Another blow to gene patents (a good thing)

Thankfully another blow has been made against the ridiculous practice of granting patents on human DNA.

http://bit.ly/drhv04

The Justice Department filed an amicus brief in a case related to patents held by a company called Myriad Genetics that claim ownership of a gene and two mutated forms of that gene which is correlated with the development of breast cancer.  An amicus brief is a document filed by a "friend of the court," someone not directly involved in the case but who has helpful knowledge relevant to the situation.  The DOJ took the position that naturally occurring genes are not patentable.

In the case in question, Myriad Genetics is trying to overturn an earlier ruling that struck down all of their patents related to a genetic test for the likelihood of developing breast cancer at some point in a person's life.  While that decision did go too far because it struck down all of the patents related to the test kit itself, part of the ruling should stand.  There is no unique intellectual property to be found in something that everyone has... DNA for example.  Products of nature are not patentable for this reason.  You cannot pick up a piece of coal and claim a patent on coal.  In the analogy that this DOJ brief makes, you cannot pull a cotton fiber out of a cotton plant and then claim a patent on cotton.  You did not invent the cotton.  Nature invented the cotton, you just picked it.

Myriad had claimed patents on isolated DNA sequences.  They did not invent the sequences, they simply isolated them from a longer strand of DNA.  What this ended up doing was binding anyone else from being able to test for that gene or use the gene in any manner.  If you wanted the breast cancer test, it had to come from Myriad and no one else.  Patents are supposed to spur innovation, not clamp down on it.  With a valid patent, once granted, all details of that patent are made freely available to anyone to inspect.  In recent years, several websites have been put up that let you do just this: search patents and look at their contents.  While you cannot commercially benefit from the information inside, you can use that knowledge to improve upon it, make it better, push forward the state of the art and then make money on your new improvement.  Patents allow you to benefit from your hard work, while still letting others become familiar with the technology so that innovation continues.  How is anyone supposed to push forward the state of the art of a strand of DNA?  DNA is not an invention of any research lab, nor is any segment of DNA.

Patents on human genes have been around for a long time.  It is expensive to isolate specific genes and prove that they have a specific function.  Some companies have claimed that patents on these identified sequences are necessary so they can recoup the money spent on research.  I call that view lazy.  If you want to recoup the money spent then patent a means of targeting the gene.  Patent a means of deactivating, activating, slowing down, speeding up, etc. the action of that gene.  Those are real inventions.  Discoveries, even important ones, are not inventions.

The valid patents in this case is the specific methodology used and physical means to test for the mutated gene in other people.  This is an invention.  This advances the state of medicine and can inspire others to improve upon this test.  The patents on the genes themselves should all be ruled invalid.  That is the position that the Justice Department is taking in this amicus brief.  It is completely rational and clear headed and I believe that all efforts to overturn patents on naturally occurring gene sequences should be supported.

The Wild Trees by Richard Preston

 

The Wild Trees by Richard Preston is another book I picked up a the Green Valley Book Fair, the same place I found Why Birds Sing.  Preston's book is an adventure through the world's oldest and tallest forests, with a big focus on the exploration of giant and coastal redwoods in California (two different species tree).  The narrative spans 20 years beginning in 1987 with Steve Sillet and Michael Taylor, unknown to each other at the time, but each finding the redwoods an irresistable wildnerness in need of exploration.  Taylor had a drive to find the biggest trees.  Sillet had a drive to climb them.  The book ends in 2006 with Sillet and Taylor, now close friends, finding and climbing the world's tallest tree, Hyperion, at just shy of 380 feet high.

 

The majority of the redwood forests have not been public land for very long.  It was only in 1978 that the government bought up most of the land on which the redwoods grow.  Ironically, it was this push to buy the forests and add it to national park lands that caused a lot of clearcuts.  The legislation for aquiring the land would allow the companies to take out any trees laying on the ground.  In response, the companies made sure that as many as possible were laying on the ground.  I'm not sure who learned a lesson there.  Probably no one.  Interspersed throughout the book, historical facts like this are thrown in as relevant to the exploration of the forests we still have.  Thankfully, the author does not drone on and beat a dead environmentalist horse at points like this.  The history is effectively given as a backdrop, not a sob story, actually adding to the book in a meaningful way without making detours into a fantasy wish-list of "what might have been" that journalists almost always fall into.

 

It was amazing to me how much of the redwood forests were and are still unexplored, beyond incomplete and inaccurate surveys by lumber companies.  This facet to the narrative is what I felt I could relate to and a part of the book I really enjoyed.  A lot of my weekends are spent hiking in Virginia's national forests, wilderness areas, and Shenandoah National Park.  Just recently I spent a Saturday afternoon trying to find a trail in St. Mary's Wilderness Area that the map said existed, but the real world refused to show me.  The adventures of Taylor in his search for the tallest trees put me right back into that wilderness area.  I could easily imagine Taylor crawling through all of that brush and trackless land, as the author's description was as close to my own experience in the wilderness as a second hand account could be.

 

The book is also about exploring the canopy of these tall trees.  Sillet became a pioneer of giant tree climbing, learning from others and coming up with his own techniques.  He would climb, study, and even sleep in hammocks at the top of the world's tallest trees.  The adventure in the sky was just as fun or more so to read as the adventure on the ground, sometimes keeping the pages turning like a crafted novel.  This section is from a September evening in 1994 when Sillet and a small climbing team were sleeping in a redwood named Telperion during a rain storm:

 

Steve Sillet couldn't get the Dyerville Giant out of his mind: that pancake of roots tipped up into the air, that crater forty feet across.  He was also concious of the fact that there were very few standing dead redwoods anywhere in the groves.  No rotting skeletons of redwoods standing upright.  The floor of the redwood forest was a maze of fallen trunks.  Now, in Telperion, the meaning of it became very clear: redwoods fall while they're still alive.

 

A heart stopping realization when your hammock is in the top a tree swaying to its breaking point in wind so loud you couldn't hear the guy next to you talking without yelling.

 

These sections of the narrative and the discoveries made in the canopy are what really kept me interested in the book.  The descriptions of what is actually up there in the tops of trees was so interesting that it has had me wondering for several days how I could get up into some of the trees in the forests here:  gardens of ferns, lichen, and moss; soil deep enough for colonies of earthworms, non-flying insects, and salamanders; bonzai-like trees growing in the crooks of branches creating mini-forests within a single top.  Of course, the top of a single redwood can be a huge place to explore:

 

"Adventure Tree is never exactly my first choice for a tree to climb," Antoine commented, as she got her stuff together in the garage. "My first experience climbing that tree was kind of scary."  I asked her what had been scary about Adventure.  "I got lost in it."

 

Some of what I learned just from this book has even made my local hikes more interesting.  I've been able to identify some of the strange lichen I was stomping through as something that originated in the tops of the trees, taking nitrogen from the atmosphere and returning it as fertilizer to the soil as the tree shed braches or as wind and wildlife knocked it from its perch.

 

This book contains many good stories, adventures, and even useful information.  However, the first two-thirds is also filled with grating soap opera type disfunction.  The adventure and exploration is often broken up by the personal life of the explorers.  Most of this I could really have done without.  I got pretty tired of reading about how this guy or that guy didn't have a clue about how his personal life was collapsing and the daytime tv style arguments and bad decisions they would make.  I realize the information is important to getting to know the people he is describing and why they do what they do, but I found the writing in these sections to be extremely poor to the point of almost skipping entire pages from boredom.  The only good thing about the writing and descriptions of these guys' personal lives is that these sections are completely forgettable.  That way they don't hurt much when you think back over what you've read.

 

Though badly written, there is one good lesson to learn from what is told about these guys.  When you dedicate your hightest priorities, affection, and even worship, to something incapable of returning that love (in this case trees), your life will rot from the inside out.  The lives of these two men suffer greatly until they find an actual person to whom they decide to give some of the attention they had always given to the trees.

 

In the end, I think I can better appreciate the forests I have here because of this book.  They seem more interesting in their details and pull the beauty of the wilderness higher into the sky.  Together with my recent fascination with birds, this book has made areas I've hiked in for 10 years a place with new mysteries to explore.

 

Author: Richard Preston

Title: The Wild Trees: A Story of Passion and Daring (Paperback)

Genre: Science, Nature

Year: 2007, paperback 2008

 

These are some great photos of trees and people described in the book, a National Geographic video of measuring the world's tallest tree that features the people in this book, from Hulu an episode of National Geographic Explorer on the redwoods featuring some of the people in this book, and an October 2009 edition of National Geographic Magazine featuring redwoods.

 

 

 

The foolish message of Avatar

I would say beware of spoilers below, but if you've ever heard or read a speech by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Osama bin Laden you already know the climax and ending of the movie Avatar.

For most of the movie I was hoping to be able to brush off the underlying message as just another "nature is nice, people are bad" story put to into an attractive 3D setting. A big bad mining company (strip mining no less) has somehow hired on the Marines to be the muscle for their operation. In true cliché fashion the magic money ore is right below the village of the nice peaceful nature loving natives. The natives don't want to move, the marines just want to shoot people, and so they fight.  Did I mention that the earth by this time has no more green and is a dead planet?  Yeah.

Unfortunately the script of this movie made it all too clear that this predictable story, while present, was not the real point to be communicated to the audience. The unescapable message of this movie is that the US armed forces are the trigger happy tool of corrupt corporations, anxious to invade and destroy peaceful people who just want to be left alone. Schools that are built and infrastructure that is provided are just con jobs to get foreigners to lay down so we don't have to waste bullets. Reality is that we really do deserve all of the aggression that terrorists throw against us as we somehow started it all in the first place by exploiting the innocent populace. Pre-emptive strikes are a facade to cover our attempt to kill the weak natives so they don't have a chance to get back at us for tricking them with our schools while taking their land and stealing the valuable resources buried underneath. But don't be afraid to fight back, natives. In the end, if you are willing to attack the corrupt white people and face certain death, technological superiority and overwhelming firepower will fail because your god will protect you.

Sound familiar? The first place I remember hearing it was from bin Laden. More recently we've heard it from the floor if the United Nations from Ahmadinejad. That is the story of Avatar. Neither "terrorists" nor "pre-emptive strike" is something read between the lines. They are the spoken lines of the movie. All of the corporation and Marine commanders were white people who go out of their way to show no respect for any form of life.  They have nothing but a desire to kill and destroy a beautiful culture so they can make lots of money. Throw in a helping of euthanize-the-handicapped and you have the last 5 minutes of the movie to wrap up your evening. After all, what meaning does life have if you can't climb trees?  This last message tossed in at the end seems to me more destructive than all the rest.

It is sad to me that such a foolish message has been put into such an attractive presentation. The presentation of such a grand setting in 3D was done very well. Until the true point of the movie could be ignored no longer, it was quite fun to watch and I hope other (better) movies follow suit. Avatar will no doubt be a great success at the box office due to the new technology used in shooting the movie, but I hope the underlying message is seen for the garbage that it truly is.

Why Birds Sing by David Rothenberg

Why Birds Sing by David Rothenberg was one of the most engaging science books I've read. It can easily be enjoyed by anyone who enjoys the sound of birds whether they have head for science or not. There is a wide variety of material here, all of which gives you a better appreciation for the noise different species of birds make. Some of it seems musical to human ears and some does not, but regardless there is a lot to learn about the pattern and "lyric" (my term) that each bird uses. Rothenberg, with a combination of history, interviews, and personal experience, does a nice job of showing how science so far has only scratched the surface of what is going on in those little bird heads. I challenge you to read just the preface of this book and then see if you can put it back down without at least wishing you had the pocket money to bring it home.

The author is both philosopher and musician. He is a professor of philosophy and music at NJIT and plays the jazz clarinet. The writing of this book began with his attempt to interact and play music with birds at the National Aviary in Pittsburgh. The preface says that this encounter changed his "sense of how music emerges out of nature." His pursuit of the question of why birds sing incorporates a review of scientific observations, but he is not beyond challenging scientists to look beyond the base purposes of territory, food and mate. He relates one story where he was interviewed along side a bird song researcher who was put off by Rothenberg's assertion that bird song was more than a simple routine. To many scientists nature is just a complicated machine and bird song is just a kind of business transaction with females. Rothenberg says, "Nature is not a business." There is without doubt great benefit in the scientific method, but Rothenberg seems to lament that most scientists do not seem brave enough to reach for beauty as a reality instead of just a human mental construct. So do I, which may explain why I enjoyed all of this book.

Chapter one relates some of the author's experiences in the National Aviary that led to his pursuit of why birds sing. It is real enough in its descriptions that I have wanted to visit the place myself since I read it. Each bird is an individual and Rothenberg finds it easier play along with some more than others. The second chapter begins with the beginning of bird song research. At its beginning, bird song research was more poetry than science. The first records of people paying attention to the sound of birds is in poems and art, but even ancient philosophers like Aristotle took time to write about how birds learn to sing. As we move through the next chapters we move through stages of research and the knowledge revealed by those studies. We see how bird song transcriptions began with mnemonics (the spotted towhee's "chup-chup-zee" or the white throated sparrow's "old sam peabody, peabody, peabody"), then by the Enlightenment moved to detailed musical transcriptions only to later move back to mnemonics, then on to modern sonograms. Along the way we get insights into the lives of bird researchers and their desire to understand and relate to the birds they studied.

There are interesting historical tidbits and stories thrown in as well. For example, the European Starling was brought to the USA by a man in the 1800s who wanted to introduce all of the birds mentioned in Shakespeare to the New World. He released less than 200 of the birds into Central Park. It was such an invasive species that now one-third of the world's population of starlings is in America. Don't feel bad about shooting a few. I remember the great lengths that people went to rid the Texas A&M campus of the black smelly pests. I have seen them on many occasions fighting on my porch over bird food. However, they are actually very interesting birds in their song. It is not so musical, but very complex. They are also mimics, that can learn new songs and sounds throughout their whole lives. I'm sure you've seen them. They're the only black birds with yellow beaks in North America.

There is one extremely interesting little bird called the European Marsh Warbler that migrates from Northern Europe to Eastern Africa and back. His entire journey can be reconstructed by the song he sings. This bird imitates almost every other bird he encounters along his entire flight path, weaving all of the sounds into his own song.

If I'm not careful I'm going to get carried away here with interesting stories and lessons learned from this book.

His search for an answer does not come to a conclusion in the last chapter. In his words, "Can any explanation for beauty be satisfactory?" It was not his stated reason for writing, but Rothenberg does a good job of showing why looking for purpose in nature is always worthwhile, even if we have to employ an aesthetic means of understanding that modern science seems to shun. It may challenge your world view, but when one allows for purpose beyond survival and procreation the world becomes a place that allows for meaning in life instead of just being a place that we can breathe. Rothenberg thinks that science just hasn't gotten around to asking the kind of questions that will provide answers beyond function, but thinks that it will eventually. From my own observations of scientific trends, I am not so optimistic on this point as the author. Scientific observation reveals great purpose in all that we see and hear, but it will never touch the reasons why that purpose exists. I can only hope that Rothenberg will inspire other scientists to look beyond what bird song is used for and into what the bird is actually singing.

The paperback version that I bought also came with an audio CD of Rothenberg's attempts to play music with different birds.  Some are with real bird song, others are with recorded bird song that has been slowed down or modified in some other way.  Some tracks are better than others, but it is interesting to listen to as long as your CD player isn't set to repeat.

Last year Rothenberg wrote another book along the same lines called Thousand Mile Song: Whale Music in a Sea of Sound, apparently looking at whale song and his attempt to play music with those great animals as well. I look forward to finding it on sale somewhere. But who knows... after enjoying Why Birds Sing so much, I may actually pay full price.

Author: David Rothenberg

Title: Why Birds Sing - a journey into the mystery of bird song (paperback with audio CD)

Genre: Science, Nature

Year: 2005, paperback 2006

www.whybirdssing.com

www.thousandmilesong.com

Does "God made it that way" put an end to the question "why?"

In reading a book on bird song, I came across the statement that believing God created bird song was ultimately unfulfilling because it puts and end to the question "why do birds sing?". The statement bothered me so much that I almost didn't finish reading the book (which would have been a mistake... its quite good). How could this philosopher/scientist/author really believe that was a logical and rational thing to say? Where would he get that idea in the first place?

As I thought about it further, I realized that he probably got that idea from Christians. It is likely a common response when the purpose for something seen in nature is not immediately obvious. "Why is that there?" "I don't know. Because God made it that way!" But is that really the answer to the question?

I think the author is right. That answer is unfulfilling. His line of reasoning was this: "The traditional view is that biological diversity is evidence of a supreme being offering us the gift of a beautiful nature as proof of his existence - reason has never had much to do with faith." If you want to believe in God you should let God exist through evolution because nature is all the more amazing the more we learn how it works. Standing pat with God as the answer puts and end to the question "why."

The inference here is that if you believe God made it, you have no interest in looking deeper into how something works. Beauty equals some kind of proof of God's existence and nothing more. When Christians answer the question "why?" with a completely non-explanatory "God made it that way" we do our own faith, and even our own idea of who God is, a huge disservice. If we really believe that is the final and complete answer we have mistaken what God has actually done in revealing Himself through creation. That answer is correct and accurate, but it is not the end of asking why.

Romans 1:19-20 says that God has revealed His divine nature in creation. If we are to know God at all, He must reveal Himself to us. God's creation is meant to be understood and it is able to teach us about Himself. Again, Romans 1:25 shows that creation is able to teach us truth about God.

Our God is a purposeful God. Jeremiah 10:12 tells us that God's wisdom and understanding went into creation. The world around us was planned and ordered, not haphazard and shallow (and not random!). Psalm 147:4 says that God determines the number of the stars and gives them names. He invests Himself in His creation. Psalm 19:1-2 points out that nature displays knowledge. God has revealed more than simply His presence in creation.

This belief in a purposeful God is the only guarantee that an answer to "why?" even exists. It is only an assumption of some threads of evolution that every trait is selected on for thousands of years. The fact that we find so many deeper and meaningful answers by scientific inquiry is a testament to God. When we look for why something exists in nature we find a logical reason and a purpose.

God cannot be both purposeful and arbitrary; not someone who continually asks us to follow all of His commands and believe all of His promises and trust Him with the eternal significance of our souls. God is unified in His attributes. He is always loving, always just, holy, merciful, wise, faithful, etc. in all of His actions and decisions. 2 Timothy 2:13 says that Jesus, through whom all was made that was made (John 1:1-18), cannot deny Himself at any point. If He is being arbitrary, He is not being purposeful and would be violating one of His own attributes. God is not like a human being that is at one instant wise and at another foolish, or at one instant faithful and at another unfaithful.

When we accept and affirm simplistic, non-explanatory answers to the question of why something exists in creation, we attribute an arbitrary and capricious nature to a purposeful God. God gives us creation as a way to learn more about Him, not as something to dismiss as too mysterious or unknowable. We cannot know everything about God or understand all that God knows and is (Psalm 139:17-18), but we can know something and we can understand something and we can know that to be true (Jeremiah 9:23-24, John 17:3).

True discoveries of science will never conflict with scripture or with the God revealed there. We may disagree with conclusions arrived at by some scientists, but there is never a reason to abandon scientific observation. There will always be something of worth to be learned from studying God's creation, even its smallest details. We should never give the impression that we don't believe there is a reason for what we see around us. We should never try and stop anyone from asking the question "why?".

Beginning to catch up on the last 50 years of scifi

Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke was originally published 2 years before I was born, but there is very little in the book that dates the story or the writing. Perhaps that is the case of all written science fiction placed far enough into the future. Written fiction has a much better chance to stand the test of time than the stylized visuals in movies or on TV. When reading a book, nothing forces you to imagine the characters wearing disco pants as part of their space uniform. Clarke is famous for predicting communications satellites in geostationary orbits for global communications, but very few of his other predictions have come that close. His writing stands the test of time more because he stuck to the basic laws of physics instead of inventing fictional ways around them. It lends a sense of reality to a lot of his stories that other authors don't have (or maybe it is just something they don't use). It is this sense of reality that keeps alive the mystery and challenge in this story of an alien spaceship entering our solar system.

This book is the story of a mysterious object, first mistaken for an asteroid or comet, that enters into our planetary system. Many months after discovery, when the object which has been given the name Rama gets close enough for inspection with telescopes, it becomes obvious that the completely smooth and perfect cylinder is not an object of nature, but an alien spacecraft. A spaceship from Earth is sent to intercept the cylinder, the space-captain astronaut guy finds a way inside, and the real mystery begins. They see what looks like cities at a distance, but there is no movement or noise... or light. They see what looks like water, but its all frozen solid and full of poisonous chemicals. The far end of of Rama is completely cut off from the explorers by this frozen sea, but telescopes tell them from a distance it is full of interesting but unidentifiable features. What is going on inside this thing? What is the function and purpose of what we see? What unknown dangers are about to arrive? Why is this alien craft here? Time is running out as the alien vessel gets too close to the sun for the explorers to stay.

If this was a Star Trek story, the mystery would be over in two pages. Sensors would map out every inch of Rama, look inside all the walls and into every dark corner, and initiate several little beeps to announce the arrival of every new encounter. The only advantage that Clarke gives his characters that we wouldn't have today is the spaceship that gets them to Rama in the first place. It is this limitation that gets the reader involved in the story. It is a story of exploration that we can share because there is no danger of technobabble to spoil our own efforts to understand the strange things that are being described. In this case, your guess really is just as good as theirs.

Clarke doesn't paint a detailed picture of an alien civilization or try and humanize some unknown species in this book. The story is about the effort it would take to understand something that was built in a manner truly alien to our way of thinking. Everything seems obvious in hindsight once discovered, but the initial approach just leaves you stumped and in need of help from the next clue Rama itself can give.

The few distractions in the book are Clarke's strange ideas about polygamy as the norm, again he puts forward the notion of forced population control, and he merges cult with religion into something presented seriously but only recognizable as superstition. Luckily these play only a small part in the storyline and are really only mentioned in passing in two or three places. For me, the oddest thing in the whole book took place on the very first page. Arthur C. Clarke, in 1973, writes about a disaster that happens on the morning of September 11th. An asteroid flies out of the sky, destroys a city, and gives rise to the creation a proactive military body to keep things like that from happening again. How's that for weird?

The paperback version that I read also had excerpts from six of Clarke's other books. They seemed to be well chosen and did their job of encouraging me to pick a couple of them up if I see them. Not worth talking about here, though.

Author: Arthur C. Clarke
Title: Rendezvous with Rama
Genre: Science Fiction, Mystery
Year: 1990, originally 1973

Finally got my hands on a FairTax book (the red one)

A couple of years ago, I heard a rerun interview on NPR with some guy who was talking about getting rid of the IRS. I only heard the last few minutes of the interview, but I liked what I heard and he finished with a website where people could go get more information. That website was FairTax.org. So started my support of the best federal tax reform plan I have ever heard.

Normally I don't care much for discussing politics, but I really don't see any reason why everyone can't agree that the FairTax plan is much better than the current federal tax plan that we have now. FairTax: The Truth - Answering the Critics is the second book on the topic. The first I have not read, but describes the entire tax reform plan in detail. In summary, the FairTax would replace all (and I stress all) current federal taxes with a single inclusive (already included in the shelf price) consumption tax (or sales tax). No IRS, no April tax day, no income tax, no payroll tax, no tax on investments (or college tuition which is considered an investment), no federal taxes at all on anyone except for the sales tax. In addition, every household in America of legal residents with a social security number get a prebate every single month. The prebate is money from the government so that all spending up to the poverty level is tax free (net cost). The bulk of this book is geared toward answering criticisms of that plan. The beginning is a general description of the principles of tax reform that the FairTax addresses and why tax reform is needed. The authors then give some attention to the merits of the FairTax plan, and finally they move into discussion of how the FairTax, when properly understood, adequately meets all of the criticisms it has faced so far.

Some of the criticisms addressed in the book are the 23% or 30% tax rate confusion, volatility of the tax base, the relationship between price change and purchasing power, the effect of tax evasion, and the burden on the middle class. Each argument is given with references to where any reader can find the data that was used.

The book is not heavy reading. There are plenty of statistics, graphs, and dollar figures to back up all of the arguments, but the pace is slow enough that a reader doesn't feel crushed under meaningless numbers. Each argument is made in several different ways so the message is clear and the numerous footnotes contain references to all of the primary sources quoted other than original FairTax documents found on the website. The authors even attempted to throw in some humor throughout the chapters to keep the reading light (your mileage will vary on their success here). I think they did a good job of providing the detail and references needed to satisfy a technical mind (at least an engineers mind... economist I am not) while also allowing someone not interested in the exact numbers an easily approachable discussion of the topic. The discussion is intentionally kept non-partisan and only in rare cases do the authors name and shame their critics. Their purpose is to persuade those who criticise the plan, not make them look bad.

I would actually recommend this as the FairTax book to read first, even though it was written second. If you like what you read here, then you'll be in a better mood for reading through all the details in the first book (which I would be reading now if it was possible find in any used bookstore anywhere - I guess those who do read it hold on to it). If you are completely new to the FairTax idea, start at the beginning of the book and work your way through. If you think you already know the basics, just go straight to chapter 3 and skip all the sunshine in the beginning. Be sure to stay around for the appendix as well. It discusses the report from the 2005 President's Advisory Panel on Tax Reform. That report is the source for both a great deal of support for the principles behind the FairTax and some apparent criticisms of consumption taxes in general (again written in a very approachable manner).

I think that after reading FairTax: The Truth - Answering the Critics you will be a FairTax supporter. At the very least, the early chapters will help you understand why some type of radical tax reform is going to be required in this country in the near future.

Author: Neal Boortz, John Linder, Rob Woodall
Title: FairTax: The Truth - Answering the Critics
Genre: Business and Economics, Tax Reform
Year: 2008

Today we should look forward

A year ago today my father passed away.

I miss him now as much as I did the day after. Tonight my wife asked me how I was feeling and if I wanted to talk about it. It took me an hour to put anything into words. I thought about what it was like on this night last year. I thought about the time I was able to spend with Dad in the days and weeks before. All of those are precious memories I don't want to forget, but none of them are comforting. None of them make it easier to face the next day.

I wondered how Dad would want me to spend this day, this night. I think he would want us to spend it looking forward.

It would not have mattered if my dad had lived another week, month, or year, because it would not have been enough time. Nor could there be any other ending that I could look back upon and feel satisfied. There could never be any finite amount of time when I would think, "okay, it won't make me sad to be without him now." There could never be a more complete set of memories that would have me feel like I have all I need. So I don't think this day should be spent digging into the emotions that tore through us last year. We don't have to do that to honor my dad and we don't have to do that to keep him in our minds and hearts.

We either believe in heaven or we don't. We either believe, as Christians, that when we leave this place we are with Christ, or we don't believe. If we act like the memories of my dad are all there is to his existence and all we have left, then we act like we don't believe.

I don't remember Dad ever dwelling on bad things in the past, wishing it would change. No matter the situation, what I remember is my dad thinking about what we could do now and what we could do in the future. I think Dad would want us to spend this day, especially, looking forward.

I think we should spend this day looking forward to seeing Dad again. I look forward to seeing Dad again because I love him. I look forward to seeing Dad again because he loves me. I look forward to seeing Dad again because I will hear him speak to me again. I look forward to seeing Dad again because I will be able to talk with him and hug him and smile with him. Smile because when we meet again it will not be for any finite amount of time. Nothing will have been lost but the pain and dirt of this life he has already left behind. We will be together in heaven and on a new earth and in whatever else eternity holds. That is the promise that our God has given, and even when all else shakes God's promises hold.

That doesn't mean that there are no tears to be shed. I miss him today as much as I did the day after he left us. I love him now as much as I did the last time I saw him.

It does mean that there is a great reason to look forward to tomorrow. It does mean that there is comfort to be had in thinking about the time I had with my father. During that time, he gave me reason to look forward to seeing him again.