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stayfreemagazine - Stay F---! | November 10

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  • From: Carrie McLaren <stay.free AT verizon.net>
  • To: stayfreemagazine AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Stay F---! | November 10
  • Date: Tue, 9 Nov 2004 23:21:02 -0500

Posted at:
http://www.stayfreemagazine.org/public/index.html

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Hello, I'm finally getting around to adding material from Issue #22 to the website, beginning with the World View newsbytes:
http://www.stayfreemagazine.org/archives/22/worldview.html


(Sorry, no photos on the site. I'm lazy.)


Meanwhile, outside the Stay F---! web universe, there's:


HOW TO THINK ABOUT PRESCRIPTION DRUGS
By Malcolm Gladwell
http://newyorker.com/critics/atlarge/?041025crat_atlarge

Let me preface this by saying that I think Malcolm Gladwell (http://gladwell.com) is a bit of a charlatan. His modus operandi is to put forth a counterintuitive argument, then cleverly select points that advance his thesis while ignoring and obscuring those that don't. Still, he raises a good point here: one reason prescription drugs costs are skyrocketing in America is because Americans are taking a lot more drugs. The rest of his argument is, however, pure hokum.

"The emphasis of the prescription-drug debate is all wrong," Gladwell writes. "We've been focused on the drug manufacturers. But decisions about prevalence, therapeutic mix, and intensity aren't made by the producers of drugs. They're made by the consumers of drugs."

See, friends, it's not the drug company's fault that your colitis medication is almost $600, it's YOURS. What's especially weird is that Gladwell himself acknowledges the power of deceptive marketing and patent-law abuses--practices that the average consumer is, for all practical purposes, helpless against. But in Gladwell's fantasy world, doctors, health insurers, and consumers should take responsibility for drug company shenanigans. In making his case, Gladwell conveniently ignores the fact that drug companies have done everything they can to prevent studies comparing competing drugs to one another, and to prevent the reporting of negative data from clinical trials.

How come, when I'm prescribed a drug, there is no way for me to report the drug's effectiveness: did it help? did it hurt? If there were some reliable, independent resource that collected this data--a sort of "Consumer Reports" for pharmaceuticals--then maybe patients would have a tool to balance corporations' marketing muscle. (Such a resource would also help in filling out the shortcomings of clinical trials.) But with nothing of a kind, and with only flashy--and often misleading--advertisements to fill the gap, neither the little old lady in Omaha nor the hyperinformed New York journalist has much to go on.


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Serious, noncommercial, online journalism.
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DIEBOLD & ELECTRONIC VOTING

Today I got bored with myself and posted a few links about electronic voting up at Deebold.com (a domain I registered a while back). One noteworthy item is a video excerpt of MSNBC's "Countdown with Keith Olbermann," which does a hard-hitting roundup of voting inaccuracies in last week's election. Several counties in Florida and Ohio, for example, had more votes than voters! See http://www.stayfreemagazine.org/diebold/ (aka deebold.com)

.....


"MARRY AN AMERICAN"

In the wake of the Presidential election, our friends in Canada have stepped in to lend a hand by offering "desperate" single Americans a pathway to freedom:
http://www.marryanamerican.ca/

.....

TIRED JAPANESE BUSINESSMEN

Neato photo archive of overworked Japnese business men sleeping (or passed out) on trains, sidewalks, and even staircases:
http://masamania.com/archives/2004/09/japanese_busine.html
(via BoingBoing.net)

that's all for now,
carrie




  • Stay F---! | November 10, Carrie McLaren, 11/09/2004

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