America has a doctor shortage that even qualified medical school graduates can’t fill. That’s partly because of a residency bottleneck. Residency is an essential part of a practicing physician’s training. But in 2021 there only 35,194 first-year residencies available for 42,508 new[...]
Archive for the ‘America’ Category
What did Grant eat for breakfast?
Cucumbers soused in vinegar, washed down with coffee. No, this isn’t a “who’s buried in Grant’s tomb” joke, it’s a historical fact which I found in a book by highly reputable historian. Grant, the Civil War’s greatest general (sorry, Lee fans, but he was), w[...]
How Trump changed America’s nuclear strategy
America’s 14 Trident subs, 8 operating in the Pacific out of Bangor, Washington, and 6 in the Atlantic, are now armed with some low-yield “tactical” warheads. This warhead, dubbed the W76-2, has about one-third to one-half the explosive power of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs. De[...]
Ukraine through Putin’s eyes
Western media likes to portray Putin’s mind as a mysterious and unknowable place. It’s true that predicting what he’ll do next is a guessing game. It’s also very likely true that emotion, as well as rationality, plays a role in his decision-making. (Isn’t that somewhat [...]
Red states are eroding civil liberties
Republicans say they’re for “freedom.” They’re not, except for gun owners and people behaving badly. “States where the GOP controls both the governorship and state legislature are moving in unprecedented numbers to restrict abortion, limit access to voting, ban [...]
Canada’s approach to Covid-19 is different and better
“Canada’s provinces have generally employed strict Covid-19 measures such as school mask mandates and vaccine passports … [that] have enjoyed broad public support in doing so; even the strictest restrictions are less controversial in Canada than in the US,” Vox says (here). ̶[...]
Truckers behaving badly
“What started as a convoy of truckers protesting Covid-19 mandates has snowballed into a blockade in the Canadian capital and the obstruction of a US-Canadian border crossing,” CNN reported on Monday, January 31, 2022. But that’s not the half of it. Their behavior has been unruly a[...]
Things could get ugly for Russian invaders
Ukraine’s military can’t match Russia’s for heavy hardware like ships, aircraft, tanks, and artillery (not to mention tactical nukes). But how do they use that military power against angry Ukrainian civilians with guns, who could make life a bleeding hell for Russian occupiers? And[...]
62% of GOPers are Putin fans
A new Yahoo News/YouGov poll has found that 62% of Republicans and GOP-leaning independents think Putin is “a stronger leader” than Biden. A former CIA station chief who ran operations in Russia isn’t having it. “Shame on them,” he says. “That’s incredibly, incredibly myopi[...]
The world’s biggest stockpile of nuclear weapons is right under Seattle’s nose
At least, that’s what this article says: “Bangor, Washington, now houses the largest single nuclear weapons site in the world … holding roughly 25% of the United States’ 9,962 nuclear warheads.” Bangor, of course, is the home base of America’s ballistic-missile submar[...]