Whatever their crime or sentence, prisoners should not be legitimately fearful of choking to death on their own vomit every time they climb onto their prison bunks. But this is a daily worry for federal prisoner Paul Shook. The Federal Bureau of Prisons, known colloquially as the BOP, has devolved from its small, exclusive “Club [...]
It is not unusual for members of the diminishing upper middle class to drop $20,000 or $30,000 on a big wedding. But for celebrities this large sum wouldn’t cover the wedding dress or the flowers. When country music star Keith Urban married actress Nicole Kidman in 2006, their wedding cost $250,000. This large sum hardly [...]
by Steve Heilig
Once in a while the US Supreme Court gets things right. It did so recently regarding Healthy San Francisco, the city’s local “public option” now giving more than 50,000 residents access to health care. The court declined to hear a lawsuit that might have derailed the entire program. A local restaurant association had sued to [...]
In our latest newsletter, hot off the press — What do the W.R. Grace Company, the Trade Towers, Libby Montana and asbestos have in common?
A current controversial federal law allows product manufacturers to withhold the identity of untested chemicals from the public if the manufacturer has reason to believe that such public knowledge could harm business — and even if the manufacturer and the feds know that a chemical poses a considerable risk to public health. It’s crazy, and [...]
The late comedian George Carlin did a bit about Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome (back then it wasn’t called a Disorder). During WW1, Carlin reminded us, we called it “shell shock.” Now those two words pack some punch, don’t they?
Vermont’s Senator Bernie Sanders spoke for months about his “historic” efforts to get a vote on a single-payer health care bill in the Senate. While we all knew the outcome was going to be a rather miserable failure, it was a tiny crumb being flicked to those of us who still believe in both real [...]
Coast psychiatrist Dr. Mark Klein was back before the Board last week to present a follow-up to his pre vious informal request: a draft of a resolution “sup porting treatment not incarceration for people with serious mental illness.” The doctor’s resolution was sprinkled with “whereases” stating what anyone with even a remote awareness of the situation already [...]
by David Severn
Some years ago I was working out Clow Ridge and as usual had taken a couple of my kids along. On leaving the job my eight-year-old daughter Dandelion wanted to ride her bike down the hill. Descending that steep grade just above the stop sign on Nash Mill Road she lost control and did a [...]
by Daniel Mintz
Congressman Mike Thompson answered questions, dispelled myths and endured occasional outbursts in a town hall meeting on what is now the nation’s most debated issue — health care reform. In a September 2 event that saw standing-room-only conditions a half-hour before it began, Thompson told an audience of hundreds at a building in Eureka’s Redwood [...]
