I wrote in an early blog about the disparity in deaths from shootings in the US and Australia. Australia, like the U.K.., has strict gun control laws. The death rates by shooting in the UK and Australia are a tiny fraction of the rate in the U.S. To put things in perspective, according to an editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine (provided below), there are ten times more shooting deaths in the U.S. each year than the number of deaths in Iraq over the past 5 years.

A little more than a week ago, the Supreme Court, in a landmark decision, struck down Washington D.C.'s (and thereby all other cities) ability to control gun ownership. The Supreme Court's decision virtually guaranteed that the gun death rate in the U.S. will rise even higher.

In 1984, I was working at a hospital in San Diego when the intercom system urgently paged for every available doctor to get to the ER. There was a mass shooting at a McDonalds restaurant in San Ysidro. At the time, it was the single largest death toll from a mass shooting in the US. Over the next 24 years, the toll has continued to mount, with the prospect of ever more San Ysidros, Columbines, and Virginia Techs, along with the media images of horrified officials and grieving families. Yet the madness of America's obsession with owning deadly weapons has, if anything, increased with each massacre. 

The prestigious New England Journal of Medicine has today published an editorial calling the Court's decision a "risky epidemiological experiment". Please take the time to read this worthy editorial below. It is an open-access article, so I assume that I am free to post it, with all due acknowledgments to the authors and publishers.

Published at www.nejm.org July 9, 2008 (10.1056/NEJMe0805629)

The Supreme Court has launched the country on a risky epidemiologic experiment. The announcement by the Court last month of its decision in District of Columbia v. Heller,¹ which struck down a ban on handgun ownership in the nation's capital, has set the stage for legal challenges to gun regulation in other major American cities. Such challenges have already been introduced in Chicago and San Francisco. If there is a widespread loosening of gun regulations, we will learn over the next few years — in a before-and-after experiment — whether the laws we had in place had a significant impact in mitigating death and injury from handguns. In our opinion, there is little reason to expect an optimistic result; research has shown and logic would dictate that fewer restrictions on handguns will result in a substantial increase in injury and death.

The Supreme Court's 5-to-4 decision reflects the sharp division among the justices and a very narrow victory for the majority. Still, all the justices agreed that American society has a legitimate interest in regulating firearms. The disagreement lay in the extent of regulation that they found acceptable within the framework of the Constitution. The majority indicated that regulation must be limited to specific circumstances, such as gun ownership by felons and the mentally ill and the carrying of firearms in schools and public buildings, whereas the minority believed that more far-ranging regulation, including laws such as the District of Columbia's handgun ban, meets a constitutional standard.

We believe that closer regulation promotes the public health. In April, just after the oral arguments in District of Columbia v. Heller, we wrote that "health care professionals, whose responsibility it is to treat the wounded and the dying, have special reason to be concerned."² In light of the Court's decision in the case, that concern has been magnified.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in concert with health authorities across the country, keeps careful records on the number of injuries and deaths that result from handgun use. In 2005, the last year with complete data, there were more than 30,000 deaths and 70,000 nonfatal injuries from firearms.³ About one quarter of the nonfatal injuries and a tenth of the deaths were in children and adolescents. To place these numbers in perspective, 10 times as many Americans die each year from firearms as have died in the Iraq war during the past 5 years. Firearm injuries represent a major public health problem that seems certain to be exacerbated with less handgun regulation.

It is well documented in the medical literature that regulation of guns benefits the public health. For example, a careful study⁴ demonstrated that the 1976 restrictive handgun law in the District of Columbia, which was the focus of the Heller case, resulted in an immediate decline of approximately 25% in homicides and suicides by firearms, but there was no such decline in adjacent areas that did not have restrictive laws.

With the weakening of handgun regulations, we are very concerned about the health of the public, especially young people, whose safety is disproportionately affected by firearms. We have a heightened concern about suicide, in which impulsivity may have an important role; ready access to a gun may significantly increase the risk of completion.^5,6 We believe that a sensible level of regulation is essential. There is no language in the Constitution that would limit regulation. Indeed, the preamble to the Second Amendment includes the phrase "well-regulated" in reference to the use of firearms by militias. Given the diversity of geography and population in the United States, lawmakers throughout the country need the freedom and flexibility to apply gun regulations that are appropriate to their jurisdictions. The Court's decision in District of Columbia v. Heller may greatly reduce the latitude that legislators have had in setting firearm regulations for their localities.

With the Supreme Court's decision and the expectation of a substantial reduction in gun regulation, we are poised to witness another epidemiologic study of the effect of regulation on gun violence. With this experiment, which may play out in many American cities, we will know in the coming years whether the overturned laws reduced death and injury from handguns. The Court has heard the arguments and made its decision; we will now learn the human ramifications of this landmark case.

No potential conflict of interest relevant to this article was reported.
Source Information

We thank Jordan Eipper for assistance with research.

This article (10.1056/NEJMe0805629) was published at www.nejm.org on July 9, 2008. It will appear in the July 31 issue of the Journal.

References

1. District of Columbia v. Heller, No. 07-290 (2007). 
2. Curfman GD, Morrissey S, Drazen JM. Handgun violence, public health, and the law. N Engl J Med 2008;358:1503-1504. [Free Full Text]
3. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Number of deaths from 113 selected causes by age: United States, 2005. (Accessed July 7, 2008, at http://www.disastercenter.com/cdc/Age%20of%20Deaths%20113%20Causes%202005.html.)
4. Loftin C, McDowall D, Wiersema B, Cottey TJ. Effects of restrictive licensing of handguns on homicide and suicide in the District of Columbia. N Engl J Med 1991;325:1615-1620. [Abstract]
5. Hemenway D. Private guns, public health. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004.
6. Miller M, Lippmann SJ, Azrael D, Hemenway D. Household firearm ownership and rates of suicide across the 50 United States. J Trauma 2007;62:1029-1035. [Medline

But, according to The Nation report on income inequality,  "it will take a lot more than closing an obscene tax loophole to reverse thirty years of tax cuts for the rich, union-busting, and deregulation that promoted corporate interests at the expense of consumers--all of this bankrolled by conservatives and corporations to instill blind faith in the market as a magic elixir that can solve any problem".

Thanks to Katrina Van DenHeuvel of The Nation for pointing out that "we now live in a Second Gilded Age. The richest 1 percent of Americans currently hold wealth worth nearly $16.8 trillion, $2 trillion more than the bottom 90 percent. According to the Center for American Progress, since 1979 the average income for the bottom half of American households has grown by 6 percent. In contrast, the top 1 percent of earners have seen their incomes rise by 229 percent during that same period.

In January 2007, Congressman Barney Frank said dealing with income inequality was his top priority as chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. He summarized the impact of conservative, free-market ideology run amuck this way: "Concentrated wealth defines our nation's political and spending priorities. Until we seriously tax the holders of that extreme wealth we'll lack the funding resources necessary to undertake any bold poverty-fighting, middle-class promoting, initiative.

Under Republican President Dwight Eisenhower the highest marginal tax rate was 91 percent, compared to the current 35 percent.

With Barack Obama back-pedalling and deserting his liberal base for the so-called "middle-ground" voter, I'm beginning to doubt that he has the political courage to impose the taxes on the obscenely wealthy (and therefore, obscenely POWERFUL), that would begin to reverse the excessive income inequities of the past 3 decades. His health care plan is far less comprehensive than this country deserves.  He should have the courage to fight for a single-payer universal system - if the wealthy want more than that, then let them use their obscene wealth to pay for more - but instead of George Bush's "No Child Left Behind" policy, Obama needs to have a health care policy of "no human being left out of medical care". And he should seriously consider my previous call to nationalize the big pharmaceutical companies. Like health care, disease-fighting, life-saving drugs should be affordable for ALL. If we can continue to fund Amtrak, despite its bungling bureaucracy and yearly losses, then surely there is a far better case to be made for "THE PEOPLE" owning the pharmaceutical companies, and running them for the benefit of all, not for the massive profits of stockholders.

Recent blogs have highlighted the dirty dealings of the Mr. Bigs of illicit drugs, and their dirty law enforcement allies. But those Mr. Bigs are small fry in comparison to the Mr. Bigs of the Pharmacuetical industry, whose profits are even more unjustifiable and obscene.  Frequently, we are told that the pharmaceutical companies need to charge very high prices to cover the cost of research and development of newer, better drugs, and in order to subsidize drugs for less common diseases that would otherwise be prohibitively expensive. Many of us have swallowed this line. But it is a lie.

Some years ago, while working in community mental health, I saw the free weekends at 5-star resorts that were routinely given to doctors, and the luxurious free dinners at top restaurants, among other bribes, in return for listening to a brief sales pitch for their drugs - with the expectation that these same doctors would then prescribe more of these drugs. Once, I even became Dr. Roger XXXXX (a little hard to imagine a woman named Roger!), and enjoyed one of these waterfront restaurant dinners, when Roger was unable to attend, and didn't want to waste the invitation, if his mere mortal psychologist colleague could enjoy the benefit. I thought this level of influence over doctor's prescribing practices was ethically very questionable. But nothing prepared me for the aggressive assault of the pharmaceutical industry on both patients and doctors in the USA. I'd never seen advertising for drugs on television in Australia, so when every second television commercial on television in the USA seemed to be for a sleeping pill, or a restless leg treatment or an antidepressant, I was shocked. I've since learned that the drug companies actually spend billions MORE on advertising than they do on research and development. So their argument that the price of drugs is high because of R & D costs is just a lie - its because of the billions they spend on television advertising, and bribes to doctors through luxurious "gifts", sponsorship of so-called Fellowships at their research institutions, and sponsorship of whole research facilities - presumably intending that those medical researchers will provide endorsement for their products by way of favorable clinical trials.

Another way that drug companies rip off the consumer is by their devious schemes to thwart the law that allows their patents to expire, and opens their money-makers up to cheaper generic production. After several years, in order to meet the requirements of  the Waxman-Hatch patent extension legislation, the drug companies simply change a molecule of the active ingredient and claim that they now have a new, and better drug, and that it qualifies to extend their patent, thus denying it to generic companies. This was claimed by Pulmicort's manufacturer, Astra Zeneca - although Budesonide was the sole active ingredient two Pulmicort ptoducts in the UK in 1981 and 1982, Budesonide was still protected by a basic patent in 1993 - but it was an "old" active ingredient and could not be brought within the patent extension regulation. So its manufacturer, Astra Zeneca, claimed that it was now "additive free budesonide in the form of aggolmerated micronised particles" and that a patent extension should be granted on the basis of a later marketing approval in 1990 for the Pulmicort Turbuhaler device. So, now in 2008, Astra Zeneca is still rakingin massive profits on this old active ingredient that is being kept from generic manufacturers.

This has meant that pulmicort still sells for around $175 for a 4 week supply in the US. If it had gone off-patent, the same active ingredient (budesonide) in an inhaler would probably cost one quarter from a generic company.

Given that life-saving drugs are unavailable to many who need them because of the exorbitant cost,  especially in third-world countries, but even in America with its 50 million uninsured, its time someone dared to challenge governments everywhere to nationalize pharmaceutical companies. OMG!!! Nationalize an industry for the public benefit? quell horreur! Governments everywhere have been all about privatizing industries, not nationalizing them! But if any industry cries out for nationalization it is the pharmaceutical industry. Are you listening Hugo Chavez? 

Astra Zeneca's application was turned down by the British Patent Office. On appeal, they argued that extensive research had been required to adapt the formulation of budesonide for the Turbuhaler. This argument was rejected. The difference in legal opinions on this subject accounts for some of the differences in prices paid for the same drugs and devices in the US and other countries.  The US, not surprisingly, given the massive amount spent on lobbyists, manage to maintain their patents - and profits - longer than in other countries.

THE woman who raised the alarm about disgraced former NSW government Minister Milton Orkopouloswas fired by the state parliament from her electorate office job.

Orkopoulos, formerly the state's Aboriginal Affairs Minister, was found guilty of 28 pedophilia and drug charges. Gillian Sneddon, Orkopoulos's former electorate officer in the Hunter seat of Swansea, who helped collect evidence from his office for police, had her employment terminated last month - the day she began to give evidence at the Orkopoulos trial, Sydney newspapers say.

She had been on stress leave and is fighting a workers' compensation claim against parliament.
From courier Mail March 15, 2008

In reading many stories of whistleblowers, it is a common thread that they are often fired, and lose everything - job, income, reputation, etc. Often the stress of the process impacts on their relationships, resulting in marriage breakups, and/or depression. Since so few whistleblowers are ever rewarded for doing what's right, the least we can do is to recognize their courage and applaud them.

I would like to start a collection of little-known whistle-blowers. So if anyone reading these blogs reads or hears of one, please email me, or send the information in a comment to the blog, which is at the end of each blog entry. I have a small collection for your inspiration, and will share these with you periodically, starting with a name unknown to almost everyone - James Hansen - a NASA scientist. Jim deserves  recognition for his bravery in risking his job to stand up for the truth against the bullying, incompetent, anti-science, pro-business polluters/anti-envrionment Bush Administration - in short, he went public with the "inconvenient truth".

Jim directs NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Jim and his team, were researching the physics of climate change, when Jim became the first leading scientist to testify to congress in June 1988 about global warming. His forecasts proved to be accurate over the next two decades, and put him on a collision course with the anti-science, anti-environment White House. According to a report in the October 29, 2007 issue of Time, Hansen, in the full knowledge that his job might be at risk, spoke out, claiming that White House "junior lackeys with no scientific training tried to muzzle him in 2005". According to Time, "he bravely and successfully defended his freedom to speak out. The simple truth, inconvenient as it was for the Administration, is that Hansen had the science firmly on his side."

Hansen is highly concerned now about the acceleration of climate changes, and the melting of the ice caps, which will hasten warming, leading to massive rises in the sea level. He is urging a swift and concerted shift to a sustainable economy.

For those of you who have been unable to find the photos I referred to in my article on Vietnam, you have to go to the right side of the page, and go to page 2, where you will see a link for "my profile". click on that, and then click on photos. Unfortunately, I tried to reduce them in size so that I could get plenty on, but it was so excruciatingly time consuming, that I suspended my efforts temporarily.

THE SECOND WORLD WAR IN A PARAGRAPH
"Battle doesn't determine who is right. Only who is left. We destroyed fascists, not fascism; men, not ideas. Our triumphs did not serve as evidence that democracy is best for the world any more than Russian victories proved that communism is an ideal system for all mankind. Only through our peacetime efforts to abolish war and bring a larger measure of freedom and security to all peoples can we reveal to others that we are any better than our defeated opponents." - Peter Bowman 'Beach Red'

I came across this quote while searching for the name of the young US Air Force Captain who refused to continue to bomb north Vietnam during the war. His story was in the War Remnants Museum in Saigon (known more appropriately to the local vietnamese as The War Crimes Museum). I wanted to see if I could find out what became of him after he became a conscietious objector, and the war eventually ended. If anyone has a lead on this, I'd like to hear it - you can leave the information in the comments below this blog, or you can just email me the information.

Thanks to Wendy for the quote of the year -  I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep; I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.
Alexander the Great

So sad that most people really are sheep. Even sadder when they're led by fanatics - case in point:  the riots over the Danish cartoons.

A recent article in the New York Times discusses the findings of newly published research on the outcome of trauma counseling for 9/11 victims, suggesting that those who obtained counseling fared worse over the next 2 years than those who didn't get counseling. This issue has a practical meaning for me, as I plan on doing volunteer work with an international aid organization later this year. They send psychologists to help in places where there are severely traumatized people from armed conflicts, earthquakes, hurricanes. So knowing what helps and what doesn't is really vital. This would not be the first time in history that well-meaning health professionals eventually find that what they thought was helping, was actually hurting. Not saying that talk counseling IS hurting - just opening up a dialogue.

I've asked a couple of my psychologist friends for their opinion on this article. I will try to obtain the orginal journal article in its entirety before making too much of it. In 2004 researchers reported they had found a way to prevent PTSD by giving a certain drug soon after the trauma, so that the traumatic memory was not "laid down" in the brain. There was quite a bit of controversy about this concept - are we trying to engineer a "Stepford Wives" World, where no-one feels the pain and hurts of real life, or is it a moral imperative to relieve suffering in any way possible? Both arguments are persuasive. Then there's legal implications on top of the moral questions. Now, even the so-called truism that "talking about it helps", is being called into question.

I once read that the Aborigines don't believe in our white counseling, because they believe that the past belongs in the past, buried.  Our white culture says we should talk about traumatic events in our life. I've had some niggling doubts about the usefulness, as well as the efficacy of trauma counseling, so I will be interested to see the full article and to hear opinions from my psychologist friends. If anyone has had an experience as a counselee of trauma, I'd really like to hear about the experience, positive or negative, whether it helped or hindered, etc. etc., because maybe its time to really think about what else might help trauma surviviors.

here's an excerpt from the NY Times article, and you can read the NYT article in full at:

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1812204,00.html

"Talk it out. That's the first advice most victims are given in the wake of trauma. Conventional wisdom would suggest that burying one's emotions after a violent incident — such as a school shooting or terrorist bombing — will only lead to deeper anxiety later on. Yet, while mental health practitioners widely subscribe to this truism, it has rarely been tested outside a laboratory setting — past studies have found a lack of convincing evidence to support the use of psychological debriefing to mitigate trauma — and some experts think the theory doesn't hold up in every situation.

Researchers at the University at Buffalo and University of California, Irvine, explored the question by compiling survey data from a random sample of 2,000 Americans after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. What they discovered surprised them — participants who chose not to discuss their feelings right after the attacks often fared better over the subsequent two years than those who did. "We constantly tell people it's wrong to hold feelings inside," says lead author Mark Seery, a psychology professor at Buffalo. "But our findings [suggest] the exact opposite."

Leading nicely on from my expose of the crooked counselor at HRRJ who had a spending addiction, that led her to commit bankruptcy fraud - among a number of federal financial offenses - my favorite conservative columnist, David Brooks of the NYT, has written an op-ed column on the moral and social problem of indebtedness in America.  He's one of the few conservatives I can stand to read or listen to, but he is always well-reasoned, and articulate, so after reading the excerpt I am copying below, please read his whole op-ed - its well-worth the time. He makes an excellent case that this is more of a social issue for the poor and less well-off than it is for the well-heeled.

David Brooks: NY Times 10 June 2008: " The social norms and institutions that encouraged frugality and spending what you earn have been undermined. The institutions that encourage debt and living for the moment have been strengthened. The country’s moral guardians are forever looking for decadence out of Hollywood and reality TV. But the most rampant decadence today is financial decadence, the trampling of decent norms about how to use and harness money.

Sixty-two scholars have signed on to a report by the Institute for American Values and other think tanks called, “For a New Thrift: Confronting the Debt Culture,” examining the results of all this. This may be damning with faint praise, but it’s one of the most important think-tank reports you’ll read this year.

The deterioration of financial mores has meant two things. First, it’s meant an explosion of debt that inhibits social mobility and ruins lives. Between 1989 and 2001, credit-card debt nearly tripled, soaring from $238 billion to $692 billion. By last year, it was up to $937 billion, the report said.

Second, the transformation has led to a stark financial polarization. On the one hand, there is what the report calls the investor class. It has tax-deferred savings plans, as well as an army of financial advisers. On the other hand, there is the lottery class, people with little access to 401(k)’s or financial planning but plenty of access to payday lenders, credit cards and lottery agents.

The loosening of financial inhibition has meant more options for the well-educated but more temptation and chaos for the most vulnerable. Social norms, the invisible threads that guide behavior, have deteriorated. Over the past years, Americans have been more socially conscious about protecting the environment and inhaling tobacco. They have become less socially conscious about money and debt.

Foundations and churches could issue short-term loans to cut into the payday lenders’ business. Public and private programs could give the poor and middle class access to financial planners. Usury laws could be enforced and strengthened. Colleges could reduce credit card advertising on campus. KidSave accounts would encourage savings from a young age. The tax code should tax consumption, not income, and in the meantime, it should do more to encourage savings up and down the income ladder.

There are dozens of things that could be done. But the most important is to shift values. Franklin made it prestigious to embrace certain bourgeois virtues. Now it’s socially acceptable to undermine those virtues. It’s considered normal to play the debt game and imagine that decisions made today will have no consequences for the future. "

I like the part where David Brooks  says churches should put their money where their mouth is - and lend the money to people in need.  Of ocurse, that not exactly how he put it, but its the meaning of what he said!!. Now there's a fine idea!! How about making the loan interest free, like the Moslem rule? The Catholic church may be a bit flint at the moment with all the billions they've paid out over their rogue pedophile priests, but it just goes to show that they were able to spend it when they had to pay judgments from a worldly court, so why couldn't they have used that money to help the poor of this world?

 Here's the link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/10/opinion/10brooks.html?em&ex=1213243200&en=95803073a0a2b518&ei=5087%0A

On the ABC's book review this month, the panel unanimously raved about Tim Winton's latest novel, "Breath", but the recommendation of Peter Fitzsimons,  Demons at Dusk, was panned by the rest of the panel, as appallingly bad writing. Fitzsimons is a prolific writer, whose works include one of the biographies of war hero, Nancy Wake.

An interesting documentary, in a similar vein to An Inconvenient Truth, was Global Dimming. Watching this, with its many scientists demonstrating their fastidious research on the declining amounts of sunshine reaching the earth, made me really confused as to how this jibes with Global Warming. Its not as if the scientists think less sunshine, is a good thing. Quite the contrary - they think its as disastrous for the planet as Global Warming. Its just odd that this research has been so ignored.

While on environmental issues, this is not strictly a book or documentary review, but I strongly recommend this article from the summer 2004 edition of Ms magazine, called "Food, Farming...Feminism? Why Going Organic Makes Good Sense", by Elaine Lipson.  Here's a few brief excerpts to capture your interest:

"Every feminist, woman or man, who embraces equality and diversity and opposes violence and domination, should recognize that the foods we eat, and how they’re grown, matter to our environment and to our lives."

Its a familiar movie plot: good drug cops thwarted in catching Mr. Big because Mr. Big has bought off someone vital at the top echelon of the law enforcement chain. On Tuesday, Sydney saw the scenario played out in real life. A top-level Investigator in NSW's Crime Commission, which was set up with extraordinary powers to catch the Mr. Big's of the drug world, was arrested at his desk and charged with a slew of serious drug importation conspiracies.  The arrest was the culmination of a 2-year international investigation spanning 3 continents. Drug authorities estimate the street value of the drugs at about $100 million. Apparently, this 30-year law enforcement veteran was feeding information on the Crime Commission's surveillance and search methods. The Police Commissioner acknowledged that he had recently learned that Mark Standen had a gambling problem.

As if that wasn't bad enough, yesterday it emerged that the bad cop was having an affair and his lover works at the ICAC (Independent Commission Against corruption)!!! Whoa.

On the same day, in a court room in Sydney, another senior drug cop was sentenced for a plot that is straight from the movies: the cop and his partner got a paid drug informant to set up a major "buy", then at gun point, they stole the money, and told the informant that they'd charge him with drug dealing and send him to prison if he fingered them.

Today, we have yet more bad cops making the headlines. As a result of an international child pornography investigation, 70 people were arrested, and many computers seized. One of those arrested was a federal police officer.

Just weeks ago, a NSW government minister was sentenced for his pedophile acts on young boys, who he got hooked on heroin in order to keep them under his evil control.

Brings to mind the old saying "you never really know a person....."  I wonder how long it had been since Standen had undergone a security clearance?

Millions of people took to the streets in South Korea today, to protest the government allowing US beef back in, after a mad cow scare.  Despite Korea having some of the most expensive beef in the world, millions of people attended angry protests at the resumption of American beef imports. Presumably the resumption of American beef imports would bring the price of beef down, but the people are obviously more concerned about mad cow disease than they are about saving money at the butcher shop. The solution seemed simple to me: just stop eating cows!!!

Now there's a novel idea!  Not only would the Koreans ensure that they won't contract Mad Cow Disease, but less beef consumption means less green house gases, because cows are a major source of methane gas. It also means there are less people wanting to chop down rainforests for cattle ranches, so that helps the greenhouse gas problem, also. Finally, the best reasons of all for them to just stop eating beef is that they will be healthier, and the cows avoid being slaughtered. How much simpler can it be?

Wendy sent me an article about a list of the top 1,000 books of all time, compiled by a British academic, by surveying a wide spectrum of people in the arts and academia (mostly British). I didn't  think much of the list, so I thought:  why not have all my friends and relatives send me their favorite 10-25 books, and we can then share a list of books that you may find enjoyable/inspiring/thought-provoking/suspenseful, etc.

I'll start the list myself, and you can then use the comment box at the end of this article to send me your top twenty five (or less, if the memory is a little stuck).  I think we'll stick to fiction, but if you like, you can send me your favorite non-fiction, as well. I know that Sam Harris' atheists' manifesto  Letter to a Christian Nation will top the non-fiction list for several of us.

Here's my top 25, (which could well change tomorrow when another favorite pops into my mind). They are in no particularl order. The Power of One; Tess of the D'urbervilles; Wuthering Heights; City of Joy; Jane Eyre; The Kitchen God's Wife; Charlotte's Webb; The Wind in the Willows; A Farewell to Arms;  Jude the Obscure; The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe; The Summer of My German Soldier; The Confessions of Nat Turner; The Plague; The Bridge of San Luis Rey; Anne of Green Gables; The Alchemist; Woman at Point Zero; The Runaway Jury; The Kite Runner; Heidi; Silas Marner; The Thirty Nine Steps; The Borrowers; Tom's Midnight Garden.

Congratulations to the whole world for agreeing to ban cluster bombs, this week. They are deadly for decades after a war, and most of the innocent victims are children, losing legs and arms and eyes. Oh, I should have said the the whole of the civilized world - the US, India, China, Russia and Pakistan refused to sign the treaty.  Maybe Barack Obama will show incredible leadership, and restore some credibility and trust in America next year, by signing the treaty. Kevin Rudd kept his promise and signed the Kyoto Agreement as his first act in office, and also signed the cluster bomb treaty this week.

John McCain is pro-war and anti-veteran

The following reasons not to vote for John:McCain were provided by an Iraq war veteran, and appeared on the CNN online political news today:

Reasons why Veterans, active duty personnel, and anyone who cares about them should not vote for McCain:

*AWOL for May 22nd vote on GI Bill. Expressed opposition to bill saying "it was too generous to Veterans".

*Voted against Bill in September that would have mandated adequate rest for troops between combat deployments.

*Voted No on $1.5-billion increase for Veteran Medical services (money would have come from closing corporate tax loophole).

*Voted No on establishing a trust fund to bolster underfunded Veteran Hospitals.

*Voted No in May 2006 against $20-billion allotment for expanding Veteran Medical Facilities.

*Voted No in April 2006 to increase Veteran Outpatient care.

*Voted No in March 2004 another $1.8-billion reserve for Veteran Medical care (again funded by closing corporate tax loopholes).

Bottomline, McCain is more interested in taking care of big business then the men and women he wrongly sent to fight in Iraq.

Oh, and the rumor is that McCain intends to re-introduce the draft in 2010, if elected. That seems like a likely scenario to me, given that the military is just about all used up and burn-out from back-to-back deployments, and stop-loss extensions. They simply can't continue the two wars as they are now. So a draft is virtually inevitable.

Recently, an article about the Voluntary Simplicty Movement appeared in the New York Times. The small number of Americans who are choosing a more simple lifestyle is so miniscule, that it hardly rated a feature article. Still, it spoke to my own thoughts and plans, to sell up and move into organic farming in the near future. For several years, I've grown less attached to "things" - but still need to do some more work on this - and I buy a lot less "things" - both by choice as well as by necessity, than I did a few years ago. A friend recently noted that I was wearing the same clothes in our vacation photos from Peru (2005) , the Carribean cruise (2006) and Vietnam (2007), and asked: "Did you only take one dress?"  No, but I have mastered the art of packing all that I need in one tiny carry-on bag . When I left Vietnam, I even came back with a near-empty bag - figured the people there needed the clothes a lot more than I did. After all, everyone of us has way more clothes than we need.

Its said that  people really don't change much once they are adults, but my way of life and thinking has changed a great deal. Now, a simple life of growing fruit and vegetables in a way that doesn't harm the soil or the air, or put poisonous chemicals into our food, seems like a higher purpose than speeding down a freeway to work or school, and buying everything from supermarkets.

One of the people in the NYT's article even bought a boat to live on. Sounds good to me -  I wish I had my own boat to sail to the US this summer, so I didn't have to sit in the foul air on a plane.

In case anyone missed it, last week was "National Composting Week"!!!!  With wars, a housing crisis, earthquakes and cyclones, and presidental politics, I guess it was not a priority. But a tv story featured a woman who almost died of cancer on her conventional farm, and when she finally recovered, she vowed to turn her farm organic, and to "heal the soil" from all the toxic chemicals it had been laden with by modern farming. I think that's a noble cause, to "heal the soil".  So, I've been thinking that I will try to combine my desire for organic farming, and "healing the soil" by going where the soil needs healing the  most - the scene of American chemical warfare in Vietnam. The Australian Permaculture organization already has a model permaculture farm project there.  (See my previous blog on vietnam, and the description of the area around Khe Sanh, in Quang Tri province.  With my lung problems, I can't go to the mountains, but there's no shortage of other places needing to be rehabilitated. 

One of the surprising things Wendy & I noticed in Vietnam was that there were gum trees (Eucalyptus trees), in many places. When we asked about this, we were told it was for the timber, because they grow quickly. But I have since learnt that they were chosen by Vietnamese environmentalist for their ability to withstand harsh conditions, to grow quickly, thus quickly providing a protective canopy for native species to grow, etc. etc.  We also noticed gum trees growing on the mountainsides of the Sacred Valley in Peru. Again, they were chosen for their fast growth, and ability to hold the soil on the steep mountainsides, and the timber was used in building houses.

We can all live a little more simply just ask yourself "do I really need this?" Usually, the answer is "no".

I am re-printing an article from the Washington Post, in toto, trusting that the brilliant author, Marie Cocco, nor the WP, will take offense. Cocco's article is sorely needed. The media have treated Hillary Clinton so unfairly, and they've done it so subtly and insidiously that few people have called them out on it. But some of their misogyny is so blatant that Cocco's article is a welcome validation of what many women feel about the contempt that has been shown to Clinton. Even though I will be voting for Obama, I'm angry that Hillary has been treated in such a sexist way. I don't like her type of politics, but I do admire her as a strong, brilliant, incredible woman, and it could be many years before we have anyone as hardworking and as brilliant as Hillary to run for President.

Having just ranted and raved in my previous blog about the mindless sheep who think that forcing a 12 year old girl to pose for nude photos in front of a middle aged man, is "art" , Maria Cocco's article seemed like a timely reminder of the pervasiveness of misogyny in our society.

Misogyny I won't miss - Washington Post
 
As the Democratic nomination contest slouches toward a close, it's time to take stock of what I will not miss.

I will not miss seeing advertisements for T-shirts that bear the slogan "Bros before Hos." The shirts depict Barack Obama (the Bro) and Hillary Clinton (the Ho) and are widely sold on the Internet.
I will not miss walking past airport concessions selling the Hillary Nutcracker, a device in which a pantsuit-clad Clinton doll opens her legs to reveal stainless-steel thighs that, well, bust nuts. I won't miss television and newspaper stories that make light of the novelty item.
I won't miss episodes like the one in which liberal radio personality Randi Rhodes called Clinton a "big [expletive] whore" and said the same about former vice presidential nominee Geraldine Ferraro. Rhodes was appearing at an event sponsored by a San Francisco radio station, before an audience of appreciative Obama supporters -- one of whom had promoted the evening on the presumptive Democratic nominee's official campaign Web site.
I won't miss Citizens United Not Timid (no acronym, please), an anti-Clinton group founded by Republican guru Roger Stone.
Political discourse will at last be free of jokes like this one, told last week by magician Penn Jillette on MSNBC: "Obama did great in February, and that's because that was Black History Month. And now Hillary's doing much better 'cause it's White Bitch Month, right?" Co-hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski rebuked Jillette.
I won't miss political commentators (including National Public Radio political editor Ken Rudin and Andrew Sullivan, the columnist and blogger) who compare Clinton to the Glenn Close character in the movie "Fatal Attraction." In the iconic 1987 film, Close played an independent New York woman who has an affair with a married man played by Michael Douglas. When the liaison ends, the jilted woman becomes a deranged, knife-wielding stalker who terrorizes the man's blissful suburban family. Message: Psychopathic home-wrecker, begone.
The airwaves will at last be free of comments that liken Clinton to a "she-devil" (Chris Matthews on MSNBC, who helpfully supplied an on-screen mock-up of Clinton sprouting horns). Or those who offer that she's "looking like everyone's first wife standing outside a probate court" (Mike Barnicle, also on MSNBC).
But perhaps it is not wives who are so very problematic. Maybe it's mothers. Because, after all, Clinton is more like "a scolding mother, talking down to a child" (Jack Cafferty on CNN).
When all other images fail, there is one other I will not miss. That is, the down-to-the-basics, simplest one: "White women are a problem, that's -- you know, we all live with that" (William Kristol of Fox News).
I won't miss reading another treatise by a man or woman, of the left or right, who says that sexism has had not even a teeny-weeny bit of influence on the course of the Democratic campaign. To hint that sexism might possibly have had a minimal role is to play that risible "gender card."
Most of all, I will not miss the silence.
I will not miss the deafening, depressing silence of Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean or other leading Democrats, who to my knowledge (with the exception of Sen. Barbara Mikulski of Maryland) haven't publicly uttered a word of outrage at the unrelenting, sex-based hate that has been hurled at a former first lady and two-term senator from New York. Among those holding their tongues are hundreds of Democrats for whom Clinton has campaigned and raised millions of dollars. Don Imus endured more public ire from the political class when he insulted the Rutgers University women's basketball team.
Would the silence prevail if Obama's likeness were put on a tap-dancing doll that was sold at airports? Would the media figures who dole out precious face time to these politicians be such pals if they'd compared Obama with a character in a blaxploitation film? And how would crude references to Obama's sex organs play?
There are many reasons Clinton is losing the nomination contest, some having to do with her strategic mistakes, others with the groundswell for "change." But for all Clinton's political blemishes, the darker stain that has been exposed is the hatred of women that is accepted as a part of our culture.
Marie Cocco is syndicated by the Washington Post Writers Group. Her e-mail address ismariecocco@washpost.com.

I was about to begin a brief new blog on the "Voluntary Simplicty Movement " before retiring to bed, when another blogger's entry caught my eye. What I read so outraged me, that I was propelled to write a scathing reply. Here it is, and I intend to send it to every politician in the NSW state government, (as useless, corrupt and incompetent as they may be), and the federal government. I think they need to know that people who care very much about the rights of vulnerable children do not agree with the art-elitists crying "censorship!", and shrieking so loudly in support of Bill Henson.

For my friends and relatives in the USA, Henson is a famous Australian artist. His work has been controversial in the past because of its emphasis on the naked or near-naked bodies of adolescent boys. In the past week, Henson was due to open a new exhibition at a Sydney gallery. The gallery printed up invitations with an image of one of the pieces in the exhibition, and posted them on its website. The images were of a naked 12 year old girl. A child rights activist got wind of the exhibition and went to the police. The police promptly shut the exhibition down, and seized Henson's so-called "art". There was much controversy around whether the images were "art" or plain, simple child pornography.  The gallery took the images down from its website, but probably not before thousands of pedophiles all over the world managed to download them for their sick enjoyment. The media plastered this poor child's image all over the news, for days, and the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd commented that he found the images "revolting". To which most sensible people said "here, here!"

Some of my US friends may not know that I was a child psychologist in NSW, working with sexual abuse victims, for several years. I am totally outraged by these creeps going to Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, etc. to prey on vulnerable, poor children, and this situation isn't much different - I see a middle-aged man, forcing a 12 year old girl-child to pose naked for photographs. Then he hides behind the word "art" to protect himself from prosecution.

So as not to repeat myself, please read the reply that I sent to the blogger who thinks the seizure of this child pornography is an assault on the freedom of artistic expression.  He should probably know that even the US Supreme Court does put a few limits on Free Speech, such as not crying fire in a crowded theater. They also made an exception for child pornography. In a recent First Amendment/Free Speech decision, the Supreme Court allowed "virtual" child pornography (i.e. images made by a computer, not using a real child), but leaving real-life child pornography as an exception to the right to  Free Speech. That blogger, when decrying the "censorship" might also consider that censorship is appropriate to protect children, just as its appropriate when it intends to incite to racial or religious hatred and violence.

My Response:

I agree with many of your views, but I could not disagree more strongly on this issue. Your openning paragraph says you feel violated by the closure of Henson's exhibition. I felt violated when I saw those images! I wouldn't expect an 81 year old man, no matter how liberal-minded you may be, to understand that adolescent girls are very vulnerable, and the children who are Henson's subjects are far too young to be giving "informed consent" to the exposure of their bodies to all and sundry, all over the world. Their right to the privacy of their own body has been horribly violated. What kind of misguided parent would permit such disregard for their child's right to privacy?

No doubt, the images posted on the gallery's website have made many pedophiles very happy to have these freebies handed to them. In my opinion, Henson is a pedophile who is hiding under the cloak of "art". This is NOT about censorship, its about protecting the most vulnerable members of our society from sexual exploitation. I am waiting in hope that Henson is charged.

Tony Abbott, just interviewed on ABC's Lateline, pointed out the hypocrisy of prosecuting Joe Average for having images like these on his computer, yet hanging in an art gallery, the art-elite call it "art", and think its immune from prosecution. These out-of-touch, sexist elitists cry fowl when a spade is called a spade - that is that Henson is a pedophile. As the saying goes.... if it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck......

I know child exploitation when I see it and its NOT art. The media have a huge offense to answer for in this whole fiasco. They plastered this child's face all over the news, thinking that it was OK because they blacked out her breasts. The child was standing naked, and despite the little black bar across her breasts, the news media thinks its OK to plaster her face all over the national news!!! They should be prosecuted along with Henson. Who is the more exploitative - Henson or the media? If the media isn't prosecuted, then the child needs to have a guardian ad litem appointed (her parents obviously can't make decisions in their daughter's best interests), and sue the media for the gross invasion of this child's privacy. Then the guardian ad litem should take out a civil suit against Henson for the emotional and sexual abuse she's been subjected to in this exploitative art show.

This case does not harken back to the censorship cases of old. Its about a child's right to the privacy of her own body, and its about exploitation. Me thinks the cries of censorship by the art-elitists is a case of "the emporer has no clothes". Someone needs to give them a reality check, and I applaud Kevin Rudd for expressing what the vast bulk of decent, child-loving people think of Henson's work - its "revolting". 

I agree with you that we struggle to improve this world in which we live. Personally I prefer to put my efforts into protecting the vulnerable, than those who prey on them for their own fame and fortune. What would Henson sell these "art" works for? How much would the little girl who had her privacy completely and utterly violated, get out of it? I'll bet she would have gotten absolutely nothing. And had he paid her???? Well then her parents have been paid for pimping out their child. Shame on them.

Your elitist attitude implies that anyone who doesn't agree that Henson's work is "art" (instead of pedophilic soft porn), must be an intellectual cripple or a Luddite. I think if you read my blog at www.blognow.com.au/Janice_Brooks, you'll see that I am solidly on the side of the under-dog, the environment, against corporations and their obscenely overpaid CEO's, and thoughtfully analyze a wide array of public issues.

This is not a censorship issue. Its a child protection issue. I worked as a child psychologist with child sexual assault victims, for many years, and in my professional opinion, this child was exploited and abused. The question everyone should ask themself: would you let YOUR child pose naked for a middle-aged man? I don't know anyone who would put their child through such a violation of their innate human right to the privacy of their own body. This is a HUMAN RIGHTS issue, not a censorship issue.

I am a "card-carrying ACLU" member (American Civil Liberties Union). They have fought many controversial First Amendment/censorship battles over the past several decades, and I support everyone's right to Free speech, and freedom of expression - but never the exploitation of a vulnerable child under the despicable claim that their child pornography is "art".

If the politicians and police have any guts whatsoever, they WILL charge Henson. Since several politicians, law society, etc. have expressed doubts about the success of a prosecution, I say, "there's more ways than one to skin a cat". Henson has clearly violated numerous laws, so charge him with all of them. Put this pedophile where he belongs. There will be plenty of opportunity for him to do his "art" work in jail.

In a surprising, indeed shocking, yet reassuring interview in Sydney today, Frances Fukuyama , one of the prominent group of neo-cons who sent an open-letter urging regime-change in Iraq, said that he believes the invasion of Iraq was a mistake, and is highly critical of the Bush administration. Neo-cons staunchly believe that Democracy can, and should, be imposed (militarily if necessary), on key countries, such as Iraq. But after the war was completely and tragically bungled by the neo-cons (Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, etc.), Fukuyama changed his mind.

Rafael Blair, reviewed Fukuyama's 2006 book,  After the Neocons, for The Observer. Blair says that Fukuyama, "a political economist and pillar of the conservative American intellectual establishment, disavows the Bush administration and all its works. For practising neocons this is a big disappointment. Imagine Karl Marx returning from the grave in 1922 to suggest that Lenin had rather missed the point of what he had been trying to say". Well said!! 

According to another reviewer, "Fukuyama now expresses qualms about the killing of ‘tens of thousands’ of innocent Iraqis who had done nothing to harm America or its inhabitants: ‘These casualties in a country we were seeking to help represent an enormous human cost.’ Such guarded words of regret will strike most readers as welcome and overdue. To unrepentant apologists of the war, by contrast, they have the feel of apostasy and betrayal.

Fukuyama is a deeply analytical intellectual, and IS still a conservative Republican - many would say that's a contradiction in terms, but listening to him, I realized that there might actually be conservatives with noble, even humanitarian ideals. Of course, its equally telling that the rare Republican who IS analytical and humanitarian, has disavowed the Bush administration, the Iraq war, and his former neo-con pals.

Most shocking of all in his interview, Fukuyama says that he voted for Obama! He believes that both McCain and Clinton belong to a political mind-set that is too focused on the use of military solutions, but that Obama has the necessary mind-set to use diplomacy to better manage American foreign policy. 

If a died-in-the-wool neo-con like Fukuyama is backing Obama, the Republicans really ARE in trouble in 2008. I hate to get my hopes up, but perhaps America just might be about to enter a new "age of reason", with some controls over corporate excess, a healthcare system that is available to everyone regardless of their means, a responsible environmental policy, some controls over lobbyists, and most importantly: a new emphasis on diplomacy over military force.

The honeymoon is over with the new Labour government, with its recent decision to kill about 400 kangaroos on a Department of Defence site in Canberra.

According to the government, the kangaroo numbers have multiplied so much that they are threatening 3 other species on the land. They decided to cull the kangaroos because they considered the cost of removing them to another site was too expensive. 

Those of you in America could help stop this cull by writing to the Australian Ambassador in Washington D.C., expressing your disgust, and pointing out the hypocrisy of Australians protesting the killing of whales by Japan, yet the Australian government is killing off kangaroos.

Lots of people don't care for movies with subtitles, but this is one that is definitely worth watching. It is the true story of a University student in Munich during WWII. Sophie and her brother were part of a small group of protesters against the Nazi regime. She and her brother risked their lives to print and distribute thousands of flyers denouncing the Nazi regime, and demanding freedom. Eventually, their flyers were smuggled out to the Allies who dropped millions of them by air over Germany. If only there were more Sophies in America today - speaking out for freedom of speech, and against a war-mongering regime. Sophie paid the ultimate price for her opposition to the Nazi's - she was guillotined. Sorry to tell you the ending, but the real point of the story is her heroism and her dignity.

My daughters live hundreds of miles apart, so they don't get to visit each other as often as they'd like. But they decided to institute an annual  sisterly bonding weekend as a family tradition - and to hold their reunion at the annual American Atheist Conference. They definitely don't have much time for right wing fundamentalist christians preaching the "right to life" by bombing abortion clinics, or bigotted fundamentalists disrupting the funerals of Iraq soldiers with their offensive signs preaching God's hatred of "fags", or the cretins who want to force creationism onto public school curricula. They firmly believe that religion has a lot to answer for, and think the world would be a better place if it was based on scientific rationalism, and a philosophy of simple kindness.

I agree with much of their atheist beliefs, and find proselytizing religions, such as Christianity and Islam particularly troublesome. The "live and let live" non-violence of Buddhism is fine with me, but not religions that insist that they are the only "true" religion, and that anyone who doesn't believe is doomed - or worse still, according to Islamic radicals, should be destroyed. So, watching a documentary on the Jehovah's Witnesses tonight stimulated some contradictory feelings for me. On the one hand, I detest their proselytizing, and their "unshakeable fundamentalism" and cult-like life-style.  On the other hand, I learnt things that have left me feeling a lot more positive toward them, and realizing that I share some of their beliefs.

Firstly, I have to give them their "props" for refusing to participate in war.

Secondly, they were sent to the concentration camps by the Nazis, and were renowned for their selfless sharing with the other internees.

Thirdly, they have been responsible for more landmark First Amendment  cases in the Supreme Court than almost any other group. They also won landmark cases as Conscientious Objectors, and a 1990 landmark case on medical decision rights. 

One of the landmark cases in the 1930's involved the pledge of allegiance - initially, the Supreme Court ruled against them when their children refused to recite the pledge, but in a highly unusual event, the Court reversed itself 3 years later. They not only refuse to recite the pledge of allegiance and honor the flag, they refuse to serve in the military, and they do not vote.

Almost everyone knows that they refuse to have blood transfusions. The documentary followed a young man who was in dire need of a liver transplant. Hospitals would not provide a transplant to a Jehovah's Witness. Amazingly, the University of Southern California medical center decided to perform the transplant. It seems that concerns over HIV and other viral blood contaminants has stimulated research interest in developing transfusion-free surgical techniques -  so the JW's have actually been helping research in this important medical area.

These are people after my own heart -they're non-violent, and fight their battles in the courts. Between 1935 and 1958, the Jehovah's Witnesses were before the Supreme Court 40 times.!!!! Worldwide, they currently have 400 cases in litigation.  Gotta love it!!

According to a report in the New York Times yestrerday, a letter written by Einstein in 1954 to the philosopher Eric Gutkind, in which he described the Bible as “pretty childish” and scoffed at the notion that the Jews could be a “chosen people,” sold for $404,000 at an auction in London. That was 25 times the presale estimate. The unidentified buyer is passionate about theoretical physics, and outbid  Oxford Professor, and outspoken atheist, Richard Dawkins. Dawkins is the author of the bestselling "The God Delusion".

I've watched some great documentaries over recent months, and read a few excellent books, so I'd like to share some of them with you.

I feel very fortunate that I've been able to see so many good documentaries at home, when I don't have cable. The Australian free-to-air television has a lot more cultural, political, and artistic offerings than American free-to-air television. 

Years ago, I hated this aspect of Australian television. I was annoyed that they provided so much programming  for esoteric social interests, catering to the high-brow, "intellectual elite". As a busy single Mum who was already brain-dead after a draining day at work, followed by picking kids up from day-care, shopping, cooking dinner, overseeing homework, etc., all I wanted was some mindless American cop drama, or trivial quiz show, and my half-hour of 30-second sound-bite news. I was bored stiff by talking-head political interviews, and worse still, by any kind of drama, documentary, etc. that was produced in England.

My my, how things have changed. It's frequently said that people never change, but at least in this respect, my tastes have changed 180 degrees. Now I love the English dramas, and especially the English comedy, which is so completely different to American comedy. So, here's my recommendations for some of the best documentaries and books:

1. Taxi to the Dark Side . Won this year's Academy Award for documentaries - says it all. Its shocking, its sickening in parts, and its deeply disturbing. I strongly recommend watching it with another intelligent, thinking person, because it raises such deep issues around the nature of human brutality.

It is the story of a young Afghan taxi-driver who ends up captured and taken for interrogation to Bagram Air Base. His "interrogation" by the US military turns into torture, which results in a horrendously painful death. The American doctor who signed the death certificate stated that he was beaten so badly that his legs were literally "pulpified". Had he survived his ordeal, his legs would have had to be amputated.

Remember the Donald Rumsfeld  torture memo that said harsh techniques "just short of organ failure" are acceptable??? Well, how does a soldier know when he's crossed the line with his beating from "just short of organ failure" to torture that causes actual organ failure resulting in death?

The soldiers who killed this young man are interviewed. One of them is softly spoken, and seems like a gentle person - but he inflicted merciless brutal injuries on this defenseless Afghan man. One wonders how a seemingly decent human being can do this to another human being. And one is left with deep disgust that the woman Army officer responsible for the interrogation unit at Bagram at the time of this homicide not only evades being held accountable, but is actually promoted to command an interrogation training unit in Arizona!!!

This case is not the only homicide at Bagram that is being investigated, and with cases like this, its not hard to see why the war in Afghanistan is going so poorly, and the Taliban are resurgent. Its a crying shame the way the war has been conducted, because the Taliban, in my mind, are so evil, that winning the hearts and minds of the Afghan people should have been a cake-walk.

With the botched job done by the Bush administration in Afghanistan, even with Obama's lack of experience, I believe that he has the intellect and analytical ability and rationality to turn the situation around. I really hope so, because as a woman, none of us want to see the Taliban return the poor women of Afghanistan to the dark ages.

I would really welcome any feedback and comments anyone makes about this documentary.

2. The Fog of War: This 2003 Academy Award-winning documentary is an in-depth interview with Robert McNamara, who was the Secretary of Defense during the Vietnam war years. It is a surprisingly honest interview about his role in the Vietnam war - his burden of guilt at the tremendous human carnage of the war is obvious, and the ending is poignant when he speaks about his post-war meeting with one of the victorious communist leaders. One reviewer wrote of McNamara's "psychic distress" at his responsibility for the human suffering.

McNamara is a fascinating, brilliant, intellectual who played a starring role in 20th Century American history & politics, as the youngest professor ever, at the Harvard Business School,  a bomber pilot in the Army Air Forces in World War II, where he used statistics to maximize the efficiency of the bombing raids over Japan; to the President of Ford Motor Co.,  and finally, in 1961, at age 44, to President John F. Kennedy's Cabinet, as the secretary of defense. Following the momentous Tet offensive, he resigned/was fired as Secretary of Defense by President Lyndon Johnson. Her speaks at length about his disagreements with Johnson in his interviews for The Fog of War.

Although there are a couple of occassions when he self-servingly makes excuses for the terrible human cost of his decisions,  on the whole, he is introspective, at times searingly honest, at times self-reproachful. But be warned, his recall of the Gulf of Tonkin incident (and his role in it), is pure self-serving fiction. Either he has lost his memory or its deliberate deception. Anyone interested in how the American involvement in the Vietnam war began, should study the records about the "Gulf of Tonkin" resolution, because the parallels with the Iraq Weapons of Mass Destruction fiasco/manipulation/outright lies, is quite incredible. 

One of the surprising admissions McNamara makes is that he and General Curtis Le May could have been tried as war criminals if the US had not won the war against Japan.  That piece of honesty from a former Secretary of Defense was utterly gob-smacking. Can anyone remotely imagine Donald Rumsfeld ever admitting his responsibility for his war crimes?!?

Until this documentary, I knew that the US fire bombing of Tokyo had killed 100,000 people, but I didn't know that there were many, many more cities that were also fire-bombed, and hundreds of thousands dead, and that the Atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was unnecessary, because the fire-bombing had already destroyed almost all of Japan's infrastructure and industry and had brought Japan to its knees. 

I won't include McNamara's 11 lessons from the documentary (which really came from the film-maker). McNamara went on to publish his own 10 lessons, as well as his 11 lessons from Vietnam and these are truly so thoughtful and relevant to the wars America is engaged in today, that I strongly recommend everyone to read them. You can find them at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fog_of_War. I will include just a couple of them to entice you to read the rest. Remember, McNamara is talking about Vietnam here, but the lessons for Iraq are equally as true:

Lesson 4: Our judgments of friend and foe alike reflected our profound ignorance of the history, culture, and politics of the people in the area, and the personalities and habits of their leaders.

Lesson 9: We did not recognize that neither our people nor our leaders are omniscient. Our judgment of what is in another people's or country's best interest should be put to the test of open discussion in international forums. We do not have the God-given right to shape every nation in our image or as we choose.

I am working on an article on the lessons of Vietnam, so I'll be trying to get a copy of McNamara's 1996 book,  In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam:

Let's hope that the new regime in Washington from 2009 will live up to the lessons McNamara has so wisely handed to us.

3. Ground Truth. My friend recorded this for me, and I really didn't think I'd be interested in watching a bunch of interviews with Iraq war veterans - but I figured I'd watch a little bit of it, since she'd gone to the trouble of recording it for me. I guess my friend knows me better than I know myself. I was instantly engrossed by the interviews of the veterans.

This was no ordinary documentary on war veterans. All of these veterans admitted to participating in killings in Iraq, either directly, or as witnesses, that left them wracked with guilt, depression, and post traumatic stress disorder. It really is an extraordinary set of interviews, with footage of the war that was familiar to me - it was the sort of footage that we used to see on our nightly news from the Vietnam war. I realized that we never see this kind of gross human destruction in Iraq news reports, with body parts strewn over a road, as we used to be shown in nightly newscasts from Vietnam. Now, the television networks consider those images "too disturbing".

That's one of the lessons that the neo-cons in the Bush administration learned from Vietnam - make sure the American public is "protected" from seeing the true horrors of the war. If the public doesn't see this human carnage -  the maimed and disfigured women and children, the eviscerated bodies, the burned faces, the limbs lying unattached to bodies  -  the war will not become the emotive issue that it was during Vietnam. Its worked. Although the Iraq war is overwhelmingly unpopular, there are no mass protests, no real outrage.

4. Book Recommendation:  Imperial Life in the Emerald City by Rajiv Chandrasekaran. The author is a New York Times journalist who was assigned to Baghdad's Green Zone during the reign of Jerry Bremer. Frankly, I thought this book would quickly become tedious and boring, but I devoured every page with enthusiasm. It was my bedtime reading, my waiting in doctor's room reading, and my train travel reading, and every spare moment reading. The writer has a knack for making what could have been repetitive material into such a great narrative. The level of incompetence, cronyism,  and corruption is beyond normal comprehension. There is a gripping battle narrative - and I'm definitely no fan of written battle descriptions, but this was simply entralling.

Well, folks, its very late, so I'll have to save any further recommendations for another blog. I hope that these reviews will entice some of you to watch/read the documentaries/book. A friend has generously loaned me her copy of "Infidel" by Aayan Hirsi Ali, so I should be able to review this in a couple of weeks.

If you have any great documentaries or books to recommend, please leave them in the comments section of this blog.

PS - the Michael Moore Documentary "Sicko" was excellent, and I highly recommend it to everyone. It  was nominated for the Academy Award this year, but was beaten (in my opinion, rightly), by Taxi to the Dark Side.