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Wednesday, May 26, 2010
How to Fix Medical Research in One Law
If the drug is a pre-existing compound, or was published in research literature by a University... this will often preclude development. This problem was illustrated quite nicely in a recent Newsweek article, but the author came to a rather backward conclusion. The right solution is simple. The company that pays for the clinical trials and gets FDA clearance for a drug or treatment should receive an exclusive right to develop or license that precise treatment for several years - even if it is not patentable. In other words...if you do a trial on Vitamin-C infusion as a cancer cure... and prove it, and get clearance to use that treatment.... then your company becomes the only company allowed to to advertise and sell Vitamin-C cancer treatments for 3 years. Sure, lots of people will "off label" buy their own Vitamin-C and use it. But a good marketing team with an exclusive on a working treatment is worth its weight in gold. A simple law like this would be extremely beneficial to the industry. Billions of dollars are wasted every week on developing new, less-effective drugs, when effective solutions already exist... merely because pre-existing drugs aren't patentable. An incentive for innovative treatments - without needing to develop new drugs, would work wonders. Literally. [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Tuesday, April 06, 2010
Will Work for Praise
Most of them I built because I needed them, and open sources because of shameless self-promotion. I've noticed that, after releasing code, I completely ignore it unless either a) someone (usually me) needs new feature/fix or b) someone emails me and says they like it. Praise is, apparently, the bigger motivator. After someone emails me to ask for a patch/fix... I fix it, sure. But after I get praise... I find myself, usually within a few weeks, adding things like testing suites, transaction support, plugins.... or some other major overhaul. Not sure *why* I do that. But after 10 years, I've noticed a pattern. Labels: politics, programming [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Wednesday, December 02, 2009
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
State Healthcare : A Nail in the Coffin of Democracy
But that's not what we're going to get. Big pharma is the key lobbying group behind the new healthcare plan. With 80% of health expenditures being paid down in the last 90 days of life, what we have is hundreds of billions of dollars in federal funding for keeping dying people alive and on drugs, from atropine to Vicodin for an extra few months. I don't think people realize what's happening. Talk to any emergency room physician and they'll tell you that huge percentage of their time spent treating people they are legally required to - but that any reasonable person would see was a waste of time. From saying no to drug addicts and hypochondriacs to keeping people in pain alive that want to die, the problem with healthcare today is that legal requirements and liability issues prevent doctors from moving beyond the treadmill of time-wasting and working on care for patients who need it. With all that money going to the wrong places ... it's no wonder that healthcare is expensive. The problem is, and always has been, that poor government regulation has driven up costs and prevented real care. Do we think that's going to get better under the new plan? No way. As coverage expands, so will "patient rights" - a codeword for doctor's liability. Once a person starts taking drugs, they tend to stay on them for life. Schools are currently refusing to educate students that don't take medication after being diagnosed with ADHD. With government support, these drugs will be free. Some kids really have a problem, sure, but it is highly subjective diagnosis. A student who is smart enough to realize that our eduction system is broken could be easily diagnosed. A student who just needs a little more outdoor time could be diagnosed with ADHD. Unfortunately some of the brightest and most creative children in the country are being diagnosed with a disorder because classroom settings are too boring and curriculum is too slow and repetitive. America is crumbling under the influence of corporate interest and, sadly, this bipartisan health care plan is more of the same. But we don't have to worry about the population taking to the streets in protest... they'll be too drugged up to notice. Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Sunday, July 19, 2009
Blame the Guy with Money
Thank goodness some American companies are making money, bringing it home and spending it here. When I worked at other companies, i grew tired at how people loved to blame intelligent, hardworking people for "raising the bar" or "making them look bad". Goldman has done just that... made every other bank look bad by proving it was possible, by hiring the best and brightest, to make money in hard times. And just like the watercooler losers who like to rib the nerd down the hall for actually getting work done, American politicians - the true vampires - are busy blaming Goldman for doing their job right. But the most embarrassing thing is how widespread this is. The biggest problem with America is the sense of "entitlement" it's citizens have. Rather than work to get something, it seems we now demand or whine to have it handed to us. "What about me?" could be our new motto. Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Monday, October 27, 2008
Durham, NC Punishes Residents for Conserving Water
Another example of our incredibly backward government system "in action". Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Friday, October 03, 2008
Drill Baby Drill!
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And what about after 2030? How much more oil would we get? Only seven percent increase after 20 years. And even in 2030, there is not significant impact on prices? Basically that's ZERO increases EVER as far as I'm concerned. Forget environmental concerns, that's just a waste of time, effort and money. So why does McCain like to talk about it? Because he knows that it pushes the buttons of his opponents and wins him votes so he can take your hard earned money and line the pockets of his buddies. The oil industry doesn't give a crap about offshore drilling. They know there's nothing out there. They just want a campaign issue to fight on that appeals to Americans. And they got it. 60% of Americans, who have been tricked and duped by the McCain spin doctors think that the "offshore drilling issue" is a "significant reason" to support McCain. You can't blame the American people. We are being LIED TO. McCain's camp has convinced us that offshore drilling is going to make a difference... while they laugh behind their backs at our ignorance. Please email the DOE link to as many people you know that think drilling is important. Here's the DOE link again: http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/otheranalysis/ongr.html This issue is a *red herring*. And if you think it matters, you're a sucker. And your tax dollars will go to people who are laughing at you. Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Friday, July 25, 2008
Uncomfortably True
If going to war with Iran is something that you think would be in America's best interest (even if you don't say it out loud), then vote McCain. He's your best bet. Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Articles of Impeachment
Now I say "seemingly" since, well, that's what it seems to have been done for. Saddam was leaking oil at half-market value. Opec hated him. He's gone. Oil went through the roof. Bush's oil buddies get to laugh all the way to the bank. And we all get stuck with the bill. Of course, since Bush & Co.'s buddies are in control of all the resources, he'll just have to lower the prices before the election, finger "new gains" in the war in Iraq as the cause, and then McCain will win... followed by 3 and a half more years of record-high oil. IMHO, Americans won't be fooled in 2012. By then, a trained dog will be able to win running as a Democrat. Which is unfortunate. Because the socialist nutjob who will be winning in 2012 will make Obama look like a right-winger. Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Saturday, May 31, 2008
The John McCain Short List
Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Friday, May 23, 2008
Clinton's Veiled Assasination Threat
Hillary Clinton's mention of the RFK assassination, in connection with Obama, left him and his supporters "visibly rattled". This country is getting creepier and creepier. You don't toss around thinly veiled assassination threats on prime time. It's uncouth. Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Thursday, May 15, 2008
Bookmark this Electoral Poll Site
Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Monday, May 05, 2008
Latest Barack Obama News, In My Opinion
Sure, the media is having a field-day with Obama's charismatic former pastor, and it's obvious that his radical sermons make great prime-time viewing. I have relatives in my family who would make Wright seem *boring*, and I'm sure Hillary's cocaine dealing brother in law, Roger Clinton won't turn up in the press, but it seems like white American's are "fixin' for a lynchin'" this year and just aren't ready for a President who grew up with controversial figures that they don't understand. If Obama's pastor was a white conspiracy theorist, who talked about the 911 attacks being coordinated by the Bush-Bin Laden cartel (did you know there's Bin Laden airfield in Texas), we would have understood. Maybe some of us would have even been sympathetic. But, instead, he was a black conspiracy theorist. Ouch! When my white brother mails me a conspiracy video about depleted uranium exposure in the Iraq war, I can choose to think "harmless hobby" or "maybe there's something to it". But when I see Jeramiah Wright claiming that HIV could have been bioengineered as an assault of blacks and gays (yes, there's a gene that whites have gives them resistance and immunity to AIDS), I'm supposed to think "my god I can't vote for someone who hung out with this guy". Sure, Hillary's mentor was Saul Alinsky, who was analogous to a secular, white Jeramiah Wright, a rabble rouser and conspiracy theorist from Chicago. But that actually gives her credibility among liberals... any news about that and Democratic voters would cheer. The downturn in polls for Barack reflects white liberal America's misunderstanding of what Wright represents. He's a charismatic kook, but really, a lovable one... and among those who are struggling to get by in Bush's economy, he is one that is more to Obama's credit (in a political-street-cred sort of way) than to his disfavor. Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Monday, April 28, 2008
The Story of Stuff
Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Stop Biofuels Now!
How can we justify continued advocacy for biofuels versus alternative energies like solar - which isn't damaging our planet? More references on the damage caused by biofuels: Wikipedia , IHT ![]() [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Canadaian Conservatives help Clinton
So now conservatives in Canada, pleased with "politics as usual", have chosen meddle in America's elections. And it worked. Clinton leaped on the bone offered by the Canadians and has been doing her best to smear Obama in Ohio. The worst part is, though, that Obama's economic adviser fell for it. Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Universal Pharma? Education or Oil Profits? You Choose.
Or you could follow the money. OpenSecrets.org allows you to view campaign contributions by industry. It's a quick way of showing which kinds of people are in of support which candidates, and IMHO, it's the most telling. Hillary Clinton tops the list of health-industry donors with her plan to federally subsidize the medical industrial complex. Barak Obama is tops among (you guessed it) education and computer people. Giuliani had a lock on the gambling and oil industries, before he dropped out. Now it's split. McCain's got casinos and Romney's got oil. And you can guess who the Washington lobbyists love... Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Samson's Max-Out
In 2004, I was politically active, reading speeches, comparing campaign issues from all the candidates Republican and Democrat. Seems like for 2008, I've sort of been asleep on the whole thing. I intend to at least listen to 1 campaign speech from each major candidate (Rep and Dem) before voting. Maybe I'll compile them here. Labels: north carolina, politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Saturday, April 07, 2007
9/11 Controlled Demolitions
Labels: politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] Saturday, December 23, 2006
Honolulu Surge
![]() Made a bad move and decided to read some news headlines. IMHO, the Iraqi "Surge" is a win-win political maneuver for Bush & Co. This is something they probably shouldn't get approval for by the new Democratic Congress, if the will of the electorate, which is 60% opposed to troop increases, is followed. But if Congress doesn't give it to him, then he'll be able to say "If only you'd approved my surge", and blame the Democrats as Iraq slowly drifts into chaos. And if we do give it to him, he'll only chuckle and come up with an even more expensive and outlandish thing that's needed to get the increasingly amorphous job done. No matter what, the Democrats will safely be able to be blamed. Labels: christmas, hawaii, politics [View/Post Comments] [Digg] [Del.icio.us] [Stumble] |
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