Government / Political Views / Uncategorized

The next president of the United States may not be running for that office!

For some time, I have been thinking that the next president of the USA might not be currently running for office. Perhaps this has been just wishful thinking. I can’t imagine the possibility of Donald Trump as president. Frankly, it scares me. While I can imagine Hillary Clinton in the Oval Office, I don’t find … Continue reading

Government

How John Boehner becomes the Democrats Bitch and Saves America

The recent behavior of the Republican-controlled House of Representatives has given me an opportunity to learn a lot more about how our government works or, more appropriately, does not work. We have outlasted the Constitution It is pretty clear that we have outlasted the wonderful constitution that our founding father’s provided.  Yes, it was a … Continue reading

Avram's Past / broadband / Government / Intel / Old Media / Technology

Avram’s Congressional Testimony on HDTV 1998

The House Commerce Committee Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade and Consumer Protection convened a 2 1/2 hour meeting to discuss HDTV standards and deployment issues on April 24, 1998. I was invited to give testimony. The panel was made up of a large group of executives representing the consumer electronics, the television broadcast and the cable industries. In addition there were two representatives from the computer industry, Bob Stearns from Compaq and me, from Intel. The chair was Billy Tamzin, a republican who later went on to make a fortune as a lobbyist. The ranking member from the democrats was Ed Markey (now running for the Senate in MA). Stearns and I had a couple of objectives. While most of the panel saw a TV, we saw a Monitor. We understood that with that if we could achieve high resolution and progressive scan, the HDTV set of the future could serve as a monitor for computers. Just like the CD and DVD, the consumer industry do the R&D and and manufacturing of important and innovative products which the computer industry would “highjack” for its own use. Everyone one on the panel had their own agenda and often it was a secret agenda. Continue reading

cancer / Health Care

PSA Testing Debate

There have been a number of recent articles in the press (most notably at the New York Times) about the advisability of giving men routine PSA tests to detect if they have Prostate Cancer. A government panel has recommended that the practices of giving men over 50 (or over 40 if there is family history) be stopped because it results in needless procedures that are costly and effect men negatively without saving lives. I believe this is a dumb recommendation. The PSA can provided valuable information that can save lives. It is not the PSA test that is the problem it is what is done after the results come back that is the issue. Continue reading