the irony of conservatives suddenly becoming supportive of public health when they're personally threatened, I have to say tommy46's point is one with which I also agree whole-heartedly. Bird flu epidemics happen frequently; nearly annually. There was a major bird flu epidemic on the northeast, especially Pennsylvania, in the, ummmm, early 80s I believe, that did a lot of damage to poultry farmers but very little else. These are common events. There're a couple of differences from the past. One is the speed with which we hear about problems - and the problems we tend to play up. There're major problems in India with cholera and Japanese B encephalitis right now, and they keep having bubonic plague bubbling along. Those a scary diseases with very high fatality rates, and Japanese B nearly always leaves the victims with residual neurologic deficits. However in the normal course of things flu spreads so much more easily and quickly that the sheer numbers of ill are overwhelming and can mean large numbers of hospitalized or dead people. So for a world-wide outbreak, flu is the big scary. So why now? Well, perhaps the flu types are indeed shifting to something scary - after all, look at the high death rate from people who do catch what the chickenc have. However, that's usually the case with a virus whose usual host is not human - the disease has a much higher mortality rate than normal human illnesses. Second, I'm going into tinfoil hat mode here and hypothesize that some people are making hay out of warning us about scary disease outbreaks. Some of these people are epidemiologists who have a name in infectious diseases, and should really know better. But I smell at least a hint of career self-promotion with some of these folks, and the media are always happy to find a scientist or two willing to help them out. Maybe they're actually believing what they're saying, but some of the noisier parties in this circus I've had personal experience with, and I harbor serious doubts. I think there's a heavy aroma of an agenda about all this.

I couldn't help being amused. My daughter recently took a college literature course on Arthurian legend, and one of the books she read for the course, from which she quoted to me at length and with great hilarity, was the Art of Courtly Love,

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0231073054/104-1602933-3708731?v=glance&n=283155&s=books&v=glance

to which the letter, Cary's response, and many of the comments bear an alarming resemblance.

Very interesting discussion of how a technology could develop over the next couple of decades. The author's concern over access to the technology is strange in that he limits his discussion to the severely flawed US healthcare system and does not apparently anticipate any changes in that system over that same couple of decades. I hope he's wrong.

I lived in Korea from 1971-74 (Peace Corps), and my wife is Korean. The article Andrew refers to in the letter above seems a pretty good depiction. I remember 10 - 30 acres being about average. South Korea is about the size and shape of Indiana, although the latitude is more Missouri. But it's quite hilly, even mountaineous, and there aren't the huge Iowa spreads of flat land to cover with rice fields. The area referred to in the article, the IHT Andrew points to, is the capital of North Cholla province, which has nearby the largest flat area in the country, Kimjae county.

Since I was there in the 70's, I've managed to get back every 10 years or so, and the urbanization is striking, as is the increasing prosperity. My wife's relatives in North Cholla province, in Chinan county, now raise rice and vegetables, but also tobacco, ginseng, and shitaake mushrooms in the pine woods. So they're not just feeding themselves and some neighbors but raising cash crops.

Rice is a central part of the culture - "have you eaten (rice)?" is a standard greeting. And much of the history, the way of looking at the world, is from the viewpoint of a rice farmer. They don't have, never have had, water buffalo, but in the 70s farming was hard manual labor, and some people did still use oxen instead of the tricycle tractor rigs that one sees all over Asia...or did see. It's easier now, and many people have moved to the cities and are becoming something different, but there is still that strong tie to the ancestral home. The true Korean national anthem is probably a lovely song called "Spring in my hometown."

So the objections to the WTO are not just about the price - it's fear of a loss of a way of life.

.............dan strickland

Well, it may not be McCain, but I can think of one or two possibles. I grew up in Indiana while Dick Lugar's career developed, and I have enormous respect for him, although I completely disagree with his politics. And a few years ago I lived in Nebraska for a while, where Coach Tom Osborne, overly adulated of course, struck me as a very decent human. Lugar did make a run for president some years ago, and it seems a shame his campaign never caught fire.

what will all those red state big ag companies do with their soy and corn? That's why there's so little research. Even if the research proves out, it realistically won't go forward. Not in Con Agra's or Cargill's interests, you see.

Roe V Wade as I understand it said that most laws against abortion violate a constitutional right to privacy, overturning all state laws outlawing or restricting abortion. So the immediate direct effect of an overturn would not be to outlaw abortion in any state - I think each state would have to enact laws to make abortion illegal, or perhaps revive laws on the books.