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Thursday Morning Open Thread

By Big Tent Democrat, Section Blog Related
Posted on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 09:52:40 AM EST
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I'm busy again. Light blogging if any from me.

Open Thread.

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    Thursday Morning Open Thread | 42 comments (42 topical)

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    What a mess is Alabama today. (5.00 / 1) (#21)
    by jeffinalabama on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 03:35:28 PM EST
    I don't have any contact info right now, but you all are probably more aware of the far reaching effects than I am.

    I can tell you that the people are coming together and helping one another. It's also amazing how civil everyone is. I lived through Katrina, and there was less civility following Katrina... I suspect the temperature difference is the key.

    Here's the biggest issue: gasoline availability. People are sharing food, medicine, those with generators are using them to power refridgerators and freezers for neighbors... but gasoline is the weak point.

    If you need to contact someone here, best to use a land line,cell comms are sketchy, at best.

    Mail  has run fine, water's available, there's an ice plant some 35 miles away...

    But people here are suffering shock. These storms came through one year and three days after a major tornado hit Albertville. This event dwarfs last year's, but theres a serious amount of PTSD.

    More reports later.

    Good news, small scale (5.00 / 2) (#35)
    by jeffinalabama on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 05:39:41 PM EST
    Spoke by cell phone with Angel Eyes(now platonic Angel eyes). She, her poodles, her sister, family, and about 12 other dogs made it through with no injuries.

    Bad news: My mother had a car accident in Auburn this morning. Totalled the car, but she's already home from the hospital. Bruises from airbags, etc, good painkillers.

    She said, "You're not taking my car away from me," to which my brother, who waas there, said, "We don't have to. That wrecker just did."

    So... can I change my handle here to Hoke, since my new job will be Driving Miss Daisy? after all, it's close to Atlanta, just on the 'wild side' of the Chatahoochie.

    What an eventful couple of days. Thank you scientists, for xanax, by whatever name it's prescribed.

    Parent

    jeff and kdog (5.00 / 1) (#37)
    by jimakaPPJ on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 06:52:05 PM EST
    Re the Tunica trip.

    MS Gambling commission has directed closure of all river casinos 5/2 for an undetermined time due to expected flooding of MS river. No estimate on time.

    I'll try to tell you what I find out but we lost telephone service Tuesday with no estimate of when it will be back due to extreme damage to telco lines. We lost 11 trees but no house damage.

    Take care!

    Parent

    Glad you're ok jim (5.00 / 1) (#39)
    by jeffinalabama on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 08:25:00 PM EST
    I'll wait
     to hear from you. jeffinalabama@gmail.com
    Keep the grandkiddies safe!

    Parent
    Jeff - Will do (5.00 / 1) (#41)
    by jimakaPPJ on Fri Apr 29, 2011 at 08:25:52 AM EST
    Glad you're ok. And I sympathize re your Mom. One of the hardest things we had with my Mom was telling her she could no longer drive after an accident.

    All our damage is trees, I'll be doing the chain saw bit for weeks, no need to spend money for what I can do. The insurance covers a magnificent $1000.

    But after looking at AL and MS I feel like we were on a walk through the park.

    Phone system still down. No DSL at home. This from a wifi hot spot.

    Parent

    Jeff, good to know you are okay. (none / 0) (#40)
    by caseyOR on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:17:56 PM EST
    And, while sorry to hear your mother had an accident, I am glad to know she will be alright.

    Also, glad to hear that platonic Angel Eyes and her family and pets came through this.

    I had to pull out the atlas today so that I could put all the relevant Alabama towns in their proper place.

    Parent

    Glad to (none / 0) (#38)
    by Ga6thDem on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 07:21:56 PM EST
    hear you made it through fine.

    Parent
    Been through a number of (none / 0) (#25)
    by brodie on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:21:33 PM EST
    major natural disasters myself, up and down the state of CA with earthquakes and mudslides and fires, then earlier in life with tornados in the MW.  Been very lucky so far with no major personal injuries or serious property loss.

    Tornados are scary things to experience, especially the build-up and retreating to shelter in the basement with the candles and portable radio, while up above the sound they make roaring through is like the end of the world is nigh.

    But usually, in the aftermath, people come together and act civilly, even in normally somewhat semi-neighborly and cool places like CA.  

    Katrina -- the exception, but we can mostly thank for that an incredibly indifferent and inept response by the federales and Geo W. Bush along with Heckuva Job Brownie.  A major double-disaster like that, you need the people at the top to take charge and act like they care.  Didn't happen unfortunately.  Huge embarrassment for this country in the eyes of the world.

    Best of luck to you Jeff.

    Parent

    TY Brodie, I made it through this one (none / 0) (#36)
    by jeffinalabama on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 05:43:14 PM EST
    unscathed. There are many people suffering here, though, and my heart goes out to them. They are the kind of folks, like Iraqis, who, if they have one bowl of rice, they'll share half of it with you if you have none.

    Poor but proud.

    I don't know if I'm going to heaven or if I'm going to hell, but I do know I'm going from Alabama, to misquote Medgar Evers.

    Parent

    A lot of the kids that were in the (none / 0) (#28)
    by Militarytracy on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:45:32 PM EST
    high school here when it took a direct hit a few years ago still have a kind of storm PTSD.  The walls of the school came down on them though, eight of them died, hundreds of them were in the hospital having spleens removed and body parts put into casts.  Some of them have never been able to fully recover and they have meltdowns when we have tornado sirens, and sometimes even when the weather gets very rainy and unpredictable.

    Parent
    that's really sad... (none / 0) (#31)
    by sj on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:53:52 PM EST


    Parent
    Did you know that Obama's SSN (none / 0) (#1)
    by observed on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 10:20:37 AM EST
    shows he's from Connecticut? Neither did I, but that is a new talking point.
    Did anyone see Orly Taitz and O'Donnell go at it last night?

    All the SS will show is (none / 0) (#8)
    by Harry Saxon on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:13:08 AM EST
    where the SS number was applied for, not where you're from.

    Parent
    Well, "Connecticut" sounds like a (5.00 / 2) (#9)
    by observed on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:16:47 AM EST
    foreign name to me---definitely not a native American place name.


    Parent
    He's not a Muslim... (5.00 / 2) (#16)
    by kdog on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 12:05:18 PM EST
    He's a Mohegan! LOL

    Parent
    Busy? (none / 0) (#2)
    by kdog on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 10:31:58 AM EST
    Not going crazy searching high and low for your birth certificate are ya?

    Surely its just misplaced, it'll turn up before you declare your intentions to run...don't sweat it bro:)

    I am so much more qualified than Trump. (5.00 / 1) (#3)
    by observed on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 10:36:38 AM EST
    I only  need a single-combover---and a small one at that.


    Parent
    I don't doubt it... (none / 0) (#4)
    by kdog on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 10:45:11 AM EST
    as I'm sure if you were in the business of taking bets on games of chance where the odds are solidly stacked in your favor, you'd manage to turn a profit!  You're infinitely more qualified:)

    Parent
    Catching up on a good (none / 0) (#5)
    by brodie on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 10:53:53 AM EST
    PBS NewsHour documentary on Autism by Robert MacNeil, former co-anchor for many yrs of the evening news with Lehrer*.  

    His 6 yo grandson, who began life seemingly normal in development, was diagnosed as autistic shortly after getting his allotment of several vaccinations in one visit to the doctor.  MacNeil's adult daughter Alison wonders on camera whether there is a connection.  The medical experts interviewed are mostly puzzled by the rather sudden increase in incidence of autism since the early 80s, and those interviewed try to find other explanations apart from the controversial vaccination angle.  

    Well worth watching, and a balanced and informative presentation, even if the sensitive pro-vaccine crowd objects that the vaccine-autism theory isn't as thoroughly rejected as they would prefer.

    (students of media history will also recall Rbt MacNeil, then a young WH reporter for NBC, being the only reporter having the good sense to get off the press bus in Dallas that day in '63 as he then went immediately to the knoll area where everyone seemed to be converging; yrs later he was one of the first mainstream reporters to publicly suggest conspiracy)  

    The supposed vaccination-autism (5.00 / 4) (#7)
    by observed on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:00:30 AM EST
    link comes from a fraudulent study by Andrew Wakefield.
    I'm sorry, but not matter what MacNeil's personal story, it is irresponsible journalism to even suggest a theory which has been so thorougly discredited.
    There is a LOT of harm done by the anti-vax movement. Wakefield has blood on his hands, now.

    Parent
    Like MacNeil, I'm not (none / 0) (#11)
    by brodie on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:24:18 AM EST
    an expert in this area either, and I suspect you aren't either.  As for the causes, the experts, as I noted, are puzzled and actually all over the place with their theories (with the exception of being careful, probably for career maintenance reasons, not to embrace the taboo possible cause of over-vaccination)

    As for Wakefield, what I'd like to see is a calm, rational exchange, preferably televised on PBS over an hour or two, no comm'ls, between the pro-vaccine and Wakefield camps, ideally with Wakefield himself leading his team.  Jeff Greenfield, who has some experience with this format, could be the moderator.    

    Oxford/Bill Buckley style debate if you will, the way they used to do it back in the day.

    Unfortunately, PBS doesn't seem to do debates any more.  Usually --with rare exceptions such as this MacNeil offering -- it's one dominant, Establishment-backed camp casting aspersions, often of an ad hom nature, against their opponents, with little or no chance for the other side to respond.

    Parent

    The journal which published Wakefield's (5.00 / 5) (#12)
    by observed on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:35:24 AM EST
    study now claims it was fraudulent.
    I don't need to be a medical expert to understand that Wakefield is a charlatan.

    Parent
    Yeah, I think I've seen (5.00 / 1) (#13)
    by brodie on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:49:18 AM EST
    this picture before.  Controversial article/book published that steps on some sensitive powerful toes, then, unknown to the public, pressure is brought to bear behind the scenes, and soon you have the publisher apologizing, etc.

    Or at least this one has that same flavor.

    Sorry, but we know there are powerful corporate interests involved in the vaccine production area, and we know what powerful people can do in terms of suppressing unwanted information.

    I believe in open debate, lay out the full case for both sides, and let the parents and public decide.

    Parent

    but that's not scientifically valid (5.00 / 3) (#15)
    by Dr Molly on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:56:03 AM EST
    I believe in open debate, lay out the full case for both sides, and let the parents and public decide.

    I mean, should take that approach to issues like global warming too? let the public decide?

    There's no credible scientific link between autism and vaccinations.

    Parent

    Not sure what you mean (5.00 / 1) (#17)
    by brodie on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 12:17:40 PM EST
    by scientifically valid, since the scientists themselves are puzzled about what causes autism, and since the issue involves more than mere dry, isolated scientific inquiry that harms no one but instead is possibly affecting the lives of many thousands of young victims, and will adversely affect society as they grow into adulthood.

    And if the case is so very strong scientifically that a heavy vaccine schedule for young children has no link to autism, why the apparent nervous reluctance about taking that strong case to the public in a way that directly confronts -- and firmly rebuts -- the other side?

    Why not for instance have a full airing about global warming, since so many scientists (rightly, imo) have concluded it is largely anthropogenic and since the trend lines in public opinion in the last 5 yrs or so have been going the other way, towards the denialists?  What would you be so afraid of by putting the denialists rather flimsy case "on trial" before the public?  As a firm g.w./climate change advocate myself, I would welcome such an opportunity to inform the public in an open adversary proceeding.

    Why are you so afraid of stepping up and, in effect, publicly producing the birth certificate, with a public debate which should, according to your confident assertions about the scientific facts supposedly on your side, put the other side to shame?

    Instead, we get presumption of guilt, with no trial and a lot of character assassination emanating from the pharmaceutical side.

    Parent

    The anti-vax case HAS been (5.00 / 5) (#18)
    by observed on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 12:39:24 PM EST
    strongly and publicly rebutted, over and over again.
    The problem is that when the anti-vax charlatans get airtime, CHILDREN DIE.


    Parent
    Particularly now (none / 0) (#19)
    by Militarytracy on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 01:20:38 PM EST
    Pertussis is making a comeback.  They are pretty sure I got it here last winter along with a really bad sinus infection.  My titers suggest I was suffering a current infection or had recently battled one.  I had my shots as a kid :)  Now they offer an adult pertussis vaccination too, but that is a little late for me.  I'll probably still get it.  Man the coughing is terrible though, and it goes on for months and there isn't much that can be done.  Joshua's respiratory system is compromised.  If I had given him pertussis I have no doubt I would have killed him.  He was recently vaccinated though thank God, I was not.  He is now required to have a pertussis booster and be vaccinated for meningitis this summer before he can enter sixth grade and I'm GOOD with that.

    Parent
    Btw, the "anti-vaccine" (none / 0) (#20)
    by brodie on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 02:43:49 PM EST
    case being made, or much of it, has not to do with vaccines per se or their efficacy, but at least the reasonable "anti" case has to do with giving such cumulatively heavy dosages of various types of vaccines all at the same time to small children, which is what happened (as per the standard medical procedure) to the MacNeil grandchild.

    There is a smaller subset of the above group which is anti-vaccine entirely.  That's a different matter.  Afaik, Wakefield isn't so much anti-vaccine as anti-dangerous vaccine or anti-dangerous dosages.

    Parent

    Is there any evidence that (none / 0) (#23)
    by Militarytracy on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:17:53 PM EST
    they give too many at once and it is affecting the children?  If this is the case the fix is easy.  If this is an immune system overload response though, we would be seeing autism developing after immune systems had been taxed in the course of other disease processes.  Doesn't make any sense to me at all in that light.

    One of our friends just had a daughter go through basic training and a nineteen year old going through it with her died.  He got meningitis and he was gone before they could even be certain what he had.....poof, gone......nineteen....physcially fit in every way.  But meningitis vax was optional for him growing up.  

    Parent

    regarding proof: (none / 0) (#26)
    by sj on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:32:45 PM EST
    Let me ask you this:  When your immune system is compromised (in this case, coming into existence) what do you expect to happen, and how do you expect to feel, when your system is shot full of drugs?

    When I adopted my dog (he found us) the vet wouldn't give him his vaccinations until he could confirm that my Boy was already in good health (basically).  What do you expect to happen to these 8 pound, fragile little beings when we shoot them full of a vaccine cocktail?  

    I'm glad I don't have to decide about vaccinations for a child in today's world.  I would want the vaccination.  Just not the whomping megadoses that we now give.

    As for this:

    If this is an immune system overload response though, we would be seeing autism developing after immune systems had been taxed in the course of other disease processes.  

    Has that been studied or are you making an assumption, because I'd like to know.

    Parent

    If an overloaded immune system (none / 0) (#27)
    by Militarytracy on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:40:48 PM EST
    is going to cause autism due to vaccinations, how can it not produce autism as well due to disease that overloads the immune system?

    Parent
    I've read your (none / 0) (#29)
    by sj on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:53:08 PM EST
    sentence several times, but I'm still not sure what you intend to say.  

    Nevertheless, that's not going to stop me from offering up yet another opinion :)

    What I see as a big problem is this.  Every person has different susceptabilities.  One person can smoke for eighty years and die at the age of 95 from the flu.  Another can can acquire lung cancer or heart disease from the same level of smoking and leave behind orphaned children.  We're not all the same.  Conceptually I don't have a problem with setting our standards to protect the most fragile.  I just don't know you determine that.

    Reading your question again:  are you comparing a drug cocktail to contracting an illness?  Because I think those are two different things.  And anyway, how do you know that some children have not presented as autistic after contracting a disease?

    Parent

    I think the idea is (none / 0) (#32)
    by CST on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:54:59 PM EST
    most vaccines are composed of weak strains of diseases, thus your immune system is able to fight it off and learn it.  Or something.

    Parent
    to be entirely fair (none / 0) (#30)
    by CST on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:53:29 PM EST
    we don't know that this doesn't happen.

    Or something.

    The entire world keeps changing drastically, air quality, plastic, new cr@p is introduced to the environment all the time, and we're better at testing than we were 30 years ago.

    It could be any number of environmental factors, or it could be the fact that people are more aware and looking harder.  Then again, it could also be vaccines.

    The way I see it, if we were born 500 years ago we'd be more likely to die young anyway.  $hit happens, and you can't cure all $hit.  Sometimes curing $hit causes $hit, but you still end up with slightly less $hit.  In other words, I'd get the vaccine.

    Parent

    Medical science isn't perfect (none / 0) (#33)
    by Militarytracy on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 05:20:43 PM EST
    But I would think we would have had some reason to investigate it by now, and maybe we already have.  I don't know.  But we know many many things now based on what the people who treat us have been able to deduce and then check out in a clinical setting, and parents who have autistic children are usually as upset and distraught about it as I am over what Joshua's challenges are.  We go over everything in our heads with a fine tooth comb trying to come to terms with the reality.

    If an overloaded immune system caused autism many parents of autistic children who became that way due to a disease process overloaded immune system would be arguing that that is when it took place, the delineation would be more obvious to them than anyone else.  When Joshua was three months old his first military doctor refused to not assume he was also going to suffer from retardation.  When Josh was three months old we had a real swingfest when he brought it up during a checkup :)  I told him that this was my second child, and that combined with all my care of other infants I was pretty certain that Joshua was not exhibiting any retardation.  I could tell from the way he tracked things and focused on things that retardation wasn't likely going to be one of his problems.  The doctor told me my child was too little for me know anything about him...well whatever dude...you are a military doctor so don't expect me to take your medical opinions to the bank :)

    It was previously thought that some children with FSS suffered from retardation when Josh was born, but within three years and the leaps in science where genetics and decoding DNA were concerned we came to understand that the children suffering from a retardation aspect had a completely different gene mutation than the children that were originally diagnosed with FSS.

    Of those who still seemed to qualify as truly having FSS, we also found out that they are really split into three different groups and each group is a different mutation.  Joshua's particular mutation is so small it still can't be detected yet through any DNA testing we currently have.  But his mutation is very rare and funding is scarce, nobody is looking very hard for it right now.  I'm just not biting on any of the vaccine causing autism silliness.  There is no evidence, many many more children have autism and the funds are there for serious research.  I bet they get around to figuring exactly where Josh's mutation is in the genome though before he is an adult.  Unless the toothfairy fails to save our economy and everything goes to hell, then who knows.

    In the light of the enormous new understanding that they have gained about my son, I just cannot for the life of me give any credence to the vaccination arguments.  If they were truly the cause we would have the proof, they have looked and they have the means to check things out like they never have before.

    Parent

    Have you actually read Wakefield? (none / 0) (#42)
    by observed on Fri Apr 29, 2011 at 09:43:25 AM EST


    Parent
    i read a satirical post recently (none / 0) (#14)
    by The Addams Family on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:52:31 AM EST
    about how autism is caused by attachment parenting

    the point of the post was to mimic the same specious reasoning that attributes autism to vaccines

    Parent

    Electro-Swing Thursday (none / 0) (#6)
    by Dadler on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 10:56:43 AM EST
    A fiddle jig, a big beat, and a largely indecipherable voice that sounds kind of like Nina Simone on speed.  This sh*t just gets me moving.  Have a good day, y'all, and a special thought to all our TLers in tornado territory.

    Double dip starts here? (none / 0) (#10)
    by ruffian on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 11:19:20 AM EST
    GDP 1.8% Q12011 Isn't that recession territory if it persists a couple of more quarters? Bernanke is optimistic it won't though, so that makes me feel better.

    From the (none / 0) (#22)
    by sj on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:13:01 PM EST
    ... invaluable Avedon Carol:

    I figure the big reason the Villagers want to kill off older people is because they can still remember what life was like in the United States before a succession of presidents from both parties started dismantling the New Deal. They particularly want to get rid of the last generation to be taught in school what the Constitution and Declaration of Independence were really all about, what our system of government is supposed to do and how it's supposed to work.
    This is hysterical (none / 0) (#24)
    by sj on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 04:18:31 PM EST
    On so many levels.  I'm not sure if I'm laughing at the police or the citizens.

    "I am a burglar, please open the door"

    Under those circumstances I might have opened the door myself :)

    Tallahassee Man Dies After Being Tased (none / 0) (#34)
    by john horse on Thu Apr 28, 2011 at 05:26:04 PM EST
    You can add Kevin Darius Campbell to the list of individuals who have died after being tasered by the police.

    Video shared by Kevin Campbell's sister show paramedics arrived at the Hickory Hills complex Monday night after neighbors say police forcefully moved Campbell from the patrol car.

    "They snatched him up by his feet and when they slung him out the car his head hit the ground, " said witness Lashae Sholt.

    "He was begging for water, telling them plaese please I'm not resisting, Please take the hand cuffs off me, begging for water." said Elpagnier Williams . . .

    Eyewitnesses and neighbors say they are willing to relive the nightmare if it means Campbell will get a fair investigation.

    "They just laid there, with the man on the ground and their knees in the man's back." says Williams.
    Thursday Morning Open Thread | 42 comments (42 topical)

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