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By James Andrew Miller, Tom Shales
$14.91
28.99
$23
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By Marie Cocco — If we seemed doomed to refight the battles from eight years ago, perhaps it’s because Al Gore’s warnings about a Bush presidency turned out to be so prescient.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The Democratic contest in Iowa—and possibly the battle for the party’s presidential nomination—hangs on whether Hillary Clinton can use the next two weeks to encourage second thoughts about Barack Obama, and get voters to take a second look at her.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The former senator knows his fate hinges on a strong showing in the coming caucuses and that he will be out of the race if he runs third.
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By Eugene Robinson — We Americans like to think of ourselves as strong, rugged and supremely confident. So why do we find ourselves hunkered behind walls, popping pills to stave off diseases we might never contract and eyeing the rest of the world with suspicion that borders on the pathological?
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Rep. Dennis Kucinich stole the show at the Brown and Black Democratic Forum when he hijacked the format to ask himself a question.
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thephoenix.com
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BBC: “US Vice President Dick Cheney has been found to have an irregular heartbeat and will get further evaluation shortly, his spokeswoman has said. ... Mr Cheney, 66, has had four heart attacks, quadruple bypass surgery and operations to clear blocked arteries. He was fitted with a pacemaker in 2001.”
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The contours of the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination are set, and it is not a battle about “issues.” Advisers to the major contenders largely see things this way, and Democratic voters are in a quandary about what to do.
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By Marie Cocco — Countless studies show that abstinence-only sex education just doesn’t work, so why is it getting more money than ever from the federal government?
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By Ellen Goodman — My Thanksgiving prep began in one of those markets where, for a premium, you get a story with your food. Every vegetable, every creature and every jar of jam comes with its own pedigree and memoir.
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By Amy Goodman — Bell’s palsy. It hit suddenly a month ago. I had just stepped off a plane in New York, and my friend noticed the telltale sagging lip. It felt like Novocain. I raced to the emergency room. The doctors prescribed a weeklong course of steroids and antivirals. The following day it got worse. I had to make a decision: Do I host “Democracy Now!,” our daily news broadcast, on Monday?
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cbs.com
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The Doctors Without Borders relief organization has whipped up an ingenious (and, apparently, tasty) lifesaving food product called Plumpynut, a nutritionally enriched mixture of peanut butter, powdered milk and sugar, along with other simple ingredients—and it’s already working wonders on malnourished children around the world.
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seniorsinservice.org
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The White House should hand out pamphlets featuring stock photos of squealing, happy children and serene-looking seniors entitled “Global Warming And You!” after spokeswoman Dana Perino’s startling musings about possible “health benefits” of global warming. Perino made the comments, with a disclaimer, in speaking with reporters Wednesday at the White House.
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checksinthemail.com
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When Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control, went before Congress to testify on the effects of global warming on Americans’ health, she was about 10 pages lighter than planned. According to a source within the CDC, the White House “eviscerated” Gerberding’s prepared remarks, slashing 10 of the original 14 pages.
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politico.com
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House Democrats managed to pick up a few more votes for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, but not enough to override the president’s veto. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi promised to keep fighting for the overwhelmingly popular program: “In the next two weeks we will send the president another bill that insures coverage for 10 million children.”
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By Marie Cocco — The elderly are paying for waste in the GOP-crafted Medicare drug benefit. Rep. Waxman, D-Calif., is lifting the lid on this kettle, and what’s inside ain’t pretty.
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By Will Durst — Oooh. He’s clever. And obviously knows exactly what he’s doing. This is all a setup, people. Has to be. Yes, I’m talking about George Bush’s veto of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. Who but a total stoned horned ogre would do that? Maybe an ogre with something up his sleeve, eh?
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The Department of Health and Human Services’ latest abstinence ad commands the viewer to “tell your kids you want them to wait till they’re married to have sex.” That’s the Bush administration for you: Forget about the heaps of data that show a strategy doesn’t work and just keep throwing money at it.
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By Andy Borowitz — In a sign of confidence befitting her status as front-runner, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has begun airing what her aides call “extremely vicious attack ads about herself.”
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By Eugene Robinson — To say that George W. Bush spends money like a drunken sailor is to insult every gin-soaked patron of every dockside dive in every dubious port of call.
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foxnews.com
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President Bush may not have done his party any favor in coming elections by exercising his veto privilege—the fourth time he’s done so—to deep-six a bipartisan bill passed by Congress that would have renewed the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.
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AP photo / Kathy Willens and Brett Flashnick
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By Bill Boyarsky — Maybe I’m crazy, but I’d bet on John McCain to win the Republican presidential nomination. And the Democrat with the best chance to beat him is John Edwards.
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By Marie Cocco — Voters put Democrats in control of both houses of Congress last fall and, for this act of civic determination, they face an infuriating conundrum. Republicans are still running things.
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totallychoice.com
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File under “Your Tax Dollars at Work”: Congress has once again approved a three-month extension of a $50-million nationwide abstinence-education program, a move detractors say ignores indications that the approach (shock!) may not be working for America’s teens.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The GM-UAW labor contract could prove to be a victory of innovative thinking in the private sector. Now politicians should be clear on how they would attack the deepening problems that confront working people.
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By Ellen Goodman — When they write the cultural history of childhood in 21st-century America, I hope they leave room for a few unkind words about “Kid Nation.”
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en.rian.ru
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Despite widespread speculation that Cuban leader Fidel Castro had died recently, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has assured the global community that Castro is, in fact, alive and doing better. Cuban officials, meanwhile, also say Castro is recovering but haven’t said if and when he would return to office.
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By Joe Conason — Hillary Clinton’s skillful introduction of her new health care plan demonstrated why she is the most formidable Democrat running for president. It also suggested that if victorious, she won’t be defeated so easily by the insurance and pharmaceutical industries as she and her husband were the last time they tried to reform the dysfunctional American medical system.
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By E.J. Dionne, Jr. — The genius of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign has been her skill at turning liabilities into assets and weaknesses into strengths. By putting out a detailed health care plan on Monday, Clinton embarked on this year’s most daring act of political jujitsu.
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By Marie Cocco — Hillary Clinton’s health care proposal won’t please progressives looking to do away with corporate insurance or conservatives who prefer unaffordable micromanaged care to government “bureaucracy,” but at least it’s a step in the right direction.
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AP Photo / Charles Dharapak
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Aaron Glantz —
The sorry state of care of American veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan is not accidental. It’s on purpose. Since the invasion of Iraq in 2003, the Bush administration has fought every effort to improve care for wounded and disabled veterans.
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The City by the Bay is launching a new initiative that aims to provide healthcare for all of its uninsured residents. The plan is to pay for coverage with existing resources that are spent on more expensive—and less effective—emergency room and chronic care.
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Here’s the good news: Significant drops in heart disease and strokes, two leading causes of death among Americans, have contributed to the highest life expectancy in the country’s history, which rose to 77.9 years in the latest report released by the National Center for Health Statistics.
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By Marie Cocco — When the National Guard helicoptered her husband, Mark, to Staten Island to work as a wireless technician setting up a communications network for thousands of emergency workers who were descending upon Lower Manhattan on Sept. 11, 2001, Jeanmarie DeBiase did not know this would begin the unraveling.
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medecineworld.org
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Cigarette smoking is even worse for your health than previously thought. Dutch researchers have found that smokers over the age of 55 are 50 percent likelier to develop some form of dementia.
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timeinc.net
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Is it just a coincidence that an unusually large number of American troops and Iraqi civilians are suffering from what appears to be a cancer epidemic? Iraq’s environment minister and a growing number of victims, scientists and even politicians say the widespread use of depleted uranium in U.S. munitions is to blame.
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Associated Press / Jose Goitia
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Though he’s been laying low for the last year after undergoing intestinal surgery, Cuban leader Fidel Castro (pictured) is still well enough to remain in charge of his country, according to Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque, despite rumors that his health is rapidly deteriorating.
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iraqslogger.com
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Rampant violence and a curfew that makes nighttime medical aid unrealistic at best are threatening the health of pregnant Iraqi women and their children. Official data on the problem is scarce, but medical and humanitarian workers say childhood and maternal mortality is on the rise.
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AP Photo / Chris Gardner-File
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Rudy Giuliani switched to damage-control mode Friday in an effort to minimize the negative impact of a comment he made to the press Thursday at a Cincinnati baseball game. Referring to his dedication to the rescue and relief efforts at the World Trade Center site after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Giuliani said Thursday that he was at ground zero “as often, if not more, than most of the workers.” Whoops.
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Chief Justice John Roberts was hospitalized Monday (and released Tuesday) after experiencing a seizure, his second. Doctors were unable to find a cause in either case, leading one neurologist unrelated to the episode to observe: “Having two seizures so many years apart without any known culprit is going to be very difficult to figure out.”
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life-senior-insurance.com
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Although many assume the elderly lead largely abstinent lives, AIDS is on the rise among seniors as HIV-positive Americans are living longer than ever. With one study suggesting the majority of HIV patients in New York will be over 50 within a decade, AIDS workers are beginning to pay more attention to the senior set.
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By Amy Goodman — Republican and Democratic senators have reached agreement on a measure that would boost healthcare coverage for millions of poor children, but President Bush has vowed to veto the win-win legislation.
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Keith Olbermann and Michael Moore move the “SiCKO” discussion into the meaningful hows and whens of fixing the system by shooting past the CNN media controversy.
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wulfweard.blog.co.uk
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While many schools continue to move toward abstinence-only (aka “keep your fingers crossed”) sex education, some communities are fighting for more candid and honest curricula. A Maryland school district, for example, just won the right to teach middle and high schoolers about homosexuality and the proper use of condoms.
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Female genital mutilation, known euphemistically as “female circumcision,” has been banned completely in Egypt following the death of a girl. Although a soft ban has been in place for 10 years, some studies estimate that 90 percent of Egyptian women have had the procedure. Government and religious leaders have joined in condemning the practice.
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By Marie Cocco — The rudimentary equation of the health insurance industry is that to make a profit, it must take in more money than it pays out in claims. This is why the public, as distinct from the political class, will intuitively understand and likely appreciate Michael Moore’s new film, “Sicko.”
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