Jimmy Carter to Chair Election Reform Commission

Thank you, Jimmy Carter.

Boston.com / News / Nation / Washington / Jimmy Carter to Chair Election Reform Commission: "March 24, 2005"

gladwell dot com: Blink

I have been reading an interesting book called Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. Mr. Gladwell discusses the nature of what our brains can do in the blink of an eye, the "first impressions," judging a book by its cover and so on.

One particularly interesting point in the first chapter concerns doctors, whose likelihood of being sued in a malpractice suit can be deduced in a few seconds of looking at him/her talking. Essentially, the difference between doctors who get sued and those who don't is not what they say but how they talk to their patients, and we can identify their style very quickly, even at a first glance.

It is suggested (by me) that another possible approach to rising costs of malpractice suits might be improving doctors' ability to spend quality time with their patients. Patients who like their doctors will not sue them, another point made in this chapter. Hmm.....

VR / Divestment campaign / reaction

RAW STORY has a good article about the VR campaign to change voting systems in America through threat of divestment by its proponents. Of note here is a number of responses of a variety of voting system manufacturers.

Brown & Cole vs. Wal-Mart

Will it ever end?

Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Washington grocery chain to sell 8 of 31 stores, cites Wal-Mart: "THE ASSOCIATED PRESS"

Union loses Wal-Mart vote - Note here that basically they intimidated these people into voting against a union. Add into it the recent deal with the store in Quebec and you've got a serious issue here.