some years ago my wife, daughter and I were flying to Seattle. As we boarded, our daughter, then about 10 or so, looked into the flight deck with interest, and was asked if she wanted to come in for a look. Of course she did, and my wife and I went to our seats. Part of the reason we were going to Seattle was for a Suzuki music camp for our daughter, so she had her violin in hand. What happened next was the crew asked her about her instrument, and she opened the case and showed her (then new) violin to them, and they asked if she would play a piece. Evidently someone flipped a switch, because as the last bunch of passengers were boarding, over the loudspeaker came violin music, in fact one of the pieces our daughter knew - in fact as we listened, we realized it was her. A little later she came walking back, full of interest about the flight deck, and we said "nice playing" She went "huh?" and we said - someone put you on the PA. And not just to the plane, but into the tower as well, by later reports. She was surprised, but pleasantly so. And the audience was thoroughly appreciative.

although certainly the position is about communicating, a good argument for Gupta. However, the headlines about this story were a bit odd - a "rural family physician" isn't normally someone you'd expect to be a MacArthur fellow and black female head of the state medical association in the old south.

and in the years following, I was impressed by the decency and integrity of the guy. His politics are miles and miles away from mine, but he's a genuine Republican, not one of these neo-con clowns.

although I don't know if it's still going..

http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/10/29/drug.clinic/index.html

As a public health practitioner, making anything that affects health illegal makes it much more difficult to treat. Public health I like to define as the practice of medicine upon communities (whereas clinical medicine practices upon individuals) although these realms do overlap. When a health problem in the community is driven underground, it becomes difficult to find, to measure, to prevent, to treat. The example under discussion is drugs, but in the past alcohol was a problem during prohibition, the stigma associated with being gay and the fear in the early years of the AIDS epidemic posed enormous challenges, and prostitution with the associated STD risks is always problematic. And to get very harsh about it, in the days of illegal abortions many hospitals had entire wards devoted to patients suffering the consequences of botched abortions.

Anything affecting health should be brought out into the open as much as possible to protect public health. Shutting it all down is one of the worst possible ways of protecting the community.

"healthcare costs" I really think splitting is more informative. When we say "healthcare costs" have risen by whatever over however many years, that's only mildly informative. I'd really like to see which components have risen at what rates.

However, I suspect there are some industries that would prefer that level of detail remain obscure. They should be ashamed.

used to drive me nuts, until I decided to amuse myself by counting how many times I heard it: "At this time".

my wife is part of the old (Chosun dynasty) Korean royalty. They did have succession rules, but used them as guides only, and selected the monarch based upon suitedness for the state of the nation at the time. Granted, the selection process was restricted- it was usually the dowager queens who did the choosing (elderly, small-of-stature but strong-willed and intimidating women - my wife confesses she never looked Queen Yun in the face). And the system generally worked. The last ruling queen, Myoungseong (aka Queen Min) walked a tightrope between Russia, China, Japan (and peripherally the US) trying to keep her country independent. She succeeded for a time, but finally was assassinated, in tribute to her effectiveness, in 1895.

I have felt, since the Kennedys, that frankly, the American people on some level need royalty and aristocracy....so let's reinstate that institution, train them properly, and get rid of these clowns and pretenders. They shouldn't rule; heaven forfend! But as an object of general adulation, they would provide a missing element to the American culture.

about the lousy coverage of this - it has been disgraceful, and it's local, not just national, media that have been close to useless. My community, Altadena, was severely threatened Saturday, yet TV coverage seemingly was unaware of our existence. LA County has at least realized its shortcomings in information gathering and communication, and has already prepared measures to repair those failings. A real life-saver has been a blog run by one of our local community activists. Information came onto there from everyone in the community on the ground, reporting what was happening where they were, talking with sheriffs and fire fighters in their neighborhood. The guy who runs this blog should be up for a Pulitzer, I kid you not. Take a look:

www.altadenablog.com

@Mountainviewer:

Controlled burns (or uncontrolled burns) versus containment are very controversial in the fire world. There're a couple of academic researchers in town (UC Irvine & UCLA) who hold strong opposing opinions on this, with a lot of interesting evidence, and comparisons get made with Baja California. In the Baja, the climate and topography are similar, but small fires are pretty much allowed to go, with the result that large fuel loads don't build up. And again, that observation is a subject of much controversy.

And to those of you going on about LA sprawl, desert conditions, homes in vulnerable areas, etc. - your ignorance is showing....others have already answered very well, but population density here is actually higher than most eastern cities. Manhattan Beach has higher population density than Manhattan.