Bump's Stump

Just read a most interesting book, "Being Mortal" by Atul Gawande. The author discusses the aim of medicine today -  and makes a significant suggestion to improve it. 1. The aim now, so to speak, is to preserve life as long as possible . 2. The author makes an excellent case for preserving a reasonable quality of life as considered by the patient, close family, and the medical people involved. The Author, a Medical Doctor himself, has noted a trend developing as the scientific community is experiencing an exponential growth of pharmaceutical products, nuclear medicine and other curative treatments that are increasingly able to extend life, but with essentially disastrous consequences. The advancing fight against cancer illustrates what he considers an undesirable trend. It is now possible to extend a persons' life to a non-reversible point where the patient is no longer aware of his existence, surroundings, family or friends. The patient is technically alive in t

Americans are avoiding the obvious. We are thoroughly enmeshed in a  religious war with the Religion of Islam that threatens us and most other nations of the world. It's guerrilla type war rather than a conventional one, but  war nevertheless. Battles usually involve a small number of victims, but not always. The attack on 9/11 for example, resulted in a very large death toll. There are have been several other large and vicious attacks as well. Usually they involve a few perpetrators led by an independent leader and designed to murder as many people as possible. Americans persist in referring to each attack as an "isolated terrorist incident" , or some other even less disturbing woods.  Actually, they are the attacks of a singularly vicious enemy. An enemy like no other we've seen looking back in time several centuries.  It is a large war that has two alarming characteristics:  1. The support and attacks are largely coming from people who have nothing to lose. The

The GOP has an impressive history. It's ancestry more or less started with Abe Lincoln and ended most recently with G.W. Bush. Along the way there were some stalwart fellows and some duds, but overall the Grand Old Party evolved to stand for small government, less federal footprint on citizens, to favor states rights where ever possible, and the common sense attributes: "beware of spending money you don't have as it inevitably leads to failure." The GOP also  has a history of favoring a strong military to help defer policies unfavorable to America, and for protection of the Nation if threatened". At the moment however (2016) the GOP seems to stand in unity for very little indeed.  Several Republican candidates are contesting to be President, and with the exception of Gov. John Kalish, and before he dropped out Dr. Ben Carson, the others have degraded campaigning to the most disgraceful level since the days of duels. Meanwhile, the agenda, policies, plans o