A small win for science and rationality

A state judge in Maine has rejected an effort by that state’s governor to impose a quarantine on Kaci Hickox, the nurse who treated Ebola patients in Liberia and then on her return was the target of a short-lived attempt by New Jersey governor Chris Christie to quarantine her for 21 days before pressure forced him to change his mind and send her to her home in Maine.
[Read more…]

Who says assault vehicles are unnecessary?

Roger Hoeppner, a 75-year old resident of a rural Wisconsin county, has had a long-standing dispute with local authorities. He was challenging the zoning rules that they said required him to move some wooden pallets in his front yard. As he continued to defy them, the local authorities did what any small community when confronted with an elderly resident who was being difficult.
[Read more…]

The rabbi, the mikvah, and the hidden cameras

There has been a scandal recently in the orthodox Jewish community when a prominent rabbi of a big temple was arrested when it was discovered that he had secretly installed hidden cameras to film women taking a ritual bath known as a ‘mikvah’. I was curious about what a mikvah was and its purpose and this article by Lauren Markoe addresses most of the questions. It turns out that it relates to the obsession that all religions have about women’s purity and how to make them ‘clean’ so that they become worthy to be in the presence of men and have sex with them.
[Read more…]

The stupidest person in Congress

Stephen Colbert makes the case for congressman Louie Gohmert who wins it even in the face of stiff competition from the likes of Michele Bachmann. I sometimes wonder whether he could be as stupid as he really seems to be and whether he is really quite savvy and has figured out that by saying deliberately stupid things, he gets a lot of media attention. But that would require him to be a really good actor, worthy of an award.
[Read more…]

Why Matt Taibbi left First Look Media

First Look Media, the media venture started by billionaire Pierre Omidyar, was the corporate entity that would publish different online magazines in which the journalists would have much freer reign to investigate and report on stories than they would have with the mainstream media. It hired a whole slew of highly respected independent-minded journalists, not your usual subservient stenographers dutifully transmitting the talking points of their confidential sources.
[Read more…]

Got milk? No? Good!

I have had mild lactose intolerance since childhood. This means that I have no problems with butter or ice cream or milk in my coffee and tea and cereal and in other foods but cannot drink a full glass of milk with getting an upset stomach. It turns out that what I thought of as a limitation and even a minor health hazard (milk is good for you, right?) may actually be a positive thing. While butter and eggs got the green light some years ago, switching from being bad for you to being either good or neutral, a new study suggests that milk may go the other way, switching from being an unalloyed good to health hazard.
[Read more…]