palmd
Posts by this author
March 16, 2009
Thankfully, I don't receive all that much blog-related mail. But this weekend I received several communications about a piece in popular liberal blog. The piece is (ostensibly) about Lyme disease, which coincidentally happens to be one of the topics of my first post here at SBM. In fact, I've…
March 15, 2009
OK, folks, PalCast #8 is up and ready...it's the "road edition"...just listen and you'll see what I mean. Once again, thank you Isis for the name. Remember that the feedburner site allows you to subscribe on iTunes as well as your favorite feed reader.
Feel free to c'mon back here to discuss the '…
March 13, 2009
I hate this topic. I really do. But Abel started it this time. Over at Terra Sig, the good pharmacologist brought up the issue of pharmacists behaving badly. I've dealt with the ethical implications of conscience clauses ad nauseum but Abel's discussion raised some important points.
A brief…
March 12, 2009
An interesting article was recently published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, the journal of the American College of Physicians (my professional organization). It has been noted in previous studies that there are differences in outcomes between African Americans and whites who are diagnosed…
March 12, 2009
Mrs. Pal registered the kiddo for kindergarten this week. What a kick in the gut. The first time she went to a pre-school class without us, I cried, so what's going to happen when she gets on the bus?
The other day we were watching TV, and she said, "You know that Jonas brother with the straight…
March 11, 2009
It's not like we haven't had this discussion before. I have, on previous blogs, written about the fantasy that is reiki, as have my colleagues. In fact, the very same colleague turned me on to a recent news piece out of Cleveland. Here's my problem with reiki---it's bullshit, pure and simple…
March 11, 2009
This is a piece from last year that is kinda resonating today, so I'm gonna share it with you. --PalMD
As
I've written before, I love my work. You really have to love medicine
to do it, because, contrary to popular belief, it's a lousy way to get
rich. I'm not starving or anything, but there are…
March 10, 2009
As the term of President B. Hussein Obama begins its transformation of American democracy into a socialist state, one guy saw early indications of his minority-led red revolution.
"He spent his childhood in a Mohammadean country," the guy said, "they could easily have started his indoctrination…
March 10, 2009
So, I was exploring the twittersphere and noticed that one of my followers was an advocate of "EFT". This sounded familiar, so I dug through the old blog archive and found this piece from early last year.
Once again, by way of Mercola.com, I've learned of a whole new woo. He touts this one for…
March 10, 2009
Just some reminders:
In case the Underground has not yet sufficiently infiltrated your online life, I'm on twitter, facebook, and friendfeed. It's all great fun, but I'm still not sure what to make of all these media. Still, I'm trying them out, and we'll see what shakes out.
March 9, 2009
This morning was rough---daylight savings time messed with the whole household. PalKid was not real happy about getting up, but she did. I brought her waffles in bed (real maple syrup, as always). Mrs. Pal packed most of her lunch the night before--I heated up the soup and put the thermos in the…
March 9, 2009
Just a reminder that PalCast #7 is up.
Carnival of the Elitist Bastards is up at En Tequila es Verdad. I'm happy to say that I am a featured mamzer.
I'm remiss in announcing the launch of the Diversity in Science.
There is also a disturbing thread over at Isis's place, in which she receives…
March 9, 2009
A pastor in Illinois was shot and killed over the weekend. A similar tragedy happened in my community many years ago. Religious leaders are very public figures and have an emotional connection with members of their communities, so I suppose it's not so strange that they should be targets. Many…
March 9, 2009
Most of my readers know that I'm a dad, but I don't write all that much about fatherhood. We have some great bloggers here who talk about being a mommy and the difficulties of being a mom and a scientist.
I'd like to add a voice about fatherhood. Every couple and every individual approaches…
March 6, 2009
If someone were to write a biography of the Creationist neurosurgeon, "Unhinged" would be an apt title. He used to content himself with rants against philosophical materialism, and evangelize for dualism with a zealous religiosity. But that wasn't enough. The "forces of secularism" seemed to…
March 5, 2009
This is a cross-post from Science-Based Medicine. Go there! --PalMD
There are many ways in which cult medicine believers try to insinuate themselves into the health care system. As Dr. Gorski has pointed out, "prevention" is one of their metaphorical feet in the door. The cult medicine…
March 5, 2009
So, Open Lab 2008 is now available, and you must buy a copy. Open Lab collects the best writing from the blogosphere and (ironically) captures them in print. It's a nice chance to read some great stuff that you knew you'd love, and some great stuff you've never even seen. The cover art by Dave…
March 4, 2009
OK, the title is inaccurate. Kirby is not bound by the same code of ethics as researchers and doctors, so perhaps he's not unethical. But his latest rant in HuffPo encourages unethical behavior. Honestly, I'm getting tired of writing about this guy, but he just keeps bringing the stupid, and…
March 3, 2009
I need a pick-me-up today.
She loves Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald.
But not as much as she loves her daddy!
March 3, 2009
The blogosphere is doing a reasonably good job of covering this, but I'm still fuming over Senator Tom Harkin's (D-IA) health care policy hearings. Each morsel of the hearing contains more idiocy than the last. In my attempt to shed some light into Harkin's guano-filled cave, I'm going to…
March 1, 2009
Remember when President Obama said something about returning science to it's rightful place? Well, our new president has a real tough climb ahead of him. The previous administration shoved science aside for political expediency and religious ideology. Now, forces in the president's own party are…
February 28, 2009
It's up and ready! It's maybe not my best, but I'm getting used to my new equipment and I've been out of the podcasting biz for a while.
Feel free to come back here and discuss.
February 27, 2009
MTV news is reporting that Bow Wow is coming to Chris Brown's defense. For those of you who have been too busy worrying about the economy to follow the personal lives of celebrities, Chris Brown is a young singer who beat the shit out of his girlfriend Rihanna, another young singer (I'm sorry--"…
February 26, 2009
Yesterday, a fellow medical blogger suffered a blow most of us cannot imagine. She goes by the name "drsmak" and was a great writer before her son fell ill, but when her son fell ill, her document of the struggle showed us how good the blogosphere can be. She allowed us a view of what it is like…
February 25, 2009
It's really early, but I've been up for a while. The leg pain caused by the disk pushing into my L5 nerve root is turning me into a cranky insomniac. So this morning I'm giving in. I'm giving up on tossing and turning, grinding some good coffee beans, boiling some water, combining them in a…
February 25, 2009
The Autism Omnibus Trial is a conundrum for the infectious disease promotion movement. Still, their ability to pick up the goalposts and run is unmatched, and that is just what David Kirby and Robert Kennedy, Jr. have done in today's Huffington Post.
To review, the recent Omnibus decision looked…
February 25, 2009
HP feels really, really bad, and they are sending me a brand new tablet pc, apparently a newer, shinier, happier one. Yea!!
February 23, 2009
A while back I wrote about a naturopathic "physician" who was specifically preying on the Latino community. This is troubling for a number of reasons, some of which I mentioned. In my zeal to rant about the quackery, I may have not delved deeply enough into some of the other important issues.
For…
February 23, 2009
So I've been dealing with a sick computer for a while now. It died ungracefully during ScienceOnline09, first giving me the dread blue screen of death, then giving me a black startup screen that said the pc equivalent of "piss off".
My other computer is a mac, but the hospital's system isn't mac…