Socialism is Good for your Health

A new study from the Cato Institute finds that Portugal's policy on drug decriminalization is paying health dividends. Portugal decriminalized possession of all drugs on July 1, 2001, including heroin and cocaine. Trafficking in drugs is still a criminal offense. The study clearly indicates rehab is a major component of the success of the decriminalization policy, and that such rehab needs to be available to all. Successful rehab is thus only possible when health is a public service. Without a public health program, most users (who are poor) would be unable to afford rehab (which tends to be relatively expensive), thus removing any possibility of improved public health outcomes - users will remain as users with increasing incidence of STD & death. Unfortunately, the US would rather spend untold sums on the War on Drugs, and on the incarceration of users. Apparently it is still un-American (to some) to invest those sums in public health.

Continue ReadingSocialism is Good for your Health

Assisted suicide under the microscope

I'm a lot different than Jerry, a former co-worker. About twelve years ago, Jerry told me that he had a collection of guns and ammunition for when times got bad. He foresaw that all decent society might collapse someday. At that point, large numbers of people would become violent, running around in every neighborhood breaking into each others' houses and shooting each other in order to steal each others' stuff. If this ever happened, he assumed that he would be spending considerable time sitting on his front porch defending his family with his guns. Jerry asked me what I would do if that day happened. I told him that I had already purchased a copy of a book called "Final Exit." If society got that bad--so bad that I'd need to sit on my front porch shooting my neighbors in order to survive--I'd rather check out. Jerry, a conservative and religious man, had never heard of Final Exit. I explained that it is a book written by the founder of the group formerly known as the Hemlock Society. The book explains a relatively painless method of killing one's self. The author was largely motivated by the fact that so many people in great and unrelenting physical pain longer wanted to live, yet they had no socially acceptable way of ending their lives. After I explained this, Jerry was aghast. You'd kill yourself? At that time I had no children. I figured that it was my wife's choice whether she wanted to sit on the porch and shoot the neighbors. Now that I do have children, the decision of what to do, assuming society-wide pandemonium from which there is no physical escape, would be all the more wrenching. I don't know what I'd do. It would depend on how bad things actually got. I am utterly repulsed by the thought of shooting my neighbors. My conversation with Jerry recurred to me as I read "Death Watch: Final Exit's clandestine ways have put the assisted-suicide network on life support," by Aimee Levitt, published 4/8/09 by the Riverfront Times, a free alternative newspaper in St. Louis. Levitt dug deeply into the facts, carefully considering the divergent perspectives on the moral/emotional/legal issues generated by the actions of a group that calls itself, "Final Exit," a group that assist its "clients" to commit suicide. The right to kill one's self always seems to be a simple issue in my mind, at least at first glance: My body, my choice.

Continue ReadingAssisted suicide under the microscope

Refusing to shuffle quietly out the door, one local journalist stands tall –

Post-2008-election, I felt as though our country was finally regaining consciousness. I felt hope and optimism rise and my cynicism roll back ever-so-slightly, breezes of fresh thought dispersing the haze. As my vision returned, I could once again engage in conversations that did not fizzle into frustrated non-verbal noise. I began to see glimpses of a cultural evolution of thought through the wider population. Just glimpses, but they were there, I know it. I felt the whoosh of tired air as egos fat with imaginary power based on non-existent wealth were deflated by the reality of financial correction. I smiled as the facade of organized evangelical religion cracked under self-made storms of condescending hypocrisy. I grinned with sincere joy every time I heard new dialogue about race and culture in the wake of electing our first minority president. All in all, I saw daily reminders that people, all of us, are truly equal underneath all the cultural trappings. Eye contact became pleasant again. The obvious human connections we share - that we all love and laugh and hurt and seethe and wonder and sigh and ache and even hate - I could see those commonalities beginning to connect us again. We argue and bicker, we debate and discuss, we learn, we teach, we manage, we create, we err and we try. We help, we care, sometimes we dismiss. We each react to information and situations from our own perspectives, wrought upon our own personalities by our own life stories. But we seemed to be listening to each other again. I hoped anew that as a culture, we were learning that all of those life stories matter. That each one of us brings a unique self to the cultural table and that even when we strenuously disagree, we do not dismiss each other simply because of it. Silly me. Last week, a friend of mine was fired. Not a big deal, you might think, as people have been laid off in record numbers (including myself) over the past months of economic strife. Sure, a big deal for him, maybe. But, well, welcome to the masses. Except that this friend represented something we cannot afford to lose, and his firing rips further into the frayed fiber of our local democracy. Sadly, too many will dismiss the loss as no big deal - for the exact reason we so desperately needed Sylvester Brown to stay.

Continue ReadingRefusing to shuffle quietly out the door, one local journalist stands tall –

NASA does not name ISS module COLBERT.

NASA recently held an online contest to name the new ISS module (formerly known as Node 3). After more than a million votes cast, and despite winning the popular vote, Comedy Central's Stephen Colbert was denied his name on the module. NASA instead chose the name Tranquility. Bill Gerstenmaier, associate administrator for Space Operations said, "Apollo 11 landed on the moon at the Sea of Tranquility 40 years ago this July. We selected 'Tranquility' because it ties it to exploration and the moon, and symbolizes the spirit of international cooperation embodied by the space station." "We don't typically name U.S. space station hardware after living people and this is no exception," Gerstenmaier joked. "However, NASA is naming its new space station treadmill the 'Combined Operational Load Bearing External Resistance Treadmill,' or COLBERT. Colbert announced the naming live on his show yesterday evening

Continue ReadingNASA does not name ISS module COLBERT.