Stem Cell Research in the Developing World

I'm curious as to why more stem cell research isn't going on in Mexico or Central America. Perhaps the strong Catholic (or Christian) influence in Latin America has meant that laws outlawing most stem cell research (especially since they originally came from embryos) were easily passed in these countries.

My thought is that 1) the countries might have more relaxed standards for research; 2) lower overheads for facilities, staff and materials; and 3) they're close enough to the U.S. that scientists could easily move back and forth to share research or materials.

I'll have to see what I can look up in terms of laws about these matters.

My War on Drugs

Watching episodes of "Drugs, Inc." on National Geographic makes me think about my plans for fighting the war on drugs. My idea is a vigilante, "extra-curricular" war, waged by former military members with weapons and insurgency training. I think law enforcement might be willing to share their intelligence with them and a lot of times that information is known throughout the community. It may be that news people know - or have heard - about people within the structure but have no reason to write about it without a major bust (or can't write about it because it would be slander without an arrest or legal allegation).

I think there are so many ways the fight could be fought. I mostly think about using sniper shots to take out criminals from afar. But there are also more devious, up close methods like poison and improper medication. The most difficult (but perhaps most crucial) would be to get to people in prison and shut down those networks. Perhaps, if intelligence work is implemented, the criminal networks can be used to pass death up to the shot-callers locked away. Either that or systematically destroy the support networks around the prison systems so they can no longer get their messages out.

Of course, I have other ideas about prison and "treating" or torturing hardened criminals. Interestingly enough, I have a lot of compassion for prisoners; there is no place for redemption in American prisons: the people who are there are (generally) not going to learn anything good or compassionate and they are not encouraged to. It is my own personal belief that if the country really focused inward on the prison population and reached out to them in a real way, making them part of society, even in their incarcerated state, it might change the nature of prison and what they - and we - are able to do as a society.

I think we need to try out the modern, "liberal" prison model that they have in some European countries, as well as working to educate our prison population as much as possible. Offering them basic intellectual educational opportunities as well as vocational, hands-on type training (horticulture, landscaping, furniture-making, metal-working) might open their minds (to themselves and the world) and might change them in a fundamental way that absolute idleness never will.

And for anyone that says it's punishment and they should be denied these opportunities, consider these things: 1. They could be more useful to society if they are educated. 2. Changing the culture of prison could change the effect it has on those people who aren't going to be there forever, which improves our larger society when they re-integrate. 3. Their punishment is being denied liberty, one of the fundamental freedoms. And if you don't think that's bad enough, try staying in your room continuously for 24 hours. And prison definitely isn't as nice as your room.

The Rich Could Repair The Economy

Y'know, if rich liberals want to change this country, they can do that in significant ways right now. For instance: what if they put solar panels all over a low income neighborhood, eliminating or reducing those households electricity bills? What if they were to step in and renegotiate some home loans? Maybe a few or maybe a bunch (think $50 - $80,000 homes).

By the same token, if rich conservatives wanted to change this country right now, they could. They could go into hospitals and pay off large bills for people, keep the hospital in business but also doing charity in healthcare. They could make a concerted effort to make business loans all across the country, helping people with start-ups.

Churches, Housing and Rebuilding Neighborhoods

They're building a new part/condo building near a Metro stop I use. The other day while waiting for the train, I thought to myself: if I had a ton of money, I could lease two or three apartments and "give" them to charities or let them use them.

The idea, for me, is to provide more traditional housing than is currently or normally available. So for women who are escaping domestic violence or people who are transitioning out of homelessness or public housing (under very tight conditions, of course), they could have a nice apartment - a new apartment - to start their new lives in.

This also brings up another idea I've had with regards to my own neighborhood. A lot of black churches in DC, where I live, have older populations who have moved out of the city and the neighborhoods where the church is located. I don't know how or why that happened (perhaps an interesting research project) but when the housing market was so low a couple of years ago, I thought that would be a great time for a church in my neighborhood to buy up some houses and place "their" people in those houses, "re-seeding" the congregation in the neighborhood. I even imagined it as a dual-focus project wherein they brought parishoners back to the neighborhood but also provided 1) a start for young people just starting out (a place to live in the city, close to their work [maybe]) and 2) mixed housing, putting young people with elderly members so that those members had a sense of connection and family that they might not have with their own blood family. Basically it was about building community in the neighborhood with the church as the center. I thought many times about writing a letter to the pastor of that church, anonymously or not, suggesting the idea.

A Third Way on Health Care?

I was reading a study about health care (that I didn't understand very well) that was talking about how 5% of people account for 25% of all medical expenses. Interestingly enough, it seemed to be saying that the majority of this group had private insurance and were middle-aged to senior whites. Not what I would have expected.

In any case, in thinking about health care, I again considered ways to provide health care to the poor through means that different people could agree on. In the past I've wondered what it would be like if you hired doctors specifically for different public housing buildings, making them a kind of "neighborhood" doctor for those people. Limiting the number of patients could make their care more specific and intense and deeper because all of their patients would share similar circumstances.

The problem with this method is that - because I was thinking of this doctor as an alternative healthcare system - it doesn't provide for the tests, procedures or surgeries that might crop up. It's just a GP for the neighborhood.

Maybe if such a doctor was assigned and made part of the public health system, they could be useful in the way I described. If the people in the housing are actually the working poor and have some kind of insurance, that might not be helpful.

So let's think about another way to provide a blanket of healthcare to the poor. I had an idea some years ago - an idea similar to this - that was something I thought could work as a test case to show the wealthy how the poor could be covered in a cheaper way through charity. In that instance, I suggested that a wealthy corporate developer buy basic insurance for all of the lowest-paid workers on their projects. I was thinking they would most likely be working poor and possibly recent immigrants.

I don't know if those employers automatically provide health insurance and now that I'm thinking about it, the idea may have been different. It may have been that I thought of those workers but was thinking the program should be to offer family coverage or to go into their neighborhoods and choose a small geographical area to cover.

The new idea is similar to that one. This idea involves taking a building and insuring everyone in the building. To my idea, it could be a combination of left and right ideals: on the one hand, you're providing something for people that could be provided by work.* On the other hand, if you buy them all private insurance, you're keeping the money in the private sector and supporting the system.

Of course, there is a flaw in this idea: many (if not all) of the people who are poor enough to need insurance but are not able to afford it are on Medicaid, the government's plan. In my mind, though, this plan would be a perfect argument for or against the conservatives who want charity and private enterprise to take the place of government. (To me, one way the role of government can be described is to take on those projects that are humane but money-losing. There are plenty of things that the populace needs that don't profit anyone [at least in any obvious way]. Health care is an example. You don't make money providing for someone's health care [without laying off the costs on others] but it is, I would argue, the human thing to do.

* This presumes that there is work to be found, they are qualified for the jobs available and that they have the tools to get/keep the job (transport, childcare, etc).