Policy Thoughts

Cancer is the 2 nd most prevalent cause of death, accounting for 10 million annual deaths and half of all deaths for individuals older than 70 [out world in data]. The current standard of care is composed firstly of tumor resection and subsequent chemotherapy and radiation. These treatments have significantly reduced mortality of many cancers (such as prostate cancer, whose 5 year survival rate has increased from 68.7% in 1970 to 98.65 in 2013) and increased the overall 5-year survival rate of all cancers from 50.3% to 67% in the same period. However, despite this improvement, an aging population in many countries has led to a higher incidence rate of cancer, so both the absolute number and share of deaths attributed to cancer is increasing. To combat this, research investigating new approaches to treating cancer, such as immunotherapy, angiogenesis disruption, and differentiation therapy, is being conducted. One major avenue of research has been the study of tumor initiation and C...

Growing up I was certainly a sensitive boy; everyone said so. I had supportive parents to go to when I had to cry. I had teachers who cared how I did and supported me. I had both male and female friends. I felt seen and heard, like if I disappeared there would be a piece of my community missing in the shape of me. As I went to university, this largely changed. It's difficult to put any of these in order or pinpoint when exactly they happened. Alas, here are broadly some observations I've made regarding my metamorphosis into a 'man'. The Creep As a someone who courted then dated the same girl more or less since high school, women's change in attitude towards me largely went unnoticed until this relationship ended. What I hadn't realized is that between high-school and university I had become a creep. I experienced several rejections where my desires to seek friendships with women after breaking up was met with cold rejection, ignoring shoulders, and a gener...

Introduction           This is a Review of US Federal Government Budget. In it, the key concepts of the budget will be introduced (including the different classes of revenue and spending), the 2018 budget will be broken down and non-trivial  categories illuminated, the exact composition of  US Debt  will be examined, and the Congressional Yearly Appropriations Process will be elucidated. Further, the President's 2019 Budget Proposal will be subsequently analyzed and his specific changes made clear. Finally, some conclusions will be drawn in the discussion where the current budget will be compared against historical precedence and where it will be examined and inferred what future the budget is leading us towards.           To begin, the Federal government has a revenue of $3.328 Trillion , spends $4.108 Trillion  per year and has a deficit of $779 Billion . It holds a Total Debt of $21.4 Trillion , including an ...

Civil Disobedience is the breaking of a law in order to protest that or another law to inspire a change in law. Historically, civil disobedience has been instrumental to the expansion of human rights and for our collective progression towards a more equal and just society. Moreover, in this synthesis the individual’s moral obligation to participate in and the overall necessity of civil disobedience will be reaffirmed. This determined, a premise that one should generally avoid violent disobedience will be established and the scenarios wherein it is necessary to partake in violence will be outlined. This will illuminate the fact that in a near-perfect society with integrationist aims, violent civil disobedience is never justified; only in a non-near-perfect society or with separationist aims is violent disobedience justified. Firstly, the necessity and justification of civil disobedience is confirmed through an analysis of various texts. In his book “In Defense of Anarchism”, ...

The Second World War was the bloodiest conflict in history, with an estimate of over forty-five million dead (“BY THE NUMBERS”). Many consider that the entry of the United States of America into the war as a major turning point in the tide of the conflict. However, it is important to recognize that US’s engagement in the foreign conflict was not done without deliberation and without criticism. Many people in the United States, known as non-interventionist or isolationist, did not want to fight in Europe. The enrollment in the war was also not the result of a single event, a misconception for which Pearl Harbor holds a pedestal. Instead, the process for the United States to join World War II on the Allies’ side was a tedious one, one condemned by many, wherein the Lend Lease Act of 1941 was the hallmark for those pro-war and interventionist. The Lend Lease Act was, in effect, an outcome of the shift of popular motivations from the observed isolationism in the 1930s to interventionism...