July 2011
19 posts
Thank you, birthday fairy.
I love love, esp. the longlasting kind - Gay marriage: We get old, just like anyone else http://t.co/KIkktJu via @theeconomist
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20 things that could happen if the debt deal isn't... →
Including:
possible cuts to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid
federal workers may not be paid, including military personnel
federal student loans could be frozen
and 17 other possibilies…
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Still True Today: Frequently Forgotten Facts of... →
These are facts:
If the debt-limit debate had anything to do with reality, every story about it would include a few basic facts. Starting with: President Obama inherited a $1.2 trillion budget deficit. And: Republican leaders supported the tax cuts and wars that (along with the recession, another pre-Obama phenomenon) created that deficit. Also: Republicans engineered this crisis by attaching...
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A Blogosphere of Bigots →
The racism and bigotry that have simmered for years on anti-Islamic and anti-immigration Web sites in Norway and other European countries and in the United States made it possible for [Anders Behring Breivik] to believe he was acting on behalf of a community that would thank him. As John Donne famously put it, “No man is an island … every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the...
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Atheists Seek Chaplain Role in the Military →
Additional read here: Pastafarianism in the military
Justin Griffith’s story particularly intrigues me because he went from creationist to atheist. (His dog tags read Atheist/FSM [Flying Spaghetti Monster]).
And, personally, I like the idea of more religioius diversity in the military. Homogeneity and fundamentalism (in many forms) worry me. And as long as you’re still treating...
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Why Gay Marriage Is Good for Straight America →
The court has ruled that the right to marry precedes the Bill of Rights; it has decided that prisoners on death row have a right to marry, even if they can never consummate it. It has ruled that no limitations may be put on it for anyone—deadbeat dads, multiple divorcées, felons, noncitizens. Hannah Arendt wrote in 1959 that “the right to marry whoever one wishes is an elementary human right …...
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NPR's Series: The Cost of Dropping Out →
The impact of that decision is lifelong. And the statistics are stark:
The unemployment rate for people without a high school diploma is nearly twice that of the general population.
Over a lifetime, a high school dropout will earn $200,000 less than a high school graduate and almost $1 million less than a college graduate.
Dropouts are more likely to commit crimes, abuse drugs and alcohol,...
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We can't allow Somalia to starve →
I think the toughest thing about these humanitarian crises is that a normal citizen doesn’t know what to do to help. It’s not that we’re not doing anything because it’s in another part of the world (a brown-skinned part of the world), but it’s because we don’t know what to do to really help.
Ban Ki-moon tells us that 11 million people are in desperate need....
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Bonuses for Billionaires →
Kristoff is angry too. So much sarcasm, I love it.
LET JOBS TRICKLE DOWN Leftist pundits say that House Republicans don’t have a jobs plan. That’s unfair! Granted, the Republican-sponsored Cut, Cap and Balance Act would eliminate 700,000 jobs in just its first year, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, but those analysts are no doubt liberals. America’s richest 400 people own...
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Note to self
Note to self: stop reading readers’ comments on websites, news articles, etc. (See readers’ comments from this story: Washington state cancels Jose Vargas’s license). They just make you lose a little bit more faith in humanity. What happened to empathy and rational debate? Instead it’s all vitriol.
And, for the record, I don’t know how I feel about the whole thing, I...
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The Road Not Taken →
Worth reading just b/c Brooks uses the term “Big Government Blowhards.” But, seriously, where are all the practical politicians, especially Republicans? Why are we held hostage by politics and celebrities rather than policy?
#BrooksIsAngry
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Column One: After fire, a young man's life... →
This story is a collision between my obsession with Friday Night Lights and my summer internship on burns.
It’s an inspiring story, but it really highlights the disparity in health outcomes between high income countries and developing countries. Derek Thomas had 3rd degree burns on over 85% of his body and survived. In developing nations, often 3rd degree burns on 40% of your body basically...
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Public health: Not vaccinated? Not acceptable →
There’s really almost no excuse to not vaccinate unless you’re immunocompromised.
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New state law requires textbooks to include gays'... →
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California Achieves Federal Healthy People 2020... →
huzzah! #ActuallyMeetingGoals
The percentage of adult smokers dropped 1.2% from 2009 (13.1%) to 2010 (11.9%), naming California one of only two states to reach the federal Healthy People 2020 target. This goal aims to reduce the adult smoking prevalence rate to below 12%.
…[California Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ron Chapman] notes, “While we take great pride in seeing smoking...
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Immigration policy: U.S. should abolish its... →
This is an argument worth highlighting, although I don’t agree with it.
A green card to the U.S. is one of the most valuable pieces of paper in the history of the world. So why would we want to give roughly 5% of them each year to people who, for all we know, have nothing more to offer America than a high school education, a winning ticket and (in many cases) an agent they paid to help...
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Haiti: Why an accurate count of civilian deaths... →
Good research matters.
It is vital that social scientists get their methods right when counting deaths and injuries after crisis. This is not just a matter of scholarly integrity. It has life-and-death implications for potential aid recipients. A vigorous discussion of estimates is to be encouraged, but these must be premised on good science and not on politics or other types of bias. While...
I guess being out of school just took the tumblr out of me for a while, but I’m back! And with a backlog of internet finds.
