Mike Dunford was a graduate student in the Department of Zoology at the University of Hawaii, Manoa, where he studied evolution. Life as an army spouse has since moved him on to Pensacola, where he's currently trying to figure out what to do next. While he's doing that, he writes stuff here, although not usually in the third person. He's also a contributer to I'm back after taking (unforgivably, I know) another full weekend off from blogging, and as always there's quite a bit to catch up on. In the news since the weekend, we've got some interesting new research on sleep problems related to PTSD, a truly superb Bill Maher piece on "elitism," Rob Knop on gun control, the White House attempt to redefine "partisan" to exclude themselves, and a brief lesson on the problems that can arise -particularly in the bathroom- when water is too closely associated with electricity.
Count fewer sheep:
Anyone who has ever had - or lived with someone who has had - any degree of PTSD can tell you that major, massive nightmares are a common symptom. In a just published article in the journal Biological Psychiatry, researchers report preliminary but promising findings on a possible treatment. They find that the anti-hypertension medicine prazosin significantly reduced nightmares and improved sleep when compared with a placebo. Given the numbers of veterans currently returning from the Mideast with PTSD and related conditions, this is clearly an area that will require a great deal more attention in coming years.
The President's an Ivy-League Legacy Admission, but Liberals are Elitists.
One of the most annoying things about the right-wing is their use of "elite" to denigrate various people they disagree with. It's annoying at the outset because it seems to be trying to equate "American" with "mediocre" - and is succeeding at that alarmingly well. It's particularly annoying when it comes from within this particular administration, given that the "Decider" got into the Ivy League school he attended because of his family ties with the school and not on his own merits. Bill Maher has a fantastic article expressing his frustrations with this over at Salon.com.
Gun Control.
Rob Knop used the tragic shooting at Virginia Tech to begin a discussion on gun control. Rob's quite a bit more conservative than I am, and I think he said some spectacularly stupid things in his article. He also said quite a few things that make a lot of sense. I'll be responding in full to this one later this evening.
"Partisan," Pots, and Kettles
The White House is attempting to put some more spin on the Iraq/Afghanistan supplemental funding bill. They've got a new talking point that they're pushing now that the "no funds means the troops are going to be there longer" message was undercut by the Pentagon's decision to keep the troops there longer whether they get the money or not. This latest talking point is causing hypocrisy detectors to explode all around the world: Congress needs to cut out the partisanship and do what the President wants them to do.
Repeat after me: Electricity + Water = Bad.
In today's final entry, Jake Young provides a link to a story about a product recall in Japan. The nation's largest toilet maker has recalled 180,000 bidet toilets after three separate incidents in which the electric bidet accessory shorted out and burst into flames.
