likely cost less money and certainly result in far fewer casualties.

Al Gore and my mom

2005-07-27T22:29:00.000-04:00

Al Gore recent spoke in St. Paul, MN and my mother went to hear him speak. Here's what she had to say:

I was privileged to be among about 1000 people to hear an excellent lecture by former Vice President Al Gore on Tuesday night in the River Center of St. Paul.

The topic was global warming and the presentation was chilling in its predictions. Mr. Gore has an excellent command of the statistics that prove, beyond any doubt that 1) global warming is happening, 2) it is a consequence of greenhouse gasses, notably CO2, and 3) the consequences of global warming will be drastic, tragic for much of the population of the earth, and unpredictable.

Mr. Gore did not linger on the solutions to global warming, but does have evidence that the United States can decrease its creation of greenhouse gasses to 1970 levels, those required by the Kyoto Accord from which President Bush withdrew, using the technology we already have.

Those who want the earth to survive for our children and grandchildren should do everything in their power to decrease their personal contribution to global warming. They also should repeatedly urge their elected officials to act to help save the earth by signing the Kyoto Accord, legislating in favor of renewable energy sources, energy conservation, and protecting the environment.

Had the entire country had seen Vice President Gore's presentation, we would all be united to fight this threat to our very existence.

The guy who was sitting next her also mentioned this speech on his blog, www.murphybytes.com. My mother had some more insights in response to his statements:

Besides using less stuff, changing our commuting habits, recycling, and supporting the Kyoto accords, there are ways to decrease the CO2 produced in making our electricity:

1) Xcel has a program that allows a consumer to pay extra to support wind energy. Eventually it should be self-supporting, but wind turbines are very expensive to set up.

2) In addition, there are small steps that each individual can take, such as solar panels. It is not economically efficient today in Minnesota to make your electricity from the sun, but it does decrease the amount of CO2 produced. We had a 2 kilowatt system put in by Innovative Power Systems. Since it was finished late last December, it has prevented 3/4 ton of CO2 from being produced to provide our electricity. Of course, not everyone can afford this kind of system. We need higher rebates like they have in California.

3) ME3, Minnesotans for an energy efficient economy is pressing the state government to become 20% energy self-sufficient by 2020. I applaud the goal, but think we can do more. The state should encourage business that research, develop, and produce renewable energy solutions to relocate here. This field will, indubitably, be the "plastics" of the future.

Hypocrits

2005-07-25T23:28:00.001-04:00

Senator Rick Santorum was on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" today. He embodies the kind of hypocracy that I find so difficult to understand. In this show, Santorum was talking about his new book, which addresses his concerns about the direction of our society. He and Jon Stewart discussed marriage and in character, Santorum stated that married heterosexuals are the optimal setting for raising children. Surprisingly, he did state that homosexuals can be virutous people and some homosexual couples might actually be able to raise children properly. But, he still believes (strongly enough to put it in a book) that allowing homosexuals to 'marry' would ruin the institution of marriage because it would, in effect, allow something less than the ideal to be institutionalized.

What's so interesting about that statement is how closely juxtaposed it was with another statement that Senator Santorum made regarding racial segragation:

We needed a strong federal government to come in and say that you need to treat everyone in the country equally

It's impressive to me that he can believe that everyone in the country should be treated equally and (as he also said) "with dignity", and yet he believes it's not only legitimate, but imparative, that we have legislation that robs some people of the rights. I don't see how he can say that every American should be treated equally and then say that homosexuals should not have access to the rights that come with civil marriage (for example, hospital visitation rights). It's just amazing to me.

Then again, this is the same guy who said

While it is no excuse for [the priest abuse] scandal, it is no surprise that Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm.

Climate Change

2005-07-22T04:50:00.000-04:00

News Flash! Our planet is warming up rapidly!

I feel I need to point this out because it seems that people in America aren't aware. Certainly my next-door neighbor who just replaced his minivan with a Hummer isn't. Or he's just not concerned, like Mr. Bush. However, there is a surprising new group who is concerned, including General Electric, BP and Sunoco (for more see Pew Center on Climate Change). They might want to hop on the 'climate change' bandwagon for reasons of their own, but until they start building on a new nuclear reactor, they might have some positive impact.

The most amazing part about our country's consistently ignoring the huge impact we are having on the world is that the science is becoming nearly irrefutable. It would not necessarily take major changes in our cushy lifestyles to move in the direction of prevention. It is looking almost certain that the longer we wait, the greater the sacrifice if/when we decide to try to 'turn the boat around'. And, like the Titanic, there will almost certainly come a point when we can see the iceberg, but we are incapable of doing anything about it.

Mr. Bush continually evades pressure from the whole world to sign the Kyoto Treaty on Global Warming or do anything that would decrease America's current greenhouse gas emissions. His statement is that the science is not yet clear and it's not a good idea to do anything 'hasty'. This statement is amazingly flawed. You don't have to be a geologist or a meteorologist to look at the available data and come to the same conclusion as most scientists: global warming is happening and people are the cause. In the next few posts, I will be quoting some data from recently published papers in well-respected, peer-reviewed scientific journals. Here's the first:

Mark B. Dyurgerov and Mark F. Meier, Twentieth century climate change: Evidence from small glaciers, Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (2001) 97, 1406-1411
Glaciers are very sensitive to climate - they grow and recede in response to temperature, precipitation, humidity, wind speed, and even the reflectivity of the glacier surface. Therefore, many climate studies are focused on the world's glaciers.
In this paper, the authors studied total glacial volume change in 37 small glaciers across the world. For me, the most striking data are in figures 2 and 4. Figure 2 shows the this change in glacier volume for each glacier from 1960 to 1997. It really doesn't take a genius to look at the trends and notice that around 1975, the volume change for almost every glacier started to either dramatically decrease or increase. The authors also looked at glacial mass balance, which is the difference between annual snow and ice accumulation and snow and ice melted. It can be represented as an average thickness added to or lost from the glacier for a given year and is very sensitive to glacial climate. Figure 4 shows the how the average annual mass balance of glaciers across the world differs from the average glacier mass balance averaged across 1961-1990. The figure depicts a dramatic decrease in annual glacier mass balance beginning in the late 1970's. The authors state that while the total global glacial mass balance is declining, some maritime glaciers are gaining mass, indicating that the precipitation and other global climate patterns are changing. The authors conclude that on a global scale, glacial volume has been decreasing since the mid-1970's and the rate of loss is accelerating.

Misinformation

2005-06-30T07:00:00.000-04:00

Senator Ted Kennedy recently made a speech in the Senate Armed Services Committee in the course of questioning Donald Rumsfeld on the current situation in Iraq. You can read the transcript at http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/6/23/1470/85484, but basically his point was that Rumsfeld and the Bush Administration have made a large number of enormous mistakes in Iraq. He mentioned how they misled Congress and the country as a whole in their justification for the war (WMDs), how they underestimated the number of soldiers needed to secure Iraq, ignored warnings of the possibility of an insurgency and understated their threat even as they killed American soliders, grossly underestimated the cost of the war, overstated the number of Iraqi soldiers trained and the timetable for having more trained (those numbers still haven't been reached two years later). He stated that our soldiers deserve competent leadership which this Secretary of Defense has not provided.
His final question was "In baseball, it's three strikes, you're out. What is it for the Secretary of Defense?"
Secretary Rumsfeld's response was "Well, that is quite a statement."

A friend of mine found a blog that had Kennedy's statement and the blogger's response, which I will share with you because I think it represents something very sad and frightening about the country we live in today:

This is why I would never make it in politics. I think I would find it difficult to have the proper attitude of respect and humility and back-slapping good-natured fun in such a situation. It seems more like an opportunity to unleash my Jack Nicholson alter-ego: "Baseball analogies, Senator?! You're giving me baseball analogies? Well, I just happen to have a baseball right here in my expensive, leather briefcase. Whaddaya say you and me play us a game of hardball, shall we, Senator?"
As I listened to the sparring last night on the news, I wondered what I might say if I were in Rumsfeld's shoes, answering Senator Kennedy's charges. For instance, I might have replied: I see you've been discussing the war effort with your bartender again, haven't you Senator. (I'd deliver that line with a wink and a smile, of course.)
Or, maybe this, which is a bit more deferential: Senator Kennedy, I thank you for those comments. As I stand at my post in the Pentagon, not a day goes by that I don't think to myself, 'If only, if only the distinguished senator from Massachusetts where here right now to tell me what to do, everything would be peachy-fine.'
Or, I might go for a diversion: Speaking of baseball, Senator, how about them Red Sox! I think they've got a shot at the pennant, don't you?
Perhaps the backhanded compliment would be better: Long after I leave public service, Senator, I will cherish these moments sitting at your feet and being tutored by someone with such vast military knowledge and experience.
But maybe the best reply would simply be the direct reply: Last time I checked, a Senator from Massachusetts doesn't get to tell the President of the United States who will serve on his cabinet. Deal with it, Teddy.

Upon reading this, my friend had to respond and point out what should be obvious to all:
What is wrong with you? Do you think there is something wrong with holding a person's feet to the fire? Which of Teddy's points do you think are factually incorrect? Your best defense would be that the senator is an alcoholic? So is your hero George W.

The blogger's response was:
Kennedy's charges have all been answered before. He was grandstanding, and increasingly my Democratic party has been acting like a bunch of petulant 6-year-olds. No ideas, just whining, carping, and obstruction.
The fact is, Iraq has a popularly-elected democratic government for the first time in its history. The "insurgents" are Al-Queda sympathizers, mostly from Saudi Arabia, Syria and other countries bent on overturning that government. Even Kofi Anan now believes that the UN needs to support and protect this new seedling of democracy in the middle east.
But Senator Kennedy's only priority seems to be returning his out-of-touch party to power by demonizing the current administration and the war in Iraq.

My friend responded to this statement:
The charges have been answered before? Yes, with white house doublespeak. I believe that the "last throes" of the insurgency may last 12 years, according to Rummy. Remember how they sold this war to you: (a) war will be quick (Rummy said less than 6 months), (B) we are going in to dismantle a WMD program that is near nuclear capable (C) Iraq had ties w/ Al Qaida (and hence 9/11, nudge nudge) (d) we will be greeted as liberateors (e) war will be cheap, just a few billion dollars.

Which of these is true? Exactly.

It's not about party lines, it's about competence. I don't know what you do for a living but if you consistently showed up to work and screwed things up you'd get fired wouldn't you? Teddy is trying to return his party to power? The republicans are in control of the white house, senate, and congress and still are trying to blame the dems for all of their problems. Look, the fact that people like you don't hold the administration accountable for anything means that they can contiunue to mess up for another 3+ years without check. Where will we be then? I'll tell you. 1.) still in Iraq fighting insurgents or trying to qwell a civil war (hopefully not) 2.) broke beyond all comprehension (multi trillion dollar budget deficit) 3.) unable to respond militarily to any real problems that arise (Iran, North Korea, the latter with a standing army of 2 million by the way) 4.) in desperate need of friends

Blogger then said:
"A) war will be quick..." The war was quick. The nation-building has taken much longer than the administration suggested. I don't hold the administration responsible for failing to accurately predict the future. I never did believe the stablization of Iraq would be easy or quick.

"B) WMD's..." Iraq had an active and ongoing WMD program. Or else the Kurds gassed themselves? It's fairly obvious to everyone that the program assets were transferred to friendly countries, such as Syria. Even the UN admits that the inspections did nothing to halt Saddam's continuing R&D, and the UN oil for food program actually provided him with the funds to continue his research.

"C) Iraq had ties w/Al Qaida (and hence 9/11..." See Andrew McCarthy's lengthy list of the Al Queda/Iraq connections in the National Review.

In the end, a democratic Iraq and Afganistan will do more to quell terrorism than any other effort. The root cause of Islamic fundamentalism is the frustration of centuries of poverty and tyranny. If democracy takes hold and a fair and free economy grows in Iraq, it will spread to many other areas of the middle east that are in need of the blessings of freedom.

My friend:
(a) "The war was quick. The nation-building has taken much longer ..."

That's a VERY convenient definition, especially since almost all of the 1700+ dead American soldiers died after Baghdad "fell" and Bush stood under a Mission Accomplished banner. You SHOULD blame the administration for not having planned for an insurgency. Various military advisors DID counsel the president that insurgency/civil war were strong possibilities but he/Cheney/Rumsfeld didn't listen.

(b)The Kurds were gassed with stuff the US gave to Iraq to fight Iran. Follow this link to learn about that and view a photo of Rummy shaking hands with Hussein in the 80's.

http://marc.perkel.com/archives/000295.html

"It's fairly obvious to everyone that the program assets were transferred to friendly countries, such as Syria."
Things for which there is no evidence are usually not obvious to me.
(c) You know who is responsible for 9/11 and he's still out there because we're bogged down and distracted in Iraq. Al Qaida had no presence in Iraq before we invaded and practically handed them the country to use as a training/recruiting ground.
"In the end, a democratic Iraq and Afganistan will do more to quell terrorism than any other effort."
Yes, but only if it actually happens. (Life is full of risks, and rather devoid of guarantees.)

At the same time I was also composing a response to everything I'd read thus far. Part of what upset me so much about this guy is that he has so clearly been drinking the Administration's Kool-Aid, but is so misinformed about the facts of what is happening in our world. What's most frustrating is how dogmatically he hangs on to his ideas, even when faced with the truth that contradicts what he believes. I think that it's this kind of "willfull ignorance" that has created a situation in which a large part of the country is completely misinformed. Certainly, FOX news (as well as CNN and MSNBC, if you haven't noticed) have aided in this trend, but they have to have a complient audience, as well. And that is what I find most frightening about the current direction of our country. I respect people who have opinions that are based on facts, but many people seem to consider facts to be superfluous.

So as to keep this post from getting any longer, I'll just publish my response to this blogger and be done:
The Kurds, you might remember, were gassed with weapons that we, the United States of America, gave to Saddam in the '80s to use in their war against Iran. Remember when Rumsfeld went to meet Saddam in Baghdad with the idea that "The enemies of our enemies must be our friends"?

I don't know what news you listen to, but the UN weapons inspectors asked for more time to complete the inspection and since we've been in Iraq our own inspectors have concluded that there were NEVER any weapons of mass destruction.

Once again, every reputable news source has repeatedly pointed out that the US has many more connections to Al Qaeda (the CIA gave them support via Pakistan's government, in order to fight against the Soviets in Afghanistan) than Iraq. The 9/11 Commission also found no link between Iraq and Al Qaeda (http://www.9-11commission.gov/report/index.htm). Incidentally, Iran, which actually does have nuclear capability, has strong ties to Al Qaeda.

The oil-for-food program has admitedly been a source of money lining pockets and corruption, but since there were NO WMDS, it's doubtful that Saddam was using that money to make them.

The fact that Senator Kennedy is trying to hold the government accountable for its actions is part of what makes America great. If no one in government were ever accountable, we would not be able to either learn from our mistakes or improve the situation. You must agree that the ongoing deaths of Iraqi and American people due to any type of incompetance is of concern. If you're really a Christian, you should recognize that death of innocent people is never okay and that if it can be avoided, it should be. That's the goal in holding Rumsfeld and the entire Bush Administration responsible for their actions. If you read "Plan of War" (endorsed by Mr. Bush himself), you'll learn that no one in the Administration even bothered to plan for what might happen after Saddam was overthrown. It's almost hard for me to imagine that distinct lack of forethought. You are probably right that the Senate cannot remove someone from their cabinet appointment, but you should be aware that they are required to approve cabinet appointments - it's part of our fine government's system of checks and balances, in which the President isn't the King and the Congress and Judiciary have the responsibility to check his power. If you love democracy so much, you might wish to study how ours is set up and why.

I don't think that anyone is arguing that a democratic Iraq is a bad thing. What we are arguing is that an unstable Iraq (or Afghanistan) is a breeding ground for terrorists. Also, I don't know if you've noticed that when you invade and occupy another country, it looks an awful lot like "tyranny" and when the people there don't have jobs or reliable electricity (2 years after the invasion, no less), that strongly resembles "poverty" so I don't think we're doing a lot to make friends with Muslims in Iraq.

Reading List

2005-06-04T08:14:00.000-04:00

Today it isn't science or politics - it's literature! I've always had trouble finding new authors or good books to read. So, I recently asked many of my friends and family to give me the titles of two books that they enjoyed. Below are their responses.

Larry’s Party by Carol Shields
The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer
Stranger in a Strange land by Robert Heinlein
Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card
Basin and Range, In Suspect Terrain, Rising from the Plains, Assembling California by John McPhee
mysteries by Dorothy Sayers (in order)
The Dogs of Babel by Carolyn Parkhurst
The Science of Harry Potter by Roger Highfield
Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Famished Road by Ben Okri
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
stuff by PG Wodehouse
Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies and Why by Laurence Gonzales
Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
Hocus Pocus (or anything else) by Kurt Vonnegut
The Princess Bride by William Goldman
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston

Some of my favorite books by my favorite authors are
Last Chance to See and Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams
Animal Dreams, High Tide in Tuscon, and The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austin
In the Time of the Butterflies and How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents by Julia Alvarez
and everything else I've read by these authors
Also
Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them by Al Franken

Bounced Checks

2005-05-12T15:52:00.000-04:00

The report last month from the Presidentially-appointed commission to investigate the intelligence that indicated Saddam Hussein's Iraq had WMDs has led me to think about governmental accountability. It seems that people in the government are only held 'accountable' if the government wants them to be. Right now, for instance, the President is not accountable for invading another country on dubious pretenses because the Republican Congress will not hold his feet to the fire on the subject. The people who were most directly involved in the intelligence failure will not be held accountable because they are the President's friends and will only be investigated by commissions populated by more of the President's friends. Not only that, but it seems that the commissions will be given strict instructions to blame only those who are basically untouchable - appointed, not elected, officials.

This unaccountability appears to be extending farther, to include the Senate and the judiciary. With the Senate Judiciary committee's narrow approval of William Pryor Jr., all four of Bush's most controversial (and questionable) judicial nominees are all in place for a full Senate vote. If the Republicans succeed in their anti-filibuster power grab, we'll be witness to a whole new level of immunity. This immunity would reach to the very top of the "balance" - the Supreme Court. Paired with the push to change the House ethics rules for Tom DeLay, it's hard to imagine where the Republican majority won't take advantage of their current situation to protect their buddies and further a neoconservative agenda.

It seems that the only hope is public outcry. Could changing the House ethics rules or the Senate rules to prevent filibuster actually be unpopular enough that there will be an eventual backlash? Or could some other yet-to-be-taken action push too far? We continue to avert our eyes every time we hear about the nigh-daily fatalities in Iraq, but those in power can't run unchecked forever.

Divestment from Israel - no.

2005-05-11T20:04:00.000-04:00

Living, as I do, in Michigan, near the largest Arab population outside of the Middle East, I hear a lot about divestment from Israel or companies that do business with the Israeli military. When presented as a human rights effort, the theory behind divestment is to put economic pressure on Israel to end occupation of Palestinians. This almost makes sense to me. I agree that the current situation for Palestinians is one that includes at least a few human rights violations - violation that I would strongly object to here in America. I also agree that investors should consider the activities of the companies they put their money in. Companies like Raytheon, General Electric and others that have huge contracts with the United States military, as well, and have made fortunes on human suffering and death. So, it makes sense to have a world-wide campaign to divest from all war-making companies. Even more positive is that divestment is a nonviolent means of exerting pressure, and in many ways preferable to suicide bombers.

So why don't I support divestment from Israel? The first reason is that largely the divestment issue is not truly about the causes I listed above. It's about the fundamental belief that Israelis do not belong in Israel at all. Even as the Israeli government plans to pull their own citizens, kicking and screaming, out of the Gaza trip, Arabs across the world are shouting louder for divestment. It's not about the hope of the Palestinian people for a time when they will not be occupied, which is a hope I wholeheartedly support. Divestment is about a hatred of Israel and does not solve the ongoing conflict.

It seems to me that if Arabs outside of Gaza and the West Bank truly wanted to improve the situation for Palestinians, they would take a fairly different approach. They would take a positive stance, instead of a negative: encourage religious and academic institutions to invest in Palestine, instead of insisting that they divest from Israel. They would actively support peace in the region, instead of instigating hatred. Fighting for divestment polarizes sides, instead of bringing them together. It is bringing people together, trying to find the commonalities that will ultimately raise up the Palestinian people. I once read that while Palestinians dislike Israel, many admire Israel's democracy and aspire to have their own democratic state. I think they would do well to go one step farther and mimic the Jews of pre-1948. The Zionists who created the State of Israel recognized that if the Jews were going to thrive, they would have to stop being the victims and become proactive. The original Zionists worked to create, not to destroy. Palestinians and their supporters could take that approach as an alternative to destruction - through suicide bombings or divestment. I imagine that if they focused on educating their young, improving their self-sustainability and economic prosperity and promoting a peaceful relationship with their neighbors, they would be much closer to their goals.

Nuclear Senate

2005-03-25T14:21:00.000-05:00

I was going to write about the Schiavo case (everyone else has), but there is something much more important going on right now in the Senate. The Republican majority, with VP Dick Cheney as the chair have threatened to end the filibuster - a long-standing procedure that allows the minority to 'balance' the power of the majority. If it happens, it will basically strip Democrats of the power to block the appointments of even the most radical judicial nominees (to the Federal Courts).

This "nuclear option" is a crafty way to take the 55 Republican votes - not enough to vote down a filibuster directly - and end debate in the Senate. However, it's not at all surprising that the Bush Administration and it's allies in the Senate are using loopholes to silence all opposition. It fits nicely with the refusal of press passes to journalists who are more interested in the truth than White House spin and the chorus of yes-men who have replaced them.

I'll admit that I'm scared of this move because points directly to the appointment of a conservative ideologue on the bench of the Supreme Court. I am still amazed that there are "right to life" groups who plug for radically conservative judicial appointees, with no concern for the well-being of a country in which the judges hand down rulings based on a political agenda. The judicial branch is meant to be apolitical, as a 'check and balance' for the politically charged executive and legislative branches. But, it seems that 'spreading democracy around the world' means that we must forfeit our own.

So, what can we do? Write, call and email your Republican Senators today and tell them that you do not support any action to end or circumvent a filibuster. Write to your local newspapers and other media outlets and tell others why they should be afraid of a Senate in which nearly half its elected members have no voice.

Interests: Money

2005-03-19T08:29:00.000-05:00

As I was setting up this blog, the 'profile' section asked me about my interests. It occurred to me that no one ever writes "money" as their interest. However, plenty of people make almost all of their life choices based on that interest. What career they choose, where to live, how to live, and how to vote. So many people I know choose careers that they don't enjoy because they will make a lot more money than if they did what they love. Personally, this confuses me because the dream job almost always will pay enough to get by and it's the money job that makes people miserable and stressed.

I am even more confused when the money-makers then vote based on their tax-cut. Most of them have stated, matter-of-factly, that even though they don't agree with a policy of invading other countries, denying civil liberties or weakening anti-pollution laws, they believe that their few thousand dollars is more important. They don't seem to be aware that dollar for dollar, they get more out by putting in to the system. My personal favorite are the libertarians - though I am still very grateful for the work that Michael Badnarik did with Green Party's David Cobb on the Ohio recount - who seem unaware of the government-funded services that they would sorely miss, like roads and public schools.

The money-voters also fail to notice that even though their tax cuts are safe, for now, by putting Bush in office again, we continue to see a declining stock market - I hear "Stormy Weather" on NPR's Marketplace all too often - increasing budget deficits and the dollar's value sliding. These things, along with the growing number of people who are paying the alternative minimum tax - the NY Times had an op-ed piece about this March 13th - so clearly tell me that the money people are losing, not gaining. And as I sat down to do my taxes, I realize that even with my meager income, I would not notice a few hundred dollars more in taxes. I would celebrate that payment, if it were going to resource conservation and health care instead of big oil and weapons manufacturers.

Arctic National Pipeline

2005-03-17T23:02:00.000-05:00

I started this blog today because I really can't take it anymore. After the 2004 election, it was clear that many things I love about this country would be lost. However, in the past there have been enough down-to-earth Republicans in the Senate to stand with the Dems and vote down efforts to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Yesterday, the polar bears weren't so lucky and now our public lands are open for business - making money for BP, Chevron, etc. Luckily, carribou love pipelines (according to a previous US President, so I've heard) and as many Senators seem to believe, wildlife can easily live in harmony with oil rigs. I guess we should have told that to the seals that were covered in oil after the Exxon spill.

Along another depressing line, neocon Paul Wolfowitz has been nominated by Bush to head the World Bank. It nevers fails to amaze me that this President can get away with giving prizes to the people least deserving. It really shouldn't surprise me anymore, since he has appointed Alberto Gonzales, the guy who, as the attorny general, said that torture in Abu Graib is A-OK, given the former head of the CIA, George Tennet, the Presidential medal of honor despite the massive 'intelligence failure' that allowed the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and appointed John Bolton, who had previously scorned the UN, to the same organization. But, Paul Wolfowitz's nomination is particularly upsetting because he is one of the few who should be held responsible for the deaths of thousands of American soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis as a result of the war the Bush Administration started - not to mention the tremendous debt accrued for future generations to pay. Apparently we now live in a country in which the acts of shunning the rest of the world, torturing people and starting wars deserve reward and promotion.