Here is a video explaining clearly how and why cancer spreads, using prostate cancer as an example. In the process the video also explains why it is that cancer is more likely to strike the older we get, the basis of the comment that cancer is the reward we get for getting old.
(Via Gawker.)
Teresa Sullivan, the president of one of the most prestigious universities in the country, was summarily fired after just two years on the job and despite the fact that there was no hint of scandal or that she had done her job poorly. Kevin Carey argues that part of the problem lies in the fact that rich political contributors to winning candidates get rewarded by being appointed as Trustees to public universities. [Read more…]
While much of the attention has focused on the guilty verdict in the Jerry Sandusky case, another case may have even greater long-term impact when it comes to the sexual abuse of children.
Monsignor William Lynn of Philadelphia, whose case I discussed before, was convicted of child endangerment because of his role in covering up abuse of children and could face 10 to 20 years in prison. He was acquitted of the charge of conspiracy. The jury was deadlocked on the rape and child endangerment charges of another priest James Brennan.
This verdict is significant for three reasons. One is because Lynn was not accused of abuse himself but of covering up the crime, and there is ground to think that a large number of senior clergy in the Catholic hierarchy are guilty of similar things. The second is that he is the highest ranking member of the Catholic Church in the US to be convicted of crimes involving abuse. The third is that the police and prosecutors seem to have overcome at least partially their ‘respect for religion’ nonsense and reluctance to treat religious leaders, especially high ranking ones, the way they treat other suspected criminals. The slowness of the Brooklyn district attorney to prosecute sexual abuse cases involving Orthodox Jews in the Brooklyn Hasidic community is an example of such reluctance. Shmarya Rosenberg has been chronicling all the abuses in that community.
All these factors must be causing sleepless nights for many high ranking religious people who were involved in such cover-ups and were effectively enablers of such acts.
Those of us who have argued that the measures taken by the US in the fight in the bogus ‘war on terror’ are harmful to fundamental rights are sometimes accused of being too complacent. We are charged with erroneously thinking that the chances of the US being subjected to a terrorist attack is small and not realizing that it is only these draconian measures that have kept us safe so far. Take away the drones, the torture, the indefinite detentions without trial, the secret surveillance of all our communications, the excessive airport security, and the US would be subject to another attack. Or so we are told. [Read more…]
… it is revealed that the US and Israel were behind the latest Flame computer malware (along with the earlier Stuxnet malware) that was used to wage cyber warfare against Iran. [Read more…]
Recently Mitt Romney said: “I need to get 50.1 percent or more” to win.
No, he doesn’t. What he means of course is that he needs just one vote more than 50%, which is not at all the same thing since 50.1% can translate to a winning margin of 200,000 votes in a presidential election. [Read more…]