I have a Juris Doctor degree. No one calls me doctor. No one should.

See this post on "Dr. Biden" from Glenn Reynolds.  Hilarious. Sad.

A New Book; an Old Book; Mere Christianity

A new book is still on trial, and the amateur is not in a position to judge it.... The only safety is to have a standard of plain, central Christianity ("mere Christianity" as [Richard] Baxter [the 17th Century pastor] called it), which puts the controversies of the moment in their proper perspective. Such a standard can only be acquired from old books. It is a good rule, after reading a new book never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between.

-C.S. Lewis, God is in the Dock, ed. Walter Hooper (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1970), pp. 201-20s, as quoted in Foster and Smith, Devotional Classics: Selected Readings for Individuals & Groups (San Francisco, CA: Harper Collins, 1993) p. 2.

As to "mere Christianity" and C.S. Lewis, go here.

CDC report: Illnesses linked to poultry, seafood rising.

Mary forwarded this from today's issue of the AMA's "Morning Rounds":

The AP (4/19) reports, "Bacteria commonly linked to raw milk and poultry is causing more and more food poisonings, health officials said." Over the past five years, the number of Campylobacter cases "grew by 14 percent," according to a report (pdf) released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Although the report, which the CDC refers to as "the nation's annual food safety report card," was "based on foodborne infections in only 10 states" (about 15% of the US population), it is considered to be a "good indicator of food poisoning trends."

        The Wall Street Journal (4/19, A3, Tomson, Subscription Publication, 2.29M) adds that the report also showed a 43-percent increase over the 2006-2008 rate of infections from Vibrio bacteria. Last July, cases of Vibrio, which has symptoms similar to cholera, prompted the Food and Drug Administration to issue a consumer warning against eating shellfish from Oyster Bay Harbor in Nassau County, New York. The Journal notes that an FDA spokesperson said the agency is accelerating its efforts to gain jurisdiction over how states implement plans to control for Vibrio contamination.

        The Los Angeles Times (4/19, Healy, 692K) "Booster Shots" blog says Vibrio and Campylobacter were "followed distantly by Shigella, Cryptosporidium, Escherichia coli, Vibrio, Yersinia, Listeria and Cyclosporidium," in the report. Of the "15,531 food-borne illnesses reported by the CDC's 10-site surveillance system in 2012, 4,563 resulted in hospitalization and 68 resulted in death." And although "Salmonella killed the largest number of infected patients, Listeria was the most deadly, killing 10.74% of the 121 patients who were infected by it."

        In its coverage of the CDC report, Bloomberg News (4/19, Armour) notes that the "Obama administration has been slow to fully enact the 2011 Food Safety Modernization Act, which was supposed to be the most sweeping overhaul of US food safety in 70 years." One of the "two regulatory proposals" the FDA released "Jan. 4 to carry out the core of the food safety act would give companies one year to develop a formal plan for preventing the causes of food illness. The second would force produce farms with a 'high risk' of contamination to develop new hygiene, soil and temperature controls."

        The CDC report is also covered by the Denver Post (4/19, Booth, 443K) "Daily Dose" blog, The Packer (4/19, Ohlemeier, 13K), HealthDay (4/19, Preidt), Medscape (4/19, Lewis) and MedPage Today (4/19, Petrochko).

 

        FDA commissioner requests more funding. Reuters (4/19, Clarke) reports Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, MD, asked Congress on Thursday for more funding to enable the agency to improve food safety and importation oversight, as well as to design chemical- and biological-threat countermeasures. During her testimony at a budget hearing yesterday, Dr. Hamburg told a Senate appropriations subcommittee that the FDA is reducing the amount of money allocated to travel expenditures and training to weather some $209 million in Federal sequestration cuts the agency faces. She also noted that the agency is funded in part, through taxpayers but that the bulk of the FDA's money is garnered through the user fees that pharmaceutical companies pay to accelerate new product reviews. Reuters quotes Dr. Hamburg as saying, "FDA is a true bargain among federal agencies."

Camillus House Completes its $80 Million Upgrade; the Hon. C. Clyde Atkins; Murray Sams and My First Day in Federal Court (Updated)

The Herald today reports a hopeful advance in the care and rehabilitation of the Homeless in Miami.

Also today, the Herald reports the other side of the story.  The Homeless continue to impose a huge cost on Miami's development, impeding the renaissance of Downtown and near-Downtown.  The Hon. C. Clyde Atkins, US District Judge,  issued 20 years ago a restrictive ruling in response to high-handed police efforts to clear tent cities established by the Homeless.  (It reflected the settlement of a suit brought by the ACLU against the City of Miami.)  Those tent cities were on the doorstep of the cruise-ship terminals.  Now that venerable and even then (perhaps) impractical order is under attack.  Having spent most of my waking hours during that 20 year period working in and about Downtown Miami, I would say that it is very much time to give that order another look.

We should note, however, that Norwegian Cruise Lines is a big contributor to the Camillus House project, according to the first linked article.  One has to ask whether Camillus' success in raising funds and drawing positive attention from the private sector would have occurred without the obstacles that Judge Atkins' order created.

The church where I grew up, Central Baptist, is located across the street from a Federal office building that is part of a complex that includes the Federal Court House.  According to a story told me during the late 1980s - early 1990s by one of the members of that church, Judge Atkins' office was on the north side of that building, directly across the street from the south side of the church and its south-side entrance, which is quite wide.  An architectural feature of that entrance is a portico that extends over the sidewalk.  Because that part of the sidewalk was so well covered, homeless people would camp out there at night.  They made a mess, according to the people at the church, and it took some time each morning to clean up after the campers.

Judge Atkins apparently knew this was going on.  He could see this situation from his office window, according to the person who told me this story.  Judge Atkins called the church office one day and told the receptionist that the church was not to disturb the homeless camping under the portico.  The church did not.

My first appearance in federal court as a lawyer was in 1972.  It was before Judge Atkins and it was unplanned.  I was a green associate at Smathers & Thompson, and one of the partners asked me to review the court file of a case before him.  At that time, the federal judges kept the court files for their cases in their chambers rather than in the clerk's office, the practice in the state court system.  So I went to Judge Atkin's chambers and asked his secretary for permission to review the file. 

She said that the file was not in the office, but with the judge himself who was, at that very moment, conducting a hearing in the case.  I telephoned the partner and told him the situation.  Somehow he had not gotten the word that the judge had convened a hearing.  "Well," the partner said, "Go on in there and take care of this!"

So into the court room I went.  The lawyer on the other side was Murray Sams, Jr., a legendary trial lawyer.  Holy Cow!, I thought.  About the only other thing I remember, other than that it turned out all right that day, is that Murray came up to me just after the hearing.  In his thoroughly charming and gracious way, he introduced himself and welcomed me to federal court.  Then, he proceeded to tell me that my clients were involved with the Mafia and did I know that?  Murray Sams, the consummate advocate.

China Has Aborted 336 Million Babies since 1971

This, according to that country's own records apparently.

According to World Magazine's Jamie Dean, this number is "equvalent to the U. S. population".  Of course, the U. S. population would be much larger without our country's own abortions, government protected if not government sponsored.

A new estimate published by the National Right to Life Committee indicates there have been an estimated 54,559,615 abortions [in the U.S.] since the Supreme Court handed down its 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision allowing virtually unlimited abortions.

-from a 1/23/12 post in LifeNews.com, a post a year old.  So the figure today would be greater.

I would suggest that the collective culpability of our nation is greater than China's, given our cultural and religious history, and the peace, freedom, and prosperity with which God has blessed us for over two centuries.  Think of what China has had to deal with in the last two centuries.  In the 20th Century alone, think of its exploitation by the West, its invasion by Japan, its civil wars, and the Cultural Revolution.  I don't say that to excuse China, because it also had a profound penetration by the Gospel in that century.  I am saying it to elucidate more fully our own moral situation here in the United States.

Controlling the Extravagent Demand for Medical Care

The medical economist Rashi Fein observed in 1986 that there are only three ways to limit the extravagant demand for medical care: "Inconvenience," the practice used in the military, where one must wait interminably for care. "Rules," the third-party approach by which layers of rules and thousands of regulations are devised, most recently in a fool's quest to contain costs under ObamaCare. And "Price." This last option elicits gasps and chest-clutching from bien pensants who insist that all financial impediments to care must be removed. Yet it has one incontestably beneficial attribute: It requires the physician to study the true cost and benefits of a course of action, and then to present that data to the patient. Who is better suited than the patient to assess the value to him of the proposed treatment? Kathleen Sebelius? You gotta be kidding. [Link added]

-from "Reflections of a Medical Ex-Practioner", by Ed Marsh, in yesterday's WSJ.  (Thanks, Carol.)

Hand Injuries

It has been over a year since Carol and I started the fitness program at CrossFit Downtown Miami.  We feel better and are stronger, and we have enjoyed the process. 

I have fallen three times, however: twice during the box-jump exercises and once while running when I tripped on an uneven sidewalk.  On one of those occasions, I injured my right hand and on another my left hand.  Both of those injuries have healed without any sort of intervention.  In fact, I have learned that aches, pains, and even injuries are not uncommon.  I have also learned that I probably have some osteo-arthritis, definitely in my hands and probably in my feet. 

I visited a hand specialist recently about some pain that persisted in my left hand.  He identified an arthritic bump at the base of the thumb on that hand and said the pain could come from it.  He also said I could simply have stretched some ligaments.  He said that the treatment in either case is the same, and gave me a written “Hand Arthritis Treatment Form.”  This is what the form said to do:

      1.       Heat (e.g. Paraffin Baths)

2.       Medications:  (a)   Tylenol,  (b)  NSAIDs: Ibuprofen (Advil), Alleve, Celebrex,  (c) Glucosamine &  Chondroitin

3.       Foods:   (a)  Cherries,  (b)Blueberries, (c) Pineapple, (d)  Turmeric, Flaxseed (oil)

4.       Creams: Capsaicin, Arnica, Voltaren

5.       Splints: www.beabletodo.com (a very cool site)

6.       Whole Body Exercise (Endorphins)

7.       Cortisone Injections

8.       Surgery

Additional Information on Hand Problems:  www.handcare.org

Except for 7 and 8, one can treat himself.  With the first injury, when I fell off the box and injured my left hand, the physician's assistant fitted me with a splint (5).  I threw it away after a day's use, and I got better anyway, although possibly slower.  The physician did not encourage 7, because he said it was temporary.  As to 8, he said that doctors like him have all kinds of things they can do, but said it in a way to indicate that I should stay away from surgery if I can.

Living Smug in Miami Springs

I am reading Steve Peifer's, A Dream So Big - Our Unlikely Journey to End the Years of Hunger.  I sometimes catch a few pages in the lunch room, but MetroRail is where I can read without interruption.  I have to be careful when reading the book, because Steve has a way of dropping in stories that make the tears well up and run down my cheeks.  So be warned.

I didn't cry about a story on page 142, where I am now, but I did have to stop and post about it, even though I have a crushing amount of work to do:  It's about "a young man named Moses" whom Steve met in Nairobi when waiting for a shipment from the states to be inspected.  Steve writes that Moses "was a newlywed and made a fair living at the freight yard, but lived in one of the worst slums in Kenya."  Steve asked why he lived there. "He explained that because he was the eldest son in his family, it was his duty to help his younger brothers and sisters complete their education.  Because he was currently paying his younger brother's school tuition, he could not afford any housing except the slum."

What first struck me is the very high value I assign to living in a safe, comfortable home in Miami Springs.  I have taken a lot of pride over the years in not living in a much bigger home and in a swankier place than modest Miami Springs.  My strategy has been to live generally at a standard of living below our income, leaving room for important exceptions, such as private higher education for my children, reduction and avoidance of debt, release of Carol's time to parent rather than to "work outside the home."  However, I don't think we could have been more comfortable and happy in a house twice the size of the one we have or in a neighborhood with more expensive houses.  It really wasn't much of a sacrifice at all.  To the contrary.

But live in a slum?  For the sake of a younger brother so he could go to school?  As I think about it, I might do that for my brother or sister or my children or someone in the extended family.

There is a problem with that question, however.  It won't stay put.  It begs, at least for a Jesus follower, other questions:  Who is my brother?  What if his need is not only education but medical attention, food, or shelter?  What then?  Are the answers to those questions different, that is easier, if I am 66 instead of 36 or is there really no difference at all?

Will living smug in Miami Springs continue to do?

Sowell's New Book: Intellectuals and Race

There is a two-part interview of the author.  The first part is here and the second here. 

Intellectuals and Race is at Amazon here.

I particularly liked Sowell's discussion of David Hume and the Scots, which is held in the context of a larger discussion about the dogma of "multiculturalism" and how it holds people back.  (This is in the second half of the interview):

"AmSpec: Let’s talk about the example of David Hume and the Scots and the path they followed.

"Sowell: The role Hume played was one diametrically opposed by that played by most intellectuals as regards ethnic groups that are lagging behind. He wanted the Scots to master the English language. And that’s what they did. There were places all over Scotland that were giving lessons in English. The Scots learned that and it greatly expanded their cultural universe. I don’t know if there were any books in Gaelic in Scotland, and you were unlikely to learn chemistry or anything like that in Gaelic. The Scots came out of nowhere. They were very backward at one point. But from the middle of the 18th century to the middle of the 19th century many of the leading British intellectuals came from Scottish ancestry, including John Stuart Mill and Adam Smith."

Brazil Views Immigration as a Valuable "Flow of Minds" into its Economy

While the United States wrangles over immigration policy, Brazil has already made up its mind about immigrants. It wants more — as many as 6 million more.

They’re needed, said Brazilian officials, to accelerate Brazil’s development.

“In a globalized world, we need not only the flow of goods and services but also the flow of minds,’’ said Brazil’s Secretary of Strategic Affairs Ricardo Paes de Barros. “We’re not after population; we’re after talent and human capital. By opening society, we can accelerate the development process.”

-from "Brazil is in the market for immigrants" in today's Miami Herald.

Compare the World Magazine article in its February issue, "Friend or foe," which shows the link between some of those opposed to immigration reform and their promotion of abortion on demand.  There is a sinister consistency with that opposition: cut-off the flow of minds into our country from any source, whether from the womb or from other countries.

Frank Frazetta

I read all the Edgar Rice Burroughs paperbacks that the Miami Springs library had when I was at the threshold of adolescence.  That interest had nothing to do with the Mr. Frazetta's cover art.  Nothing.       

Rest and Nutrition. What a Concept.

[New Philadelphia Eagles Coach Chip] Kelly is not coy about embracing science, as evidenced by the hiring of a sports-science coordinator. There are two specific areas that Kelly has addressed: sleep and nutrition. He said an elite athlete requires 10 to 12 hours of sleep. He believes there's a best physiological time to practice, but he still needs to figure out the logistics for the Eagles. He also pays attention to what his players eat and when.

"Everybody has a dining hall, and they're not eating Tastykakes and Chickie's and Pete's fries every night," Kelly said. "When you get to this level you are always talking about nutrition and their diet and things like that. Some guys do it, and some guys leave the building and go to McDonald's.

"[The question is,] did you get the right guy who is going to buy into what you're doing?"

-From "Eagles Coach Chip Kelly: 'I'm no genius' " in the Philadelphia Inquirer 4 days ago.

Digital Dislocation

The WSJ today reports that Scholastic Corp, will have a wider fiscal third quarter loss than expected.  The primary reason, according to the article, is the fall in sales of the Hunger Games trilogy, which Scholastic owns.  But

Scholastic also said it was stung by delays in educational-product purchases as school districts turn more to training and digital investments. 

Well, of course.

We upgraded the workstations at our office last week, and included in that upgrade are dual monitors for each station.  (A few of us had them already.)  This greatly facilitates our digital document production and research.  We expect to move or renovate our offices soon and hope to convert a great deal of our paper files to digital as we do so and not to retain future paper documents as they (decreasingly?) come in the front door.  This may be old hat to most business by now.  However, remember that we are lawyers and lawyers are deadly about innovation.

There have been battles between the FL legislature and our court system about funding the bureaucracies in each county known as "the Clerk's office."  There were serious state employee lay-offs following the Great Recession and lots of complaining from court staff and delays is the local "Clerk's office."  But now the court system is well into email court filing, digital record retention, and the use of the internet for all sorts of functions.  Would that system have moved in this direction without the recession?

I bought a new book on Amazon the other day, Steve Piefer's A Dream So Big.  The spread between the Prime hardback cost and the cost of the Kindle edition is only about $2.  I used to prefer the hardbacks, but now I am evenly divided over the issue.  For a book like this one, I would have bought the Kindle edition.  (What stopped me from getting the Kindle edition is that for the second time my cheap Kindle broke down.  Next stop, I think, is the smaller iPad.  Carol has made great use of her iPad.)

A big box of paper documents just came into my office, documents that I must review today.  My knee-jerk reaction is, "I don't want to see this box cluttering up my office and my file cabinets.  Put them in digital format.  Give me a reader that works."

I trust someone is working on a profoundly robust back-up system.  We have what we have, but the economy-wide race to digital worries me (and I'm sure a lot of other people) about the national interest in this respect.

Thirty-one years ago, when my dad reached age 70, he bought an IBM PC for his home office.  A new insurance product, adjustable life, had arrived on the market, and one needed a computer to understand and sell it.  (The insurance companies developed that product in response to the economic recession in the late 70s and the rampant inflation that followed it.)  He didn't hesitate to adopt both the tool and the product.  (He continued working until congestive heart failure finally retired him about age 80.)

Brave new world.

Let's Just Tax the Young People

From "Workers Saving Too Little to Retire" in today's WSJ.

"Miami is the Center of the Universe"

The renovation of the NE corner of the airport fully explained.

Cancer's Biography

Mary sent me Siddhartha Mukherjee's The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, New York Times Bestseller, Winner of the Publitzer Prize, etc. and etc.  I am on page 169 of its 571 pages, and I can confidently state that the book and its author richly deserve such recognition.  As a survivor of Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, diagnosed nearly 20 years ago, I can also say that my family and I lived part of that biography within a community of others with the same diagnosis and with their loved ones.  About half of us with that diagnosis survived.

George P. Canellos, MD, shows up several times in the bio.  After my oncologist delivered his diagnosis and recommended chemotherapy ("CHOP"), we asked him for a reference to another physician for a second opinion.  He suggested Dr. Canellos at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.  Dr. Canellos would see us, so we made the appointment, sent some records on ahead, and made a one day trip, up and back.

Dr. Canellos was warm and encouraging, he approved the treatment, and said I would live to be an old man.  (Working on it.)  Until I started reading this book, I had only a dim idea of what American medicine (and heroic cancer patients and their families) had to go through for him to arrive at such a prognosis.

Another Big NY Firm Jettisons Trusts and Estates

Corporate law firms once viewed trusts and estates as a small yet important practice that discreetly advised wealthy families. But drafting wills and trusts, and the legal matters that flow from that, is less lucrative than the primary revenue drivers at big law firms: multibillion-dollar corporate transactions and high-stakes litigation.

And there are problems with trusts and estates within a big law firm model. The practice, to use the law firm management parlance, is not as leverageable as other areas. Corporate and litigation partners generate big fees by assigning armies of junior lawyers to megamergers and complex lawsuits. By comparison, trusts and estates work requires far less manpower, which mean far less profit.

Another issue in sustaining these departments is that individual clients bristle at billable rates that now reach more than $1,000 an hour. While big corporations grudgingly pay those rates, wealthy families often resist them.

As a result of these dynamics, firms’ trusts and estates practices have remained small and, in many cases, decreased. At the same time, firms have aggressively built up their corporate and litigation practices across the globe. They have also embraced hot, moneymaking practice areas like patent law and white-collar criminal defense.

-from "Debevoise & Plimpton Drops its Trusts and Estates Practice,"  in the Feb. 5 New York Times.

The process of large law firms pushing out their trusts and estates practices has been going for 20 years or more.  Perhaps a key factor in this particular situation is a lock-step compensation system for senior partners.  It has always seemed to me, however, that the big firms could simply pay the T&E lawyers less, unless the overhead structure is so burdensome in the big firm that the T&E lawyers would do better in a small firm setting.  That is an argument that I hear from T&E lawyers who would prefer to practice in boutique firms and not to join a larger firm with a diverse practice. 

We get several inquiries a year from large firms seeking a merger.  Haven't bitten yet.

Top Schools Suing Grad Students Who Default on Perkins Loans

The Russians report the story this way:

Graduate student borrowers are defaulting on almost US$1 billion in federal loans that were given out to the poor. US colleges such as Yale, Penn State and George Washington are coming after them in the courts, suing for nonpayment.

-from "Wealthiest US Colleges Suing Students over Default loans" from the RT website.

Bloomberg reports it this way:

Needy U.S. borrowers are defaulting on almost $1 billion in federal student loans earmarked for the poor, leaving schools such as Yale University and the University of Pennsylvania with little choice except to sue their graduates.

From "Yale Suing Former Students Shows Crisis in Loans to Poor" from the Bloomberg News Website.

The government is holding the schools accountable that admitted the subject students in the first place. Those subsidies increased the demand for the grad school's education.  Increased demand meant higher fees and expenses could be charged by the schools, which meant the students needed to borrow further, a malignant cycle, no?  Now the schools sue the former students.  We trust that prospective students are much more wary.

I have to question Bloomberg's assertion that the schools have "little choice except to sue their graduates," especially the top ones, with huge endowments, vast fixed assets, and prosperous alumni.  They could start paying the government back right now and not wait on how their lawsuits turn out.  But perhaps they are.

Surely some of the grad students, especially the ones who can't find jobs, will countersue the schools, alleging misrepresentation about the status of the jobs market and a failure on the part of the school to determine whether the student would be able to pay back the school before admitting the student in the first place.

I would be interested in how many suits the government has against the schools.  Probably none at this point.  It ought to happen.

In any event, this probably indicates that government subsidies of higher education generally are at serious risk. In fact, the articles state that this is the case. The higher-education bubble that Glenn Reynolds describes continues its slow motion burst.  It would seem to me the entire business model of the university is experiencing a "creative destruction" wave of the sort that other business and social sectors have experienced.  It's time.

80% US Men, 77% Women Overweight

The United States clearly has a weight problem. The World Health Organization says a third of American adults were obese in 2008, and 69.4 percent were overweight. Two years later, WHO said 80 percent of American adult men were overweight, along with 77 percent of women. Obesity accounts for at least $150 billion a year in American health care spending.

-from "Obesity and its Consequences Spreading Rapidly" in the Dallas Morning News.

This is getting to be pretty old news.  In light of the government (and its taxpayers) having taken on the task of keeping us all well, perhaps we will see a different approach to the farm subsidies that prop up the meat, fructose corn syrup enablers, sugar, and cow milk producers.

Entering the Windows 8 World

We flew from Ft. Lauderdale to Austin for Christmas.  On the SW Airlines concourse at the Ft. Lauderdale airport, near our departure gate, Microsoft had planted a demonstration area for Windows 8, complete with several tall tables with computer devices on them and people there to assist you with them.  If you "toured" Windows 8 on one of the devices, you got a prize.  In addition, you received a $25 dollar coupon on a SW Air "getaway" flight.  I bit.  I worked with Windows 8 on a Windows "Slate," a beautiful object, every bit as attractive as anything Apple might produce.

I was in the market for a new laptop, because my MacBook had been stolen.  The introduction to Windows 8 led to my purchase of an Asus VivoBook X202E-DH31T 11.6-Inch Touch Laptop. This is light enough to easily carry in my briefcase.  It doesn't have a disk drive, but Asus sells an outboard unit that I added for use at home, and it works very well.  All of this at not much more than half the price of a new MacBook, and I get to try out Windows 8 and a touch-screen device in the bargain.

According to CNET, Intel is pushing very hard for the adoption of touch-screen technology.