I assume you mean something like what happened in South Africa? Of course, nobody was going to miss trading with them so much (quick: name 3 things in your house made in SA. Time's up....). Plus, apartheid was particularly odious to the "great and good" who run things, including especially the media that it was a very popular trade embargo.

The problem with China is not just that they are egregious offenders against the rights of their citizens (including those who'd really rather forgo the privilege, like the Tibetans), but that they have become indispensable to our own financial comfort. This makes any proposal at using trade leverage a non-starter.

So, what makes you think that we aren't (mostly) using monoculture strains now? I don't see this as a compelling argument for that reason - most large agriculture is already monoculture (http://bss.sfsu.edu/fischer/IR%20305/Readings/global.htm). Not that that's a good thing, but it's the way it is because, presumably, it is economically desirable - at least until the next rust fungus or whatever shows up that targets the favored strain(s).

Uh, yes, nonsense. Sorry about the yaws, but for everything else listed there are medications that "work" even if there is no cure, which you didn't specify.

This is nonsense, of course. There are a wide variety of medications for diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol and a huge number of metabolic/physiological illnesses from Alzheimer's to Yaws (can't think of a "z" disease at the moment).

Mod parent up as informative amongst a raft of uninformed half-baked opinion.

Nonsense

Stem cell therapies (even using embryo-derived cell lines) are not illegal. However, there are professional and ethical standards of treatment and research protocols that would prohibit this kind of "scientific voodoo" medicine. The sad fact is that this woman was desperate enough to try this snake oil treatment, but it was a serious error in judgment.

We don't know the details of her decision or of the medical issue that she faced. But there is no "policy" issue here; we can't command the science to provide a reliable treatment without careful study. Sadly, this patient either didn't have the time or the patience to wait and paid the price for that.

Also, US law to the contrary, corporations are not real people. Imposing taxes on corporate profits is just a way for the government to "double-dip" on taxing productive activity - tax the corporation and the individuals who profit from their stock holdings. It also makes no sense that US corporate tax rates are higher than almost anywhere else in the developed world.

In fact, they didn't. Most of the oil development contracts made last year in Iraq went to EU and Chinese companies. That "Blood for Oil" mantra was mostly BS. See http://www.globalpolicy.org/component/content/article/168-general/48444-did-big-oil-win-the-war-in-iraq.html

It seems (from the article) that the draconian punishment of exclusion from all federally-funded programs was not optional, thus necessitating the bogus "whipping-boy" subsidiary. This is stupid law, of the same stripe as large minimal sentences for drug possession and many other politically-motivated examples. That's just our lawmakers pandering to the thirst for vengeance exhibited by many other posters here who seem to want to punish the corporation, as if it exists as a real person.

The fact is that you can't really "punish" a corporation, since it isn't really a person (no matter what the law says on that). Neither can you really tax one since the cost of fines and/or taxes are just passed along in the price of products. Tax the income derived from the investment by the shareholders, by all means, but taxing a corporation's profits just makes it another tax collector and distorts operational and investment decisions.

What we have is bad law - treating corporations as persons for some purposes (and, inconsistently, not for some others), and then the one mandating a stupid punishment for crimes that should be attributed to individuals.

All of this further diminishes the rapidly fading sense of personal responsibility that was once such a defining characteristic of American culture. So long, American republic, it was nice while it lasted.

That's not what I said. I was pointing out that he lies about US in a wild and paranoid style designed only to appeal to the prejudices of his base. Just like Hitler and the Jews.

Read more news (and history) then. Hitler and Mussolini were elected too, you know. Chavez has shut down opposition newspapers, thrown political opponents into jail, supported the leftist-cum-terrorist operations of FARC in Columbia, is best buds with the Castro brothers, etc. All of which adds up to me as dictator-like behavior. He first came to notice after a failed coup attempt in 1992 - and when he did come to power, became one of the leaders of the OPEC cartel, reducing production to boost oil prices.

See http://latinamericanhistory.about.com/od/presidentsofsouthamerica/p/09HChavez.htm - a generally sympathetic view of him as a leftist reformer, but his dictatorial aspirations are clear.

Plus, he's just a lying SOS and enemy of the US, just on general principles (or lack thereof). Most recently, he accused US of being responsible for the Haiti earthquake ( http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,583588,00.html ) using some magical new weapon no one else has heard of. Evidence of the paranoid style and demonization of some "enemy" which is page one of the dictator's handbook.\p>