Further evidence of the Sackler family’s utter rapaciousness

The Sackler family are the owners of Purdue Pharma, maker of the powerful opioid OxyContin, the drug that has been a major contributor to the drug crisis that has killed so many people and ruined the lives of so many others. I have written before about how they relentless marketed the drug in their effort to get more money. The people in the pharmaceutical industry that pushed these drugs have been described as “drug dealers in lab coats”. Now ProPublica, that excellent investigative news organization that I financially support, has another report obtained from sealed testimony about their sleazy tactics to get doctors to prescribe more of the drug by giving them a false impression of its potency.
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Why did no bankers go to jail?

This was the big question after the financial crash of 2008 that ruined the lives of so many people. The public radio program Marketplace had a detailed examination of this question. While banks were named in indictments and plea deals reached with them for fines, no top bankers were named or prosecuted. Indeed the government bailouts enabled them to reward themselves with big bonuses. The analysis lasted about 45 minutes but was spread over three days as follows: Part 1 lasts from 0-19 minutes, Part 2 was from 4:50 to 15:30, and Part 3 lasted from 0 to 15:30 minutes.
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False metaphors should be retired

Good metaphors can be powerful things, bringing a dull and difficult concept to vivid life by comparing it to something else that is believed to be true and can be easily visualized. But if a once powerful metaphor is found to be based on a false premise, should we continue to use it? This has become the case with the ‘boiling frog’ metaphor frequently used to discuss how we can be oblivious to major and potentially disastrous changes if those changes occur slowly. The metaphor is based on the belief that “a frog immersed in gradually heating water will fail to notice the creeping change in its circumstances, even as it’s literally being boiled alive.”
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The neoliberal attacks on Bernie Sanders begin

Bernie Sanders made his formal announcement for the Democratic nomination on Sunday at a speech in his hometown of Brooklyn, New York, although his political career has been largely in Vermont. In it he spoke of his vision for the country and also his own story, something he rarely does because he clearly prefers talking about issues and disdains personality-driven politics, even though his personal story reveals a lifelong commitment to the causes that he is currently fighting for. He is no Johnny-come-lately, seizing the popular positions of the moment but has been instrumental in pushing the discourse in that direction. This is of course why he is so hated by both conservatives and Republicans but also by neoliberals and the Democratic party establishment and their supporters in the media. They see in him a genuine threat to the status quo and someone who cannot be bought off.
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Cue cards

One of the things that surprise me is that hand-written cue cards are still used on some live TV shows. I would have thought that teleprompters with giant screens and lettering would have replaced a person standing in front and whipping out one card after another. Via Rusty Blazenhoff I came across this video of how Saturday Night Live uses cue cards, as narrated by their head cue card person. He makes a good point that since the show is live, they cannot afford the risk of a teleprompter glitch and that the old fashioned cue cards are fail safe.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s effective use of Twitter

She has a knack for how to use this medium, as can be seen by these responses to her critics.


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