05/23/2011 archive

If only the US Attorney General had this agenda.

Accord With Comptroller Will Help Attorney General Pursue Corruption Cases

By Nicholas Confessore

Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman and Thomas P. DiNapoli, the state comptroller, have entered into an agreement that will grant Mr. Schneiderman powers to criminally prosecute corruption involving taxpayer money, significantly expanding the attorney general’s authority to pursue public integrity cases.

Under the agreement, the comptroller and the attorney general will establish a joint task force on public integrity. Mr. Schneiderman’s prosecutors will work with Mr. DiNapoli’s investigators and auditors looking into legislative earmarks, state pensions and government contracts.

But in a twist, Mr. DiNapoli has also agreed to employ a little-known provision of state law to refer any findings from joint investigations to Mr. Schneiderman for criminal prosecution.

“We’ll coordinate our respective roles to uncover and prosecute government waste, fraud and abuse,” Mr. DiNapoli said in a statement. “This is a powerful message: New York’s two independently elected oversight officials are partnering together to ensure integrity and accountability to every level of government in New York State.

snip

“It could be a very effective approach,” said Eric R. Dinallo, who headed the securities bureau in the attorney general’s office under Eliot Spitzer and was later superintendent of the State Insurance Department. “If you can’t get legislative relief around ethics issues in government and you’re trying to get jurisdiction, sometimes the law has all the jurisdiction you need – if you look at it in a creative way.”

Good work, gentlemen, and much success.

Lyme Disease is a new condition in our infectious disease panoply.  It has only been suspected since 1975, and only in 1978 was it suspected to transmitted by ticks.  The causative agent was not identified until 1981.  This piece is intended only to be a very basic survey of the condition and some of the controversies surrounding it, not a comprehensive dissertation.  There is a very good group at Dailykos called Lyme Disease Awareness with contributors who have more personal information than I do.  However, do not take anything you read in this piece or in the group in general as a substitute for competent medical advise and treatment.

Let us think about that for a minute.  Western medicine had recognized most all serious infectious diseases since the time of Herodotus!   Certainly some exceptions are present, such as syphilis, with seems to be a New World import to Europe and certain, very long latent period virus diseases that we are just now discovering.

Lyme Disease is different, though.  It is caused by a bacterial agent, a specific spirochete called Borrelia burgdorferi, the species name from its discoverer, the brilliant Swiss-American biologist, Dr. Willy Burgdorfer.

Oh… wait.

Spain’s Governing Party Suffers Heavy Losses

By RAPHAEL MINDER, The New York Times

Published: May 22, 2011

MADRID – The governing Socialist Party suffered heavy losses on Sunday in regional and municipal elections, even as tens of thousands of Spaniards calling themselves the “indignant” said they would pursue their protests to force an overhaul of the country’s political system.

Conceding defeat on Sunday night, Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero said that his Socialist Party had been understandably punished by voters for overseeing an economic crisis that had left Spain with a 21 percent jobless rate, more than twice the European average.

…

Mr. Zapatero, who has been in office since 2004, announced in April that he would not seek a third term, and the extent of the Socialists’ loss suggests that, even with a new leader, the party will struggle to hold on to power in the general election, expected next March.

Never mind.

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Militants storm Pakistan military base in Karachi

by Hasan Mansoor, AFP

28 mins ago