• For years, critics have been saying that the NBA needs to change its playoff seeding system. After two consecutive Western Conference finals that don’t feature the two best teams in the conference, I’m starting to wonder if they’re right. After all, doesn’t it seem more appropriate for the Jazz to have played the Mavs last round? Similarly, the Mavs defeat of the Suns in 2006 was anticlimactic after their dramatic victory over the Spurs in the second round.
• Although I disagree with his decision, I’m proud of the way Hank Aaron explained his decision not to sit in attendance when Barry Bonds breaks his home run record. Rather than saying what he (most likely) really thinks about Bonds, Aaron merely said that he didn’t have the energy or time to follow a record chase. Well done!
• After tanking the season and still ending up with only the 5th pick in the lottery, expect the city of Boston to officially give up on basketball for a long time. Also, don’t be surprised if Doc Rivers doesn’t finish next season with his job intact.
• The Cleveland Cavaliers were robbed last night. It is completely unexplainable how the refs didn’t call a foul on Richard Hamilton after he hacked James in the paint. That said, Cleveland is simply not good enough to beat the Pistons in a seven game series. Pistons in 6.
• Am I the only Black person who is embarrassed by this whole Pacman Jones/Michael Vick controversy?
• I think that Donovan McNabb is overreacting to the fact that the Philadelphia Eagles drafted a backup quarterback with their first pick. First of all, McNabb is injured nearly every year. With Garcia gone, the Eagles need a legitimate backup other than Detmer. Even if McNabb weren’t injury prone, how can the franchise not consider its long-term plans? As long as McNabb is healthy there will be no quarterback controversy. So why complain?

A recent DOJ report found that vets are twice as likely to be jailed for sexual assault than non-veterans.
Why Male Military Veterans Are Committing Sexual Assault at Alarming Rates
By Lucinda Marshall

A recent study by the Department of Justice found that military veterans are twice as likely to be incarcerated for sexual assault than nonveterans. When asked about the finding, Margaret E. Noonan, one of the authors of the study, told the Associated Press, “We couldn’t come to any definite conclusion as to why.” The intrinsic and systemic connection between militarism and violence against women, however, makes this finding far from surprising.

Sexual violence has been a de facto weapon of war since the beginning of the patriarchal age. Raping and assaulting women is seen as a way to attack the honor of the enemy, and women have always been the spoils of war. The result is that many types of violence against women are exacerbated by militarism, including the indirect effects on civilian populations both during hostilities and after the conflict ends and soldiers go home. These include:

• Rape/sexual assault and harassment both within the military and perpetrated on civilian populations
• Domestic violence
• Prostitution, pornography and trafficking
• Honor killing

Examples are not hard to find. Before and during WWII, the Japanese enslaved as many as 200,000 “comfort” women, and after the defeat of the Japanese, the United States continued to use tens of thousands of Japanese women as sex slaves. During the 1990s more than 5,000 women were trafficked into South Korea primarily to work as “entertainers” near U.S. military bases. Hundreds of thousands of women have been raped, frequently for the purpose of ethnic cleansing in countries such as Bosnia, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

For the rest of the story, click here. 

Selling anxiety sells medicine. Drug companies know this and profit by it. But are women benefiting as much as the industry’s bottom line?

Don’t Buy The Hype: Big Pharma Targets Women For Drugs They Don’t Need
By Judy Norsigian
Selling anxiety sells medicine. Drug companies know this and profit by it. But are women benefiting as much as the industry’s bottom line?

The pharmaceutical industry spent much of its $4.2 billion direct-to-consumer advertising budget in 2005 on ads targeting healthy upper-income, middle-aged people. A common underlying message was this: you appear to be healthy, but a deadly heart attack, hip fracture, or other medical catastrophe could occur at any time. Therefore, you should take a prescription drug to prevent such problems.

For example, a long-running Merck ad featured an older woman with this message: “See how beautiful 60 can look? See how invisible osteoporosis can be?” and recommended that women ask their doctors about bone density screening. As a result, many women started taking Merck’s drug Fosamax, even though the benefit may not outweigh the harm.

With such direct-to-consumer ad campaigns, which highlight risk factors and promote screening tests, drug companies move beyond promoting certain pills for treatment of diagnosed conditions to expanding their use in healthy people. And selling prevention through prescription drugs certainly does fill pharmaceutical industry coffers. Healthy people, preferably in early middle age, who can be persuaded to take a drug daily for the rest of their lives, are clearly the industry’s most desirable customer base. But as a category, these people who are at low risk of having the problem the drug is meant to treat may still suffer a serious adverse reaction.

For example, Fosamax cuts the risk of hip fracture from 2 percent to 1 percent, but that small benefit may not be worth the 1.5 percent risk of suffering an esophageal ulcer. In addition, in a small percentage of women using Fosamax over the long term, the jawbone will start to crumble. And some research now suggests that the type of new bone created by Fosamax is more brittle and more prone to fracturing over time.

For the rest of the story, click here. 

Trump Quits The Apprentice

Donald Trump, host of the low-rated NBC television series The Apprentice, says he quit abruptly before the network could bump him from the schedule. What do you think?

Wendy Halpern,
Systems Analyst
“I can’t knock a guy as successful as he is. The man single-handedly built an empire on nothing but a huge inheritance from his father.”

Remmick Seavey,
Horticulturist
“Does this mean ‘you’re fired’ can become public domain again? I haven’t able to let go of any of my employees for almost three years.”

Todd Palmer,
Graphic Designer
“What? Quick, cancel my subscription to Trump Magazine and my order of Trump Steaks! Pull my kids out of Trump University! Dump out my bottle of Donald Trump: The Fragrance! Sell, sell, sell! Sell, sell, sell!”

Today’s song of the day is “Black Maybe” by Common featuring Bilal.

To hear the song, click here.