Interesting Things

Some interesting things I've come across recently:

• Glucosamine is no better than a placebo in reducing hip pain. In my experience, it doesn't work for ankle joint pain either.
• Is Portland, Oregon overrated? I've never seen a city that likes to talk about itself as much as Portland.
• Who says there's no censorship in the United States?
• In WWII, Japanese soldiers who waterboarded American prisoners were put to death by the US military for committing torture. Talk about moral relativism.
• Yet another end-of-the-world movie coming up: The Happening. Are all these a response to the sentiment of our times, or helping to create it?
• Americans are losing their employer-sponsored health insurance in both good economic times and bad. Bush couldn't care less.
  
• Germany approves a "GM Free" label for food.
  
• Ben Stein seems fine with asking questions, not so fine with taking them.
• The Heartland Institute is offering to pay the way of legislators who want to attend their upcoming "International Climate Change Convention." I asked the Heartland Institute who was sponsoring this conference, but James Taylor of the HI wouldn't tell me, except to say that no corporations were providing funding, it was all coming from individuals and foundations.
  
• The number of children living in poverty in American today (17.4% in 2006) is greater than what it was in 1969. This story (as all stories about the poor) is way undercovered.