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MA wrestles with idea of doctor's labor union CHICAGO - The frustration of doctors under managed care companies peaked Sunday at the American Medical Association's annual meeting, when hundreds of physicians gathered to debate the merits and risks of forming a labor union. "American physicians are angry, frustrated and exhausted over the intrusions of third-party payers into the day-to-day practice of medicine," said Dr. William G. Gamel, a delegate from Austin, Texas, and director of that state's Medicaid program. "And they are looking to us, their representatives at the local, state, specialty and national levels, to help them find a ...

As the new field of sociobiology has emerged during the past quarter century, it has met with firm and unrelenting opposition from prominent liberal critics. Sociobiology—also known as evolutionary psychology or neo-Darwinian theory—holds that many patterns of human behavior have a basis in evolution. Because this approach often suggests biological explanations of gender roles, it affronts many feminists. It has also drawn opposition from a group of biologists on the left who have raised general scientific and philosophical objections and have had great influence in shaping liberal opinion. The scientific critics have included highly respected figures in biology: Ruth ...

DEMS SEE GUN CONTROL AS POTENT POLL WEAPON By DEBORAH ORIN Democrats yesterday predicted that they'll score big and knock off some Republicans if they can turn the 2000 elections into a shootout over gun control. They spoke after the House, led by Democrats, killed the latest gun-control bill because it would weaken existing laws on background checks at gun shows - although it also had some tough new measures like safety locks. "When you look at polling data and when you see the resonance this issue has all over the country ... I think this is going to be ...

For education & discussion only. The First Lady no one knows. I CONFESS I've always had a soft spot for Hillary Rodham Clinton. But then, asked to name my favorite Marx Brother, I usually cite Margaret Dumont. In A Night at the Opera and A Night in Casablanca, she was the haughty, imperious grande dame standing on her dignity while Groucho prowled around, waggling his cigar at every other woman in sight. The rock, the anchor of every great double-act is always the straight man, and the best straight man-or woman-is one who never really gets the joke in ...

For education & discussion only. The First Lady no one knows. I CONFESS I've always had a soft spot for Hillary Rodham Clinton. But then, asked to name my favorite Marx Brother, I usually cite Margaret Dumont. In A Night at the Opera and A Night in Casablanca, she was the haughty, imperious grande dame standing on her dignity while Groucho prowled around, waggling his cigar at every other woman in sight. The rock, the anchor of every great double-act is always the straight man, and the best straight man-or woman-is one who never really gets the joke in ...

1) CNN's Wolf Blitzer landed an exclusive interview with Bill Clinton, but avoided Chinagate. Instead, he wondered: "When did you learn that the First Lady was a New York Yankees fan?" 2) Nightly News ignored it, but Tim Russert brought Warren Rudman on Meet the Press to discuss his report on nuclear lab security. 3) "I think Bush is in bigger trouble when the suburban moms and women discover" he's an "extreme" pro-lifer, insisted Eleanor Clift. 4) PBS's Liberal Week in Review: "As we all know, one of the biggest mistakes that his father made was to make that ...

I read several editorials this morning (on in the New York Times and the other in the Washington Post) which criticized the state lotteries as a regressive tax which exploits the poor and uneducated. I agree. I believe that all states should abolish their lotteries and that the government should remove itself from the gambling industry. The sad thing is, the government will not do this because it has become as dependent upon the lottery as any other gambling addict. David Mathews David Mathews' Home Page

While Russian diplomat Viktor Chernomyrdin was grabbing headlines with his Kosovo peace missions, top military planners secretly worked on a very different priority in a Stalin-era compound a few blocks from the Kremlin: planning the surprise Russian military incursion into Kosovo. The clandestine operation grew so large -- involving up to 150 military strategists, researchers and intelligence officers -- that more rooms had to be commandeered in the stately yellow mansion that houses the headquarters of Russia's general staff. At first, the task force worked hand-in-hand with Chernomyrdin's peace mission, providing the envoy with military analysis and research. But when ...

Future talks possible on Kosovo independence: Blair WASHINGTON, June 20 (AFP) - British Prime Minister Tony Blair suggested Sunday that Kosovar Albanian desires to see their province move beyond autonomy to actual independence from Yugoslavia might be discussed in the future. It was a rare expression of willingness to consider moving beyond the terms listed in the G8 peace plan agreed to by Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic and later ratified by a UN Security Council Resolution. Speaking on the ABC television program This Week, Blair, in Cologne for the G8 summit, said the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) knew "all the ...

President says he believes China will one day accept embassy .6/21/99 BONN, Germany (AP) - President Clinton said today he believes China ultimately will see the NATO bombing of its Belgrade embassy as ``a truly tragic accident,'' even though the United States failed to convince Beijing of that in its latest diplomatic mission. The president acknowledged that the embassy bombing, which killed three Chinese journalists, had created ``a difficult, painful period'' for the Chinese people and U.S.-Chinese relations. But he said he remains hopeful that the difficulties will be smoothed out, and negotiations could resume soon on bringing China ...

Switzerland: Europe's gun centre where kids don't kill kidsFor education and discussion purposes only By Gerard Jackson No. 124, 21-27 June 1999 The Littleton killings have once again brought into the spotlight America's alleged love affair with guns and its violent nature. Horror story after horror story is wheeled out to demonstrate this 'fact'. Statistic after statistic is faithfully recited to convince people that the horrors would go away if only guns were banned. According to this mantra, guns are the real evil, as if they were some kind of voodoo curse. Because of this malignant force, according to Cameron ...

Untitled Normal Page New York Governor George Pataki issued an executive order requiring an FBI instant check at gun shows on NY property; thus agreeing with the NRA   Pataki's order in effect At Albany gun show, buyers, sellers shrug at background checks By LYNN BREZOSKY Gazette Reporter ALBANY - With a long-armed CNN microphone hovering inches over his head, and a camera nearby jostling for the best angle, James Sabia completed the yellow 4473 background-check form newly required for purchasing guns at New York State gun shows. His dealer, a Greek immigrant from Long Island, dialed into an ...

Just one week after President Clinton explained that he authorized a military attack to enforce ethnic amity in the Balkans, the Senate Appropriations Committee last Thursday quietly and unanimously voted $20 million in start-up money to equip a Kosovo "self-defense force." It definitely will not be in the business of promoting good feelings between Albanian and Serb. The Clinton administration made no objection to the appropriation pressed by Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). While insisting it was not a continuation of his long crusade to arm the Kosovo Liberation Army, McConnell told me "some of those folks" in the new ...

Despite reservations about our long-term policy in Kosovo and the Balkans, I voted for airstrikes against Serbia because the worst thing that we could have done in the face of Slobodan Milosevic's atrocities would have been nothing. I was troubled during the initial phase of the war when our political objectives -- including prevention of further "ethnic cleansing" by Milosevic and agreement by the Serbs to the Rambouillet accords -- had to be discarded or modified. I felt that I had seen this before in Vietnam, where our servicemen and women paid a high price for the failure of ...

Bar Codes for the Body Make It to the Market Biometrics May Alter Consumer Landscape HOUSTON—Jordan Pearce stood before the Bank United cash machine, stared at a blinking light for perhaps three seconds, waiting quietly while a hidden camera scanned his eyeball. The machine's television screen spasmed once and opened for business. Moments later Pearce pocketed $40 and departed, just like millions of other Americans who stop at their local ATM to get money every day. Except that Pearce, 18, a rising freshman at nearby Rice University, didn't have an ATM card. Instead, he simply allowed the camera mounted in ...

Court Backs Gore Dissenter's Suit WASHINGTON (AP) _ A federal appeals court ruled Friday that a woman who dissented from the findings of a White House panel chaired by Vice President Al Gore has the right to the same information as other commissioners. M. Victoria Cummock, appointed by the president to a special commission on aviation safety in the wake of the TWA Flight 800 air disaster, sued Gore and others on the panel, saying she had been denied access to a ``classified annex,'' but never got the document despite her security clearance. Cummock also said she was denied ...

COLOGNE, Germany - While he and his aides were still struggling to end the ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, President Clinton was agonizing over the United States' failure to halt an even greater tragedy five years ago. Last month, the President directed his top foreign-policy advisers to study the genocide that took hundreds of thousands of lives in Rwanda to see whether the United States could have intervened effectively. Now, as American forces settle into the job of policing part of Kosovo, Clinton is reexamining the massacres in Central Africa, as well as ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Kosovo, in an ...

The Cox Report is out, and the Media is ignoring it. (like usual) FRee Republic is not going to allow this to go away. With your help Free Republic is going to go where no web site has gone before. We have set our sights on appearing before Congress and give our Testimony on this TREASON that has taken place. We can do this, we can make a difference. We need YOUR help to accomplish everything we need to do to prepare for this historic effort. We are putting out the call for Freepers to step up and be counted. ...

Here they are folks, those who have been "honored" after appearing on yesterday's news shows PROFESSIONALS' MONTHLYBe sure to check out the "THINKING MAN" cartoon at the bottom of the page.Also, since he's been doing the rounds promoting his new book (SHADOW), an excerpt of a critique of Misters Woodward and Bernstein (after their appearance on Meet the Press on 8/98 during which they commented on the Lewinsky matter) follows (the rest of the article is at PROFESSIONALS' MONTHLY): Almost exactly 24 years ago this week, an historical event took place. Amazingly, we seem to be living it all over ...