Good Lord,

Look how easily and thin-skinned this dermatologist's 'arguments' are.

@harry,

I was going to include Mexico, but got too depressed at the prospect.

The French's docs don't have a financial interest in the imaging centers and labs.

How old is this doc? Maybe he was going to retire in 2014 anyway!

I suggest that Canadians who show up in US medical offices complaining about their wait times, etc. are mostly upper middle class folks who can afford to travel.

It's kind of like some of the first polls that showed Herbert Hoover to be many points ahead of Roosevelt. The reason? The pollsters used the telephone system, which most people could not afford.

The problem with enforcing the Sherman Anti-Trust Act is that the times are more complicated than they once were. Back in the day, the courts only required the "belief" that a business was behaving in a monopolistic manner. But the Act itself doesn't specifically define what is or is not monopolistic behavior (only its outlines) and in the past 30 or 40 years the courts have required more specific guidelines that make it more difficult for bringing successful cases against monopolistic behavior. It is interesting to note that at the time the act was passed many people--perhaps Sherman himself-- thought that the act was merely a political charade that had no real authority or benefit.

@Robert S.: wonder how many Americans can find Earth on a map? :D

@harry, c'mon everyone knows Earth is right there between Pluto and.... Mickey Mouse.

thats not earth, thats Pluto's play-toy.

@rladlof, Nixon not heinous as a president? Sure if you look at all the Presidents ('cept Carter) since him, amazing how our expectations in Presidents seem to continually fall. :-(

I wonder if you can flag your own comments as offensive? I might just have to try it on that last one of mine. :-)

Actually, "head funge" manager sounds as sensible as anything in that territory.

Runaway Paranoid Insanity must cover an awful lot. A little trip down memory lane:

The bombing of Cambodia, the deportation of John Lennon, the enemies list, the plumbers, paraquat, Bebe Rebozo, Spiro (nolo contendre) Agnew, the Saturday Night massacre...just off the top of my head.

@Maxrot: "Circle of Debris found around Uranus" - headline from leftwingwacko.com. @Robert s. re: Nixon: Dont forget the overthrow of Allende in Chile.

Student loans are the new system of indentured servitude. Wage slavery runs an interesting parallel.

There must have been *some* tea party rallies somewhere, for these mocking signs to appear:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/the-best-fake-teabagger-signs-at-the-boston-common

Kucinich: White House Assassination Policy Is Extrajudicial

by Jeremy Scahill

One of the few Democrats to publicly address the issue of government-sanctioned assassinations is Ohio Representative Dennis Kucinich. "I don't support it--period," he said in an interview. "I think people in both parties that are concerned about the Constitution should be speaking out on this. I can't account for what anyone else doesn't do."

Kucinich told The Nation he has sent several letters to the Obama administration raising questions about the potential unconstitutionality of the policy, as well as possible violations of international law, but has received no response. "With all the smart people that are in that administration, they've got to know the risks that they're taking here with violations of law," he says.

Targeted killings are not a new Obama administration policy. Beginning three days after his swearing in, President Obama has authorized scores of lethal drone strikes, including against specific individuals, in Pakistan and Afghanistan, surpassing the Bush era numbers. The elite Joint Special Operations Command maintains a list of individuals, including US citizens, which it is authorized to assassinate. In January, Dana Priest reported in the Washington Post that the CIA had US citizens on an assassination list, but the Post later ran a correction stating that only JSOC had "a target list that includes several Americans." The policy of the CIA targeting al-Awlaki, a US citizen, for assassination, therefore, appeared to be a new development, at least in terms of public awareness of approved government assassinations.

"In the real world, things don't work out quite so neatly as they seem to in the heads of the CIA," says Kucinich. "There's always the possibility of blowback, which could endanger high-ranking US officials. There's the inevitable licensing of rogue groups that comes about from policies that are not strictly controlled and that get sloppy--so you have zero accountability. And that's not even to get into an over-arching issue of the morality of assassination policies, which are extra-constitutional, extra-judicial. It's very dangerous from every possible perspective."

He added: "The assassination policies vitiate the presumption of innocence and the government then becomes the investigator, policeman, prosecutor, judge, jury, executioner all in one. That raises the greatest questions with respect to our constitution and our democratic way of life."

Kucinich remains one of the few members of congress actually concerned with the rule of law. Crimes remain crimes regardless of administration.

re Tea parties: I don't think many people attend them unless there's a big-name demagogue there.

Thom Hartmann

The Loveboat with Louise and Higgins

Portland, Oregon

Dear Mr. Hartmann,

Prior to 1984, I was a deep operative for the goose-stepping Republicans. Our operations were to search and destroy decent, honest, and truthful Democrats.

I did not vote for Reagan in 1984. I became enlightened by listening to Reagan and his pathological lying and I could no longer be a Republican.

As I look back on the Reagan years, he was a total disaster for average and middle class Americans.

Please continue to share with us your truthful insights regarding our elected officials.

Sincerely, gerald

Celebrate Confederacy Month, shoot a separatist today!

@rladlof,

Nixon also created the EPA and signed the Clean Air Act. He also, as I noted previously, resisted calls to implement the Chicago Boys Freidmanesque Shock Treatments that were part of the Chilean experiment.

@harry,

The Allende case is exactly what I was refering to earlier, and yesterday I believe, as well.

@Robert S. maybe thats why i thought of it.

I've put the states of Texas, Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Georgia,South Carolina, Alaska, and North Carolina up on eBay (no reserve). Surprise seccessionists! You're now owned by Goldman Sachs and/or Mexico and Venezuela!

@Maxrot,

He gave Tad Stevens a "get out of jail free" card. Paul Minor and Don Siegelman, not so lucky.

Also, Maxrot, as I posted yesterday, Eric Holder has now indicted whistleblowers, Bradley Birkenfeld USB, and also Thomas Drake for revealing the illegal NSA wiretapping.

What the Whistleblower Prosecution Says About the Obama DOJ

by Glenn Greenwald

The more I think and read about the Obama DOJ's prosecution of NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake, the more I think this might actually be one of the worst steps the Obama administration has taken yet, if not the single worst step -- and that's obviously saying a lot. During the Bush years, in the wake of the NSA scandal, I used to write post after post about how warped and dangerous it was that the Bush DOJ was protecting the people who criminally spied on Americans (Bush, Cheney Michael Hayden) while simultaneously threatening to prosecute the whistle-blowers who exposed misconduct. But the Bush DOJ never actually followed through on those menacing threats; no NSA whistle-blowers were indicted during Bush's term (though several were threatened). It took the election of Barack Obama for that to happen, as his handpicked Assistant Attorney General publicly boasted yesterday of the indictment against Drake.

Aside from the indefensible fact that only crimes committed by high-level Bush officials -- but nobody else -- enjoy the benefits of Obama's "Look Forward, Not Backward" decree, think about the interests being served by this prosecution. Most discussions yesterday suggested that Drake's leaks to The Baltimore Sun's Sibohan Gorman were about waste and mismanagement in the "Trailblazer" project rather than controversial NSA spying activities, but that's not entirely accurate.

Of all the disappointments of the Obama Administration, Holder is one of the most egregious. I mean, no one could expect any differences from Robert Gates, he's a holdover war criminal. Holder is a fresh apologist for aggression and torture.