When Money Comes in the Door, Ethics go out the Window

One of my medical school professors told me that sometime between 1960-1964. He emphasized that one should never recommend a course of treatment on the basis of personal financial benefit. He also felt that medical inventions should not be patented, and that surgeons should not take a fee plus collect a royalty for a surgical device or implant. I took that advice to heart, and never violated those rules. At the midpoint of my medical career I served as chairman of a department of orthopedic surgery and director of a total joint fellowship program at a Midwestern medical school. One of the manufacturers of joint implants that we used offered me a substantial bribe to use their implants exclusively. They knew that our trainees would likely continue using those implants for five or more years after completing the fellowship. 

I refused to accept their offer, and continued to use many different manufacturers products depending on my assessment of the patients needs. My residents and fellows became comfortable with a variety of total joint implants. The company that had offered the exclusive deal went to the president of the medical school and offered a million dollar endowed professorship if they would replace me with a surgeon who would use their products exclusively. Naturally, they took the deal, and I relocated. 

The Unamerican Flag

The Obama campaign is selling this abomination for $12.95.  35.00.  Words cannot convey how I feel about this.

Activists wearing Chris Matthews and Harry Reid costumes greet GOP Delegates

Reelect me or I'll eat this dog.

"Reasonable Gun Control"

The massacre at Century 16 got me really upset.  The early reports indicated that the shooter was fully protected with ballistic armor, and thus would have been a difficult takedown for a concealed carrier in the audience.  It turns out he wasn't, and one shooter could have easily ended the carnage.  The theater and the community don't like concealed carry.  In my opinion, if they choose to deny a lawful holder of a CCW permit the right to self protection, they are obligated to safeguard their patrons with, at a minimum, metal detectors and security guards at every entrance and unlocked exit.

To me, a simple solution to this problem would be a sign at the entrance that welcomes lawful concealed carry on the premises.  In some states, including mine, concealed carry is not allowed when paid admission is required.  So, let permit holders in free.  I would guarantee that cowardly mass killers like the recent one would avoid theaters with these policies.

Increase the debt limit or this guy gets it!

Painting The Mice

I had a chance to discuss "climategate" or "stolen-email-gate" as Barbara Boxer prefers to call it with a colleague today at lunch. He didn't think it was too big a deal, and expressed a belief that the behaviors described in the emails were not exceptional, nor evidence of any misconduct. I challenged him on that point, and reminded him of the case of William Summerlin, in the 1970's. Summerlin was a researcher at the Sloan-Kettering Institute who claimed to have solved the allograft rejection problem, which, if true, would have likely won him a Nobel Prize in Medicine. Unfortunately, others were not able to replicate his results. When his boss asked him to show his data, Summerlin apparently painted black patches on white mice. He was caught by a whistleblower. Since that time, "painting the mice" has been a term to describe deliberately fudging scientific data.

Scientific misconduct is not common, and generally takes the form of plagiarism. Actually manipulating data to produce a fraudulent result is probably much less common. Because even the suspicion that something like that has occurred would be disastrous to a scientist's career and reputation, no reputable scientist would ever refuse to show his original data and the methods used to refine the data. No real scientist would destroy his original data, especially after questions arose. The destruction of the original data calls the entire output of the CRU into question. There have always been questions about the alarmism over this issue. The discrediting of the "hockey stick", for example. The extreme claims of Al Gore, and some of the proposals of our current government and the extreme environmentalists can now be seen to have no sound scientific basis, and will inevitably end up as the Piltdown man of this century.