Judge reforms patent law

Story here. A New York federal judge has ruled that patents on genes are invalid. Up until now, discoverers of genes could patent the gene and deny other scientists or companies the right to use it. The genes in the suit are natually occurring human genes, not artificial ones. The judge ruled that naturally occuring genes are not patentable, because they are not invented or created, they are merely discovered.

Hallelujah. This might be the beginning of the end of ridiculous patents. This will be appealed of course, but there is a chance the Supremes will see the light when this gets up to them.

National vehicle of the People's Republic of Cambridge

The Volvo. The height of Cambridge coolness, a muddy 240 Volvo wagon, with about ten Cambridge parking permits in the rear window. In 1999 Ford bought Volvo for $6.4 billion. Today Ford announced the sale of Volvo to the Chinese for $1.8 billion.
Credit Ford's new CEO, Mulally, for having the smarts to recognize a loser and dump it. Taking a $4.6 billion dollar loss, was better than taking the day-to-day losses of operating Volvo.
And boos to previous Ford management for wasting so much money on a doomed acquisition. Volvo was loosing money when Ford bought them. They didn't have enough volume to get the cost of production down far enough to make money. The only way to lower Volvo's production cost is/was to use a lot of high volume Ford parts or, simply put the Volvo badge on a Ford.
Doing this kills the sales. Volvo buyers buy the car 'cause it isn't Detroit iron. They want to own something different. Once they find the Volvo is just a Ford with a new grill and a Volvo badge, they leave the showroom, in droves. Volvo was asking BMW money. Nobody is going pay BMW money for a gussied up Ford, they will buy a real BMW instead. This was obvious to everybody in the car business in 1999, but the old Ford management went right ahead and wasted $6.4 billion buying Volvo.
They had company. GM bought up a number of European loser mobiles and they still haven't sold any of them.

Electronic Medical Records follow up

Cato institute has concerns about the security of electronic medical records too.
Come to think of it, Uncle Sam can check your electronic medical record in disputed cases of disability.

Corporate America, Profiles in Courage

After Obamacare is signed into law, we have Caterpillar, AT&T, and some other corporations complaining about the amount of money it's gonna cost them.
Where were all these corporations BEFORE Obamacare was passed? Could it be that they feared Obama administration retaliation if they spoke out against Obamacare?
Where were Harry and Loise when we needed them?

Electronic Medical Records

I'm listening to a long discussion on TV about the downsides to electronic medical records. Only at the very end of the discussion do the debaters touch on the real problem. Hackers.
Seems like every week I hear another case of credit card records getting hacked and card holders getting ripped off with phony charges. The credit card people are mostly banks with a good tradition of data security, and yet they get hacked on a regular basis. Don't expect hospitals to be any better.
Once your medical records are on a computer, they might as well be posted on a bulletin board in the center of town. They will become public, especially for a snooper willing to spend a little money.
Imagine a hiring manager who, after the job interview, downloads the candidate's medical history to see if he will burden the company medical plan. Or, how would you like your spouse or potential spouse checking up on your health? And God help people with mental health problems or drug and alcohol treatment on their records.
This didn't happen in "1984"

Let's hear a real threat

The democrats are complaining of "threats" conveyed by phone, mail, and email. How real is this? There is a difference between chewing out a congressman and threatening one. The only "threat" that has made it to the media was ambiguous. "There are lots of people who wish you harm".

Do any of these bold congressman have anything worse than this? Or is this just a smear the tea party tactic?

Words of the Weasel Part XV

"Closing tax loopholes" is liberal speak for "raising taxes". NH Public Radio was calling for closing loopholes just this morning.