So, I just finished reading this article in WaPo . It's extremely confusing to me what Schwarzenegger is thinking, in terms of the politics of all of this. As Phil Angelides says

Schwarzenegger rose to power because he was a moderate who seemed above partisanship and because Gray Davis was just god-aweful. However, I don't understand what he is thinking, taking on all of these people? Is he gaming to be defeated for reelection? Or, does he think that voters won't vote based on these economic issues? It's my opinion that he's operating a shrewd political game that he will likely lose. The main question is whether Californians vote based on social policy or on economic policy. This is key because is if CA voters vote based on social policy, there's a good chance that Schwarzenegger will skate past the Dems again in '06 since he agrees highly with the majority of Californians in this area (for god's sake, he even agrees with me on probably 90% of social issues, and I'm close to being a socialist!). However, if they vote based on economic issues as well, I think the Governator will be on the losing end of the stick come November 2006 because this issue is hitting home for a lot of people. The service industries described in the WaPo article employ a considerable amount of voters who are content with Schwarzenegger's social politics but will not be fine with his economic policies. The challenge for the Democrats come primary time will be to select a candidate who is a true progressive on both social and economic issues. If the Dems select a DLC type or someone with progressive social values but corporatist economic values, they will face a big defection from progressive voters like myself who would rather vote Green because the two parties won't be any different on economics OR social priorities meaning, why vote for one of two evils? What do you all think?

Let me first say that this diary will give away the ending of Million Dollar Baby, so if you have not seen it and want the ending to remain a surprise, please do not go to the flip side. Otherwise, click away!

Ok, so I've been reading these blogs for 5 months or so now and have just been content in reading them since a lot of you make the same points I would. However, this recent hubbub about Terri Schiavo has really got me irritated! As a medical student at Stanford University, I know a few things about patients' neurological states and let me tell you, for all intensive purposes, Terri Schiavo is dead. The reason she has her eyes open and still breaths and reacts to certain stimuli is because her brainstem, where all her cranial nerves reside, is still intact. For laymen, this means that she can still react to light, smell, move her eyes, maybe shrug her shoulders or move her neck, swallow, move her face, breath and her heart can still beat. BUT she does not have any cognitive functions! She may appear to smile or move her eyes, but there is nothing behind these movements, in terms of will or emotion. Those actions are present in the cortex, which for Schiavo has been destroyed. So, she is alive, yes, but she is not functioning and never will. This is just plain sick. And I want to talk more about 2 points on the flip: 1. Why is Congress intent on interfering with the doctor-patient relationship? and 2. We've seen a couple polls in the last days saying that over 85% of people do not agree with Congress' actions on this case, yet the Rethugs still go on. Why? I have the answer....