On the other hand, the biggest hazard facing a cyber warrior is likely to be the morning commute.
There are a lot of computer attacks that must be done from inside a network, either because it isn't connected to anything else or because firewalls are good enough to stop outside attacks. This might require being on the ground somewhere that being shot at is possible.
The solution is to relax the physical requirements, not toss them out completely. The military could allow someone to join who doesn't meet standards, but every year after that, they would have to get closer to the standard, and maybe even eventually meet the same ones as every other soldier.
It would make more sense to have different divisions/etc for different purposes. You can't pilot a fighter jet safely in combat without excellent vision, but that doesn't mean that you can't refuel one without excellent vision, or plan a mission back at the Pentagon, or maybe even ferry one across the ocean. The solution to that isn't to insist that air force members steadily improve their vision either. You just don't let people without good vision become combat fighter pilots.
By all means have squads that are intended for infiltration, and they should have strict requirements, of which fitness is just one. The guys who set up their laptops don't need to meet the same requirements, and they're probably even more important to the mission since I doubt that the infiltrators are going to write their software from scratch while in the middle of an enemy facility. They may very well have to improvise, but if they don't have the right equipment they'll do as well as a special forces soldier with a gun that doesn't work.
Sure, and for somebody who is forward-deployed the physical standards make a lot more sense, along with the rest of basic training, weapons proficiency, etc.
Somebody else pointed out that they really should tailor the requirements to the job, and not to the person. If the job required being able to run a mile in n minutes, then make those the requirements, and don't relax them for different genders, age, etc. If the job doesn't require that, then don't require it.
I imagine that you'd want some groups that are purely domestic-based, and you might want other "special operations" cyber warfare groups that are actually designed to be deployable. That shouldn't be done just so that the general can admire his tent full of guys with laptops - it should be done because the mission requires it (maybe the enemy is jamming satellite communications so nobody can talk to the USA and you need guys to mount "cyber attacks" locally. That certainly doesn't describe any situation the US has been in recently, but...
The *best* would have no problem spending 30 minutes a day (or even every other day) for a month or so to meet those minimal requirements. Especially if you actually *wanted* the job - if not, then who cares? All it takes is a very small amount of willpower and commitment, something the Army should be looking for.
So your point is to require arbitrary commitments in order to weed out people who don't waste their time doing pointless work because they're desperate to have the job? I'm not sure that you're going to find a lot of great candidates for your "cyber warrior" division.
The thing is that the typical "cyber warrior" probably isn't some kid who doesn't have any other options (especially if they don't want to recruit people with criminal backgrounds, etc). If you want the best then it is the employer who really needs to be bending over backwards to prove that they have the willpower and commitment to hire the best. If you merely want mediocre to less, then by all means make your candidates jump through hoops, in this case almost literally.
If you are in your early 20's and otherwise pass the basic health requirements, but can't do a dozen push ups in 2 minutes or stand for an hour, you probably should *not* be in the Army.
We're talking about a "cyber warfare" division of the Army. Your statement is like saying that grunts who don't know what an opcode is probably should *not* be in the Army. Both types belong in the new Army, but not in the same roles.
If you don't have any other health issues besides being so out of shape you can't accomplish those, then yes, I think spending the month or so it would take to get in a bit better shape to pass it would be a good sign of someone who might actually take pride and responsibility in their work.
You're more than welcome to think that. You may even take pride and responsibility in your work. Clearly though you're not a very good judge of character, though, so you'd definitely not be on my interview team.:)
If you want to know whether somebody takes pride in their work, then take a look at their work. Now, if the job you're hiring them for is highly physical, then their muscles will be a part of that work. If you're hiring a baker, then you probably should be caring more about whether they spend their spare time making cakes.:)
> Well, if that alone isn't cause for concern, I don't know what is
Given that young people are arrested for possession of alcohol if they're under 21, for driving with an expired license, or for insisting on filming police at a peaceful protest on a public street, it's not shocking.
Sure, and I wasn't suggesting that the problem was that the right sort of people weren't being born. I doubt the population of newborns today is somehow less virtuous than those who were born 50 years ago. The problem obviously lies in the laws, and by extension the public school system and the parents.
Playing a musical instrument is often correlated with intelligence
Correlated with things that have arbitrarily been deemed to be intelligence, you mean. There's a difference.
Sure, and correlation also is of limited importance as well. But, I imagine that asking a candidate to play a song is about as useful a predictor of job performance as asking them to do pushups.
AFAIK they recruit excellent engineers that meet their fitness requirements so what is so different about the USA?
Well, do you want the best, or do you merely want "excellent?" There can only be 10 top-10 anythings in the world, and maybe they aren't good at pushups?
I couldn't tell you what if any differences exist in the current physical standards between the branches of the US military.
So they are looking for pasty scrawny geeks to fly their drones?
Hardly. I believe that they require drone pilots to be qualified as ordinary aircraft pilots, and they make them wear flight suits while they're piloting drones.
Idiotic, but it is a culture thing. There is certainly an overlap of skills in piloting a drone and a manned aircraft, but there are lots of things exclusive to either. Maybe your next ace drone pilot is afraid of heights and you wash him out in training.:)
FYI, doing a few push-ups is not working out. It's a basic functionality your body should have. Like standing or walking for extended periods.
Not everybody can stand or walk for extended periods either.
You're of course welcome to choose what sorts of people you hang around with. I certainly don't find it difficult to gain employment, or socialize with colleagues.
Don't get me wrong - having physical requirements for anybody who is deployed anywhere near a combat zone or who is responsible for providing physical security is a no-brainer. If the mission requires having a "cyber warrior" join a team that will infiltrate some facility then they certainly should be able to meet the physical qualifications, use a gun, etc.
When I enlisted in 1990 you only had to be able to complete something like 13 pushups to be assigned to a basic training unit.
I'd have failed that.
Really? I'm 45, overweight, horribly out of shape, and even I can do 13 pushups. What the hell was wrong with you?
Perhaps you should ask somebody who knows something about physiology. I was not diagnosed with any medical abnormalities that I'm aware of. I can't say when the last time I tried to do a pushup was, but I doubt I could do 13 of them today.
I don't know how old you are, but 13 pushups is not a lot. I'm 59 and have no problem doing twice that many.
I'd probably have a hard time doing one, and I'm not obese (for whatever BMI is worth). I have no problem doing stuff with software, math, and the physical sciences that 99.99% of the population who can do a pushup probably couldn't do with a year of coaching. I'm hardly the brightest coder around, either.
You have to choose your priorities if you want the "best" for a particular job. Do you want the best, or the best of what's left?
Basic physical fitness helps with a lot of things, mental acuity included.
Well, if what you care about is mental acuity, then why not just measure that? Playing a musical instrument is often correlated with intelligence, but I've yet to be asked to bring an instrument to a job interview.
"a lot of time" in this case equal about six weeks of try to do 13 push ups a day. You're literally disqualifying yourself because you don't want to spend two hours TOTAL exercising.
Somehow I doubt it takes only two hours total. But, whatever. Honestly, I could really care less whether I can do a pushup.:) My current employer doesn't really have a problem with that, and I don't have a problem with accepting their paycheck.
The U.S. high school graduation rate is 80%. About 30% of the population have been arrested.
Well, if that alone isn't cause for concern, I don't know what is. Think about the implications of that in a society where you have a good chance of being unemployable even if you have a college degree...
When I enlisted in 1990 you only had to be able to complete something like 13 pushups to be assigned to a basic training unit.
I'd have failed that. Sure, I probably could have spent a lot of time working out and gotten to that point, but what's the point?
Anytime you introduce a selective pressure for one attribute, you're unwittingly selecting AGAINST other attributes. Do you want the best "cyber warrior" you can find, or the best "cyber warrior" who also happens to be able to do 13 pushups too? If the bad guys aren't so picky, she might find herself outclassed...
And it's not as if this isn't for good reason either - the Army learned some hard lessons in the Korean war with out of shape soldiers; and if anything, the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have further blurred the lines are between combat and non-combat MOS's.
I can buy that if you're talking about somebody who is in a supply train which is vulnerable to attack.
On the other hand, the biggest hazard facing a cyber warrior is likely to be the morning commute.
That will allow them to identify you, but it won't help them at all in confiscating your assets, which is what he was talking about. Also, he never said that he was violating the law, and the whole point of this article is that the IRS can go after you even if you don't violate the law.
If the IRS wants to seize your bitcoins then they'll either need to find your unencrypted wallet, or ask you to give it to them. Compelling you to do the latter requires a court order, which is something they don't need to seize all your cash. It is the difference between you having to get something back vs you having to avoid giving something away.
You don't have to present a certificate to the server?
You can initiate SSL/TLS where by the only party presenting a certificate is the server to the client.
Read my post again.:)
I had to switch from delivering my mail to Gmail via SMTP to having Gmail poll my POP3 server. In the first model Gmail is presenting me with the certificate. In the new model, I'm presenting them with the certificate. They don't trust my certificate, so they refuse to use TLS. Thus, I end up having to have them retrieve my mail unencrypted.
Just another case where the SSL trust model results in less security.
This story seems like click bait the way it just leaves it as a cliffhanger. so you bombarded an aluminum plate and.... a superhero aluminum man emerged? what what?.... how did this submission get promoted to a front page story? I'm surprised it did not end with "your jaw will drop when you see what happened next".
Just bad journalism. If you have to read more than 3 sentences to get to the end of the story, then you're reading an advertisement, not an article or an abstract. Journalists are paid by their subscribers to save them the trouble of going out and getting the story themselves. Advertisers are paid to generate interest, not to satiate it. The problem is that slashdot is supposed to be about doing the former to sell the latter, but it has become about doing the latter to sell even more of the latter.
Lol. Its not like the republicans can't just change it when they have control of the senate.
Yup. I don't get why people act like the whole cloture thing is some kind of constitutional guarantee. Committees, rules, cloture, etc are all just traditions. Anybody with a majority could choose to get rid of every congressional committee overnight, or remove all members of the opposing party, or whatever they want to do. The purpose of those committees is supposed to be to facilitate getting bills passed (ie make sure that there is something close to consensus on a bill before tying up the whole Congress in debate). They aren't supposed to exist so that a few congressmen can basically have a pre-veto on any legislation.
All the constitution requires for a judge to be appointed is a majority vote. I don't think the founders ever really intended the Supreme Court to be this body where people serve for 40 years and huge wars get fought over which partisan side the 4-3 majority falls on. Lower courts are supposed to be even less political.
Most promising EBOLA vaccine currently in human trials was developed in Canada, another single-payer country.
Lots of drugs are developed by non-US companies. They make all their profits selling them in the US, just like US companies do.
If the US instituted price-controls on pharmaceuticals it would hit the bottom lines of the likes of GSK just as fast as it hit the bottom line of Pfizer. The location of a large company's headquarters has very little impact on anything other than how it manipulates its taxes/earnings/etc. Large companies source from the entire planet, and sell to the entire planet. The main exception to this are companies that are heavily subsidized by a national government, but I don't think that pharmaceuticals generally fall into this category (sure, they benefit from the fruits of government R&D, but for the most part countries don't target particular companies with their grants and few of those grants actually directly go to a pharma company - more often some academic lab does the government-funded R&D and licenses it to the highest bidder).
I wouldn't put medical procedures in the same bucket as pills. The latter are more like products - patented and sold around the world. The former tends to less commercial in nature unless it is connected to some kind of medical device or pill. If you publish how to perform a surgery, it is very hard to make any money off of it beyond your regular fees for performing the surgery (you'd probably make more than the average doctor if you're prestigious, but not like you would if you got paid a share of the cost every time anybody anywhere did the procedure).
So, the fact that this cell transplant was demonstrated in a country with socialized medicine is significant - I just wouldn't use pharma as an analogy. Actually, socialized medicine might be the perfect place for improvements in procedures - the government paying for the R&D is the party that saves money on paying for less-effective treatments and accommodations.
And, not intending to completely contradict everything I just said, Ebola is also a bit of an unusual case in the drug world. For various reasons it would probably be hard to make money off of an Ebola vaccine. However, socialized medical systems still benefit from having it in the bag of tricks. I would argue that in the case of non-profitable medications that a socialized medical system may very well outpace a for-profit system for investment. Just don't expect them to come out with the next Viagra.
If the CDC had descended on the hospital like a ton of bricks and the first inkling of Ebola they might have prevented most of that from happening then people would be complaining about Federal overreach.
No argument there, but this is really broken. This is a matter of interest to everybody in the country - it really can't be left up to the local hospital to have the final say. It makes no sense to have a system where New York is super-rigorous about Ebola but we'll go ahead and let Oklahoma become a huge pool of carriers because they don't want to spend too much money on this. Since the US has no restrictions on travel/etc internally the US population is going to be as well-off as the lowest level of care we give to somebody who is infected. Your million-dollar-a-year health insurance plan is worthless if some guy making minimum wage shows up to the local fast food joint and sneezes on your burger despite being symptomatic with Ebola because he doesn't have health insurance and paid sick time.
What do you expect when you constantly tell people they shouldn't have to pay for medical care? Most people don't have a very high regard for "free stuff" or even "cheap stuff".
The US Medical system puts patients and doctors in an adversarial relationship from the start.
The doctor in the US operates as a gatekeeper for medical services. Another word for gatekeeper is guard, and they arm guards for a reason.
I was chatting with a doctor who was talking about how owning a gun increases the risk of suicide, so he was thinking about asking patients about whether they owned one, but was concerned that patients might resent being asked. So, we had a bit of a chat about why patients lie to their doctors.
I know somebody who needs a lot of chronic medical care. They've come to greatly resent doctors in general, though not 100% of the time. The doctor basically wants to be in the role of the final-decision-maker. The US legal system ensures that if the doctor doesn't take this role he gets thoroughly screwed because if he prescribes a treatment course which isn't by-the-book he gets sued. On the other hand, the patient might not agree with the course of treatment and might want a different one. However, in the US medications and often even tests are illegal to sell without a prescription, so the patient's options end up being to either do what the doctor wants, convince them to do something else, find another doctor they can convince, or forgo treatment altogether. The patient is automatically going to resent the doctor for having this choice foisted upon them, even though the doctor didn't personally create the US medical system (though the AMA certainly helps to perpetuate it). Due to the whole liability thing, often the best way to "convince" a doctor to go with a different treatment is to manipulate them by controlling their access to information or lying to them.
The thing is, it is also in the patient's best interests to get frank advice from their doctor. The problem is that in the US we don't offer the patient of receiving frank advice and making an unrestricted treatment decision.
Then money becomes a factor as well, since insurance companies want to pay for the treatment option that is statistically the most likely to cost them the least - ie the patient gets better as fast as possible at the lowest cost. So, they get a say in treatment as well. I think that the folks paying for treatment ought to have a say in the matter, but there has to be a way to do this without taking ALL control away from the patient. If nothing else they should be able to pay for their own pills maybe with a credit for whatever the standard of care would typically cost.
IMO doctors shouldn't be gatekeepers except in limited circumstances. I'm fine with them being gatekeeper for antibiotics (even though it seems like many fail at that job today), since abuse of antibiotics is a public health problem. I'm fine with them having responsibility for reporting epidemics and such - anything that is a true public health problem and not merely a personal one. Otherwise, if somebody wants a test then as long as they understand the risks they ought to be able to pay for a test just like they can pay to get a tattoo. All medications should be available over-the-counter. By all means still have a system of prescriptions so that insurers can decide when to pay for medications, but if somebody wants to take something that is contra-indicated, that should be their right.
Maybe there is an in-between solution. However, if you want people to stop resenting doctors then you need to make them feel like they're the ones actually in control of their treatment.
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On the other hand, the biggest hazard facing a cyber warrior is likely to be the morning commute.
There are a lot of computer attacks that must be done from inside a network, either because it isn't connected to anything else or because firewalls are good enough to stop outside attacks. This might require being on the ground somewhere that being shot at is possible.
The solution is to relax the physical requirements, not toss them out completely. The military could allow someone to join who doesn't meet standards, but every year after that, they would have to get closer to the standard, and maybe even eventually meet the same ones as every other soldier.
It would make more sense to have different divisions/etc for different purposes. You can't pilot a fighter jet safely in combat without excellent vision, but that doesn't mean that you can't refuel one without excellent vision, or plan a mission back at the Pentagon, or maybe even ferry one across the ocean. The solution to that isn't to insist that air force members steadily improve their vision either. You just don't let people without good vision become combat fighter pilots.
By all means have squads that are intended for infiltration, and they should have strict requirements, of which fitness is just one. The guys who set up their laptops don't need to meet the same requirements, and they're probably even more important to the mission since I doubt that the infiltrators are going to write their software from scratch while in the middle of an enemy facility. They may very well have to improvise, but if they don't have the right equipment they'll do as well as a special forces soldier with a gun that doesn't work.
Sometimes the morning commute is in Kabul.
Sure, and for somebody who is forward-deployed the physical standards make a lot more sense, along with the rest of basic training, weapons proficiency, etc.
Somebody else pointed out that they really should tailor the requirements to the job, and not to the person. If the job required being able to run a mile in n minutes, then make those the requirements, and don't relax them for different genders, age, etc. If the job doesn't require that, then don't require it.
I imagine that you'd want some groups that are purely domestic-based, and you might want other "special operations" cyber warfare groups that are actually designed to be deployable. That shouldn't be done just so that the general can admire his tent full of guys with laptops - it should be done because the mission requires it (maybe the enemy is jamming satellite communications so nobody can talk to the USA and you need guys to mount "cyber attacks" locally. That certainly doesn't describe any situation the US has been in recently, but...
The *best* would have no problem spending 30 minutes a day (or even every other day) for a month or so to meet those minimal requirements. Especially if you actually *wanted* the job - if not, then who cares? All it takes is a very small amount of willpower and commitment, something the Army should be looking for.
So your point is to require arbitrary commitments in order to weed out people who don't waste their time doing pointless work because they're desperate to have the job? I'm not sure that you're going to find a lot of great candidates for your "cyber warrior" division.
The thing is that the typical "cyber warrior" probably isn't some kid who doesn't have any other options (especially if they don't want to recruit people with criminal backgrounds, etc). If you want the best then it is the employer who really needs to be bending over backwards to prove that they have the willpower and commitment to hire the best. If you merely want mediocre to less, then by all means make your candidates jump through hoops, in this case almost literally.
If you are in your early 20's and otherwise pass the basic health requirements, but can't do a dozen push ups in 2 minutes or stand for an hour, you probably should *not* be in the Army.
We're talking about a "cyber warfare" division of the Army. Your statement is like saying that grunts who don't know what an opcode is probably should *not* be in the Army. Both types belong in the new Army, but not in the same roles.
If you don't have any other health issues besides being so out of shape you can't accomplish those, then yes, I think spending the month or so it would take to get in a bit better shape to pass it would be a good sign of someone who might actually take pride and responsibility in their work.
You're more than welcome to think that. You may even take pride and responsibility in your work. Clearly though you're not a very good judge of character, though, so you'd definitely not be on my interview team. :)
If you want to know whether somebody takes pride in their work, then take a look at their work. Now, if the job you're hiring them for is highly physical, then their muscles will be a part of that work. If you're hiring a baker, then you probably should be caring more about whether they spend their spare time making cakes. :)
> Well, if that alone isn't cause for concern, I don't know what is
Given that young people are arrested for possession of alcohol if they're under 21, for driving with an expired license, or for insisting on filming police at a peaceful protest on a public street, it's not shocking.
Sure, and I wasn't suggesting that the problem was that the right sort of people weren't being born. I doubt the population of newborns today is somehow less virtuous than those who were born 50 years ago. The problem obviously lies in the laws, and by extension the public school system and the parents.
Playing a musical instrument is often correlated with intelligence
Correlated with things that have arbitrarily been deemed to be intelligence, you mean. There's a difference.
Sure, and correlation also is of limited importance as well. But, I imagine that asking a candidate to play a song is about as useful a predictor of job performance as asking them to do pushups.
AFAIK they recruit excellent engineers that meet their fitness requirements so what is so different about the USA?
Well, do you want the best, or do you merely want "excellent?" There can only be 10 top-10 anythings in the world, and maybe they aren't good at pushups?
I couldn't tell you what if any differences exist in the current physical standards between the branches of the US military.
So they are looking for pasty scrawny geeks to fly their drones?
Hardly. I believe that they require drone pilots to be qualified as ordinary aircraft pilots, and they make them wear flight suits while they're piloting drones.
Idiotic, but it is a culture thing. There is certainly an overlap of skills in piloting a drone and a manned aircraft, but there are lots of things exclusive to either. Maybe your next ace drone pilot is afraid of heights and you wash him out in training. :)
FYI, doing a few push-ups is not working out. It's a basic functionality your body should have. Like standing or walking for extended periods.
Not everybody can stand or walk for extended periods either.
You're of course welcome to choose what sorts of people you hang around with. I certainly don't find it difficult to gain employment, or socialize with colleagues.
Don't get me wrong - having physical requirements for anybody who is deployed anywhere near a combat zone or who is responsible for providing physical security is a no-brainer. If the mission requires having a "cyber warrior" join a team that will infiltrate some facility then they certainly should be able to meet the physical qualifications, use a gun, etc.
When I enlisted in 1990 you only had to be able to complete something like 13 pushups to be assigned to a basic training unit.
I'd have failed that.
Really? I'm 45, overweight, horribly out of shape, and even I can do 13 pushups. What the hell was wrong with you?
Perhaps you should ask somebody who knows something about physiology. I was not diagnosed with any medical abnormalities that I'm aware of. I can't say when the last time I tried to do a pushup was, but I doubt I could do 13 of them today.
I don't know how old you are, but 13 pushups is not a lot. I'm 59 and have no problem doing twice that many.
I'd probably have a hard time doing one, and I'm not obese (for whatever BMI is worth). I have no problem doing stuff with software, math, and the physical sciences that 99.99% of the population who can do a pushup probably couldn't do with a year of coaching. I'm hardly the brightest coder around, either.
You have to choose your priorities if you want the "best" for a particular job. Do you want the best, or the best of what's left?
Basic physical fitness helps with a lot of things, mental acuity included.
Well, if what you care about is mental acuity, then why not just measure that? Playing a musical instrument is often correlated with intelligence, but I've yet to be asked to bring an instrument to a job interview.
"a lot of time" in this case equal about six weeks of try to do 13 push ups a day. You're literally disqualifying yourself because you don't want to spend two hours TOTAL exercising.
Somehow I doubt it takes only two hours total. But, whatever. Honestly, I could really care less whether I can do a pushup. :) My current employer doesn't really have a problem with that, and I don't have a problem with accepting their paycheck.
The U.S. high school graduation rate is 80%. About 30% of the population have been arrested.
Well, if that alone isn't cause for concern, I don't know what is. Think about the implications of that in a society where you have a good chance of being unemployable even if you have a college degree...
When I enlisted in 1990 you only had to be able to complete something like 13 pushups to be assigned to a basic training unit.
I'd have failed that. Sure, I probably could have spent a lot of time working out and gotten to that point, but what's the point?
Anytime you introduce a selective pressure for one attribute, you're unwittingly selecting AGAINST other attributes. Do you want the best "cyber warrior" you can find, or the best "cyber warrior" who also happens to be able to do 13 pushups too? If the bad guys aren't so picky, she might find herself outclassed...
And it's not as if this isn't for good reason either - the Army learned some hard lessons in the Korean war with out of shape soldiers; and if anything, the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have further blurred the lines are between combat and non-combat MOS's.
I can buy that if you're talking about somebody who is in a supply train which is vulnerable to attack.
On the other hand, the biggest hazard facing a cyber warrior is likely to be the morning commute.
That will allow them to identify you, but it won't help them at all in confiscating your assets, which is what he was talking about. Also, he never said that he was violating the law, and the whole point of this article is that the IRS can go after you even if you don't violate the law.
If the IRS wants to seize your bitcoins then they'll either need to find your unencrypted wallet, or ask you to give it to them. Compelling you to do the latter requires a court order, which is something they don't need to seize all your cash. It is the difference between you having to get something back vs you having to avoid giving something away.
However, if you happen to run some intermediary servers that handle traffic once a backbone layer is crossed, then you can clobber their value.
I suspect that the only folks who care to do deep packet inspection at that level are the privacy-loving folks at the NSA. :)
You don't have to present a certificate to the server?
You can initiate SSL/TLS where by the only party presenting a certificate is the server to the client.
Read my post again. :)
I had to switch from delivering my mail to Gmail via SMTP to having Gmail poll my POP3 server. In the first model Gmail is presenting me with the certificate. In the new model, I'm presenting them with the certificate. They don't trust my certificate, so they refuse to use TLS. Thus, I end up having to have them retrieve my mail unencrypted.
Just another case where the SSL trust model results in less security.
This story seems like click bait the way it just leaves it as a cliffhanger. so you bombarded an aluminum plate and .... a superhero aluminum man emerged? what what?.... how did this submission get promoted to a front page story? I'm surprised it did not end with "your jaw will drop when you see what happened next".
Just bad journalism. If you have to read more than 3 sentences to get to the end of the story, then you're reading an advertisement, not an article or an abstract. Journalists are paid by their subscribers to save them the trouble of going out and getting the story themselves. Advertisers are paid to generate interest, not to satiate it. The problem is that slashdot is supposed to be about doing the former to sell the latter, but it has become about doing the latter to sell even more of the latter.
Lol. Its not like the republicans can't just change it when they have control of the senate.
Yup. I don't get why people act like the whole cloture thing is some kind of constitutional guarantee. Committees, rules, cloture, etc are all just traditions. Anybody with a majority could choose to get rid of every congressional committee overnight, or remove all members of the opposing party, or whatever they want to do. The purpose of those committees is supposed to be to facilitate getting bills passed (ie make sure that there is something close to consensus on a bill before tying up the whole Congress in debate). They aren't supposed to exist so that a few congressmen can basically have a pre-veto on any legislation.
All the constitution requires for a judge to be appointed is a majority vote. I don't think the founders ever really intended the Supreme Court to be this body where people serve for 40 years and huge wars get fought over which partisan side the 4-3 majority falls on. Lower courts are supposed to be even less political.
Most promising EBOLA vaccine currently in human trials was developed in Canada, another single-payer country.
Lots of drugs are developed by non-US companies. They make all their profits selling them in the US, just like US companies do.
If the US instituted price-controls on pharmaceuticals it would hit the bottom lines of the likes of GSK just as fast as it hit the bottom line of Pfizer. The location of a large company's headquarters has very little impact on anything other than how it manipulates its taxes/earnings/etc. Large companies source from the entire planet, and sell to the entire planet. The main exception to this are companies that are heavily subsidized by a national government, but I don't think that pharmaceuticals generally fall into this category (sure, they benefit from the fruits of government R&D, but for the most part countries don't target particular companies with their grants and few of those grants actually directly go to a pharma company - more often some academic lab does the government-funded R&D and licenses it to the highest bidder).
I wouldn't put medical procedures in the same bucket as pills. The latter are more like products - patented and sold around the world. The former tends to less commercial in nature unless it is connected to some kind of medical device or pill. If you publish how to perform a surgery, it is very hard to make any money off of it beyond your regular fees for performing the surgery (you'd probably make more than the average doctor if you're prestigious, but not like you would if you got paid a share of the cost every time anybody anywhere did the procedure).
So, the fact that this cell transplant was demonstrated in a country with socialized medicine is significant - I just wouldn't use pharma as an analogy. Actually, socialized medicine might be the perfect place for improvements in procedures - the government paying for the R&D is the party that saves money on paying for less-effective treatments and accommodations.
And, not intending to completely contradict everything I just said, Ebola is also a bit of an unusual case in the drug world. For various reasons it would probably be hard to make money off of an Ebola vaccine. However, socialized medical systems still benefit from having it in the bag of tricks. I would argue that in the case of non-profitable medications that a socialized medical system may very well outpace a for-profit system for investment. Just don't expect them to come out with the next Viagra.
If the CDC had descended on the hospital like a ton of bricks and the first inkling of Ebola they might have prevented most of that from happening then people would be complaining about Federal overreach.
No argument there, but this is really broken. This is a matter of interest to everybody in the country - it really can't be left up to the local hospital to have the final say. It makes no sense to have a system where New York is super-rigorous about Ebola but we'll go ahead and let Oklahoma become a huge pool of carriers because they don't want to spend too much money on this. Since the US has no restrictions on travel/etc internally the US population is going to be as well-off as the lowest level of care we give to somebody who is infected. Your million-dollar-a-year health insurance plan is worthless if some guy making minimum wage shows up to the local fast food joint and sneezes on your burger despite being symptomatic with Ebola because he doesn't have health insurance and paid sick time.
What do you expect when you constantly tell people they shouldn't have to pay for medical care? Most people don't have a very high regard for "free stuff" or even "cheap stuff".
The US Medical system puts patients and doctors in an adversarial relationship from the start.
The doctor in the US operates as a gatekeeper for medical services. Another word for gatekeeper is guard, and they arm guards for a reason.
I was chatting with a doctor who was talking about how owning a gun increases the risk of suicide, so he was thinking about asking patients about whether they owned one, but was concerned that patients might resent being asked. So, we had a bit of a chat about why patients lie to their doctors.
I know somebody who needs a lot of chronic medical care. They've come to greatly resent doctors in general, though not 100% of the time. The doctor basically wants to be in the role of the final-decision-maker. The US legal system ensures that if the doctor doesn't take this role he gets thoroughly screwed because if he prescribes a treatment course which isn't by-the-book he gets sued. On the other hand, the patient might not agree with the course of treatment and might want a different one. However, in the US medications and often even tests are illegal to sell without a prescription, so the patient's options end up being to either do what the doctor wants, convince them to do something else, find another doctor they can convince, or forgo treatment altogether. The patient is automatically going to resent the doctor for having this choice foisted upon them, even though the doctor didn't personally create the US medical system (though the AMA certainly helps to perpetuate it). Due to the whole liability thing, often the best way to "convince" a doctor to go with a different treatment is to manipulate them by controlling their access to information or lying to them.
The thing is, it is also in the patient's best interests to get frank advice from their doctor. The problem is that in the US we don't offer the patient of receiving frank advice and making an unrestricted treatment decision.
Then money becomes a factor as well, since insurance companies want to pay for the treatment option that is statistically the most likely to cost them the least - ie the patient gets better as fast as possible at the lowest cost. So, they get a say in treatment as well. I think that the folks paying for treatment ought to have a say in the matter, but there has to be a way to do this without taking ALL control away from the patient. If nothing else they should be able to pay for their own pills maybe with a credit for whatever the standard of care would typically cost.
IMO doctors shouldn't be gatekeepers except in limited circumstances. I'm fine with them being gatekeeper for antibiotics (even though it seems like many fail at that job today), since abuse of antibiotics is a public health problem. I'm fine with them having responsibility for reporting epidemics and such - anything that is a true public health problem and not merely a personal one. Otherwise, if somebody wants a test then as long as they understand the risks they ought to be able to pay for a test just like they can pay to get a tattoo. All medications should be available over-the-counter. By all means still have a system of prescriptions so that insurers can decide when to pay for medications, but if somebody wants to take something that is contra-indicated, that should be their right.
Maybe there is an in-between solution. However, if you want people to stop resenting doctors then you need to make them feel like they're the ones actually in control of their treatment.