Transparent Vindication

As loyal readers may recall, I was suddenly defederalized last October a few weeks short of being legally immune from employer abuse of the kind administered to at least four older workers in the FDA public affairs shop.

Everyone knew the that new boss was not only not the same as the old boss but actually was parachuted in from a planet where “communication” meant silence, “transparency” meant hiding information and “public service” meant “no we can’t.”

Now, however, it seems that either her ability as a manager was exposed to her bosses or she failed to toady enough to the Obama hacks. (I can’t prove anything, but I suspect the former.) She is, I am reliably told, leaving government to join an advocacy/lobbying group run by the state politician whom she worked for before arriving in DC to wreak her damage here. In Washington, departing a high profile job in only one year is not a sign of success.

Anyway, this is not the story of one guy having a problem with one bad boss. I have moved on happily from other ones and survived. This is a story about how what happened in front of my naive eyes seems emblematic of what is going on elsewhere in government -- the wreckage of Obama's pretense of bringing a fresh way of doing things to Washington.

Many of my own observations are confirmed by an op-ed in today’s Washington Post detailing how this administration is more secret and contemptuous of public information than the Bush administration.

In the meantime, I remain one of the uncounted unemployed. Vindication doesn’t put food on the table, but it does taste sweet to announce, “Boss, thy name is ‘Payback.’”

Pink Panthers ... and Redskins and Jets and Packers etc.

It’s bad enough having to watch the Redskins, and pro football is ridiculous enough, without having to gag on all the pink that permeates the NFL – a wholly owned subsidiary of the cancer lobby.

It is only for the month of October, but every player, coach, referee and prime stadium advertising space throughout the stadiums is bathed in pink.

Is there not enough awareness of breast cancer yet? Or are the American Cancer Society and the Susan G. Komen Foundation (which so far as I can tell is not involved in the NFL campaign) merely rackets that exist to market themselves and raise money?
Any corporation, including cancer-causing ones, line up to get the Komen-pink imprimatur, and the ACS is basically, like all “disease organizations” heavily funded by the drug industry.

Ah, but what’s wrong with fighting cancer? Nothing, except we have been at it for 40 years and breast cancer is not the biggest health threat facing women, and not even the biggest cancer threat.

You have probably heard that women have a 1 in 8 chance of getting breast cancer. That is not exactly true. Women have a 1 in 8 – or 12 percent chance -- of getting breast cancer over a lifetime. But that risk is virtually nonexistent in children and women into their 30s. The only meaningful statistic is the risk at any given age, because it changes based on how long you have lived without breast cancer and how long you might live.

According to the National Cancer Institute, a woman’s chance of being diagnosed with breast cancer is:

• from age 30 through age 39 . . . . . . 0.43 percent (often expressed as "1 in 233")
• from age 40 through age 49 . . . . . . 1.45 percent (often expressed as "1 in 69")
• from age 50 through age 59 . . . . . . 2.38 percent (often expressed as "1 in 42")
• from age 60 through age 69 . . . . . . 3.45 percent (often expressed as "1 in 29")

And that is the rate of diagnosis, not the death rate. The most fatal form of cancer in women is lung cancer. And the biggest threat to women’s health – as it is for men – is heart disease.

By the way, Major League Baseball not only uses pink bats on Mother’s Day but blue paraphernalia for Father’s Day, as if breasts and prostates are somehow equivalent. And, yes, prostate cancer is not the threat, either, that most people assume.
Although about 1 man in 6 will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during his lifetime, but only 1 man in 34 will die of the disease.

Professional sports is so much about statistics, so it would be nice if the public understood more numbers than just passer ratings and earned run averages.

Nero's Heroes

It isn't often that a public affairs person for the government can save a life, and, of course, I didn't do it all on my own, but there is a dog in New Jersey who is alive partly due to my comprehension that no matter how cold-hearted, no bureaucrat is gonna let a dog die on his watch.

Here is the story of Nero, a cane corso (Italian mastiff), whose owner, Patrick Bianco, later told me that this breed was famous in history as the war dogs of the Roman Empire, the guardians of Caesar! (Indeed, as I noted with obvious irony, but to no response, they didn't do that great a job.)

Anyway, Nero was bought from a breeder in Sicily and carried a hitchhiker on his voyage to the States – a Leishmania parasite spread by sand flies common to the Mediterranean.

Not long after, the dog became sick, but through the efforts of international doctors at a New York veterinary center who had the right drugs, Nero survived and prospered. In mid-April, he showed symptoms of the disease again, and Bianco arranged to have the international pharmaceutical company Merial prescribe and ship the needed drug, Glucantime, to him. But Nero got sicker and sicker, bleeding profusely from the nose, while waiting for the shipment. It arrived April 11, but it had to clear the necessary customs and FDA screening process at John F. Kennedy International Airport before the shipping company (DHL) could release it.

There it sat while a compassionate but clear-headed receptionist at Franklin Lakes Animal Hospital, doggedly pursued getting the Glucantime to Nero. Because the drug is not approved for use in the United States – leishmaniasis is barely present in America and no drug company has applied for FDA approval – it was routinely held in “detention” by customs and FDA officials until explanations could be made.

It was not made clear that this was an emergency case until receptionist Donna Pontrelli called a New York area television station. When that reporter contacted FDA at 4:55 p.m Friday evening, April 16, the agency swung into action. The case moved swiftly from the Office of Public Affairs, to the Center for Veterinary Medicine, to the Office of Regulatory Affairs to the Emergency Operations staff and then to (Mr.) Camille Mondé, FDA’s Director of Import Operations for New York City.

He came back to the office from home, got on the phone to DHL, which was closing its JFK desk for the day, ordered the drug released, and began cell phoning and texting with Pontrelli, who was waiting for the word. It came by 7 p.m. She drove two hours through the rain to pick up the Glucantime from a DHL executive who was standing by, and then drove it back to Franklin Lakes, where Nero was treated the next morning by veterinarian Jill Shiffman and began to improve almost immediately.

Although FDA must by law screen for and detain unapproved drugs to prevent adulterated medications for both humans and animals from entering the country, the agency may use enforcement discretion in emergency cases for the personal use of a product that is not available domestically. Such was the case with Nero’s Glucantime.

“We’re very pleased with the way it worked out in the end,” a grateful Bianco said.

Said an ebullient Pontrelli: “I love the FDA. We wouldn’t be where we are today without you."

FDA? Yes, where I work ... the Food and Dog Administration, at least for one night.

March of Folly

I didn't realize it was March until I saw an article in this morning's New York Times saying that many adults are often too tired to have sex.

Yes, every March there is a spate of news article and cutesy TV new spots about 1) sexless adults 2) teenagers too tired from lack of sleep to do well in school 3) Gen Xers with too few Zs.

Ever wonder why this happens in March?

When does Daylight Savings Time start?

Who issues these crocus-times press releases based on scientifically absurd studies?

If it were the case that the National Sleep Foundation is behind this annual campaign to persuade gullible news media into believing phony statistics and bad science, one might want to ask why.

One might wish to find out who funds the National Sleep Foundation and why.

A new war on science?

This morning, fellow UPI alum Gail Collins has one of the better columns I have read lately, not only because it is about an important topic -- breast cancer screening -- but because of her flippant note that everything including her own breast cancer is fodder for a good column.

Also because she asks the obvious, but rarely heard, question:

Has anybody noticed that the people who darkly warn about government bureaucrats forcing insurance companies to cut back our coverage appear to be the same ones who just voted to force insurance companies to stop covering abortions? Where’s the sanctity of the marketplace when we really need it?

For years, I observed and complained about the Bush administration's war on science -- how politics and ideology always trumped evidence.

Now, we have the best possible science telling women that unless there is a known risk of breast cancer, they should wait until age 50 before having regular mammograms and no woman should rely on self-examination. Why? Because those recommendations, pushed by people who profit from mammograms and needless breast biopsies, found that early screening is on the whole more harmful than helpful.

But that didn't stop the Obama administration's secretary of health and human services from stating the recommendations that were produced by an independent panel of experts appointed by her own department under the Republican administration are not to be taken seriously.

As of next Sunday, the secretary becomes my boss and I will be working for a federal agency that regulates the people who make x-ray machines.

Therefore, I have no opinion on this matter.

Hypocritic Oath: First Do Harm

I try hard to love my country, but damn it’s hard when Americans seem to be the most ignorant people on the planet and they elect liars and demagogues who harm the most basic interest any person has – personal health.

Here is who I am talking about:

Republican Rep. Brian Bilbray, of San Diego is asked about the verbal thuggery his party is fomenting at town hall meetings held by Democratic lawmakers and says this “fear” and “paranoia” is the reason why health care reform should not be rushed through Congress. Until two weeks ago, when the Republican Party and its paid cheerleaders, decided to spew lies, frighten the elderly to death and stand silently by their henchmen disrupt democracy, no one at all had any fury at all about this legislation. So, maybe Mr. Bilbray should have been asked by the wimps on MSNBC who was spreading the fear and paranoia?

We know who they are. They are the four horsepersons of the Apocalypse. Their names are Gingrich, Palin, Limbaugh and Shirley. The last one is Craigon J. Shirley, whom I met fairly pleasantly about 25-30 years ago when he was a young radical bomb thrower. He is a p.r. operative for the rightest of the right wing. He is beyond conservative, although to call someone a verbal stormtrooper would not advance any argument.

He was behind the infamous and racist Willie Horton ad on behalf of George H. W. Bush and behind this ad now appearing wherever ignorance and hatred are a matchstick away from open violence.

As for the other well known hypocrites, we know who they are. Thanks to Rachel Maddow of MSNBC , we learn that Limbaugh, who is calling health care supporters pro-Nazi, actually has been paid to promote the living wills he and others now claim are a Democratic plot to kill the elderly.

Also, thanks to Maddow and others, we learn that Sarah Palin signed a proclamation during her brief governorship favoring living wills. And Newt Gingrich, who has called Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor a racist and the Obama health care plan Naziistic, wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post earlier this year calling for – you guessed it – living wills as part of the Medicare program. So Limbaugh, Palin and Gingrich were for "death panels" before they were against them.

And then there is that cowardly little hog farmer Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the chief Republican negotiator on health care legislation, who has been pretending to be bipartisan and who President Obama naively believes is a moderate.

Grassley doesn’t have town hall meetings; he has pig sty meetings, and this week, while having led America to believe he was delaying action in Washington to improve the bill, he was telling his rube electorate that he opposes “pulling the plug on Grandma” (which is not in any bill) and that he is to be lauded for “putting my finger in the dike.”

Meaning he never had any intention of getting health care reform legislation at all, much less improving it. The next time Iowa is flooded or hit by tornados, Obama ought to put his finger in the dike of disaster assistance.

Why do I call the American people stupid? Aside from the foregoing, consider the following, courtesy of Bill Maher.

• About one-third of the American people – Fox News viewers – believe that Saddam Hussein was behind the 9/11 attacks.
• A majority of Republicans and majority of southerners do not know whether President Obama is American.
• A majority of Americans cannot name their member of Congress.
• Two-thirds cannot identify Roe v. Wade and two-thirds do not know what the Food and Drug Administration does.
• A near majority of Americans believe God created mankind pretty much as it exists now.
• A majority believes U.S. foreign aid is about 25 times higher as a percentage of the budget than it really is.
• 18 percent believe the sun revolves around the earth.
• Half don’t know that Judaism preceded Christianity.

And that, my fellow Americans, is why I believe this country deserves what it elects. Fortunately, I will be dead (and I have a living will) before this country collapses from sheer ignorance.

Issa That a Pistol in Your Pocket?

The science that has given America the best health care in the world – at least according to myopic Republican politicians – is grounded in the unique system by which the federal government awards research grants for the independent study of important medical issues. Most of the grants are issued by the unassailable National Institutes of Health (unassailable because I work for it as a contractor), and the value of those grants are decided upon by panels of experts in the field. Partisan politics does not play a role.

But since this is taxpayers’ money, every once in a while a cretinous Congressman thinks he can make political hay by arousing the public over grants that have to do with one subject and one subject only. Sex.

Several years ago, the House came within one vote of canceling grants because the eponymous Rep. Jeff Flake of Arizona didn’t like studying the prostitutes who are largely responsible for the African AIDS epidemic that has killed millions of black people and ruined the economies of half a continent.

Now, another yahoo who should know better got the House to pass, without debate and without a vote, cancellation of several other AIDS studies.

This living example of the need to for further brain research is Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif. His amendment – which one hopes will be quietly dispatched by the Senate or a conference committee – high-handedly would cancel behavioral research studies on 1) the factors that put Thai prostitutes at special risk of HIV; (2) decreasing high-risk HIV behaviors among Russian alcoholics; and (3) an intervention program targeting HIV risk and alcohol use among Chinese prostitutes.

Why does Issa care? He cares because these three grants were brought to his attention by a news organization that was rooting around the tens of thousands of grants the NIH awards to find those having to do with sex. The news organization? The reputable Christian Broadcast Network, founded by the always reputable Pat Robertson.

I sure hope Issa or anyone in his family never gets AIDS, never has sex outside of marriage and never needs their lives saved by discoveries made through scientific inquiry.

Mr. Issa is the guy who made a fortune with the Viper car alarm system, and is literally the voice behind “Please step away from the car.”

While convicted only once, he has a very interesting history regarding the use of cars, as explained on Wikipedia.

In 1971, Issa allegedly stole a Dodge sedan from an Army post near Pittsburgh. The allegation was made by a retired Army sergeant, and published in a 1998 newspaper article. Issa denied the allegation. No charges were filed.

In 1972, Issa and his brother allegedly stole a red Maserati sports car from a car dealership in Cleveland. He and his brother were indicted for car theft, but the case was dropped.

Also in 1972, Issa was convicted in Michigan for possession of an unregistered gun. He received three months probation and paid a $204 fine.

On December 28, 1979, Issa and his brother allegedly faked the theft of Issa's Mercedes Benz sedan. Issa and his brother were charged for felony auto theft, but the case was dropped by prosecutors for lack of evidence. Later, Issa and his brother were charged for misdemeanors, but that case was not pursued by prosecutors. Issa accused his brother of stealing the car, and said that the experience with his brother was the reason he went into the car alarm business.

A day after a court order was issued, giving Issa control of automotive alarm company A.C. Custom over an unpaid $60,000 debt, Issa allegedly carried a cardboard box containing a handgun into the office of A.C. Custom executive, Jack Frantz, and told Frantz he was fired. In a 1998 newspaper article, Frantz said Issa had invited him to hold the gun and claimed extensive knowledge of guns and explosives from his Army service. In response, Issa said, "Shots were never fired. ... I don't recall having a gun. I really don't. I don't think I ever pulled a gun on anyone in my life.”

The views expressed in this post are mine and not those of the National Institutes of Health or any other component of the U.S. government.

D.C. Droppings -- XIII

Memorial Daze

The more awful our foreign policy is and the more we inflict terror on populations who don’t want to be democratic – and the more the public votes against such things—the more we as a country spew false love upon veterans and today’s “heroes,” the chumps who sign up to kill or be killed in order to get a college education. Or because they are too aimless to do anything else.

Of course, many young Americans sign up for the military because they feel they want adventure or they want to serve in a job that they see as heroic. But the only reason they see it that way is because civil society paints them as heroes, no matter what their cause or their actions.

You could not turn on the television or go anywhere in public this weekend without being drenched in phony bathos about our “heroes.” Memorial Day was once about dead veterans of the Civil War, then expanded to honor the dead of our good wars, the last one ending in 1945.

In my view, unpopular as it may be, there is nothing inherently heroic about signing up to do a job and then doing it. A lot of people face danger in their jobs, not the least of whom are teachers in urban public schools, traffic cops on pollution-choked city streets or drivers for fly-by-night interstate bus companies.

These soldiers kill for us in a war we all hate but we publicly revere them as gods? We all know why – it is a cheap way of looking patriotic, by honoring the troops but not the war. That is beyond stupid. If we didn’t honor them, if we had no Memorial Days, if we didn’t choke up publicly at every moment, if Marines didn’t lose whole platoons so that they would never leave a fallen comrade behind, then no one would sign up for future ill-begotten wars. We “honor” the troops because of a collective guilt about how Vietnam War veterans were allegedly treated upon their return. Except for the government itself forgetting their medical, emotional and financial needs, they were honored, or at least not dishonored, as is the canard spread by right wingers still fighting the wars of the Sixties.

Stop Him Before He Tortures Again

Which brings us to Cheney, the Dick. All that needs to be said about this sneering sniveling Valdemort is that he ducked service to his country five times. He wants Guantanamo to remain open, even though W. doesn’t.

But I wish someone would explain why Cheney is not there since he is the biggest enemy of our way of life.

When it was known we were torturing people, Cheney denied it , then said if we did it, it was legal and then said if it wasn’t exactly legal it was okay because the president had shysters on his staff say it was. And now he says violations of international law were not only effective but anyone who thinks otherwise is damaging our national security. Yet he also says it only happened three times or so and it was not his administration’s policy. So is he really saying, “Stop me before I torture again?

And if the secret CIA memos really do support the Cheney position that torture worked, how come they haven’t been leaked yet, as was everything else that made the war look good?

Needless to say, with the criminal-in-chief Bush unaccountably silent lately, it is Cheney whose patriotism must be called into question.

Coca Cola Health Plan

And what’s with Bill Clinton, from whom sleaze won’t adhere to the slime? He is a leader in global health and was governor of Arkansas, whose successor administrations instituted a tax on soda pop, in order to help curb the obesity epidemic. But now, the former billboard for junk food is speaking out against a move to apply such taxes in other states. How could that be? Oh, did anyone besides the New York Times mention, just in passing, that the Bill Clinton Foundation receives between $250,000 and $500,000 from Coca Cola?

Catch-2204 7832 6712 0095 Exp. 07/10

With Congress finally cracking down on credit card companies, the usurers will have to find new sources of revenue. And that means instituting fees and shortening the period in which you must pay. And that means a violation of that old Clinton chestnut about governing for “the people who play by the rules” because those of us who make sure never to carry a credit card balance will have to pay for the privilege of paying on time.

Spend a Night at the Museum

I am pretty discerning about movies, and rarely do we venture out beyond the confines of the indie house that features quality films. But despite my general distaste for Ben Stiller (loved his parents, though!) I think Night at the Museum, and its new sequel Night at the Museum: The Battle of the Smithsonian are the funniest and best made movies I have seen in a long time.

It is a PG movie that, like the best satire, appeals to two different audiences at the same time. And the effects are pretty cool, too.

A Real Pro-Life President

Thanks a lot, Bush

Eight lost years in the fight against heart disease, cancer, Parkinson’s are coming to an end now that President Obama has lifted most federal restrictions on the use of embryonic stem cells.

What is important beyond the Executive Order he issued today are the words that went with it, a recognition that George W. Bush retarded (now there’s a fun phrase) science and tried to turn back the scientific clock to Newton. While the past several hundred years in science have progressed toward the use of evidence to make public policy, Bush created policy and then had his industry-fed know-nothings manufacture evidence. Now, science is recognized, however imperfect it is, as the proper driver of policy.

It was never about science or ideology or even religion for that matter. Bush’s worldview was that money is God and science ought not get in the way of it. Progress to Bush was greed and death. No one will ever know how many people died last year from disease that might have been contained had stem cell research gone on the past eight years. God knows how many hundreds of thousands this butcher had massacred in order to show his father what toughness really is.

What that hateful, misanthropic little shit did to his country, and the world, can never be redeemed unless he makes one more mistake and travels to any other country in the world and becomes subject to arrest and trial on charges of war crimes.

I used to call him Bushitler, but it got old and it pissed people off. I mean there was no way of persuading people by calling names. But the latest stuff coming out of the Obama Justice Department shows how close he came to pulling off a fascist coup.

He was given legal advice by brownshirted bullies in his Justice Department that in wartime he had unlimited powers—powers to detain people without a warrant, including U.S. citizens; engage in torture; hold people at Guantanamo without charges and without evidence of their complicity in anything adverse to the United States; and to take action against the press. Apparently he decided on his own, without lawyers, that if your country is attacked, you should retaliate against some other country and kill its leader.

The Bushitler administration was ordered by a court to preserve videotapes of prisoner interrogations. At first, these cowardly liars said they didn’t have any. Then they said they had two. Then it turns out, thanks to the Obama administration, they had 92 tapes AND DESTROYED THEM ALL in violation of a court order. Legality meant nothing to these Chuckies.

Any time you think it’s unfair to limit a president to two terms, consider that a man with no character, no brains, no conscience and no record stole an election, ran a party that tried to deny Democrats the right to vote in dozens of states and almost became the dictator of America.

I suppose one could thank him for not actually doing everything he believed he had the power to do. But maybe he didn’t totally understand the words his lawyers put in front of him. Or maybe, just maybe, God spoke to him again and said, “You’re starting to piss me off!”

I don’t think there needs to be any legal action taken against Bush and his henchmen, because it would set a terrible precedent, but a congressional investigation, an independent Truth Commission and constant public reminders of what he did might help make sure that it can’t happen here.

Gupta No Koop

If he weren’t British, Hugh Laurie would make a great director of the Centers for Disease Control. If he weren’t Canadian, William Shatner would make a great director of NASA. But Sanjay Gupta is an American and therefore this celebrity is deemed worthy by Barack Obama of becoming U.S. Surgeon General.

This appointment, if it happens, is a clunker.

It is ethically difficult enough to do brain surgery while on a journalistic assignment without then using a government bully pulpit to increase your future entertainment industry income. Gupta is a walking, talking conflict of interest, whose Time magazine essays and “House Doctor” programs on CNN too often offer questionable, if not dangerous, medical advice based on the interests of the drug and device industries.

Gupta will not come out of this nomination and government service ethically intact and Obama will look like the celebrity ass-kisser Republicans feared he was. But luckily Gupta cannot harm the American people much because the office of surgeon general is toothless. It just ought to go to someone who has no ulterior motives, someone of the ilk of Dr. Koop, not Gupta.

Memo from Editor of Congressional Quarterly

Congratulations ... I'm happy to announce that Jonathan Allen has won a National Press Club political journalism award for his CQ Weekly piece "Manifest Disparity," in which he dug into the development of appropriations earmarks and the way are doled out among members of Congress.

This multi-part magazine cover story -- 8,300 words in all -- ran in the Weekly last October after Jon sorted and crunched numbers from a taxpayer group that collected earmark figures from House-passed 2008 spending bills (but didn't sort them in a meaningful way).
His package examined the disparity in earmark distribution among members by race, by their relationship to House leaders, by politics and, in a fascinating story, by one's proximity to "Murtha's corner."
...
It was groundbreaking journalism, and a good read to boot. FYI, the award is the Sandy Hume Memorial Award for Excellence in Political Journalism. It's given to journalists under 34, and this year marks the third time a CQ reporter has won it since its establishment in 1999. Jon will pick up the award at the Press Club on July 14. Congratulations to Jon and the rest of the enterprising team that helped plow this fertile journalistic ground.

This is My Day-Job Reading

Government gobbledygook is bad enough, but combine government and science and here is what you get. Now, this is from a peer-reviewed journal by authors at the pinnacle of their expertise and written for other highly pinnacled people.

I think some mice may have given their furry little lives for this.

Figure 2. (A) The upper panel is the amide region of NOESSY spectrum with the peptide RIWKFDELSKAFKNVEIDPK. The underlined part indicates the core region
targeted for binding, and the flanking residues were added to allow for the likelihood of terminal residues unraveling in solution. The lower panel shows the 1H secondary chemical shifts (according to residue number within the peptide), which were derived from the -proton chemical shifts of the peptide after subtracting the corresponding random-coil values. The amide resonance of residue K20 was not observable, and the preceding residue is a proline. The 1H chemical shift of D18 was modified due to the neighboring proline effects. (B)Surface plasmon resonance studies of the mAbs binding to full-length Brugia malayi identified two patterns of association curves. (C) Immunoblot representative of four IgG1 mAbs reactive with native B. malayi AsnRS and 1–110 amino terminus truncated B. malayi AsnRS. Unrelated proteins (control 1: bovine serum albumin, control 2: E. coli protein) and recombinant human AsnRS were not immunoreactive. (D) Immunostaining of adult Brugia malayi using mAb 3D6. (Upper left) Cross-section of female worm-negative IgG1 isotype control showing distribution of embryos (center) and poorly visualized muscle cells under the cuticle. (Lower left) Saggital section of negative control mature female worm. (Upper right) Immunostaining (brown) of intrauterine embryos and larvae with mAb 3D6. (Lower right) Intense immunostaining of intrauterine structures using mAb 3D6.

I can't show you the figures because I assume they are copyrighted, but I do hope from time to time to amuse, frighten and evoke sympathy from Faithful Readers with these kind of examples of what causes migraine.

What Are They Afraid Of?

(adapted from material produced by Research!America)

Although “science versus faith” is a false dichotomy, “faith” apparently is the more appealing topic for politicians to discuss. So far, none of the three remaining presidential contenders has agreed to participate in the national bipartisan call to participate in “Science Debate 2008,” but Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, did just agree to take part in a “compassion forum” next Sunday night, which likely will focus on the nexus between faith and issues such as poverty, the environment, AIDS and Darfur. Well, science issues are moral issues as well.

Faith is not subject to proof as are scientific theses, yet this presidential campaign, just like almost all public policy debates, ignores science as the basis for arriving at real solutions for real people: federal support for medical research, restrictions on stem cell research, genomics, climate change, genetically modified crops and species survival, for example.

Maybe creationism versus evolution, or abstinence-only sex education, might come up next Sunday, but there is little likelihood there will be a robust discussion of the role of science in formulating public policy in other areas – from Minnesota bridge design to regional economic growth.

Martin Peretz, editor of The New Republic and a backer of the Science Debate 2008, says, “(T)he American future depends on American advances in science and engineering. … Of what are the candidates so frightened? Let's see their brains have to stretch, and for God's sake, too.”

The Nobel laureates, other scientists and university presidents behind “Science Debate 2008” are attempting to get it scheduled before the May 20 Oregon primary.

Time is running out, not only for holding candidates accountable on scientific questions, but for the future of American pre-eminence in the field.

Paw-Eye Coordination

I had to stop what I was doing to post this during the middle of my morning perusal of science news. Forget curing cancer, lengthening life expectancy or cold fusion. This breakthrough has infinite implications for the natural world, and the species known as "couch potato."

The Japananese have taught a rodent -- in this case something called a degus -- to use a rake. It's small, as you will see on the video accompanying the article, but if we can breed gigantic watermelons, why not breed degi (or whatever) to rake our lawns, vaccuum the den and do the laundry.

One problem, however: They like to eat bulbs, and I can see them now grabbing a rake from the shed and digging up my tulips, daffodils and lilies without having to dirty their grubby little paws.

But we humans are smarter. Should this rodent ever eat my bulbs, I would give it a scooper and assign it to clean the cat litter.

The Sunshine State?

Floridians seem to be evolving, at least the ones who haven’t yet evolved into the grave. The state Board of Education yesterday voted to include the Theory of Evolution in the public school curriculum.

What gives one at our end of the evolutionary scale pause is that the vote was only 4-3, and the final measure passed was watered down to define scientific fact as a “scientific theory.” That’s fine, because in science, a “theory” is not the wild-assed guess the rest of us think the word means.

A scientific theory is a set of facts that have been observed, tested, repeat-tested, subjected to review by independent experts and proven to predict future experimental results. Gravity is a theory.* Relativity is a theory. Evolution is a theory.

Except to half of Florida. A poll taken last week by the St. Petersburg Times found that 50 percent of Floridians want only “creationism” or “intelligent design” to be taught.

Well, evolution will work its will, all right, because that kind of thinking also dismisses the meteorological theory that hurricanes will continue to hit the state; creationists will be busy praying while rationalists will be preparing to be survivors of the species Homo sapiens.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

* I am reliably informed that gravity should be a theory but somewhere along the line became a "law."

Saving Lives AND Saving Money

If President Bush wants to remain at all relevant and leave any kind of positive legacy in his last year in office, he could put whatever muscle he has left in service of restoring the federal government’s commitment to medical and health research.

Early in his first term, Bush recommended budgets that strengthened research through the National Institutes of Health. However, since then, he has proposed budgets that undercut decades of sustained investment in research which has drastically reduced early deaths from heart disease and stroke and even reduced cancer deaths. In his final State of the Union speech, he can show the nation a renewed commitment to this vital public priority.

While there seems to be universal support for a short-term economic stimulus of $150 billion, it is an increase for research funding that will help guarantee our longer-term growth. Research ensures our ability to compete in the global marketplace and helps fuel local economies all over the country.

Yet for five years, the federal research budget has been flat. When federal funding for research stalls, private research spending ultimately stalls, too, resulting in a downward spiral that costs lives, costs jobs, and deters smart young people from choosing careers in science.

For facts, figures and analysis of how medical research saves lives and saves money, visit Research!America.

The Pin Commandments

What with the Hollywood writers' strike, I thought readers might try their hand at a late-night monologue gag based on this too-good-to-pass-up news item just in:

In a triumph of nanotechnology, scientists in Israel have printed the entire Old Testament on a pinhead. Actually a silicone chip smaller than a pinhead.

As a result, Mitt Romney will give a speech announcing that the Book of Mormon already exists in a pinhead.

Rocky Weather

A friend casually mentioned in an e-mail about the this'n'thats of daily life, "The only weather instrument that I really trust is my weather rock."

I had heard of pet rocks, moon rocks and rocks for jocks, but never a weather rock. Apparently it is the trustiest weather indicator there is, outside the Farmer's Almanac, which is good because a rock wouldn't fit inside the rather thin publication.

Again, I may be a little late on picking up on popular culture, but for those of you who do not know of the predictive powers of the weather rock, follow along:

The Weather Rock is the ONLY 100% guaranteed indication of weather ! ! ! !

Instructions:

First -- Observe the rock for motion

The Rock is not moving- 0-3 MPH light breeze
The Rock is moving slightly - 4-10 MPH Mild wind
The Rock is moving in a small arc - 11 to 20 MPH Wind
The Rock is moving in a medium arc - 21 to 40 MPH Wind-Gusts to 50 MPH
The Rock is standing off to one side by 15' - Gale Force Winds
The Rock is standing off to one side by 30-45' - Big Blow Coming
The Rock is standing off to one side by 60'-Hurricane!!
The Rock is standing at 90'-Tornado!! Get to a root cellar! Take Toto!
The Rock is bouncing up and down-Earthquake !!

Second - Touch and Look at the Rock

The Rock is cold, dry and easy to see- Clear, Fair Weather, it's Cold
The Rock is cool, dry and easy to see- Overcast Weather
The Rock is warm, dry and easy to see- Clear, Fair Weather
The Rock has a shadow - It's sunny
The Rock is hot & dry and easy to see - Clear Weather, It's Hot
The Rock is warm and white - Chase the birds away
The Rock is cold, wet and easy to see-It's a cold, wet, day-Dress warm
The Rock is wet on top and dry on the bottom- It's Sprinkling
The Rock is cool,wet, and easy to see-It's raining. Get your poncho.
The Rock is dripping on all sides-Its a downpour-Too late for poncho
The Rock is warm, wet and easy to see-Its a summer shower, Have fun
The Rock is hot, wet and easy to see-What're you doing at the Equator?
The Rock is cool, damp and looks milky- Its foggy, be careful.
The Rock is cool, wet and looks milky- Its foggy and raining
The Rock is cold, white and hard to see- Its snowing
The Rock is cold, iced & wet & easy to see- Its sleeting
The Rock is cool, dry, and hard to see- Its Night, go to bed.
The Rock is underwater- Look for a bearded man loading animals on a funny boat ! ! !
The Rock is has melted and the rope is vaporized- It is a Volcanic eruption
You see two or more rocks - Check the coffee!

Third - Smell the Rock

Get down on your hands and knees, smell each side of the Rock. One side will smell musty. That side will have some moss one it. This is the North side of the Rock and you are looking South. On your right is West and on your left is East.

Fourth - Taste the Rock

Tasting the Rock is no longer recommended by the National Office due to health reasons. See the Designated Rock Taster for help.

Tasting the Rock may, for example, indicate conditions such as acid rain; in which case the Rock will taste bitter.

Fifth - Listen to the Rock

Sounds coming from the Rock indicate a number of conditions.

The Rock may be haunted
You may be haunted
You may be spending too much time working on your ticket; Relax!
This may indicate an earthquake and you should leave the area immediately.
The Rock is talking-The weather is fine-you're not!!

Although you can build your own - there are many weather rocks around the country ! ! !

What Do You Expect Where The Capital is Salem?

You’ve got to hand it to the people of Oregon, my birthplace, for their consistency. Ten years ago, these generally Blue Staters voted in favor of physician-assisted suicide. Yesterday they voted for suicide without benefit of a doctor.

By a “healthy” margin, they defeated a referendum that would have increased the cigarette tax in order to provide health coverage to 100,000 children – a proposition supported by state PTAs, unions, the American Cancer Society and the health insurance industry. They raised a whopping $3.4 million to publicize their campaign, but it was doomed from the start because the tobacco industry, based in North Carolina and Virginia, poured $12 million into advertising to defeat the measure.

A long time ago, conservatives who wanted to cut budgets without raising taxes would vote to increase “user fees.” A user fee is a tax, something like the cost of license plates or turnpike tolls, based on the principle that those who use publicly maintained highways should pay for the privilege. Calling the process of extracting more money from the people could be called a user fee, revenue enhancement, or, God forbid, a tax. But that’s what it is.

The logic of the subcategory of user fees known as “sin taxes” – the extra you pay for a bottle of liquor or a pack of cigarettes – is a little screwy, though. Because that which you tax should, according to the law of supply and demand, reduce usage. But if people react by using less tobacco, or alcohol, you can’t fund the program the taxes were paying for.

Except when the product is addictive.

So on the one hand, Oregonians wishing to extend health care to uninsured children were counting on more people smoking themselves to death. And on the other hand, the merchants of death known as R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris, were spending their couch change to ensure that they will have fewer customers in the future.

I am not as concerned by the other surprising referendum defeat in liberal New Jersey. There, voters rejected a huge bond issue for the purpose of establishing a stem cell research center. The issue there seems to have been fiscal, rather than moral. But the election of a Democratic president and retention of Democratic majorities in Congress next year should render this decision moot.

Oddly enough, voters in one state approved $3 billion in bond issues over the next 10 years to fund cancer research. What is odd is that the state is Texas – by most measures of social well being right at the bottom of the oil barrel -- and that the champion of this measure was Lance Armstrong, who I have always felt was a couple of links shy on the ethical derailleur.

One War We Are Winning

There was good news from one war today – the War on Cancer declared by Richard Nixon in 1971. The mortality rate for leading cancers is dropping and for a number of reasons: prevention, early detection, better treatment, and nagging by those national nannies that conservatives hate. That’s a simple, but fair, reading of what today’s numbers from the National Cancer Institute reveal.

Of course, there is more to the story.

For one thing, even fewer people would die from lung, colon, prostate and breast cancers if they only had access to health care in the first place.

For another thing, the progress in prevention, detection and treatment was due in very large part to federal investment in research, mostly through the National Institutes of Health along with several other agencies. From 1999 to 2003, Congress doubled the funding for the NIH, which now has a budget of $28 billion, most of which is filtered through 325,000 researchers and more than 3,000 universities and other research institutions in all 50 states and around the world.

However, since 2003, funding for the NIH, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Policy has flattened, and gone down when you take inflation into account. How can this happen? Two reasons: 1) Bush’s trillion-dollar march to Armageddon and 2) public apathy about the need for political pressure to keep those laboratories and scientists discovering cures.

The other front-page news today was that American generals believe that the Al Qaeda franchise in Iraq has been crippled. Clearly, then, our troops can come now (no WMD, Saddam hanged, democracy in Iraq a pipedream and a stable government an oxymoron, Al Qaeda defeated) and it is the War on Cancer that needs a surge lest this week's word of medical triumph becomes a blip instead of a trend.

Disclosure: My wife is an employee of the NIH, and my largest consulting client advocates in Congress and elsewhere for more federal research spending.