Birds are Disappearing

At first I thought the numbers in the below article were off. But apparently the numbers are accurate.  What if modern life as we experience it in the so-called First World is actually not good for humans and other living beings?

What if that modern life, which is being eagerly sought after by billions of people in China, Africa, India and other so-called Third World regions or countries is incompatible with continued human existence? If one-third of wild birds have vanished then what replaces their previous role in the world's life cycle? And what impact will that replacement have on us all?

Nearly one-third of the wild birds in the United States and Canada have vanished since 1970, a staggering loss that suggests the very fabric of North America’s ecosystem is unraveling.

The disappearance of 2.9 billion birds over the past nearly 50 years was reported today in the journal Science, a result of a comprehensive study by a team of scientists from seven research institutions in the United States and Canada. As ornithologists and the directors of two major research institutes that directed this study, even we were shocked by the results. We knew of well-documented losses among shorebirds and songbirds. 

Antibiotics are losing their effectiveness

The problem with getting better at overcoming a problem is that often times the problem evolves and adapts. This has been the case with antibiotic usage. 

Although antibiotics are literally lifesavers, assisting our immune systems  to defeat some very nasty infections, many infections (fungi and bacteria) have evolved to resist and become immune to the antibiotics and antifungals. They've done this very quickly as humans count time but perhaps not as bacteria and fungi count time. 

One reason for this problem is that people across the world (this problem is evidently most acute in South Asia) have overused antibiotics and antifungals in a wide variety of circumstances. So we're seeing more of these organisms shrug off our best attempts at killing them. It's as if prisoners started developing immunity to small arms fire. Such a thing would be an unwelcome surprise to prison guards tasked to stop breakouts.

Check out the fascinating nine minute video below which explains the dire situation we're in and how worse may be yet to come. As pointed out in the video some other reasons that this situation exists include the requirements of globalized capital and an unnatural food supply chain. There is nothing supernatural here but this is nonetheless a very real horror show.

Michigan Apples

One good thing about living in Michigan is that you get first dibs on a pretty amazing variety of apples every fall. Now it won't officially be fall for another ten days or so but football has started, leaves have begun to turn color, and apple orchards are starting to toot their horns about what they have to offer. Probably in a few weeks when the temperature has fallen to what I consider real fall weather and more of the harvest has become available I will go to an apple orchard near me. I am sure the ones listed in this story are nice.

But in Michigan it's hard to drive twenty minutes without running into an apple orchard somewhere. Maybe next year I will try some a bit farther afield. Of course apple orchards offer more than apples. They have cakes, pies, candy, syrup, donuts, fritters, and all sorts of other goodies that are derived in part or in whole from apples.

Area orchards and cider mills have opened for the season, offering treats such as apple cider, donuts, pies and fresh apples.
The Michigan Apple harvest 2019 crop estimate is 25.25 million bushels (1.06 billion pounds), according to the USApple Outlook meeting held recently in Chicago.
This year's crop estimate is in line with the average harvest, which is about 25.2 million bushels per year.

Black Doctor Prevented From Entering Her Own Neighborhood

I've written before about how one of the most persistent elements of American anti-Black racism is the idea that some whites have that a given Black person doesn't belong in a certain space and can or must be challenged. Some racists can't believe that anyone Black can legitimately own or enjoy nice things. These challenges can range from anything from hard looks and slow service at an upscale restaurant to extra demands for id when writing a check or using a credit card, to mistaking a co-worker for a criminal or janitor all the way up to physical attacks by the police or others. This all goes back to slavery and formalized Jim Crow. During slavery Black mobility was severely limited and had to be literally signed off on by a white of sufficient authority to grant it. Blacks, free or otherwise, who were caught in "white" areas without some sort of pass could run into some serious trouble. This attitude has never really gone away. Most Black people can tell a story in which this racialized hostility is revealed either in a minor or major way. The other day it was a Black doctor's turn.

ATLANTA — A Black doctor is upset at a man who she says racially profiled her when he blocked her from entering the community that she has lived in for about eight years. A part of the nearly 30-minute exchange was captured on camera. A police report indicates that Nnenna Aguocha stated she was attempting to enter the Buckhead Townhome community after just coming off an overnight shift when another property owner stopped her at the gate entrance. She said he parked his car under the gate arm and refused to move forward to let her in, despite her repeated requests. "He got out of the car and threatened to call the police on me because I was trespassing," she said in the video recording taken at the scene. "This is racial profiling at its finest."

John Henry

John Henry was a little baby, sitting on his papa's knee
He picked up a hammer and little piece of steel
Said "Hammer's gonna be the death of me, Lord, Lord
Hammer's gonna be the death of me"

The captain said to John Henry
"Gonna bring that steam drill 'round
Gonna bring that steam drill out on the job
Gonna whop that steel on down, Lord, Lord
Gonna whop that steel on down"

John Henry told his captain
"A man ain't nothing but a man
But before I let your steam drill beat me down
I'll die with a hammer in my hand, Lord, Lord
I'll die with a hammer in my hand""

Now the man that invented the steam drill
Thought he was mighty fine
But John Henry made fifteen feet
The steam drill only made nine, Lord, Lord
The steam drill only made nine

John Henry hammered in the mountains
His hammer was striking fire
But he worked so hard, he broke his poor heart
He laid down his hammer and he died, Lord, Lord
He laid down his hammer and he died

John Henry" is a folk-blues song that is more closely associated with the Appalachian-Piedmont blues tradition than the Mississippi one. Like many of the best folk songs, it may have been based on real life events. It was certainly used as a rallying song during the civil rights movement of the fifties and sixties. It has foreboding, superhuman heroic acts, and of course, death. In the very first stanza of the song the hero, then just a child, knows that he's not long for this life and will die in a heroic sacrifice. Of course, the nature of the sacrifice is debatable, especially in today's post-industrial world where physical labor often is considered suitable only for people not smart enough to do anything else. There are many different interpretations of this song. As with most blues songs there are several different lyrical variations. But every version hits the key points. John Henry was a steel driving man who, when threatened with loss of his livelihood via automation, takes up the challenge and beats the machine, but only at the cost of his life.

Michigan Mother Jailed over Vaccination Refusal

People have differing beliefs about the efficacy of some scientific or medical procedures. We have, within some very wide parameters, the ability to make these decisions for ourselves. Your body. Your choice. There are limits. You can't legally decide that ingesting cocaine and meth is the best way to spend your weekend. You can, however, eat and drink yourself into a stupor. An adult can refuse medical treatment for conditions or diseases that everyone knows require immediate treatment. The state or concerned family or friends face a high barrier trying to force an adult to accept medical treatment or drugs that he or she opposes. I know some doctors and lawyers who are frustrated by this. They snark that someone has spent a few hours on Google or WebMD and now considers themselves a doggone legal/medical expert. I've had discussions with friends and relatives who have what I consider to be conspiratorial paranoid mindsets. I know how irritating it can be when someone refuses to see reason. But this is our system. An adult doesn't have to justify his or her bad decisions. The state or other adults have to justify why they wish to substitute their judgment for someone else's.  

But children are a little different. With children the state has an independent interest, separate from the parents, in ensuring the child's health and life. When the parents disagree with the state or disagree with each other things can get messy. Rebecca Bredow, a local Southeast Michigan woman, shares joint custody of her son with her ex-husband, James Horne. Horne wanted his son vaccinated. Bredow disagreed, citing health and religious beliefs. The judge presiding over the case was unconvinced
. 

Terry Foster: Hypertension and Health

It's important to keep in mind how fragile and precious your health and life really is.
No one knows the day that he or she will leave this world or how he or she will depart. But sometimes life gives us little reminders that nothing is guaranteed. Local writer, sports radio talk show host, and former Detroit News journalist Terry Foster was reminded of that recently when he had a mild stroke that was apparently brought on by hypertension. Foster was already dealing with Type 2 diabetes. Hypertension and Type 2 diabetes often occur together. Although it appears that Foster had his blood glucose within safe levels he did not have his hypertension under control. So what happened, happened. This is just another reminder of how important it is for people, particularly African-Americans, to avoid these conditions in the first place or stringently deal with the conditions if they are unfortunate enough to have them. Proper diet and exercise are not only what we owe to ourselves and our loved ones as joyful payment for being alive but good food and vigorous movement are also some of the most effective tools we have to fight hypertension and Type 2 diabetes. Some people still consider it a sign of virility to avoid seeing a doctor. I think that the wiser move is to treat going to the doctor the same way you would maintenance on a car or home-- a routine if occasionally unpleasant task that must be done in order to avoid larger costs down the line. The scary thing about hypertension is that you may have it for quite some time and feel no ill effects. You'll feel fine right up until the moment when you have a stroke, go blind or undergo even worse experiences.

Highly engaged listeners and video stream viewers could have noticed a few weeks ago that Foster seemed to be having difficulty with some words. He says now that he was in denial.
“I was struggling with my speech and my fine motor skills in my right hand were off,” Foster said. “I was typing slower, I had slower reaction times and I thought it was the effect of a bad cold that I had, but obviously it wasn’t and I was on the air for a couple of days and I was struggling with my speech. At some point, I was kind of getting scared and said ‘I need to go in and see what’s going on’ and that’s what that was.”
What was the last straw?

“It was slurred, I couldn’t say ‘971 The Ticket,’ I was like saying ‘nine-one the Ticket, like that. There were certain words that I could not say or they were child-like when I said that,” Foster said. “And so, I think, to compensate I started talking louder and slower and that was the big symptom right there.”

Now, he has a message for his listeners, the men, especially. Don’t skip doctor’s visits. And no matter how strong you feel, no one is invincible. Foster said he hadn’t been to the doctor and didn’t know he had high blood pressure, which was 220 over something he can’t remember when he showed up at Henry Ford Hospital in West Bloomfield suspecting something was wrong. Like most, he was eating inconsistently, high-fat foods sometimes and healthy meals other times.

Below Foster talks about the literal bullet he dodged and some of the warning signs he ignored. I thought this talk was worth sharing. Each of us may have inherited some weaknesses from our parents. We can't do anything about that. But we can control what we do with our body and how we treat it. There's a wealth of information available on how to eat better and exercise more often. Doing those things just might save your life.



Blood Pressure
Dash Diet
LINK

Do the Right Thing!

Do you think you are a moral person? You probably do. There are very few people who consciously think of themselves as evil, immoral or heartless. Even people who kill puppies for a living usually have what they see as good reasons for doing so. From time to time we all have to make decisions, some small and some large about what sort of people we are. Generally these are not difficult and life altering major decisions like telling your dying friend that his wife cheated on him and he has been raising another man's children or escaping a sinking ship and realizing that the lifeboat only has enough room for two other people when you have three kids. All the same morals are morals no matter how minor the decisions seem to be. The choices we make in situations both big and small define the sort of people that we are trying to become. There aren't necessarily right answers to many of these questions but there are probably some answers that may seem right to you. Some questions are purely hypothetical; others are drawn from real life experiences, albeit not necessarily mine. What's the right thing to do in the following ten situations?

One
You're out in public. You notice that a highly attractive member of the opposite sex has some writing on a body part normally not visible to the general public. This could be a very important message. If this person didn't wish for you to read the writings on their (insert body part here) they wouldn't have ventured out dressed as they did, would they? So what do you do? Avert your eyes? Take a quick look and move on? Openly leer? Politely inform the person that they are showing more flesh than they may realize? Or saunter over to ask the person what the message says as you can't quite make it out from your vantage point? 

Two
You are with your unmarried significant other at an important family event. You think that s/he could be the ONE. This is your first chance to make an impression on their family. Your honey's parent makes an offhand comment to you on a sensitive topic (race/religion/culture/politics) that makes you see red. You wonder how a person this stupid manages to dress themselves every morning. But your special rider thinks their parent hung the moon. S/he told you beforehand that their parent had different views than you. S/he asked you to be nice. Arguing with their parent might destroy your relationship with Miss/Mr. Wonderful. So what do you do? Do you pretend agreement? Say nothing? Gracefully change the subject? Or let this ignoramus know how dumb they are? Would your answer change if you were married?

Three
At the grocery store you buy something cheap. The cashier makes a mistake. He returns too much change. E.g, he gives you back two $10 bills when your expected change was $2.10. Do you point out the mistake and return the money? Or do you take the money and keep it moving? After all it's not your fault he can't count.

Four
You're on a company critical project. You discover a catastrophic flaw. You need time to correct the problem. You may need to redesign everything. Without a fix you KNOW there will be massive failures, bad publicity, legal consequences, and increased costs. You tell your boss. Your boss says the project has been delayed long enough. She insists that you cut corners to make the target date. She doesn't trust your analysis. She says any problems can be fixed later. This is not a debate. She informs you that you will meet the date. She warns you against going to upper management, ownership or the press. The boss says this issue is closed. All she wants to hear from you is "Yes. We will meet the date". Getting on her bad side is a career limiting move. She has a long memory and highly placed friends throughout the company. So what do you do?

Five
You're attending a company training event. This week long class is required for your next promotion. You must create and deliver a multimedia presentation on various business cases. The instructor wants teamwork. He has randomly assigned everyone partners. The instructor will judge you on the final presentation and on cooperation with your partner. Your partner is a man infamous throughout the entire department for ignoring basic American hygiene. He last showered during the Clinton Administration. Soap, toothpaste, deodorant and daily clothing changes are foreign concepts to him. He can make you nauseous. The other students know this and definitely won't switch partners with you. What do you do? Grit it out without complaining? Tell the instructor that you can't work with this person? Or angrily tell Mr. Skunk that unused soap is worthless soap?

Six
A good friend has privately told you that the thrill is gone from their marriage. He or she is cheating. They are entirely unrepentant. Their spouse is completely clueless and still believes that Mr./Mrs. Cheater is wonderful. The cheater just wanted to vent. They don't want their spouse to know. They don't want THAT headache right now, especially since they're on their way to the no-tell motel. You are also REALLY good friends with their spouse and routinely see them, both with and without their adulterous other half. The faithful spouse believes that you are righteous. They would see your silence as a horrible betrayal. So what do you do? Mind your own business and let grown people work it out? Tell the other spouse what's going on?

Seven
You're at an impasse on a work assignment. Your task must be completed tomorrow but that looks unlikely. Your boss has gone home. There is another more experienced, higher ranking person who could immediately provide the solution. However, in the past when you asked him for help, he made a Broadway production of how busy he was. He said that if you wanted him to do your job for you then he wanted your salary. He ultimately gave you the answer you needed but not without a humiliating dressing down disguised as humor. You can ask him for assistance, eat a big load of crap, get the answers you need and meet deadlines. Or you can continue to fly solo. You'll stay late and will probably miss your project time commitments anyway even if you do eventually find the answer. Your boss will be VERY upset with you if you miss your deadlines. So what do you do?

Eight
Walking through a grocery store aisle you see a person knock an entire section of items off the shelf. They do not put anything back on the shelf and just continue on their way. What do you do? Do you also ignore the items on the floor because you didn't create the mess. Do you confront the person who knocked the items over? Do you start putting things back yourself?

Nine
You have a valuable investment. Selling it won't permit you to retire but you will be able to improve your savings, carry out some home improvement projects, and provide seed capital for your long postponed Evil Overlord project to rule the world. But before selling the asset and admiring your fat wallet you learn that a close family member (but not your spouse/sibling/parent) is in a serious financial jam. Rescuing them will cost roughly the expected profit from your asset sale. Do you help your kin? It will take years to recoup the lost cash. Do you stick to your original plans? Would your answer change if it were a first degree relative?

Ten

You've had a long hard day at work. You're dead on your feet. You're taking crowded public transportation home. You're about 20 minutes away from your stop. Fortunately you found a seat. Standing people are packed together like sardines. A visibly pregnant woman gets on the vehicle. There are no open seats. No one offers her a seat. She's in front of you. She's not verbally asking for your seat but she is making eye contact with you. Do you offer your seat? Is your answer dependent on your age or gender?

What's Your Excuse? Maria Kang Tells It Like It Is: Fat-Shaming or Truth Telling?

Smoking is bad for you. It causes and/or correlates with lung and throat cancer, hypertension, heart disease, yellowed teeth and fingernails, erectile dysfunction in men and several other nasty medical conditions in both genders. Smoking gives your hair, clothing and breath what I find to be an unpleasant odor. Being around smoke gives me a vicious headache. I don't allow smoking in my home. I avoid cigarette smoke as much as possible. Yes we all know of or have heard of someone who smoked three packs a day, had clean pink lungs and lived to be 107 or of someone else who never touched a cigarette and died at 31 hacking up his esophagus and lungs. But those are considered to be outliers. Most people, even many smokers, accept, grudgingly or otherwise, that smoking is bad for you. Although the anti-smoking crusade may have gone too far in some aspects, there aren't many groups, other than tobacco company fronts, who argue with a straight face that not only should you have the right to smoke but also that smoking is a positive good. If you smoke there are few support groups who claim that other people should stop trying to "smoke-shame" you. But oddly enough, many people see overeating as being different from smoking.

Despite consistent and increasing medical and scientific evidence that overeating, avoiding exercise and carrying excess weight is, generally speaking, bad for you, there are several people who won't accept that fact and don't want to hear other people raise it either. Sometimes their defensiveness slides into rage at a person's justifiable pride at being in shape. 

Exercise enthusiast Maria Kang found this out when she was temporarily banned from Facebook and had her post deleted for writing that while we shouldn't hate fat people neither should we normalize obesity. Her post brought about a firestorm of criticism, presumably from overweight women, and Kang's words were said to be akin to hate speech.

I am a firm believer that one should love their body in order to start loving and nurturing it. What I don’t like is the fine line we are walking today – which is love and accept your body versus love and progress your body.  We should celebrate any person who makes their fitness and nutrition a priority. There is no one-size-fits-all in fitness. It’s unfortunate that we don’t see more variety in the physiques that bombard our media streams. I get that. That’s why I’ve never posted a motivational poster with a fitness model attached to the message (you can now look at my FB history) because I don’t want to perpetuate the notion that ‘fitness’ looks a certain way.

Please start your keyboards now (as I know many are thinking I encourage people to look like me) because I’ve never said that. I am not a size 0 like most runway models and I don’t have a six pack like most fitness models. I am not a paid celebrity. I don’t work in a gym. I have a stressful life. I don’t have the perfect marriage. I have struggled with food addiction. And I was not blessed with the best genetics. I run when I’m tired. I avoid food when I’m stressed. I discipline my constant desire for chocolate. I am barely 5’4. I have stretchmarks. I have excess skin – and while not perfect, I know this is how my body (not everybody) manifests after children through consistent nutrition and exercise.

While fitness changes lives, the lack of fitness destroys lives. I hate the pain of watching my mother not take care of herself. I hate watching friends pop prescription pills for cholesterol, blood pressure and diabetes. I hate reading news about our healthcare crisis and I hate seeing people blame others for their lot in life.

LINK

 I know many people still get riled up with me and my convictions but the truth is I KNOW how it is to work your ass off and not have energy at the end of your day. I know how it feels to be overweight and not drop an ounce after years of disordered eating. I know how difficult it is to raise multiple children – all born a year apart – and make my fitness and nutrition a priority. Lastly, I know how it feels like to grow up with an unhealthy mother wondering if she will live to see your wedding day. I know it’s hard. I know it’s not easy to break habits and build new ones. I know your environment challenges you and I know making your health a priority amongst the many priorities to stay afloat in today’s world is difficult. But I will tell you this: IT IS WORTH IT.

Kang evidently didn't like seeing stories about lingerie for fat women designed to make them think of themselves as beautiful and perhaps similar stories of other bloggers attempting to spread fat acceptance. Curvy Girl Lingerie Owner Chrystal Bougnon reported Kang to Facebook for making "anti-fat" comments. "I want to be a safe place for women to talk about being fat," Bougon told NBC Bay Area. "People are sending in their photos and telling me they never felt beautiful until they found my page. I want to have a sliver of cyber space without people hating on us." Bougon feels that Kang – best known for her flat abs Facebook post in October with her kids, asking “What’s Your Excuse” – is “fat shaming” her and others who are overweight.
Bougnon, who has accused Kang of stirring up the controversy to sell fitness tapes, obviously also has a financial interest in keeping the pot boiling as she has used her Facebook page to promote what she sees as "real" (read overweight) women in all their glory and imperfection. I am aghast by the attempts by some "fat positive" activists to downplay or dismiss legitimate health concerns about weight or diet as "hate speech" or bully people into saying that fat women are always just as attractive as normal size women. Having read Kang's facebook and blog post I find nothing that's hateful.

There are a few points which I think are worth making.

1) The fashion industry, which excites so much attention from some women and subsequent rage at supposedly male derived beauty standards, is not in fact run or generally consumed by heterosexual men. The constant news about this or that celebrity mother's weight gain and loss during and after pregnancy is something that most men have little to no interest in. This is about competition between and among women. The women that heterosexual men idealize who are represented in the media are generally speaking a little heavier, often shorter, more feminine, and rather obviously differently shaped from fashion model types. Men are more accepting of women's weight than many women might think. And fat women get married, date, and have children like anyone else. And they seem to be increasing in number. Americans in general are getting fatter.

2) That said, everyone has an ideal of what's attractive in the opposite sex. That's life. Getting angry about this is like getting mad that when it rains you get wet. You can curse, scream and pout all you want but you're still gonna get wet. Since you can't control the rain, the smart thing to do is to get inside, wear a raincoat or carry an umbrella. This goes for both genders. The overweight or obese women complaining that weight related beauty standards disadvantage them could decide to lose weight OR they could find a man who, perhaps because he may not be what most women consider attractive, may be more accepting. Or maybe a larger woman can find that successful attractive man who just likes larger women. Those are the choices. Those choices are under the control of one or two people. But trying to change what millions of men find attractive, well quixotic doesn't even begin to describe that challenge. Good luck with that. Bring a lunch because I think it's going to be a while.

If you're overweight or obese, generally speaking it's because you are eating too much, eating the wrong foods and not exercising enough. It's simple math. 3500 calories = 1 pound. If you consistently eat more than required you will store the extra calories as fat. I don't know all the reasons WHY a person might be doing this. The reasons are as varied as the stars in the sky. But I do know math and mechanics. Burn more calories, consume fewer calories, reduce or eliminate bad foods, lose weight. Eat more calories, eat crappy calories, sit on your fundament all day, gain weight and eventually become fat. Obviously there are several external factors, what with subsidized sugar pumped into so much of our food supply, food deserts, and time constraints. However, an adult decides what he or she puts into their mouth. No one chased after a thin person, strapped them to a gurney and force fed them until they became obese.

It's probably compassionate to spare someone's feelings as you try to convince them to change something about themselves. I've done that myself for people I care deeply about and there are people who could honestly say they've done that for me. No one likes blunt criticism, especially from an intimate. Yes, the long term solution in solving someone's weight gain will involve finding out why they're eating more food than their body needs, not moving around enough and eating the wrong foods. There may be some deep emotional wounds that need healing. That can take some time and some pretty deft maneuvering around emotional and psychological landmines. But sometimes you must dispense with politesse and tell it like it is. If you are around (and I have been) when someone is undergoing diabetic ketoacidosis or experiencing a heart attack, it's too damned late to hold their hand and try to gently convince them that no they don't really need that extra sugar donut or that sodium and preservative laden fried food. No. If they are lucky enough to survive and wind up in the hospital the doctor will likely force them on a very limited diet that doesn't include the mentioned items.  And if they don't survive, well then you will have be proud that although you'll never see them again, at least you didn't hurt their widdle feelings. Wonderful. You were so freaking brave. You deserve a medal for your sympathy and empathy and compassion.
I've been there and done that.

Because of some painful experiences I have less and less interest in trying to spare anyone else's feelings on this topic, especially if they are people I care about. Being fat doesn't make you a bad person. I hope that is clear.Your problems are just more obvious than other people's. But being fat could and often does put you at higher risk for a variety of life threatening or life altering conditions. I've seen far too many people die, get permanent unpleasant conditions, suffer amputations or have eyesight issues. We shouldn't be silent about health issues just because some vain fat women wish to harangue people into attesting that fat women are beautiful. I don't believe that fat people must walk through life with people pointing and laughing at them. I've never done that and never will. But that just isn't what Maria Kang was advocating. The people who claim she was are just showing their own guilty consciences. When someone showing justifiable pride in her own accomplishments is accused of hate, our society is warped.

I think that people know that being morbidly obese is not a healthy or desirable state. And no amount of jawboning, guilt-tripping or whining about "fat-shaming" can make me think otherwise. But if someone disagrees that's fine. They can live their life as they see fit. If they want to desecrate the temple of their body, go for it. Eat buckets of ice cream and platters of donuts. Guzzle down high sugar drinks. Have not only dinner seconds but also thirds. Hook yourself up to a glucose drip if you like. Just don't tell me I must agree with or applaud such actions or their impact on your body. Because I won't.

Ever. Never. Ever.
If you're that rare person (and I know a few) who has underlying medical conditions which have caused weight gain that is obviously an entirely different kettle of fish. But most people who are overweight simply need to eat less and exercise more. As Kang said in a non-apology apology:

What you interpret is not MY fault. It's Yours. The first step in owning your life, your body and your destiny is to OWN the thoughts that come out of your own head. I didn't create them. You created them. So if you want to continue 'hating' this image, get used to hating many other things for the rest of your life. You can either blame, complain or obtain a new level of thought by challenging the negative words that come out of your own brain. "With that said, obesity and those who struggle with health-related diseases is literally a 'bigger' issue than this photo. Maybe it's time we stop tip-toeing around people's feelings and get to the point."

LINK

What's your call?

Was Maria Kang engaging in hate speech?

Should her facebook post have been removed?

Is "fat acceptance" a good idea?

How did criticism become "shaming"? 

If you're doing wrong, shouldn't you be ashamed?

Obamacare Losers

First of all, if you've got health insurance, you like your doctor, you like your plan - you can keep your doctor, you can keep your plan. Nobody is talking about taking that away from you."
President Barack Obama
7/16/2009

President Obama's statement has been shown to be untrue. I don't ascribe ill intention to the President or PPACA supporters. PPACA may prove broadly beneficial. But those who lose their current coverage and receive no government subsidies will be worse off. The counter to the claim that they're worse off is that their new plans will have increased level of (mandatory) benefits which are better for them and society. 

I am unconvinced by this argument. It's exactly like saying that instead of driving your $12,000 compact car with minimal upgrades and a low chance of being undamaged in an accident, you MUST purchase a fully loaded $60,000 large sedan, SUV, or pickup truck with a better chance of surviving a serious collision. So the government forces auto companies to stop making the $12,000 compact that you prefer. Though you have little financial capacity and less desire to drive something large which also has voice activated commands or rear view cameras, the choice isn't yours anymore.

At least 146,000 Michiganders — and possibly thousands more — with health coverage purchased directly from insurers now are learning their polices will end Dec. 31 because they don’t meet the minimum requirements of the federal health care act. Under the law, each policy must cover essential benefits in 10 categories. Instead of beefing up these policies, insurers are opting to drop them, advising consumers to consider other policies that are now available either from the insurers directly or though the Michigan Health Insurance Marketplace, also known as the state exchange. The policies that are ending were often less expensive on the individual market because they provided limited benefits and were sold to healthier consumers.

And that was fine with consumers such as Josh Mulder. Mulder had landed a plan several years ago that cost his Wixom family of four just $291 a month. That policy will end Dec. 31, according to a letter from his insurer. The policy didn’t cover things such as maternity care or prescription drugs, but, Mulder said, his family is generally healthy and he was willing to take the risk.“I had a great rate,” he said. Rates that meet the required benefits under health reform average $762.06 a month on the Michigan Health Insurance Marketplace for his family of four..

LINK

Purchasing health care is not like purchasing an automobile but the principle is the same. The government is mandating a specific choice. Maybe this is okay because the government already requires that vehicles have certain safety features and pass certain tests. You can't purchase a new car without seat belts or air bags.  

Often people who make this argument have trouble delineating any point where the federal government can't mandate or regulate. But let's take that objection seriously. It does have some validity. A government which wants to prevent vehicular carnage can surely attempt the same in health care no? I'd say no because drivers directly impact other people. The people detailed in this article are not those fierce individualists or (in some people's minds) lazy freeriders who haven't purchased insurance. They've already purchased insurance which fits their needs and budget. 

The government is making them purchase additional insurance which they don't need and may never use in order to subsidize other people's insurance choices. If I am a sixty something worker I may no longer need to cover my child until he's twenty-six. If I am a forty something man I have little use for insurance that mandates well woman visits or contraceptive coverage. If I am a thirty something fitness guru I may not desire extra coverage which allows multiple doctor visits. If I am a woman well past her reproductive years I may skip an insurance policy that includes maternity care. And so on.

Some might argue that such people are wicked selfish folks. Perhaps. But we are all self-interested. In a marketplace people are able to pursue their own self-interest. For some, the PPACA has reduced choice and raised costs. This is not a good thing.
A utilitarian may claim that it will all be worth it if the people with increased coverage and lower costs outnumber the people with the opposite. We lack that data. But if the PPACA's goal was to give coverage to those without, it may have been wiser to do a simple transfer payment. Raise taxes on everyone and give the money to those without insurance; cut taxes on those without insurance and allow them to use the money to purchase insurance, or open up Medicare/Medicaid to anyone without insurance, regardless of age or income.

Those decisions all have their own cost-benefit analyses. But they would have been more straightforward than reducing choices and raising costs for some with insurance in order to subsidize favored groups with insurance or give insurance to those without. I have no problem paying higher income taxes to get someone else insured. I have a major problem with being forced to buy coverage I don't want and lose coverage that I like. Can you afford to pay twice as much for insurance coverage as you do now? Because I couldn't. I think a law that results in that outcome needs editing. PPACA supporters may feel differently. That's fine. I simply ask that they at least acknowledge that the PPACA does harm some people. That data is in.

What are your thoughts?

Health Benefits of Exercise

Have you been exercising as much as you should? There really is a use it or lose it calculus that applies to the human body, regardless of gender or age. It's unfortunate to look around as I often do in the great state of Michigan and see people that are not using what God or evolution gave them to the best of their ability. It's like seeing someone with a brand new car treat it like garbage. This is obviously particularly noticeable in the summertime. Clothing gets skimpier but fat rolls become more apparent.

It's easy unfortunately to get so caught up in other things and leave your body to the last. Of course there are a million and one reasons behind this. These reasons can be emotional, psychological, sexual, what have you. Not everyone is meant to be a certain size of course and no one should be shamed into thinking that they're automatically less than human because they are over a certain weight. That sort of thinking is short-sighted and ugly. That said I sometimes wonder if certain heavy people these days don't go too far in denying that they have a problem. Some even attempt to bully other people into saying that morbid obesity is somehow attractive. Morbid obesity isn't attractive. And it's associated with a higher risk for a number of dangerous conditions and diseases.

Exercise and diet are really important in not only extending your life but making sure that the life you have is worth living long into the future. We're still learning a lot about how diet and exercise work on the body. That's why I thought this recent NYT article was so interesting.

Exercise promotes health, reducing most people’s risks of developing diabetes and growing obese. But just how, at a cellular level, exercise performs this beneficial magic — what physiological steps are involved and in what order — remains mysterious to a surprising degree.

Several striking new studies, however, provide some clarity by showing that exercise seems able to drastically alter how genes operate. Genes are, of course, not static. They turn on or off, depending on what biochemical signals they receive from elsewhere in the body. When they are turned on, genes express various proteins that, in turn, prompt a range of physiological actions in the body.

One powerful means of affecting gene activity involves a process called methylation, in which methyl groups, a cluster of carbon and hydrogen atoms, attach to the outside of a gene and make it easier or harder for that gene to receive and respond to messages from the body. In this way, the behavior of the gene is changed, but not the fundamental structure of the gene itself. Remarkably, these methylation patterns can be passed on to offspring – a phenomenon known as epigenetics.

What is particularly fascinating about the methylation process is that it seems to be driven largely by how you live your life. Many recent studies have found that diet, for instance, notably affects the methylation of genes, and scientists working in this area suspect that differing genetic methylation patterns resulting from differing diets may partly determine whether someone develops diabetes and other metabolic diseases.

But the role of physical activity in gene methylation has been poorly understood, even though exercise, like diet, greatly changes the body. So several groups of scientists recently set out to determine what working out does to the exterior of our genes. The answer, their recently published results show, is plenty. ..“Our data suggest that exercise may affect the risk for Type 2 diabetes and obesity by changing DNA methylation of those genes,” says Charlotte Ling, an associate professor at Lund University and senior author of the study.

So there you have it. It's important to exercise. I already knew that. But the idea that you can make genetic changes in yourself and possibly pass these changes along to the next generation was something I did not know. I'm not a scientist but I was fascinated by how some common sense admonitions (get off your a$$ and jam!!!) are backed up by science. I intend to refocus and expand my exercise program over the next few weeks. We don't have a choice in the particular genetic gifts or curses our parents granted us. But to the extent that some of what your parents gave you is negative you can overcome that inheritance by eating well and exercising. So just because say diabetes or hypertension runs in your family doesn't mean that you are doomed to acquire those conditions or that if you do you must have a shortened and less pleasant life. You, all by yourself, have the power to change your body and more importantly, change your health. That's pretty awesome. With changes in the health care system making it more explicit that to an extent, we are all our brothers' and sisters' keepers, I expect that insurance "incentives" to exercise will become a bit more shall we say noticeable.

How often do you exercise?

Have there been times when you've stopped exercising? 

If you don't exercise do you intend to start?

Royce White: Sick Man or Unrealistic Child?

Every job has certain requirements. Generally speaking the more difficult these requirements are, the better paying the job will be. The more important the job is, the more critical these requirements are. This is common sense. I'm a solitary personality. I'm not a particularly adept or engaging public speaker. I don't like traveling more than absolutely necessary. So I work in a career field and more specifically in a job class where constant travel and public presentations aren't huge requirements. I very rarely must do either. Looking back I can say that I probably consciously or subconsciously steered my career this way. It was my decision. I realize now that I must change to make more money but that's my cross to bear.

Let's say I applied for and obtained a job where I needed to be an enthusiastic extroverted IT manager leading cross-functional teams in different countries, traveling most of the year and selling work to various business owners. This job would pay two to three times what I earn now, not even counting bonus. That's good. Immediately after I got the job assume I told my new boss that I didn't want to travel, hated doing presentations, didn't like rejection, corporate rivalries and backbiting, and disliked being responsible for anyone's work but my own. But I still wanted the big paycheck. Well my new boss would probably tell me to leave. She would be upset. Unproductive or unhappy subordinates make her job more difficult, call her judgment into question and put her year end bonus and future promotions at risk. So before hiring someone at a high skill, well paid job, companies usually try to make sure that the person can do the work and will be happy doing it.

That's the situation that the NBA Houston Rockets find themselves in with their employee, rookie forward Royce White.

The Houston Rockets suspended first-round pick Royce White for ''refusing to provide services'' required by his contract on Sunday.General manager Daryl Morey said Sunday that the team will continue to work with White in hopes of finding a resolution.White will not be paid during his suspension. White refused his assignment to Houston's D-League affiliate a week ago. The 16th overall pick in the June draft has spent most of the season on Houston's inactive list while he and the team figure out how to handle his anxiety disorder and overall mental health.

White has been vocal on Twitter throughout this saga, and he continued to voice his opinions on the Web site after the announcement Sunday.''What's suspending me suppose to do. I've been away from the team for a month 1/2. Guess we want to give it a title to shift accountability,'' he tweeted. 

The 6-foot-8 White missed the first week of training camp to work with the Rockets to create an arrangement to deal with his anxiety disorder within the demands of the NBA's travel schedule. He and the team agreed to allow him to travel by bus to some games while he confronted his fear of flying and obsessive-compulsive disorder. He flew to Detroit with the team for the season opener and then traveled by bus to Atlanta and Memphis for games. But he soon stopped participating in team activities and said on Twitter that dealing with his mental health took precedence over his NBA career. Then came his decision last Sunday to refuse his assignment to the D-League. Despite that decision, he said then that he still hopes to return to basketball in the future.

LINK

Now the Houston Rockets knew that White had issues with travel when they drafted him. They went ahead and did so anyway. And presumably White knew that professional basketball players play half of their games away from home. I know some people with diagnosed and undiagnosed anxiety or obsessive-compulsive disorders. Most don't like their condition. Most deal with it and are just as productive as anyone else. In some extreme situations they don't and the condition greatly damages their personal and professional happiness. This may be what's going on with Royce White. I am very sympathetic to someone who has mental health issues. You can't always just tell some people to suck it up or deal with it. That just doesn't work.

But if those symptoms interfere with your job so much that you can't do your job, you should take a different job. I don't think that Iowa State did White any favors by attempting to cater to his disorders. You can't be a professional basketball player, and a rookie at that, and have problems with flying. It's not a question of being unsympathetic to White or making fun of him. That's not my intention. It's just a question of job requirements. If you're claustrophobic, coal mining isn't the job for you. If you have body image issues, exotic dancing might not be the best fit. If you truly despise math and arcane business rules, don't be an accountant. I agree that dealing with serious health issues should always take precedence over your job. Most definitely. I just see White's situation a little differently. It's one thing to have a health challenge a decade after you've been doing your job, especially if that health challenge arose in part because of your job. It's something a bit different to take a job you know you can't do, refuse to do the job and then demand to get paid anyway. The world doesn't really work like that, especially if you're just starting out in your career. This isn't a case where a heartless corporation is uncaring about someone's health. At least not from what I can see. It's just not a good match. 

Questions:

1) Were the Houston Rockets right to suspend Royce White?

2) Is White correct to refuse assignment to the D-League?

3) Should the Houston Rockets find White alternative modes of transportation?

4) What's the best outcome here?

Fear Cuts Deeper Than Swords-A Game of Thrones

If you've been around the blog for a while you know that I am an A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones fanatic.
This post's title is a mantra which Arya Stark was taught by her fencing instructor Syrio Forel. Unfortunately she has reason to take it to heart and live by it as she must endure experiences which might scar a grown man, let alone a nine year old girl. But things are what they are. I really like the phrase "Fear cuts deeper than swords" because it has a meaning which definitely rings true in my life. I bet at least once it may have been true in yours as well.

The Storyteller recently did a great post about fear being used by both sides to influence the upcoming election. Fear is a useful emotion. It tells us that we don't know what's going to happen next and we have to be careful. It may sharpen our senses and make us very alert to our surroundings and events taking place therein. If you happen to work with mobsters or you are followed by hoodlums or you are forced to consider heart surgery or you are stopped in the "wrong neighborhood" by a police officer with a bad attitude or you are trapped on a sinking ship that is surrounded by sharks then fear is a completely rational response. Fear in those situations can help keep you and yours alive. For most of us that's more important than anything else. Someone who claims to be fearless is usually someone who is lying through his teeth, doesn't have much relevant information about the situation he's in, or no longer cares if he lives or dies. So in that aspect a little fear can bring much needed rationality and clarity to a situation. We all have fear. We all need fear. Believe that.

But on the other hand, fear has a very negative side as well. Fear pops up in situations that aren't life and death. Fear can arise when you think about doing something out of your comfort zone that you haven't done before. Fear can arise when you have to stand up to a boss and tell that person that they are full of it and if they don't like what you said that's too freaking bad. Fear can arise when you want to make that move on someone you've had your eye on for a while but you immediately start to think of all of the reasons why s/he wouldn't give you the time of day. Fear also has some negative physical impacts. Being in continual fight-or-flight mode can contribute to such problems as hypertension and sleep deprivation, not to mention heart disease and other ailments. And a fearful person may lash out at other people for no good reason, even those or especially those that remind them of themselves. Ultimately if you constantly live in fear of doing new things, of taking chances or risks, of growing up, of confronting problems or bad people in your life, you end up in a state of paralysis, unable to move forward and mature. You can become stagnant and trapped in rationalizations of your own failings. You may congratulate yourself for avoiding the risks of talking action but on the other hand you never get to enjoy the rewards of growth. You may watch with envy and confusion as other people move past you by whatever standard has meaning to you.

This can be quite painful for some people's egos of course so rather than examine and confront the reasons why they are afraid they will often pretend that the rewards of change and growth aren't really what they are cracked up to be. They tell themselves that they could have chosen to be more successful but they made a deliberate decision not to do so. Some folks even go further and suggest that this somehow makes them a better, more moral person, than the individual who dealt with their fears and worries and went ahead to take chances. If you happen to know people like this it can be both sad and infuriating at the same time because they've convinced themselves not only that deliberately throwing away their full human potential is a practical thing to do but also that it's a good thing to do and they are better than you for doing so. In the worst cases you have someone who is smugly and perversely proud to have made nothing of his life or natural talents. That indeed does wound the person deeper than a physical attack would have done. It's often extremely difficult for someone to come back from a fear that has consumed their self-worth. That sort of damage can take years to repair.

It is of course much easier to surmount your fears if you have a supportive family and/or especially a significant other or if you've been trained from birth to acknowledge your fears but proceed with your plans and dreams anyway. The other method in which some people confront their fears and to paraphrase George Clinton, "rise above it all or drown in their own s***" , is to be forced into a position in which there is literally no choice but to take action. There is a phrase that a hero isn't anything but a coward that got cornered. There is something to that. Whether it's the fictional Batman descending into a cave to deal with his fears of bats and darkness or the very real parents who at some point place their child in the deep end of the pool and urge him to swim or tell the bullied child that if he doesn't go back and confront the bully he'll have a worse problem at home, sometimes a shock to the system can shake things up. The person then realizes that the fear that he had was preventing him from going to the next level of accomplishment. Fear is just a message that you are sending to yourself. There is no shame in fear. There is shame in letting fears define or limit you. Winter is coming for us all whether we like it or not. We do ourselves or our loved ones no favors by not living life to its fullest.

Bran Stark: Can a man still be brave when he is afraid?

Ned Stark: That is the only time a man can be brave.

Questions:

How have you overcome fears in your life?

What have your fears taught you about yourself?

Has fear ever helped you in a bad situation?

Bloomberg, Broccoli, Smoking and Health Care

As we wait for the US Supreme Court to rule on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (popularly and derisively known as "Obamacare" ) it might be useful to remember the slippery slope/limiting principle argument against the mandate to purchase private health insurance.  This was often referred to as the Broccoli argument. Opponents invoked the spectre of an empowered and leviathan Federal government ordering everyone to eat their vegetables. The law's supporters thought that this argument was completely ridiculous, not worth a response, and prima facie evidence that the mandate's opponents either had damaged amygdalae or had spent too much time surfing libertarian websites looking for pictures of S.E. Cupp.

I am not a fan of NYC Mayor Lord Michael Bloomberg because I think his bland corporatist persona is the cover for a raging power mad nutter who seeks control over other people just because he knows what's best for everyone. He may not have Sauron's One Ring but he certainly acts as if he does. This is most evidenced by his out of control NYPD that on his orders has effectively disregarded the Fourth Amendment for Black and Hispanic citizens in Gotham, especially if they happen to be young and male. Bloomberg says it's for their own good of course. But his need for control over people is not just limited to continuously stopping and frisking every single black male within the city or spying on Muslim citizens in other states. No, Bloomberg is convinced that he knows what people should be eating and how they should be eating. So his health department is poised to ban 32oz sodas. Of course that didn't go far enough and his health department, no doubt emboldened by the impending soda ban as well as the current trans fat ban, publicly mused about the desirability of banning milkshakes and popcorn as well.
LINK

The 11-member health panel met on Tuesday in Queens and approved the plan. A public hearing on the issue on July 24, with a final vote is scheduled for Sept. 13. If approved, the new regulations would go in effect on March 2013.Certain members spoke up, however, saying that the proposal should include other items. Board member Bruce Vladeck questioned why large tubs of popcorn were not included in the ban, according to the New York Daily News. Another member, Dr. Joel Forman, pointed out that even 100 percent juice and milk-containing beverages have large amounts of calories and should not be excluded.While Dr. Kenneth Popler, board member and president of the Staten Island Mental Health Society, recognized that it would infringe on New Yorkers' rights, he felt that the health benefits were worth it, the Wall Street Journal reported. Obesity has led to 5,800 deaths a year in New York City and costs taxpayers $4 billion, according to statements presented at the meeting.

So, while the kommissars in NYC were deciding how next to extend their personal preferences under color of law, one of the largest employers in the Metro Detroit area decided that it would no longer hire people who smoke. Period. 

Job seekers who smoke aren’t welcome at the Detroit Medical Center. The health system on Wednesday joined a growing number of companies to require new applicants to be tested for smoking.The policy does not apply to current smokers, though they are encouraged to stop smoking and participate in cessation programs, the DMC said in an announcement. In Michigan, the DMC joins the Lansing-based Sparrow Health System, the Oakwood Health System in Dearborn and the Crittenton Hospital Medical Center in Rochester to adopt the no-smoking policy for applicants. “I think it’s becoming a pretty common practice across the country, especially in hospitals and (other) health care” employers, said Paula Rivera-Kerr, spokeswoman for Dearborn-based Oakwood Healthcare System, which adopted a similar policy Oct. 1. 

Dr. A. Mark Fendrick, a University of Michigan physician who is director of its Center for Value-Based Insurance Design, said that because businesses spend significantly more on health costs for smokers than for non-smokers “it’s no surprise to see various types of screening and benefit-design changes” to discourage smoking, among current and future employees. “Projections about increased health costs are a major concern to employers right now,” he said. While several states have passed laws banning such hiring policies, Michigan has not, leaving smokers without legal grounds to challenge such a hiring decision, said Tim Howlett, an attorney with Detroit-based Dickinson Wright law firm and acting chair of the State Bar of Michigan Association’s labor and employment law section.

LINK

Now just to get the obvious out of the way I don't smoke. I don't permit smoking around me. I try to eat right. I fully understand that if you don't eat well and exercise you're more likely to live a sub par existence. I have little patience for fat people that try to protect their ego by trying to pretend that fat people don't have health issues. I get that large agribusinesses and food interests often push poisonous products onto consumers.  I think that everyone should minimize or eliminate things like sugar, fat, salt, blah, blah, blah from their diet.  And I actually LIKE broccoli. But those things are individual choices. Should your employer be able to discriminate in hiring based on lifestyle? Well if your lifestyle is related to your job, I would say yes. You won't find too many overweight cheerleaders or bodybuilder jockeys. But if you're doing something that is unrelated to your job on your private time, what business is that of your employer's? And if we say well it's because of health costs, then how far do we want to go? You may have a family history of chronic diseases. Should your employer be able to not hire you because of that? And if we allow discrimination in hiring because of smoking why not obesity? But that's in the (semi)private marketplace so the rules may be different.

In NYC though we have the city government seizing the ability to tell you what you can eat and how much of it you can eat. Again, they claim to be doing so because of health costs. This health cost argument was the same reason the federal government claimed the right to be able to force you to purchase health insurance. Now if you don't bend the knee to Lord Bloomberg and accede to his latest caprice, then you, as a business owner will be fined. Of course if you decide to ignore the fines and tell Lord Bloomberg exactly what he can do with them, sooner or later large serious men with guns will magically appear to either shut your business down or take you away to some place unpleasant. But it's for the public good.

Now can someone tell me again why the broccoli argument was so outrageous?

What's your take?

Should private companies be able to refuse to hire smokers? Obese people?

Is Bloomberg out of control or is this (considering rising obesity rates) a necessary and good decision? Should the government be involved in determining portion sizes and food choices?