DEDICATED TO EXPOSING DISINFORMATION AND PROPAGANDA AND TO PROMOTING UNIVERSAL HUMAN RIGHTS - WITH SHARP ANALYSIS AND BLUNT COMMENTARY. NO ADS. NO TIP-JAR. JUST THE TRUTH.
Patient's shock at hospital waiting list in Australia
AN UNWELL woman with a family history of bowel cancer said she was shocked to learn she had at least an eight-month wait for a colonoscopy.
Maureen Watts, 63, says she has been waiting to hear back from Royal Darwin Hospital since mid-February about when she could be booked in for the procedure.
But last week, she said, she rang to check again on when they could fit her in, and that it was then she was told there was no theatre spare.
"(She) told me they're renovating or refurbishing the hospital and that they don't have a theatre ... until September," she said.
"(And then) there was a big backlog of people that they have to go through.
"I asked what can I do about it, and she said 'well, really, nothing - neither can I'."
Ms Watts - whose mother and both grandfathers all had bowel cancer - said she had been feeling unwell before seeing a RDH doctor in February, who agreed she should have a colonoscopy as well as an endoscopy.
RDH media officer Kasey Brunt said the hospital was investigating the case.
To fairly divide the climate change fight between rich and poor, a new study suggests basing targets for emission cuts on the number of wealthy people, who are also the biggest greenhouse gas emitters, in a country. Since about half the planet's climate-warming emissions come from less than a billion of its people, it makes sense to follow these rich folks when setting national targets to cut carbon dioxide emissions, the authors wrote on Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
... Rich people's lives tend to give off more greenhouse gases because they drive more fossil-fueled vehicles, travel frequently by air and live in big houses that take more fuel to heat and cool. By focusing on rich people everywhere, rather than rich countries and poor ones, the system of setting carbon-cutting targets based on the number of wealthy individuals in various countries would ease developing countries into any new climate change framework, Chakravarty said by telephone.
[THE OPENING IS AN EXAMPLE OF VERY BIASED REPORTING:]
Elected president Manuel Zelaya was overthrown a week ago.
[THE END IS MORE HONEST:] ...BBC correspondent Stephen Gibbs, who is in Honduras, says there is no evidence of disunity in the military, and a substantial proportion of the Honduran population do not want Mr Zelaya to return.
He says that, despite near universal support internationally, Mr Zelaya faces some major challenges if he is to be reinstated.
Let me start by pointing out something serious health economists have known all along: on general principles, universal health insurance should be eminently affordable.THEY SPEND LESS BECAUSE HEALTHCARE IS RATIONED(EITHER ON PURPOSE OR BECAUSE THERE ARE SHORTAGES) AND AS A RESULT THEY GET LESS CARE, FEWER TESTS, LESS MEDS, ETC.
After all, every other advanced country offers universal coverage, while spending much less on health care than we do.
The boys in green are coming as the Environment Agency sets up a squad to police companies generating excessive CO2 emissions.
The agency is creating a unit of about 50 auditors and inspectors, complete with warrant cards and the power to search company premises to enforce the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC), which comes into effect next year.
THIS IS WHAT THE LEFTIES DO BEST: PASS LAWS AND TAXES AND THEM USE THE COERCIVE POWER OF THE STATE TO COLLECT THE MONEY OR CRUSH THEIR OPPONENTS.
IT'S HAPPENING IN THE UK NOW, AND IT WILL HAPPEN HERE IF OBAMA GETS HIS WAY.
DISSENT ACCORDINGLY.
All told, Paris has set aside 100 million euros in stimulus funds earmarked for what the French like to call their cultural patrimony. It is a French twist on how to overcome the global downturn, spending borrowed money avidly to beautify the nation even as it also races ahead of the United States in more classic Keynesian ways: fixing potholes, upgrading railroads and pursuing other “shovel ready” projects.
“America is six months behind; it has wasted a lot of time,” said Patrick Devedjian, the minister in charge of the French relance, or stimulus. By the time Washington gets around to doling out most of its money, Mr. Devedjian sniffed, “the crisis could be over.”
Gallic pride aside, Mr. Devedjian has a point. While he plans to spend 75 percent of France’s stimulus money this year, the White House is giving itself until fall 2010 to lay out that big a share of the American expenditure. And many experts predict that Washington will fall short of that goal.
The G8 leaders are set this week to deliver their strongest statement so far on global warming.
They are likely to agree that the world ought to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2050 - with rich nations reducing them by 80%.
The group will probably also say that any human-induced temperature rise should be held to 2C - a level considered to be a danger threshold.
The US has previously objected to such a clause.
But it looks as though the G8 will fall short of agreeing the short-term targets scientists say are essential to ensure that the 2C threshold is not breached.
With the clock running out on a new US-Russian arms treaty before the previous Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START, expires on December 5, a senior White House official said Sunday said that the difficulty of the task might mean temporarily bypassing the Senate’s constitutional role in ratifying treaties by enforcing certain aspects of a new deal on an executive levels and a “provisional basis” until the Senate ratifies the treaty."The most ideal situation would be to finish it in time that it could be submitted to the Senate so that it can be ratified," said White House Coordinator for Weapons of Mass Destruction, Security and Arms Control Gary Samore. "If we're not able to do that, we'll have to look at arrangements to continue some of the inspection provisions, keep them enforced in a provisional basis, while the Senate considers the treaty."
What's the rush?
What will require such immediate implementation?
For Barack Obama to sell any agreement he reaches with the Russians, he must portray today’s Russia as being led by “new men”, reasonable men, men perceived to be unlike Vladimir Putin. In this way he can say that ‘new page’ has been turned; and America is now dealing with ‘people we can trust’. Obama probably knows that Medvedev only represents “a more accommodating face of Russia … only because Mr Putin wants him to”. But it suits his book to present Medvedev’s face or at the very least to portray Russia as a battlefield between “moderates and neo-conservatives”. The wool being pulled over isn’t over the President’s eyes but someone else’s.As part and parcel of his Gramscian leftist agenda, the Obamessiah is preparing to surrender to the rump of the Soviet Union. He is hell bent on weakening America, knowing that when the bastion of freedom falters, leftist tyranny can spread unchecked throughout the world.
President Obama told Russia’s ITAR-TASS/ROSSIYA TV that his “goal is that both countries reduce their nuclear stockpiles in a way that doesn't leave either country with an advantage, but reduces tensions and the expense of maintaining such high nuclear stockpiles when they're not necessary for our defense and our deterrence."Tell me why a President who wants to give up America's military superiority over a dangerous, adventurous tyrant is not guilty of treason.
Eleven people are seriously harmed during NHS surgery every day, it emerged yesterday.
The number of major errors has risen by 28 per cent in five years, with more than 4,000 patients hurt in 2007/08.
Mistakes include objects such as scalpels and coils being left inside patients, organs being punctured, and the wrong dosage of drugs being given.
A total of 722 objects were left inside patients during surgery last year.
... 'This has undoubtedly, in a number of well documented cases, been a contributory factor in making services unsafe,' the report said.
The MPs added that many mistakes were not reported by the NHS – raising the possibility that the recorded number of medical mishaps is just the tip of the iceberg.
The latest figures were uncovered by the Liberal Democrats in a parliamentary answer.
... Health spokesman Norman Lamb said: 'These figures raise serious concerns and call into question the Government's claim to be making patient safety a priority.
'There really is no excuse for leaving objects inside people. Far too many avoidable mistakes are still being made.
'Many doctors and nurses are under enormous amounts of pressure to meet Government targets.
'We have to ensure that patient safety isn't being compromised to satisfy the whims of Whitehall.
President Obama and Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., in separate interviews this weekend, said that the accelerating crackdown on opposition leaders in Iran in recent days would not deter them from seeking to engage the country’s top leadership in direct negotiations.
In an interview with The New York Times, a day before his scheduled departure for Moscow on Sunday, Mr. Obama acknowledged the arrests and intimidation of Iran’s opposition leaders, but insisted, as he has throughout the Iranian crisis, that the repression would not close the door on negotiations with the Iranian government.
“We’ve got some fixed national security interests in Iran not developing nuclear weapons, in not exporting terrorism, and we have offered a pathway for Iran to rejoining the international community,” Mr. Obama said.
Mr. Biden echoed the same themes in an interview conducted in Iraq and broadcast Sunday on the ABC News program “This Week.”
Burgess Meredith, the late actor who played “The Penguin” in the original “Batman” television series, plays the role of a conservative Christian branded as “The Obsolete Man” in a same-name episode of The Twilight Zone television series I watched on the SciFi Channel this afternoon. While watching the classic episode, which aired for the first time June 2, 1961, I couldn’t help but notice the many similarities between characters portraying representatives of an all-powerful, Godless government (a.k.a., “The State”) and the liberals who make up the current administration of President Barack Obama. Hmmm? The State oppressing a conservative Christian? Talk about life imitating art.
Click here to watch the episode, shown in three parts, and see if you agree.
NEW JERSEY: Thousands take part in ‘tea party’ protest against high taxes in Morristown.
TEXAS: Sen. Cornyn booed at Capitol “tea party”. “‘You’re the problem,’ a crowd member hollered.”
Also, Thousands attend America’s Tea Party protest at Southfork Ranch.
NEVADA: Fourth of July Marked with Tea Party in Reno: “The tea party, in which ‘tea’ stands for ‘taxed enough already,’ was one of five held in Nevada on Saturday and was organized locally by Republican Debbie Landis. Landis estimated 3,000 people participated through the course of the day.”
MASSACHUSETTS: Pride, concern share stage at Quincy Tea Party Freedom Celebration.
Also, ‘Tea Party’ crowd fills center of Hanoverton.
SOUTH CAROLINA: Tea Party protesters rally against big government, massive spending.
INDIANA: Hundreds show up in rain for second local tea party.
IDAHO: T.E.A. Party In Idaho Falls.
ARKANSAS: TEA Party Packs Bomber Stadium.
MICHIGAN: Genesee TEA Party holds Independence Day tax protest, plans campaign against Hurley millage.
MINNESOTA: Tea Party calls for less government, people’s rights.
FLORIDA: Apopka TEA Party Has Big Turnout.
NEW MEXICO: TEA Party Rally Focuses On Nation’s Values.
CONNECTICUT: Norwich tea party protest draws 500.
This is just what was at the top of Google News under “tea party” this morning. Nothing systematic about it. But as Michael Silence notes below, it’s a widely distributed phenomenon.
