text:
Daily Aspirin May Cut Cancer Deaths, Another Study Finds
But drug has bleeding risks and shouldn't be used solely to prevent cancer, experts say
URL of this page: http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/news/fullstory_128152.html
(*this news item will not be available after 11/08/2012)
Friday, August 10, 2012
The lower risk of dying from cancer associated with aspirin, however, may not be as great as previously thought, say the authors of the large new study.
And aspirin's possible side effects -- notably the higher risk of bleeding episodes -- need to be taken into account when considering its use, they added.
"Expert committees that develop clinical guidelines will consider the totality of evidence about aspirin's risks and benefits when guidelines for aspirin use are next updated," said lead researcher Eric Jacobs, the society's strategic director of pharmacoepidemiology.
Jacobs said, until there are new guidelines, he doesn't recommend taking aspirin for cancer prevention.
"Although recent evidence about aspirin use and cancer is encouraging, it is still premature to recommend people start taking aspirin specifically to prevent cancer," he said.
Even low-dose aspirin can substantially increase the risk of serious gastrointestinal bleeding, Jacobs pointed out.
"Decisions about aspirin use should be made by balancing the risks against the benefits in the context of each individual's medical history. Any decision about daily aspirin use should be made only in consultation with a health care professional," he added.
The study was published in the Aug. 10 online issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
To look at the potential effect of daily aspirin use on cancer deaths, Jacobs' team used data from the Cancer Prevention Study II Nutrition Cohort, part of a larger long-term study on the effects of lifestyle factors on mortality.
This study included more than 100,000 men and women without a history of cancer, some of whom were taking aspirin daily.
Of the study participants, 5,138 eventually died from cancer.
Aspirin use was associated with an up to 16 percent lower risk of dying from cancer, which, however, was less than seen in another recent study, the researchers noted. In that analysis of randomized trials (where people were randomly assigned to either take aspirin or not take aspirin), aspirin use reduced cancer deaths by 37 percent during five years of follow-up and 15 percent during 10 years of follow-up, the authors noted in the report.
Nevertheless, "even a relatively modest benefit with respect to overall cancer mortality could still meaningfully influence the balances of risk and benefits of prophylactic [preventative] aspirin use," Jacobs' team concluded.
A limitation of the study is that it was an observational study, not a randomized trial. This could mean that the reduction in cancer deaths tied to aspirin use may be over- or under-estimated, the researchers noted.
Dr. John Baron, a professor of medicine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine, who authored an accompanying journal editorial, said, "It's a remarkable idea that something that's in medicine cabinets around the world, and has been around for more than a century, can prevent cancer."
However, Baron is not recommending that people start taking aspirin to cut their odds for malignancy.
Why it works against cancer isn't known, Baron said, and he noted that the effect of aspirin is seen over time. For example, aspirin might start preventing colon cancer after a person had taken it for about 10 years.
During that time, however, that person might have gastrointestinal or brain bleeding caused by aspirin. So those risks and benefits need to be balanced, he noted.
The question is no longer whether aspirin prevents cancer, according to Baron, but rather whether the risks associated with aspirin are overshadowed by its benefits, he suggested. "But even the most pessimistic study shows a meaningful reduction," he added.
But while the new study found an association between aspirin use and reduced cancer risk, because it is not a randomized, controlled trial -- the "gold standard" for research -- it did not prove a cause-and-effect relationship.
Copyright (c) 2012 HealthDay. All rights reserved.
- More Health News on:
- Cancer
- Gastrointestinal Bleeding
- Pain Relievers


text:
One of the little-known freebies Gmail offers is a portable SMTP server to send mail from any network for any email address.
Travellers who use their ISP's SMTP server to send mail with their email program (like Thunderbird or Outlook Express) can find themselves in a bind if they're on another network away from home, like at a coffee shop, airport or visiting relatives. But if you've got a free Gmail account (get one here) you can use Google's SMTP server to send mail through Thunderbird from [email protected] Update: Google rewrites the from address to your Gmail address.. Here's how to set it up:
In your email client software, under Outgoing mail, set the SMTP server to
Set the your username is
[email protected]
and make sure "Use username and password" is checked.Also check off "TLS" under "Use secure connection."
And voila! You can send mail for any email address from any network (that lets you connect to an outside SMTP server) using your Gmail account - be sure to enter your Gmail password when prompted.
Check out Gmail's help section on POP access for Gmail for specific instructions for setting this up with your email program. If you only want to use the SMTP server, skip the POP bits and only set up SMTP to work with your existing email account.
Update 1: I was remiss not to point out that Gmail will set the from address for messages sent through smtp.google.com to [email protected] when using this method. Profuse apologies.
A reader says: "Some clarification: I set up Gmail for a client for SMTP access, and we discovered the following huge drawback: Gmail automatically rewrites the "from" line of any e-mail you send via their SMTP gateway to your Gmail address, and it overrides any Reply-To settings you may have in your e-mail software in favor of the one in Gmail's web interface. So while Gmail's SMTP access sure is handy, it's not a perfect solution for everybody.
On the plus side, Gmail also stores and indexes anything you send via SMTP as if you had sent it using the website, so all your e-mail is still searchable and in one place. Also, since Gmail SMTP does not use port 25, I've yet to see an ISP that won't allow me to send mail through it." Thanks, David!
Update 2: The Gmail spooler is no longer available, but a reader says Gmail invites can be had at bytetest.com. Thanks, Darin!
Update 3: Reader Derek Bennett says, "The solution is to go into your gmail Settings:Accounts and "Make default" an account other than your gmail account. This will cause gmail to re-write the From field with whatever the default account's email address is."
Configure POP access [Gmail: Help Center]
Ask Lifehacker: Switching SMTP servers

subset: commoncrawl


text:
There was never any doubt that Labour would win the Manchester Central and Cardiff South by-elections, both constituencies having returned Labour MPs for decades, but the party will still be pleased that it managed to increase its margin of victory in each.
In Manchester, its share of the vote rose by 16.4 per cent to 69.1 per cent, with a swing from the Lib Dems of 16.8 per cent. It was a bad night for the Tories, who came within five votes of being beaten by Ukip and who lost their deposit as they received just 4.5 per cent of the vote, their lowest ever in the seat. All parties, however, will be disappointed by the turnout, which at 18.16 per cent was the lowest in any by-election since the Second World War.
In Cardiff, Labour's share of the vote rose by 8.4 per cent to 47.3 per cent, with a swing from the Tories of 8.41 per cent, in line with that currently shown by the national opinion polls. Turnout was higher than in Manchester at 25.35 per cent.
Attention will now move to Corby, which Labour is expected to gain from the Tories, and the first-ever police and crime commissioner elections. Early signs suggest that turnout in the latter could fall to a new record low for a national election, with as few as 15 per cent of eligible voters taking part. The ignominious record is currently held by the 1999 EU Parliament election in which 23 per cent voted. With most police areas not due to begin counting until later this morning, we've just one result so far, with the Tories, as expected, winning Wiltshire. Turnout was a dismal 16 per cent.
We'll have full coverage of the PCC elections and the Corby by-election, where a result is expected around 1pm, on The Staggers.
Here are the two by-election results in full.
Manchester Central by-election
Labour 11,507 votes 69.1% (+16.4%)
Liberal Democrats 1,571 votes 9.4% (-17.2%)
Conservative 754 votes 4.5% (-7.3%)
UK Independence Party 749 votes 4.5% (+3%)
Green Party 652 votes 3.9% (+1.6%)
British National Party 492 votes 3% (-1.1%)
Pirate Party 308 votes 1.9% (N/A)
Trade Unionist & Socialist Coalition 220 votes 1.3% (N/A)
Respect 182 votes 1.1% (N/A)
Monster Raving Loony 78 votes 0.5% (N/A)
People's Democratic Party 71 votes 0.4% (N/A)
Communist League 64 votes 0.4% (N/A)
Labour majority 9,936 (59.7%)
Turnout 16,648 (18.2%)
Cardiff South and Penarth by-election
Labour 9,193 votes 47.3% (+8.4%)
Conservative 3,859 votes 19.9% (-8.4%)
Liberal Democrats 2,103 votes 10.8% (-11.5%)
Plaid Cymru 1,854 votes 9.5% (+5.3%)
UK Independence Party 1,179 votes 6.1% (+3.5%)
Green Party 800 votes 4.1% (+2.9%)
Socialist Labour Party 235 votes 1.2% (N/A)
Communist Party 213 votes 1.1% (+0.7%)
Labour majority 5,334 (27.4%)
Turnout 19,436 (25.35%)


text:
...making Linux just a little more fun!
Dear Mr.Okopnik
My name is Liang Jun-Ming,a student from Taiwan.
I'm suffering from a programming problem,I would very much appreciate receving an answer from you ! I wrote a testing program named hello.s , and a linker script named ldscript as follows:
See attached liong.hello.s.asm.txt
after " as hello.s -o hello.o" and "ld -Tldscript hello.o -o hello" I get an executable named hello.
My question is:
What does "AT(0x3000000)" mean ?
Does it mean that the loader will load this executable at "physical address " 0x3000000 ?
I know the "virtual address" of the first byte of this executable would be 0x1000, but in Linux , can we put data at any physical address as we wish ? If it does, why the program still works even if the RAM is 32M in my PC ?(0x3000000 > 32M). What tool in Linux can we have to let us "watch" the contents of memory by specifying "physical addresses"? If it doesn't, what is the function when we write "AT(xxxx)" ? Hope I can receive an answer when you are not busy. Thank you very much!
[Ben] Hi, Jun-Ming -
I'm afraid your question is somewhat misdirected: I'm not an assembly expert, under Linux or otherwise. My suggestion to you would be to start at http://linuxassembly.org and go from there - their front page reads
............... Welcome to the Linux Assembly! If you are looking for information on assembly programming under UNIX-like operating systems (Linux/BSD/ BeOS/etc), this is the right place to be. Here you can find various resources, ranging from tutorials and documentation, to actual programs written in assembly language. As time passes, we will try to provide as much information on the subject as possible, so stay tuned. ............... |
That seems like the right place for your query.
[Jimmy O'Regan] The AT() keyword is for things like ROMs. I recommend you read the GNU Linker manual:
Dear Answer Gang:
According to the GNU linker ld manual:
the AT() keywod specifies the load address of a section, and it says "this feature is designed to make it easy to build a ROM image..."
( forgive me for a Chinese student's poor English !)
[Jimmy] The AT() keyword can be used for ROMs - if you want to write a replacement BIOS (such as Linux BIOS: http://www.linuxbios.org), you will have to do use the AT() keyword; or if you are creating a ROM images for later use in an emulator, or to write to a physical ROM.
You can also use the AT() keyword for boot loaders/kernels, which need to be at a specific location in RAM to be executed; and in a normal program. If the program has a specified load address, and is loaded on an MMU-less system, or in an OS which doesn't use the MMU, then you get access to that specific area of memory, but in an OS (such as Linux) which makes use of the MMU, the address is transparently remapped to an address within the space allocated to your program by the kernel.
Jimmy also asked a friend... -- Heather
[Jimmy] Sorry about the format this takes; I asked a friend from college if he could answer the linker script question, the answer is in the attached IRC log. There's a lot of overview in there which I thought was interesting. Philip's credentials are that he wrote an operating system for his degree thesis, based on KeyOS (http://keyos.sourceforge.net), to which he contributed code under a pseudonym (the college made some claims about copyright...).
Logged from the UnderNet IRC on Jun 20.
-- Heather
............... |
I had used the following script for launching Firefox (earlier named firebird) (See my article Mozilla Firebird - A review (http://linuxgazette.net/issue97/shekhar.html) to see how you can use this).
#!/bin/sh /usr/lib/mozilla-firebird/MozillaFirebird -remote "openURL('$@', new-tab)" || exec /usr/lib/mozilla-firebird/MozillaFirebird "$@";
However, with the 0.9 release (the latest one, which is even more slick and fast), this stopped working. Instead of launching the new tab, the Profile Manager UI pops up. This was reported as bug http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=246168 in the Mozilla Bugzilla.
The reason for this is the change in the format of calling the remote command. The new way of doing this is:
firefox -a firefox -remote openURL(<url>,new-tab)
Note that there should be no space between the the comma and the command after the url (new-tab in this case, you can also use new-window to start a new window) or you get a "Error: Failed to send command: 509 internal error".
So the script to launch firefox becomes
#!/bin/sh /usr/lib/firefox/firefox -a firefox -remote "openURL("$@",new-tab)" || exec /usr/lib/firefox/firefox "$@";
[Ben] I just had the same problem with the new Mozilla upgrade; the trouble is in the brain-dead URL parser at the end of the wrapper script. Although I fixed it, it very quickly became useless: I downloaded Mozilla 1.7 from http://mozilla.org, and its wrapper script works fine.
Oh, and since you brought this issue up: just yesterday, I was reading about Mozilla's "remote" methods in order to fix the above problem - and still forgot, completely, that there's a "native" way to test if Mozilla is running or not.
Wonder if I can trade this brain in for a newer model?
mozilla -remote "ping()" 2>/dev/null && mozilla -remote "openurl($1,new-window)" || mozilla $1
This one courtesy of LWN. You want to build a package from the latest source, but have it managed by your favourite package manager. Checkinstall claims to automate the process for Debian (presumably any system using dpkg?), Slackware and RPM based systems. I gotta have it
Publication by LWN is hereby permitted
[Thomas] I have used both, and my personal preference would be the use of stow over checkinstall.
Typing stow as a keyword into the search box at freshmeat.net also reveals some interesting competitors, and a front end for stow.
Also, Allan Peda had an article on this topic in Issue 75, Simple Package Management With Stow -- Heather
One for Ben: a periodic table of Perl 6's operators.
[Ben] "Today, we're going to learn about one of the varieties of serious mental disturbance. Here, for example, is a distinctly pathological case..."
It's got some amount of cuteness to it, but I think you'd have to be a bit obsessed to actually do the thing up. Reminds me of an excellent model of the Titanic, about 8' long IIRC, built out of matchsticks - all the way down to the deck chairs and the oars in the lifeboats - that I saw at an exhibition of artworks done by mental patients. Much of the work was incredible, brilliant, and unrepeatable in many cases - and the stories (such as that of a woman who made these shockingly beautiful patterns from threads she'd pluck out of rags... and almost all of whose work had been thrown away because it was just "trash" made by "crazy Nancy") would break your heart.
Hi Guys
Here's another contribution. Hopefully, you can publish it as a 'two cent tip'
As part of a PHP web app I'm playing with, I needed to authenticate the web client user with a remote system. Unfortunately, this system is a mainframe and setting up a web-enabled authentication product on it is somewhat timeconsuming and requires a lot of administrivia. I wanted to avoid all that, so I had to come up with another way to authenticate web users remotely.
The one TCP/IP networked app our mainframe has available is FTP. Now, the FTP protocol implements security processes with the 'USER' and 'PASS'word commands, and our host security people have ensured that the host FTP server requires these two functions. In our case, the 'USER' and 'PASS' functions on the server interface with the ACF2 security system to validate that the given userid and password combination are correct, and will not let an FTP connection in if they aren't.
I use this little tidbit of information to let me authenticate web users of my Linux box by forcing their web browsers to pop up the Authentication panel, and sending their entered userid and password information to the host in an FTP 'USER' and 'PASS'word command sequence. If the host's FTP rejects the sequence, then the user isn't authorized, but if the host's FTP accepts the sequence, then the user is valid to the host. In either case, I don't actually transfer files over the FTP link; I simply close it unused. I only need it for the authentication.
Neat or what?
Here's an example PHP script that demonstrates the process. It needs an ftp server in order to work, and is (for demonstration purposes) set up to talk to the ftp server at localhost...
<?php /* ** LoginPrompt() sends headers and html with the intent of ** inducing the web-browser to display it's built-in userid/password ** prompt. ** It sends a WWW-Authenticate header to give the authentication specs, ** a HTTP 401 on the current page requested by the browser, and ** a dummy HTML page to be displayed if the user cancels the ** login prompt ** It then exits, causing php to terminate the current transaction ** without further output */ function LoginPrompt($URL) { /* force the login popup to show up */ Header("WWW-Authenticate: Basic realm=\"System Login\""); Header("HTTP/1.0 401 Unauthorized"); /* if the user hits Cancel, send him to a place he cant hurt us from */ echo "<meta HTTP-EQUIV=\"Refresh\" CONTENT=\"0; URL=$URL\">"; exit; } $userid = $_SERVER['PHP_AUTH_USER']; $passwd = $_SERVER['PHP_AUTH_PW']; $validuser = "no"; if ($userid && $passwd) { /* connect to FTP server, see if it accepts the given userid & password */ $conn = ftp_connect("localhost") or die("Cant connect"); if (@ftp_login($conn,$userid,$passwd)) $validuser = "yes"; ftp_close($conn); if ($validuser == "no") /* bad user - try the login again */ LoginPrompt("http://www.php.net/manual/en/features.http-auth.php"); } else /* first time into this page - force the 1st login prompt */ LoginPrompt("http://www.php.net/manual/en/features.http-auth.php"); phpinfo(); ?>
This is in reply to:
http://linuxgazette.net/103/lg_tips.html#tips.4 -- Thomas Adam
Regarding Xserver spits multiple windows to foreign Xclient:
I have no knowledge of Exceed. I use cygwin to connect to unix/linux boxes.
You have to configure/install cygwin with X (and ssh, if you're going to use
that, and why not?). Crucial step is to start an xwdm (blackbox I think,
whatever is available on Cygwin) first, and start linux x-apps from inside the
xwdm (start with an xterm!). The full screen x-windows display manager is
actually running locally, while the windowed apps are in the dm.
Chris C
Ambassador of Pain - quite entertaining for 64 lines of code. (That's in C, mind you; if it was Perl, I'd be expecting Quake3, including the PAK file.
A while back, Groklaw mentioned that they wanted to have a Linux usability test, and technical documentation written for new users. They've started a wiki (based on the Wikipedia software) to do this:


text:
KISSIMMEE, Fla. — Jeremy Hefner showed that he can punch out hitters if he gets riled up enough.
Not known as a strikeout pitcher, Hefner struck out the last six Atlanta batters he faced in a five-inning outing marred earlier by two home runs in the New York Mets' 5-2 win over the Braves on Friday.
"I got mad more than anything," Hefner said. "I was less than thrilled with my performance before then."
Juan Francisco hit a leadoff homer in the third inning and Freddie Freeman connected to start the fourth. But after B.J. Upton and Dan Uggla followed Freeman's blast with singles, Hefner ended the inning with three strikeouts and then fanned the side in the fifth.
Asked when he had struck out six in a row the last time, Hefner said, "High school or maybe college. Is that what I had?"
The Mets have an open spot in their rotation because of the absence of Johan Santana and Hefner will likely fill it. He has a 2.93 ERA this spring and 15 strikeouts with only three walks in 15 1-3 innings.
The 27-year-old pitcher split last season between the majors and Triple-A Buffalo, going 4-7 with a 5.09 ERA in 26 games (13 starts) for the Mets.
So far this spring, Mets manager Terry Collins likes what he has seen.
"He's throwing the ball very, very well," Collins said. "A lot of strikes."
With Santana not ready to start the season, Collins said that Aaron Laffey might also get a look as a potential starter before spring training is over. The left-hander finished up the win over the Braves with 2 2-3 hitless innings.
"We've got to find ourselves another insurance (starter)," Collins said. "We need some other guys in the mix."
Tim Hudson started for the Braves and bounced back from a rough outing against the Miami Marlins on Sunday, when he gave up nine hits and six runs in five innings.
Hudson worked six innings and allowed five hits and two second-inning runs. Lucas Duda hit a leadoff homer and Brandon Hicks delivered a RBI double.
"A little better, but not a lot," Hudson said. "I'm still not where I want to be with my command. It's taking a little longer than I would like. I wish I was a little more fine-tuned. But there are still two weeks to go."
Braves center fielder Upton might not need more preparation time, though. Upton, signed as a free agent over the winter, is hitting .444 (20 for 44) and has 10 hits in 15 at-bats over his past five games. He had a single and double in three trips to the plate against the Mets.
The Mets broke a tie with an unearned run in the eighth and added two runs in the ninth. Andrew Brown and Jamie Hoffmann each drove in a run with a double.
NOTES: Zach Lutz had two hits for the Mets and is batting .355 (11 for 31). ... OF Jose Constanza finally joined the Braves after being delayed in the Dominican Republic for nearly a month by visa issues and was thrown out trying to steal as a pinch runner. Constanza is competing with Jordan Schafer for a roster spot. ... Mets 2B Daniel Murphy, sidelined by a strained intercostals muscle, saw his first action of the spring, playing a few innings defensively during a minor league game back at Port St. Lucie. ... The Mets optioned INF Wilmer Flores and reassigned RHP Carlos Torres and INF Josh Satin to minor league camp. ... The Braves optioned 1B Ernesto Mejia to AAA Gwinnett and sent OF Todd Cunningham, C Matt Kennelly and SS Elmer Reyes to minor league camp. Both teams are down to 42 players.
Lucas Duda homers in Mets' win over Braves


text:
Tips to Prepare For Clinical Privileges and Peer Review Hearings Part 2 of 2
By George F. Indest III, J.D., M.P.A., LL.M., Board Certified by The Florida Bar in Health Law
In Part 1 of this blog, I began a list of tips that should serve you well if you are notified by your hospital or medical staff that you are the subject of internal or external peer review hearings.
20 Tips For Successful Outcome in Peer Review Hearings (Continued):
10. If you are given the opportunity to meet with the reviewers or provide information to them, do so. If you haven't been offered this, ask for it in writing.
11. Make sure any written response is provided in a typewritten letter formal not via e-mail, text or YouTube posting or handwritten note.
12. In your written statement or response, if you use any abbreviations, spell them out completely the first time you use them and place the abbreviation after, in parentheses. Remember, future reviews of your statement may not be physicians (e.g., a judge) or may not be in your medical specialty.
13. It is never too early to engage experienced health car legal counsel to assist you in such matters. But if you do, make sure you do hire an actual health law attorney who has experience with medical staff peer review hearings. This is no place for a plaintiff's personal injury attorney, a criminal defense attorney or your tax, or business lawyer.
14. If you find out that your matter is being sent out to an external peer review organization you should retain an experienced health law attorney immediately and obtain your own medical expert review.
15. If the care being examined involved another physician as well as you, or if the care was of a patient referred by another physician, see if that physician supports the care you provided and will provide you a letter or statement saying that.
16. If the allegation being reviewed involves facts that you know are not true, see if you can obtain evidence of this. For example, I had a case where nursing staff filed a complaint against my client a male OB/GYN claiming that the mother of a minor female patient had demanded that her daughter only be examined by a female doctor. We are able to obtain an affidavit from the mother swearing that she had never stated that. The peer review matter was dismissed and closed.
17. If it appears that you are being targeted for repeated peer review complaints or investigations, it is time to get out of that place. Read the handwriting on the wall. However, see #1 above. Do not resign with any type of peer review pending.
18. Remember that peer review proceedings are supposed to be confidential. Therefore work through your legal counsel in obtaining outside reviews. Do not discuss the matter with those outside the medical staff.
19. Although the peer-review process is confidential, it is not supposed to be "secretive." The person who is the subject of peer review should have access to the complaint and medical records involved. This should not be a Star Chamber proceeding. Make a polite written request for copies of such materials or to be allowed to review them and make notes.
20. In many cases, you may find that you did make a mistake, violate a policy or procedure, skip a step in an algorithm, fall below the standard of care, or otherwise screw up. Except in cases of the most egregious situations, your best course o action may be to admit this, explain how this happened, and outline steps you are taking to make sure it does not happen again. This is especially true when it is your first "offense" and you have many years of otherwise excellent performance. The medical staff usually wants to make sure that when a mistake occurs, the health provider has the ability to recognize it and learn from it.
Follow These Tips for The Best Results in a Peer Review Matter.
If you follow these tips, you have the best chance of coming out of the peer review without problems. However, in a really serious case, where many records are being reviewed and the allegations appear to be very serious, then it is most important to retain an experienced health care attorney at the earliest opportunity and take that attorney's advice. You will be in for the fight of your professional life.
Click here to read Part 1 of this Blog.
Don't Wait Until It's Too Late, Contact a Health Law Attorney Experienced in the Process of Peer Review Hearings.
If you are the subject of a peer review proceeding, immediately retain experienced, knowledgeable health care counsel to represent you. The attorneys of The Health Law Firm have experience in most, if not all, types of "fair hearings" involving health care issues and health care providers.
At the Health Law Firm, we provide legal services for physicians and other health care providers. This includes nurse practitioners, nurses, dentists, psychologists, psychiatrists, mental health counselors, medical students and interns, hospitals, ambulatory surgical centers, pain management clinics, nursing homes, and any other health care provider. We represent facilities, individuals, groups and institutions in contracts, sales, mergers, and acquisitions. We also represent physicians and health care providers in complex litigation in both state and federal courts.
To contact The Health Law Firm, please call (407) 331-6620 or (850) 439-1001 and visit our website at www.TheHealthLawFirm.com.
About the Author: George F. Indest III, J.D., M.P.A., LL.M., is Board Certified by The Florida Bar in Health Law. He is the President and Managing Partner of The Health Law Firm, which has a national practice. Its main office is in the Orlando, Florida area. www.TheHealthLawFirm.com The Health Law Firm, 1101 Douglas Ave., Altamonte Springs, FL 32714, Phone: (407) 331-6620.
Keywords: Legal representation for peer review, peer review defense attorney, medical staff peer review confidentiality, medical staff fair hearing legal representation, medical staff fair hearing attorney, clinical privileges hearing defense attorney, clinical privileges hearing legal representation, clinical privileges hearing attorney, legal counsel on peer review process, legal representation for physician defamation, health law defense attorney, economic credentialing, sham peer review attorney, health law peer-review attorney, legal representation for peer review investigations, health care litigation legal counsel, complex health care litigation attorney, legal representation for health care employment issues, disruptive physician representation, legal representation for disruptive physicians, health care employment defense attorney, The Health Law Firm reviews, reviews of The Health Law Firm Attorneys
"The Health Law Firm" is a registered fictitious business name of and a registered service mark of The Health Law Firm, P.A., a Florida professional service corporation, since 1999.
Copyright © 2019 The Health Law Firm. All rights reserved.


text:
Saturday, December 01, 2007
Healthcare and SubPrime Mortgages
Why is it confusing that purchasing more house that we can afford with low "teaser" rates might come back to haunt us later when the rates reset? Why is it confusing to think that banks that lured gullible consumers by offering them subprime home loans might want to continue generating profits when the market turns?
So now, when the interest rates have reset, people with adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) found they didn't have enough money to pay their loans(who knew?!!!?)! They default. The banks and financial institutions that created the ponsy scheme called ARMs suddenly lose their income stream. They lose billions. They run to the government before insolvency. "Help!" they cry. And now government now wants to "work with banks" to freeze "temporarily" interest rates on certain subprime home loans in the interest of assuring mortgage holders can still afford to pay their loans so the ponsy scheme can continue.
But despite the cost of the current subprime mortgage mess to our economy, it pales in comparison to the potential economic fallout of our current healthcare crisis. You see, government intervention on free markets occurred with healthcare before, too.
It started with Blue Cross - a health plan that originated in 1929 at Baylor University in Waco, TX that provided teachers 21 days of hospital care for $6 a year. The plan was extended to other employee groups in Dallas, and similar employer-sponsored health plans began to spread nationally. Employees began demanding the perk. Employers without these plans were at risk of losing employees to their competitors. And so the programs grew to be expected by employees. Upon retirement, though, retirees were threatened with the potential for no health insurance, so Medicare and Medicaid were formed - a government run "insurance program" signed into law in 1965 to assure the continued availability of healthcare at low cost to seniors. Remarkably affordable healthcare could then the obtained by many at very low cost (sound like ARMs?). So people felt entitled to healthcare, just like people felt entitled to a big 7000-square-foot house when money was cheap. The sky was the limit as to what they could spend. But unlike healthcare that was funded by an entity that could hide the cost-overruns by dipping into the endless money pool called the national debt, banks that supplied ARMs have no such safety net to write off their debts. They might go bankrupt. And so they now have run to the government for cover.
But if we can learn from anything, we should recall our experience with healthcare. Now, some relatively-short 42 years later, we see the effects of trying to make something appear cheaper than it really is: a $2 trillion dollar healthcare economy that has forgotten the very patient that it is supposed to benefit while preserving bureaucracy and corporate profits.
So go ahead, Mr. Bush. Have the government suck up the tab for the latest financial and banking debacle. Forty years from now, you'll be long gone. But our kids, just like with healthcare, well, they'll be left holding the bag.
1 comment:
- The Happy Hospitalist said...
Wes. The patient believes and the insurance both private and Medicare, together, believe that paying premium on insurance equates to an unlimited use of health care currency dollars.
I paid my premium, there for I should get all care all the time.
Our system, by default has turned our premiums into a guarantee of unlimited cash flow towards the purchase of "health care"
To turn FREE=LESS you will have to ration or say no with much more frequency. You will have ration.
And the best way to ration care is to make the patient financially responsible for that care.
If the government bails out the folks who chewed off more than they could handle, it will implicitly be saying that
owning a home is a right.
An entitlement.
Of course they will use "in the interest of national security" as an excuse for the bail out.
I would love to see a lawyer sue the federal government on behalve of a homeless guy claiming that he has a right to a home.
He is entitled to a home. - Sat Dec 01, 10:33:00 AM CST


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Sweet talkin' in Santa Fe! Engaged duo Justin Theroux and Jennifer Aniston shared a sweet moment while out and about in Santa Fe, N.M., Saturday.
As the "We're the Millers" star, 43, caressed her fiance's face, she gave onlookers a glimpse at her giant engagement ring from her love of more than a year and a half.
This summer, a source close to the pair told Us Weekly Aniston is set on a "destination wedding" for her big day, "kind of like eloping with a few friends."
PHOTOS: Jennifer and Justin's matching style
"There will be the feeling of a vacation, since that's their favorite thing to do [together]," the source revealed.
"Jen is over the moon about her second chance at a happy marriage," another source says of the "Horrible Bosses" actress, who divorced Brad Pitt in 2005. "Justin is giving her a solid vow to love."
PHOTOS: Why 2011 was Jennifer's best year ever
Theroux proposed to Aniston on Aug. 10 in NYC while he was celebrating his 41st birthday.
Slideshow 49 photos
Jennifer Aniston
Theroux's rep told Us, "Justin Theroux had an amazing birthday Friday, receiving an extraordinary gift when his girlfriend, Jennifer Aniston, accepted his proposal of marriage."
More in TODAY Entertainment:


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Blockchain: what's it good for? Not all a lot, says report
In a joint report for the Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Learning (MERL) Technology conference, researchers who studied 43 blockchain use cases came to the conclusion that all underdelivered on claims.
"Despite all the hype about how blockchain will bring unheralded transparency to processes and operations in low-trust environments, the industry is itself opaque. From this, we determined the lack of evidence supporting value claims of blockchain in the international development space is a critical gap for potential adopters"
And, when they contacted several blockchain providers about project results, the silence was deafening. "Not one was willing to share data," the researchers said in their blog post.
In their research, Christine Murphy, a social researcher at Social Solutions International and John Burg and Jean Paul Pétraud, fellows at the US Agency for International Development, found a proliferation of press releases, white papers and persuasively written articles touting the many attributes of the distributed ledger technology (DLT).
"However, we found no documentation or evidence of the results blockchain was purported to have achieved in these claims. We also did not find lessons learned or practical insights, as are available for other technologies in development," the researchers reported.
"Despite all the hype about how blockchain will bring unheralded transparency to processes and operations in low-trust environments, the industry is itself opaque. From this, we determined the lack of evidence supporting value claims of blockchain in the international development space is a critical gap for potential adopters," they added.
Blockchain pilots and proofs-of-concept, however, are not without value, the researchers noted; in the end, the real value of blockchain deployments may not be technology itself, "but rather as an impetus to question what we do, why we do it, and how we could do it better."
The scathing evaluation of blockchain by the research trio was backed to some extent by industry analysts, who said the marketing hype around it has created unrealistic expectations, especially as enterprise use is not yet fully baked.
No surprise
Avivah Litan, a Gartner vice president and distinguished analyst, said while the report's findings came as no surprise to her, it lacked balance. The researchers did not bother to ask why projects had not delivered on goals, such as improving transactional efficiency, transparency and privacy, she said.
"Back in early 2018, we'd already said… 99% of enterprise projects are dead end; 99% don't need the technology; they don't get out of the lab. They're a result of CEOs fear of missing out – the FOMO phenomenon," Litan said. "Having said all that, it's a very valuable technology. People started trying to use it before it was ready for prime time. That's true in the cryptocurrency world and in the enterprise blockchain world."
Gartner gauges the maturation of new technology through its "Hype Cycle," a graphic-based lifecycle that follows five phases: from the Technology Trigger, when proof-of-concept stories and media interest emerges, to the Plateau of Productivity, when mainstream adoption occurs – if the technology is more than niche.
Among those five Hype Cycles is the Trough of Disillusionment, when interest wanes as pilots and proofs-of-concepts fail to deliver and technology providers either work out the kinks and improve the technology to the satisfaction of users, or ultimately fail and die out.
Enterprise blockchain technology that is centrally administered like a traditional database yet still part of a peer-to-peer architecture that immutably stores encrypted transactions is headed into the Trough of Disillusionment, Litan said.
"Blockchain winter has come," Litan said.
Deployed environments
Earlier this year, a Gartner CIO survey revealed on average that only 3.3% of companies worldwide had actually deployed blockchain in a production environment.
In a blog post, Litan listed eight hurdles needed for blockchain to advance and meet the goals stated by technology providers hawking it as a cure-all for virtually any international, transactional network need – from fee-less, cross-border payments to supply chain tracking.
The challenges include a more efficient consensus algorithm, a more scalable design – including the ability to move the bulk of data "off chain" to a separate database – and data confidentiality through zero knowledge proofs (ZKP), a cryptography technology that allows a user to prove funds, assets or identifying information exist without revealing the information behind it.
"Until such time that these hurdles are surmounted, most permissioned blockchain projects will remain in development or POC mode," Litan said. "More importantly, they will not support the key blockchain tenet of decentralisation, so under those circumstances, these projects are likely much better off using proven legacy database technology."
Industry groups and vendors are working to overcome those hurdles. For example, Ernst & Young has created a public blockchain prototype it plans to launch in 2019 that lets companies use ZKPs to complete business transactions confidentially.
The Hyperledger Foundation and the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance (EEA) – the two largest open-source blockchain consortiums – have teamed up to tackle performance issues, including developing "Layer 2" architectures for offloading data from blockchains to aid scalability.
Failing to materialise
Martha Bennett, a principal analyst for Forrester Research, noted any blockchain or "DLT" project is a long-term strategic initiative, and disappointment is inevitable "when the hoped-for miracles fail to materialise.
"It's not realistic to expect a solid cost model or definitive benefits statement because it's simply too early for that," Bennett said via email. "To assemble real evidence, we need to have a number of fully operationalised, scaled-out deployments running for at least a couple of years. And we're simply not there yet."
Just as there are many projects that exist only in white paper or conference presentation format – where language is all about the "could have" potential – "equally, there are many initiatives that are going forward because it's clear to the participants that the benefits are achievable," Bennett added.
For example, US retailer Walmart has, for the past two years, been piloting a produce supply chain powered by IBM's blockchain service. The pilot has been so successful, Walmart recently presented its suppliers with an edict: get your product data into the system by September, 2019 so it can be tracked from farm to store.
Fintech software provider MonetaGo deployed the first Hyperledger Fabric production blockchain for financial institutions to gain financing approval. The network has been live since March and is used by the licensed Trade Receivables Exchanges in India.
"The network boasts 100% uptime and is scalable to meet the rapidly growing needs of the Indian market," MonetaGo CEO Jesse Chenard said via email. "Once frauds, fuzzy matches, and operational errors are accounted for, the return on investment is approximately 631.46. Understandably, this number is extremely high due to preferred pricing for early network participants. At scale, MonetaGo anticipates the ROI to be 45. That means for every dollar spent on the blockchain technology, companies can expect to make about 45 dollars back."
Foundation pilots
The Linux Foundation, which oversees the Hyperledger Foundation, pointed to other successful pilots, such as blockchain supply chain deployments by the diamond industry.
"We recently concluded a perception survey on developers and financial decision makers at large companies using or considering blockchain. Almost 90% of the 376 respondents who responded to the online survey in August and September expect moderate to high growth in business blockchain over the next two years," a spokesperson for the Linux Foundation said via email. "A similar majority see business blockchain as a core technology of the future that will enable new business models to emerge."
IDG News Service


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BRUNETTI, ANGELO (better known as Ciciruacchio):
Popular Roman leader, and advocate of the emancipation of the Jews; born in Rome 1800; died there Aug. 10, 1849. Inspired by the patriot Mazzini, Brunetti labored not only for the deliverance of his native city, but also for the unhappy inhabitants of the Roman ghetto. He utilized the great influence he had gained during the prerevolutionary epoch, in effecting a reconciliation between the Jews and their Christian fellow-citizens. On July 8, 1847, he won over the inhabitants of Regola, a suburb of Rome, and a week later an immense mass-meeting in favor of the Jews was held in the capital itself. On the evening of that meeting (July 15) 6,000 Roman citizens went to the ghetto and fraternized enthusiastically with its inhabitants. When on April 17, 1848 (the first day of Pesaḥ), theorder of Pius IX. to tear down the walls of the ghetto was made public, Ciciruacchio hastened thither with a large number of his friends, and they were the first to begin the work of demolition. In the following year Ciciruacchio, together with two of his sons, was killed in a riot in the streets of Rome. The Jewish congregation of Rome erected in its council-room a tablet to his memory, with an inscription recording his great services in the emancipation of the Jews of Rome.
- Boni, La Conjura di Roma e Pio IX., Lausanne, 1847;
- Berliner, Gesch. der Juden in Rom, ii. 149;
- Vogelstein and Rieger, Gesch. der Juden in Rom, ii. 370, 374.


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The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith and two of its former investment adviser representatives with misleading pension consulting
The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith and two of its former investment adviser representatives with misleading pension consulting clients about its money manager identification process and failing to disclose conflicts of interest.
Merrill Lynch has agreed to settle the SEC's charges and pay a USD1m penalty.
"There has been tremendous growth in the pension consulting business in recent years. This case is an important reminder to firms and their investment adviser representatives that, whenever they sit across the table from their advisory clients, they need to make sure that all material conflicts of interest are disclosed," says Scott W. Friestad, deputy director of the SEC's division of enforcement.
According to the SEC's order, Merrill Lynch failed to disclose its conflicts of interest when recommending that clients use directed brokerage to pay hard dollar fees, whereby the clients directed their money managers to execute trades through Merrill Lynch. These clients received credit for a portion of the commissions generated by these trades against the hard dollar fee owed for the advisory services provided by Merrill Lynch Consulting Services.
Consequently, Merrill Lynch and its investment adviser representatives could and often did receive significantly higher revenue if clients chose to use Merrill Lynch directed brokerage services.
The SEC's order finds that Merrill Lynch also failed to disclose a similar conflict of interest in recommending that clients use Merrill Lynch's transition management desk.
In addition, the SEC finds that Merrill Lynch made misleading statements to the clients served by its Ponte Vedra South, Fla. office regarding the process used to identify new money managers to present to its clients.
The SEC also charged Michael Callaway and Jeffrey Swanson, who were formerly employed in Merrill Lynch's Ponte Vedra South office.
In a settled enforcement action against Swanson, the SEC finds that he made misleading statements to some of the firm's pension consulting clients regarding the process by which Merrill Lynch assisted them in identifying new managers.
As a result, the SEC charged Swanson with aiding and abetting and causing Merrill Lynch's violation of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940. Without admitting or denying the SEC's allegations, Swanson has agreed to a censure, and to cease and desist from committing or causing violations of Section 206(2) of the Advisers Act.
In the contested enforcement action against Callaway, the SEC's division of enforcement alleges that Callaway breached his fiduciary duty in making misrepresentations about the manager identification process used by the Ponte Vedra South office and his compensation in connection with transition management services.
The division of enforcement further alleges that Callaway was a cause of Merrill Lynch's violation of the Advisers Act because he failed to ensure that Merrill Lynch disclosed to clients the conflicts of interest in recommending that clients enter into a directed brokerage relationship with Merrill Lynch and in recommending that they use Merrill Lynch for transition management services.
The division of enforcement charges that, by this conduct, Callaway willfully aided and abetted and caused Merrill Lynch's violations of Section 206(2) of the Advisers Act.
The SEC charged Merrill Lynch with violations of an anti-fraud provision of the Advisers Act, which does not require a showing of scienter (a legal term that refers to intent or knowledge of wrongdoing).
The SEC also charged Merrill Lynch with failing to maintain certain records and failing to supervise its investment adviser representatives in the Ponte Vedra South office.
Without admitting or denying the SEC's allegations, Merrill Lynch has agreed to a censure, to cease and desist from committing or causing violations of Sections 204 and 206(2) of the Advisers Act, and to pay a USD1m penalty.


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Hornets Beat: Injuries Aplenty
With Anthony Davis concussed, Eric Gordon riding the pine for 4-6 more weeks, and Al-Farouq Aminu looking like a stud, we're not short for topics this week.
1. What do you make of the news that it will be 4-6 more weeks before Eric Gordon will return?
Jason Calmes: My mind is open to any number of possibilities. It could be that there is residual damage from any known or known prior injury, and more recent injury, or some condition that is rearing its head. He had arthroscopic surgery, so damage could have been visually assessed. It could be unrelated to medical issues, as the 6 week mark lines up with the day he can be traded with his consent.
Michael McNamara: To be honest, I don't believe it. We are supposed to believe that rest didn't work for the last eight months, but magically it will solve this knee pain that exists though there is no structural damage? In five weeks, we will hear, "Eric is participating in practice, could be any day now." Two weeks after that it will be, "Eric is still feeling pain, but we will revisit it in another week or two." The, sometime in mid-January he will have surgery and will be out for the year. We've seen this story before.
Jake Madison: Honestly? I have no idea. I can't imagine he is faking the injury, but it is a remote possibility that I can't rule out. I guess my approach is basically wait and see because there isn't much else we can do. This whole situation could play out any number of ways.
Mason Ginsberg: It scares me. I shouldn't go to the extent of saying that I wish surgery had been the solution instead, but at least then we would have been able to identify the problem. Things seem just as cloudy as ever for Gordon, and as Michael said, it's hard to buy into a proposed solution that has not appeared to work over the past year. Regardless, we have no choice but to ride it out and hope this timeline comes true.
Joe: From what he says, it reminds me of a recurring tennis injury I have in my arm and shoulder on a Padel Tennis Court. I can play once or twice a week and experience only minor, temporary discomfort. But, if I play even a semi-rigorous schedule, my arm throbs. Using it for even day-to-day tasks becomes unbearable, and the idea of trying to play through it just isn't a legitimate option. I can't help but wonder if Gordon doesn't experience similar pain and discomfort, and if the answer may just be to severely limit his participation. Or I'm just drawing parallels where there aren't any…
2. If you could offer one piece of advice to Gordon, what would it be?
JC: "Eric, go seek advice of talented guards with maximum deals who faced injury. Ask them if they sat too long, missed too much time, got the right surgery. Use their knowledge to help you make the best decisions about getting healthy vs. playing hurt. Similar advice holds true if this is not about an injury."
MM: "Have your agent look around the league and see if anybody would be interested in your services. This organization wants guys like Kobe Bryant- men who will play even when they feel like their foot is about to fall off. Deron Williams is playing with bone spurs in his foot and already has offseason surgery scheduled. This is not the right place for you, short term or long term."
JM: "Broseph, get as much info as you can regarding this whole mess–both for injuries and if you want out of here. Use the knowledge to find a resolution to this situation–whatever it may be–and stop prolonging everything.
MG: "Work your butt off to get your knee back in playing shape. If it's rehab and strengthening that the doctors recommend, then that's what you have to do every single day. Listen to the doctors, your trainers, and your coaching staff. The only way to shed doubt about your future is by getting back on the court, so you need to do whatever you can to make that happen as soon as possible."
Joe: "Get a freaking PR guy to supplement your Twitter account and to ghost write an "I Heart Nola" blog for you. Unless you undertake a fairly intensive PR campaign, the local fans aren't going to give you the benefit of the doubt if this thing keeps you out longer than expected, or you have flare ups in the future that prevent you from taking the floor. Fight this house fire before the whole city is ablaze."
3. Monty Williams commented on the NBA's concussion policy, saying, among other things, that the league is treating players "like they have white gloves and pink drawers". Do you think players should have the final say on whether or not they play?
JC: No, and by no means. We live in a litigious world, and legal liability rules the day silently in a black suit and shades. No insurance, no play. That's a fact. A college dropout, or college never-was, that was not setting the world on first academically, which is the worst-case scenario in the NBA, should not be making decisions that will have to hold up as expert opinion in a court case. Even more so if they misdiagnose their condition as "clear."
MM: If we could figure out time travel once and for all, I would be all for asking the 70 year old version of the player what they think, but these kids are just that, kids. They see what is directly in front of them and nothing more. Coaches see the bigger picture, so I put the final decision on them and they can take as much or as little feedback from the player as they see fit.
JM: I love Monty's hard-nosed approach to the game, but this has to stay in the hands of doctors. Players, I would assume, would almost always say they are fine. Missing a game or two isn't the end of the world, but brain damage can have seriously long-term effects.
MG: Definitely not. The vast majority of professional athletes are huge competitors and will do whatever they can to stay in the game. In the heat of the moment, they will at times focus too much on the present and not worry about long-term effects, even if it puts their health at risk. For this reason, the decision of whether or not a player can play in the case of concussion symptoms should be made by those who are knowledgeable and can make an unbiased judgment on the situation – the team doctors.
Joe: I want to say yes, largely because I feel taking physical risks are a huge part of the reason why these guys are paid five, ten, or fifteen million dollars a year play a game that many of us play for free. That said, the reasons given my colleagues are simply too overwhelming to counter. I agree with their reasoning and conclusions.
4. Al-Farouq Aminu has has looked great so far. Is what we're seeing an aberration or the new normal?
JC: An aberration, but may indicate continued progress. Ryan has noted that he was playing better in the second part of last season, and I agree. Smith started the first part of the 2010-2011 season on fire, and the Hornets were the top team in the NBA at one point. Then he made the game tape, and fell to Earth. However, he continued to improve, especially in year two with Monty. I can see that happening here in what is now Aminu's contract year.
MM: On offense, an aberration. On defense, the new normal. And you know what? Hornets fans should be happy with that. The fact is that Aminu is 17 for 18 on dunks and layups and 2 of 14 everywhere else. And to add to that, his turnover percentage is actually up this year. But on defense, man is he good. His rotations are spectacular, he challenges everything, and he never takes a play off. He could be an All-NBA defender if he plays like this all year.
JM: Defensively I can see him keeping this up. He is flying around all over the place doing everything he can, and is succeeding. Offensively, as Mike pointed out, it's kind of a smoke and mirrors thing. When he gets easy, high percentage looks, which is happening often, he is finishing them. Everywhere else has been pretty bad.
MG: His first two games were likely an aberration on the offensive end, but I could see Aminu's game on Saturday night in Chicago (8 points on 6 shots, 6 rebounds, a pair of blocks and steals) becoming close to the norm for him. As long as he refrains from taking bad jump shots on offense and limits his turnovers, Aminu could easily become the Hornets' most improved player this year.
Joe: The new normal on both ends. Look, we all know Aminu can't take the ball to the floor and create for himself. He hasn't done that successfully this year, and he likely won't ever be able to for anything but brief spurts of time. What he has done is become a force in transition and as a garbage man. As long as he doesn't get the idea in his head that he needs to score 10+ a game or whatever, he should continue to have an efficient year on offense. Hell, it could get even better if he stops taking the shots he's obviously not good at converting. Defensively he's a baller, and that should continue to be the case for years to come.
5. What do you make of the first game and a half of Anthony Davis' career?
JC: I'll quote Sweets when he spoke of Jackson Heights' own Mr. Randy Watson in Coming to America: "That boy good."
MM: Jason said that boy good, but to me, that boy great. His per 36 minute stats read like a line from a video game (24ppg on 56% shooting, 100% from the line, 11 rebounds, 2.5 blocks, 2 steals, and less than 1 turnover). Those are numbers that would have made him the second best big man in the league last year behind Kevin Love. We are looking at a guy who will be an MVP candidate within months of him legally getting his first drink.
JM: This is has been/will be so much fun watching him.
MG: His offensive skills are translating to the NBA even faster than many of us had hoped. Given the tremendous upside that Davis possesses, the fact that he has played this well already should have Hornets fans overflowing with optimism and excitement.
Joe: While Davis has been awesomely fun to watch so far, I can't agree with Mike that he's an MVP candidate yet (Mike doesn't know that in New Orleans you can legally drink at the age of 18 inside a private residence). I kid, but I'll concur with the line of "that kid great". Also, two games have proven to me that anyone who continues to think he'll be anything but a star on offense has lost their damned mind.


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Senran Kagura: Ninja Flash!SynopsisOn her way back to Hanzo Academy to continue her training in the art of the ninja (as it is); Asuka meets up with a girl named Homura, whom she immediately strikes up a bond of friendship with. However, Homura turns out to be a part of a rival school, the dark Serpent Academy for girls, and the girls from said school then unleash a series of attacks on the girls of Hanzo Academy. ReviewDuring most of its existence, the Senran Kagura series of games, manga and anime has been known for mainly one thing; having a cast of girls with gigantic breasts and no particular fear of putting them in scenes of fanservice. It's not an unfair assessment, and as anyone who's been a fan of anime for at least some time will attest to; fanservice is probably here to stay. It might sound defeatist, and maybe it is, but there's also another aspect to fanservice that has become more clear to me as of late; whether it is the harmless kind or the harmful kind. The core of the issue is solely centered around how the girls who provides this fanservice is portrayed and treated. Oddly enough, from a fanservice perspective, Senran Kagura is actually kind of average, at least when you measure it up to many other shows I've seen. The girls seems to be about as comically overdeveloped as the girls in the Koihime Musou series, so I have a bit of a hard time taking it seriously as actual titillation, regardless of how many sushi rolls (aka "penis-shaped food") they are seen shoving into their mouths. And aside from Katsuragi's penchant for groping the girls during shower scenes, most of the scenes are just that. Shower/bath scenes and maybe some awkward camera angles centered around mostly clothed breasts and hips, or stuff being shoved into massive cleavages. It's cheesy, it's dumb, but it's also fairly harmless stuff. It should also probably be the main reason why you're watching this, because the rest of the show is kind of a mess. Senran Kagura is quick to introduce the cast of girls as part of ninja schools; Hanzo is the academy of the "light ninja", exclusively meant for girls with clean records -- no murder, or even attempted murder, and presumably also some other limitations the show doesn't really get into -- while the "dark" Serpent Academy will accept anyone with the ambition to learn the skills they offer. Yet, to the show's credit, it is not quite that simple. However, this is also where the show kind of shoots itself in the foot. It quite quickly points out that Homura and the girls of the "dark" academy are certainly not bad girls, even though some of them might come across as vaguely psychotic or sociopathic at first. But that's because, unlike most of the girls of Hanzo, the girls in Serpent Academy actually have very tragic backstories that wouldn't have been out of place in Gunslinger Girl. It is kind of disconcerting to have this sort of thing unleashed in an anime that otherwise treats you like an idiot. And it does. If you take away the Serpent Academy for girls on the "dark" side, Senran Kagura turns into the same generic "you can do it" fluff you've probably seen a thousand times before. It's especially egregrious when it comes to the character of Hibari, whose clumsy, pink-haired antics will most likely make you wonder what she's doing in the academy in the first place, or, if you can recognize the pattern, understand that she will eventually realize her quality before it all ends. If you'll forgive me the spoiler, it becomes all the more head-shakingly hilarious in a scene late in the show where she infiltrates Serpent Academy while dressed in, granted, their black attire, but with her flaming pink hair still making her an easy spot for whichever sentries might be patrolling the area. Yet, she does so quite competently for all intents and purposes. The core idea isn't necessarily bad either; it shows a surprisingly convoluted setup between the head of Hanzo academy and someone from the Serpent school playing her secret scene that actually makes sense in hindsight, but they're still hampered by tiresome lessons you've heard before, comedy that doesn't really make the lighthearted moments work to the fullest, and an ending that bogs itself down with trite speeches. So in the end, what could have been a fun, if awkwardly cheesy romp along the lines of Strike Witches or Heaven's Lost Property instead becomes kind of a chore to get through. I also had some problems with the fact that the show kind of made Hanzo Academy come across as massively exclusionary, even beyond the point of fairness, particularly seeing as some of the things that happened to the Serpent Academy girls were far outside of their control. To make matters worse, in one case, one of those very realistic tragedies gets turned into a bit of a tiresome repeated joke. But hey, if you're only in it for the fanservice, I have some good news for you. The character designs are mostly quite pleasant, which, if you've seen some of the promo art, you probably already know. The animation is generally quite decent, and the fanservice is at least not massively overplayed like another show whose first episode I just watched. (If you need to know, it's the ridiculously titled "I couldn't become a hero, so I reluctantly decided to get a job".) So... yeah. It's a mostly pleasant, kind of dumb piece of "ninja" action show with some fairly dark, yet underplayed twists. Take that as you will. Kind of lame in all, but if you're in it for the cute, if too exaggerated character designs, feel free to add a star or two. — Stig Høgset Recommended Audience: Despite its premise, the fanservice isn't really all that worrisome. I think most teenagers -- which, let's face it, is the target audience for stuff like this -- would be fine with it. I'm more concerned by some of the more serious topics, like some of the girls' dark and/or violent pasts. Version(s) Viewed: Digital Source. Review Status: Full (12/12) Senran Kagura: Ninja Flash! © 2013 MarvelousAQL / Senran Kagura Production Committee |
© 1996-2015 THEM Anime Reviews. All rights reserved. |


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For Steve Richards, in today's Independent, the question topping this post is the key question facing the Conservative Party. He attacks the "absurd" and "superficial" nature of the leadership debate up until now and its focus on appealing to gays or not wearing ties.
The task of challenging Mr Brown will be a daunting one. The Iraq factor – which damaged Labour's standing amongst its most traditional voters - will be unwinding by the next election. And if the economy is weak it may actually play to Brown's advantage. A YouGov poll for the Centre for Social Justice found strong support for Mr Brown being in charge of a troubled economy. Brown in 2009 could parallel Major in 1992. Voters may prefer Labour to revive the economy if they still enjoy a lead on economic competence (which is currently double figured).
Mr Richards argues that only two Tories are up to the job of challenging Mr Brown – Ken Clarke and David Davis. He says that Mr Clarke's popularity with the electorate and Mr Davis' frontrunner momentum make them the stand-out contenders.
David Cameron is rejected as untested in the heat of political battle – but his "time will come".
Mr Richards is optimistic that the Tories can do well at the next election:
"They seek to flourish in a conservative country that has not been fundamentally changed by a Labour government. They do so with the potential support of powerful right-wing newspapers. This should make them optimistic."
Nick Wood, former Tory Director of Media, is much less keen on Ken Clarke. Mr Wood thinks that the Tory contest will be a Davis v Cameron clash. On Clarke he writes:
"Clarke, or a leftish disciple such as Rifkind, may yet stand. But given that he is out of step with most of his party over tax and spending and public service reform, as well as Europe, and given that at 65 he is old enough to be Cameron's father, he stands no chance of beating Davis."
Read Nick's full article on conservativehome.com.


text:
HSBC is getting a little slimmer.
The London-based mega bank said Wednesday it had reached a deal to sell its 16% stake in Ping An -- one of China's largest insurance companies.
The share sale, to the Charoen Pokphand Group of Thailand, is valued at $9.4 billion. The bank has been selling assets in recent years in an effort to streamline operations, but Wednesday's transaction is the largest to date.
The Charoen Pokphand Group will pay HK $59 per share, a slight premium over Tuesday's closing price for Ping An shares trading in Hong Kong. Shares fell sharply earlier this week after HSBC acknowledged it was exploring a sale.
HSBC (HBC) first acquired Ping An shares in 2002, paying only $600 million for 10% of the company. The investment's value has increased dramatically since then as China's insurance market rapidly expanded in size.
Related: SEC charges China affiliates of 'Big 4' accounting firms
HSBC chief Stuart Gulliver cautioned that the sale should not be seen as a sign that the bank's commitment to Asia is weakening.
"China remains a key market for the Group and we will strengthen our focus on growing our own operations and building on our long-term strategic banking partnership with the Bank of Communications," he said in a statement.