Archive for 2016

October 9, 2016

JOHN HINDERAKER: Trump Wins. “Some of the rats might want to consider returning to the ship. Donald Trump came through pretty well tonight, mainly because the focus was on the issues. As long as issues are being discussed, Trump wins.”

Posted at 11:25 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Oct 9th, 2016

STEPHEN GREEN’S DEBATE WRAPUP:

(Forgive any typos, run on sentences, bad punctuation, etc. I’m flying without a net and with four (?) bourbon-rocks.)

The Kraken was indeed released.

Now, to be fair, the Kraken had been asleep for a long time, stuck in that watery cage. When the gates finally opened, he didn’t roar right out and smash a bunch of ships or Medusas or whatever.

(Forgive me. I haven’t watched the movie in years.)

Instead, the Kraken hit the snooze button (waterproof, presumably) a couple of times, yawned, choked on some seawater, burped, dog paddled out of the cage, and then looked awkward and sheepish because the Argonauts spent the next ten minutes pointing at his morning wood.

Well.

I think I’ve stretched the Kraken metaphor thinner than Ursula Andress’ toga, so let’s switch gears.

For all the lovely camaraderie of the last couple of minutes, it’s clear that Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump loathe each other. Instead of a 90 minute town hall format, there’s no doubt that both candidates would eagerly agree to a debate held in a Roman Colosseum, to the death.

And, yes, we would be entertained.

But we have to talk about tonight’s debate, which is unlike anything I’ve ever seen, going back to when I was a child barely older than my oldest son, watching Reagan take on Carter.

I’ve seen them all. I’ve drank to most of them. Most have faded into nothingness.

This one, however, might linger.

I’ve never seen one candidate come on so week, then reverse course — in his own limited, almost demented fashion — so strongly.

I’ve never seen another candidate, so thoroughly programed, act as though her various subroutines had been corrupted by one of those nasty Russian viruses.

And all of this was after we began a presidential debate — a debate to determine the next President of the United States! — by talking about the proclivities of a major-party candidate who had once grabbed about grabbing women by…

Well, let’s not go there. We’ve said too much already.

This was not, in the end — or at almost any other point, really — a serious debate on the issues.

But it was a deadly serious contest between two people too unserious to be president.

However.

One of those unserious people demonstrated tonight that he is at least serious enough to recover from his many self-inflicted wounds, and in the most adverse and public circumstances.

Round 3 is ten days from now. I don’t know what to expect, because nothing from the first debate prepared us for anything from tonight’s debate.

But I can tell you this much: As pure entertainment, I’m looking forward, for once, more to the debate than to the cocktails.

Okay, that’s huge.

Posted at 11:16 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Oct 9th, 2016

ASKING THE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS: Excuse Me, Why Are You Wearing Those Surgical Scrubs Outside The Hospital?

Scrubs are basically socially acceptable pajamas. I’ve considered making them my go-to daywear. But there’s a downside: “Nurses’ scrubs that were tested at the end of a clinical shift tended to turn up bugs, including some scary ones.”

Posted at 8:05 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Oct 9th, 2016

THE POWER OF PLACEBOS:

Ted Kaptchuk, a professor at Harvard Medical School who ran the experiment, said his colleagues initially thought he was crazy at the beginning of the study. But it worked: He says roughly 60 percent of the subjects in his study reported getting better, even though they knew they were taking a placebo.

A placebo, Kaptchuk explained, is an inert substance, usually something like cellulose, starch or sugar. But the “placebo effect” goes well beyond the actual pill.

“Placebo effect is everything that surrounds that pill — the interaction between patient, doctor or nurse,” Kaptchuk said. “It’s the symbols, it’s the rituals. These are powerful forces.”

Doctors have understood the power of placebos at least since they were first used in clinical trials in the ‘50s, but fake pills work only in certain cases.

“There are a lot of illnesses you don’t give placebos for, [like] cancer, lowering cholesterol,” Kaptchuk said. “Basically the scope where a placebo effect is relevant is any symptom that the brain can modulate by itself.”

In those cases, just making an appointment, going to a doctor and taking a pill suggests something may happen.

Dr. Arthur Barsky, a psychiatrist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, says that people will report some symptomatic relief from taking a substance that is not biologically active about 35 percent of the time. “It’s very impressive.”

Yep.

Posted at 6:38 pm by Glenn Reynolds on Oct 9th, 2016