Dear Japan, I hate you, signed Jennifer

Japanese Whale Hunt: A Japanese fleet left for the Antarctic Ocean yesterday with the intention of killing more than 1,000 whales, including 50 of the endangered humpback whales protected by an international moratorium since 1963. Japan argues that whaling provides value material for research into whale stocks, and that whale populations are at sustainable levels. Hideki Moronuki, whaling chief at the Japan Fisheries Agency, said humpback whales in our research are rapidly recovering Junichi Sato, spokesman for Greenpeace Japan, said "this is not about research," and charged that most of the whale meat will end up in Japanese pubs and supermarkets

A Private Hatred

I'm furious with someone. I really want to vent about it. But the problem is that it's not very mature to bitch about someone publicly when it will most likely get back to them.
This kind of brings me to wonder about blogging ethics, what to write, or avoid writing. Is a blog more like gossip on the bathroom wall, or writing an article for a newspaper or keeping a diary? Each kind of writing has different rules.
If the blog is my diary and I slam someone in it, and that person is mad, then is that their problem for reading my inner thoughts? Do you open my blog at your own peril? It can't be like the bathroom wall, because even if I don't have my name attached to this blog really, most of the people who read this know who I am. If it was a diary, then you wouldn't be reading this at all because it would be on a piece of paper in a book under my mattress, with one of those funny little locks on it.
I always admire the way that Linny can talk about her feelings and issues she's having with other people without revealing too much, it's deliciously cryptic. But when I do anything like that it doesn't seem nearly so interesting, perhaps it's just not possible to find oneself interesting?
Anyway, if you're reading this, and you're wondering if it's you that I'm mad at, it's probably not and I wouldn't really worry about it, I'm not planning on sending ninjas to any one's house or anything. I just kind of wish that I believed in an afterlife so that I could believe that the person I'm pissed at would get some kind of punishment for what they've done.

I *heart* Stephen Lewis

UN agency hampers AIDS fight: Stephen Lewis

Feb 27, 2007 03:18 PM
Michelle Nichols
Reuters

UNITED NATIONS – The U.N. drug control watchdog is hindering efforts to fight the global AIDS pandemic and the agency should be independently reviewed, human rights groups and a former U.N. AIDS envoy said Tuesday.

The Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, the Open Society Institute and Stephen Lewis, a former U.N. special envoy for AIDS in Africa, accused the 13-member International Narcotics Control Board of enforcing drug policies that ignore public health.

"If I had it in my grasp I would take them out behind the international woodshed and give them an intellectual and rhetorical flogging, the like of which they would never forget," Lewis told a news conference.

A report by the groups said one third of HIV infections outside of Africa were caused by injection drug use and while the U.N. board acknowledged drug use was accelerating the spread of the disease in some countries, it failed to encourage any preventive action.

The report, "Closed to Reason," said the International Narcotics Control Board, established in 1968, had not only ignored the public health implications of drug use, but discredited "effective programs" such as sterile syringe exchanges and the use of methadone as an addiction treatment.

"It's as though the HIV/AIDS conjunction has passed the International Narcotics Control Board right by," Lewis said. "They are aligning themselves with the virus rather than opposing it determinedly."

Lewis, a Canadian, also told of how while he was former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's special envoy on AIDS in Africa between 2001 and 2006, he voiced support for safe drug injection rooms.

He said the control board complained to Annan about his comments. "The fact that they would write a letter attempting to silence a critic is a demonstration of how out of control the International Narcotics Control Board is," Lewis said.

The Vienna-based International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) is an independent judicial body elected by U.N. members that monitors the implementation of international drug control conventions. A spokesman was not available for comment.

Nearly 40 million adults and children in 2006 lived with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, with more than 25 million in Africa alone, U.N. figures show.

"Millions at risk of HIV in Eastern Europe and Asia can benefit from drug policy that works in tandem with public health," said Daniel Wolfe, deputy director of the Open Society Institute's international harm reduction development program.

"Alleviation of human suffering is one portion of the international conventions that the INCB has done strikingly little to uphold," he said.

I hate the VP

I hate vice presidents. Not one VP in particular, not political VPs - although Dick Cheney can kiss my ass. I'm talking about corporate vice presidents. Almost every time I have a problem with someone at work it's a vice president. For example, there was one office I worked at years ago where the VP was an asshole to me every day, the guy made no secret of his dislike for me. This was an office where we would go out for drinks on Friday nights after work and the company would pay for it. I used to go out with the office crowd have a few drinks and then meet up with my own friends and go dancing. One Friday night, I invited a couple of the girls from the office to come dancing too. And that VP, who treated me so terribly, drunkenly hopped in the cab with us when we were leaving bar where we'd been drinking with the office crowd. The guy, the VP, was getting married in a couple of weeks, and was hitting on one of the girls from the office so badly that she decided to leave early. When we got to the bar things took at turn for the worse when the drunken VP got out on the dance floor and started dancing, terribly. Then he started to take off his shirt and ended up dancing on a riser twirling his shirt over his head showing all the world his moley pot-bellied body. And it wasn't the kind of bar where that kind of behaviour would be a regular occurrence either.
Now that's an extraordinary case of bad VPism, but generally, I think the problem is that the VPs don't feel secure in their position of authority. They want their asses kissed, and I'm not a very good ass kisser. I'm more of a 'we're just all folks' kind of a person at work. This goes over with the president of a company, generally, because the novelty of having their asses kissed has worn off. But the VPs are like silver medalists in the Olympics. I read a study that said that Olympic gold and bronze medal winners are generally very happy with the results and feel satisfied with their achievements. The gold winners, for obvious reasons, and the bronze, because they are pleased with getting on the medal podium at all. But the silver winners generally had a much lower level of satisfaction, because they didn't just squeak into the medal standings like the bronze winners and they didn't get the top spot like the gold winners. This is the VP situation perfectly. You have some power over your own staff, but you're not the boss and so you need someone to reaffirm your bossliness, so you pick on the little guy, the low man on the totum pole.
I've been thinking a lot about that this week after one of the VPs at my new office complained to my boss that I wasn't deferential enough towards her. Not that I was rude to her, because I wasn't, but that I wasn't deferential enough! I'd be embarrassed in this day and age to ever say such a thing. Anyway, I like my new job OK, and the rest of the people here are fine except for the VP who wants me to grovel.
So this morning it's my turn to go into the office early and open, the Christmas party was last night - I didn't go, and I'm creeping in about 5 minutes late, thinking no one will be there before me because they're all at home sleeping it off. Unfortunately, to get to my desk from the back door, I have to walk through the executive hallway. So I'm walking along looking into every office to see if anyone is there to notice my tardiness and as I'm looking the other way I walk past the office of the VP who wants me to be more deferential, and I hear "Hello!" Not the 'good morning, nice to see you kind of hello, but the kind of hello you'd say to a waitress who had been ignoring you for 45 minutes. Chilling, busted, awful.
I usually have someone in the office that I love to hate, my office nemesis. But that position has already been filled by someone much more fun to hate. I don't like hating the VP at all. So I'm putting her, and all other VPs, 'On Notice.'

Stockwell Day, you're on notice

Jesus Christ! What the fuck is Stockwell Day's problem? Does he have any idea how much it costs our health care system to care for a person with AIDS or Hep C? Prisonners get tattoos, that's what they do, why on earth would you take away a successful program to teach inmates a trade, so that they can get a career when they get out of jail, and prevent so many people from catching nasty, expensive diseases.

I'm sure everyone who has ever read this blog, or listened to me talk for more than 5 minutes, knows that I am down on tattooing and piercing. In fact, it's kind of surprising that I haven't put tattooing and piercing 'on notice', and I may yet, because, the skin is, afterall, the first line of defense against infection. But this is one situation where I think we, as a nation, need to spend some money and get some people tattooed. It's called harm reduction Doris! If you don't know what that is, look it up! Are you going to cancel needle exchange programs for drug addicts next? Probably.

I hate you Sockwell Day, I hope you get AIDS and Hep C. I'm being lenient by putting you on notice, only because I expect that you'll piss me off some more and I'll wait until then to make you 'dead to me.'

What the heck is a Public Safety Minister anyway? The Tories suck.

Tories end funding for prison tattoo parlours
Last Updated: Monday, December 4, 2006 12:22 PM ET
The Canadian Press
The Conservative government is cutting a safe-tattoo program for federal prisoners despite concerns the move will increase the spread of AIDS and hepatitis C.

Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day announced Monday that the government would not continue a pilot project that offered tattoos to inmates.

"Our government will not spend taxpayers' money on providing tattoos for convicted criminals," Day said.

"Our priority is to have an effective federal corrections system that protects Canadians, while providing inmates with access to acceptable health-care and treatment programs."

Supporters of the pilot project said the move is a mistake. They argue that safe tattooing saves millions of dollars in health care and social costs by reducing the number of AIDS and hepatitis C cases.

Day said Corrections Canada, in partnership with Health Canada and outside organizations, would continue to run health and education programs to help reduce the transmission of infectious diseases.

Tattoo parlours at six federal prisons across Canada have been sitting idle since the one-year project ended Sept. 30.

The $600,000 project was aimed at reducing the spread of AIDS and hepatitis C by providing safe tattooing using clean needles.

Inmates are up to 10 times more likely to contract HIV, the virus that leads to AIDS, than the general population. Their likelihood of contracting hepatitis C is also about 30 times higher.

Hepatitis C is a blood-born virus that often attacks the liver and can be fatal. One of the most common methods of transmission is getting a tattoo from equipment that is unsanitary or was used earlier on an infected person.

The pilot program educated inmates about safe tattooing while also training selected inmates on infectious diseases and infection prevention. Selected prisoners were also trained to perform tattoos on fellow inmates.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation hailed the move, calling the project a waste of taxpayers' money.

The federation estimated the annual cost to taxpayers to expand the program to all 58 federal correctional facilities at $5.8 million, plus $2.6 million in startup costs.

South Dakota's reprieve....

I don't know if it's really kosher to take someone off the 'Dead To Me' list. But this is certainly an extraordinary circumstance. Not only did the Democrats take control of the house and the senate while I was away, but South Dakota's referendum resulted in a repeal of the abortion ban. I think I'm happier about the abortion thing than the larger defeat of the Republicans. I'm not sure if it's that it's too big to process the implications of the entire election, or if I've maybe written off the Democrats too. Anyway, I'm taking you off the 'Dead To Me' list, South Dakota, but mind your manners, because one wrong move and you're right back up there!

South Dakota voters say `No' to abortion ban

Nov. 10, 2006. 01:00 AM

LYNDA HURST

FEATURE WRITER

Nationwide, the war in Iraq may have dominated the U.S. mid-term elections, but in the conservative heartland of South Dakota, the issue was women's access to abortion. Guaranteed by the United States Supreme Court in 1973, the right has been under growing attack since George W. Bush became president and the religious right began a systematic campaign to overturn it.But South Dakota voters said a clear "No" on Tuesday to a sweeping state law passed in March that banned virtually all abortions. It made no exception in cases of rape or incest or for women facing serious health problems — only those at risk of dying.Voters rejected the ban by 56 per cent to 44 per cent.The wide margin of victory surprised and delighted Sarah Stoesz, head of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America division covering South Dakota, which spearheaded the anti-ban campaign."It's doubly heartening because we beat the ban in a pro-life, extremely conservative, not liberal, state," says Stoesz."People have had enough of cynical wedge issues like this aimed at distracting them from the real problems this country faces."Access to abortion in South Dakota has been steadily eroded in recent years, with its Republican legislature passing five laws limiting its provision in 2005 alone. The result was that no state doctors were willing to perform the procedure. Instead, four physicians had to fly in from Minnesota once a week to the state's only clinic, run by Planned Parenthood. The latest all-encompassing ban would have meant those doctors faced five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.The law was due to come into effect in July but was put on hold after a hastily created coalition of opponents called Campaign for Healthy Families collected double the required number of signatures to force a referendum in the congressional elections. "This is a David and Goliath story," says a jubilant Kate Looby, director of Planned Parenthood's South Dakota office. "We were up against pro-life groups that have been well-organized for 30 years, but volunteers come out of the woodwork."People who had never been politically active on any issue, let alone abortion, knocked on doors, ran phone banks and put up more than 7,500 lawn signs, says Looby. "I never could have imagined that a year ago."But South Dakotans, she adds, reject a lot of government involvement in their personal lives. "When voters realized the truth of the law, that it made no exception for rape or incest, they decided they didn't want government making that kind of decision."Had the ban not been rejected, a legal challenge almost certainly would have been mounted, forcing a showdown at the Supreme Court over its landmark Roe vs. Wade decision giving women the right to choose termination. Given Bush's appointment to the court this year of two conservative judges, no one relished the prospect.Similar laws introduced last spring in 11 other Republican states were set aside pending the outcome of the South Dakota ballot. Melody Drnach, vice-president of the National Organization for Women, suspects they'll now never see the light of day."State legislatures have just been told how Americans feel about the right to reproductive freedom. I hope they hear the message: the public will not stand by you when you write extremely harmful laws against women."On the other hand, South Dakota's Republican governor Mike Rounds, who introduced the controversial abortion ban, was handily re-elected.

Iceland, you're on notice!

Iceland kills fin whale, breaks ban

Commercial hunt outlawed in 1986

Species on list of endangered animals

Oct. 23, 2006. 05:35 AM

REYKJAVIK—Iceland has broken a global moratorium on commercial whaling, killing an endangered fin whale for the first time since the 1980s, the Icelandic media reported yesterday. Iceland's RUV television showed footage of a large fin whale being towed by the Hvalur 9 whaling boat. It said the whale was harpooned in the North Atlantic about 320 kilometres west of Iceland. Iceland announced last week it would resume commercial whaling, ignoring a worldwide moratorium that came into effect in 1986. Fisheries Minister Einar Kristinn Gudfinnsson said his ministry would issue licences to kill nine fin whales and 30 of the more numerous minke whales in the year ending Aug. 31, 2007. The announcement was condemned by conservation groups and many governments around the world, but praised by pro-whaling Norway and Japan. The International Fund for Animal Welfare's Joth Singh called the hunt "cruel and unnecessary." Icelanders have been hunting whales since the days of the Vikings, but stopped commercial whaling in 1985, and scientific whaling in 1989, under the international moratorium on commercial hunts. It resumed scientific whaling in 2003. Japan, Iceland, Norway and other pro-whaling states have been pushing the International Whaling Commission to revoke the 1986 ban on commercial hunts amid controversy over exactly how many whales are left in the world's oceans. At an IWC meeting in June, those countries passed a symbolic resolution to support ending the moratorium. Officially ending the ban would require a 75 per cent majority among commission members. Fin whales are on the International Conservation Union's "red list" of endangered species, but Iceland says they are plentiful in its coastal waters. Iceland's fisheries ministry said this week that there are more than 43,000 minke whales and 25,000 fin whales in Icelandic coastal waters, adding limited commercial hunting was "consistent with the principle of sustainable development."

Congratulations Dr. Yunus!

Poverty fighter wins Nobel peace prize

Oct. 13, 2006. 06:38 AM

DOUG MELLGREN

ASSOCIATED PRESS

OSLO, Norway (AP) — Bangladeshi microcredit pioneer Muhammad Yunus and his Grameen Bank were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for their work in advancing economic and social opportunities for the poor, particularly women.

The economist and the bank he founded will share the prize. They were cited for their efforts to help “create economic and social development from below” in their home country by using innovative economic programs such as microcredit lending.

Grameen Bank has been instrumental in helping millions of poor Bangladeshis, many of them women, improve their standard of living by letting them borrow small sums to start businesses.

Loans go toward buying items such as cows to start a dairy, chickens for an egg business, or mobile phones to start businesses where villagers who have no access to phones pay a small fee to make calls.

“Every single individual on earth has both the potential and the right to live a decent life. Across cultures and civilizations, Yunus and Grameen Bank have shown that even the poorest of the poor can work to bring about their own development,” the Nobel Committee said in its citation.

Reached by the Nobel foundation, Yunus was excited about winning the prize.

“I’m absolutely delighted. I cannot believe that it has really happened,” he said by telephone. “Everyone was telling me that I would get the prize but it came as a surprise. It is fantastic news for the people that have supported us.”

Yunus has drawn praise for advancing microcredit, which has been credited with helping poor women to advance their lives and pull them out of poverty.

Microcredit is the extension of small loans, typically $50 to $100, to entrepreneurs too poor to qualify for traditional bank loans.

Ole Danbolt Mjoes, chairman of the committee, told The Associated Press that Yunus’ efforts have had visible results.

“We are saying microcredit is an important contribution that cannot fix everything, but is a big help,” Mjoes said, adding that Yunus is a “smart guy. He is creative. His head is in the right place.”

Mjoes recounted that Yunus himself lent $30, divided among 42 people, in 1976, to help them buy weaving stools.

“Then they got the weaving stools quickly, they started to weave quickly and they repaid him quickly,” he said.

In its citation, the committee noted that “economic growth and political democracy can not achieve their full potential unless the female half of humanity participates on an equal footing with the male,” the committee said.

Grameen Bank, which was founded by Yunus, provides credit to ``the poorest of the poor” in rural Bangladesh, without any collateral, according to its website.

“At GB, credit is a cost effective weapon to fight poverty and it serves as a catalyst in the overall development of socio-economic conditions of the poor who have been kept outside the banking orbit on the ground that they are poor and hence not bankable,” the committee said.

The bank claims to have 6.6 million borrowers, 97 per cent of whom are women, and provides services in more than 70,000 villages in Bangladesh.

Yunus and the bank will share in the $1.6 million prize as well as a gold medal and diploma.

The announcement that Yunus and the bank had won was a surprise to many pundits and oddsmakers.

Late speculation on the prize had settled comfortably upon former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari for brokering an August 2005 peace deal with Indonesia’s government and Aceh separatists.

Other contenders, at least in the public domain, included Chinese dissident Rebiya Kadeer who has fought for the rights of Uighur Muslims in China and Chechen lawyer Lydia Yusupova.

The five-member awards committee never says who is being considered only offering up the number of nominees it has received. This year, 191 nominations were received.

But the decision was in line with the committee’s goal of encouraging ongoing processes or human rights efforts rather than rewarding completed ones like Aceh or Cambodia.

The peace prize was the sixth and last Nobel prize announced this year. The others, for physics, chemistry, medicine, literature and economics, were announced in Stockholm, Sweden.

Burka-style hospital gowns help patients to cover up

I'm all for offering choices to make people more comfortable, and I have never understood why those hospital gowns have to be so brief, and I'd sure as heck ask for the head to toe hospital gowns if they were available here. But here's what I don't get, why didn't they do this before, how come they didn't do this to be sensitive to me, and the rest of the non-denominational types, who just don't want their ass hanging out the back of their outfit? How come hospitals and other organizations are only sensitive to religious groups? Do I have to start my own religion to get what I want? If so, then I'm going to start a religion that requires services to be offered that allow my adherents to be as modest as the want, also we need for food options to be available that don't contain any of the things we are allergic to, or don't like, and it's one of our commandments that abortions should be freely available to us. I'll hammer out the rest of the commandments later.

Tue, 05 Sep 2006

Head-to-toe hospital gowns will be offered to patients whose culture or religion requires more modest clothing than the traditional, drafty design, two British hospitals announced Tuesday.

A staff member at Lancashire Teaching Hospitals in northwestern England designed the full-length gowns.

"I noticed a gap in the market and thought that it would be great if there was a gown that helped to preserve a patient's modesty," said Karen Jacob, linen services manager for the hospital's trust foundation, which designed the product.

The trust runs two hospitals, the Royal Preston, and the Chorley and South Ribble, where the gowns will be available starting Nov. 1.

The feedback from patients has been positive, said Jacob, and other hospitals have said they want to stock the Inter-Faith gown.

Muslim women can adjust the gown to show their faces or only the eyeline, she added.

Other manufacturers are designing longer hospital gowns with privacy in mind, while also eliminating steel snaps that interfere with X-ray or MRI machines.

Blanco signs law that would ban abortions

Sat Jun 17, 9:35 PM ET

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - Louisiana Democratic Gov. Kathleen Blanco signed into law a ban on most abortions, which would be triggered if the U.S. Supreme Court overturns its 1973 ruling legalizing the procedure, a spokesman said on Saturday.

The ban would apply to all abortions, even in cases of rape or incest, except when the mother's life is threatened. It is similar to a South Dakota law that has become the latest focus of the abortion battle.

The South Dakota law was enacted partly to invite a court challenge in the hope a more conservative Supreme Court would overturn its Roe v. Wade decision that established a woman's right to abortion.

The Louisiana ban would take effect if Roe v. Wade is overturned. Medicaid, which provides health benefits for the poor and disabled, requires funding for abortions in cases of rape or incest. Louisiana would allow those exceptions so long as it was required for Medicaid funding.

Seven states have such abortion trigger laws, and Louisiana already had a trigger law, although abortion legislation has been blocked by courts. The new law would mean the ban would happen quicker in the case of a new Supreme Court decision.

Blanco cited "overwhelming" support for the bill in the state Legislature.

"The central provision of the bill supports and reflects my personal beliefs," she said in a statement, adding she had hoped for legislation with exceptions for rape and incest.

Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards said lawmakers were focused on the wrong thing, especially as the state rebuilds from Hurricane Katrina, which devastated New Orleans last August.

"It is hard to believe that by passing this ban they are addressing what is most on the minds of most of the citizens of Louisiana," she told Reuters.

Most U.S. states have some limits on abortion linked to gestation of the fetus and often based on viability, essentially the ability to live outside the womb.

Take that, state government of Florida!

Gay storks make good parents
Four gay storks have proved they are as capable of raising a family as their heterosexual counterparts.
Staff at the zoo in Overloon, near Eindhoven, were unsure if the gay and lesbian storks would still have the same natural urge to raise offspring.
But after giving one egg to a pair of gay males to sit on, and another two eggs to a pair of lesbian storks, they say the gay storks took to parenthood straight away.
Zoo spokeswoman Esther Jansen said all three chicks had hatched successfully: "The gay storks look after the eggs and the chicks just as well as our heterosexual birds."

Low tech solutions to third world problems

Neoprene suit helps prevent deaths in childbirth, study finds
Last Updated Mon, 27 Feb 2006 17:26:39 EST
CBC News
A low-tech suit could potentially help to prevent a major cause of death among women who give birth in developing countries, a new study suggests.

The neoprene suit is designed to restore blood flow to vital organs of women in shock because of bleeding during childbirth.

Hemorrhaging accounts for more than one-third of the more than 500,000 maternal deaths worldwide each year due to childbirth.
During childbirth, blood can pool in the mother's legs and abdomen, reducing blood flow – and vital oxygen – to the brain, heart and lungs.

Researchers tested if the reusable lightweight suit could help prevent such problems in a pilot study of 364 women in Egypt.

The suit – known as the non-pneumatic, anti-shock garment, or NASG – is designed to push blood back up to vital organs to keep a woman alive until she can be treated in hospital. The NASG resembles the bottom half of a wetsuit.

The 206 women who wore the suit during the study lost half as much blood compared with 158 women who received the standard treatment for bleeding.

"The NASG shows promise for management of obstetric haemorrhage, particularly in lower-resource settings," the team concluded.

The suit includes five segments tightened with Velcro to shunt blood to vital organs. It is a variation on a suit used by emergency medical technicians in the U.S. to transport patients with lower-body trauma.
"In our research, women who appeared clinically dead, with no blood pressure and no palpable pulse, were resuscitated and kept alive for up to two days while waiting for blood transfusions," said Suellen Miller, a maternal health expert at the University of California, San Francisco, who conducted the pilot study.
The suit tested in Egypt can be applied by anyone and no medical training is needed, Miller said in a release.

Larger studies on the suit are planned.

Uncontrolled bleeding accounts for about 30 per cent of the more than 500,000 maternal deaths worldwide during childbirth, nearly all in poor countries, according to the researchers.

The study appear in the Feb. 27 online issue of the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.