The goodfellas of occupational medicine are fond of telling stories about industry suppression of studies, but they don’t much like to hear or tell similar stories about how iconic public health scientists did the same. [read post]

Accordingly, assuming, without deciding, that Senator Skelos presently has standing to sue the Governor, we now proceed to the merits (see Matter of New York State Assn. of Criminal Defense Lawyers v Kaye, 96 NY2d 512, 516 [2001]; Babigian v Wachtler, 69 NY2d 1012, 1013 [1987]; Matter of Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany v New York State Dept. of Health, 66 NY2d 948, 951 [1985]). [read post]

  To a political scientist, one way is by viewing it as a power play by the rabbinate, an attempt many centuries before the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Cooper v Aaron to engage in a performative utterance establishing themselves as the “ultimate interpreters” of the document in question, whether the Torah or the Constitution. [read post]

. * 162 BC: Eleazar Maccabeus was crushed to death at the Battle of Beth-zechariah by a War elephant that he believed to be carrying Seleucid King Antiochus V; charging in to battle, Eleazar rushed underneath the elephant and thrust a spear into its belly, whereupon it fell dead on top of him * 4 BC: Herod the Great suffered from fever, intense rashes, colon pains, foot drop, inflammation of the abdomen, a putrefaction of his genitals that produced worms, convulsions, and difficulty… [read post]