Featured Articles

Sustainability, Not Fear: What CFCs Can Teach Us About Beating Climate Change

Oct 28th, 2015 | By | Category: Energy, Environmental, Featured Articles, Lead Article, Science and Society

Cliff Mass (meterologist, and a smart man with a consistently different take on global warming issues), makes an interesting point in a recent post: By focusing on global warming as a moral issue (and from his perspective, using scare tactics about the weather to promote concern) environmental activists are failing to convince the public to […]



Ebola Thrives on Poverty and Disparity

Oct 1st, 2014 | By | Category: Featured Articles, Lead Article, Public Health

Ebola–like many viruses, including the recently popular enterovirus 68–is spread by filth. Ebola thrives on poverty and disparity. Decency for the poorest is what makes a developed country a developed country: a place where one does not die from easily prevented diseases (among other things). Decency isn’t our long suit.



The American Health Care Market Just Became Less Opaque

May 8th, 2013 | By | Category: Featured Articles, Lead Article, Medicine

How much a plate of spaghetti is going to cost you isn’t usually a mystery. Sure, the price can vary quite a bit–from a few cents if you’re making the plate yourself from groceries, to dozens of dollars at a fancy restaurant. You shouldn’t be too surprised by the bill at the end; the price […]



The Fukushima Disaster

Mar 17th, 2011 | By | Category: Featured Articles, Lead Article, Nukes

Like many of you, I’ve been closely following the developments at the Fukushima reactor complex. Below is a set of links to articles I’ve written for the Stranger, as the events have unfolded. 3/12/2011 Explosion at Fukushima Nuclear Plant, Cesium Detected 3/14/2011 Don’t Panic Geiger Counter Readings Rise in Tokyo 3/15/2011 What’s on Fire at […]



The Gold Standard: Inflation, Wealth and Economic Growth

Oct 12th, 2010 | By | Category: Economics, Featured Articles, Lead Article

Conservative commentators have been riling up their audiences recently with lots of talk about America ‘devaluing our money’ and expressing the horrors that befell us after the United States left the Gold Standard in 1972.

Let’s talk macroeconomic theory, and see why they’re wrong.



The Health Care Debate

Oct 7th, 2009 | By | Category: Featured Articles, Lead Article, Medicine

The US healthcare system, in its present state, is a failure. It fails those with and without coverage. We spend more, care for fewer and are sicker than the citizens of any other industrialized nation.



Drugs and Devices

Oct 1st, 2009 | By | Category: Featured Articles, Medicine

Why are prescription drugs so damn expensive? Or that test your doctor ordered–requiring you to be contorted into some ornate machine–that costs thousands of dollars?



Why Are American Doctors So Damn Expensive?

Sep 15th, 2009 | By | Category: Featured Articles, Medicine

The salaries of American doctors are huge, terrifying, for anyone trying to bring down health care costs in the United States. Why are American doctors so damn expensive? Medical school is a big part of the answer.



Extraterrestrial Saltwater Ocean on Saturn Moon

Jun 25th, 2009 | By | Category: Featured Articles, Space

Enceladus, a moon of Saturn, probably has a saltwater ocean under it’s surface, at least per an analysis of data from the Cassini probe. Take it away NASA and JPL: For the first time, scientists working on NASA’s Cassini mission have detected sodium salts in ice grains of Saturn’s outermost ring. Detecting salty ice indicates […]



Good Work Dendreon

Apr 15th, 2009 | By | Category: Economics, Featured Articles, Lead Article, Medicine

Dendreon, a Seattle-based biotech startup, just completed a successful phase III trial on an entirely new kind of cancer treatment.