Re: FW: Breeding, was: Re: FW: The structure of future work...

[Victor Milne]

Thanks, Ray, for your very interesting and detailed information, both on
lead poisoning and on Russian immigrants. You did fail to mention one
important group among the Russians. Shall we call them the entrepreneurial
group? I mean the ones whose presence caused the Toronto police to set up a
"Russian crime unit". They stole two tractor-trailer loads of product
(natural gas fireplaces) from my employer 70 miles north of Toronto. It was
fortunately recovered when a Toronto cop spotted the cartons in a warehouse,
and a wiretap (requiring a translation from the Russian) led the police to
the boss. Harry Pollard might quibble about my choice of terms, but the
difference between these gentlemen and the American entrepreneurs trying to
patent the genes of indigenous people rather eludes me.

Victor

Re: FW: Breeding, was: Re: FW: The structure of future work...

[Ray E. Harrell]

Good point.  I believe that Mike Hollinshead was the first to point
this out to me.  I think that it will take a correlation of all of the
external factors with requisite comparisons before serious conclusions
can be drawn.  Of course if you define the parameters you can
prove almost anything by virtue of what you leave out.

One of the
things that is often left out of the Com/Cap comparison between the
U.S. and the old Soviet Empire is the weather.  They didn't suffer for
want of oil but it was a hell of a lot easier to get it out of almost any
of our fields than it is out of Siberia.

Agriculture is another point.
lf your growing season is short you need tremendous amounts of
land to compete with those who can plant many crops in a small
amount of land.And on and on.

My point is that in areas where
we are roughly equivalent like education, we have gotten our behinds
whipped.

The Arts are another area even though the official dogma
is that they were pampered,  anyone who knows their refugees
finds the opposite is true although they are magnificently trained and
have far superior work experience since they did have work before
the collapse of the Soviet.

American graduates who paid for their
own education have an average full time employment of 2%.   They
also lose out to the émigrés because of the superior work experience
that they bring to America.  That makes the competitive advantage
overwhelming in their ability to be creative, improvise and invent
new models.

If you have no work experience, your creativity is
profoundly impaired as most of America's performing artists have
discovered.  Those who have succeeded usually have European
experience to replace America's cultural poverty.

William Bradford Ward wrote:

> HARRY: Every year a bunch of US cardiac specialists went to the Soviet Union and for 
>two weeks, they would work solidly in a Moscow hospital doing, I suppose, triage as 
>they took patients from the multitude to operate and save lives. I remember one 
>comment from a US doctor. He couldn't believe that the Head of Cardiology at the 
>Moscow hospital got a salary of $7 a week - about the same as a bus driver. A sure 
>way to attract the best people into medicine.
>
> I couldn't let Harry's comment go unnoticed although I really am not interested in 
>the communist/capitalist argument but do have problems with people who use irrelevant 
>arguments to make their point.
>
> At a meeting of the American Heart Association one year a bunch of cardiovascular 
>surgeons said that the reason that there had been a 30% drop in cardiovascular deaths 
>in the previous ten years was that open heart surgery was up 30% in the same period.  
>A biostatistician friend of mine got up after that and showed that beer consumption 
>was up 30% in the same period and said that it was truly the increase in beer 
>drinking.
>
> By the way, no one has ever been able to show any relationship between health 
>services in the US [except for immunizations] and improvement in health [except for 
>the health of health care workers].
>
> ---
> Bill Ward, MA, MPH, DrPH
> Research Director
> Arthritis Research Institute of America
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> On Wed, 26 Jan 2000 13:32:24   Harry Pollard wrote:
> >Victor wrote:
> >
> >>I am by no means a communist or socialist, but this looks like
> >>propaganda-sriven tunnel vision to me. Comments follow.
> >
> >I rarely find a genuine communist or socialist. Lots of waffling liberals,
> >but hardly any genuinely philosophic communists, or socialists. It's a shame.
> >
> >Meantime, you did not answer a single point in my post.
> >
> >You said:
> >
> >VICTOR: "There were most certainly inequities with high party officials
> >living in
> >luxury and ordinary people living very humbly in crowded apartments. (By the
> >way what's the difference in life-style between a US senator and your
> >average Washington, DC resident?)"
> >
> >HARRY: The Ukraine after the separation was landed with a dacha of a high
> >party official. The story appeared in the newspapers because they were
> >trying to get rid of it. They couldn't afford the $300,000 a year it cost
> >to maintain it.
> >
> >Yep! There certainly were inequities.
> >
> >But the USSR was a classless society - remember? The "to each" and "from
> >each" nonsense - remember? Meantime, Senators like other politicians all
> >over the world lead the good life as they "serve us".
> >
> >VICTOR: "However, medical care was universally available and pensioners
> >could live without financial anxiety. This is not the case after a decade
> >of US-driven free enterprise in Russia. For another communist country,
> >Cuba, I read recently that the infant mortality rates are less than in the
> >USA."
> >
> >HARRY: Every year a bunch of US cardiac specialists went to the Soviet
> >Union and for two weeks, they would work solidly in a Moscow hospital
> >doing, I suppose, triage as they took patients from the multitude to
> >operate and save li

Re: FW: Breeding, was: Re: FW: The structure of future work...

[William Bradford Ward]

HARRY: Every year a bunch of US cardiac specialists went to the Soviet Union and for 
two weeks, they would work solidly in a Moscow hospital doing, I suppose, triage as 
they took patients from the multitude to operate and save lives. I remember one 
comment from a US doctor. He couldn't believe that the Head of Cardiology at the 
Moscow hospital got a salary of $7 a week - about the same as a bus driver. A sure way 
to attract the best people into medicine.

I couldn't let Harry's comment go unnoticed although I really am not interested in the 
communist/capitalist argument but do have problems with people who use irrelevant 
arguments to make their point.

At a meeting of the American Heart Association one year a bunch of cardiovascular 
surgeons said that the reason that there had been a 30% drop in cardiovascular deaths 
in the previous ten years was that open heart surgery was up 30% in the same period.  
A biostatistician friend of mine got up after that and showed that beer consumption 
was up 30% in the same period and said that it was truly the increase in beer drinking.

By the way, no one has ever been able to show any relationship between health services 
in the US [except for immunizations] and improvement in health [except for the health 
of health care workers]. 


---
Bill Ward, MA, MPH, DrPH
Research Director
Arthritis Research Institute of America
[EMAIL PROTECTED]


On Wed, 26 Jan 2000 13:32:24   Harry Pollard wrote:
>Victor wrote:
>
>>I am by no means a communist or socialist, but this looks like
>>propaganda-sriven tunnel vision to me. Comments follow.
>
>I rarely find a genuine communist or socialist. Lots of waffling liberals, 
>but hardly any genuinely philosophic communists, or socialists. It's a shame.
>
>Meantime, you did not answer a single point in my post.
>
>You said:
>
>VICTOR: "There were most certainly inequities with high party officials 
>living in
>luxury and ordinary people living very humbly in crowded apartments. (By the
>way what's the difference in life-style between a US senator and your
>average Washington, DC resident?)"
>
>HARRY: The Ukraine after the separation was landed with a dacha of a high 
>party official. The story appeared in the newspapers because they were 
>trying to get rid of it. They couldn't afford the $300,000 a year it cost 
>to maintain it.
>
>Yep! There certainly were inequities.
>
>But the USSR was a classless society - remember? The "to each" and "from 
>each" nonsense - remember? Meantime, Senators like other politicians all 
>over the world lead the good life as they "serve us".
>
>VICTOR: "However, medical care was universally available and pensioners 
>could live without financial anxiety. This is not the case after a decade 
>of US-driven free enterprise in Russia. For another communist country, 
>Cuba, I read recently that the infant mortality rates are less than in the 
>USA."
>
>HARRY: Every year a bunch of US cardiac specialists went to the Soviet 
>Union and for two weeks, they would work solidly in a Moscow hospital 
>doing, I suppose, triage as they took patients from the multitude to 
>operate and save lives. I remember one comment from a US doctor. He 
>couldn't believe that the Head of Cardiology at the Moscow hospital got a 
>salary of $7 a week - about the same as a bus driver. A sure way to attract 
>the best people into medicine.
>
>I also wonder whether the millions of "officials" in the communist 
>hierarchy used that hospital - or perhaps they had an inequity somewhere, 
>fully over-staffed and without the problems the common folk suffered.
>
>Vivid in my mind is a Ted Koppel television program in which a place 
>looking like an abattoir had a line of people awaiting abortions - there 
>was no anesthetic. One woman was having her 35th abortion. A high school 
>kid was having her fifth. Ugh!
>
>Yes, medical care was universally available, all right.
>
>And of course "pensioners could live without financial anxiety". I fear you 
>have "propaganda-driven tunnel vision" when you look a a country where 
>practically anyone not official was not long way from the edge of 
>starvation. Thank God for the free market, beg pardon - black market. That 
>kept the people fed - at a cost.
>
>Our child mortality is certainly not the best in the world, though I expect 
>that if we measured only those outside the inner cities, it would be best. 
>The inner cities is where the greatest concentration of welfare state 
>services are. Yet, all we need to do to improve things is to decriminalized 
>drugs. That would remove half the inmates of our prisons, too.
>
>However, in dictatorial countries such as Cuba, statistics such as child 
>mortality are more likely to come out of their public relations office than 
>the medical department.
>
>You said:
>
>VICTOR: "Good God! I'd far rather have a doctor who discussed football 
>results than
>investments. I'd fear the latter's main preoccupation would be operating on
>my wallet rather than hea

Fw: Globe 2000 International Environment Conference (fwd)

[Sabita Ramlal]

- Original Message -
From: Jivan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: Mr Amar Wahab <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Mrs Marisa Clarke Marshall
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Ms Sabita Ramlal <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Prof Dr Sunita
Kaistha <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Prof Dr Preeti Singh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>;
Ms Marcia Leite <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Koushki, Alison & Prof Dr Parviz
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Friday, January 28, 2000 9:38 AM
Subject: Globe 2000 International Environment Conference (fwd)

>
> Original message
> Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2000 09:04:40 -0500
> To: (Recipient list suppressed)
> From: Gary Gallon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Subject: Globe 2000 International Environment Conference
>
>
>  THE GALLON ENVIRONMENT LETTER
>
>506 Victoria Ave., Montreal, Quebec H3Y 2R5
>[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>  Vol. 4, No. 2, January 10, 2000
>
> *
>   CANADACANADACANADA   CANADA
> *
>
> GLOBE 2000 BI ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON
> BUSINESS AND THE ENVIRONMENT, VANCOUVER, MARCH 2000
>
> The Globe 2000 International Conference and Tradeshow on the
> Environment will be held March 22 and 24, 2000 in Vancouver, B.C.
> This bi annual conference last held in 1998, has grown to be Canada's
> largest, and one of the world's largest environmental conferences and
> tradeshows on environmental technologies and policies. There will be
> 10,000 participants, 2,000 conference delegates, 500 corporations,
> 400 technology exhibits, 250 speakers, 50 international buying delegations
> from a number of countries around the world.
>
> There was $460 million in business generated by exhibitors at GLOBE 98.
> Expect more buying in 2000 as the worldwide market for environmental
> goods and services grows to more than $450 billion annually. GLOBE
> will bring companies together with key international buyers, governments
> and corporate executives. More than 2,000 corporate leaders and senior
> government officials from 50 countries are attending. If your company is
> interested in accessing international markets, GLOBE, supported by
> Environment Canada and Industry Canada, is the place to be. Limited space
> is available in the tradeshow. Showcases including Clean Energy Avenue,
> Software Alley, Sustainable Transport and the Learning Lane.
> Organizations already on board for GLOBE 2000 include AGRA
> Earth & Environmental, Ballard Power Systems, Battelle, Boeing,
> Golder Associates, Sanexen Environmental Services, and TurboSonic
> Technologies. For more information call ph. 6047757522 or
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]   Visit the website at
> http://www.globe.ca/
>
> *
>
> RON PORTELLI TO LEAVE CEIA NATIONAL
>
> Ron Portelli, President of the Canadian Environment Industry Association
> (CEIA National), based in Ottawa, will be departing after his three year
> term. CEIA National Chairman, Chris Henderson, of Delphi Group, Ottawa,
> said that, "Ron Portelli played a tremendous role in helping strengthen
the
> organization and make it relevant to our companies' needs." Prior to
joining
> CEIA, Portelli was President of Concord Environmental, a mediumsized
> environmental and air pollution control company based in Toronto. During
> his years at CEIA National Portelli was able to consolidate a diverse
> provincial driven organization into a national powerhouse. He worked
> on the expansion of export sales and helped create the new Environmental
> Exporters Council (EEC). Portelli also worked closely with Environment
> Canada and Industry Canada during the implementation of the federal
> Canadian Environment Industry Strategy (CEIS). You can still reach
> Ron at Canadian Environment Industry Association, 350, rue Sparks St.,
> Suite 208, Ottawa, Ontario, Tel. (613) 2366222, Fax (613) 2366850,
> email [EMAIL PROTECTED], website
> http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/
>
> *
>
> MINISTER DAVID ANDERSON SUPPORTS ENVIRONMENT INDUSTRY
>
> Speaking at a luncheon meeting of environment industries in Montreal
> with Grappe de developpement des industries de l'environnement,
> November 12, 1999, Canada's federal Environment Minister, Hon.
> David Anderson said, "our economic and social quality of life will
> be directly linked to the environment." Expounding on the importance
> of environmental and efficiency industries and technologies, David
> Anderson said, "environment and economy go hand in hand". He
> reminded the company representatives that there is a second "more
> invisible and subtle series of environmental issues that are affecting
> us", and urged the companies to address these, such as climate change
> and ozone depletion. Talking about greenhouse gas 

Re: FW Hunger in America

[S. Lerner]

>
>To the list,
>
>This is long, (since my mother taught typing).   So if it bothers you just
>cut to the next post.   But the article at the end is an important one, I
>hope you will read it.
>
>REH
>
>Harry Pollard wrote:
>
>   (snip)
>
>   And well you should avoid answering it, for their ability to put potatoes
>   into the mouths of their peoples is atrocious.
>
>
>The  below poverty level in the Soviet Union was 20%  it is above that here!
>The difference was in the upper groups because there was no truly
>wealthy class.  You can insist that one political group was paid more but
>relative to world wealth and to inheritance, it didn't exist.  That is why
>their children often ended up here.  There was no advantage to their
>parents accomplishments for their offspring.   Here they could make
>money by making American feel better.   Violence and terror, true,
>they were as bad as the LAPD in the ghetto or the FBI at Pine Ridge.
>
>You seem to insist that looking at something without bias is to deify it.
>Strange.
>You may very well call the party members an upper class but they had
>nothing compared to the wealth that they have now under the present system
>and the peasants and scientists are operating on barter.  Not unlike Haiti
>in the back country and the US in the first hundred years of its existence.
>Slavery, genocide etc. and lots of railroads, plantations and textile tycoons,
>children laborers etc.   Trying to "make it" in the world always makes brutes
>of governments and cultures.   The Romans, the Catholics, the British,
>the Portuguese, the Americans and even the Dutch to mention only a few.
>Some call it Empire I would consider it national adolescence and it seems
>to be world wide including the "outspent" communist countries.
>
>
>   It was the job of the State to support the Bolshoi, the Kirov, the two
>   Moscow companies (three if you include the Kremlin) and the rest of them -
>   and they did very well. The people they trained at great expense were often
>   superior - and they had every reason to be so, for the competition for
>   these plum positions must have been great.
>
>Your ignorance is rampant.  The Soviet Union had thousands of performing
>arts institutions and major composers (writing in Russian of course
>incomprehensible to mono linguistic Americans.).   "If you can't read it, it
>don't exist."   Just like their fashions and space program!   Seventy years
>into America they were still fighting over whether Blacks and American
>Indians were human or not.  Meanwhile in the current U.S., Doctors and
>toilet paper CEOs make more than artists, scientists or master teachers.
>
>Harry, this is embarrassing but are you implying that the
>manufacture of toilet paper (which was terrible in Russia and still is I'm
>told) is more important or somehow more "real" work than the arts?
>
>That is an attitude that made the writers, painters, dancers and
>singers leave the U.S. in droves and still does.  Read Henry James.
>Basically the history is that the peasants came here understanding
>Shakespeare and La Sonambula but with the contract for private
>funding of the arts, their children learned to understand much more
>simple things.   Meanwhile in places like Kazan the families of former
>serfs know more about cultural complexity than America's children.
>How do I know?  I have students who have sung there and told me.
>This is not unlike the miners in Colorado in the 19th century who would
>make most Americans seem like boobs in their knowledge of both
>history and their individual culture's treasures.
>
>Consider that today most can't understand the relationship between
>artistic complexity and the learning of math and history.  They think
>of art as a pill to make children smart but have no idea of the
>discipline and processes by which that happens.  They think it is
>found in simple listening.   Meanwhile the Sloan School tries to
>teach ensemble to adults who were deprived of such complexity
>as children in simple academic three R courses.
>
>Ref. Levine Harvard Massey Lectures:  Highbrow/Lowbrow, the
>Emergence of Cultural Hierarchy in America.  Harvard pub.
>
>
>   A very good ballet dancer would be treated like royalty. But, not so the
>   bulk of the Russian people. The peasants who suffered under the Czar
>   suffered equally under the Soviets - at least those who were left after the
>   massacre of the millions.
>
>
>I have one of those Bolshoi members in my studio.  You wouldn't be
>happy with the things she endured in order to be the best.   Nothing
>"Royal" about those things.Or do you just resent the fact that they
>could eat and had a regular salary to live on?They couldn't eat much
>however, if they wished to survive the rigor.   Their life style was middle
>to upper middle class here.  "Oh horrors!  Artists?"
>
>I'm putting an article at the end of this just for you and your attitude. I
>know about the massacre of millions first hand and my historian father's

FW Poor get poorer, rich not so rich

[S. Lerner]

>X-Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2000 17:42:39 -0500
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>From: Bob Olsen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: Poor get poorer, rich not so rich
>Mime-Version: 1.0
>
>
>
>
>  First an announcement, then a news report.  Read on!
>
>
>From: "Ann Curry-Stevens" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>To: "Bob Olsen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: Press release on growing gap in Canada
>Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2000 09:13:59 -0500
>
>
>
>Inequality Rises As More Families Slide To The Bottom Of The Income
>Scale Tax cuts don’t address economic reality says new report
>
>January 27, 2000 – Canadian families have fallen towards the bottom
>of the income scale over the course of the 1990s, and the odds of
>“getting ahead” have all but disappeared says a new report released
>today by the Centre for Social Justice. (Toronto)
>http://www.socialjustice.org/textindex.html
><[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>Canada’s Great Divide: the politics of the growing gap between rich
>and poor in the 1990s by economist Armine Yalnizyan charts the
>startling results of the decade’s “grand social experiment” as
>governments put the emphasis on “more market, less government.”
>
>Despite economic growth over the last decade, inequalities have grown.
>There has been a dramatic surge in the proportion of families who have
>ended up at the bottom of the income scale.  Surprisingly, the
>proportion of families in the middle and at the “top” actually fell
>between 1989 and 1997, as did their average incomes.  Cuts to
>transfers and taxes further fueled the growing gap.
>
>“We are witnessing a slide to the bottom, with fewer opportunities to
>get ahead.  These are not the results that we were led to expect from a
>more vigorous pursuit of market solutions over the ‘90s,”  says Armine
>Yalnizyan, author of the report.  “By any measure, there are more poor
>families and they are poorer than ever. ”
>
>In 1989, 30 per cent of families registered an after-tax income of
>less than $35,038.  By 1997, more than 37 per cent of families found
>themselves in this income bracket.
>
>The poorest 10 per cent of families fared the worst.  In 1989, this
>group had an average after-tax income of less than $15,596.  In 1997,
>their after-tax income had fallen to an average $13,806.
>
>With incomes this low, says Yalnizyan, proposed federal tax cuts will
>not reach the poorest Canadian families.  She cautions against a
>tax-cut approach of “giving back to Canadians” which leaves a large
>number of families out in the cold, and does not address escalating
>concerns about cut-backs to social programs and services.
>
>“Tax cuts aren’t the solution because taxes aren’t the problem,”
>Yalnizyan says. “Tax policy is not a substitute for social policy.
>A tax cut will not buy us better hospital emergency services when we
>need them.  A tax cut will not keep our kids’ schools from closing.
>A tax cut won’t raise the incomes of the poorest Canadian families who
>don’t have taxable incomes.”
>
>The report examines the critical role of political choice in shaping
>the growing gap, highlighting the outcome of two distinct periods over
>the 1990s – recession and recovery.
>
>. . . / 2
>
>Inequality Rises As More Families Slide To The Bottom Of The Income
>Scale Centre for Social Justice /2
>
>
>During the recessionary period of 1989 to 1993, the gap between rich
>and poor grew in market terms, but government actions helped close the
>after-tax gap despite tough economic times.  The opposite trend
>occurred during the recovery period of 1994 to 1997.  Average market
>incomes improved for all income groups, including the poorest, closing
>the market gap; but in after-tax terms the gap grew at the most rapid
>rate it has since the 1970s, when we first started tracking trends in
>income inequality.  The growing gap in after-tax incomes can in part be
>traced to governments pulling back from key income supports to Canadian
>families such as Unemployment Insurance and social assistance.
>
>The report also tracks income disparities in the provinces over the
>1990s, again with surprising results.  There were significant
>differences in rates of economic growth and decline across the country,
>but economic growth did not always translate to reductions in income
>inequality.  In the final analysis, the state of inequality was more
>likely to correspond to choices of the governments in power than
>economic circumstance.
>
>“This trend in sliding family incomes has devastating implications.
>Our odds of achieving greater prosperity or simply greater financial
>security have dropped – let alone the odds facing our children,” says
>Yalnizyan. “The promise of prosperity through tax cuts plays on that
>sense of insecurity. But tax cuts will not reverse this economic trend,
>nor address the erosion of services.  As poll after poll has shown,
>Canadians are looking for a new direction from their governments, one
>that will increase their security and well-being.”
>
>
>For more information, please