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Todd Huffman is a pediatrician and writer living in Eugene, Oregon. He is a regular contributor to many newspapers and publications throughout the Pacific Northwest.
(4 comments) SHARE Saturday, July 7, 2007 Do Parents Matter?
In our incessant media world of confusing and often contradictory advice, few are more vulnerable than parents. Across all forms of media, various self-described "parenting experts" contradict each other, and often even themselves. Parents are then left confused and uncertain as to what is considered the "best advice".
SHARE Friday, March 3, 2006 The Crisis of Meth
Children are the forgotten victims of the worsening national epidemic of methamphetamine abuse.
(9 comments) SHARE Sunday, July 1, 2007 What Does Freedom Mean Anymore?
It is worth remembering during this week divided by an Independence Day holiday that as Americans we are united by freedom, perhaps even as many freedoms as there are of us. But what does the common man actually believe about freedom today? Does freedom today mean the same thing as written and fought for over two centuries ago?
SHARE Saturday, March 11, 2006 Rules Don't Apply To Me
Osama bin Laden brings far less fear into my everyday life than do 'Rules Don't Apply To Me' people.
(3 comments) SHARE Tuesday, November 14, 2006 Poverty In America: A Republican Moral Failing
Republican leaders for a dozen years have led with the philosophy that the solution to poverty is to grow the economy out of the problem. And yet despite nearly two decades of generally robust economic growth poverty, especially severe poverty in single-parent families with children, has risen dramatically. Now, it's up to the Democrats to show moral leadership on the issue of poverty in America.
SHARE Friday, June 8, 2007 Stem Cells To Stay Locked Up
The decision we face is whether an unwanted blastocyst, a mass of one hundred cells fully eleven weeks away from any neural function, has moral rights equivalent to the moral obligation we have to act for the benefit of the sick among us.
SHARE Sunday, June 3, 2007 Science 101
From climate change to embryonic stem-cell research, from evolution to theories of the origins of life and the universe, science and scientific information is being yanked back and forth in high-profile public debates of urgent consequence to our nation's fiscal and educational future. The oncoming presidential election year promises even greater degrees of controversy and contention, and the outcomes are less than certain.
(1 comments) SHARE Wednesday, May 24, 2006 Stealing Jesus
The Christian Left needs to do a better job pointing out the hypocrisy of those on the Right who claim to "walk" with Jesus even as they run away from those for whom Jesus spoke.
(5 comments) SHARE Sunday, June 10, 2007 If John Q. Public Ran For President
After work one recent evening the author had the good fortune to chat with John Q. Public over a few beers...
(2 comments) SHARE Wednesday, June 6, 2007 And That's The Way It Is
With such an awesome responsibility as often the sole harbinger of news good and bad, we should expect much from our television media. Instead, we get the titillation of the trivial.
(3 comments) SHARE Monday, June 11, 2007 Does Deterrence Trump Fallibility?
After a long and relatively quiet time away, capital punishment suddenly appears poised to rejoin the crowded battlefield of America's culture wars.
(1 comments) SHARE Sunday, November 19, 2006 Giving The Gift Of Child Survival This Christmas
Every minute of every day, 20 children die somewhere in the world. Each year, one in seven children in developing countries - nearly 11 million children - die before the age of five. Would it surprise you to know that fully two-thirds of these deaths are avoidable?
(7 comments) SHARE Thursday, July 19, 2007 Bush's Views On Health Care Make Me Sick
Mr. Bush apparently has no philosophical objections to the number of children equivalent to the entire population of the state of Oregon going without health care. Why should he? We all know that he also has no philosophical objections to the number of Iraqis he's killed equivalent to the entire population of Austin, Texas.
(13 comments) SHARE Monday, June 4, 2007 Refueling Our Fears
The news this weekend of the arrest of three suspects allegedly plotting to sabotage the jet fuel lines servicing JFK Airport – a plot in its nascent stages and one not likely to have caused much in the way of actual damage besides psychological – will undoubtedly have the effect of increasing the supply of fuel to the mass media's jet engine-like power to soar the worries of everyday Americans to the stratosphere.
(27 comments) SHARE Saturday, July 29, 2006 It's Time To Say "No More!"
It's time for everyday Americans to stand up to the fiscal and social policies of the Republican leadership, to greed disguised as ideology, and say "no more!"
(12 comments) SHARE Tuesday, July 24, 2007 Full Bumpers And Empty Gestures
Most everyone in America "supports the troops". But what does that really mean? Does displaying a $3 magnetic ribbon made in China really support the troops? Does countering with anti-war bumper stickers really support the troops? Or do both actions simply make the drivers feel good about themselves as if they are "doing their part" to support or resist this war?
(1 comments) SHARE Thursday, June 15, 2006 If I Were A Progressive Candidate
Some thoughts on what Joe & Jane Voter might want to see in a progressive candidate in 2006 & 2008.
(23 comments) SHARE Sunday, June 17, 2007 On Writing In The Age Of New Media
We should be especially curious, in this the Age of Image, why writers nonetheless go on writing, why they still spend so much of their spare time conceiving ideas, nourishing them and helping them grow, and laboring to deliver them as words that few others will ever see when put to paper or screen.
SHARE Thursday, March 30, 2006 If You Don't Mind, Why Don't You Mind?
To anyone who isn't yet appalled by the extent of the disaster that is the Bush presidency: Why Don't You Mind?
(1 comments) SHARE Saturday, June 16, 2007 Abortion Contortions
Anyone pro-choice following the Republican debates – anyone? – must admit to a bit of schadenfreude at watching front-running presidential aspirant Rudolph Giuliani twist himself into Clintonesque contortions over the issue of abortion.
(7 comments) SHARE Sunday, July 15, 2007 Doctoring Science
Last Tuesday, former U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Richard Carmona gave testimony to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. During his testimony, Dr. Carmona, who served as Surgeon General from 2002 until 2006, spoke of his experience working within the Bush administration.
SHARE Sunday, March 12, 2006 What Are We Afraid Of?
Why do we fear the wrong things? Largely because of our crisis-driven media, which sears spectacular images into our minds, and diverts our anxieties from big risks toward smaller risks.
(2 comments) SHARE Tuesday, June 19, 2007 Taguba, Torture, And Abu Ghraib
In the June 25th issue of the New Yorker magazine, Seymour Hersh interviews Army Major General Antonio Taguba about Abu Ghraib, and the administration's complicity with torture and human rights abuses.
(22 comments) SHARE Tuesday, June 19, 2007 Bring 'Em Home
This war that our leaders have concocted has sapped our military strength, our credibility, our economy, our disaster preparedness, our morale, and our moral standing in the world. It has increased the threats America faces, and reduced the military, financial, and diplomatic tools with which we can respond. It is long past time for this gigantic distortion in our national priorities to be called to an end.
SHARE Monday, May 29, 2006 The Freedoms And The Fallen We Honor
We would do well this Memorial Day to remind ourselves of the freedoms, unique in all the world and modeled since, for which untold Americans have fought or even given their lives.
(12 comments) SHARE Saturday, June 23, 2007 How The Christian Left Can Get It Right
If the spiritual and Christian Left is to win the 21st century conflict between Christianities, it must talk more, much more, about spirituality and about Jesus. While protecting separation of Church and State is of utmost importance, it does not require that religion be banished from public discourse.
(7 comments) SHARE Friday, July 6, 2007 In The Ambulance Together
We need a universal and affordable system of health insurance - available to everyone regardless of how much they earn, where they work, or even whether they have a job. Comprehensive health care reform is long overdue. By squandering time, we're narrowing our options.
(4 comments) SHARE Friday, July 13, 2007 A Nation Of Heroes
In the aftermath of September 11th America became, to itself, a nation of heroes. Six years on we still fling the word hero around amply, carelessly, in every direction.
(4 comments) SHARE Thursday, June 14, 2007 The REAL Domestic Terrorism Threats
Why does no one cover the terrorism that does affect us personally, that exists in our daily lives, and is steadily on the rise? You know the terrorism I'm talking about, the kind perpetrated by a certain type of person with a certain type of personality, known as the 'Rules Don't Apply To Me' personality.
(2 comments) SHARE Tuesday, June 5, 2007 On The Release Of Two Prisoners
Dear Mr. President, From the mind's prison, I release you – consider your time as served. However, Mr. President, be mindful that your freedom was not earned, nor was it reward for good behavior. Rather, your freedom was granted of my epiphany, after more than six years, that a mind consumed with holding one captive is a mind itself held in captivity.
(1 comments) SHARE Thursday, March 16, 2006 I Saw The News Today, Oh Boy
Television news once informed, and provoked, and challenged the status quo. No longer.
(2 comments) SHARE Friday, February 24, 2006 How The Christian Left Can Get It Right
A friend recently lamented that the Republicans have “stolen God”. Maybe, I said, but at least we still have Jesus. While many on the righteously religious right say they’ve “found” him, the story of the Jesus they’ve found is the one they’ve written themselves – in which a vengeful Jesus wields his cross as a sword and a shield. That’s not the Jesus I know, nor the one known by many Americans.
(4 comments) SHARE Thursday, June 7, 2007 No Sin Left Behind
Public interrogations of piety and faith, such as undergone by the Democratic candidates earlier this week, amount to a sort of religious litmus test for public office. Something, lest we forget, our Constitution in Article VI explicitly forbids.
(3 comments) SHARE Wednesday, July 18, 2007 Listening To Voices
Sometimes I find it comforting to step outside of our own immediate historical experience into the past, to learn about problems that never change, remember what wiser men and women before us have said, and bring back some of that inheritance.
(6 comments) SHARE Sunday, July 8, 2007 Intelligently Designing Politicians
These are heady days in the world of science. Rapid advances in robotics, computers, and nanotechnology all promise less work and better living. Genetic engineers tell us we can expect designer children and designer pets within the decade. And perhaps best of all, scientists are offering cautious hope of designer politicians.
SHARE Saturday, June 2, 2007 The Voice That Is Great Within You
To the Class of 2007 Graduate: Use the voice that is great within you to raise uncomfortable questions, and speak uncomfortable truths.
SHARE Wednesday, March 22, 2006 Searching For Common Ground
The author considers how unfortunate it is that people get along best when unaware of each other's beliefs.
(1 comments) SHARE Saturday, December 2, 2006 Titillation Of The Trivial
With such an awesome responsibility as often the sole harbinger of news good and bad, we should expect much from our television media. Instead, we get the titillation of the trivial.
SHARE Monday, June 11, 2007 On Finding Common Ground
Our mental filing cabinets in America today seem to have only two drawers, labeled "those who think like us", and "those who do not". Those who think like us earn our uncritical admiration and our unbending ear. Those who do not are just filed away, and never listened to again.
(21 comments) SHARE Tuesday, June 26, 2007 Hoping Against Indifference
Heretofore all too seldom, several authors have been read in recent weeks expressing sentiments of hope against and despite all that so many more authors have so richly and explicitly detailed as going wrong with our world. I find such hope refreshing...
SHARE Sunday, February 26, 2006 Bring 'em Home
This war has been a recruiting sergeant for the very forces of terror our leaders sought out to destroy.
(1 comments) SHARE Friday, June 22, 2007 Will Any Candidate Champion America's Children?
What of the largest sliver of America than does not vote, involuntarily that is? Why does no candidate at least pretend to pander to their needs, to champion their cause? Of course, that unrepresented group is America's children.
(1 comments) SHARE Thursday, June 28, 2007 Over The Horizon
Has anyone else noticed how often White House Press Secretary Tony Snow uses the term "over the horizon" when answering questions regarding the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq? It makes one want to break out in song...
SHARE Saturday, March 4, 2006 George's War
Three years ago George Bush started a war of choice - and all for what cause?
(1 comments) SHARE Monday, February 27, 2006 The Coming Pandemic?
The H5N1 virus is rapidly spreading to new countries and continents. Health experts are increasingly worried.
(5 comments) SHARE Wednesday, December 13, 2006 George's War
In just three short months, the fourth anniversary of the aerial "shock and awe" campaign that launched the U.S led war on Iraq will tap our shoulders. It will remind us that a fifth year of war stands raving and eager to follow the same terrible path down which this country has been misled for four.
(2 comments) SHARE Monday, July 2, 2007 Here We Go Again
Make no mistake. The current posture and policy of the Bush administration is leading our nation inexorably toward a ruinously self-defeating conflict with Iran, a conflict that will have grave consequences for the Middle East, the United States and the world. And once again, everyone is busily pretending that it is not happening.
SHARE Thursday, April 13, 2006 Here We Go Again
Haven't we heard all this before? The fate of the world lies in the hands of two fundamentalist regimes: American and Iranian.
SHARE Thursday, March 2, 2006 Pledging 0.7 Percent For Child Survival
It might surprise you to know that the United States ranks last amongst the wealthiest nations in foreign aid as a percentage of national income: only 0.16 percent.
SHARE Wednesday, November 1, 2006 Election Song
A favorite line of song, penned by the Canadian band The Magnetic Fields, poses the question: If you don't mind, why don't you mind? Where is your sense of indignation? To anyone who isn't yet appalled by the extent of the disaster that is the Bush presidency, I could not think of how better to ask it: Why don't you mind?
SHARE Wednesday, March 1, 2006 Behind The Curtain No Longer
Six months ago today, Katrina not only flooded a city and flattened a coast. She also blew away the thick curtain our nation had drawn across our most poor.
(1 comments) SHARE Sunday, July 30, 2006 American Tune
Do what you can, where you are, now. It is "the age's most uncertain hour".
(2 comments) SHARE Tuesday, October 24, 2006 The Politics Of Hope
Indifference is still the dominant American civic attitude towards politics. What's wrong with having a little hope?
SHARE Wednesday, July 4, 2007 Remembering Our Freedoms
This year perhaps more than any before we would do well to use the opportunity of the anniversary of our nation's Declaration of Independence to remind ourselves of the freedoms, unique in all the world and modeled since, for which untold Americans over the past 231 years have fought or even given their lives.
SHARE Thursday, February 23, 2006 Where's The Party?
Six months after Katrina, rescuers are still looking for the Democratic Party.
SHARE Monday, March 13, 2006 Darfur
In Darfur, will the world once again wait until genocide is complete and lament afterward that we should have done something?
(1 comments) SHARE Monday, October 30, 2006 No More!
Families that work hard and full-time shouldn't be poor in America. On November 7th, Americans need to elect politicians of every stripe who will support a living family income, who will put poverty relief ahead of tax relief for the rich, and who will put the interests and needs of America's workers ahead of corporations and wealthy estate-owners.
SHARE Saturday, November 18, 2006 Another Crack In The Wall
With virtually no public awareness, the U.S House of Representatives late in September passed a bill that undermines enforcement of the First Amendment's Establishment Clause, which the Supreme Court has for more than 150 years upheld as vital for the separation of church and state.
(2 comments) SHARE Wednesday, May 17, 2006 Of Congress And Camels
As Congress is set to pass more billions in tax cuts for the wealthy, the author wonders how the faith of Jesus came to be pro-rich and pro-business.
SHARE Monday, August 7, 2006 Fear No Evil
Another election season is upon us, and we can soon expect to be terrorized by the politics of fear.
(3 comments) SHARE Thursday, November 23, 2006 Keeping What We've Been Given
While voters resoundingly gave both houses of Congress back to the Democrats on November 7th, Democrats must clearly understand what it is that they have been given: a mere two-year opportunity to demonstrate why they deserve a shot at measuring for new curtains in the Oval Office in 2008. It isn't much time, and there's too much work to be done to waste time sharpening the hatchet.
(1 comments) SHARE Friday, March 17, 2006 Moral Standing Falling Down
Three years after the start of the war on Iraq, it is crucial that we consider its effects on global attitudes towards America as we debate whether this war has made us any safer.
SHARE Thursday, October 19, 2006 Words We'll Never Hear
"My Fellow Citizens,
On this night I would like to depart from the usual empty talking points demanded by my pollsters and political spinmeisters. On this night, ladies and gentlemen, I would instead like to speak about America's children..."
SHARE Wednesday, December 20, 2006 Asleep And Dreaming
Our soldiers need to know that while their nation loses sleep worrying for them, and wishing for their safe return home from their Mesopotamian nightmare, their commander-in-chief sleeps easily, more easily than they'd ever assume.
(1 comments) SHARE Monday, September 11, 2006 In Memoriam
On a bright and terrible morning five years ago this day three thousand lives were lost in a series of instants. Five years on, let us leave the past to its restless peace.
SHARE Tuesday, February 28, 2006 Sowing Dragon's Teeth
By insisting that the United States can win a "long war" against "radical Islam", the President is sowing dragon's teeth.
(1 comments) SHARE Sunday, August 20, 2006 Five Years On
The fifth anniversary of September 11th will tap our shoulders next month. It will warn of another year of war that waits raving and eager along that same terrible path down which this country's grief over that day has been misled for more than three.
SHARE Sunday, May 28, 2006 To The Class of 2006
Your future promises more possibilities and more challenges than those experienced by any generation before you.
(1 comments) SHARE Monday, October 16, 2006 What If The Democrats Win?
Barring a wouldn't-put-it-past-them pre-election staging of George W. Bush personally dragging bin Laden by his beard out of his bat cave, Democrats appear poised in a few short weeks to translate their witty way with bumper-stickers into control of one or both houses of Congress. Will they use their newfound power wisely?