Some Thoughts On Independence Day

It’s the Fourth of July.  I’ve been pondering whether or not to write something politically pithy or culturally au courant and here it is, almost noon, and I’ve made no decision.  I think I pretty much said what I had to say about my feelings about this country a few posts back for Memorial Day, so I don’t think I’ll revisit that. Last night we sat on our front porch while the pre-Fourth fireworks went off in the surrounding neighborhood.  Folks nearby spend an unconscionable amount of money on things that blow up and look pretty and we benefit from the show.  Neither of us like large crowds, so going down to the St. Louis riverfront for the big explosion is just not an option.  The older I get the less inclined I am to squeeze myself into the midst of so much anonymous humanity. We’ll likely go to bed early tonight after watching the rest of our neighborhood go up in brilliance, starbursts, and smoke. I suppose the only thing I’d like to say politically is a not very original observation about how so many people seem to misidentify the pertinent document in our history.  The Declaration of Independence is often seen as more important than the Constitution and this is an error, one which leads us into these absurd cul-de-sacs of debate over the religious nature of our Founding.  [More . . . ]

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The power of patients networking

Dave deBronkart learned that he had renal cancer in 2006. From his doctor and from many internet resources, he heard that his death was imminent. Then, he hooked into an internet network of renal cancer patients, where he learned about a scientific (but not well-known) treatment that offered him a chance.  He pursued the treatment and had a great result. He became an e-patient, a patient who became empowered because he acquired access to important data. Now, 4 years later, he gave the following TED talk, and you'll see that he's very much alive and kicking. I recent had a similar experience, though not in nearly as serious a situation as Dave's. I was diagnosed by two doctors with "tennis elbow." I don't play tennis, but I play the guitar, and I suspect that that strumming was the precipitating cause for me. About three months ago, before I noticed any problem, I assumed that tennis elbow was irritating, but that it quickly went away when you stopped engaging in the causative activity.   The two doctors I consulted told me otherwise. They said that tennis elbow lasted for as long as a year, or more, and that it can be disabling. They said that you simply take aspirin and rest it, that it is a long drawn out problem and that there is not much else you can do about it. I "confirmed" this first-hand, when I stopped playing the guitar for two months, but the condition did not get any better. I bought two types of arm wraps at the drug store and I wore one or the other for weeks. My arm remained extremely weak. For instance, I could not lift a heavy book with the affected arm. When someone shook my hand, I felt excruciating pain at the elbow. Like Dave, I refused to stop searching for a better answer. I took to the internet, and about three weeks ago I found what appears to be a cure. It's a rubber bar that costs $15: [caption id="attachment_18575" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Thera-Band FlexBar"][/caption] I've been doing the simple exercises for two weeks (click this link and watch the short video demonstrating the exercise); it's amazingly simple and it takes less than 10 minutes per day. My pain has decreased by 95% and my strength has probably tripled, even though I'm taking only one over-the-counter Naproxen per day. This is a scientifically-designed and tested remedy, which suits me fine.   In fact, the device and exercise was being tested in a double-blind study that was so incredibly successful that the experimenters stopped the study in mid-stream and gave all of the patients rubber bars.  It pains me to think of all of the victims of "tennis elbow" out there who are suffering with the pain needlessly because their doctors are telling them what my doctors told me. I have no interest in any form of voodoo, such as homeopathic medicine, and you'll hear a lot about these unscientific treatments on the Internet.  This post is not about unproven and unscientific remedies.  What you heard from Dave (and from me) is that there are often effective and proven remedies out there, and that you will not learn about from your doctor.  I agree with the main point made by Dave, that we need better methods for sharing information regarding successful treatments that are already out there.  E-patients, unite!

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Bring out the corporate flags to celebrate the Fourth of July

It's almost the Fourth of July, the date that red-blooded Americans thank God that they are not British. And, increasingly, we give homage to our corporate sponsors. I was walking by the St. Louis Arch today, and noticed all of those American flags flapping in the wind in anticipation of the big St. Louis Independence Day Fair at the arch grounds. I looked more closely and noticed that flapping along with the American flags were the flags of a corporate who's who. AT&T, Pepsi, Boeing, Peabody Coal, InBev, U.S. Bank and many others, letting us know how inter-twined government is with corporate America these days. After they noticed that there were 50 stars, what would the founding fathers have thought had they seen those American flags touching the flags of corporations? They would probably have asked why those corporate flags were there, and we'd need to explain that corporations own Congress and control the elections. I doubt that that would satisfy them.

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The obvious ideas of a comedian and the “genius” of Osama bin Laden

I'm reading a 900-page compendium of George Carlin's written works: 3 x Carlin. It includes a full copy of Napalm and Silly Putty, a book Carlin published in April, 2001. Take a look at this excerpt from the chapter Carlin titled "Airport Security" (p. 325):

I'm getting tired of all the security at the airport. There's too much of it. I'm tired of some fat chick with a double digit IQ and a triple digit income rootin' around inside my bag for no reason and never finding anything. Haven't found anything yet. Haven't found one bomb in one bag. And don't tell me, "Well the terrorists know their bags are going to be searched, so now they're leaving their bombs at home." There are no bombs! The whole thing is fuckin' pointless. And it's completely without logic. There's no logic at all.  They'll take away a gun, but let you keep a knife!   Well, what the fuck is that? In fact, there's a whole list of lethal objects they will allow you to take on board. Theoretically, you could take a knife, an ice pick, a hatchet, a straight razor, a pair of scissors, a chainsaw, six knitting needles, and a broken whiskey bottle, and the only thing they say to you is, "That bag has to fit all the way under the seat in front of you." And if you didn't take a weapon on board, relax.  After you've been flying for about an hour, they're gonna bring you a knife and fork!  They actually give you a fucking knife!  It's only a table knife--but you could kill a pilot with a table knife.  It might take you a couple of minutes.   Especially if he's hefty.   But you could get the job done.  If you really wanted to kill the prick . . .Or suppose you just had really big hands, couldn't you strangle a flight attendant?  . . .

.   .   .

Airport security is a stupid idea, it's a waste of money, and it's there for only one reason: to make white people feel safe!. That's all it's for. To provide a feeling, an illusion of safety in order to placate the middle class. Because the authorities know they can't make airplanes safe; too many people have access.
Indeed, George Carlin pretty much summed up American airline security back in April 2001.  Consider what happened only five months after he wrote these words, a dramatic series of attacks that depended on the lax American security described by Carlin, as well as the less-than-brilliantly-conceived strategy of allowing flimsy doors to the cockpit. In the wake of the 9/11 attacks, American political and military leaders elevated Osama Bin Laden to the status of alleged evil genius, essentially to give themselves cover for the pathetic American security protocol described by Carlin. The American establishment embraced bin Laden as an evil genius because it served two purposes. A) It was an attempt to deflect criticism from the abject stupidity of the American approach to airline security; recognizing the "genius" of bin Laden allowed hawks to continue with their mantra that Americans can do no wrong, and it was an exceptional and evil man that spilled American blood; B) Calling bin Laden a genius and broadcasting his brown-skinned non-English speaking image all over Televisiondom justified pouring trillions of dollars into America's warmongering-torturing-spying machine; it "justified" an immense job-security program for those who wanted to use those many of those exciting Yankee weapons of war to pretend to solve complex international social and economic problems. And lots of bombs have been dropped ever since. Here we are, a decade later, with our economy and our infrastructure on the verge of a second collapse, with almost nothing good to show for all of that money we've poured into our wars of discretion.  We Americans continue to demonstrate that we are absolutely incapable of self-critical self-examination, in that we continue to pour two billion dollars per week into our Afghanistan adventure despite the lack of any meaningful military objective.  It's merely an adventure in sunk costs (and see here).  And the American corporate media cozily continues to conspire with the American military to pretend that we've been making great strides in Afghanistan, the longest war in American history.  Americans are currently mesmerized by their "Peace President" to continue supporting, if not escalating, the most expensive self-deceptive con-job in history.  But at least we killed an evil man whose genius was that he was about as observant as an American funny man. To summarize by paraphrasing George Carlin, the American military involvement in Afghanistan is a stupid idea, it’s a waste of money, and it’s there for only one reason: to make white people feel safe!. That’s all it’s for. To provide a feeling, an illusion of safety in order to placate the middle class. Because the authorities know they can't make America completely safe from terrorism; too many people have access. [Photoshop image by Erich Vieth. Image of George Carlin by Creative Commons; Image of Osama bin Laden, public domain]

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