Mad Cow or Mad FDA?

"WASHINGTON (AP) — The Bush administration said Tuesday it will fight to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for mad cow disease." - USA Today

Can you believe this? A private company want to test all of its beef, using the same tests the government uses and the administration is trying to stop them, claiming "false positive" tests may provoke panic.

Oxycontin not adddictive?

From the "can you believe this" dept...

"Purdue Pharma L.P., its president, top lawyer and former chief medical officer will pay $634.5 million in fines for claiming the drug was less addictive and less subject to abuse than other pain medications, U.S. Attorney John Brownlee said."

- NY Times May 11th 2007

Really, it's not addictive, just ask Rush Limbaugh...

Not a Healthcare Crisis, but an Insurance one.

From a recent NY Times article on long term care insurers:

“The bottom line is that insurance companies make money when they don’t pay claims,” said Mary Beth Senkewicz, who resigned last year as a senior executive at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. “They’ll do anything to avoid paying, because if they wait long enough, they know the policyholders will die.”

As you read the NY Time article, bear in mind the Bush administration wants to dismantle Medicare and force everyone into the greedy clutches of exactly these private insurers. The radical free market wing of the Republican party argues that private business can meet people's needs more effectively than government programs. What is clear is that what big business does best is to protect the interests of big business.

Every interaction I have had with my insurance in the last few years has been an exercise in frustration. The process has deliberately been made complex so that they can deny claims. No form in triplicate - denied! Form electronically submitted - denied! Form not electronically submitted - denied!

The best thing we could do for health care in the county is bar private health insurance from the market in favor of single payer. Did you know that what the insurance companies spend on lobbying congress every year is more than enough to insure every uninsured person in this country? Imagine where we'd be if the administration had targeted that profound waste of resources instead of squandering billions on the war in Iraq.

Bush accuses Dems of "Using Troops as leverage to win domestic political battles."

From the "it takes one to know one" dept....

"President Bush on Saturday accused Democrats who are moving anti-war legislation through Congress of using troops as leverage to win domestic political battles."

Wait a minute - do they think the public is completely stupid? Using the troops to win domestic policy battles is the Bush regime's stock in trade. Aren't these the same folks who silence debate by accusing anyone who disagrees with them of "not supporting the troops"?

The appalling medical care crises in the VA goes hand in glove with the administration's disdain for the middle class and the poor.

The window dressing around "fixing" the VA crisis ignores the fact that caring for the service folks wounded in this war will cost billion and billions of dollars for the next thirty or forty years. These funds have not been allocated under any of the President's supplemental spending bills. In this bit of budget sneakery, "supplemental" can be translated as "we don't want to fess up to the war's real cost, either in dollars or lives." They'd prefer to pass those costs along to your great-grandchildren, the better to force dismantling the social safety net down the road.

The administration clearly doesn't really care about effectively managing policy to provide for the troops*, they care about "appearing" to care about the troops.

As Edward Albee said in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolfe: "Truth or illusion George, truth or illusion?"

*Actually the President doesn't cotton to policy at all, given his professed disdain for reading.

Snorkeler, mistaken for rodent, shot.

NEWS OF THE WEIRD -

It seems a man named Roderick mistook a snorkeler in a river in Eugene, OR for a Nutria, and shot him in the face at point blank range.

Despite sounding uncannily like a sports nutrition beverage, a Nutria is a capybera-esque rodent, bigger than a muskrat, but smaller than a beaver.

As the shooter was in possession of crystal meth at the time of the shooting, the story appears to be page from Hunter S. Thompson, a wacky crystal-meth induced hallucination.

On the other hand, perhaps the shooter is a hunting buddy of Dick Cheney's.

"Roderick told deputies he thought Cheesman was a nutria swimming in the Smith River near Reedsport, about 90 miles southwest of Eugene, and shot him with a .22-caliber rifle, police said." - CNN

It's a tad reminiscent of Jimmy Carter's unfortunate rabbit-wacking incident.

Though they have quite similar teeth, as you can see the rodent above looks totally unlike a snorkeler....

How would a patriot act?

Where's the Presidents "straight up or down vote" rhetoric now?

Did you know that the President just fired 7 Deputy US Attorneys, in districts around the country; not because they weren't doing their jobs, or because they were corrupt, but because they didn't share Albert Gonzalez' radical ideology? This crass political maneuver is a last ditch effort to retain influence over law enforcement. The President's desire for political due process has gone out the window after the "whupping" the Republicans were delivered in the mid term elections.

Last year, while comfortably in the majority, the President spoke often of nominees for federal positions deserving "a straight up or down vote." Now, knowing he's unable to continue to foist his radical ideology on us, he's crassly manipulating the law and the political process to avoid an up or down vote on his nominees.

"In March 2006, President Bush signed the reauthorization of the PATRIOT Act. Included in that bill was a provision allowing interim U.S. attorneys appointed by the president to serve indefinitely without Senate confirmation." - Radley Balko, quoted in Fox News.

This means that his seven new appointees can serve the rest of Bush's term of office, with no "up or down vote" and in defiance of the constitutional protections against the potential abuses of the executive branch.

This Rovian maneuver clearly illustrates the thinking of the radicals who've hijacked the Republican party: to wit, "if we can't win fair and square we'll just stack the deck."

Having been given a drubbing in the "straight up or down vote" arena, it seems the President has lost his taste for democracy...

James Hartline - Have you seen this nutbag?

Have you seen the blog of this San Diego "ex-gay" nutbag?

Hmmmm...

For someone who claims to be an "ex-gay" he sure spends a lot of time thinking about naked men...

"I hope God will help us shoot down their planes."

"I hope God will help us shoot down their planes."

- Sheik Mohamoud Ibrahim Suley, a leader of the Somali Islamic Party currently at war with Ethiopia.

What the F#ck?

Call me old fashioned, but it's hard to imagine that God is interested in shooting down planes....

The Somali government has been in a shambles since the longstanding dictatorship was toppled there in 1991. The US backed government has failed, and the government's effectiveness there is limited to a small area surrounding the capital. The country is now a haven for Al Qaeda, who are using it as a base to expand militant Islamic hegemony in the horn of Africa.

Hmmm...

Am I having Deja Vu?

A Child's Christmas in Hollywood

People say there are no seasons in LA, but the signs of Christmas are everywhere -

Santa hats have appeared on the Styrofoam wig forms in the shops on Hollywood boulevard.

The hookers have broken out their red patent leather boots.

The scientologists have fired up the snow machine at the "sit on Santa’s lap" personality testing center.

All is right with the world.

Ho! Ho! Ho!

Ahem

The one below is especially good - "Santa as Creepy Voyeur." Ah, Hollywood!

Tea at the Oriental Hotel, Bangkok

On my third day in Thailand I investigate the bastion of Old Bangkok elegance known as the Oriental Hotel.

The most cost effective way to do this is by having Tea in the Authors' Lounge, connected to the hotel’s library, where the likes of Noel Coward and Somerset Maugham took their tea.

It occurs to me that this year I have been stalking Noel Coward. Through an unexpected series of filial obligations I have found myself in both Capri and Bangkok in the same year. (I know, how sad for me...)

Odder still, in both places I visited the homes of prominent expat-homos who frequently entertained Noel. (To clarify, they weren’t entertaining me; lest I give the wrong impression both expat-homos are long since dead, and their houses are now museums.)

I knew I’d be soaked in sweat by the time I walked back to my hotel to change. I bought a linen shirt from one of the vendors at Wat Arun, figuring I could change into it at the Oriental’s dock. The woman wanted 200 bhat. ($5.46 US), but when I mangled a few words in Thai she obligingly dropped the price to 150 bhat ($4.10 US.) Sold!

I arrive at the Oriental by Chao Phraya riverboat which disembarks at the public dock next to the hotel. I pass through a fetid alley full of caged live poultry and lizards, which makes for a surreal contrast to the swanky lizards staying next door. I struggle to pull the too small, button-less linen shirt over my head without staining it too much with sweat and dust.

As I pass the guardhouse to enter the hotel my heart sinks. A tasteful placard reads – “No Sandals or Bush Jackets Allowed.” What bit of weird stiff upper lip Britishness is this? No Sandals? It’s 98 degrees fer Chrissake! I gaze down at my grimy feet, and engage in a peculiarly odd bit of denial in which I convince myself that Birkenstocks aren’t really sandals. That piece of mental gymnastics complete, I forge brazenly ahead.

The Author’s Lounge is a glassed in fantasia of white wicker, potted palms and Victoriana. I think of my Mom, telling me to eschew white wicker furniture on the porch lest my home be mistaken for a nail salon. I laugh when I realize that this is the exact Victorian-tropical elegance that all those salons are aping….

I imagine that the beautiful hostess glances downward at my grimy feet, though she doesn't. She escorts me around the corner to a table well out of sight of the main room. I am verging on miffed, and perhaps more so when I realize I’ve been ghettoized; this is clearly homo – corner.

The table across from me is occupied by a pair of haughty French queens, both immaculately attired in freshly ironed polo shirts, with matching tropic-weight cotton sweaters tied around their shoulders. (Oh, puhleeze Mary!) Their shoes are obviously très cher. The blonde one gives me the once over. His lip curls when he spies my footgear. I nod hello and he ignores me, turning to his partner and shrugging distainfully, as if to say – “Americans, always under dressing for all the wrong reasons.”

Next to them is single British gentlemen, straight, but British and alone, and therefore highly suspect. He is wearing sensible brown suede track shoes, not elegant, but definitely not sandals.

I console myself with the realization that I am seated at the door of the hotel’s library, done up in Writers on safari photos. (Hemmingway, natch!) I muse that at least Noel would have been seated in homo – corner as well. (At least until he became the darling of the West End, and thus earned better billing.)



I order a pot of “The Oriental” tea, and the “Old Siam Tea Set”, which is a high tea with a distinctly “Anna and the King” flavor. Mango tarts, Sticky Rice Cakes, and delicious curried chicken salad, as well as the requisite cucumber sandwiches. The tea set is accompanied by “The Oriental Blend” – a tea created especially for the Hotel by the East India Company. It’s all too British Raj for words, which is a bit weird since Thailand is the only Southeast Asia county which was never colonized by anybody. I’m all for fantasy so I go with it.



I give one more go at being friendly with the French boys, but the taller one just prissily crosses his feet at the ankle and pointedly admires his footwear, while the short one ignores me. So much for improved Franco – American relations. While I wait for my tea a parade of Americans in Sandals passes through on their way to the pool, and I feel simultaneously vindicated and a bit embarrassed. Moments later the Gendarmes Du Fashion sign their check and leave.

Much to my amazement the hostess returns with a trio of high glam Thai ladyboys, who are ensconced where the French boys sat. The tallest one looks like a cross between Ralph Cruz and Imelda Marcos, and keeps his BIG Jackie-O dark glasses on throughout tea. They are much friendlier, and though we can only exchange a few words I do discern that they are effusively using “Ka” for each other – a Thai pronoun which in this context loosely translates as“the speaker is a lady, and expects to be treated as such.” Interspersed among their Thai banter are the words “Fabulous”, and “O La La”, no doubt in deference to the tables' previous occupants.

I don’t understand that much of their words, but I quickly realize that “dish” is a nearly universal language, and I am able to smile in all the right places, which tickles them no end.

Plus, they don’t even glance at my shoes…

What's Bangkok Like?

Somebody asked me on the phone yesterday what Bangkok was like.

This mailbox says it pretty well - there's Bangkok, and then there's other places...

Errata Dept - cross cultural mis-under-estimation.

Classic Thai-glish phrase spotted on the website for a resort hotel in Phuket:

"Landscape in secret garden bring you to maximum relaxation pressure."

I thought bringing you to maximum relaxation pressure was what all those girls in the Patapong night market in Bangkok were about?

Or maybe Mr. Bush wrote their promo materials...

Bangkok's New Suvarnabhumi Airport

I am a BIG aviation buff. I typically arrive at the airport two to three hours before my flight, partly because I am descended from my paternal grandmother, (she worried) and partly because I just love airports. Thusly, I was thrilled to be arriving in Bangkok a mere ten days after the opening of the brand spankin’ new Suvarnabhumi Airport. (For those of you not up on your East Asian news, Suvarnabhumi is the biggest & newest single building commercial aviation terminal in the world.)

I had been watching the press reports of problems with Suvarnabhumi with mixed feelings – cracked runways, creepily isolated woman’s restrooms, and major baggage handling problems. These are the same sort of things that plagued DIA when it opened.

“Cut the folks a break” I mused, opening the single largest transit terminal building in the world can’t be trouble free.

I want to preface this with a cautionary note. This post is not in any way a reflection on the Thai people. They are perhaps the most hospitable and charming people on the planet. That said, the new airport is a friggin’ mess. The Thai airport staff reflect a deep mortification – what was to be the pride of Thailand is, so far, a disaster. They are now discussing delaying the “official” opening (at which the beloved King presides, so as not to taint his Majesty with the problems.) Suvarnabhumi is beautiful, spectacular even, but is missing such obvious accouterments as chairs, to say nothing of toilets.

This airport cost nearly 4 billion US dollars. I am therfore somewhat stunned to find that there is nowhere to wait for your plane. The gates are sealed off from all airport facilities behind individual security checks. On paper this sounds good, as it tightly controls access to the planes, but it means that the entire terminal area is exposed to any hijinks that anyone may wish to perpetrate. (This in a country plagued by a brutal Muslim insurgency, given to blowing up Buddhist schools full of five year olds because at 3% of the population they can’t win elections.)

My flight time is two hours away, the gate has yet to be posted, and there is not a single chair in the airport! The lack of waiting areas has forced people to improvise seats out of decorative planters and suitcases. I half expect to see tent cites springing up like mushrooms by the check in counters.

As I listen to a German tourist bellowing behind me, I reflect that it was probably a German architect who designed this place. It is eerily beautiful, a bauhaus-esque machine for flying, yet totally unusable for any human purpose. Since the WiFi is unlocked and free, a few mouse click reveals this to be true – a man named Werner Sobek of Stuttgart, Germany designed this mess.

What is it with architects and designers that they become so enamored of their design concept that they forget people have to use the spaces they create?

The Wedding Banquet

Most of my friends know that this trip to Asia is centered around a wedding reception for my Brother and his Wife. (They were married last spring in New York, where they live. This reception was for her Father, family and friends back home in Taiwan.)

In the photo, my Brother and his Wife enter the banquet hall amid a cloud of steam. (Not dry ice smoke, but steam, presumably to ensure wrinke free garments.)

I know you're waiting with baited breath for the Banquet Menu -

It was -

Appetizers including Braised Pork Tendon, Dried Shrimp, Crispy Walnuts, Salted Peanuts and Fava beans, and unidentifiable sticky things.

and then seven more courses, plated as follows -

Roast Suckling Pig, Dried Mullet Caviar on Daikon-ish squares, Jellyfish Salad, Tuna Sushi and Bean Curd Rolls (not like egg rolls, but wrinkly bean curd skin like in western Honshu in Japan rolled up in a sauce.)

Fried Rice Dumplings (These had a soft texture like moochi balls, the rice must be ground into a powder) rolled in peanut dust.) YUM!

Steamed Sharksfin soup with Hasma Crabmeat. Very delicious, but extremely rich and a tad gelatinous for western tastes.

Braised abalone with black mushrooms in oyster sauce. Very good, and a special thrill since harvesting Abalone is illegal at home.

Cracked lobster (more like GIANT crabs) with scallions and fish sauce. Tragically, this got cold as we made our introductions.

Steamed Star Garoupa (a tender whitefish, steamed whole but plated in chunks.) This was subtly accented with Yunnan Ham, Bean Curd and red dates on a mess o’ braised lotus leaf. (Incredibly good!)

Baked Seafood (shrimp, fish, unidentifiable oceanic creatures) in a thai-ish curry fried rice.

The banquet finished with a tripartite dessert, including something that I can only describe as a pomegranate cobbler, (Indescribably good!) Cherry ice cream, and an orange infused flannish - custard.

It took nearly five hours, including synchronized dancing waiters bearing flaming trays into the dining room to the Vangelis "Chariots of Fire" theme, smoke effects, lighting cues, columns of fire, slide shows (film noir-ish Shanghai private eye wedding photos, with my Brother’s Wife looking like a much sexier Mother Gin Sling and honorable Brother looking mortified.) There were also three bride / groom costume changes. Again, shy and honorable Brother looking simultaneously tickled pink and completely mortified.

I am told that the reception drew on Taiwanese weddign tradition, but mixed in western elements. (Like an enourmous plaster wedding cake on the platform, and the white dresses etc. A lot of the razzle-dazzle is stuff that is currently popular in Taiwan.

During dinner, we were escorted around the room and introduced individually to the 300 guests, toasting with each of them. The amazing thing is, this event was about half the size of some banquets.

Taipei, Republic of China (Taiwan)

Taipei was a surprise to me – bustling, (expected) sophisticated, (less expected) and filled with incredibly friendly and welcoming people. After the serene order of Japan, the cheery chaos and omnipresent laughter of Taiwan was a refreshing change.

I am here for my Brother’s wedding reception. Our hotel is downtown near City Hall and directly across the street from Taipei 101, the world’s tallest building. I am a tad ashamed to admit my own ethnocentrism; I thought the tallest building was the Sears tower in Chicago. (Actually it depends on how you define “tallest”, but that is another story altogether.)

The neighborhood where we are staying is bustling with restaurants, shops and theatres, interspersed with peculiarly staid and massive 1960’s chinosierie buildings honoring Chang Kai Shek. The lower floors of Taipei 101 contain the most upscale shopping center I’ve ever been in. (I live in Los Angeles, the American epicenter of the faux urban experience known as the shopping mall, so that’s saying something.)

The food court at Taipei 101 belies our image of “food court” – a breathtakingly international bounty of food is available here. I know that later Yueh Ling and her friends will take us to the night markets for some authentic Taiwanese specialties, so I go easy here. I blanch a bit at the thought of some of the food I suspect will be on offer, and time proves this instinct correct. Pig blood rice cake, steaming bowls of pig intestine, whole duck heads and “stinky tofu” which is so pungent that your eyes water at five feet.

Boarding with the Borg

A lot was made in our lectures here about the Japanese socio-cultural identity favoring the group over the individual. The Japanese are raised to favor how their actions affect the group (my school, my company, my fellow passengers etc.) over thier individual needs. I have to say it's true based on my observations.

The way I saw this most clearly was in Boarding with the Borg. Flying down to Okinawa, (Doesn't that sound like an Andrews Sisters song?) I was a bit concerned as the flight had yet to board at fifteen minutes before departure. At ten minutes to departure the announcement that boarding would begin was made. The ground crew bowed three time at the waiting passengers. (Who were waiting patiently in their seats rather than clamoring at the gate as the zone five grannies from Dubuque, Iowa do in the US.)

The Japanese passengers stood, and in one smooth and amazingly rapid process flowed on board in an orderly stream and took their seats. No one stopped in the aisle to rearrange their bags, tried to change seats, or even stood in the aisle to grab thier paperback while stowing luggage.

The entire Boeing 767-400 (that's a really big plane - some 350 passengers when outfitted for Japan) was loaded, bags stowed, seat-belted and taxiing out early in under eight minutes.
It was truly stunning to me as an aircraft that size typically take 30-45 minutes to board in the US even with the flight crew pleading with people to speed it up. In the US passengers would be encamped in the aisles while they repacked thier bags, gate crashing outside thier zones, spilling thier McDonalds Mega-Huge beverages etc.

We could take a lesson from the Japanese on this one!

The view of Mr Fuji over the plane's wing.

Sayonara Japan!

Goodbye to Japan.

We flew last night to Okinawa, on our way to Taipei, Taiwan. Which was a spectacular flight - clear as a bell, so we could see Mt Fuji.

Okinawa airport was festooned with orchids - thousands of them everywhere. it was a little surreal, as I don't generally think of Japan as including tropical islands!

Then on to Taipei, on China Airlines.

Retro Sumo Wrestler Trading Cards

Ok - no big commentary here. These Retro Sumo Wrestler Trading Cards are just cool. - Will

The (really) big Buddha of Nara

Ok, you've all heard superlatives when traveling. The biggest, best, oldest, tallest, best-est, oldest made of sheep cartilage etc. This one - Todai-Ji Temple at Nara, really is two of those things.

Todai-Ji is both the largest, and oldest wooden building in the world. It’s really, really big. As if that wasn't enough, the temple contains the biggest (old) bronze Buddha statue in the world. (There is a bigger bronze Buddha in Hong Kong, but it is modern.)

The temple is surrounded by a vast park, known for its deer - who are said to be holy messengers. Holy and hungry, as it turns out. The deer have grown accustomed to the crowds that UNESCO World Heritage status brings. As outward and visible proof of their holiness, they have figured out how to badger food from the pilgrims by bowing. (It’s a bit more like the equine head nod that horses do, but I make it a point not to quibble with deer.)

Outside the temple dozens of school kids madly fan the censure with their cheery red hats. They fan the incense smoke over their heads to invite Buddha’s blessing and make them smarter. Have you ever seen American school kids engaged in a playful ritual to make them smarter?

I was expecting a really big Buddha, and the Buddha of Todai-ji didn’t disappoint. This was Indiana Jones & the Temple of Doom big. I wasn't expecting the totally breathtaking scale, nor the Buddha’s otherworldly beauty. The picture doesn’t begin convey the scale of this place. The Buddha's thumb is as big as I am. Ten men can stand on his palm. The lotus flower seen frame right in the picture is three stories tall. Those candles on the alter? Two times the size of a full grown man.

Of everything I’ve seen in Japan this place struck me the most deeply. Beautiful and holy, exotic and spectacular – it was everything I came to the East to see. The peace of the temple is so deep – it rendered the throngs of visitors invisible to me.

“The Loach Scooping Dance”

Sakai – Ko & Matsue

In one of the more interesting manifestations of Japanese culture I’ve seen here I just witnessed an updated “loach scooping dance.” A loach is a small paddy and mud dwelling fish, traditionally scooped up in baskets which filter the mud and silt out and leave the fishes. The particular performer updated the traditional dance and added a twist by conjuring live loaches and eels during the act. It was pretty impressive – as a live eel is a lot more slithery to keep up your sleeve than a dove…

PS: The dance also featured a segment on the “plucking of the leeches” in which the conjurer / dancer removed leeches from his legs. Thankfully I’d already had breakfast…