Much of the current debate surrounding health care – putting aside momentarily the catastrophic failure of the public health system during the pandemic – is whether or not it is a “right” or a “privilege.”
Critically, though, what should be …
The Playmobil Society vs. The Game of Nations
Language, and by extension its emergent feature, narrative, is one of the distinctive characteristics that make us human. Humans are “storytelling animals,” as literary scholar Jonathan Gottschall would say; cultural philosopher Ernst Cassirer called man an “animal symbolicum” (or “symbolizing …
The History of Public Health Colonialism
In a world where ‘equity’ is the catch-cry of corporatists accumulating unprecedented wealth, the return of colonialism should not surprise. Colonialism, after all, brings great benefits to those whom it disempowers and pillages. Success requires a highly centralized approach to …
WHO’s Guilty of Fake News, Now?
“A liar begins with making falsehood appear like truth, and ends with making truth itself appear like falsehood,” poet William Shenstone once wrote. These words are likely to strike a chord with those who have been following the World Health …
How the Sea Turns Stones Into Pebbles
One of the favorite pastimes of my often competitive family growing up was seeing who could get the most “skips” from a stone thrown into the low-tide waters at the beach. This is a game that, as anyone who has …
A Close Look at the Amici Briefs in Murthy v. Missouri
The convergence of state and corporate power has spawned unexpected bedfellows as Stanford University, the CATO Institute, and Letitia James have joined forces to support the censorship regime in Murthy v. Missouri.
The David and Goliath dynamic of the case …
Technocrats Cut Ireland at the Knees
Driving home after Christmas, we pulled in at the last toll plaza on the M8 to Cork. It had been dark for hours with ‘Storm Gerrit’ still pelting. As I lowered the window to hold out my card, a voice …
Technology: Weapon of the People
In an essay titled “Looking forward, looking backward,’ philosopher of technology, Andrew Feenberg writes (in Between Reason and Experience: Essays in Technology and Modernity, The MIT Press, 2010, p. 61; my emphasis, B.O.):
The utopian and dystopian visions of the …
Technology: Weapon of the People
In an essay titled “Looking forward, looking backward,’ philosopher of technology, Andrew Feenberg writes (in Between Reason and Experience: Essays in Technology and Modernity, The MIT Press, 2010, p. 61; my emphasis, B.O.):
The utopian and dystopian visions of the …
In Health Care, We Are Flying Blind
In the movie Paddington, a bear moves in with a London family. The father of the house is an insurance actuary. As the bear is bathing, he places a panicked call to his home insurer to add a provision in …
Sickness Everywhere
A silent disruption of population health and human potential is causing a decline in economic growth and increased poverty worldwide. The number of citizens losing trust in leaders from public-private partnerships that ruled and mandated public health and climate policies …
Australia to Face an Honest Inquiry
On 19 October, the Australian Senate agreed to hold an inquiry under the auspices of its Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee into proper terms of reference for a Covid Royal Commission to be established in 2024. An impressive alliance of …
We are Being Systemically Blinded
[This testimony was given at the US Senate, Monday, February 26, 2024.]
Ladies and gentlemen, I believe we must zoom out if we are to understand the pattern we are gathered to explore, because the pattern is larger than the …
The End of the End of Ideology
In 1960, Harvard sociologist Daniel Bell published a book called The End of Ideology. It argued that it was time to put aside all our ridiculous arguments of the past – socialism, fascism, liberalism, anarchism, technocracy, etc. – and just …
Politics as Lawfare
There is a wonderful quote from noted scary fascist (back when fascism was still a vogue and “the coming thing”) Oscar Benavides who was president of Peru from 1933-39. it’s as apposite as ever today:
To my friends, everything; to …