Genetic Variance is Key to Individual Immune Response – Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News

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Ever wonder why your friend, co-worker, or partner doesnt get as sick as you, even though they caught the same bug you did? Maybe they made some Faustian bargain that affords them greater protection to infections, or perhaps they are part of some top-secret government experiment that injects them with an array of antigens isolated from an alien race living in Area 51. While both theories are potential explanations, it seems likely that differences in response to infection lie in something a bit more scientificlike genetics. Now, a collaborative team of investigators from the University of Bonn, Germany, and the New York Genome Center has just published findings that map several genetic variants that affect how much gene expression changes in response to an immune stimulus.

Results from the new studypublished in Nature Communications in an article entitled Genetic Regulatory Effects Modified by Immune Activation Contribute to Autoimmune Disease Associationsoffer novel insights into the genetic contribution to varying immune responses among individuals and its consequences on immune-mediated diseases.

Our defense mechanisms against microbial pathogens rely on white blood cells that are specialized to detect infection," explained co-senior study investigator Veit Hornung, Ph.D., chair of immunobiochemistry at the Ludwig-Maxmilians-Universitt in Munich. Upon encounter of microbes, these cells trigger cellular defense programs via activating and repressing the expression of hundreds of genes.

We wanted to understand how genetic differences between individuals affect this cellular response to infection," added co-senior study investigator Johannes Schumacher, Ph.D., a research scientist at the Institute of Human Genetics within the University of Bonn.

The human immune system plays a central role in autoimmune and inflammatory diseases, cancer, metabolism, and aging. The researchers discovered hundreds of genes where the response to immune stimulus depended on the genetic variants carried by the individual.

"These genes include many of the well-known genes of the human immune system, demonstrating that genetic variation has an important role in how the human immune system works," noted lead study investigator Sarah Kim-Hellmuth, Ph.D., a postdoctoral researcher at the New York Genome Center. "While earlier studies have mapped some of these effects, this study is particularly comprehensive, with three stimuli and two-time points analyzed."

In the current study, the research team captured genetic variants whose effects on gene regulation were different depending on the different infectious state of the cells. These included four associations to diseases such as cholesterol level and celiac disease. Moreover, the researchers discovered a trend of genetic risk for autoimmune diseases such as lupus and celiac disease to be enriched for gene regulatory effects modified by the immune state.

"Here, we isolate monocytes from 134 genotyped individuals, stimulate these cells with three defined microbe-associated molecular patterns (LPS, MDP, and 5-ppp-dsRNA) [lipopolysaccharide, muramyl dipeptide, and 5' triphosphate double-stranded RNA], and profile the transcriptomes at three-time points, the authors wrote. Mapping expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL), we identify 417 response eQTLs (reQTLs) with varying effects between conditions. We characterize the dynamics of genetic regulation on early and late immune response and observe an enrichment of reQTLs in distal cis-regulatory elements. In addition, reQTLs are enriched for recent positive selection with an evolutionary trend towards enhanced immune response. Finally, we uncover reQTL effects in multiple GWAS [genome-wide association study] loci and showed a stronger enrichment for response than constant eQTLs in GWAS signals of several autoimmune diseases.

Co-senior author Tuuli Lappalainen, Ph.D., assistant professor at Columbia University and core member of the New York Genome Center added that this data supports a paradigm where genetic disease risk is sometimes driven not by genetic variants causing constant cellular dysregulation, but by causing a failure to respond properly to environmental conditions such as infection."

Using the collected monocyte samples, the researchers treated the cells with three components that mimic infection with bacteria or a virus. They then analyzed how cells from different individuals respond to infection by measuring gene expression both during the early and late immune response. Integrating the gene expression profiles with genome-wide genetic data of each individual, they were able to map how genetic variants affect gene expression, and how this genetic effect changes with the immune stimulus.

Findings from this new study provide a highly robust and comprehensive dataset of innate immune responses and show wide variation among individuals exposed to diverse pathogens over multiple time points. The investigators identified population differences in immune response and demonstrated that immune response modifies genetic associations to disease. The research sheds light on the genomic elements underlying response to environmental stimuli and the dynamics and evolution of immune response.

"It's been known for a long time that most diseases have both genetic and environmental risk factors, concluded Dr. Lappalainen. But it's actually more complicated than that because genes and environment interact. As demonstrated in our study, a genetic risk factor may manifest only in certain environments. We are still in early stages of understanding the interplay of genetics and environment, but our results indicate that this is a key component of human biology and disease. The molecular approach that we took in our study can be a particularly powerful way for researchers to delve deeper into this question."

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Genetic Variance is Key to Individual Immune Response - Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News

All of these health-care plans are so 20th century – Washington Post

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By Todd G. Buchholz By Todd G. Buchholz August 17 at 7:25 PM

Parrots can learn economics, claimed Victorian economist Alfred Marshall. Just teach the parrot to squawk supply and demand. So if a parrot can learn, why cant the U.S. government?

House and Senate GOP health-care plans, like Obamacare itself, have squawked loudly about subsidizing demand but said little about the supply of doctors, nurses and drugs. That is economic malpractice.

It is also so 20th-century. In an era of Amazon, Uber and Airbnb, the non-health-care economy is getting a shock treatment of new supply that is boosting accessibility while restraining prices. Health care needs a supply-side shock, too, and government can help.

Health care is not entirely immune to supply-side pressures. When Lasik eye surgery appeared in 1999, thousands of eye surgeons jumped into the act and prices fell by about 25 percent in 10 years. Shortly after the Food and Drug Administration approved Botox for furrowed brows in 2002, dermatologists, nurses and spas jumped in, keeping prices from rising. The government does not subsidize these cosmetic procedures.

We are seeing other hints of supply-side improvements in medicine. In California, Heal.com will send a doctor to your house for $99. Does it work? In San Diego, Heal.com receives a 4.5 score on Yelp. Nearby hospitals receive a 3.0.

Now, of course, the hospital handles many more dire cases than a drive-up doctor making house calls. But note this: Many hospital patients are labeled LWOT (left without treatment). These are cases in which sick or injured patients feel so frustrated with waiting times that they drive off. In one California hospital, more than 20 percent of emergency-room patients are LWOT.

An aging population is pushing up demand, and without more supply, prices will catapult higher. Doctors are aging, too: More than 30 percent are 60 or older. Forecasts project a physician shortage ranging from 46,000 to 90,000 by 2025, especially among specialists.

Already, one quarter of the federal budget goes to Medicare and Medicaid. Taxpayers will find themselves frustrated with packed waiting rooms and higher taxes. So what can Washington do to help spark a supply-side shock in health care? Here are four important steps:

First, we need new medical schools. The United States accredited no new medical schools from 1986 through 2004. Recently, in response to the looming shortage of doctors, a number of new schools have been announced, for example, at the University of Nevada, Seton Hall and Washington State. Yet new schools face formidable licensing costs and delays from federal, state and local boards, which can deny accreditation for serious reasons such as unhygienic equipment as well as nonmedical worries such as the dimensions of parking garage spaces. Government agencies can work together to fast-track approval processes.

Second, state governments should give greater authority to nurse practitioners and physician assistants to open their own practices and encourage walk-in clinics, such as CVSs Minute Clinic and Walmarts Care Clinic. Research shows that, compared with doctors offices, such clinics deliver cheaper and equivalent care for patients who presented symptoms of ear infections, sore throats and urinary tract infections.

Third, the Food and Drug Administration should pursue reciprocity for drug approval with other advanced countries. Under current law, if a drug is approved by the European Medicines Agency, Americans cannot buy it unless the FDA slogs through its own long, expensive protocol. And theres precedent: In 2013, a potentially lethal meningitis outbreak spread through Princeton Universitys dorms. Princeton begged the government to allow it to buy a common vaccine made by Novartis in Switzerland. The bureaucrats eventually relented. Why cant the FDA permit reciprocity with other advanced countries for other cases?

Finally, legal reform could also save patients money. Fear of lawsuits cuts the effective supply of health-care services in two ways: First, malpractice insurance payments encourage early retirement. Second, fear prods practicing doctors to order unnecessary procedures, leaving fewer resources for those who need treatment. More than 80 percent of physicians say that they prescribe tests for fear they will be sued if they do not. The American Board of Internal Medicine has specified 45 tests that are often prescribed without merit, from annual electrocardiograms to imaging for temporary lower back pain.

Americans need more doctors, more nurses and more prudent care.Trying to solve health-care problems by focusing just on demand is like trying to cut rope with only the bottom blade of a scissors. Youll likely struggle to get the results you desire, and you might even hurt yourself.

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All of these health-care plans are so 20th century - Washington Post

The healthcare debate we’re not having – The Hill (blog)

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Theheadlinesfrom Capitol Hill give the impression that Congress is debating the future of U.S. healthcare. Thats somewhat misleading. The debate is about health insurance, not healthcare.

It is an important distinction. Insurance is a ticket to enter the healthcare system. Healthcare is what the system delivers. To be sure, if Congress rolls back insurance coverage, it will prevent millions of Americans from gaining timely access to healthcare. That is abad outcome in itself and worthy of the attention its getting.

Nonetheless, a real debate over healthcare would begin with an accurate diagnosis of our ailing system. We have theworlds most expensive healthcare, and despite the superior quality of American providers, science and technology ourlife expectancyandinfant mortality ratesare the middle of the pack among developed nations.

The cost, quality and patient experience of care varies widely among doctors and hospitals. Despite billions of dollars of investments in information technology, medical records still dont follow patients across providers, and we lack the real-time data insights that fuel quality improvement in other industries. Finally, our healthcare system emphasizes treating people when they are sick not keeping them well.

Federal policy on its own cannot improve the sectors leadership, culture, cost or quality. Those of us who provide care must step up and accept accountability for the results we deliver. But the federal government can help us chart a course toward more patient-focused, coordinated and cost-efficient care by giving us the right incentives, setting consistent rules and removing the roadblocks.

Thats why a new debate should begin with the topic that is currently missing from the headlines: payment.

We pay for most healthcare services today one by one, a system called fee-for-service. The more services a doctor or hospital delivers, the more they get paid. Sicker patients earn them (us) higher payments and drive each healthcare team member to concentrate on the services they alone deliver, not the patient as a whole person. As a result, we care for people in a fragmented, inefficient and costly fashion.

Conversely, if we were to pay providers based on the quality and cost of care they provide, they would more likely focus on keeping people well, managing patient illnesses and preventing costly interventions that send people to the hospital. This is known popularly as value-based care. It may be a poor choice of phrases, conjuring up K-marts blue-light special instead of Tiffanys light blue box, but the point is the right one: payment should reward the value of services not the volume. Value-based payment holds providers accountable for the quality of their care, and puts their payments at risk if they dont deliver.

The federal government can play a decisive role in moving the ball forward. Medicare alone accounts for20 percent of all healthcare spending. Under both Democratic and Republican administrations, Medicare has begun to embrace value-based payments.

But instead of accelerating this trend, the Trump administration has proposed slowing it down, albeit to avoid overwhelming small physician practices. If we stay on this course, it will penalize early adopters like Prevea Health and many of my fellow American Medical Group Association members, which have invested millions reengineering systems to provide value-based care. The administration should be helping lead the way, not putting on the brakes.

We also lack timely access to Medicare and commercial payer claims data about the very patients we serve. Data is the lifeblood of quality improvement, and without it, we lack the feedback we need to improve patients health outcomes. Congress can fix this by requiring both federal and commercial payers to provide access to this data.

But data is also a double-edged sword. Currently, Prevea is required to submit data to numerous payers in different formats. And we are not alone shouldering this incredible burden on financial and workforce resources that could be spent on patient care.

One study reported inHealth Affairsfound that physicians in four common specialties spend, on average, 785 hours per physician and $15.4 billion annually dealing with the reporting of quality measures. Congress should require federal and commercial payers to standardize the data submission and reporting processes.

In the depths of the Great Depression, FDR said, The country demands bold, persistent experimentation. It is common sense to take a method and try it: If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.

Bold, persistent experimentation is what we, as healthcare leaders, need to be asking of Congress. We know the healthcare system we have isnt serving our best interests. The debate we should be having in Washington and throughout our country is about creating a system that will.

AshokRai, M.D., is president and CEO of Prevea Health and the incoming chairman of American Medical Group Association,an Alexandria, Va.-based association representing multispecialty medical groups and integrated systems of care.

The views expressed by contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.

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The healthcare debate we're not having - The Hill (blog)

Doctors warm to single-payer health care – Salon

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Single-payer health care is still a controversial idea in the U.S., but a majority of physicians are moving to support it, a new survey finds.

Fifty-six percent of doctors registered either strong support or were somewhat supportive of a single-payer health system, according to the survey by Merritt Hawkins, a physician recruitment firm. In its 2008 survey, opinions ran the opposite way 58 percent opposed single-payer. Whats changed?

Red tape, doctors tell Merritt Hawkins. Phillip Miller, the firms vice president of communications, said that in the thousands of conversations its employees have with doctors each year, physicians often say they are tired of dealing with billing and paperwork, which takes time away from patients.

Physicians long for the relative clarity and simplicity of single-payer. In their minds, it would create less distractions, taking care of patients not reimbursement, Miller said.

In a single-payer system, a public entity, such as the government, would pay all the medical bills for a certain population, rather than insurance companies doing that work.

A long-term trend away from physicians owning their practices may be another reason that single-payer is winning some over. Last year was the first in which fewer than half of practicing physicians owned their practice 47.1 percent according to the American Medical Associations surveys in 2012, 2014 and 2016. Many doctors are today employed by hospitals or health care institutions, rather than working for themselves in traditional solo or small-group private practices. Those doctors might be less invested in who pays the invoices, Miller said.

Theres also a growing sense of inevitability, Miller said, as more doctors assume single-payer is on the horizon.

I would say there is a sense of frustration, a sense of maybe resignation that were moving in that direction, lets go there and get it over with, he said.

Merritt Hawkins emailed its survey Aug. 3 and received responses from 1,003 doctors. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

The Affordable Care Act established the principle that everyone deserves health coverage, said Shawn Martin, senior vice president for advocacy at the American Academy of Family Physicians. Inside the medical profession, the conversation has changed to how best to provide universal coverage, he said.

Thats the debate were moving into, thats why youre seeing a renewed interest in single-payer, Martin said.

Dr. Steven Schroeder, who chaired a national commission in 2013 that studied how physicians are paid, said the attitude of medical students is also shifting.

Schroeder has taught medicine at the University of California-San Francisco Medical Center since 1971 and has noticed students increasing support for a single-payer system, an attitude they likely carry into their professional careers.

Most of the medical students here dont understand why the rest of the country doesnt support it, said Schroeder.

The Merritt Hawkins findings follow two similar surveys this year.

In February, a LinkedIn survey of 500 doctors found that 48 percent supported a Medicare for all type of system, and 32 percent opposed the idea.

The second, released by the Chicago Medical Society in June, reported that 56 percent of doctors in that area picked single-payer as the best care to the greatest number of people. More than 1,000 doctors were surveyed.

Since June 2016, more than 2,500 doctors have endorsed a proposal published in the American Journal of Public Health calling for a single-payer to replace the Affordable Care Act. The plan was drafted by the Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP), which says it represents 21,600 doctors, medical students and health professionals who support single-payer.

Clare Fauke, a communications specialist for the organization, said the group added 1,065 members in the past year and membership is now the highest since PNHP began in 1987.

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Doctors warm to single-payer health care - Salon

Trump administration agrees to continue healthcare subsidy for now – Los Angeles Times

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The Trump administration, faced with increasing pressure from Republican members of Congress, backed away from causing an immediate crisis in healthcare marketplaces and agreed Wednesday to continue making payments to insurance companies that are widely viewed as critical to keeping the industry stable.

President Trump and his top aides have flirted for months with cutting off the money, known as cost-sharing reduction payments, which help subsidize insurance co-payments and deductibles for low-income and moderate-income Americans. Doing so would be one step toward causing the Affordable Care Act to implode as Trump has sometimes put it.

The decision to make this months payment, due next week, signaled that the administration has decided against immediately precipitating a collapse, potentially giving Congress time to pass a bipartisan package of fixes to some of the laws problems.

Leading Republican members of Congress have pressed the administration to keep making the payments, fearing that any move to cut them off would cause chaos in insurance markets. Trump has said voters would blame Democrats for any problems with the markets, but few Republican elected officials share that view.

The pressure to continue the payments increased Tuesday when the Congressional Budget Office reported that cutting off the payments would actually increase federal spending. Ending them would cause insurance premiums to rise sharply and thereby increase the cost of other government subsidies, the budget office said.

A White House official confirmed Wednesday that the administration had decided to make this months payment, which will total about $600 million. The question of whether to make future payments remains under review.

The announcement drew praise from Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), the head of the Senate committee that handles healthcare legislation.

The decision to continue the subsidies helps 18 million Americans who dont get insurance from the government or on the job, Alexander said in a statement.

When Congress returns from its recess in September, lawmakers should quickly pass legislation that would continue the payments through next year, Alexander said.

The continuation should be linked to changes in the current law to give states more flexibility on the kinds of insurance policies that consumers can buy, he added.

But some conservative lawmakers and organizations were quick to voice their displeasure, calling the payments a bailout of insurance companies.

That opposition illustrated the difficulty Alexander and like-minded lawmakers will face in trying to round up Republican support for legislation to stabilize a healthcare law the party has long wanted to repeal.

And if Congress does not quickly settle the issue, the continued month-to-month uncertainty about the payments is likely to cause insurers to hike premiums.

Already, industry executives have publicly blamed the uncertainty for higher premiums for next year. Insurers are coming up on deadlines next month for setting their premiums for next years open enrollment period.

The part of the healthcare law at issue greatly lowers the cost of insurance for millions of low- and middle-income consumers by requiring insurers to hold down deductibles and co-payments.

That requirement can save thousands of dollars for families with big medical bills who can qualify for the cost reductions if their incomes are below about 2 times the federal poverty level.

The requirement to hold down co-payments and deductibles, however, costs insurance companies a lot of money. To make them whole, the government reimburses them with the monthly payments.

Since early this year, the administration has refused to commit to continue sending the checks.

In late July, after Republicans failed in their effort to repeal the healthcare law, Trump said that he wanted to let Obamacare implode. An abrupt cutoff of the cost-reduction payments would be among the quickest ways to make that happen.

The cost-sharing reductions have long been a controversial part of the healthcare law.

Republican lawmakers went to court in 2014 to challenge the payments, saying Congress had never appropriated money for them. A federal district judge in Washington agreed last year. The Obama administration appealed, and the ruling has been on hold ever since.

At one point, Trump administration officials talked of dropping the appeal as a way to kill the payments. That option faded this month after Democratic state attorneys general won the right to intervene in the case, which would allow them to keep the appeal alive if Trump pulled out.

Although many of Trumps advisors oppose the payments, the budget office report Tuesday put them in a difficult position.

The report from the nonpartisan budget office said that cutting off the payments would have paradoxical effect of increasing federal spending.

Thats so because insurers would still be required to hold down deductibles and co-payments for low- and moderate-income consumers. To avoid losing money, some insurers would pull out of the marketplaces. Most, however, would raise premiums, the budget office projected.

The premiums for the medium-cost silver plans on the exchanges, which are the most popular plans among consumers, would go up by about 20% to 25% over the next couple of years if the cost-sharing payments ended, the budget office said.

The cost of those higher premiums would land primarily on taxpayers, not on individual consumers. Thats because nearly 80% of people receiving coverage on the marketplaces also receive a second kind of government assistance to help pay monthly premiums. As overall premiums rise, so will the cost of those other government subsidies.

The net result would be to increase the federal deficit by almost $200 billion over the next 10 years, the budget office said.

If the subsidy payments were ended, insurers pulling out of the market would leave about 5% of the population in counties with no marketplace insurer, the budget office also projected.

david.lauter@latimes.com

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Trump administration agrees to continue healthcare subsidy for now - Los Angeles Times

Health care still an employee priority as businesses eye uncertain future – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

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Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Health care still an employee priority as businesses eye uncertain future
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Health care remains a primary concern for most employees in the job search process, though some companies say that age impacts how important of a consideration those benefits are. At Leroy Metz's Downtown law firm Metz Lewis Brodman Must O'Keefe, ...

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Health care still an employee priority as businesses eye uncertain future - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Blood Biopsy Reveals Unique, Targetable Genetic Alterations in Patients with Rare Cancer – UC San Diego Health

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Using fragments of circulating tumor DNA in blood, University of California San Diego School of Medicine researchers were able to identify theoretically targetable genetic alterations in 66 percent of patients with cancer of unknown primary (CUP), a rare disease with seven to 12 cases per 100,000 people each year.

In order to plan treatment for cancer in general, physicians first attempt to pinpoint the primary cancer where the tumor first developed. In CUP, despite its spread throughout the body, the origin remains unknown, making treatment more difficult. The current standard of care is platinum-based combination chemotherapies with a median survival time of six to eight months.

Razelle Kurzrock, MD, director of the Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy at Moores Cancer Center at UC San Diego Health.

In a study published in the journal Cancer Research on August 15, researchers report that by sequencing circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) derived from blood samples in 442 patients with CUP, they were able to identify at least one genetic alteration linked to cancer in 290 66 percent of patients. Researchers used a screening test developed by Guardant Health that evaluates up to 70 genes. Based on known carcinogenic mutations, 99.7 percent of the 290 patients who had detectable tumor DNA in their bloodstream had genomic alterations that could hypothetically be targeted using existing FDA-approved drugs (as off-label use) or with therapies currently under investigation in clinical trials.

By definition, CUP does not have a definite anatomical diagnosis, but we believe genomics is the diagnosis, said Razelle Kurzrock, MD, director of the Center for Personalized Cancer Therapy at Moores Cancer Center at UC San Diego Health and senior author. Cancer is not simple and CUP makes finding the right therapy even more difficult. There are multiple genes and abnormalities involved in different areas of the body. Our research is the first to show that evaluating circulating tumor DNA from a tube of blood is possible in patients with CUP and that most patients harbor unique and targetable alterations.

A blood or liquid biopsy is a diagnostic tool based on the idea that critical genetic information about the state of disease can be found in blood or other fluids. One vial of blood could be used to detect the onset of disease, monitor its progression and measure its retreat less invasively than a tissue biopsy.

Shumei Kato, MD, assistant professor of medicine at UC San Diego School of Medicine.

Another advantage of the liquid biopsy is that the location of the cancer does not matter, said Shumei Kato, MD, assistant professor of medicine at UC San Diego School of Medicine and first author. With a blood sample, we can analyze the DNA of tumors throughout the body to find targetable alterations. With tissue biopsies, we can only see genomic changes that are in that one site and that may not be the same as what is in different sites not biopsied, such as the lung or bone.

Liquid biopsies are relatively simple to get and can be obtained regularly to monitor changes over time, as was the case with a 60-year-old woman with CUP. Her case, which was evaluated by Brian Leyland-Jones, MB, BS, PhD and study co-author with colleagues at Avera Cancer Institute, was described in the study to show the changes observed in ctDNA over the course of her treatment.

What we saw was that the patient was responding to treatment, but the cancer had emerging new mutations, said Kurzrock. Whats new here is that we can do the same evaluation through a blood test that we previously could only do with a tissue sample. You will see these changes with a simple blood test and it is easy to repeat blood tests, but hard to repeat tissue biopsies.

The study also reported the case of an 82-year-old man who was prescribed a checkpoint inhibitor immunotherapy as part of his treatment because of a mismatch repair gene anomaly that is typically observed in less than two percent of patients. He showed a partial response within eight weeks and blood biopsies showed the tumor DNA disappearing.

We can see that each patient has different mutations in their tumor DNA, which means that treatment plans cannot be a one-size-fits-all approach; a personalized approach is needed, said Kato.

Kurzrock is already using liquid biopsy technology in the Profile Related Evidence Determining Individualized Cancer Therapy (PREDICT) clinical trial a project focusing on the outcome of patients who have genomic testing performed on their tumors and are treated with targeted therapy.

The authors suggest that a liquid biopsy approach should be further investigated in next-generation clinical trials focusing on CUP.

Co-authors include: Nithya Krishnamurthy, Scott M. Lippman, UC San Diego; Kimberly C. Banks, Richard B. Lanman, Guardant Health, Inc.; Pradip De, Kirstin Williams, and Casey Williams, Avera Cancer Institute.

This research was funded, in part, by the National Cancer Institute (P30 CA016672) and the Joan and Irwin Jacobs fund.

Disclosure: Razelle Kurzrock receives consultant fees from X-biotech and from Actuate Therapeutics, as well as research funds from Genentech, Pfizer, Sequenom, Guardant, Foundation Medicine and Merck Serono, and has an ownership interest in Novena Inc. and CureMatch Inc.

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Blood Biopsy Reveals Unique, Targetable Genetic Alterations in Patients with Rare Cancer - UC San Diego Health

Scientists foresee Russian gene therapy for HIV cure may be registered in 5-10 years – TASS

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MOSCOW, August 17. /TASS/. A Russian gene therapy drug for individuals infected with HIV called Dinavir is undergoing pre-clinical trials, and the drug has already proved its efficiency on cells. The pre-clinical tests on animal models, clinical trials and the registration procedure may take up to 10 years, senior research fellow at the Epidemiology Central Research Institute of Rospotrebnadzor (the Federal Service on Surveillance for Customers Rights Protection and Human Well-Being) Dina Glazkova told TASS.

"This is not about the next year, but rather in five years, at the earliest. It takes up to 10 years on the average," she said.

Glazkova reiterated that the registration is made after the clinical trials. "Again, the clinical trials are costly, and the drug production is costly as well," the scientist added.

Dinavir proved to be safe while tested on cells, in vitro. A Phase II pre-clinical trial will utilize animal models to test the efficiency and safety of treatment. A Phase I clinical trial will be carried out on humans to test safety of the therapy and will take up not less than a year.

"Phase II takes up two to three years, and it is unclear how much will be required from us. Phase I is about safety, and it takes a few patients: five, maybe ten. Phase II is when we have to prove that the drug works in these five to ten [patients] and that it had a positive effect on them. Phase III is when we enroll a lot of patients [in the trial] to show that the five were cured not by accident and that it [the gene therapy] really works," Glazkova explained.

The gene therapy for HIV treatment is being developed by a group of researches at the Epidemiology Central Research Institute of Rospotrebnadzor.

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Scientists foresee Russian gene therapy for HIV cure may be registered in 5-10 years - TASS

Get Ready. Renowned Bitcoin Trader Says the Currency Will Hit $15000 in 2017. – Futurism

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In Brief A bitcoin trader with a reputation for accurate predictions now claims the cryptocurrency will be worth $15,000 before the end of 2017. Masterluc expects the value to continue to increase until 2019, at which point it will top out somewhere between $40,000 and $110,000.

Late last week, the price of bitcoin rose beyond $3,500, and it currently sits slightly above$4,200. While some are skeptical of this steady increase in value, according to an expert observer,itwont be endingany time soon.

Veteran trader masterluc predicts that bitcoin will be worth $15,000 before the end of the year. He believe the cryptocurrencys current bull run will then continue into 2019, at which point its price will top out somewhere between $40,000 and $110,000.

Masterluc has historically been adept at predicting bitcoins future value. He was able to accurately predict in March 2013 that the crypto would enter into a bear market in November 2013, and then in May 2015, he made a prediction that proved to be just slightly off point,missing the start of the cryptos current surge by just two months.

Masterluc isnt the only pundit expectingbitcoin to go from strength to strength. Earlier this month, Goldman Sachs analyst Sheba Jafari predicted that the currency could reach $4,800, having previously forecast a highof $3,691 as recently as July.

Bitcoin is on a roll at the moment, and predicting when this run will start to drop off is no easy task. Masterluc has a history of being right in his predictions, and many experts agree that the uptick will continue for at least a little while longer, which could have some major ramifications for traditional currency.

Disclosure: Several members of the Futurism team, including the editors of this piece, are personal investors in a number of cryptocurrency markets. Their personal investment perspectives have no impact on editorial content.

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Get Ready. Renowned Bitcoin Trader Says the Currency Will Hit $15000 in 2017. - Futurism

A New Theory Suggests We May be the Only Technologically Advanced Civilization Still Around – Futurism

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In BriefRetired astrophysicist Daniel Whitmire re-examined the FermiParadox, and why the universe is silent if there is alien life outthere. He believes that it's possible that humanity was the firstto have become technologically advanced. The Sound of Silence

For retired astrophysicist Daniel Whitmire, currently a mathematics professor at the University of Arkansas (UARK), humanity is typical. Not exactly in the sense that were ordinary; were typical in a statistical sense, following a concept in modern cosmology called the principle of mediocrity. This principle suggests that in the absence of evidence to the contrary, we should consider humanity to be a typical member of a certain reference class.

This was Whitmires conclusion, in a study published in the International Journal of Astrobiology, when he revisited his thoughts on the Fermi Paradox that we havent encountered alien life, despite the high probability of it existing and again asked if theres alien life out there. With all the billions of stars in billions of galaxies, chances are theres bound to be other intelligent life in the cosmos. So, where are they?

I used to tell my students that by statistics, we have to be the dumbest guys in the galaxy,Whitmire said in a UARK press release. After all, we have only been technological for about 100 years, while other civilizations could be more technologically advanced than us by millions or billions of years.

But Whitmire changed his mind on this concept based on two observations: Firstly, that humanity was the first technologically advanced civilization that evolvedon Earth, and were currently in our early technological development. (Technological, here, is to be understood as biological species that developed electronic devices and are capable of significantly changing the planet.)

On the surface, this may seem like an obvious observation. However, based on the Earths habitable time span from around 5 billion years ago, and for an estimated billion years in the future it would have been possible for other technological civilizations to precede us on this planet. The thing is, theres no geologic record that shows someone else came before us. Wed leave a heck of a fingerprint if we disappeared overnight, Whitmire said.

But what about life outside of the Earth? Following the same principle of mediocrity, technological civilizations that lasts millions of years or longer are atypical, Whitmire says. If one considers a bell curve of all supposedly extant technological civilizations in the universe, humanity would fall in the middle 95 percent.

If that is the case, the lack of communication from similar civilizations around us does not bode well. Whitmire explains the silence of the cosmosas a product of how typical technological civilizations work: They usually go extinct after attaining technological knowledge. This is the same explanation held by other scientists, and one even suggests that we should look for traces of alien technology instead of alien life.

The Great Filter hypothesis is another possible explanation. It suggests that before any life in the universe becomes technological or before technological life goes beyond the bounds of its own planet, it had to overcome some extremely difficult evolutionary threshold. Some even think that climate change is humanitys great filter.

For resident Science Guy Bill Nye, the Fermi Paradox should push humanity to explore further. The reason why we havent found intelligent extraterrestrial life or even simple alien life is because we havent been looking hard enough. Theres still a big chance that theyre somewhere out there.

Yet these theories assume that were not a typical representative of life in the cosmos. If were not typical then my initial observation would be correct, Whitmire said. We would be the dumbest guys in the galaxy by the numbers.

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A New Theory Suggests We May be the Only Technologically Advanced Civilization Still Around - Futurism

The First Truly Applicable Hologram Tech is Here – Futurism

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In Brief Australian company Euclideon has created the first real multi-user hologram table in the world, and it's going to change gaming, business, and so much more. This new tech solves previous problems with holographic images using motion-tracking glasses. Interactive Holographic Images

A working prototype of what will be the first real multi-user hologram table in the world has been created by theAustralian company Euclideon. Wearing only a small pair of glasses, up to four people can interact with the tables holographic images and each other, making this a major advancement from the experience provided by current AR technology. The company estimates that in 2018, the table will be up for sale for $60,000 Australian.

The concept of the hologram table in film and science fiction is hardly new, but because of the many technical difficulties inherent to executing the concept, the idea has yet to be realized. This difficulty originates from the fact that holograms are computer-generated stereo images, dependent on the perspective of the viewer. When a group of people in different positions look at a hologram, the illusion breaks as they dont get the same perspective on it and it doesnt change as they move. Computer-generated holograms work by tracking the viewer but which viewer does the computer track when theres more than one?

Euclideon has solved this riddle in a worlds first without a gigantic helmet that no one wants to wear, which is the fatal flaw of many multi-user VR/AR systems. After all, its hard to interact with your friends if youre all inside helmets.

The Unlimited Detail (UD) 3D graphics processing engine is what first brought Euclideon renown in the gaming community. The UD engine made it possible for users to be immersed in huge, amazingly detailed, 3D virtual environments, without special graphics cards or high-end computers. And while it didnt excel with the dynamic motion of objects or physics, its strength in geospatial imaging forms the basis for the new table.

Euclideons table requires that users wear only a small, light pair of motion-trackable glasses, which look and feel a lot like 3D glasses. These are much more practical for meetings and social events than huge VR/AR helmets, not to mention more comfortable. As users wear the glasses, the table tracks their eye positions, building a custom image for a potential total of eight user eyes. The table itself is a screen, and the device is made up of projectors that rest beneath a unique film which is sandwiched between two pieces of glass. The result is a mass of mixed up, colored images that the glasses separate out for users, enabling them to see binocular stereo holograms specific to their location.

The glasses themselves have special crystal film layers over them, which can change the frequencies of light waves. When users wear the glasses, the computer can tell which light waves belong to which users. The glasses have small boxes at the temples which contain tiny microcomputers and microchips similar to the VR headsets tracking jiggers, signaling the users position to the table.

Euclideon is currently about to begin the manufacturing process and expects their tables to be ready in February of 2018.

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The First Truly Applicable Hologram Tech is Here - Futurism

When Will the First Human Space Colony Be Established? – Futurism

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In BriefExperts predict that if we do not establish space coloniessoon, humanity could be wiped out by a single disaster perhaps inthe next 100 years. But will we board our rockets in time? Here's atimeline for when you can expect to see the first space settlementestablished, and perhaps become a colonist yourself. The Final Frontier

Our days on Earth may be numbered. Great minds have postulated that humanity must spread itself across multiple planets in order to avoid being entirely wiped out by one natural disaster. Physicist Stephen Hawking has gone so far as to predict such a catastrophe will occur on Earth in the next 100 years, which doesnt give us much time to pack our rocket ships.

Will humanity be ready to colonize space before doomsday? We asked Futurism readers when they thought humans will colonize off-planet, and the results revealed quite a consensus.More than 70 percent of people who took the poll thought acolony will be established during the first half of the 21st century, and the decade with the most votes a whopping 36 percent of participants was the 2030s.

Satish Varma, a software engineer, explained why he voted for this decade.Varma wrote in his response that our technological advances in spacecraft design, artificial intelligence (AI), and bionics will be the driving forces that finally propel us into space long term. Currently there are some promising advances in space exploration and artificial intelligence by companies like SpaceX, Google, and Tesla in a short time frame, Varma wrote.

Varmas observations are right on both SpaceX and Blue Origin have recently reached significant milestones in developing reusable rockets, which will be key in making space travel economically viable. Google has recently developed an AI that can learn almost as fast as we can, making the technology much more promising for real-world applications, like flying spaceships.

The technologies have enticed governments and companies around the world to take the idea of space colonization seriously. The two most popular targets for human occupation are currently Mars and the Moon. The Moon gets a little less attention these days, but scientists have estimated that we could build a colony there over the pan of six years and for as little as $10 billion. The Chinese and European space agencies are carefully examining the possibility of a Moon base, as such a resource would greatly reduce the cost of traveling to other planets including Mars.

On the Mars front,the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has announced its intention to establish a settlement on the Red Planet by2117. Other nations are likely to beat the UAE in reaching this goal, however, as the U.S. government has tasked NASA with getting humans on Mars by 2033, and China has set aneven more ambitions goal: by the end of the decade. These government efforts align with readers predictions.

But SpaceX CEO Elon Musk hopes to prove just how much more efficient private companies are thangovernment bureaucracies. His plan, too, is to sendhumans to Mars by 2020, but that isnt his only goal. He wants to make travel to the Red Planet affordable, setting the price cap at $200,000 in his new plan that focuses on establishing a self-sustaining space civilization rather than a simple exploratory expedition. Such an establishment will be paramount to the future of the human species, Musk said.

History suggests there will be some doomsday event, and I would hope you would agree that becoming a multi-planetary species would be the right way to go, Musk said at a press conference last year. I want to make Mars seem possible like something that we can do in our lifetimes.

With all these efforts to get humans off world over the course of the next few decades, it seems like a good bet a Martian colony is not only something this generation could see, but something it will.

See all of the Futurism predictions and make your own predictions here.

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When Will the First Human Space Colony Be Established? - Futurism

Religious freedom is an important right. Once same sex-marriage is legal, it must be protected – The Guardian

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Not all of us who want these issues addressed are opponents of same sex marriage. Not all of us who want these issues addressed are opponents of any form of plebiscite or postal survey. Photograph: Angelo Perruolo/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Countries such as the US, the UK, New Zealand and Canada already recognise same-sex marriages. They also have bills of rights which accord some recognition to the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. Australia does not yet recognise same-sex marriages not even those marriages recognised in their countries of origin. Neither does Australia have a bill of rights with the result that the federal protection of rights such as freedom of religion is more piecemeal than in other countries. In Australia, the tendency has been to treat the freedom of religion on contested questions as an exemption to sex discrimination laws. This results in freedom of religion being treated as a second order right. But in international law, it is a first order non-derogable right.

The Australian parliament will legislate this term or next term, or perhaps the term after that, to recognise same-sex marriages. No one can predict certainly which party will be in government when the legislation is passed. No one can predict certainly which preliminary steps will have been conducted prior to the introduction of the legislation. There may be a voluntary postal survey conducted by the ABS. But then again, the high court might find a problem with it, and well be back to plan c with the Turnbull government or plan a with a future Shorten government.

One thing is certain. The issues surrounding religious freedom in a society which recognises same-sex marriage will not be fully resolved any time soon. Some argue that these issues should be resolved before the public votes in a compulsory plebiscite or voluntary postal survey. I can see that opponents of same-sex marriage might want to insist on this, and that supporters of same-sex marriage might regard this as a time delaying tactic. I could vote yes in a survey while hoping and demanding that the parliament do the hard work on religious freedoms when considering amendments to the Marriage Act. It is important to appreciate that the legal and policy changes needed to protect religious freedom would not appear in the Marriage Act but in other statutes such as the Sex Discrimination Act.

I will highlight just a handful of the practical religious freedom questions which will arise. Once the Marriage Act is amended, should a church school be able to decline to offer married quarters to a teacher in a same sex marriage? I would answer yes, though I would hope a church school would be open to the employment of a gay teacher living in a committed relationship. Equally I would continue to allow a church school to make a free choice as to who best to employ as a teacher.

Given the lamentable history of homophobia, I would think a good church school would be pleased to employ an openly gay teacher who respects and espouses the schools ethos. Free choice is often better than legal prescription when trying to educate in the ways of truth and love.

Should a church aged care facility be able to decline to offer married quarters to a couple who had contracted a same sex marriage? I would answer yes, though I would hope a church facility would be open to providing such accommodation in Christian charity if it could be done in a way not to cause upset to other residents. After all, same sex marriage is a very modern phenomenon and I would favour ongoing tolerance of the residents in aged care facilities run by a church, wanting to live out their last days with individuals and couples in relationships such as they have long known them.

However, even in Catholic aged care facilities, we need to admit that not all couples are living in a church recognised marriage, and it is no business of other residents to know if they are. We need to allow everyone time to adapt with good grace, provided only that we can be certain that appropriate services are available elsewhere if a church feels unable to oblige on religious grounds.

In 2009 when chairing the national human rights consultation for the Rudd government, I was surprised to hear Bob Carrs boast about how best to preserve religious freedom. He had joined forces with the Australian Christian Lobby and religious leaders like Peter Jensen, the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, and George Pell, the Catholic Archbishop, opposing a federal Human Rights Act. Carr was fond of telling audiences that debates about the scope of religious freedom and the intersection between freedom of religion and non-discrimination were best and most easily resolved by the state premier receiving personal representations from the religious leaders. He and they thought that religious freedom might suffer some diminution if the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion were included in a statutory bill of rights. Eight years on, I daresay the political influence of church leaders meeting behind closed doors with political leaders has subsided.

Two years after the national human rights consultation, the Sydney Archbishops accompanied the Australian Christian Lobby to a meeting with prime minister Julia Gillard. After the meeting, Cardinal Pell reported that the religious leaders had told the prime minister: We are very keen to ensure that the right to practise religion in public life continues to be protected in law. It is not ideal that religious freedom is protected by so called exemptions and exceptions in anti-discrimination law, almost like reluctant concessions, crumbs from the secularists table. What is needed is legislation that embodies and recognises these basic religious freedoms as a human right.

In 2015, the Australian Law Reform Commission concluded a detailed assessment of traditional rights and freedoms encroachments by commonwealth laws. Though the commission found no obvious evidence that Commonwealth anti-discrimination laws significantly encroach on freedom of religion in Australia, it did recommend that further consideration should be given to whether freedom of religion should be protected through a general limitations clause rather than exemptions. In February this year, the parliaments select committee on the exposure draft of the marriage amendment (same-sex marriage) bill unanimously reported: Overall the evidence supports the need for current protections for religious freedom to be enhanced. This would most appropriately be achieved through the inclusion of religious belief in federal anti-discrimination law. Dean Smith who has drafted his own marriage amendment (definition and religious freedomsbill 2017 was a member of that committee. His bill does not deal with many of the contested religious freedom issues.

Not all of us who want these issues addressed are opponents of same-sex marriage. Not all of us who want these issues addressed are opponents of any form of plebiscite or postal survey. I am one of those Australians who will be pleased when same-sex marriages are recognised by Australian law but with adequate protection for religious freedoms. That will require painstaking respectful dialogue given the lack of a statutory bill of rights. Its no longer good enough to treat the non-derogable right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion simply as an exemption to non-discrimination laws.

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Religious freedom is an important right. Once same sex-marriage is legal, it must be protected - The Guardian

On Liberty, Freedom, and Open Carry – KRWG

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Commentary: Although he politely bade me good morning, his clothing was a little odd: reminiscent of a 19th century cowboy from a movie, except for the very modern handgun openly displayed on his hip.

The Jeffersonian distinction between liberty and freedom goes something like this: liberty is something you are free to do while freedom, in Thomas Jeffersons writing, typically refers to being free from oppression or tyranny. Thus, while liberty is one of the inalienable rights mentioned in the Declaration of Independence, it has never been the case that liberty is absolute.

Liberty is subject to limits even in the view of the Declarations principal author. As Jefferson wrote in a letter, Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will, within the limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. To exercise an old saw, my liberty to swing my fist ends at your nose. Through this small accommodation, the enthusiastic fist-swinger is still free to swing but within a limit, so that his neighbor remains free to breathe through an uninjured nose.

Moving from the comical example to how people behave in the real world, this gets turned the other way around. Liberty-takers frequently demand, and typically get, accommodations from others around them. If you have ever suffered passively while your entire house shakes because of an automobile with an invasively loud stereo system, you know what I mean. Perhaps you are the rare person who approached that vehicle and asked them to accommodate you (or your sleeping family) by turning the volume down and you were met with outrage. Perhaps you considered calling the police, only to feel guilty for making trouble or for calling officers away from more important business. Maybe, instead, you grumbled and accommodated, like most people do.

This week, I was in a waiting room while my car was being serviced, and in walked that man who reminded me somewhat of Hondo Lane, gun at his hip. Let it be known that I neither fear nor dislike guns, and used to own a shotgun myself. Also, in New Mexico, open carry is legal and does not require a permit. You can walk into a coffee shop armed without proving your competence or sound judgment to a soul. (Many New Mexicans routinely carry concealed weapons, but if they are loaded you need a license.)

Aside from choosing to wear a sidearm to Sisbarros, this fellow did not behave strangely. Yet he had my unswerving attention. Unable to read minds, I could glean little about his intent or judgment. In some situations, a gun is clearly appropriate; but among people reading out-of-date magazines waiting for an oil change, the purpose of displaying a weapon is less clear. Yielding the benefit of the doubt, his intentions might have been completely honorable, as when some people in another era wore guns and, before that, swords. Yet knowing what a gun can do in unsteady hands, and thinking this a weird context, I remained vigilantly aware of him the entire time we shared this room.

Who, in this situation, was accommodating whom; and who was swinging their fist? If I did not feel safe I could of course leave the room, and allow my armed neighbor to dominate a shared space. Yes, the unarmed can accommodate the liberties of the armed if they feel unsafe, but in that scenario, are both people truly free? Or is freedom for the armed?

--

Algernon DAmmassa writes the Desert Sage column for the Deming Headlight and Sun News papers. Share your thoughts atadammassa@demingheadlight.com.

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On Liberty, Freedom, and Open Carry - KRWG

Confederate rally in Austin moved to later date – Austin American-Statesman

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Organizers say a rally and march to promote true Confederate heritage has changed dates after discussing the event with Austin police and the Austin Parks Department.

A Facebook event page hosted by the Texas Confederate Militia says the Dixie Freedom Rally has been moved from Sept. 2 to Sept. 23. The location Wooldridge Square park, on Guadalupe Street between 9th and 10th streets is the same.

Attendees will hear fromguest speakers, then march to the Capitol and nearby Confederate monuments, the event page says.

You can bring any Confederate or U.S. Flag, the page says. It is open carry and also concealed handguns plus longrifles are permitted. Just go by the state law. No racism tolerated or (you) will be removed. (Lets) show everyone true Southern hospitality.

An event scheduled to protest the Dixie Freedom Rally hasnot yet changed its date on Facebook. This event is hosted by Austins branch of the Democratic Socialists of America.

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Confederate rally in Austin moved to later date - Austin American-Statesman

Speaking to our parents: how is this freedom? – News24

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2017-08-17 08:02

Ashanti Kunene

Our parents were sold dreams in 1994, we are just here for the refund. These words demanded attention in a sea of posters at a #FeesMustFall protest. And it still holds mine.

The generational disjunctures between us, the so called born-free generation, and our (grand)parents generation have become increasingly tangible, visceral and unavoidable. #FeesMustFall and decolonisation are but two forms of its expression.

Intergenerational disconnectedness is not unique to South Africa. But our disconnect is unique in that it is linked to the idiosyncratic atrocities that shaped this land and its people.

For us, 1994 carries the weight of unfulfilled democratic promises.

For our parents and grandparents, it is that together with the pain, memory and lived reality of apartheid and colonialism.

To us who have only known democracy the concept of a rainbow nation rings hollow. To our parent generation, I am told, many still say they never thought theyd live to see apartheid fall.

The rainbow nation made us believe that even within our differences we are equal. But we are not. We live in a country with the highest wealth inequality in the world. All political freedom did was make us seemingly equal in identity as South Africans (and then only just).

It turned a society of fundamental inequality into a society of nominal equals. And because we are all equal, all infinitesimal pantone variations of a rainbow, it requires that we, in effect, ignore the real things that divide us.

An uncritical lens allows the rhetoric of the rainbow nation to go unquestioned.

The concept of the rainbow nation was an idea that our parents and grandparents could believe in. Needed to believe in. The promise of a rainbow nation was (and is) so much better than the brutal, unflinching unrelenting reality of apartheid beatings, rapes, teargassing, killings, oppression and daily terror.

Being included into the mainstream was progress; not having to carry a dompass and move freely was seen as progress. Not being at the mercy of a white baass whims was progress. Because it was.

But it is here where the friction of the intergenerational disjuncture manifests itself.

We recognise that progress, we are grateful for this progress, we respect the gains made. But we have to ask, must ask: how is this freedom when the very land we now move freely uponstill does not belong to us?

How is this freedom when we still dont earn the same pay as white people? How is this freedom, when the black womxn* is still the face ofpoverty and unemployment in South Africa?

On its own, inclusion based on identity does not solve the structural consequences of apartheid. We know our parent generations understand this. Or we think they do.

Our agitation comes from the seeming lack of advancement for the marginalised, the slow pace of economic justice. The apparent notion that now that we have political freedom we can sit back to let the slow progress of time and markets spread equality.

Thats not enough. Its not nearly enough; it wont solve SAs socioeconomic issues because you cannot eat a vote.

We dont want to be included, to merely be allowed to walk upon this land freely. We want to own our land, in every sense: as entrepreneurs, as business owners, as captains of industry, as owners of capital, with access to finance. We know that restitution is needed. We just dont understand why no one is seriously talking about it. We want to be heard when we say there is a need to reimagine our political economy.

Rejecting the unfulfilled promise of the rainbow nation is not a rejection of the struggles our (grand)parents of Mandela, of Sisulu, of Winnie and so many more less well known, who fought against apartheid.

It is, rather, a rejection of compromising on true freedom; political freedom with economic freedom and epistemic freedom. It is a rejection of the notion that freedom is something to be negotiated, to be bestowed on us black, coloured and Indian people by those who (still) hold the economic power and agency to live lives of dignity, relative comfort and even prosperity.

It is a rejection of a freedom that sees the structural inequalities of apartheid continue due to the unwillingness of those very same people to give up or sacrifice, this comfort and prosperity in the name of reconciliation and restitution.

Compromise on its own is not a bad thing. But compromises that privilege one section of society and continues to marginalise others is what we reject. We reject compromises that result in a lived experience that is fundamentally incompatible with the democratic promises of the rainbow nation, an experience where if you do not have R10 in your pocket, you do not eat. An experience where if you are born black, poor and a womxn one can make some fairly accurate descriptions about the kind of life you will lead. The words comfort and prosperity do not feature.

In the words of Malcolm X if you stick a knife nine inches into my back and pull it out three inches that is not progress. We still have the knife in our back.

Only a few of the majority black population has benefitted from this kind of progress and some have had to morally bankrupt themselves to get to where they are today. Marikana, Nkandla, state capture, the Guptas. We need not even say more.

We must all fulfil our historical mission and not turn back until the mission is completed. That is the duty before all of us, and especially one that lies at the feet of born frees and all those still to follow.

We simply want to talk about it. To our parents. And grandparents. And not be dismissed but taken seriously. Asijiki Singagqibanga!

* Womxn is a term used to indicate that women are not the extension of men and seeks to highlight the structural barriers all womxn face in a patriarchal society. The term womxn attempts to indicate that gender is a spectrum, its fluid and thus this term includes and speaks to the entire LGBTQI community that sits outside of the heteronormative patriarchal binary conception of man and woman.

** Ashanti Kunene is an intern in the Sustained Dialogues programme at the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation. She is also an International Studies Masters student with Stellenbosch University.

Disclaimer: News24 encourages freedom of speech and the expression of diverse views. The views of columnists published on News24 are therefore their own and do not necessarily represent the views of News24.

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Speaker with controversial race theories leads to cancellation, move of Idaho Freedom Foundation annual banquet – The Spokesman-Review

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UPDATED: Thu., Aug. 17, 2017, 5:28 p.m.

BOISE A major Boise convention center and hotel canceled the Idaho Freedom Foundations upcoming banquet forcing a change of venue just 11 days before the event because it learned the groups keynote speaker was a scholar whose controversial theories on race and intelligence have drawn disruptive protests around the nation for the past six months.

The decision to cancel the event was based solely on our responsibility for staff and guest safety, said Kristin Jensen, a partner in Riverside Hospitality, which operates the Red Lion Riverside Hotel and Convention Center. It was definitely not politically motivated or influenced.

After seeing many, many recent examples of protests and riots at Charles Murray events across the country, we knew that an incident was more than likely, and we just couldnt take the chance, Jensen said. You just never know, especially with what just happened in Charlottesville.

Idaho Freedom Foundation President Wayne Hoffman railed against the decision on the groups website, declaring, Even in Idaho, the Left is successfully bullying businesses, badgering, trolling and harassing anyone who dares to contradict their progressive world view. We are but the latest victim.

Hoffman found a new venue, the Chateau des Fleurs in Eagle, on Tuesday, the same day that the Riverside canceled the Aug. 26 banquet. The Riverside agreed to pay the $10,000 difference in cost for the higher-priced venue.

We had a signed contract, Jensen said. Any time we might be in a position to have to cancel a contract and were the ones doing the canceling, of course we would make it right.

Murray is a 74-year-old libertarian scholar with the American Enterprise Institute whose controversial 1994 book, The Bell Curve, theorized that intelligence was the best predictor of success and that social programs and efforts to educate the disadvantaged would therefore fail. Most controversially, hes tied intelligence to genetic factors, including race.

The Southern Poverty Law Center labeled Murray a white nationalist, but Murray sharply disputed that, saying theyd mischaracterized his writings.

In March, a violent protest that left one professor injured disrupted a speech Murray was giving at Middlebury College in Vermont. Protests, some peaceful and some disruptive, followed at his speeches at Notre Dame University, Indiana University, Villanova University and the University of Wisconsin, among others. One college, Azusa-Pacific University, canceled an April speech by Murray after protests.

Hoffman, who didnt return a call Thursday for comment, blamed the thought police for the change in venue of his groups annual banquet, entitled, Faces of Freedom. On the groups website, he wrote, We will not allow fear and intimidation to silence us.

The Idaho Freedom Foundation is a conservative lobbying group that rates bills in the state Legislature and assigns ratings to lawmakers based on their compliance with groups positions, such as opposing occupational licensing and taxes. Its also become increasingly active, through a political arm, in political campaigns.

Jensen disagreed with Hoffmans assessment. We were not bullied by the left, and it was not at all politically motivated. But we understand not everyone will see it that way, he said.

What it really boils down to is the fact that our guests have the expectation of a safe and enjoyable stay in a resort-like atmosphere, she said. It became evident that we would not be able to control the circumstances.

She noted that the Riverside has more than 300 guest rooms, and theyre not separated from the ballroom where the banquet was booked. Also, it has dozens of entrances and is easily accessible by foot, including from the public, riverfront Greenbelt that runs right behind it. We just thought we cant guarantee safety and security with an event like this should something break out, and in all likelihood it would, Jensen said.

She added, They didnt tell us who the speaker was. We actually found out about it because of some of the online chatter that wed seen, including plans for protests.

The Riverside notified the IFF on Monday that it wanted to meet with them; it met with IFF officials on Tuesday and agreed on terms for canceling the event.

Were not in the habit of canceling our groups events, Jensen said. It was just out of real concern for safety and security for our staff and for our guests, and that was the only reason it was canceled.

Updated: Aug. 17, 2017, 5:28 p.m.

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Freedom for the speech that we hate and fear – New Jersey Herald

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Posted: Aug. 18, 2017 12:01 am

Last weekend, serious violence broke out in Charlottesville, Va., when a group of white supremacist demonstrators was confronted by a group of folks who were there to condemn the message the demonstrators had come to advance. The message was critical of the government for removing a statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee from a public place.

For some, Lee is associated with the military defense of slavery. For others, he is associated with the military defense of the right of states to leave the union -- a union they voluntarily joined. For the organizers of the Charlottesville rally, the removal of the statue provided a platform to articulate crudely their view that the Caucasian race is somehow morally superior to every other.

Such a political and philosophical position is hardly rational to anyone who respects the dignity of all people and their moral equality before God and legal equality in America. Believing that one race is morally superior to others is largely a hate-filled theory, supportable only by bias, prejudice, fear and resentment -- and perhaps a wish to turn back the clock to a time when the Supreme Court declared that nonwhites were not full people under the Constitution, a declaration eradicated by war and history and constitutional amendments.

These hateful, hurtful ideas -- articulated publicly through Nazi salutes and flags and incendiary rhetoric last weekend -- aroused animosity on the part of those who came to Charlottesville to resist and challenge and condemn these views. After the police left the scene and rejected their duty to protect the speakers and those in the audience, a crazy person drove his car into the midst of the melee that ensued, and an innocent young woman was killed when she was hit by the car.

Is hate speech protected under the Constitution? In a word, yes.

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which protects "the freedom of speech" from infringement by the government, has a long and storied history. The drafters of the amendment referred to it as "the" freedom of speech in order to underscore its pre-political existence.

Stated differently, the freedom of speech is a natural right, one that derives from our humanity, and hence it pre-existed the government that was prohibited from infringing upon it. The government doesn't grant free speech, but it is supposed to protect it.

In the early years of the republic, Congress punished speech that was critical of the government, through the Alien and Sedition Acts. The same generation that had just written that Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech abridged it. During the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln, relying on no law, punished speech in the North that was critical of his wartime presidency. During both world wars, Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt used the Espionage Act of 1917 to punish speech that was hateful of the government, because, they argued, it might tend to undermine the nation's war efforts. Lincoln's infringements were rejected by the Supreme Court. Wilson's and FDR's were upheld.

It was not until 1969 that a unanimous Supreme Court gave us the modern articulation of the nature and extent of free speech. Clarence Brandenburg, a Ku Klux Klan leader in Ohio, verbally attacked Jews and blacks in the government in Washington, D.C., at a public rally. He urged his followers to travel to Washington and produce violence against them. He was prosecuted and convicted under an Ohio law that largely prohibited the public expression of hatred as a means to overthrow the government.

Brandenburg's conviction was reversed by the Supreme Court, which ruled essentially that the whole purpose of the First Amendment is to protect the speech we hate and fear. The speech we love and embrace needs no protection. Moreover, the right to decide what speech to listen to is enjoyed by individuals, not by groups collectively and not by the government.

All innocuous speech, the court ruled, is absolutely protected, and all speech is innocuous when there is time for more speech to challenge it. This rule -- known as the Brandenburg doctrine -- has consistently been upheld by the court since its articulation.

Now, back to Charlottesville. The government cannot take sides in public disputes, because by doing so, it becomes a censor and thus infringes upon the free speech rights of those against whom it has taken a position. On the contrary -- and this was not done in Charlottesville -- the government has the duty to protect the speaker's right to say whatever he wishes and the audience's right to hear and respond to the speaker.

When the police decline to maintain order -- as was their decision in Charlottesville -- they permit the "heckler's veto," whereby the audience silences the speech it hates. And when the heckler's veto comes about through government failure as it did in Charlottesville, it is unconstitutional. It is the functional equivalent of the government's taking sides and censoring the speech it hates or fears.

The whole purpose of the First Amendment is to encourage open, wide, robust debate about the policies of the government and the people who run it. It would be antithetical to that purpose for the government itself to decide what speech is acceptable and what is not in public discourse.

What about hate speech? The remedy for it is not to silence or censor it, because we need to know from whence it comes. The remedy is more speech -- speech to challenge the hatred, speech to educate the haters, speech to expose their moral vacuity. More speech will create an atmosphere antithetical to hatred, and it will reinforce the right of every individual to pursue happiness, which is the American promise.

But that promise is only as valuable as the fidelity to it of those in government, whom we have hired to protect it. In Charlottesville, they failed.

Andrew Napolitano, a former New Jersey Superior Court judge, is senior judicial analyst for Fox News. He owns Vine Hill Farm in Hampton.

Link:

Freedom for the speech that we hate and fear - New Jersey Herald

Vietnam criticizes US religious freedom report – ABC News

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Vietnam on Thursday criticized the U.S. State Department's annual international religious freedom report, describing it as containing partial and false information about the country.

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Le Thi Thu Hang told reporters that the government respects and ensures citizens' right to freedom of religion and belief, which is enshrined in the constitution and ensured in practice.

The State Department's report, which covers religious freedom around the world, said this week that the Vietnamese Communist government continued to limit activities of unrecognized religious groups and that religious leaders, particularly those of unregistered groups and those from ethnic minorities, reported various forms of governmental harassment, including physical assaults, short-term detention, prosecutions, monitoring, restrictions on travel and property seizure or destruction.

Hang noted that the report did make some adjustments that are "close to reality" in Vietnam.

"However, it's regretted that the report still contained partial judgments, citing false information about Vietnam," she said.

More than half of Vietnam's 93 million people are identified as Buddhists while Roman Catholics number second accounting for about 7 percent of the population.

Vietnamese government maintains tight control over the society, the media and religions even though the ruling Communist Party launched economic reforms nearly four decades ago that opened up the country to foreign trade and investment.

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Vietnam criticizes US religious freedom report - ABC News

Letter: Freedom of speech applies to everyone – Buffalo News

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Freedom of speech applies to everyone

I was swimming at the Lovejoy pool the other morning and talking with two friends about Al Gores new movie. President Trumps name came up and someone, not part of our conversation, stated that she would not stand for us talking the way we were about her president. I offered to have her join the conversation, but she would have none of that and got nasty.

Our country stands for freedom of speech! People who try to impinge on that freedom are pushing fascism. I will not stand for that. Democracy depends on various viewpoints being discussed with an open mind.

In that same spirit, I feel it is wrong to remove old statues merely because someone finds them offensive. This politically correct concept is used to make some of us feel like we are walking on eggshells. I will never be politically correct. Freedom means letting the person you disagree with have freedom, too!

Joseph Allen

Buffalo

Originally posted here:

Letter: Freedom of speech applies to everyone - Buffalo News