In an attempt to prove that he has what it “takes” to “take” his party to the next level, Svend “takes” a piece of jewelry without paying for it. Caught with his hand in the cookie jar, Svend (again) follows standard political form and announces that he will be “taking” medical time off in lieu of resignation (and/or doing time) for his low budget boondoggle.
Category Archive: Wreckollection
Jan 01
My “Stiff Penalties” award goes to… Merck & Co. (Vioxx).
Vioxx, a powerful arthritis medication, is recalled based upon clinical evidence (not to be confused with the same preliminary findings during its FDA reviews) that twice as many people who took the drug experienced a nasty side effect called cardiovascular disease. Faced with potential settlements of $10BillionUS (or more) from as many as 27,000 possible wrongful death suits, Merck & Co. is rumored to be preparing a defense based on the understanding that none of the 27,000 dead persons died from Arthritis and (if they could communicate from beyond) all of those “stiffs” would agree that they are no longer suffering from the pain of Arthritis. The lawyers of the deceased are countering that claim with scientific experts who will testify that rigor mortis is nothing more than the most advanced state of arthritis.
Breaking story: “Push(er) over Vioxx” – Merk & Co. competitor, Pfizer Inc. recently admits that their popular painkiller, Celebrex “might” also heighten the risk of heart and stroke if you can trust the results of 1 out of 2 trials. As I write, pressure is being brought to bear on Health Canada to pull Celebrex off of shelves.
Related story: Drug companies are advertising SSRI anti-depressants for use on children (and other individuals) suffering the “debilitating effects of Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD)” For those of us that weren’t born yesterday, that’s what we used to call shyness. There is growing evidence that SSRIs “cause or ex-acerbate a wide range of abnormal mental and behavioral conditions… these reactions can worsen the individual’s mental condition and can result in suicidality, violence, and other forms of extreme abnormal behavior.”
Jan 01
My “Boldly Go Where No-One has gone Before” (or “How Far will Big Drug Go to Root Out New Markets for their Cures”) award goes to… a team of Italian and Korean scientists.
They have developed a prototype of a miniature remote-controlled crawling robot complete with six legs, a battery and a teensy weensy camera. Although still working the bugs out of their, um – bug, they are already generating headlines like, “Robot pills crawl through intestines to find disease”, and “Tiny gadgets could replace more painful invasive procedures.” The FDA is already predicting spin-offs in the form of more personalized tax audits and such.
Jan 01
My “Necessity is the Mother of Invention” (or Reality Television – Wakeup Call) award goes to… flat screen televisions.
As North Americans get fatter parked in front of their king sized curvacious TV and computer monitors, those same screens are getting thinner so we can belly up for more of the same, oblivious to their residual effects measured in terms of lesser living space and larger lap tops. For those who have lost the innuendo, refer to the Oscar Wilde classic, “The Picture of Dorien Grey.”
Jan 01
My “Pot Calling the Kettle Black” award goes to… Canadians in general.
After ridiculing their neighbors to the south for their lack of good judgment when electing Baby Bush for another 4 years in office, Canadians vote for Don Cherry as one of the Top 10 Greatest Canadians ever.
Jan 01
Headlines you won’t see in those mainstream Year-end Reviews 2004
(Hurting) Headitor’s note: Its late, its New Years Eve, and I’SATIREd, sauced please accept that some (or all) of my wreckollections of the year gone by might be a bit scotchy. You should double-check my fracts with some more staid and reputable news sources before using any of the stories that I have dismembered from last year in a serious conversation.
Jan 01
“Olympic gold-medal markswoman makes politicians look like straight shooters”
After winning the hearts of women everywhere by taking aim at her ex-boss, Myriam Bedard follows up at a Commons Committee investigating the Groupaction political sponsorship scandal with other allegations that would make Baron Munchausen blush.
Jan 01
“Liberals win minority in a… mudslide(?)”
Reeling from Liberal scandals, Canadians still believe that the devil you know is safer than the new guy who is likely backed by the same pack of devils behind closed doors. Let’s just call it Parolement Hill for a while
Jan 01
“You get what you pay for. You pay for what you don’t (work for)”
In a western hemisphere marked by a relative absence of catastrophe and terror (American election results notwithstanding), underutilized grief councilors everywhere converge on Canada to console it’s populace, or more realistically it’s athletes, their support infrastructure and sports columnists after another catastrophic Olympic Medal count (defined as not winning/buying more medals at a point in time – once every 4 years – than other countries, most of whom score significantly lower than Canada in all other “day to day” events). Where does a country of 32 million get off with such grandiose Olympic expectations (our athletes’ medal count exceeded expectations when extrapolated against our percentage of global population and far outstripped even the USA when based upon our relative percentages of Global GNP). If money were the answer to all of our (imagined) athletic woes, why doesn’t the world roll over when our hockey teams comprised of so many multi-millionaires hit the ice? Over the past 4 years, according to the United Nations Human Development Index, Canada has slipped from being ranked the best country in the world to the 4th best country, whereas our Olympic medal count has remained pretty much the same (if not marginally better) over the same period. As you are asking yourself where your tax dollars should be spent over the next four years also ask yourself what all those Olympic runners who outdistanced our runners are running from. Come on Canada – get over it, but if you can’t, don’t point the finger of blame at a world class hurdler who misses one hurdle in one race.
Jan 01
“That’s why they call us patients”
Millions of Canadians are left wondering which is longer: Waiting for their operation or waiting for their politicians to agree on how to shorten hospital waiting-lists.