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Paul Brandon

Paul Brandon's picture
Mankato, MN
Commenter for
5 years 22 weeks

Recent Comments

Posted on 06/19/13 at 11:56 am in response to The 'sense and nonsense' (and big business) of traditional Chinese medicine

we were told that the Chinese typically use traditional medicine for mild chronic illnesses, but turn to Western medicine for severe problems.
BTW -- studies in Europe and the United States have shown that RM's and PA's without doctorates have cure rates just as high as MD's. Of course, they still have far more training than the Chinese 'barefoot doctors'.

Posted on 06/18/13 at 09:23 am in response to Israel debates branding settler price tag attacks 'terrorism'

Is that Israel has not decided whether the West Bank is part of Israel or not.
If it IS part of Israel, then these attacks are civil crimes against property and should be prosecuted as such.
If the West Bank is NOT part of Israel, then we are talking about acts on foreign territory against foreign citizens; an international crime.

Posted on 06/17/13 at 05:02 pm in response to Pew Poll: Large majority of Americans oppose getting more involved in Syria

this will guarantee that we -will- get involved.

Posted on 06/18/13 at 09:27 am in response to Gender and brains: Be cautious when connecting differences to behavior

you're sure that Fredette knows how to read.

More seriously, speaking as an emeritus professor of psychology,
there's a huge leap of faith involved in attributing differences in behavior to differences in brain structure.
While we know that particular parts of the brain are particularly important for different types of function, we are a long way from the kind of detailed functional knowledge needed to actually use these structural differences to account for behavior....

Posted on 06/17/13 at 10:42 am in response to Andrew Sullivan breaks with President Obama on Syria

If Sullivan explained WHY he thinks that the intervention in Libya was unproductive and destabilizing. And let's restrict the term 'war' for situations where Congress has actually declared war.
Lacking that, he should elucidate the (real) differences between the Libyan and Syrian situations.

Posted on 06/17/13 at 05:29 pm in response to Andrew Sullivan breaks with President Obama on Syria

The point is that it would be good if Congress DID rigorously adhere to the Constitutional requirement for declaring war. We've gone into too many 'wars in everything but name' without any formal process being used to verify that our national interest (as opposed to someone's economic interest) was really at stake.
It can be argued that WWII was both the last legally declared war and the last war in which our existential status was really at stake. In none of the subsequent actions...

Posted on 06/14/13 at 03:59 pm in response to Minnesota for Marriage says it spent $200,000 lobbying to fight gay-marriage law

most Minnesotans believe in individual rights.

Posted on 06/14/13 at 04:03 pm in response to Teaching Board denies Teach for America group variance, wants individual evaluations

If American education (and teaching) had a better track record your argument would be more convincing.
I worked with a state university school/college of education for 40 years -- it's entrenched mediocrity.

Posted on 06/14/13 at 12:55 pm in response to War in Afghanistan: What you see when you only look in the mirror

Before the Russians, there was the British Raj.
Like many colonial 'nations', Afghanistan in its present form doesn't have a national history; it was a creation of the British East Indian company. It's natural boundaries are tribal.
There are some good maps and a brief history at
http://www.loc.gov/rr/geogmap/pub/afghanistan.html

On the ethnic...

Posted on 06/14/13 at 01:01 pm in response to War in Afghanistan: What you see when you only look in the mirror

Since (according to her Web site) she was in the north of present day Afghanistan, the tribespeople she was with were probably Turkic, not Pashtun.
Kandahar and the Pakistani border are on the South, so it is not surprising that her friends had not heard of Bin Laden.