My mother was a very wise person, although I have to say I rarely recall her reading a book. She had a saying that people of my era will recognize. The two dominant means of spreading propaganda in my youth and well into adulthood were Time and Life Magazines. As my mother said, probably repeating her own mother’s words, “Time is for people who can’t think, Life is for people who can’t read.”
I have two major means of interacting with other people: This blog, and Facebook. Our friend and writer Steve Kelly recently quit Facebook, and I admire that. I cannot make myself do it. I am connected to my cousins, a few real friends, and some former classmates. I don’t want to lose ties with them.
I stumbled on the Lerner quote this morning, and thought it would be a nice way to introduce a subject in need of examination, PSA, or the prostate specific antigen, discovered by Richard Ablin in 1970. It has been his life’s work to inform the public on the true nature of the PSA test. Peer review, or enforced mediocrity, plays a large part in preventing the truth about various forms of quackery from seeing light of day. Ablin’s work against PSA does not stand the withering criticism of his peers, who are in it for the money. PSA testing, followed by unnecessary biopsies and prostatectomies, is big business. Ablin doesn’t get it.
