Dogs are animals of integrity. We have much to learn from them.
Category: Health
Continuing this fascinating insight into the extraordinary relationship between dogs and man.
If this is your first sight of this multi-part article about dogs then you will need to start at the beginning:
Part One is here.
By Paul Handover
This may be of no surprise to dog owners!
The BBC recently screened one of the most fascinating programmes in ages (OK, subjective comment!). It was about the relationship between dogs and humans. The hour-long programme demonstrated just how important that relationship between dog and man really is.
Indeed, within the first few minutes of the programme, one of the contributors says that without that early domestication of dogs, civilisation of man might not have taken place!
Luckily someone has uploaded this programme onto YouTube. This Post contains the link to the first of 6 parts with the following 5 parts being presented on this Blog each day.
Please, please take time to watch these videos – they will amaze you, and very possibly bring tears to your eyes.
So if you are a dog owner, prepare to see your dog friend in a totally new way.
By Paul Handover
US politics and health care
The latest political spin in the U.S. is that the Democrats lost the seat that was held by the late Senator Edward Kennedy in Massachusetts because the people “just don’t understand the health care legislation.” It is not, so they say, that the legislation is bad or that it will raise taxes or result in rationing. No, it is not the legislation at all. It is that the White House has failed to communicate the key elements of the health care legislation clearly.
I beg to disagree. I think that we, the electorate, understand the legislation, but we do not like it, and do not want it. We do not want it shoved down our throats; we do not want our tax dollars used to blatantly buy off votes for the legislation; we do not want our voices to be ignored.
And the White House knows that the public has turned against this legislation because it now knows more about the bill, not less. Why else would they endorse the secretive, closed-door sessions to draft the language of the bill? Why else would they want to hide the legislation from the light of day, from the scrutiny of the press and the public? Because the less we know, the more likely it is that this shameful legislation will slither through and become law.
So, spare us, White House. The reason people do not like the health care legislation is not because you haven’t communicated it clearly enough. It’s because we understand it all too well.
By Sherry Jarrell
Capitalising on people’s fears
I often feel that a situation is manipulated by fear. The word is regularly used on television and in the newspapers, and once the thought is planted it is easy to influence the masses!
I was not surprised to read that the Head of Health at the Council of Europe, Dr. Wolfgang Wodard, had said flu drug
makers had influenced the World Health Organisation to declare Swine flu as a pandemic so they could rake in millions.
Earlier virus outbreaks of Bird Flu, SARS, the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and West Nile virus all had major news coverage lasting weeks, but despite the scare mongering, only six deaths, for example, were attributed to Bird Flu. 1.5 million chickens were slaughtered!
The initial “breaking news” regarding Swine flu warned of 65,000 possible deaths, however the campaign of panic provided a golden opportunity for representatives from the drugs companies to lay the golden egg.
To date only 251 deaths have been attributed to the N1H1 bug, and Dr Wodarg, who made the accusation, said it was just a normal flu. The swine flu scare was faked by greedy drug companies, he claimed.
I wonder how, as if by magic, the research, testing and the availability of millions of injections could be there ready for this unexpected outbreak.
In America a few years ago, the news about Anthrax being sent through the post to a government office lasted weeks. Cheap news, Scare mongering, Fear.
Have we moved on to a situation where we create commercial business at the expense of ourselves.
Big business? We wait now for the emergency debate on the issue at the end of the month.
By Bob Derham
Approaching that big boundary between learning and earning.
It seems like only yesterday that my first daughter Natalie was born. Now Natalie is approaching 17, going to college and will soon be learning to drive. She did very well in her GCSE [UK exams taken around the age of 16. Ed] exams, but
at the moment has no real idea of what she wants to do.
Perhaps not what you would expect her Dad to say but I think that is great. Because she can continue with a broad based approach to learning and from this she will eventually channel her interests and knowledge in a particular direction.
For A levels [University entrance exams taken around the age of 18. Ed] she is taking French, Psychology, Law, and Textiles!
Clearly for a young person another language enhances the ability to communicate with the wider world. Psychology is an interesting and a useful insight into fellow humans. Law will help to make her aware of what she will be expected to deal with but textiles, that was an initial puzzle to me.
The college were very unhappy about Natalie taking up textiles because she had not done art at school but, to be honest, that was because the school, at the time, had put pressure on her to drop art in favour of another subject that fitted into the weekly program of lessons.
But in just three months Natalie has shown great flair for textiles and I am amazed by the work she has produced. However, when I called her this evening from abroad (I’m currently in the Middle East), she was feeling very unsure because her form master has been putting pressure on her to decide what she wants to do when she leaves college.
If you are lucky enough to know your career path then life is easy but actually I am pleased that my daughter is building her knowledge in an open way. I only ask that she does her best.
Exam results might seem important on the day of announcement, and they may well be of serious consideration when applying for jobs in competition with other applicants, but who is the person?
Social awareness is hugely important, and trying different jobs earning money in the school holidays has given her an insight into various ways that people earn their living.
My suggestion is for her to not even worry about exams. Just enjoy the information she is learning. In France last year she was chatting away to locals in French, and laughing, because the level of understanding was already there.
Take the pressure off ! Make learning fun. Take the subjects you want. Enjoy education. There is greater variety with regard to work these days. Natalie will not end up in an office as she fears. Her general level of education and happy disposition will guide her to something different.
It is difficult to try an explain all this, but success in adult life is not a multitude of qualifications and lots of money, it is a balance of finding something that is of interest, pays a suitable wage, and makes you happy.
When I was at school nobody suggested making stained glass windows, or restoring paintings, or moving to Greece and working with different textiles but many things are possible now.
I only hope that she will trust herself, and then when she finally discovers something she really likes, she will be happy.
By Bob Derham
US health care reform comes with strings, nay chains.
Once a single-payer health care program is enacted into law, the US Government will assume the right to tell us how to live our lives. Our health will be their responsibility. Government officials will feel empowered to tell us what to eat and drink, what risks to take, whether we can smoke, how much weight we can gain and how much exercise we must get.
If you have any doubt, consider the following statements from the Obama administration over the last year. The clear message is if the government pays for something with tax dollars, it has both a right and a responsibility to tell the recipients of those dollars how to conduct themselves.
By Sherry Jarrell
Family echoes.
Today is my 54th birthday. I am now the age that my mother was when she died, on January 8th, 1985. I knew then that she died too young, that she had so much more living to do.
Two weeks before her death, I visited her in the convalescent hospital where she had been for months. She was going home! The doctors had given her a clean bill of health. She ordered a new skirt to celebrate and had it shipped to her home. We got out maps of London and made plans to take a trip there together, as adults, as friends, the following summer. I went back to school, happy to have had such a nice visit, happy she would soon be going home.
About ten days later, on January 5th, 1985, I got a call from my brother, telling me that mother had septic shock, that she might not make it, and that I needed to get there, fast. I bought a one-way ticket and packed a dark suit. She was still alert when I finally arrived. The nurses remembered me, and let me stay with her, even when visiting hours were over. I got to talk to her, and ask her what she wanted me to do for her, what she wanted the doctors to do for her, what measures she wanted taken. She wanted to live. She was getting weak, working to breath, waiting for the antibiotics to work. Or not. The doctors recommended a ventilator, to help her conserve her strength. Before they put it in, she had one last thing to say: “I love my children.” She died that night.
I remember thinking at the time how sad it was that she had never gone to college, never had a career, never fulfilled her dreams. That she had fallen in love at 18, gotten married, and devoted her entire adult life to her children. That her last thought was of her children. I was single and doing odd jobs while earning a doctorate. I had a cat and helped take care of my 90-year-old neighbor, but having children was the furthest thing from my mind.
Fast forward to today, January 12, 2010. I am now the age my mother was when she died. I did go to college, I do have a career, and I have chipped away at those dreams. But those are the side bars of my life. Like every parent out there, the moment my first child was born, I understood what my mother meant. I understood how much you could love someone, how you could put their interests ahead of your own, and how you could not be happy unless they were okay. And, as the years go by and I get older, I understand what a precious gift my mother gave me when she said those last words. She taught me that time flies, and you never know what day might be your last. She taught me to treasure every second with your children because, before you know it, they have grown up and are out the door. Just yesterday, they were toddlers; blink, and they are turning 30.
Time passes so fast. Make it worth it.
By Sherry Jarrell
[Readers may find that an earlier Post by Sherry fits very beautifully with this moving account published today. Ed.]
Well founded suspicions of Sensationalised Science Reporting
One of my daughters gave me a super Christmas present this year, the book “Bad Science”, by Ben Goldacre.
This is a wonderful work and should be a set book for all “A” level schoolkids. There are chapters on:
…. plus several others on various very rich charlatans in the field of alternative medicine and other areas. It also contains a concise and terrible account of the insanity of Thabo Mbeki’s nutty ideas on HIV and AIDS, which killed tens of thousands of people. Continue reading “Identifying Bullshit in Science”
The work ethic!
I moved out to San Carlos, Sonora State, Mexico in September 2008 and while San Carlos is a favourite holiday & second home place for North Americans, it is still possible to watch the way that Mexicans approach their lives and view the world.
This lovely tale was sent to me recently (thank you Jonathan) and it is published because it not only illustrates the Mexican attitude but also reminds us ‘Westerners’ that we aren’t necessarily correct with our Western views.
Learning from Dogs 