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Featured Editorials

Open Thread 10/22/21 - The Draft

Submitted by JtC on Fri, 10/22/2021 - 7:00am

I woke up in 1968 when I was 14. I smoked my first weed. I grew my hair long. I became aware. I paid attention to politics for the first time. I saw older guys going off to war. Some didn't come back. I realized what was at stake. I knew what may be in store for me in just a few years. I became an activist.

Here's my original draft card from 1973 (redacted of course) back when my hair was still brown. I was also 3 inches shorter than I am now:

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Middle Class Fantasy

Submitted by fire with fire on Thu, 10/21/2021 - 1:43pm

Middle Class Fantasy

Baby Boomers grew up in a middle class culture and we all were taught to believe that the natural goal of any and all societies is to build and nurture an ever growing middle class. Rich and poor are Others to us. A normal life meant that if you were willing to work, you and your family could live in comfort and security. More importantly, that faith in your ability to attain and retain middle class comfort was supported by our government and our developing national culture of movies, books, magazines and most significantly radio and television.

Spices as Medicines

Submitted by wendy davis on Wed, 10/20/2021 - 4:40pm

(a reprise from 2012, updated in 2016, having added other herbs, foods, and supplements.)

I read news this morning about a new strain of Superbug that is plaguing India; the piece explains the NDM-1 gene and plasmids that allow easy bacterial mutations; more than I can fully grasp in a reading.  (The piece neglects to mention how much the same causes occur in the US, of course.)  But antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains other than MRSA seem to be brewing and causing increasing alarm among health care organizations.  Global pandemics are apparently not unlikely, and finding reliable cures in what they’re calling ‘a post-antibiotic era’ frightening at the very least.   Chief causes seem to be over-prescribed antibiotics, patients historically not having completed the prescribed round of antibiotics, and antibiotics in animal feed.

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