Great Article : Genius Idea of the week

This article states that Chavez wants to cut off oil deliveries to the US because he is pissed that that some capitalists (Exxon Mobil) had his assets frozen in a dispute over his freezing the assets of capitalists. The funny part is, that if Chavez succeeds in cutting off enough oil to actually cause a disruption in supply (not likely thanks to commodities markets), oil prices will sky rocket. This price increase, will then likely significantly increase Exxon Mobil's profits. That 'll Show em.

Great Article : Autism is NOT caused by vacines

I had previously posted the reasons I have found that showed why vaccines don't cause Autism. Here are some more. This article suggests that maybe some people just jumped on the bandwagon because they could potentially get money out of it. Well no $#!t. The article doesn't even mention the fact that the money being wasted on this litigation could be going to research to find the actual cause of the disease. This is part of a disturbing trend of Americans embracing greedy lawyers and crackpots instead of science.

Great Article : The real way to Desegregate schools

Brown vs the board of ed. may have ended official race segregation, but as anyone who has lived in both a urban area and the suburbs knows, America's schools are still mostly segregated. Basically it goes Black-poor-inner city-underachieving vs White-wealthy-suburbs-average achieving. Educators have repeatedly tried to fix the last part (achievement) by mixing the first part (race). Whenever race is used discrimination occurs however (even if for good ends), and thanks to the recent decision by the supreme court, this is now illegal. A much better way to attack problem is this proposal, which uses financial status to discriminate. This is a fantastic idea, and as the article claims, it may even fix the race problem as a side effect. Note to Public school teachers, there is something new called capitalism, please look it up... 2 page report due Friday.

On a side note, I can think of two reasons why economic based affirmative action is a better idea than race based AA. First is because to succeed at just about anything requires money, and poor people don't have it, no matter what race they are (obviously). No matter what the NAACP thinks, it is not easy for a poor white person to get very far in life or go to a good school. This leads us to the second problem with race AA: rich minorities. My work in college admissions has given me experiences with minorities who have every advantage growing up, but are also entitled to more because they are underrepresented. While I have nothing against the parents of my peers who needed help during the civil rights era to get a good education, I don't believe for a second that any of my private school friends or people in this neighborhood need any special help to get into private colleges. Long story short, using race allows well-off minorities to take advantage of the system, usually at the expense of the poor minorities whose places they take. Today at work, I talked to a African American girl on the phone who was unhappy that the available apartments in Center City weren't "up to her standards". I was not amused because of the fact that I just had to move out of CC because I could not afford it (this girl also dismissed East Falls after I suggested it.) This girl had applied to a disadvantaged minority program at Drexel (DPMS) , clearly hoping to play the race card in admissions (the program requests but doesn't enforce the "poor" requirement and people frequently try to take advantage) Karma won this battle though, as our wealthy "disadvantaged" applicant got rejected from the minority program because her application missed the deadline. Can't wait to see how she likes being treated like everyone else...

Great Article : Sicko and healthcare costs

While I admit that I haven't gotten around to watching sicko yet (I will need to pirate it because I am morally opposed to Michael Moore getting any of my money) my knee jerk reaction to the trailer was apparently shared with this slate writer. The irony of this documentary is that if he succeeds in causing an overhaul in the US health system, Michael Moore will help his worst enemy more than anyone else. Greedy American corporations, especially GM, stand to benefit the most from a European style healthcare system. It may surprise a lot of poor people in this country, but the brunt of healthcare costs are actually bared by businesses (as benefit expenses) as opposed to individuals (via taxes) as in European countries. The real Question here is are you willing to pay more taxes to help the sort of people in Moore's movie get better care? If yes, remember that you will be doing a huge favor to GM (especially its short term share holders), and Wall street pension managers. At least there can then be a Sicko 2... (or maybe a Richard and Me)

Disclaimer: I work at a huge for-profit hospital in a poor neighborhood.

Great Article : The decline of the US auto industry

As Toyota prepares to claim the title of the worlds largest car maker, this article from the BBC is a fascinating look at the decline of the big three American automakers. It is a sad story (for americans at least) of a spectacular fall and an important lesson for industrial giants everywhere. The British seem to blame it mostly on the vague force of "globalization", but i think it has to do with poor decisions, greedy near sighted American investors, and shoddy engineering as well. I have predicted the fall of GM for awhile now (although it looks at the moment that Ford is even more likely to go first), and when the post mortems are finally written, there will be a lot of blame to go around. The article also looks at the local human impact, which I suppose is also sad...

Good article : Global prosperity (or lack thereof)

This article is a great analysis of our current world, although I have a few quick thoughts:

1. I am not entirely convinced that the world can physically support a world where the BRIC countries consume as much as the US and Europe per capita. Serious tech improvements will be necessary, and major conflicts in those emerging countries could easily derail improvements, especially if poor workers revolt in China or the India -Pakistan conflict heats up.

2. The article claims only 50 mil. people will be added to 1st tier countries. This must not be counting immigration (there are a quarter that many Mexicans in the US alone). Not counting immigration in this type of analysis is a major oversight.

3. The author and his world bank friends seem to believe that money is the solution to all of the world's problems. Increasing African aid is not going to do anything unless those african recipients have the infrastructure and institutions to invest and distribute that money. Long story short, giving everyone in Somalia $100 (double the highest per-capita african aid) isn't going to fix anything (it will likely make the problem worse. Also, judging by the past effectiveness of the World Bank, It is clearly not the answer to the said lack of infrastructure.

Great articles : future

Two news articles caught my attention today that described breakthroughs that will have big effects on our lives in the not so distant future.
The first is an article that describes the ability of Biomedical engineers to run a computer simulation of a cell metabolism. This is a big step in making biology a more concrete science and similar technologies will likely come to dominate pharmaceutical and physiology research in a few years.

The second article describes robotic garages that are being built in NYC. This is likely the future of parking in cities. It is safer, better for the environment, and takes up much less space then regular facilities. I predict that in 10 yrs, we will be wondering what we did before.

Great Article : Human modification

I would not modify my self, unless I could be sure there was no side effects (which is likely impossible) . I am not sure what I would do In the case of a Handicapped child, all I know is that the parents should have the option.

I honestly don't know what I would do with respect to most types of body modification, many of which are laid out in this great article.