Drug expert explains how generics do and do not differ from brand-name drugs - The Washington Post

Since I am a certified pharmacy technician and work in a retail community pharmacy, I'm providing a link to this Washington Post story on the similarities and sometimes important differences between generic drugs and their brand name counterparts.  Generics in the U. S. are bioequivalent (essentially the same rate and duration of absorption once administered) and have the same active ingredient and same route of administration, although they may differ in the inert materials.  The main categories of drugs where generics may not work quite the same are thyroid, seizure, and blood thinner medications which require a specific blood concentration to work properly (and for which blood levels need to be checked).

Drug expert explains how generics do and do not differ from brand-name drugs - The Washington Post

Harold Meyerson: In modern GOP, the old South returns - The Washington Post

This column by the Washington Post's Harold Meyerson lays into the adoption of the worst of the old South into the mainstream of the Republican Party: "In its hostility toward minorities, exploitation of racism, antipathy toward government and suspicion of science, today’s Republican Party represents the worst traditions of the South’s dankest backwaters."  Meyerson makes a point-by-point case and concludes "we’re left with a GOP whose existential credo is, 'We’re old, we’re white and we want our country back.' The rest, as the sages say, is commentary."

Harold Meyerson: In modern GOP, the old South returns - The Washington Post

Natalie Coughlin, Gold-Medal . . . Farmer

I found this interesting since I've dabbled in gardening for years and became more aware after my wife's celiac disease diagnosis ... it's a lot easier to track where food comes from when it comes from your own garden.  Olympic swimmer Natalie Coughin gave this interview with the Sierra Club and talked about urban farming (replacing landscape with edible plants) and how her favorite thing to grow is kale (which has become a favorite of mine).  If you're interested in "backyard farming" or just do a little gardening, there's good stuff of interest in this interview.

Natalie Coughlin, Gold-Medal . . . Farmer? - The Green Life

Conservatives' Contraception Obsession

It is difficult not to sound full of righteous indignation when addressing conservatives’ fevered obsession with contraception. Birth control had been settled political ground for decades; now a nasty strain of political misogyny masquerading as religious freedom has reopened the subject.

Legislation such as the defeated Blunt Amendment and Arizona’s House Bill 2625 would allow employers to refuse insurance coverage for birth control medication on religious grounds. The Arizona bill would further allow employers to require women to certify their use of contraceptive medication to be for non-contraceptive purposes or be fired. This should go without saying, but what business is this of employers? It is utterly offensive to give a boss the right to pass some arcane moral judgment on female employees.

Rush Limbaugh called Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke a “slut” and “prostitute” for attempting to testify before Congress in favor of requiring insurance coverage of contraceptive medication. Fluke, who was not allowed to testify, publicly talked of a fellow student who took contraceptives for polycystic ovary syndrome and was denied coverage. Limbaugh made the recklessly false characterization that Fluke actually went before the committee and “essentially says that she [Fluke] must be paid to have sex.”

These egregious assaults on women’s access to contraceptives raise the question of the true motive behind the assaults. When you bully and coerce in legislation and in the public square, you forfeit the right to call your motives religious freedom.

Calling Radicalism by Its Name - NYTimes.com

The New York Times editorial linked below underscores the points made by President Obama's speech April 3 at the AP Luncheon in Washington.  The Times highlighted Obama's emphasis on what I've believed for awhile now, that the Republican Party is uninterested in consensus or compromise in pursuit of an extreme agenda.  To quote the editorial, 'But, in this speech, he finally conceded that the party has demonstrated no interest in the values of compromise and realism. Even Ronald Reagan, who raised taxes in multiple budget deals, “could not get through a Republican primary today.”'

Another telling part of the editorial dealt with the disingenuous criticism by House Speaker John Boehner.  'The speech was immediately attacked by the House speaker, John Boehner, for failing to deal with the debt crisis, but Mr. Obama pointed out how hollow that charge has become. “That argument might have a shred of credibility were it not for their proposal to also spend $4.6 trillion over the next decade on lower tax rates,” he said.'

In my view,  the contemporary GOP -- so far removed from the days when I was a Reagan Republican -- serves only its donors and their corporate interests.  All else is a fig-leaf covering to justify what the Wall Street set wants: regulatory gutting, Citizens United judicial decisions, reduced workplace rights from insurance coverage to internet passwords, and the like.  Baldface flow of benefits toward the upper class squeezes the middle class toward the vanishing point, and it is somewhat reassuring that President Obama is mounting a more forceful defense of equity and of the middle class ... and finally abandoning his three-year effort to compromise with what has become an intransigent political party.

Calling Radicalism by Its Name - NYTimes.com

The Reason Rally: A Woodstock for nonbelievers - Patrick Gavin - POLITICO.com

This March 24 is the date for something called the Reason Rally on the Washington Mall. It's an event for secularists, the nonbelievers in and questioners of religion. The link to the Politico article on this event is below. Paul Fidalgo, communications director at the Center for Inquiry, gave a view on why religious belief is popular: “In American culture right now, religious belief is seen as a kind of shorthand for morality. If you can espouse your devotion to a particular faith, it’s your way of indicating that you are now a moral, upright, upstanding person.” Along with an opportunity for like-minded people to get together, Fidalgo's take on a desired message to believers is “We want you to know we’re your neighbors, and we’re not scary.”

The Reason Rally: A Woodstock for nonbelievers - Patrick Gavin - POLITICO.com

The God of Thuggery

Recent instances of the kind of Christian love I could do without:

A teen objected to a prayer mural at secular Cranston West High School in Rhode Island. A federal judge ordered it removed, and the student has received multiple violent threats, including one to "drown that atheist in holy water."

Kansas House Speaker Mike O’Neal cited Psalm 109 to wish for the death of the President and the widowing of the First Lady: "Let his days be few; and let another take his office. May his children be fatherless and his wife a widow." He added, “At last — I can honestly voice a Biblical prayer for our president!"

On the heels of Tennessee's "Don't Say Gay" bill that would bar teachers from discussing homosexuality, State Rep. Richard Floyd proposed a bill to ban transgender people from using public bathrooms that do not match the gender on their birth certificates, citing “the potential for pedophiles and molesters to come into the restroom" and promising to "stomp a mudhole" into any transgender person who entered a restroom that his family was in. Think of whether you've heard of a transgendered person who molested a child; now think of how many clergy have done so.

With countless incidents such as these recent examples of hatred by so-called Christians, maybe Fred Phelps of Westboro Baptist Church is right when he contends that God hates. You certainly can get that impression. If this is not the case, Christians should do what so many have demanded from Muslims after 9/11 and publicly denounce the hatred within their own ranks.

Nobody Understands Debt - NYTimes.com

I have wondered for the last two years or so why so much damned emphasis has been on federal debt -- not the deficit, but the debt. While I'm not so sure where the push-to-exclusion-of-all-else for austerity came from, this piece from Paul Krugman is the most thorough explanation of why it does not matter nearly as much as the debt Chicken Littles make it out to be.

Nobody Understands Debt - NYTimes.com