After having read (on your recommendation) the book, How the Brain Changes Itself, I have no doubt that the skiing you and James are working on is having a positive effect on his TBI. I am so proud of you both!

• 2 hours ago

Sounds like a WONDERFUL trip - I'm so glad you posted photographs! I think it was about this time of year I was in Santiago before Matthew was born and I love the springtime view of the Andes rising up behind the city. I'm glad you had a great time and will be happy to be able to talk again!

• 6 days ago

Why do you ask? Does this mean some of us are getting paid to post comments and didn't include me? I hate feeling left out...

• 6 days ago

When lobbyists are paid by special interest groups to gain influence with politicians, I can understand the need for disclosure. When special interest groups spend large sums of money on advertising to gain influence with the general public, that too seems pretty cut and dried in favor of disclosure.

We expect (even if we don't always get) a high standard of ethics in our journalists for the very reason that we want for them to be as unbiased as possible - or at least not bought and paid for so until that system breaks down across the board, I'd like to give professional journalists the benefit of the doubt there just to give them the room they need to do the jobs we want them to do.

Independent bloggers begin to fall into a gray area and there are SOME special circumstances under which I feel a bit conflicted. When we're not paid to have and write about a particular opinion, that's fine and I believe the majority of bloggers are there. Although we're not without bias, it is much like reading newspaper editorials or watching Schram's editorial pieces on television news. You get what you get and the arguments are either convincing or they're not.

The trouble I see is when some group might decide to put a blogger on the payroll and that person might not disclose their ties to special interests. As a citizen, wouldn't I want to know that what I'm reading is NOT from an independent blogger? Might I even have a right to know it? I'm not interested in a solution that creates as many problems as it solves, but this does seem to be an important question to discuss because truthfully, I'm not quite sure where to draw the line.

I do believe we have a right to be independent bloggers without interference from the government. What about when we're not independent though? Does that matter? Maybe it doesn't. But if it does, what do we do about it?

• 1 week ago

Great idea, Joe! What a compelling story to start with. We look forward to seeing more from out of the archives in the future. Mt. St. Helens next? ;)

• 1 week ago