Thursday News Bucket

19 Comments

1. 

   CabinGirl on July 13, 2006 at 9:01 am

   One pill instead of 3:  MSNBC

   WASHINGTON – A once-daily pill that combines three drugs used to treat HIV received federal approval Wednesday, giving U.S. patients the first triple “cocktail” therapy that can be swallowed as a single dose.

   The pill, called Atripla, combines three Food and Drug Administration-approved AIDS drugs that already form one of the most widely prescribed AIDS “cocktails.”…

   Atripla can replace the two or more pills HIV-positive patients now must take each day to keep the human immunodeficiency virus in check, as well as eliminate the need for multiple co-payments when the drugs are purchased separately.

   That should simplify the treatment of HIV and AIDS and in turn could slow the emergence — and ultimately, transmission — of drug-resistant strains of the virus. Those strains can evolve when patients skip pills…

   Apparently this new breakthrough costs about $1000 a month.  Yikes.

   • 

     Alice on July 13, 2006 at 9:30 am

     I heard $1500/month.  Who’s not willing to turn over fifty bucks a day to a drug cartel just to stay alive?  

     I’m thinking we could just transfer Rumsfeld’s Pentagon budget to the drug suppliers and call it universal health coverage.  The universe would be so very healthy without the pentagon, and Donald would be a rich man.

     • 

       CabinGirl on July 13, 2006 at 9:51 am

       You’re proably closer to the mark with your estimate, ’cause I’m pretty sure mot of the 3 drugs in that cost over $400 per month each.

       Heck, I think we could probably pay for universal health care even if we just took the Iraq war budget away from the Pentagon.  Wouldn’t it be nice to see our representative pass a supplemental budget for health care instead of the occupation of a country that wasn’t a threat in the first place?

2. 

   CabinGirl on July 13, 2006 at 9:06 am

   the press characterized Gore during the 2000 election season as stiff and a bore, while Bush was someone to hang out and drink beer with?  It appears that the Hillary 2008 meme is going to be `cold and calculating’.  From an article in WashPo:

   Anna Shelley, a mother of three from Utah, says she is ready for a female president, and she is sure that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has what it takes.

   But Shelley, a Democrat, is not sure she could ever pull a lever for Clinton. Her reservations are vague but unmistakable: Something about Clinton leaves her cold…

   The article continues:

   …Clinton’s assets are formidable: an unrivaled ability to generate publicity and money, and approval ratings that are notably strong, given her polarizing reputation and the controversies she has weathered over 15 years in the national eye. In recent public opinion polls, she handily leads potential Democratic rivals.

   Beneath these positives, however, there is evidence of unease — about her personal history, demeanor and motives — among the very Democratic and independent voters she would need to win the presidency.

   A recent Washington Post-ABC News poll highlighted the paradox. Fifty-four percent of those responding view her favorably, and a significant majority give her high marks for leadership (68 percent), strong family values (65 percent), and being open and friendly (58 percent). At the same time, only 37 percent of Democrats in the poll say they would definitely vote for her for president.

   The article continues on about this ‘unease’ with several more quotes from people like this one:

   Brian Tripplett, 47, a Democrat and a United Parcel Service manager from Kentucky, says he has a strongly unfavorable view of Clinton based on impressions 15 years old. “It seems that her public image is different from her private image. It bothered me when I read she was verbally abusive to employees,” he said.

   I thought it was Martha Stewart that abused her employees…or maybe this is just the usual accusation against successful women?  Does Laura Bush abuse people, or is she just too stoned to be accused of much of anything?

   I don’t want Hillary for president, but it pisses me off to see the press already beginning to paint her as having some unknown, undefinable thing wrong with her.  Pick on her political positions, not her panty drawer or her `personality’, please.

   • 

     rba on July 13, 2006 at 11:45 am

     I remember all of them from Johnson (Nixon) forward, and they all played the same game.  Clinton can handle herself just fine – if she somehow manages to come across as straight across.  I hope the grocery-store-rack-newspapers throw everything they have at her, and any other candidate running for that office.

     If a candidate can’t handle the “panty raid” sleaze-oids, how the hell can they handle Congress, the bureaucracy, SCOTUS, and us?

     • 

       CabinGirl on July 13, 2006 at 12:25 pm

       And any other candidate is the key…no more of this softball “have a beer with him” crap for the other team, please.  How much better it would have been if the press had called Bush what he is back in 2000:  a willfully ignorant wealthy party boy whose daddy has had to bail him out of every venture he’s ever undertaken.

3. 

   boran2 on July 13, 2006 at 9:45 am

   Mousegate: bring kitty next time you fly.

   UPI Link

   Mouse infestation alleged on airplane

   ST. LOUIS, July 12 (UPI) — Aircraft overhaulers in Kansas City say an American Airlines Boeing 767 that came in for servicing in April was infested with mice.

   KSDK-TV in St. Louis said a longtime employee at the overhaul base at Kansas City International Airport contacted the TV station about the problem.

   “We had to take the chairs off and that’s when everybody saw mice running around on the floor and one ran down one of the mechanic’s arm,” the employee said.

   The whistleblower said workers found nests in air vents and dead mice

   in emergency oxygen masks. The mice ate insulation and chewed through wires, he alleged.

   “If they shorted themselves and caused a fire, it would go through that cabin so fast, we could have lost some lives,” he told KSDK.

   The TV station said exterminators estimated that anywhere from 900 to 1,000 mice could be on the aircraft. American Airlines disputes that number, saying it found only 17 live mice.

   The Federal Aviation Administration says all insulation and oxygen masks on the plane have been replaced, the cargo bins have been removed and replaced and the wiring has been inspected.

   • 

     CabinGirl on July 13, 2006 at 9:47 am

     All I can say is…EEEWWW.

     Nice to see the airline thinks there were only 17, while the exterminator thinks there were a thousand.

4. 

   Knoxville Progressive on July 13, 2006 at 10:02 am

   If this doesn’t blow your mind, nothing will:  Trees could be growing in Antarctica within a century because of global warming, an international scientific conference heard Wednesday. With carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere set to double in the next 100 years, the icy continent could revert to how it looked about 40 million years ago, said Professor Robert Dunbar of Stanford University.

   Scientists say silk fibers could be used to repair severed nerves, possibly even in damaged spinal cords.

   Scientists blame heavy fishing for an “explosion” in jellyfish in the Benguela Current that streams past Namibia in the South Atlantic Ocean. “Because fish and jellyfish essentially compete for similar food resources, a dramatic decline in fish populations could theoretically contribute to a substantial increase in the abundance of jellyfish,” said Andrew Brierley, head of the pelagic ecology research group at the University of Saint Andrews. “This type of shift has been predicted as a consequence of ‘fishing down the food web’.”  But you heard it here first, in January, LOL.

   The prototype of an inflatable spacecraft designed to be used to construct a space hotel was successfully launched from Russia yesterday.

   Whatever happened to Mount Merapi?  Indonesian scientists on Wednesday fully downgraded the alert status of Mount Merapi from code red but warned residents to still stay away from the volcano’s peak, an official said. “The alert status was downgraded in view of the decreasing activity,” said an official at the volcanology office in Yogyakarta, the main city south of Merapi.

   Twenty years after Chernobyl, the effects of the nuclear accident – or lack thereof – are the subject of heated debate.

   A new family of drugs are under development that would prevent – rather than treat symptoms of – allergies.  The drugs work by stopping allergens when they first attempt to enter the body through the skin or lung tissue.  They could begin to reach market in five years.

   House Republicans are pushing new legislation that could wipe out the ability of California and other states to ban or strictly limit the use of pesticides and toxic industrial chemicals that can jeopardize human health.  Sigh.  Some days I wish I still believed in hell, so these clowns could get their just rewards…

   Remember how those who opposed second hand smoke were once thought kooky?  Ready for round two?  Here’s a story of direct action against residential pesticide use from Massachusetts.

   • 

     CabinGirl on July 13, 2006 at 10:09 am

     I wish that allergy stuff was available today…I’ve been sneezing like crazy.

     And I’m glad people are speaking up about the residential pesticide use.  When we lived in an apartment complex where they treated the lawn, I used to freak out if my kids even walked through it with shoes on (why bring that crap into your home?).  My neighbors thought I was nuts, but that stuff really is nasty.

     • 

       Knoxville Progressive on July 13, 2006 at 3:21 pm

       Fortunately, we’re past the days of the kids tracking it in, but now we have the dogs walking through it and coming into the house, jumping up on our bed, digging around to “make a nest,” and plopping down to lick off their feet.  

       😛

5. 

   ask on July 13, 2006 at 10:15 am

   POLITICS-MIDEAST:
   Bush Faces Major Choice Amid Escalation

   WASHINGTON, Jul 12 (IPS) – The sudden opening Wednesday by Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia of a second front in Israel’s ongoing campaign against Hamas militants in Gaza presents the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush with an escalating crisis that, until now, it has preferred to ignore.

   The immediate question it faces is whether to maintain its strong backing for military action by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert or to engage in active diplomacy to prevent any further escalation and end the violence.

   That the stakes are extraordinarily high was made clear not only by Olmert’s decision to send the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) into Lebanon for the first time since Israel’s withdrawal in 2000, but also by a White House statement issued Wednesday afternoon that promised to hold Syria and Iran “responsible for (the Hezbollah) attack and the ensuing violence.”

   “This is potentially very dangerous,” Bassel Saloukh, a political scientist at the Lebanese American University in Beirut, told IPS in a telephone interview. “If the Americans take this to legitimate a strike against Iran or Syria, then I think it will escalate with devastating consequences.”

   • 

     Militarytracy on July 13, 2006 at 10:26 am

     As our president spoke today and got to the portion of his sentence where he needed to say Lebanese, but couldn’t say the word and probably wasn’t even sure what “you call those people” so mumbled something about to the North, the Hezbollah………great……just great……I can’t even describe how it feels to watch that, I haven’t been able to define it yet.

     • 

       CabinGirl on July 13, 2006 at 10:30 am

       Oh dear.  Someone hand that man a copy of My Pet Goat so he can make himself useful.

       • 

         Militarytracy on July 13, 2006 at 11:09 am

         as Hezbollah is shooting back now!  Someone had better find him a copy of My Pet Goat quick, quick……today could go Ka Boom in the middle east.  We may be lucky if we all don’t end up remembering this week in history for as long as we all live. My husband left for work this morning shaking his head……..I’m sure at Fort Rucker they will all be glued to the television today watching to see how badly this all dissolves.

   • 

     CabinGirl on July 13, 2006 at 10:29 am

     What a mess.  “The immediate question it faces is whether to maintain its strong backing for military action by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert or to engage in active diplomacy to prevent any further escalation and end the violence.”

     Active diplomacy?  BushCo?  Seems to me they think diplomacy is only something they need to fail at before bombing the heck out of people.  And they’ve already had Iran in their sights for awhile.   I wouldn’t be surprised to find that they encouraged these attacks behind the scenes to further their efforts.

   • 

     James Benjamin on July 13, 2006 at 6:26 pm

     I’m really surprised that something hadn’t already been front-paged on the unfolding crisis. Granted, the situation in Israel/Palestine and now Lebanon is extremely volatile, and one is likely to find oneself having to do plenty of updates.

     Catnip has a summary over at her blog to check out (Israel/Lebanon War Updates).

     I’ve also followed the coverage over at The Guardian: Israel steps up Lebanon offensive and Family of nine killed as they slept provide a taste of what’s going on.

     Commentary by Chris Toensing in Letting Gaza Burn.

     And this just in: US vetoes UN condemnation of Israel:

     UNITED NATIONS – The United States cast the first U.N. Security Council veto in nearly two years Thursday, blocking an Arab-backed resolution that would have demanded Israel halt its military offensive in the
     Gaza Strip.

     The draft, sponsored by Qatar, accused Israel of a “disproportionate use of force” that endangered Palestinian civilians, and it demanded Israel withdraw its troops from Gaza.

6. 

   ask on July 13, 2006 at 10:17 am

   POLITICS-CHINA:
   Displeased but Unlikely to Pressure Pyongyang

   BEIJING, Jul 13 (IPS) – China might be North Korea’s largest trade and economic partner but expectations that Beijing would exert influence over the reclusive regime of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il and succeed in persuading him to abandon its nuclear ambitions, are misplaced, observers here say, not the least because of China’s own agenda with Pyongyang that doesn’t always dovetail with the goals of international community.

7. 

   Arcturus on July 13, 2006 at 12:28 pm

   Rights advocacy groups in the United States are calling for the United Nations to take note of the gross human rights violations being committed in their country.

   A coalition of human and civil rights organizations Monday sent a 465-page report to a key United Nations committee, which details ongoing abuses of human rights across the United States.   [snip]

   The report documents various forms of human rights abuses in the United States, which include police brutality, abuse of immigrants, racial discrimination, and the use of torture in prisons.

   “Prisons are one of the largest growth industries in the United States,” according to the AFSC. With only five percent of the world’s population, the U.S. holds about 25 percent of the world’s prison population.

   “The principle offender is the prison system,” says McClary, who co-authored the report, entitled, “In the Shadows of the War on Terror: Persistent Police Brutality and Abuse in the United States.”

   “Because prisons are a closed system, operating in secrecy, the public does not comprehend the extreme forms of abuse, violence, and racism practiced daily behind bars.”

   The report, which is a rebuttal to the official U.S. response to the UN committee, documents many cases of unjustified police shootings, use of excessive force, extraction of coerced confessions, rape, strip searches, and racial and gender profiling.   [snip]

   Immigrants face sexual and physical abuse when they are detained at the borders and airports and immigration laws fail to respect their right to due process, according to the authors of the “shadow report.”

   In the report, the rights groups also explain how racism was associated with the authorities’ failure to protect the victims of Hurricane Katrina, many of whom are still deprived of the right to participate in the rebuilding process and access to basic facilities.

   Questioning the judicial practices and prison conditions in the United States, the report cites several cases of human rights violations such as the sentencing of children to life without parole, shackling pregnant female prisoners, limitation on prisoners’ access to courts, lack of healthcare, and rape and discrimination against minorities.   [snip]

   “Far from being out of the ordinary,” says McClary, “or an aberration–which is the image painted by the Bush administration–prison abuse and the use of torture in the United States is frighteningly widespread.”

   The human rights violations, as pointed out in the report, also refer to the use of electric stun belts, grenades, and guns; tethers; waist and leg chains; air tasers; and restraint hoods, belts, and beds. Prisoners, according to the report’s findings, can be held in long-term solitary confinement and extreme isolation in severely confined spaces with little or no daily contact for days, weeks, months, or even years. Sexual assault of female prisoners is common.       link