Today, first in a three-part series of guest posts addressing a duo near and dear to my heart: Technology & diabetes.
Silja Chouquet is CEO of the Switzerland-based social media consultancy Whydot and author of the leading blog WhydotPharma, which is all about “creating patient-focus through social media.” She believes that social media has the [...]

The issue of weight loss is one many people in our society struggle with. Some people really put an effort into making changes to their diet and their lifestyle. Others are looking for a weight loss solution that doesn’t require them to do very much. This is why diet pills, programs, and other materials are [...]

There are various locations on the body that are considered to be acupuncture points. These areas allow you to get the most benefits from the procedures. It may seem like common knowledge where to place the needles but it is more complicated than it may seem. For example if you are suffering from neck pain [...]

Acupuncture isn’t a procedure for those that are afraid of needles. This particular art is designed to offer various types of benefits when the needles are inserted at various pressure points. They overall goal is to help the person look and feel better than ever. Some individuals turn to acupuncture to get relieve from chronic [...]

Melanoma is most commonly associated with the skin, but in some cases it can affect the eyes. This is because it is produced in cells that are found in your eyes in the area from the retina to where the whites of your eyes are. Eye melanoma is classified as a type of cancer. This [...]

Melanoma isn’t something you want to mess around with. It can be treated but you need to deal with it in the early stages to get the best results from it. There are symptoms that can indicate melanoma so you need to make sure you see a doctor if you experience them.
Some people only [...]

Malignant melanoma is a type of skin cancer that thousands of people are diagnosed with each year. Generally it is found when a mole changes in size or color. The lesions may develop underneath the skin as well. There is a great deal of research taking place in order to help people have healthier skin. [...]

In yet another example of the news media being selective about which party labels it chooses to share, a recent CNN online story about Shirley Sherrod mentioning three Democrat politicians included the "D" when the politicians where doing something the story applauded, and left it off when the Democrat was a bad guy.

In "Sherrod’s steadfast motto: ‘Let’s work together’" by Jim Kavanagh, the party identification of segregationist Georgia Governor Lester Maddox, a Democrat, is omitted:

When drought struck the South in the 1970s, the federal government promised to help New Communities through the Office of Economic Opportunity. But the money was routed through the state, led by segregationist Gov. Lester Maddox, and the local office of the Farmers Home Administration, whose white agent was in no hurry to write the checks, she said.

But later in the story, when two Democrats do something of which the author clearly approves, the party label is included:

Using that experience, Sherrod worked with the Federation of Southern Cooperatives to help black farmers keep their land. The group worked with U.S. Rep. Mike Espy, D-Mississippi (who later became agriculture secretary), and Sen. Wyche Fowler, D-Georgia, to pass the Minority Farmers Rights Act in 1990. The measure, known as Section 2501, authorized $10 million a year in technical assistance to black farmers, but only $2 million to $3 million a year has been distributed.

This sort of bias is so obvious, I sometimes wonder why the media even bothers.

Hey, it’s Friday night. Time to kick back and enjoy some—unintentional—humor, courtesy Ed Schultz.

Big Ed sees soup lines around the corner if we "continue to follow the Republicans" [sic].  His solution to stave off disaster?  The extension of unemployment benefits. . .  . "endlessly."

Say Ed, are you aware that FDR’s New Deal socialism failed to dent the Depression?

ED SCHULTZ: You know, when I was growing up in the ’60s–I was eight, nine, ten, eleven years old–and my dad, who went through the Depression, and went through World War II and served, he used to sit at the dinner table and tell us that we wouldn’t have a depression in this country because we have got some kind of safety nets put in place now and we won’t have have the kind of the kind of economic problems we had when the crash of ‘29 took place.

But maybe we should start looking at old film like this, when people were sleeping in the streets, and people were muzzling through garbage cans looking for something to eat.  People standing in bread lines, people standing in soup lines: the soup lines in big cities in America. If we continue to follow the Republicans, I say we’re about two years away from videotape like that . . .  Unless we take drastic measures, we’re going to see lines like that. Where are these people going to go?  The moral thing to do in this country right now is to make sure that these four million people are helped out endlessly until we turn this economy around. That’s right: there shouldn’t be any sunset.

"If we continue to follow the Republicans"??  Psst: Ed, have you noticed that we have a Dem president, a Dem House, a Dem Senate?  Who’s following whom?  If we’re on the brink of breadlines, it’s because of the failure of the Dem policy that has pumped trillions out of the productive private sector and into the clutches of inefficient big government.  And your solution is more of the same . . . "endlessly"?  Brother can you spare Schultz a whine?

Some very persuasive evidence of a double standard at work in The Washington Post came to light today. Today’s Post featured a front page headline about the Securities and Exchange Commission charging billionaire brothers Sam and Charlers Wyly with fraud.

The double standard came in when it became clear that the news a couple weeks ago about the conviction of Democratic fundraiser Hassan Nemazee had gotten almost no notice. The Post printed an Associated Press item on the third page. Nemazee had defrauded almost $300 million and was a major contributor and fundraiser to John Kerry’s presidential campaign and Hilary Clinton’s campaign to be 2008’s Democratic nominee.

The Wylys have donated to Republicans and the Republican Party in the past, a fact The Post made very prominent both in its headline: "SEC charges billionaire Texas brothers who donate to Gop with fraud" and put in a quick reminder right in the story’s first paragraph:

Sam and Charles Wyly, billionaire Texas brothers who gained prominence spending millions of dollars on conservative political causes, committed fraud by using secret overseas accounts to generate more than $550 million in profit through illegal stock trades, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Thursday.

The Post was far more, shall we say, "subtle" with its coverage of the Nemazee scandal. Michael Barone reports:

This intensive treatment led me to wondering how the Post handled the conviction and sentencing to 12 years in jail earlier this month of Democratic fundraiser Hassan Nemazee for defrauding banks of $292 million? Answer: It ran as part of a three-item story labeled CRIMINAL JUSTICE on page A3, a five-paragraph Associated Press story headlined “Former Democratic Fundraiser for Hillary Clinton, Kerry Gets 12 Years for Fraud.”

My check of The Post’s website picked up only one other story from July 12, page C1, headlined "Changing arts & minds: N. Y. financial titans feel like outsiders as Obama . . . ." But perhaps I didn’t use the search function correctly; please let me know if I missed other Post coverage of the Nemazee case.

He did. The Post published five other stories relating to the Nemazee arrest, indictment and trial. However, Barone makes the point below, that a conviction is more important than an arrest.

I wonder why the Nemazee story-about a conviction, not just charges-was not deemed as worthy of front-page and exhaustive treatment as the Wyly story. Is fraud by a Democratic fundraiser considered more of a dog-bites-man story and alleged fraud by Republican fundraisers considered more of a man-bites-dog story over at the Post?

The Post did make clear Nemazee’s ties to leading Democratic politicians, if only briefly, at the top of its July 16 story. But it didn’t give nearly as great prominence to them as it did to the Wylys’ ties to leading Republican politicians in its July 30 story. Fair and balanced? I’ll let you decide.