Nation Topics - Science | The Nation

The article looks at a budget reconciliation bill written by Republicans in the United States that will lead, the author contends, to more tax cuts for rich people. The budget allows states to impose premiums and increase co-payments on low-income Medicaid recipients. Congress could have saved billions by reducing the amount that Medicaid pays for pharmaceutical drugs. The budget also cuts child support enforcement, foster care programs, and student loan programs. The author references the book "Off Center," by Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson.

The article notes the fortieth anniversary of the publication of Ralph Nader's book "Unsafe at Any Speed," a volume that inspired the consumer movement. Also discussed is the American tendency to attribute reform in Russia to the influence of the United States. "The Weekly Standard" is criticized for letting former US ambassador for nuclear arms negotiation Max Kampelman's claim that he organized the first meeting between Mikhail Gorbachev and Andrei Sakharov go unchallenged.

Offers a look at the human disaster caused by Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf Coast of the United States. Reference to a press conference with U.S. President George W. Bush regarding the loss of Senator Trent Lott's house in the hurricane; Reference to an interview with Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff on National Public Radio regarding the conditions at the convention center where hurricane refugees were being held; Devastation for African American property owners in Louisiana; Readiness of officials to label African American neighborhoods in New Orleans, Louisiana as poverty-stricken; Methods used in the evacuation of New Orleans residents.

Looks at the reaction of Christian conservatives to the potential release of a vaccine that protects against the sexually transmitted disease known as human papilloma virus (HPV). Development of the vaccine by pharmaceutical companies Merck & Co. Inc. and GlaxoSmithKline PLC; Comments regarding the vaccine from Bridget Maher of the Family Research Council, who states that giving young women an HPV vaccine could been seen as a license for them to engage in sexual activity.

Offers a look at the role of antidepressant drugs in homicides perpetrated by teenagers. Case of Jeff Weise, a teenager who killed ten others at the Red Lake Indian reservation in Minnesota, and who was on the drug Prozac; Presence of the antidepressant Luvox at the Columbine High School shooting in Colorado; Use of Prozac by Joseph Wesbecker who killed nine in Kentucky; Lawsuit against pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, manufacturer of Prozac, in the Wesbecker incident; Criticism of the clinical testing of Prozac; Connection between psychiatrists and pharmaceutical companies; Research into the likely link between Prozac and violent acts.

The degree to which market ideals have gained supremacy in all spheres of world politics, from crime to health insurance to family relations, should be of great social interest. This shift has resulted in the privatizing of some traditionally public functions without regard for art or idealism, custom or sentimentality, culture or locale. When we contract out military operations, misbehavior of the subcontractor technically shifts from state action to transaction cost. The primary duty of any profit-seeking entity is toward shareholders--the bottom line rather than the common good. In an era of biotechnology--to say nothing of bioterrorism--this arena portends battles for control. This is not merely an issue of how to regulate industrial impact on the environment. It is also one of whether and how to limit corporate ownership of the environment. If we are in a moment when governments are ceding much of that power to other monopolistic entities, whether in war, medicine, manufacturing or agriculture, we should make sure we have the chance to debate openly our desire to retain the not-always-efficient rights of citizenship in an apparently fast-emerging corporate order.

On March 24 at the New York Society for Ethical Culture, The Nation Institute sponsored a conversation between Toni Morrison, recipient of the 1993 Nobel Prize, member of The Nation's editorial advisory board and author of "Love," "Beloved," "Paradise," "Jazz" and "The Bluest Eye," among other books, and Cornel West, professor of religion and African-American studies at Princeton, Nation contributor and author of "Race Matters" and many other books and articles.

The author comments on the U.S. FDA's warning that antidepressants may cause suicidal impulses in some patients, and on the re-release of the Monty Python film, "The Life of Brian." Six years after Kip Kinkel, dosed up with Prozac, killed his parents and two students at Thurston High, in Oregon, well over a decade after naysayers, including Dr. Peter Breggin, the Scientologists and this columnist, raised the alarm about links between antidepressants and violence, the FDA has issued a warning that ten antidepressants can cause deeper depression and, for gosh sakes, even agitation, mania and other forms of violent behavior, even SUICIDE! Since the FDA cocks a nervous eye at such important constituencies as the pharmaceutical industry and its political reps in the White House and Congress, it is cautious about overhasty and tasteless prying into cause and effect. The FDA says it isn't yet clear whether antidepressants contribute to the emergence of suicidal tendencies. So there'll be a pause, during which time the FDA can fend off concerns with comforting talk about "thoroughgoing reviews" and the drug companies can continue to mine their usual extortionate markups from the antidepressants, for which 213 million prescriptions were issued in the United States in 2003. I don't see any way the pharmaceutical antidepressants will take a serious long-term hit from the FDA warning and impending review. It's great to see that "The Life of Brian" is being reissued, after Mel Gibson showed there's still a buck to be made out of the crucifixion.

The article criticizes the Medicare and energy bills, which recently came before the U.S. Congress. The corruptions of Washington are hidden in plain sight. It's no secret that there's a pay-to-play ethos that links legislators, contributors and lobbyists, and results in legislation more attuned to corporate interests than the public's. With the Medicare legislation, the White House and the Republican leaders of Congress (aided by two Senate Democrats, Max Baucus and John Breaux) produced a measure that grants seniors a spotty prescription drug benefit while rewarding two of the GOP's most generous supporters: the pharmaceutical industry and the health insurance industry. Yet once in a while the hogs of Washington outdo themselves--as they have done in the writing of the Medicare and energy bills. The energy bill went even further in terms of rewarding patrons. It would have doled out billions in tax breaks--or corporate welfare--to traditional energy companies, dwarfing the amounts reserved for renewable energy and energy efficiency. The Medicare bill, with the support of a small but decisive number of Senate Democrats and the backing of AARP, passed; the energy bill failed by two votes in the Senate, though Republicans will probably try to resurrect it when senators return to Washington in January. But both pieces of legislation tell the same ugly story. In the Washington of George W. Bush, Tom DeLay and Bill Frist, industry--that is, corporate patrons--comes first. And too many Democrats are accomplices.

The author argues that the politics of Arnold Schwarzenegger, the new Republican governor of California, are heavily influenced by the liberal agenda of the Kennedy family he married into. Arnold Schwarzenegger has sold himself to his fans as a raging Republican Terminator. But his future will depend on the outcome of a battle for his soul between the Republican Party and the liberal Democratic Kennedy culture he shares by marriage. So far, the Republican allegiance is dominant. But the "Kennedy factor" could turn him into a Terminator with a stubborn liberal streak. Why is Schwarzenegger a Republican anyway? He disagrees with mainstream Republicans on abortion fights, gay rights and the Clinton impeachment. He didn't go to the last Republican convention. He tightly suspects that the Bush White House was divided about his candidacy, with some favoring Condoleezza Rice as the successor to Gray Davis. The answer is that Arnold emerged as an ambitious bodybuilder in a European social-democratic culture that he felt was too small for him. He broke away and immigrated to the America of Richard Nixon. The bodybuilder liked what he heard and began calling himself a Republican. It seemed simple, but then he met Maria Shriver, a liberal Democrat who was genetically unable to marry a real Republican. Arnold might be unable to acknowledge publicly that the Kennedys changed his outlook, but his actual sensibility was becoming more Democratic.