The Best Health Care System?

I saw something on last week's Meet The Press that I thought I would never see. David Gregory actually questioned the mantra that the Republicans have been repeating ad nauseum throughout this health care debate.

"MR. GREGORY: Well, but wait a minute. You, you say that we have the best health care system in the world, you say it as a matter of fact.

SEN. McCONNELL: Mm-hmm.

MR. GREGORY: But it seems to be a matter of debate. You just mentioned access. You've got 47 million people who are uninsured.

SEN. McCONNELL: Mm-hmm.

MR. GREGORY: And there are experts, including one expert who is now an Obama adviser, who actually writes about this idea that it's a myth that it's the best health care in the world.

SEN. McCONNELL: Mm-hmm.

MR. GREGORY: And this is what he wrote along with another expert last fall, saying: "It's a myth that America has the best health care in the world. The United States is number one only in one sense, the amount we shell out for health care. We have the most expensive system in the world per capita, but we lag many developed countries on virtually every health statistic you can name"; life expectancy, infant mortality, obesity, death rate from prostate cancer, heart attack recovery. That's the best system in the world?"

DG gets points from me for that question. So many times I've grumbled "best at what?" at the TV when I hear a defender of the status quo repeat that lie.

"SEN. McCONNELL: That's one expert. If you look at the surveys and ask the American people what they think, they don't think quality is a problem. They think cost is a problem and access is a problem."

If they don't think quality is a problem, why are there so many successful malpractice suits? Notice that McConnell cites surveys as the source for the facts that back up his argument. I have a clear memory of the senator during the presidential campaign saying that polls are meaningless.

"Let's look at access, the people who are uninsured that you mentioned. A better way to begin to deal with that problem is to equalize the tax treatment. Right now if you're running a business and you provide health care for your employees, it's deductible on your corporate tax return. But if you're an individual buying health care on the open market, it's not deductible to you. We ought to equalize the tax treatment. Another cost item we seriously ought to address, that the administration only pays lip service to and some of the proposals kicking around in Congress actually discourage, are these wellness efforts that we've seen on display, for example, at the Safeway company, which through their own efforts have targeted the five biggest categories of preventable disease--smoking, obesity, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and lack of exercise--and incentivized their employees to improve their personal behavior in all of those areas and capped their costs. They never mentioned junk lawsuits against doctors and hospitals. We're spending billions every year, billions in junk lawsuits defending, in defensive medicine, defending all these lawsuits. They don't want to do anything about that."

Junk lawsuits? Unfortunately DG didn't probe for the definition of junk lawsuit. If a patient sues because the wrong leg was amputated, is that a junk lawsuit?

"A 2006 follow-up to the 1999 Institute of Medicine study found that medication errors are among the most common medical mistakes, harming at least 1.5 million people every year. According to the study, 400,000 preventable drug-related injuries occur each year in hospitals, 800,000 in long-term care settings, and roughly 530,000 among Medicare recipients in outpatient clinics. The report stated that these are likely to be conservative estimates. In 2000 alone, the extra medical costs incurred by preventable drug related injuries approximated $887 million – and the study looked only at injuries sustained by Medicare recipients, a subset of clinic visitors. None of these figures take into account lost wages and productivity or other costs.^[9]"

Kind Words

Sometimes people will surprise you. When you opine as much and as candidly as I have on various sites you have to get used to having your statements misrepresented and attacked, as I demonstrated on a previous post here. People disagree with varying degrees of vehemence and insult you in a great variety of ways. The ad hominem attack is the most used tactic of those with weak arguments. Because of that my guard stands hard when a public post is addressed to me, personally.

So, my psychic fists were up in preparation for sparring when I saw the latest post last night on a CIA thread on NPR's site. I had to do a double take on that one; here's what it said:

Yuri Paskalovich (Yuri) wrote:

Mr. Ed, your voice is a reasonable one. I appreciated your responses to Paul Cook & J. Walsh. With regard to "American Exceptionalism," I strongly recommend Andrew Bacevich's book, "The Limits of Power." He, like you, is a man of good sense.

Saturday, July 18, 2009 6:17:42 PM

The guy took the time to compliment me. The least I could do was take the time to thank him.

Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

Yuri,
Thank you sir. Your kind words are appreciated. My experience in posting on this & other such sites has led me to gird myself for some verbal abuse when I see a post addressed to me. Anger seems to be a stronger stimulus to writing something than agreement. So it was a pleasant surprise to read your post.
I will look for the book & read it, thank you,

Sunday, July 19, 2009 3:11:12 AM

Yuri mentioned a couple of posts that I addressed. I'll post them and my responses to give as complete a picture of what this is about:

Paul Cook (BBQ) wrote:

Yawnnnnnn. The NYSlimes reported on this back when it started but now everyone is acting surprised that the CIA makes contingency plans. Schorr won’t be happy unless all our kids are forced to speak Arabic.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009 7:27:22 PM

Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

Paul Cook,
"Schorr won’t be happy unless all our kids are forced to speak Arabic."

Here is a perfect example of the kind of lame, gratuitous insult that is clearly false, thereby reducing the credibility of the person who posted it. How could he possibly know that about Mr. Schorr? He can't, he doesn't. He's just parroting Rush. If I were to parody brother Cook I would say something absurd, like it's obvious that he has a man crush on Rush.

Saturday, July 18, 2009 10:45:03 AM

J Walsh (walshamatic) wrote:

By bomb or bullet.....who cares, as long as the terrorist is dead....they will cut your head off in a second and have no regrets for doing it..

Thursday, July 16, 2009 7:32:57 PM

Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

J Walsh,
"By bomb or bullet.....who cares, as long as the terrorist is dead....they will cut your head off in a second and have no regrets for doing it.."
By descending to the level of our adversaries we would make it impossible to claim "American Exceptionalism."

Friday, July 17, 2009 9:45:31 AM

I have to give some props to NPR listeners. Had I made similar statements on the Az Daily Star's site, where I used to opine, my patriotism would have been questioned many times for pointing out that claims of exceptionalism need to be backed by exceptional behavior. I was barred from that site because, upon his death, I posted a wish that Jerry Falwell rest in pieces. :)

You're the Expert 5 31 91

This show opened with a caller who had local issues. Plunging stock prices, busted nest eggs, am I hearing echoes?
These YTE tapes give us a glimpse into the way activism adapts to & adopts the latest available technology.
Even back then I was annoyed by people with phones in their cars. Now they're so ubiquitous that I just try to scoot away from the ones who are so distracted they're straddling 2 lanes of traffic.


The audio mixing board is on my right & I have to constantly monitor & adjust the levels, that's what keeps drawing my attention to the right. We were the entire crew.
Within the framework of an entire organization, with many helpful facilitators, dedicated to helping regular folk put out TV programming, we had a fairly minimalistic way of reaching out and bridging people & interests.

Sam Stone

Excited when I first saw that Johnny Cash covered Sam Stone. Then I heard how he left out what is probably the most powerful line in the song; "Jesus Christ died for nothing, I suppose."
I wonder why he did that. Did the show's producers make him? Was he in his Jesus phase? You haven't heard that song till you've heard John Prine do it.
One more criticism, an odd one; JC does too much singing in his version. Prine delivers it more conversationally, like a talking blues, without the humor. That seems to work better for this tale of woe.

Linda Paloma

Beautiful lyrics and gorgeous guitar playing!

At the moment the music began
And you heard the guitar player starting to sing
You were filled with the beauty that ran
Through what you were imagining
Dreaming of scenes from those songs of love
I was the endless sky
And you were my Mexican dove

Now the music that played in your ears
Grows a little bit fainter each day
And you find yourself looking through tears
At the love you feel slipping away
Though it's not the kind
Of love you might hope to find
If tears could release the heart
From the shadows preferred by the mind

Like a wind that comes up in the night
Caressing your face while you sleep
Love will fill your eyes with the sight
Of a world you can't hope to keep
Dreaming on after that moment's gone
The light in your lover's eyes
Disappears with the light of the dawn

But the morning brings
Strength to your restless wings
And some other lover sings
To the sun's bright corona
I know all about these things
Linda Paloma
Fly away
Linda Paloma

Late for the Sky

Another one of my favorite lyricists of my generation, with Dylan, Paul Simon & John Prine.

LATE FOR THE SKY

The words had all been spoken
And somehow the feeling still wasn't right
And still we continued on through the night
Tracing our steps from the beginning
Until they vanished into the air
Trying to understand how our lives had led us there

Looking hard into your eyes
There was nobody I'd ever known
Such an empty surprise to feel so alone

Now for me some words come easy
But I know that they don't mean that much
Compared with the things that are said when lovers touch
You never knew what I loved in you
I don't know what you loved in me
Maybe the picture of somebody you were hoping I might be

Awake again I can't pretend and I know I'm alone
And close to the end of the feeling we've known

How long have I been sleeping
How long have I been drifting alone through the night
How long have I been dreaming I could make it right
If I closed my eyes and tried with all my might
To be the one you need

Awake again I can't pretend and I know I'm alone
And close to the end of the feeling we've known

How long have I been sleeping
How long have I been drifting alone through the night
How long have I been running for that morning flight
Through the whispered promises and the changing light
Of the bed where we both lie
Late for the sky

CellShade Song 6

CellShade Song 5

CellShade Song 4

CellShade Song 3

CellShade Song 2

CellShade first gig

My interest in CellShade stems from the fact that the drummer is my oldest son, Frank. They're based in Rio Rancho, NM. This is from a tape of their first gig, a battle of the bands on 6/28/09.

Kristof says: "Drugs Won the War "

“We’ve spent a trillion dollars prosecuting the war on drugs,” Norm Stamper, a former police chief of Seattle, told me. “What do we have to show for it? Drugs are more readily available, at lower prices and higher levels of potency. It’s a dismal failure.”
As if that weren't enough, I keep hearing that the price, $1 Trillion over 10 years, is the main hangup in passing health care reform. Where ever can we come up with that kind of money? A clue can be found in Nicholas Kristof's column that appeared in the NY Times on June 13, 2009:
"... we have squandered resources. Jeffrey Miron, a Harvard economist, found that federal, state and local governments spend $44.1 billion annually enforcing drug prohibitions. We spend seven times as much on drug interdiction, policing and imprisonment as on treatment. (Of people with drug problems in state prisons, only 14 percent get treatment.)"
Over ten years, that's $441 billion, almost half of the trillion they say we'll need. Revenue from taxation from legal sales & income taxes from those who work in the many new industries that cultivation of the very versatile hemp plant will foment, will more than make up the rest.
What is keeping that from happening? As John McLaughlin made Eleanor Clift admit a couple weeks ago, "The Democrats are craven." All of them from, Obama on down to Gabrielle Giffords, lack the political courage to address the issue.
If the libertarian wing of the Republican party had the sense & the courage, they could revive their party by adopting a plank calling for the legalization of hemp as the fiscally responsible thing to do. But they think that being tough, even if it's stupid & counterproductive, is the conservative thing to do.
Real conservatives know that prohibition is antithetical to a free nation.

7=16-9 (Haiku)

Life's geometry
Today's date an equation
Tomorrow's a chance

Expertise

Another call from 4/12/91; a respectful young man disagrees with us & engages us in civil discourse. We agree on some issues.

Christic Institute

A clip from the Arthurian period (4/12/91) of You're the Expert. We were asked about the Christic Institute & given some strokes.

Your Mouth is Working Overtime

There's so much truth in this song. We've all known people like that.

Go Jets!

J-E-T-S - JETS, JETS, JETS,

This has been a forgettable baseball season from where I sit. I anxiously await the football season. The new look Jets could make a strong run into the post season.

Hillbilly Poet Laureate

People ARE Strange!

Here's a series of comments on NPR's blog that shows how blatantly one's words can be twisted. My original comment was in response to this NPR story:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/storyComments.php?storyId=106461484

"Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

"Researchers don't know exactly why this may be the case, but they speculate that women are more sensitive than men to sudden emotional upset."
If Larry Summers had said that at Harvard some women would have called for his head.
If it can be "speculated" that it's emotional upset that makes it harder for women to quit smoking, wouldn't it be just as logical to speculate that the same emotional upset is what keeps many women from breaking through the so-called glass ceiling?
I don't believe either. When I heard the part of the report that described how heightened emotions led to relapses I knew that that's how addiction works.
I quit smoking in 1996 after smoking for more than 30 yrs. I started trying in '84. What these people who want to quit need to remember is that Dylan was right when he said that "...there is no success like failure..." Each time you fail brings you closer to the time that you'll succeed, if you keep trying, regardless of what your genitalia look like.

Monday, July 13, 2009 12:28:00 PM

N W (plumptuous) wrote:

With all respect, Mr Tijerino,
I disagree with your assertion that women and men are hardwired differently.
Especially when we speak of emotions.
When was the last time you heard your infant barely beginning to cry, and your milk glands started 'letting down'?
When was the last time you saw men weeping openly at weddings?
I'm not saying they don't - or that women who ARE able to spell (The Brothers) Karamazov really do enjoy a good mud-boggin race...

Monday, July 13, 2009 7:30:39 PM

N W (plumptuous) wrote:

Mr Tijerino
Your choice of using quotation marks around the term glass ceiling speaks volumes about your mindset. Being a male, you haven't clue about women - or the GLASS CEILNG to which you so comfortably sneer.
As unholy a 'solution' as was Affirmative Action, there was a reason it was thought up at all.
The colloquialism 'good ol boy' describes jobs or perks rendered between MEN, unworthy of said jobs and perks.
Why? A female, gay or black person wouldn't even be considered.
ok, I'm outta here - this is too stressful for me

Monday, July 13, 2009 7:47:32 PM

Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

NM,
"I disagree with your assertion that women and men are hardwired differently."

I asserted that? Why is it that I don't remeber making that assertion? In fact, I reread my post and couldn't milk that meaning from my words no matter how hard I tried :)
The rest of your comment seems to argue that we are hardwired differently so I really don't know what you're talking about.
As to my "milk ducts letting down," my youngest son is 19 years old so it's been a long time.

Monday, July 13, 2009 8:12:38 PM

Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

NW, again?
"Mr Tijerino
Your choice of using quotation marks around the term glass ceiling speaks volumes about your mindset. Being a male, you haven't clue about women - or the GLASS CEILNG to which you so comfortably sneer."

"The lady doth protest too much, Methinks." I use quotation marks to mark a quotation. "Glass ceiling" is a cliché that has been proven to be a metaphor that describes reality by the very fact that it's a cliché.
Your assertion that "The colloquialism 'good ol boy' describes jobs or perks rendered between MEN, unworthy of said jobs and perks." makes me wonder, do you offer that incomplete description because, being hardwired differently, you'll use half truths to make your point? "Good ole boys" (there go those quotations again) used the power of their networking to keep out jews, & latinos like me, as well as blacks, gays & women.
I'm sorry if all this thinking has you flustered but I refuse to attribute that to your gender. I've known many men who were totally incapable of controlling their emotions. My point is that all of us, regardless of chromosones, need to learn to control ourselves.

Monday, July 13, 2009 8:39:26 PM

Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

BTW plumptuous, I did NOT put quotes around glass ceiling, you're tripping.

Tuesday, July 14, 2009 1:36:20 PM"

The funny thing here is that at first I believed her ( I think it's a her) about the quotes around the glass ceiling & then I reread it more carefully. The question I want answered is, was she lying or was she so stressed that she was seeing things?

Guerilla Television

In ancient times, before the "Internets," TV was the most powerful medium. Before Bill Clinton signed the abomination known as the Telecommunications Act of 1996, cable companies had to provide free public access to the people in exchange for the legal monopoly rights they received. Some of us used the opportunity to try to balance out the BS of the corporate media. The web has rendered Public Access TV obsolete.

"pachuco de oro,"

Tin Tan sings Speedy González, what a Hoot!



In one of the spoken parts he tells his girlfriend that they should take her mother down to the beach so the sharks can eat her when she goes swimming :)

Season of the Witch

The last Halloween party at VNU/CRS.
There were some fine looking women working there.

Piel Canela

I woke up with one of my favorite Spanish songs in my head, "Piel Canela," which means cinnamon skin. The version I've known all my life was by Tin Tan, a Mexican hipster from the 40s. I found a video clip of him singing at the Tropicana de Cuba.

He looks cool in "drapes" that hang like a zoot suit but the pants & jacket are different colors.

On my walk to work this morning my mp3 player's shuffle played a cover of that song by a woman whose name I refuse to remember. I love the song but I'm annoyed by the, apparently, racist way in which she changed the lyrics. To make my point I'll transcribe the opening lines, then translate them into English:

"Que se quede el infinito sin estrellas
Y que pierda el ancho mar su imensidad
Pero el negro de tus ojos que no muera
Y el canela de tu piel se quede igual..."

"Let infinty be left without its stars
And the wide sea lose its immensity
But don't let the blackness of your eyes die
And the cinnamon of your skin should stay the same"

The aforementioned woman whose name shall remain forgotten changed the last line I quoted to say: "...y el aroma de tu piel..." The AROMA of your skin? Why was it necessary to change that word? How is it possible to change "el canela de tu piel" to "el aroma de tu piel" when the song's title is Piel Canela? Cinnamon skin calls to mind a non Caucasian, unless she prefers a white lover who smells like cinnamon. She should write her own song & call it "Piel Horchata."
I need to find an mp3 of Tin Tan singing Piel Canela.

Rorschach test

Sunset Rorschach tree
Refocus your eyes to see
What it is to be

Still Life With Dusk

Sunset with wind chime
Cool as the pillows bottom
And it's twice as nice

Further Groovin'

Sun's light is softer
Glare no longer hides details
Of the bending light

My Laptop Had a Baby!

Laptop with baby

Groovin On A Sunny Afternoon

Late one afternoon
The last rays of setting sun
Bouncing off my wall

Dialogue

Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

Isn't capitalism great?

Thursday, July 09, 2009 10:08:15 AM

Nonprogressive Nonpacifist (precursorpilot) wrote:

You wrote:Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote: Isn't capitalism great? Thursday, July 09, 2009 10:08:15 AM

My answer:
There are evil people everywhere in communism, socialism, capitalisms, yada, yada, yada , but a country that has good laws and enforce them stands a chance. Communism, socialism you’re screwed. I know I’ve been there….

Thursday, July 09, 2009 1:01:28 PM

Eduardo Tijerino (Mr_Ed) wrote:

Nonprogressive yada yada,
"but a country that has good laws and enforce(s) them"

There, my friend, is the rub. An economic system that glorifies greed (capitalism) is much more likely to become corrupted than one that encourages the idea of commonwealth (Georgism). I find it curious that you defend capitalism with what sounds like patriotic fervor, as if you think it's unpatriotic to question the eficacy of an economic system that encourages multinational corporations to ignore patriotism if it gets in the way of profits.
Unfortunately our bipolar mode of thinking has you convinced that it's either capitalism or socialism/communism. There is no room for 3rd or 4th alternatives.
Does anybody know what the difference between socialism & communism is? My experience is that few people can identify either.
Scandinavia is made up of socialist states that seem to be impervious to the current catastrophe that capitalism has inflicted on the world. If you pay attention to the news you must know that there are a lot of people who are, as you put it, "screwed" here, due to the failures of capitalism.

Thursday, July 09, 2009 7:07:01 PM

Prohibition Funds Terrorists

Comment on: Terrorists, Taliban And Traffickers: New Axis Of Evil? at 7/9/2009 12:23 PM EDT

Grant Tupper,
"If we legalized Schedule 1 narcotics, such as heroin, in the U.S. it would have a similar affect on the drug traffickers as the end of the prohibition on alcohol did in the 1930's. So why are we not even considering this option with any seriosness?"

Because alleged journalists like Ms Montagne fail to ask why legalization isn't being considered. Our docile press corps do little more than transcribe the government's press releases.

Best Legislature That Money Can Buy!

Comment on: Need For Campaign Cash Opens Door For Lobbyists at 7/9/2009 11:56 AM EDT

What we need is a "campaign channel" in every media market. With the conversion to digital tv, there is a lot of available bandwith. We the people ought to dedicate some of that bandwith to create a channel on which candidates for different offices could air campaign speeches & infomercials within equally distributed time slots at varying times of day.
Of utmost importance would be equal access to minor parties who could gather enough signatures to get on the ballot.
Candidates who accepted time on the public channel would sign an agreement to not poison the commercial channels with political advertising.
That's one way that we could put a dent into the scandalous way in which politics is practiced in America.

Conversation While Waiting to Clock In

Fred: "What's the opposite of vertically challenged? Not tall but sideways."
Ed: "Laterally enhanced."
Sandi: "What did you have enhanced?"
Ed: "They don't call me Mr. Ed for nothing."

Like A Bounced Check!

I'm back! It's been a long time since I abandoned this space. A lot has happened. My brother died about a year and a half ago after a lengthy illness. He needed a new liver due to Hepatitis C. I offered half of mine but he was dependent on AHCCS & they wouldn't pay for it because of other, complicating health issues. Rationing.
Another major event was my scooter accident in which I suffered a fracture of the tibial plateau; yikes! That was on April 29, 2008. I had surgery during which Dr. Ruth inserted some hardware & calcium cement to replace the ridge of the aforementioned tibial plateau which had been badly damaged by the fall.
What happened is that I fell forward, with my knees bent in sitting position, at about 20 MPH. My scooter's rear wheel hit a pothole with so much force that the rim cracked and all the air escaped from the tire. My youngest son, built like a young bear, was riding behind me, making it harder to control the fish-tailing scooter. I have no accurate estimate of how far we traveled before we tipped over to the left but, pardon the cliché but it's true, it went in slo mo and seemed to last an eternity.
When all the force of a 550 pound scooter and approximately the same weight in chubby humanity landed on my knee cap, the bone was driven down with such force that it compressed the rim of the tibia, leaving a gaping divot along the left side of the tibial plateau.
It took two weeks to get the paper work together and get an appointment for surgery. Because I don't have medical insurance AHCCS, Arizona's version of Medicaid paid for everything except the crutches.
The thing that made the whole experience feel a bit like a blues song is the fact that Stanley, a coworker who lives in the same apartment complex that I lived in at the time, came by the next day with the news that, due to the deteriorating economic conditions, the hours at work were being cut. If I were married my wife would run away with my mistress.
Jordan, my son, left a lot of skin on the asphalt and suffered a sprained ankle; he's healed well.
Not much more than a month later my first and, so far, only grandson, Caleb Emerson, was born, on 6/6/08. As Noel, #2 son and Caleb's proud daddy, said, the baby's the neighbor of the beast. }:)
And so it goes, Life ends, life begins. If you die without having broken any bones, you haven't lived. :)

Take A Hike, Dick

Comment on: Getting Lost Is Totally Human. Try It at 7/8/2009 11:55 AM EDT

It's time for Dick Cheney to show that he's human & get lost!

Can Capitalism Be Fixed?

Comment on: Franken Wins Minn. Race After Coleman Concedes at 7/3/2009 8:14 PM EDT

James Stewart,
"The current financial meltdown has about as much to do with capitalism ... you have to read them.
Hypocrisy is rampant."
I followed the link you provided which led to a Wall Stret Journal article about how members of congress are flying all over the world on our dime. Are you obtusely implying that it's spending on junkets that caused the meltdown? Pardon my skepticism but it seems that unbridled greed (aka 21st century capitalism), has more to do with the meltdown than congressional junkets that have been going on for over a century.
The bundling of mortgages into unregulated securities is not capitalism? What other economic theory would support such a scam? I know the knee-jerk reaction among Repugnants is to say that it's socialism but one would have to be pretty stupid to believe that.
Capitalism as practiced by Henry Ford, who knew he had to pay his workers well enough so they could afford to buy his cars, was described as enlightened self interest. Today's capitalism maximizes stockholder dividends at the expense of workers' wages; workers' buying power shrinks. Today's capitalism, though unenlightened, is still capitalism. Your post left me with no idea what you think is to blame for our meltdown. Junkets?

Let The Lying Begin

Comment on: Calif. regulators warn of pot's cancer capability at 7/4/2009 1:38 PM EDT

'Though not all the studies showed a link, regulators found that "marijuana smoke was clearly shown, through scientifically valid testing according to generally accepted principles, to cause cancer," according to an agency statement.'
This is the key sentence of the story, it shows how that agency in Ca. misrepresented the facts. If the agency's statement had ended with: "to contain carcinogens," instead of "to cause cancer," the statement would've been true.
Kudos to NPR for making that distinction clear in the story.
I smell a payoff from big pharma to some flunkie(s) at California's Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment.
This will give ammunition to the Bill O'Reillys of this world to quote the statement, leaving out the meat of the story while stressing that it comes from Ca.
Let the lying begin.