UNDERNEWS

UNDERNEWS
SEP 7, 2005
FROM THE PROGRESSIVE REVIEW
EDITED BY SAM SMITH
Since 1964, Washington's most unofficial source

E-MAIL: mailto:news@prorev.com

1312 18th St. NW #502 Washington DC 20036
202-835-0770 Fax: 835-0779

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WORD
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The hardest years in life are those between ten and seventy. - Helen
Hayes (at 73)

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KATRINA
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FUNERAL HOME DIRECTOR TOLD TO EXPECT UP TO 40,000 BODIES

CLINT CONFEHR, SHELBYVILLE TIMES GAZETTE - A co-owner of
Shelbyville-based Gowen-Smith Chapel has been deployed to Gulfport,
Miss., to help with recovery since Hurricane Katrina, and his business
partner here has described the grim task there. "D Mort is telling us to
expect up to 40,000 bodies," Dan Buckner said, quoting officials with
the Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Team, a volunteer arm of
Homeland Security. . . The 40,000 estimate does "not include the number
of disinterred remains that have been displaced from . . . mausoleums,"
Buckner told the Times-Gazette Monday.

http://www.t-g.com/story/1116806.html

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HURRIANE VICTIMS TO GET SECOND BLOW FROM BUSH REGIME

CAROLINE E. MAYER, WASHINGTON POST - The new bankruptcy law that goes
into effect Oct. 17 could compound problems for people whose lives have
been disrupted by Hurricane Katrina. The new law will make it harder and
more expensive for people to completely wipe out their debts, and
consumer groups that oppose the law say it couldn't come at a worse time
for Katrina victims. For one thing, they note, many will be unable to
provide the paperwork -- tax statements, pay stubs and six months of
income and expense data -- required by the new law. Nor will they have
the time to attend mandatory credit-counseling courses. Those groups are
pushing Congress to delay the law's implementation date or change the
law to guarantee that Katrina's victims will be able to get relief from
their bills.

Debtors in the hurricane area who were planning to file before the Oct.
17 deadline can't even find a lawyer now, let alone an open courthouse,
said Travis B. Plunkett, legislative director of the Consumer Federation
of America. "They should have the right to file under the old law,"
Plunkett said. In the months ahead, hurricane victims -- or any victim
in a natural disaster -- shouldn't have to face an increased burden of
proof required by the new law, he said.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/06/AR2005090601817.html


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FEMA RAP FOR KIDS

Disaster . . . it can happen anywhere,
But we've got a few tips, so you can be prepared
For floods, tornadoes, or even a 'quake,

You've got to be ready - so your heart don't break.

Disaster prep is your responsibility
And mitigation is important to our agency.

People helping people is what we do
And FEMA is there to help see you through
When disaster strikes, we are at our best
But we're ready all the time, 'cause disasters don't rest.

http://www.fema.gov/kids/femarap.htm

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KATRINA UPDATES

"The Lord is going to come on time - if we just wait," - Condoleezza
Rice in Alabama

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BRUCE WILKEY, CHATTANOOGAN - Domestic television showed Bush visiting
the coast to comfort the people of Biloxi - even hugging some seemingly
dazed survivors. German TV, however, filed a much different report. ZDF
news reporter Christine Adelhardt reported the president's visit to be a
completely staged event. Their crew witnessed how the open-air food
distribution point Bush visited in front of the cameras was hastily set
up for his photo-op and then torn down immediately after he and the herd
of "news people" had left. And those women Bush hugged for the camera
were not even Biloxi locals. . . And as we watched the CNN video of
loaders and dozers seemingly hard at work to repair the 17th Street
levee where Bush was visiting, he told us and the world that progress
was flowing - but according to Senator Mary Landrieu, the crew that was
working so hard yesterday left and has never come back.

http://www.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_71924.asp

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INTERDICTOR - All the fish in the Aquarium of the Americas are dead.

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CNN - A major pipeline supplying refined crude products from the Gulf to
the East Coast is now running at full capacity and is delivering into
all locations along its system. The Colonial Pipeline, based in
Alpharetta, Ga., returned to full operating conditions late Monday and
full commercial electrical power has been restored to the pipeline, the
company said in a statement

http://money.cnn.com/2005/09/06/news/economy/pipeline/

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LEAH HOGSTEN, SALT LAKE TRIBUNE - Not long after some 1,000 firefighters
sat down for eight hours of training, the whispering began: "What are we
doing here?" As New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin pleaded on national
television for firefighters - his own are exhausted after working around
the clock for a week - a battalion of highly trained men and women sat
idle Sunday in a muggy Sheraton Hotel conference room in Atlanta. Many
of the firefighters, assembled from Utah and throughout the United
States by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, thought they were
going to be deployed as emergency workers. Instead, they have learned
they are going to be community-relations officers for FEMA, shuffled
throughout the Gulf Coast region to disseminate fliers and a phone
number: 1-800-621-FEMA. On Monday, some firefighters stuck in the
staging area at the Sheraton peeled off their FEMA-issued shirts and
stuffed them in backpacks, saying they refuse to represent the federal
agency. Federal officials are unapologetic. "I would go back and ask the
firefighter to revisit his commitment to FEMA, to firefighting and to
the citizens of this country," said FEMA spokeswoman Mary Hudak.

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_3004197

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CNN - New Orleans' mayor ordered law enforcement agencies Tuesday night
to remove everyone from the city who is not involved in cleaning up
after Hurricane Katrina, whether they want to go or not. Mayor Ray Nagin
instructed all public safety officers "to compel the evacuation of all
persons ... regardless of whether such persons are on private property
or do not desire to leave," according to a written statement from his
office. The order did not apply to people in Algiers on the West Bank
side of Orleans Parish. . .

"I understand wanting to stay in their homes, not wanting to give up on
New Orleans," Nagin said. "But we have a very volatile situation.
There's lots of oil on the water, gas leaks where it's bubbling up, and
there's fire on top."

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/06/katrina.impact/index.html

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AP - Four people may have died of a waterborne bacterial infection
circulating in Hurricane Katrina's flood waters, and health officials
took steps to stem spread of a diarrhea-causing virus among refugees in
Houston's Astrodome.
The deaths appear to have been caused by Vibrio vulnificus, a germ
common in warm Gulf Coast waters that's usually spread by eating
contaminated food but that can penetrate open wounds, too. The deaths -
one a hurricane refugee evacuated to Texas, the other three in
Mississippi - were attributed to wound infections, said Tom Skinner,
spokesman for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which
received the reports from officials in the two states.

The reports underscore advice issued by federal health officials
Tuesday: Rescue workers and anyone left in hurricane-ravaged areas
should try to limit direct skin contact with flood waters; seek
immediate medical attention if they have cuts or other wounds exposed to
the dirty water; and wash their hands frequently.

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20050906/D8CF2ICO0.html Murder and rape
- fact or fiction?

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GARY YOUNGE, GUARDIAN - There were two babies who had their throats
slit. The seven-year-old girl who was raped and murdered in the
Superdome. And the corpses laid out amid the excrement in the convention
centre. In a week filled with dreadful scenes of desperation and anger
from New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina some stories stood out. But
as time goes on many remain unsubstantiated and may yet prove to be
apocryphal. New Orleans police have been unable to confirm the tale of
the raped child, or indeed any of the reports of rapes, in the Superdome
and convention centre. . . And while many claim they happened, no
witnesses, survivors or survivors' relatives have come forward. Nor has
the source for the story of the murdered babies, or indeed their bodies,
been found. . .

http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,1563470,00.html

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PAUL KRUGMAN, NY TIMES - The federal government's lethal ineptitude
wasn't just a consequence of Mr. Bush's personal inadequacy; it was a
consequence of ideological hostility to the very idea of using
government to serve the public good. For 25 years the right has been
denigrating the public sector, telling us that government is always the
problem, not the solution. Why should we be surprised that when we
needed a government solution, it wasn't forthcoming?

Does anyone remember the fight over federalizing airport security? Even
after 9/11, the administration and conservative members of Congress
tried to keep airport security in the hands of private companies. They
were more worried about adding federal employees than about closing a
deadly hole in national security. . .

Several recent news analyses on FEMA's sorry state have attributed the
agency's decline to its inclusion in the Department of Homeland
Security, whose prime concern is terrorism, not natural disasters. But
that supposed change in focus misses a crucial part of the story.

For one thing, the undermining of FEMA began as soon as President Bush
took office. Instead of choosing a professional with expertise in
responses to disaster to head the agency, Mr. Bush appointed Joseph
Allbaugh, a close political confidant. Mr. Allbaugh quickly began trying
to scale back some of FEMA's preparedness programs. . . The downgrading
of FEMA continued, with the appointment of Michael Brown as Mr.
Allbaugh's successor. Mr. Brown had no obvious qualifications, other
than having been Mr. Allbaugh's college roommate. . .

The administration has always tried to treat 9/11 purely as a lesson
about good versus evil. But disasters must be coped with, even if they
aren't caused by evildoers. Now we have another deadly lesson in why we
need an effective government, and why dedicated public servants deserve
our respect. Will we listen?

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/05/opinion/05krugman.html

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MEDICC REVIEW, CUBA - Hurricane Michelle ripped through Cuba in November
2001, the most powerful storm since 1944. But just five people died.
Successful civil defence and Red Cross planning ensured that 700,000
people were evacuated to emergency shelters in time. Search-and-rescue
and emergency health-care plans swung into action. In Havana,
electricity and water supplies were turned off to avoid deaths from
electrocution and sewage contamination. Cuba's population was advised in
advance to store water and clear debris from streets that might cause
damage. Later, the United Nations reported that the government's "high
degree of disaster preparedness. . . was decisive in the prevention of
major loss of life".

The contrast between events in Cuba and earlier disasters, such as
Hurricanes Mitch and Georges in 1998 and the floods in Venezuela in
1999, is enormous. Mitch killed 20,000 people and put Honduras's
economic development back 20 years. Without better disaster
preparedness, the region's development will be knocked back by each
succeeding disaster. But where are resources for disaster preparedness
best invested? . . .

Some of the statistics related to Cuba's hurricane preparedness and
response strategy are truly dazzling . . . including these from
Hurricane Ivan:

- Sustained winds were clocked at 124 mph; gusts reached over 161 mph

- In the aftermath, 5,296,500 cubic feet of solid waste filled Havana´s
streets; garbage brigades were collecting up to 1,059,300 cubic feet
daily

- Early evacuation plan allows 100,000 people to be evacuated safely in
less than 3 hours

- 2492 evacuation centers were set up

- 1,898,396 people were evacuated (that's more than 15% of the total
population)

- Of those evacuated, fully 78% or 1,471,058 people, were sheltered in
the homes of family, friends or neighbors.

- 1,898,160 farm animals in vulnerable areas were moved to safer ground

http://www.medicc.org/medicc_review/1004/pages/top_story.html

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OXFAM AMERICA - Giving the whole population access to resources like
literacy, roads, and electricity, as is the case in Cuba, multiplies the
effect of disaster preparation and response measures. Countries without
those levels of social development do not have these multiplying effects
for their risk reduction measures. While it is clear that Cuba has a
real advantage in this, it would be shortsighted to dismiss a whole
system as not adaptable or replicable in other countries when it is
clear that that system actually does save lives. . . Cuba, with its
reduced economic circumstances, demonstrates that political commitment
to saving lives is the basis from which so much else follows. In the far
from ideal real world of the early 21st century, the absence of
political commitment at the national level cannot be allowed to remain
the definitive obstacle to addressing risk reduction in countries of the
global south, especially given the serious nature of increasing
vulnerability.

http://www.oxfamamerica.org/newsandpublications/publications/
research_reports/pdfs/cuba_hur_eng.pdf


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AFX - Some 94,000 names have been registered on a website created by the
international Red Cross to help people trace their relatives in the wake
of Hurricane Katrina, and the number is growing, it said. Survivors in
the United States can use the 'family news network' to let people know
where they are, while other relatives can post names of those feared
missing or remove names after people are located. It is also accessible
by a US toll-free telephone number. 'By this morning, we had 94,000
entries, that compares to 65,000 yesterday morning, which indicates that
there is still a lot of demand for this service,' Westphal said.

http://www.forbes.com/finance/feeds/afx/2005/09/06/afx2207791.html

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NY TIMES - Two Navy helicopter pilots and their crews returned from New
Orleans on Aug. 30 expecting to be greeted as lifesavers after ferrying
more than 100 hurricane victims to safety. "I felt it was a great day
because we resupplied the people we needed to and we rescued people,
too," Lieutenant Udkow said. But the air operations commander at
Pensacola Naval Air Station "reminded us that the logistical mission
needed to be our area of focus.". . .

Only in recent days, after the federal response to the disaster has come
to be seen as inadequate, have large numbers of troops and dozens of
helicopters, trucks and other equipment been poured into to the effort.
Early on, the military rescue operations were smaller, often depending
on the initiative of individuals like Lieutenants Shand and Udkow. . .
The storm had cut off electricity and water to the center, and the two
helicopters were supposed to drop their loads and return to Pensacola,
their home base, said Cmdr. Michael Holdener, Pensacola's air operations
chief. "Their orders were to go and deliver water and parts and to come
back," Commander Holdener said.

But as the two helicopters were heading back home, the crews picked up a
radio transmission from the Coast Guard saying helicopters were needed
near the University of New Orleans to help with rescue efforts, the two
pilots said. Out of range for direct radio communication with Pensacola,
more than 100 miles to the east, the pilots said, they decided to
respond and turned their helicopters around, diverting from their
mission without getting permission from their home base. Within minutes,
they were over New Orleans.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/07/national/nationalspecial/07navy.html

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BUSH TO INVESTIGATE BUSH'S HANDLING OF KATRINA

CHIMPY MCcOVERUP - Alternate headlines considered:

Hitler to lead investigation into what went wrong with the showers in
the death camps

Nixon To Probe Watergate Breakins

LAPD To Probe Rodney King Beating

Bush picks commission to probe Iraq intelligence failures

OREAD DAILY - Bush hopes to find out why Bush flew quickly to San Diego
in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and why, while there, Bush
attempted to play the guitar.

Bush also hopes to find out why Bush cut funds to levee rehabilitation
in Louisiana.

Further Bush hopes to discover the reason Bush appointed a horse
association boss to run FEMA and why Bush cut funds to the organization
as well.

Bush will investigate the reasons for Bush's high praise of the Dept. of
Homeland Security's and Fema's response to the catastrophe on the Gulf
Coast while thousands were left to fend for themselves for days on end.
. .

Bush also wants to know how all those national guardsmen and women got
to Iraq and what they are up to there.

Bush wants to know why Bush supports Judge Michael Chernoff and exactly
why Bush appointed him head of Homeland Security to begin with. . .

Bush also intends to find out once and for all just what Bush is always
smiling about.

Finally, Bush plans to discover just why the front porch of Sen. Trent
Lott's home was allowed to be destroyed.

In other words the Bush committee will get to the bottom of Bush's
bottom.

http://oreaddaily.blogspot.com/

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POLITICS
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THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT HILLARY CLINTON BEFORE 2008

SAM SMITH, SHADOWS OF HOPE, 1994 - During the first months of the
Clinton administration, one of the biggest national policy changes of
the past fifty years was being forged by a secret committee led by Mrs.
Clinton under procedures that periodically defied the courts and the
Government Accounting Office and whose public manifestations consisted
of highly contrived media opportunities, carefully staged "town
meetings," and similar artifices.

Despite the contrary evidence of public opinion polls, the concept of
Canadian-style single-payer insurance was dismissed early. Tom Hamburger
and Ted Marmor in the Washington Monthly tell of a single-payer
proponent being invited to the White House in February 1993. It was, he
said, a "pseudo-consultation;" the doctor was quickly informed that
"single payer is not politically feasible." When Dr. David Himmelstein
of the Harvard Medical School pressed Mrs. Clinton on single payer, she
replied, "Tell me something interesting, David."

In other words, write Hamburger and Marmor: "Fewer than six weeks into
the Clinton presidency, the White House had made its key policy
decision: Before the Health Care Task Force wrote a single page of its
22-volume report to the President, the single payer idea was written
off, and 'managed competition' was in."

If there was any popular, grassroots demand for "managed competition" it
never appeared. Managed competition had not been tested anywhere.
Nonetheless, reported Thomas Bodenehimer in Nation:

"Around Hillary Rodham Clinton's health reform table sit the
managed-competition winners: big business, hospitals, large (but not
small) commercial insurers, the Blues, budget-worried government leaders
and the 'Jackson Hole Group,' the chief intellectual honchos of the
managed competition movement. . . Adherence to the mantra of managed
competition appears to be the price of a ticket of admission to this
gathering. "

What was finally proposed involved a massive transfer of the American
health industry -- by some accounts now larger than the
military-industrial complex -- to a small number of the largest
insurance companies and other major corporations. These were companies
that had the assets to play the game being offered -- a medical
oligopoly that would dispense health-care under the rules of the Fortune
500 rather than according to those of Hipprocrates.

Clinton's position on health care had bounced around in the early months
of the campaign, finally settling on a policy that would leave the big
health insurers largely unscathed. It was not particularly surprising.
Max Brantley, columnist for the Arkansas Times, noted that "Blue Cross
owns Arkansas, and [Clinton] never did much to fight them."

The stakes would eventually become so high that a number of the biggest
insurers -- including CIGNA, Aetna and Metropolitan Life -- would leave
the industry-wide Health Insurance Association of America. Five of the
largest insurance companies formed something called the Alliance for
Managed Competition. In this new game one of the first targets of
'managed competition' was the smaller insurance companies that now
account for nearly half of the health underwriting business. Said
managed competition advocate Lynn Etheridge, "Ninety-nine percent of the
insurance companies are going to be wiped out because they're only
prepared to be insurance companies." Mrs. Clinton, sounding like a
1980s takeover lawyer, said, "It's going to be a Darwinian struggle.
Only the best and fittest of them will survive."i Similarly, when asked
how small businesses were meant to cope with the added costs of her
plan, Mrs. Clinton replied, "I can't go out and save every
undercapitalized entrepreneur in America."

Her interest lay with the largest companies, i.e. the ones with the
ability to purchase or create the health maintenance organizations that
would become de rigeur under the Clinton scheme. The new HMOs would be
major profit-centers for companies, simultaneously subsidized by federal
payments for the ailments of the poor, elderly and those without
conventional insurance.

ORDER SHADOWS OF HOPE
http://prorev.com/order3.htm#shadows

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ARTS
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DOBIE GILLIS' FRIEND

MELTING POT - Maynard G. Krebs, Dobie Gillis' best friend, was the first
beatnik on national TV and remains the most famous beatnik in history.
Sure Kerouac was the real thing while Krebs was just a fiction, but what
a memorable fiction he was. Maynard's character was created by Max
Shulman specifically for the TV show. (When Bob Denver asked Shulman why
Maynard wasn't in either of the books, Shulman would only reply "Because
I wanted to sell a few copies!")

But it was Denver himself who fleshed the character out, mainly because
the writers had no idea what beatniks were really like. Actually Denver
didn't know anything about them either -- he'd been a Catholic school
teacher when he landed the part. Denver didn't do any research on real
beatniks to develop the character. Instead he just played Maynard as a
more childlike and innocent version of himself. Denver dug jazz so jazz
musicians became Maynard's idols too. (A great example of just how hip
the Dobie show was: Can you name any other 50's sitcom where Dizzy
Gillespie and Thelonius Monk were praised on a regular basis?) . . .

Maynard lived in his own world with its own twisted logic. The G. in his
middle name stood for Walter. (He was named after his aunt.) His speech
was full of colorful catch phrases such as "You rang?" and "Like, I'm
getting all misty."

. . . Just before the Dobie show ended its run in 1962, Maynard recorded
his legendary "Like, What?" album. But when the show was cancelled, the
record's release was scrapped. Only a few hundred promotional copies
were ever manufactured. "Like, What?" is now a highly sought after
collector's item fetching thousands of dollars in mint condition. . .
When Rolling Stone magazine asked Bob Dylan where he got the inspiration
for "If Dogs Run Free", he said "I wanted to get that Krebs sound, you
know, with the girls in the back, 'Like What?' "

http://www.fortunecity.com/meltingpot/lawrence/153/krebs.html

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AMERICAN NOTES
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BURNING MAN ATTRACTS 35,000

SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, BLACK ROCK CITY, NV -- With the roar of a great
fire fed by the wind, the 40-foot man that for the past week has been
the focal point of this impromptu city went up in flames, a sacrifice to
art fashioned of wood, steel and neon that set the sky alight.

More than 35,000 people gathered Saturday night in a great circle around
the Burning Man for which the weeklong arts festival is named, each with
his or her own interpretation of the fire's significance. For some, it
was a primal experience bordering on the religious. For others, it
spoketo the fleeting nature of art and inspiration. And for still
others, it is safe to say, it was nothing more than an excuse to ingest
whatever intoxicants fell to hand, in whatever quantity that might be
available. . .

A barrage of fireworks erupted at 9:38 p.m., a cascade of primary bright
colors rising from the funhouse maze at the base of the man. The flames
quickly engulfed the base, raced past the man's feet and toward the sky,
casting a bright orange glow over the playa and sending a thick column
of smoke toward the sky.

The fire that marks the zenith of Burning Man is known simply as "The
Burn," and it is to Burning Man as prom night is to high school. It is a
rite of passage for the first-timers, and a time for reflection among
the veterans.

And for everyone, it is cause for grand parties, fancy outfits and all-
night revelry. Burners, as those who make the annual pilgrimage here are
called, spend Saturday laying low and resting up for the big night,
planning their outfits and reflecting on the past week.

"When the man burns, it's like a phoenix that burns down and you take it
with you into real life, all the lessons learned here about being good
to people and expressing yourself," said Miss Black Rock City 2005,
Heather Newman of Seattle.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/09/04/BAGQCDU4P11.DTL


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CORPORADOS
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YAHOO HELPS SEND CHINESE JOURNALIST TO PRISON

DOUG IRELAND, DIRELAND - Yahoo helped send Shi Tao, 37, a journalist
with the business daily Dangdai Shang Ba -- to prison for 10 years, by
providing China's state security authorities with details that helped to
identify and convict him, the Paris-based international organization
Reporters Without Borders announced. Yahoo for years has gone to any
lengths to gain a larger share of the Chinese market, but this ratting
out of a courageous journalist marks a new low for the U.S.-based
Internet giant.

Shi Tao was convicted in April and sent to the slammer for a decade for
the crime of "divulging state secrets abroad." And what was the "state
secret Shi Tao was accused of disclosing? He sent the text of an
internal message which the authorities had sent to his newspaper warning
journalists of the dangers of "social destabilization and risks"
resulting from the return of certain dissidents on the 15th anniversary
of the Tienanmen Square massacre, distributing it to foreign websites.
RSF today charged that Yahoo complied with requests from Chinese
authorities to furnish them with information regarding an IP address
that linked Shi Dao's personal e-mail address to a specific message
containing the government's alert to possible political protests on the
massacres anniversary. This information, which works to document cases
of Chinese political prisoners. comes from the official verdict against
the journalist as translated into English by the Dui Hua Foundation,
which works to document the cases of Chinese political prisoners.

"We already knew that Yahoo collaborates enthusiastically with the
Chinese regime in questions of censorship, and now we know it is a
Chinese police informant as well," RSF said in a statement. "We know
that Yahoo will, yet again, simply state that they just conform to the
laws of the countries in which they operate," RSF added, "but does the
fact that this corporation operates under Chinese law free it from all
ethical considerations? How far will it go to please Beijing?"

For years Yahoo has allowed the Chinese version of its search engine to
be censored. In 2002, Yahoo voluntarily signed the "Public Pledge on
Self-Discipline for the China Internet Industry," agreeing to abide by
PRC censorship regulations. Searches deemed sensitive by the Chinese
authorities -- such as "Taiwan independence" in Chinese typed into the
Yahoo! China search engine -- retrieve only a limited and approved set
of results.

http://direland.typepad.com/direland/2005/09/yahoo_helps_sen.html

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HEALTH & SCIENCE
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HEALTH BILLS LEADING CAUSE OF BANKRUPTCY

MALCOLM GLADWELL, NEW YORKER - The leading cause of personal bankruptcy
in the United States is unpaid medical bills. Half of the uninsured owe
money to hospitals, and a third are being pursued by collection
agencies. Children without health insurance are less likely to receive
medical attention for serious injuries, for recurrent ear infections, or
for asthma. Lung-cancer patients without insurance are less likely to
receive surgery, chemotherapy, or radiation treatment. Heart-attack
victims without health insurance are less likely to receive angioplasty.
People with pneumonia who don't have health insurance are less likely to
receive X rays or consultations. The death rate in any given year for
someone without health insurance is twenty-five per cent higher than for
someone with insurance. Because the uninsured are sicker than the rest
of us, they can't get better jobs, and because they can't get better
jobs they can't afford health insurance, and because they can't afford
health insurance they get even sicker.

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/050829fa_fact

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SLEEP DEPRIVED DOCTORS ACT LIKE DRINKERS

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN - A new study of young doctors who are
notoriously overworked shows that they're often so tired that they
perform some activities as if they were hammered. The University of
Michigan study was the first of its kind to do this kind of
sleep/alcohol comparison--previously used on truck drivers, for
example--on medical residents. The young doctors who were on a "heavy
schedule" slept an average of 3 hours per night. From a press release:
In findings published in this week's issue of the Journal of the
American Medical Association, 34 young pediatric residents showed
similar impairments in vigilance, attention, and driving skills on
standardized tests after they had been on duty overnight in the hospital
and worked a month of 90-hour weeks, compared with when they had
consumed three to four alcoholic drinks after a month of 44-hour weeks
with no overnight duties. . .

For example: The reaction time of residents who had just finished a
month of heavy work schedules was 7 percent slower and they committed 40
percent more errors than when they were on a month of light schedules,
On a driving simulator, they had more difficulty maintaining a
consistent lane position and a constant speed during the heavy work
compared to the lighter work schedule. Speed variability on the driving
test was also 29 percent higher following the heavy-schedule compared to
the light schedule after drinking alcohol, but there were no other
performance differences between these two conditions.

In other words, after a month of 90-hour weeks with overnight shifts
every fourth or fifth night, residents performed about the same as when
they had a BAC (Blood Alcohol Level) of 0.04 percent after a month of
44-hour weeks of daytime shifts.

http://www.med.umich.edu/opm/newspage/2005/residentsleep.htm

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DRUG BUSTS
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POT USE BY TEENS DOWN IN STATES APPROVING MEDICAL USE

ERIC BAILEY, LA TIMES - Bucking dire predictions by anti-drug warriors,
the 10 states that approved medical marijuana laws over the last decade
have experienced sharp declines in cannabis use among teenagers,
according to a new study by a marijuana advocacy group. California has
seen usage among ninth-graders drop 47% since 1996, the year the state
became the nation's first to legalize medical marijuana. Over the same
period, the nation as a whole experienced a 43% decline among
eighth-graders. . .

California, Washington and Colorado have all experienced greater drops
in marijuana usage than have occurred nationwide. Only three states with
medical marijuana laws - Maine, Oregon and Nevada - have lagged behind
the national drop in teen marijuana use, the report said.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-pot7sep07,1,3527430.
story?coll=la-headlines-california


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RECOVERED HISTORY
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NAVY THOUGHT KEROUAC HAD 'STRONG SCHIZOID TRENDS'

THE SMOKNG GUN - A decade before "On the Road" was published, Jack
Kerouac evinced "strong schizoid trends" that led military officials to
declare him unfit for service. Details of Kerouac's 1943 honorable
discharge--after just ten days of active duty--are contained in the late
writer's official U.S. Naval Reserve file, which TSG obtained from the
Military Personnel Records center in St. Louis. The Beat Generation
chronicler, who died at age 47 in 1969, enlisted in December 1942 and
reported for active duty three months later. Almost immediately, though,
he landed in the hospital, where he was examined by medical personnel
who initially concluded that Kerouac suffered from dementia, according
to the detail-rich military documents. Kerouac complained that the harsh
appraisal, which was later softened, came after he complained of
headaches and asked for aspirin. Instead, "they diagnosed me Dementia
Praecox," he said. A medical history report quotes Kerouac recalling a
"sex contact" with a 32-year-old woman (he was 14 at the time) that
"upset him somewhat." The document also includes information from his
mother and father, with mom reporting that she "believes him
heterosexual but interest in girls shallow." A second, more extensive,
medical report touches on Kerouac's masturbatory habits, writing
ambitions, drunken sprees, and the voices and symphonies in his head. A
must read, this report also includes Kerouac noting that he "had been
writing a novel, in the style of James Joyce, about his home town, and
averaging approximately 16 hours daily in an effort to get it down. This
was an experiment and he doesn't intend to publish."

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0906052_jack_kerouac_1.html


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ECOLOGY
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EUROPEANS CONSIDER ELEPHANT GRASS AS ENERGY SOURCE

BBC - The fields of Europe could soon take on a shimmering silver colour
as farmers grow giant grasses to try to mitigate the effects of global
warming.
The latest studies suggest one form of elephant grass would make a
productive "energy crop" to be burnt in power stations to generate
electricity.
Scientists told a Dublin conference the 4m-high Miscanthus needs little
fertiliser to produce very high yields. . . "There's no reason why in 10
years' time this shouldn't be widely exploited," commented Professor
Mike Jones, an Irish expert on plants and climate. "If we grew
Miscanthus on 10% of suitable land in [the 15-member] Europe, then we
could generate 9% of the gross electricity production," he told the
British Association's Festival of Science. Burning biomass is broadly
neutral in terms of its emissions of carbon dioxide, the major gas
thought responsible for warming the planet.

"As the plant grows it is drawing carbon dioxide out of the air,"
explained Professor Steve Long, from the University of Illinois. "When
you burn it, you put that carbon dioxide back, so the net effect on
atmospheric CO2 is zero."

Professor Long has been cultivating a hybrid of two Miscanthus species
on plots in his home state. The project has managed to achieve yields of
60 tonnes of dry material per hectare. This is a considerable
improvement on the trials that have been conducted in Europe, where a
typical yield is some 12 tonnes per hectare. But even this lower
production provides an energy content equivalent to about 36 barrels of
crude oil. And with a barrel currently priced around $60, such a yield
would have a potential value of about $2,160 per hectare.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4220790.stm

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SMART WHALE LEARNS HOW TO CATCH SEAGULLS, PASSES ON TRICK

AP, NIAGARA FALLS, CA - An enterprising young killer whale at Marineland
has figured out how to use fish as bait to catch seagulls - and shared
his strategy with his fellow whales. Michael Noonan, a professor of
animal behavior at Canisius College in Buffalo, N.Y., made the discovery
by accident while studying orca acoustics. "One day I noticed one of
the young whales appeared to have come up with a procedure for luring
gulls down to the pool," the professor said. "I found it interesting so
I noted it in my log."

First, the young whale spit regurgitated fish onto the surface of the
water, then sank below the water and waited. If a hungry gull landed on
the water, the whale would surge up to the surface, sometimes catching a
free meal of his own. Noonan watched as the same whale set the same trap
again and again. Within a few months, the whale's younger half brother
adopted the practice. Eventually the behavior spread and now five
Marineland whales supplement their diet with fresh fowl, the scientist
said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050902/ap_on_sc/clever_whale

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OTHER NEWS
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JUROR IN TERROR TRIAL SAID SHE FEARED FOR HER LIFE

REPORTERS COMMITTEE FOR FREEDOM OF THE PRESS - One of the anonymous
jurors in the trial of Lynne F. Stewart, the defense lawyer convicted in
February of aiding terrorism, wrote to the judge six weeks after the
verdict to say she cast her guilty vote "only as a result of the fear
and intimidation I was made to feel for my life" during deliberations.
Stewart was convicted in Federal District Court in Manhattan of
providing material aid to terrorism and lying to the government, for
releasing a statement by an imprisoned terrorist client, Sheik Omar
Abdel Rahman, in defiance of federal prison rules silencing him. The
general nature of the juror's concerns had been public since Aug. 12,
when the judge unsealed papers that defense lawyers and prosecutors had
filed about her complaint. But the letter's full text, discussed
yesterday, shows that Juror 39 told the judge shortly after the verdict
that she had feared for her life in the jury room and felt she had
rendered her guilty verdict involuntarily, according to a report in the
New

http://www.rcfp.org/behindthehomefront/