Georgia's War on Drugs: How Its Subutex Addiction Ended

Wars are particularly stupid son. Drug wars are even more stupid. You know what I feel about this. 

But here's a great story about how Georgia fought drugs. Remember they just won one battle. The druggies are still there. Eating vomit. Stay away from drugs son. It's horrible. That's what you are reduced to. Eating somebody else's vomit. 

Love

Baba

Georgia's War on Drugs: How Its Subutex Addiction Ended | New Republic
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/113051/georgias-war-drugs-how-its-subutex-addiction-ended

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Needle drugs seldom make a city look pretty, but some cities are more disfigured by them than others. In 2006, when I first visited Tbilisi, Georgia, it had all the wrecked majesty of an ex-beauty queen with six years of track-marks down her arms. It was a great European capital in decay: crumbling bridges, refugees from war, and—most of all—cast-off syringes everywhere. Alleys, parks, and tunnels under the Soviet-style boulevards all had this spiky detritus, which badly spoiled Tbilisi’s old-world romance and instead put it into a permanent state of biohazard.

So when I returned this year, I packed thick-soled shoes. It turned out that, but for the frigid temperatures (and my own self-respect), I could have worn Tevas. The syringes, which once pumped opiates into the veins of as many as 250,000 addicts, are absent. The subway now feels safe, clean, and orderly, with no trash more revolting than a Snickers wrapper. The tunnels under Rustaveli Avenue still smell pissy, but so do most big cities’ tunnels. If the addicts are still there, they have been persuaded to shoot up with greater discretion. And if they are now gone, the Georgians have accomplished something remarkable, which is the rapid diminution of smackheads.

Atul Gawande: How Do Good Ideas Spread?

Einstein said that genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration. Besides other things son I help change organisations. It's difficult. People don't like change. It's the inertia of rest. So one has to move this to the inertia of motion. Continuous improvement. This article tells much that's common in my life as well. Talk to people. Don't tell them what to do. Give options. Otherwise people will do because you told them to. Rather than do because it makes sense. 

Changing behaviours is the most difficult. And takes the longest period. Years even. You have to have insane levels of dedication, passion and perseverance. You will make mistakes. Lots of them. Learn from them son. But it can be done. 

Somebody said to me, you are strange. You like your job. I do. I like making things happen. Fun times. Nothing like walking out at the end of the day satisfied you have won some battles and have left the world a little better than you found it in the morning. 

Love

Baba

Atul Gawande: How Do Good Ideas Spread? : The New Yorker
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/07/29/130729fa_fact_gawande?currentPage=all

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Why do some innovations spread so swiftly and others so slowly? Consider the very different trajectories of surgical anesthesia and antiseptics, both of which were discovered in the nineteenth century. The first public demonstration of anesthesia was in 1846. The Boston surgeon Henry Jacob Bigelow was approached by a local dentist named William Morton, who insisted that he had found a gas that could render patients insensible to the pain of surgery. That was a dramatic claim. In those days, even a minor tooth extraction was excruciating. Without effective pain control, surgeons learned to work with slashing speed. Attendants pinned patients down as they screamed and thrashed, until they fainted from the agony. Nothing ever tried had made much difference. Nonetheless, Bigelow agreed to let Morton demonstrate his claim.

On October 16, 1846, at Massachusetts General Hospital, Morton administered his gas through an inhaler in the mouth of a young man undergoing the excision of a tumor in his jaw. The patient only muttered to himself in a semi-conscious state during the procedure. The following day, the gas left a woman, undergoing surgery to cut a large tumor from her upper arm, completely silent and motionless. When she woke, she said she had experienced nothing at all.

Online Library of Liberty - The Philosophy and Theology of Averroes

Kannu

Perhaps you may want to file this away till you have some spare time and are interested in philosophy and law and religion. 

Ibn Rusd or Averroes as he was known in the west is one of humanities great Heros. An intellectual giant. Polymath. Jurist. Philosopher. Medicine. Arts. A man like Leonardo da Vinci or Michelangelo  Buonarroti. A true renaissance man. 

He argued against the stultifying and suffocating embrace of religion son. Wrote copiously. Amazing man and amazing philosophy. 

Classic example of how history repeats himself. He analysed the Greeks to fight the Muslim fundos. Then he was forgotten in Muslim lands but the Jews and Christians used his work to fight their fight in Europe. Early last century he was rediscovered by the Muslims and he is being used to fight against the spreading fundamentalism like salafism and Wahhabism. 

Fascinating. At a lecture in London about him, one of the speakers said that the Islamic societies in British universities are full of the most close minded Muslims ever. When you go there son, observe them closely. It's those close minds that ibn rusd fought against. 

Love

Baba 

Online Library of Liberty - The Philosophy and Theology of Averroes
http://oll.libertyfund.org/index.php?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=77&layout=html

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Table of Contents

The Gaekwad Studies in Religion and Philosophy: XI.

THE PHILOSOPHY AND THEOLOGY OF AVERROES

Printed by Manibhai Mathurbhai Gupta at the “Arya-Sudharak” Printing Press, Raopura, Baroda, and Published by A. G. Widgery, the College, Baroda 1-1-1921

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DEDICATION to Dr. AZIMUDDIN AHMAD

Sir,

It was at your feet that I first learned to appreciate historical and literary research, and the following pages constitute the earliest fruits of that literary labour of mine the impetus for which I am proud to have received from you. I crave your indulgence for my taking the liberty of dedicating the same to your revered name, with the hope that it will not fail to attract the same generous sympathy from you as you have always shown to your pupil.

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PREFACE

It was as a Fellow of the Seminar for the Comparative Study of Religions at the College, Baroda, that the present work was begun. The subject was taken up in the first place as a parallel study to that contained in a paper in the Indian Philosophical Review, Volume II, July 1918, pp. 24-32 entitled “Maimonides and the Attainment of Religious Truth.” But as I proceeded with my investigation I thought it might be best to let Averroes speak for himself. For this reason I have here translated certain treatises of Averroes, as edited in the Arabic text by D. H. Muller in “Philosophie und Theologie von Averroes.” Munich 1859. I am confident that the book will prove an interesting one and will explain itself to the reader without any introduction on my part.

Though owing to my appointment at Hyderabad I resigned my position at Baroda soon after commencing this work I wish here to express my thanks to Professor Alban G. Widgery of Baroda for his constant sympathy with and encouragement for my work in and out of the Seminar. He has also kindly accepted the book for inclusion in the Gaekwad Studies in Religion and Philosophy. I am indebted to him for a complete revision of the manuscript and for the onerous work of seeing the book through the press. I am also indebted to my brother Mutazid Wali ur Rehman, b.a. for valuable help in rendering many obscure passages.

Mohammad Jamil ur Rehman

Over the hump for oil demand

Kannu
Here's a fascinating economic tipping point for you son. The world you will grow up in will be different from what I grew up in. Energy will not be that important.
This will have serious geopolitical and economic not to mention social implications. Here's something to chew over, what will you do to take advantage of this? Short some stocks? Buy something? Which ones? Which markets? Which countries?
Love
Baba

I saw this article when using the Financial Times app and thought you might be interested:
Financial Times,
Over the hump for oil demand
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By Christof Ruehl
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Energy intensity is falling as the world is using less oil, gas and coal and other fuels to deliver each additional dollar of GDP, says BP’s Christof Ruehl
Read the full article at: http://on.ft.com/1d23Wq6