BS: I Read it in the Newspaper

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 04 Apr 07 - 03:48 PM

Man, where was all this when I was in fifth grade?



A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 12:53 AM

Terror Watch: A fired U.S. attorney strikes back

The Justice Department called David Iglesias, the U.S. attorney in New Mexico, an 'absentee landlord'—a key reason listed for his firing last December. Just one problem: Iglesias, a captain in the Navy Reserve, was off teaching classes as part of the war on terror. Now Iglesias is striking back, arguing he was improperly dismissed.

WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball
Newsweek
Updated: 2:26 p.m. CT April 4, 2007

April 4, 2007 - When he wasn't doing his day job as U.S. attorney in New Mexico, David Iglesias was a captain in the Navy Reserve, teaching foreign military officers about international terrorism.
But Iglesias's military service in support of what the Pentagon likes to call the Global War on Terror (GWOT) apparently didn't go down well with his superiors at the Justice Department. Recently released documents show that one reason aides to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales cited in justifying the decision to fire Iglesias as U.S attorney late last year was that he was an "absentee landlord" who was spending too much time away from the office.

That explanation may create new legal problems for Gonzales and Justice. Iglesias confirmed to NEWSWEEK that he was recently questioned by lawyers for the Office of Special Counsel, an independent federal watchdog agency, to determine if his dismissal was a violation of the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA), a federal law that prohibits job discrimination against members of the U.S. military.

At the encouragement of Office of Special Counsel director Scott Bloch and his deputies, Iglesias said he is this week filing a formal legal complaint with OSC against the Justice Department over his dismissal on this and other grounds. (While the Justice Department normally prosecutes USERRA violations, the OSC, an independent federal agency that protects the rights of whistle-blowers, takes the case when the potential violator is the federal government itself.) "I want to make sure they didn't fire me because of my military duty," Iglesias said. "When I was away from the office, it wasn't like I was going on vacation in Europe." (A Justice Department spokesman did not respond for a request for comment on whether Iglesias's firing might have been a violation of the law.)
The OSC's inquiry into the Iglesias case—first reported this week in NEWSWEEK— injects yet another irony to the controversy over the U.S. attorney firings.

The Bush administration has vigorously promoted enforcement of USERRA—in large part because of the dramatic increase in National Guard and military reserve members who have been called into active duty due to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The law's purpose—highlighted by Gonzales himself in a Justice Department press release last summer—is to make sure reservists and National Guard members don't suffer in the workplace when they are called to serve their country.

Gonzales announced last August the creation of a special Web site to inform reservists and National Guard members of their rights under the law. At the time, he also touted the first-ever class-action lawsuit under USERRA that had been brought by the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. The suit against American Airlines alleged the company had reduced employment benefits for two pilots—one of them, like Iglesias, a captain in the Navy Reserve—because the pilots had taken too much leave to perform their military service. "This nation depends on our reservists to faithfully carry out their duty," said Wan J. Kim, assistant attorney general in the charge of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, when the lawsuit suit was filed. "No reservists—indeed, no members of our armed forces—should ever be punished or discriminated against for answering the call of duty."

"This is a really interesting issue," said Sam Wright, a veteran U.S. Navy lawyer and leading expert on USERRA, when asked about whether the law might apply in Iglesias's case. (Wright recently retired from government service).

Wright noted that USERRA prohibits employers—including government agencies—from taking any "adverse employment action" against reservists or National Guard members because of their military service or even using such service as a "motivating factor" in such actions.

While it is far from clear that the law can be stretched so far as to apply to U.S. attorneys, the circumstances of Iglesias' dismissal closely parallel the sorts of USERRA cases that are increasingly being brought by Bush administration lawyers, according to Wright and others familiar with the act.

Iglesias's background as a Navy JAG (Judge Advocate General) Corps lawyer and his membership in the Navy Reserve was well known within the Justice Department. Indeed, it was a major part of his biography when, at the recommendation of his original patron, Sen. Pete Domenici, he was first nominated by President Bush to serve as U.S. attorney in 2001. (Assigned to represent a young Marine charged in a military hazing incident in Guantánamo Bay in 1986, Iglesias mounted a vigorous defense of his client, in part by raising questions about the conduct of the commanding officer. His performance was the inspiration for the Tom Cruise character in the movie, "A Few Good Men.")

When he took off to perform his required 45 days of reserve duty each year, Iglesias said his secretary regularly notified the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys; officials there fully understood the reason he was going to be away, he said.

Those duties expanded in recent years, with the advent of the war on terrorism. In addition to prosecuting routine JAG Corps cases at naval bases in San Diego and Washington state, Iglesias told NEWSWEEK he was also enlisted to teach courses for allied military and intelligence officers at the Defense Institute of International Legal Studies at the U.S. Naval Station in Newport, R.I.—and at the Joint Special Operations University in Florida.

"I've taught foreign special forces on legal issues related to law enforcement and military operations," Iglesias said, in an e-mail exchange with NEWSWEEK. The courses focus in part on the use of military versus law-enforcement rules of engagement. "I try to get them to think of what rules of force apply to terrorists," he said.
But it wasn't until months after he was abruptly terminated as U.S. attorney last December that Iglesias was surprised to discover that his time away from the office doing his military service may have been a factor—or at least was being cited as a factor—in his dismissal.

In February, when the controversy over the abrupt firings of eight U.S. attorneys erupted, top Justice Department officials prepared internal "talking points" for Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty, who was preparing to answer questions about the dismissals before the Senate Judiciary Committee. The talking points, part of thousands of pages of internal Justice Department documents released last month, show that officials listed "performance-related" reasons that McNulty could cite to explain why Iglesisas was fired. The second reason given was that Iglesias was "perceived to be an "absentee landlord" who relies on the first assistant U.S. attorney to run the office." (In one version of the talking points, the words "absentee landlord" are underlined.)

Although McNulty never addressed the specific reasons for Iglesias's firing in his Feb. 6 public testimony, a Justice Department official (who asked not to be identified talking about sensitive matters) confirmed that the deputy attorney general later mentioned the "absentee landlord" factor in a private briefing for congressional staffers.

To be sure, Justice officials cited other reasons, as well. They described Iglesias in the talking points as "under performing generally" and as a "lackluster manager."
They also contended that he was not doing enough to enforce border security. But one of McNulty's principal deputies, William Moschella, appeared to emphasize specifically the point about Iglesias being away from the office too much during his later testimony before the House Judiciary Committee. When asked by Democratic Rep. Linda Sanchez about the department's reasons for firing Iglesias, Moscella replied that "Iglesias had delegated to his first assistant the overall running of the office. And, quite frankly, U.S. attorneys are hired to run the office."

Of the U.S. attorneys fired, Iglesias's case has arguably created the biggest problem for the Justice Department. As Gonzales's former chief of staff, D. Kyle Sampson, testified last week, Iglesias was not on the original list of U.S. attorneys to be fired last fall—and was only added in November after White House aide Karl Rove complained to Gonzales that Iglesias was not doing enough to prosecute voter-fraud cases—a top GOP campaign priority. Iglesias has testified that he got two phone calls last October from Rep. Heather Wilson and Senator Domenici, both New Mexico Republicans, pressing him to bring indictments in a local corruption case that implicated Democrats—contacts that Iglesias has alleged were improper. Those contacts prompted Iglesias to brand his firing "a political hit."
Iglesias suspects that the Justice complaints about his absences were cooked up as an ex post facto rationale to justify a dismissal that was really made for political reasons. That's why, in filing his complaint with OSC, he is also alleging that his firing may have been a violation of the Hatch Act, which prohibits federal officials from using their offices to interfere with an election.

But it is his claim under USERRA that may raise the most interesting legal issues—especially in light of the Bush administration's strong stand on enforcement of the law. The OSC's Bloch, a Bush appointee whose lawyers interviewed Iglesias by phone last week, has made "aggressive" USERRA enforcement a top priority. The agency has handled more than 300 complaints since 2004 and routinely seeks internal documents from other agencies—under threats of subpoena—to complete its investigations. In about a half dozen cases, the OSC has actually brought suit against federal agencies for USERRA violations before the Merit Systems Protection Board. (OSC lawyers say they have been able to resolve many other cases through negotiations with the agencies.) The OSC has also taken an expansive view of the reach of USERRA, contending that high-level political appointees are protected by the act, not just midlevel civil servants. "Our view is that USERRA is required to be construed liberally," said one OSC lawyer, who asked not to be publicly identified talking about internal matters. "It's very broad. There is no exclusion for political appointees."

Wright, who co-wrote the USERRA law when he worked at the Labor Department in 1994, agreed that the reach of USERRA is unusually broad. But he said it's still an "open question" about whether the law could be used to protect the jobs of U.S. attorneys—Senate-confirmed appointees who serve at the pleasure of the president.
If the question is whether U.S. attorneys, like all other citizens, have rights under USERRA, "the answer is clearly yes," said Wright. "The harder question is whether there is any remedy."

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 01:02 AM

Woman gets DUI — for horseback ride
Alabama resident allegedly used animal to ram a police car at midnight
The Associated Press
Updated: 8:21 p.m. CT April 4, 2007
SYLVANIA, Ala. - A woman who went for a horseback ride through town at midnight and allegedly used the horse to ram a police car was charged with driving under the influence and drug offenses, police said Tuesday.
"Cars were passing by having to avoid it, and almost hitting the horse," said Police Chief Brad Gregg.
He said DUI charges can apply even when the vehicle has four legs instead of wheels.
Police in the northeast Alabama town received a call around midnight Saturday about someone riding a horse on a city street, Gregg said.
Officer John Seals found Melissa Byrum York, 40, of Henagar, on horseback on a nearby road and attempted to stop her. Seals asked the woman repeatedly to get off the horse, but she kept trying to kick the animal to make it run, the chief said.
"She wouldn't stop. She kept riding the horse and going on," Gregg said.
After ramming the police car with the horse and riding away, the woman tried to jump off but caught her foot in a stirrup, Gregg said. The officer took the woman into custody and discovered that she had crystal methamphetamine, a small amount of marijuana, pills and a small pipe, the chief said.
Horse not 'in the best of health'
York was charged with DUI for allegedly riding the horse under the influence of a controlled substance. She was also charged with drug possession, possession of drug paraphernalia, resisting arrest, assault, attempting to elude police and cruelty to animals.
Gregg said the horse, which belonged to York, "wasn't in the best of health, but it's still alive."
York was released from the DeKalb County Jail on $4,000 bond and was being transferred to the jail in Jackson County, where authorities had a warrant for her arrest on unrelated charges, Gregg said.
Jackson County officials said Tuesday that York had yet to be booked, and there were no records indicating whether she had a lawyer.
© 2007 The Associated Press

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 01:06 AM

March 30, 2007
CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. - An inmate was jailed as a man for more than a week on a statutory rape charge before a shower revealed the prisoner was a woman.

Alexander David Cross, also known as Elaine Ann Cross, had been in the Hamilton County Jail awaiting a court appearance Wednesday. Cross pleaded guilty to the charge in a deal with prosecutors.

The charge stems from an alleged sexual relationship with a 15-year-old girl. Prosecutors allege Cross, 42, and the teenager had sexual contact at least three times during June and July 2006.

Officials said Cross' gender was revealed when jail authorities forced the inmate to take a shower.

"After about 10 days in jail, they figure out Alex Cross is a female," prosecutor Boyd Patterson said in court.

The plea means no jail time will be required if Cross stays out of trouble for six years. Cross must register as a convicted sex offender and have no contact with the teen. The gender designation also must be changed to female on Cross' driver's license.

Cross couldn't immediately be located for comment.

© 2007 The Associated Press

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 01:10 AM

OOPS!

LOS ANGELES - An Air Force veteran has filed a federal claim after an operation at a Veterans Administration hospital in which a healthy testicle was removed instead of a potentially cancerous one.

Benjamin Houghton, 47, was to have had his left testicle removed June 14 at the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center because there was a chance it could harbor cancer cells. It also was atrophied and painful.

But doctors mistakenly removed the right testicle, according to medical records and the claim, which seeks $200,000 for future care and unspecified damages. He still hasn't had the other testicle removed.

"At first I thought it was a joke," Houghton told the Los Angeles Times. "Then I was shocked. I told them, 'What do I do now?"'

Houghton, his wife, Monica, and their attorney, Dr. Susan Friery, said they hoped to get the VA's attention by going public with the situation.

Dr. Dean Norman, chief of staff for the Greater Los Angeles VA system, has formally apologized to Houghton and his wife.

"We are making every attempt that we can to care for Mr. Houghton, but it's in litigation, and that's all we can tell you," he said. The hospital changed practices as a result of the case, he added.
© 2007 The Associated Press.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: beardedbruce
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 11:00 AM

Australian: Technology may fuel recorded assaults
POSTED: 1:43 a.m. EDT, April 5, 2007
Adjust font size:
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) -- Recent shocking cases of Australian teenagers raping girls then sharing images of their crimes via cell phones and the Internet will become more prevalent with the spread of technology, a criminologist said Thursday.

Five private school students, aged 17 and 18, were arrested in Sydney on Wednesday for allegedly raping a 17-year-old girl, then distributing digital footage of the attack taken with a cell phone camera to the phones of friends.

Police, who described the images as harrowing, were attempting to track down all the forwarded images, and warned the public that passing them on constitutes a crime, punishable by three years in prison.

The case has attracted national media attention, as well as comparisons to an incident last year when images of a sexual assault on a mentally disabled 17-year-old girl by a gang of teenagers near the southern city of Melbourne were posted on the online video Web site YouTube.

Bond University criminologist Prof. Paul Wilson said Thursday sex crimes and the sharing of recorded attacks will become more widespread. He said young males were motivated to distribute photographic evidence of themselves committing serious crimes because of their desire for peer group approval.

"The technology allows people to show off their exploits now, and clearly we're going to see more of these occur," Wilson said. "There are those who are still stupid enough to record memories of illegal acts like they were holiday snaps."

Wilson said one of the most disturbing aspects of the recent cases was the victims were "being harmed twice," as others were watching the rape scene after the attack.

"But the most worrying aspect ... is that there are young males who think sexual aggression is OK," he said.

The five Sydney teenagers charged with aggravated sexual assault of the girl in January were refused bail when they appeared in courts late Wednesday and Thursday. The charge carries a maximum of 20 years in prison.

Police have yet to make any arrests in last year's assault near Melbourne.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 11:29 AM

I think we have an answer -- we send those youths to the testicle doctor...


A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 06 Apr 07 - 11:40 AM

NEW CASTLE, Ind. (AP) - A cat helped spare a family from death by carbon monoxide poisoning by jumping on the bed and meowing wildly as fumes filled the home, the owners said.

Eric and Cathy Keesling said their 14-year-old cat, Winnie, played a crucial role in saving their lives March 24 after a gasoline-powered water pump in their basement caused the odourless but deadly gas to build up.

About 1 a.m., the domestic shorthair began nudging Cathy's ear and meowing loudly.

"It was a crazy meow, almost like she was screaming," said Cathy, who hesitated to get up until Winnie's caterwauling and jumping persisted.

When she finally climbed from bed, she realized she was nauseous and dizzy and couldn't awaken her husband. Because he had undergone minor neck surgery the previous day, she decided to call 911 but was so disoriented she had trouble dialling.

Paramedics found the couple's 14-year-old son, Michael, unconscious on the floor near his bedroom. The Keeslings were taken from the home in oxygen masks, treated for carbon monoxide poisoning and soon recovered.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Apr 07 - 01:14 AM

That doesn't explain the noise my old cat has been making at night lately--there is no source of carbon monoxide in the house. (Usually it's just a matter that his food dish is empty, but not always).

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 07 Apr 07 - 01:50 AM

Hmmm. Mebbe send him testicle doctor also?

Hmmmm?


A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Apr 07 - 03:14 PM

Long gone.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 11:05 AM

It seems to me that with some embellishment this might be an interesting song challenge. But I'll post the story here and let Amos stumble upon it and decide if it merits its own thread for such a challenge:

Cabby, Follow That Horse!
April 09, 2007

INDIANAPOLIS - A runaway horse pulled a carriage with two out-of-town tourists on a wild ride through downtown streets, until a teenager rode to the rescue in a pursuing taxi, leaped out and grabbed the horse's reins.

The driver of the Yellow Rose Carriage was thrown from her seat when a van crashed into the buggy Sunday afternoon. "The carriage driver lady just flew off the carriage," said William Basler, 19.

Basler ran after the carriage to try to stop it. A taxi driver saw what was happening, slowed and told Basler to jump in. The cab chased and passed the carriage, and Basler jumped out, grabbed the reins and stopped the horse. "It was just instinct," Basler said. "I was just worried about the people inside of it." He needed instinct, since he said his only experience with horses was riding one once when he was 15.

Police said carriage driver Kathleen Moriarty, 53, was briefly knocked unconscious but was not seriously hurt.

The passengers complained of some pain and were examined at a hospital, said police Sgt. Matthew Mount. The horse was not injured.

Police said the van driver, Timothy D. Carlson, 46, of Indianapolis, faces several preliminary charges including felony possession of a controlled substance, misdemeanor counts of driving under the influence, public intoxication and operating a vehicle without a license.

Here is a Google search on the story for some of the modified versions of the story.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 11:54 AM

Holy Moly, what a ride for the tourists -- they'll be dining out for months on the tale. The van driver will be in the pokey while they are tucking white linen napkins around their necks and sipping bubbly; meanwhile, the horse gets rubbed down, put back inthe stable, maybe some lineament for his ankles, and back to the same old drag next day. Hope the buggy driver was okay!


A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 07:16 PM

EXPLANATION FOUND FOR VA SURGEON'S ERROR!!!!

Art classes hone med students' visual skills

Courses help aspiring doctors see more details, make better diagnoses
The Associated Press
Updated: 2:11 p.m. CT March 20, 2007

PHILADELPHIA - Modern medicine provides doctors with an array of sophisticated machines that collect and present data about their patients, but the human eye is an invaluable yet often under-appreciated diagnostic tool.

To address that, a new collaboration of Jefferson Medical College and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts has been created to teach aspiring doctors to closely observe, describe and interpret the subtlest details with the eye of an artist.

The art-and-medicine program kicked off its first workshop last week with a group of 18 white-coated medical students visiting the academy's museum and a dynamic representation of their chosen profession: Thomas Eakins' masterwork "The Gross Clinic," which depicts an operation in progress.

The first- and second-year med students heard how to take a "visual inventory" — paying attention to overall elements of the painting, such as texture and brightness, and specifics, such as body language and facial expressions.

"This collaboration with our art colleagues is a wonderful augmentation to what we're already doing," said Dr. Charles Pohl, a professor of pediatrics at Jefferson and co-instructor at Friday's workshop. "We can learn from the masters to really fine-tune our attention to detail."

Besides the two-hour Visual Perception workshop, others slated for the 2007-2008 school year are Accuracy and Perception, Hand-Eye Coordination, Art in Healing, and Sculpture and Surgery. The courses are a mix of demonstrations, lectures and hands-on art lessons.

Adding humanities to curricula
A 2001 study in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that medical students in a similar Yale University program acquired more astute observational skills than their colleagues who didn't take the courses. Besides assessing a patient's well-being during an office visit, finely honed visual abilities can also allow doctors to spot subtle changes in a patient's X-rays over time, for example.

"When they can take a better look at the person in front of them, it helps them make better diagnoses and leads to improved sensitivity to the patient," said the academy's painting department chair, Al Gury, workshop co-instructor. "That's a critical area that many feel is needed in the medical profession."

Medical schools nationwide are increasingly adding humanities courses to their curricula.

According to the Association of American Medical Colleges, 89 of the country's 125 medical schools have humanities as an educational element included in a required course and 66 have it as an elective. (There's overlap because some schools have both.) The figures include all humanities, not just visual arts, spokeswoman Nicole Buckley said. Other humanities studied in medical schools include literature, performing arts and music.

The Medical College of Wisconsin has a one-month medical humanities elective for fourth-year medical students, and Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City established a program in conjunction with the Frick Museum.

While fine art may be unexplored territory for some Jefferson medical students, many of their artistic contemporaries at the academy are no strangers to the world of science.

"Our students go to the gross anatomy labs in their upper-level anatomy study," Gury said. "But this is the first time we've hosted the medical students."

© 2007 The Associated Press.

THEY STUDIED PICASSO THAT DAY!!!

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 07:20 PM

Jolly good show, I must say. I guess Picasso, though, depends on the "period". Some Picasso lessons would be on the lines of "how to see things as though you are still drunk after three days"...


A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 07:28 PM

From New Scietist.com a lesson of profound and elegant importance:

"We know them as the most highly sexed of all the apes. Now it appears that the easy-going social life enjoyed by bonobos makes them better at cooperating than their more aggressive chimp cousins.

Brian Hare of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and colleagues tested how well chimps and bonobos coped with challenging social situations. Bonobos, they found, were more likely to share a plate of food, using play or sex to defuse social tensions. In contrast, chimps' more limited social skills meant one individual was more likely to take all the food.

The researchers gave pairs of each species a task that required them to work together to retrieve a food reward that neither could reach alone. When the food was easily shared, both species quickly learned to do this. But when the food was in a single bowl - making it easy to monopolise - chimps were less willing to work together (Current Biology, vol 17, p 619).

"It's so simple and obvious that no one's ever demonstrated it," says Hare. "You can't cooperate if you can't share the spoils." The flexibility that allows humans to work together evolved more from social adeptness than high-powered reasoning, he suggests."

Seems to me this would be a good fable for the White House gang to study up on.


A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 09 Apr 07 - 07:50 PM

Seems to me this would be a good fable for the White House gang to study up on.

But the White House gang gets too much of their support from Fundies who refuse to admit the possibility of a matriarchal social order like the Bonobos.

The VA doc could have used this course?

Training docs to examine private parts

Mannequins help give medical students a hands-on education
Reuters: Updated: 8:51 a.m. CT March 19, 2007

CHICAGO - Dr. Carla Pugh seems an unlikely patron of porn shops. But that's exactly where Pugh, an assistant professor of surgery at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, procured some of the male body parts she uses to train medical students about human anatomy.

Pugh, 41, has patented technology that combines portions of fully formed anatomical mannequins with computers to teach medical students to do exams on the body's most private and sensitive areas — genitalia, breasts and rectums.

These are the exams, she said, that students are often most afraid of and that many medical school instructors, themselves often long-time practicing physicians, still find to be a source of embarrassment. "We've got big issues in the U.S. with sexuality," Pugh said in an interview during a break from teaching first-year medical students. "These guys have to be able to do it and act professional, so that adds a lot of pressure."

Getting supplies to build the models was no easy task. Medical education has largely glossed over such training, limiting demand for products in the industry. In some cases, erotica was the only option, she said.

The simulators are a far cry from the flesh and bones of a living, breathing person. But they are close enough to the real thing to let students know whether their touch is too rough, too soft or if they've missed a key spot entirely.

In traditional medical training, students often go straight from textbook to exam room with live patients, where they observe skilled doctors in action. Questions are asked later.

"Guess what?" said Pugh. "They're sweating bullets because they haven't had a scenario where they can talk about it comfortably, safely and with someone who is more knowledgeable."

During the Northwestern class, training is hands-on. Simulators are arranged at various stations according to exam type. At the prostate station, for example, several models of the male posterior are arranged on a table in various positions.

Inside each plastic model — yes, they have a fully formed anus and rectum — are paper-thin sensors that measure a student's touch and send individual readings to an attached computer monitor.

Students show up at the station for a brief overview from an instructing physician and then moments later, fingers are inserted, line readings from sensors go up and down on the computer screen, questions are asked and answered.

Scatological humor is inevitable. An instructor assures a student that, yes, you can tell a patient it's OK to pass wind if necessary during the exam and ask for a warning first.

Time is called and students move on to the next station. On another table, several examples of the penis, circumcised and not, limp and erect, await another round of students, who smile nervously.

Dr. Sudha Rao, a pediatrician, prepares to give an overview of the proper methods for performing an examination of the penis. "It's very helpful," said Rao of the anatomical models. "I think they're fantastic to be able to show a young student who is starting out."

Pugh began performing "surgery" on her dolls as a child, transplanting eyes and limbs with a sewing kit borrowed from her mother. Since then, she said she has always maintained a hands-on approach to medicine. She was disappointed with the level of feedback she received while doing her own surgical training in medical school at Howard University in Washington.

"It frustrated me because I was unsure," said Pugh, one of fewer than 400 black women surgeons in the United States. "I didn't have the level of access to the human body that I wanted."

She came up with the idea for the technology while working on a doctorate in education at Stanford University and obtained a patent for the sensors and data accumulation technology in 2001.
Pugh formed a licensing agreement with Medical Education Technologies Inc., a company specializing in medical training products, in early 2003.
Her pelvic exam simulators are already on the market at prices ranging from $16,000 to $20,000 each, and are used by more than 60 medical and nursing schools around the country. The prostate exam simulators used in the class as well as those for breast exams are still in prototype form.

Any help in these often taboo topics will make the first clinical encounters with a patient's private parts a little easier for medical students like 28-year-old Meredith Hirshfeld at Northwestern University in Chicago.

"It's the first time we're doing something invasive," she said. "It's nerve-racking."

Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 18 Apr 07 - 02:51 PM

Norway faults fish farms for 1.2 million escapes

18 Apr 2007 16:03:19 GMT
Source: Reuters

OSLO, Nov 18 (Reuters) - Norway faulted about 50 fish farming companies on Wednesday for escapes by 1.2 million salmon, cod and trout last year in a new bid to put pressure on firms to tighten their nets.

Environmentalists, who say that escaped farmed fish threaten wild stocks because of inter-breeding, welcomed the detailed list of breakouts from farms in the Nordic nation, the world's biggest producer of farmed Atlantic salmon.

The list showed escapes from major companies such as Marine Harvest , the world's number one salmon farmer, Cermaq and dozens of smaller operators. Norway has previously published figures for escapes but without where they came from.

"Allowing fish to escape in itself is not illegal, but escapes can be a sign of irresponsible management," Jens Christian Holm, of the Directorate of Fisheries, said in a statement with the list showing 1.2 million fish escaped.

It was the highest number of fish escapes in statistics back to 2001 -- 935,000 fish escaped in 2005. And 169,000 fish escaped in the first three months of 2007, according to the Directorate.

Holm said the figures had to be treated with caution because they do not indicate the reason for breakouts. The number of escapees is a tiny percentage of the total produced.

Fish firms say that the data do not distinguish between nets that are ripped because of mismanagement or, for instance, sabotage or accidents beyond the control of operators such as rips caused by boat propellers.

"Our goal is to have no escapes," said Marit Solberg, managing director of Marine Harvest's Norwegian unit. The company accounted for 10 of 60 breakouts in Norway in 2006, although the number of fish that slipped the company's nets was just 80,000. ...

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Apr 07 - 10:35 AM

Chimps more evolved than humans

Study says more chimp genes changed in beneficial ways than human genes

By Jeanna Bryner
LiveScience
Updated: 8:04 p.m. CT April 17, 2007

Since the human-chimp split about 6 million years ago, chimpanzee genes can be said to have evolved more than human genes, a new study suggests.

The results, detailed online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, contradict the conventional wisdom that humans are the result of a high degree of genetic selection, evidenced by our relatively large brains, cognitive abilities and bipedalism.

Jianzhi Zhang of the University of Michigan and his colleagues analyzed strings of DNA from nearly 14,000 protein-coding genes shared by chimps and humans. They looked for differences gene by gene and whether they caused changes in the generated proteins.

Genes act as instructions that organisms use to make proteins and thus are integral to carrying out biological functions, such as transporting oxygen to the body's cells. Different versions of the same gene are called alleles.

Changes in DNA that affect the making of proteins are considered functional changes, while "silent" changes do not affect the proteins. "If we see an excess of functional changes (compared to silent changes) the inference is these functional changes occurred because they were positively selected, because they were useful in some way to the organism," said study team member Margaret Bakewell, also of UM.

Bakewell, Zhang and a colleague found that substantially more genes in chimps evolved in ways that were beneficial than was the case with human genes.

The results could be due to the fact that over the long term humans have had a smaller effective population size compared with chimps.
"Although there are now many more humans than chimps, in the past, human populations were much smaller, and may have been fragmented into even smaller groups," Bakewell told LiveScience. So random events would play a more dominant role than natural selection in humans.

Here is why: Under the process of natural selection, gene variants that are beneficial get selected for and become more common in a population over time. But genetic drift, a random process in which chance "decides" which alleles survive, also occurs. In smaller populations, a fortuitous break for one or two alleles can have a disproportionately greater impact on the overall genes of that population compared with a larger one.

Chance events could also explain why the scientists found more gene variants that were either neutral and had no functional impact or negative changes that are involved in diseases.

There is still much to learn, the scientists say, about human and chimp evolution. "There are possibly a lot of differences between human and chimps that we don't know about, [perhaps] because there are differences in chimps that nobody has studied; a lot of studies tend to focus on humans," Bakewell said.

© 2007 LiveScience.com

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Apr 07 - 10:37 AM

Before Chongo gets too excited, he should consider whether he really wants to be "more studied."

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Apr 07 - 10:51 AM

Chongo is a backwater in that chimp gene pool, just a tad stagnant. It comes from hanging out with that Blind Drunk gang.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 19 Apr 07 - 11:34 AM

You're saying there's more deviation variation in the shallow end of the (gene) pool?

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Apr 07 - 10:03 PM

Hye, that's on my street. I know that girl. She is whack-o!

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 24 Apr 07 - 01:18 AM

From the BBC:

A Sudanese man has been forced to take a goat as his "wife", after he was caught having sex with the animal.

The goat's owner, Mr Alifi, said he surprised the man with his goat and took him to a council of elders.

They ordered the man, Mr Tombe, to pay a dowry of 15,000 Sudanese dinars ($50) to Mr Alifi.

"We have given him the goat, and as far as we know they are still together," Mr Alifi said.

Mr Alifi, of Hai Malakal in Upper Nile State, told the Juba Post newspaper that he heard a loud noise around midnight on 13 February and immediately rushed outside to find Mr Tombe with his goat.

"When I asked him: 'What are you doing there?', he fell off the back of the goat, so I captured and tied him up."

Mr Alifi then called elders to decide how to deal with the case.

"They said I should not take him to the police, but rather let him pay a dowry for my goat because he used it as his wife," Mr Alifi told the newspaper.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Apr 07 - 05:21 PM

That old joke has gone around for ages, Amos. Are you telling me you're only seeing it just now?

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Apr 07 - 06:39 PM

John, due to the narrowness of human gene expression some geneticists think that the human family could have been smaller than 20 surviving human families world wide.

It musta been quite a ********* storm.

Next time only Repblican bunker people will survive.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 24 Apr 07 - 07:48 PM

Obvously many people think that the human line began with only a very few.

So far as I've seen, there's little to indicate a near-extinction episode after the line became identifiably "human," although it might be that I just didn't notice the headlines when it was reported. Another recent thread discussed the MRCE/MRCA theories, which have been misinterpreted by quite a number of people as meaning that the population dwindled to very small numbers at some recent point. That is NOT a correct understanding of the MRCE/MRCA arguments, but you really have to do the math to understand why, and how, it's wrong.

One of the narrowest genetic lines appears, according to some reports, to be among orangutans, and is attributed to their near extinction sometime after "being orang" was an established thing, by the HIV virus (quite recently on evolutionaly time scales). The survivors were only those resistant to the virus, and orangs remain nearly unique as one of the only known animals that (a) does not harbor the virus and is unlikely to pass it around and (b) is almost completely immune to it and can't be infected with it.

Other critters that seem immune (or at least tolerant) normally are "carriers," and/or "hosts" and have "learned" to live with the infection, rather than by developing an immunity that rids them of it.

Some estimates have placed the low point of the orang population at as few as 20 to 40 individuals who survived from a much larger earlier population. The most believable reports I've seen place the time of this event less than about 16 million years back, and a few "plausible" estimates would have it much more recent.

The orang's narrow genetic base is fairly often cited in passing, but most of the good reports were quite a while back, and I'm sorry but I don't have citations for any. Most of what I think I remember of the more rigorous discussions dates back to when early HIV researchers were looking for host animals for lab use, and had difficulty figuring out why testing on orangs didn't work. (1960 - 1980 era perhaps?) [It would have been convenient for the victims among us if orangs could be infected, as they're genetically very close to humans; but it's obvously fortunate for the orangs that they're immune.]

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Apr 07 - 10:21 PM

HIV didn't become an event in human health that was recognized until the early 1980s. At least this is my recollection. I lived in NYC from 1978 to late 1980, and I don't think they were closing down the bathhouses quite yet, as they dealt with a general public health problem in the gay population. I think it acquired a name sometime later.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 08:56 AM

070424_InternetSpeedRecord

Consortium sent data over 20,000-mile path at 9.08 gigabits a second
By Anick Jesdanun
The Associated Press
Updated: 2:56 p.m. CT April 24, 2007

NEW YORK - A group of researchers led by the University of Tokyo has broken Internet speed records — twice in two days.

Operators of the high-speed Internet2 network announced Tuesday that the researchers on Dec. 30 sent data at 7.67 gigabits per second, using standard communications protocols. The next day, using modified protocols, the team broke the record again by sending data over the same 20,000-mile path at 9.08 Gbps.

That likely represents the current network's final record because rules require a 10 percent improvement for recognition, a percentage that would bring the next record right at the Internet2's current theoretical limit of 10 Gbps.

However, the Internet2 consortium is planning to build a new network with a capacity of 100 Gbps. With the 10-fold increase, a high-quality version of the movie "The Matrix" could be sent in a few seconds rather than half a minute over the current Internet2 and two days over a typical home broadband line.

Researchers used the newer Internet addressing system, called IPv6, to break the records in December. Data started in Tokyo and went to Chicago, Amsterdam and Seattle before returning to Tokyo. The previous high of 6.96 Gbps was set in November 2005.

Speed records under the older addressing system, IPv4, are in a separate category and stand at 8.8 Gbps, set in February 2006.
The Internet2 is run by a consortium of more than 200 U.S. university. It is currently working to merge with another ultrahigh-speed, next-generation network, National LambdaRail.

The announcement of the new record was made at the Internet2 consortium's spring meeting, which ends Wednesday in Arlington, Va.

© 2007 The Associated Press.

My net tracker showed a burst at 2.3 KB/sec the other day, but it only stayed up there for a couple of seconds.

9.08*10⁹/2.3*10³ = 3,974,026 times as fast as me. I could download all of Mickey's WinXP patches in less than a day.

wow!

I might even be able to look at YouTube.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 10:45 AM

I have the most marginal DSL around, hovering at speeds only slightly better than dial-up for some operations. Until they replace the old lines and switches, I see no improvement. There is building going on near us, so maybe they'll upgrade everything when they put in new houses.

Good news for some folks, though. I foresee another round of equipment upgrades (good for those who invest in computer stock) as it becomes available.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 12:26 PM

SRS -

Your comment on the orang bit a couple of hits back is of course more accurate than my first offhand (and rather casual) recollections.

The first articles I recall that related to what is now known as HIV were possibly around 1981 - 1984, but could have been a bit earlier. Recollection is that there was a series of two or three articles in Scientific American(?) that brought some public attention to "a mysterious degeneration of immunity in gays."

I did make an unsuccessful attempt at finding those first-I-saw articles some years ago when people were claiming to have identified the airline employee they were blaming for starting it all, since they reported the existence of what obviously was the same thing several years before the purported "first appearance." At that time it was not known whether there was a particular infective agent, or whether it was just a "normal reaction" to higher than usual repeated infections of ordinary kinds. (One article subtitle was something like "can your immune system be worn out by overuse.")

The first articles I recall about the orang genetics were prior to the discovery of the virus, and before a name was given to the infection. On reflection, I'd put them somewhere around 1985 - give or take a few years (+/- maybe 5 years?).

The articles at the time noted a mysterious "inability to infect" orangs, which implies that an infectious agent was fairly well accepted but it probably had not been identified; and while they commented on the "close relationship" between orangs and humans, they also were a few years prior to the major recent developments in genetic sequencing. The "explanation," based on a presumed HIV epidemic among orangs came at least a couple of years later. (That suggestion probably came after the virus had been identifed.) So far as I've noticed there's been little past the "postulation," since research moved on to other test methods and test subjects.


I'm afraid the new Internet record speeds will remain out of reach for most of us, at least for now. Almost certainly they were using the very best fiber optic connections, and selective routing/addressing to pick the fastest relays possible. Both these are a bit out of reach in my neighborhood, and will likely remain so for some time (unless we can find someone who can make a lot of money off of the upgrades).

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 12:32 PM

This one really shouldn't surprise anyone. No link as my local rag never posts anything for more than three days so I didn't bother even to look. (It's possible that too much of the local news is simply too embarrassing?)

8A THE WICHITA EAGLE THURSDAY, APRIL 26, 2007

Japan opened brothels for GIs after World War II

TOKYO — Japan's abhorrent practice of enslaving women to provide sex for its troops in World War II has a little-known sequel: After its surrender —with tacit approval from the U.S. occupation authorities —Japan set up a similar "comfort women" system for American Gis.

An Associated Press review of historical documents and records — some never before translated into English — shows American authorities permitted the official brothel system to operate despite internal reports that women were being coerced into prostitution. The Americans also had full knowledge by then of Japan's atrocious treatment of women in countries across Asia that it conquered during the war.

Tens of thousands of women were employed to provide cheap sex to U.S. troops until the spring of 1946, when Gen. Douglas MacArthur shut the brothels down.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 12:44 PM

WANTED - COMPATIBLE MALE WITH GOOD TRACTOR. SEND PICTURE OF TRACTOR.

8A THE WICHITA EAGLE THURSDAY, APRIL 26, 2007

Teen's proud to take his Deere to the prom

NEW ROCKFORD, N.D. —Forget taking a limousine to the prom. One high school senior drove his date in a 1992 green John Deere 8760 tractor.

"A few people made bets with me that Iwouldn't do it," said Levi Rue, a senior at New Rockford-Sheyenne High SchooL

"I guess I won them." Rue's date wasn't sure, worried about her dress getting dirty. But after Rue showed her pictures of the tractor and promised to make sure it was immaculate, she agreed. "I deaned it up pretty good," he said.

Bachmeier wore a lime green prom dress that nearly matched the tractor.


John Deere 8760 (I think this is a 1998 model, but there's not a lot of difference.)

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 01:26 PM

John,

The most detailed article I first read about AIDS, including information about that flight attendant, came from a surprising source. It was in Vanity Fair magazine, and it was a long one, and came out in the 1980s. They should have won a Pulitzer for that one (if they didn't). I'll see if I can figure out when it was written. I may have the author tracked down, but I'll send the whole citation when I get it.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 02:37 PM

Alex Shoumatoff, "In Search of the Source of AIDS." It was the longest study of the disease I'd seen at the time, and was comprehensive in its examination of the evidence. I don't have the exact date, but the Vanity Fair was volume 51 (the citation peters out after that in Google, and the actual page is through a full-text journal I don't have access to, but it was in about 1986 of 1987). The essay was apparently reprinted in his 1990 collection African Madness .

The Amazon review is mixed, and I think this reviewer doesn't like Shoumatoff in general. I remember reading his Dian Fosse article also (I subscribed to Vanity Fair back in the 1980s, before I had kids so I still had time to read it!) and thinking it was very good. I've posted a new review over at Amazon to rebut, somewhat, the first review.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 04:19 PM

Vanity Fair has come up with some excellent articles on occasion. I can believe they'd have had something to say about it all. The earliest articles I remember, however, were long before it was even agreed that an infectious agent was involved; and were well before the names AIDS and HIV were invented.

The references to the genetically ancient orang epidemic, when that was proposed much later, didn't cause much of a flap; so it must be assumed that by the time that theory was proposed it was fairly well accepted that the virus had been around for a rather long time, and probably that it had affected humans in some isolated areas long before it was recognized as a serious public health issue.

My main interest, at the time, for looking for the original article was that it totally refuted the nut cases who were claiming it was a newly minted "God's punishment," specially created (last week or the week before according to some) as retribution for a "moral crime."

I suppose, by now, it doesn't much matter except as a matter of curiosity.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Apr 07 - 04:49 PM

I remember that other primates were discussed in the Vanity Fair article. That's one reason I mentioned it. He looked into the crossover theory.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: GUEST,saulgoldie
Date: 03 May 07 - 10:57 AM

And you think YOU've got it bad!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=450995&in_page_id=1879

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 May 07 - 11:15 PM

I'll see your article and raise you some research here.

There are also sensitivities to all sorts of modern smells and chemicals. A recent lecture at my university included the discussion of a 1995 film called Safe.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 May 07 - 01:11 AM


Activists want chimp declared a person

Activists seek designation for Austrian chimp after sanctuary goes bankrupt

The Associated Press
Updated: 10:02 p.m. CT May 4, 2007

VIENNA, Austria - In some ways, Hiasl is like any other Viennese: He indulges a weakness for pastry, likes to paint and enjoys chilling out watching TV. But he doesn't care for coffee, and he isn't actually a person — at least not yet.

In a case that could set a global legal precedent for granting basic rights to apes, animal rights advocates are seeking to get the 26-year-old male chimpanzee legally declared a "person."

Hiasl's supporters argue he needs that status to become a legal entity that can receive donations and get a guardian to look out for his interests.

"Our main argument is that Hiasl is a person and has basic legal rights," said Eberhart Theuer, a lawyer leading the challenge on behalf of the Association Against Animal Factories, a Vienna animal rights group.

"We mean the right to life, the right to not be tortured, the right to freedom under certain conditions," Theuer said.

"We're not talking about the right to vote here."

The campaign began after the animal sanctuary where Hiasl (pronounced HEE-zul) and another chimp, Rosi, have lived for 25 years went bankrupt.

Activists want to ensure the apes don't wind up homeless if the shelter closes. Both have already suffered: They were captured as babies in Sierra Leone in 1982 and smuggled in a crate to Austria for use in pharmaceutical experiments. Customs officers intercepted the shipment and turned the chimps over to the shelter.

Their food and veterinary bills run about $6,800 a month. Donors have offered to help, but there's a catch: Under Austrian law, only a person can receive personal donations.

Organizers could set up a foundation to collect cash for Hiasl, whose life expectancy in captivity is about 60 years. But without basic rights, they contend, he could be sold to someone outside Austria, where the chimp is protected by strict animal cruelty laws.

"If we can get Hiasl declared a person, he would have the right to own property. Then, if people wanted to donate something to him, he'd have the right to receive it," said Theuer, who has vowed to take the case to the European Court of Human Rights if necessary.

Other efforts of rights for apes

Austria isn't the only country where primate rights are being debated. Spain's parliament is considering a bill that would endorse the Great Ape Project, a Seattle-based international initiative to extend "fundamental moral and legal protections" to apes.

If Hiasl gets a guardian, "it will be the first time the species barrier will have been crossed for legal 'personhood,'" said Jan Creamer, chief executive of Animal Defenders International, which is working to end the use of primates in research.

Paula Stibbe, a Briton who teaches English in Vienna, petitioned a district court to be Hiasl's legal trustee. On April 24, Judge Barbara Bart rejected her request, ruling Hiasl didn't meet two key tests: He is neither mentally impaired nor in an emergency.

Although Bart expressed concern that awarding Hiasl a guardian could create the impression that animals enjoy the same legal status as humans, she didn't rule that he could never be considered a person.
Martin Balluch, who heads the Association Against Animal Factories, has asked a federal court for a ruling on the guardianship issue.
"Chimps share 99.4 percent of their DNA with humans," he said. "OK, they're not homo sapiens. But they're obviously also not things — the only other option the law provides."

'I'm not about to make myself look like a fool'

Not all Austrian animal rights activists back the legal challenge. Michael Antolini, president of the local Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, said he thinks it's absurd.

"I'm not about to make myself look like a fool" by getting involved, said Antolini, who worries that chimpanzees could gain broader rights, such as copyright protections on their photographs.

But Stibbe, who brings Hiasl sweets and yogurt and watches him draw and clown around by dressing up in knee-high rubber boots, insists he deserves more legal rights "than bricks or apples or potatoes."
"He can be very playful but also thoughtful," she said. "Being with him is like playing with someone who can't talk."

A date for the appeal hasn't been set, but Hiasl's legal team has lined up expert witnesses, including Jane Goodall, the world's foremost observer of chimpanzee behavior.

"When you see Hiasl, he really comes across as a person," Theuer said.
"He has a real personality. It strikes you immediately: This is an individual. You just have to look him in the eye to see that."

© 2007 The Associated Press.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 May 07 - 12:38 PM

Animal Rights is an interesting topic. But since "rights" of all sorts are perceived by and assigned by humans, it isn't going to happen.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 05 May 07 - 01:29 PM

The problem in part is the nature of our categories, a legacy from white-supreme Victorian science, which in turn goes back to Aristotle's hierarchies.

The anecdotal evidence for what most people think of as personhood in dolphins, apes, whales, and some dogs -- a sense of individual being and self-determination above the simple biological ipulses of the body -- is quite strong. Ask anyone who has looked into the eye of a big cetacean.

If we had some metric by which to assess this "individual life force" attribute, we might have some grounds for assigning personhood. But unfortunately, we might find ourselves granting person-rights to some vultures, or eagles, or individual bears, and actually finding some humans didn't measure up. :D

Intriguing theme for a sci-fi book, isn't it? Some kind of elan-meter whch rings loud tones in the presence of enough life-energy to constitute competent personhood.

Take it to the Republican National COnvention and see if it breaks.


A

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 May 07 - 02:27 PM

So Stilly, you haven't read the contributions by the eminent legal scholar Guest,Natural Guest?

And a judge has already ruled: Judge Barbara Bart rejected her request, ruling Hiasl didn't meet two key tests: He is neither mentally impaired nor in an emergency.

Couldn't "not mentally impaired" be presumed in this case to imply that the opinion was "relative to the abilities of an ordinary person?" - already implying acceptance by that court ... .

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 May 07 - 03:19 PM

I skimmed the article--it was late and I probably should have turned off the computer earlier. I saw a few keywords and went from there. I looked at that other thread one time, and made this remark:

The web citations so far are entirely iffy. Angelfire, for example, sends red flags for me. This is lunatic fringe stuff, an ass-backwards interpretation of law and individual rights. This capital letter versus lower-case stuff is nonsense.

I'll go with my first assessment of his "contributions."

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 05 May 07 - 05:10 PM

I can't comment on whether Austria might be inclined toward unusual interpretations of the law, but the concept of a "person" is deeply imbedded in US legal tradition, and can have many different meanings.

The early US Supreme Court, under John Marshal as Chief Justice beginning in 1801, is credited with establishing and intrenching the concepts, that I'll state somewhat tritely:

1. Only a person can have rights (and be subject to the law).

2. An organization or association of persons can be a "person" in and of itself, if such an association is recognized by the law.

i.e. John Marshal "formalized" the US concept of corporations (and partnerships) in the form that they usually are observed in US law.

(Too bad he's been so thoroughly forgotten by the current lawmakers and administrators.)

Bernard Schwartz, A History of the Supreme Court is a good (albeit perhaps somewhat boring) summary, particularly of John Marshall's years.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 May 07 - 08:00 PM

You're right, I didn't mention the rights of institutions (corporations, primarily) because I thought your eyes might glaze over if I went that far in my answer. There's an interesting book that came out many years ago. In 1972 Christopher Stone wrote Do Trees Have Standing? to discuss the rights of large trees to exist separate from human use. They still don't have rights. The fact that corporations have rights, a form of "personhood," is actually an early political coup on the part of wealthy business owners. Another book to consider is Arran Gare's Postmodernism and the Environmental Crisis.

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 May 07 - 11:09 PM

Now that the numbers are back on track, it looks like I left my thread hanging out there for poachers. So . . .

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 May 07 - 11:09 PM

700

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 06 May 07 - 05:03 PM

CENSORSHIP IN BRAZIL!!!

Brazil orders online ad be removed

The Associated Press
Updated: 3:22 p.m. CT May 5, 2007

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil - The government has ordered an Internet auction site to remove an advertisement in which a Brazilian man offered to sell his wife for about $50.

The Secretariat of Public Policies for Women announced late Friday it had ordered Mercado Livre, partially owned by eBay Inc., to remove the ad and warned it was violating a law banning the offer or sale of "human organs, people, blood, bones or skin."

The advertisement was no longer visible on the site Saturday.
It was posted by a man who gave his name as Breno and said: "I sell my wife for reasons I prefer to keep short ... I really need the money."

The described his wife physically and listed her qualities as a homemaker and companion. He reportedly said she was 35 and "worth her weight in gold."

The Estado news agency said it wasn't clear if the ad was meant as a joke. It said Mercado Livre told it the ad hadn't been noticed earlier because of the large number of products offered on the site — nearly 1 million.

There was no answer Saturday at phone numbers for Mercado Livre or its public relations agency.

© 2007 The Associated Press

It's gettin' really hard to make a buck anymore - almost everywhere.

John

Subject: RE: BS: I Read it in the Newspaper
From: Amos
Date: 07 May 07 - 06:12 PM

Not from a paper, but from YouTube:

Snake coughs up a whole small hippotamus.

Musta hurt sompn awful.


A