Behind the politics, potential success and costs of healthcare reform, there are the values it reflects and is meant to serve. For example, is healthcare a right or a commodity? If it is a right, what ought to be the terms of the debate, the missing provisions in a bill? If it is a commodity,…

There’s a new lawyer’s referral service based in Boca Raton, Fla and serving several states called WhocanIsue.com. There are many such services, and they can be quite useful when one needs a lawyer and doesn’t know where to turn. And yet there’s something about this one that is cause for concern, or at the very…

Across from the entrance of the old MGM, now Sony Studios, in Culver City, CA there’s a gourmet tea and coffee shop. The Assam tea sells for several dollars an ounce and the coffee, which is not any cheaper, is roasted on the premises and sold no later than 10 days later. Most of it…