Thursday, December 13, 2007

Poetry 010

The Causes
by Jorge Luis Borges

The sunsets and generations.
The days and none was the first.
The coolness of water in Adam's
throat. Orderly Paradise.
The eye deciphering the dark.
The love of wolves at dawn.
The word. The hexameter. The mirror.
The Tower of Babel and pride.
The moon that Chaldeans gazed at.
The unnumbered sands of the Ganges.
Chuang-Tzu and the butterfly that dreams him.
The golden apples on the islands.
The steps in the wandering labyrinth.
Penelope's infinite tapestry.
The Stoics' circular time.
The coin in the dead man's mouth.
The weight of the sword on the scale.
Each drop of water in the clepsydra.
The eagles, the auspicious days, the legions.
Caesar on the morning of Pharsalia.
The shadow of the crosses over the earth.
The chess and algebra of the Persian.
The footprints of long migrations.
The conquest of kingdoms by the sword.
The relentless compass. The open sea.
The clock's echo in memory.
The king beheaded by the ax.
The incalculable dust which was armies.
The nightingale's voice in Denmark.
The calligrapher's meticulous line.
The face of the suicidal one in the mirror.
The gambler's card. Avid gold.
The shapes of a cloud in the desert.
Every arabesque in the kaleidoscope.
Each regret and each tear.
All those things were necessary
so that our hands would meet.

Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Journalism 030


Ah, the wonderful world of Washington lobbying.

Carol A. Kelly was named last week to the position of Senior Vice President of Government Affairs and Public Policy with the National Association of Chain Drug Stores (NACDS), which will celebrate its 75th anniversary next year. Kelly will join NACDS in January.

The NACDS consists of nearly 200 chain community pharmacy companies. Collectively, chain community pharmacy comprises the largest component of pharmacy practice with about 114,000 pharmacists.

The NACDS membership base operates more than 37,000 retail community pharmacies with annual sales totaling nearly $700 billion, including $221 billion in sales for prescription medicines , over-the-counter (OTC) medications and health and beauty aids (HBA). Chain-operated community retail pharmacies fill over 70% of the more than 3.3 billion prescriptions dispensed annually in the United States

Kelly currently serves as Senior Executive Advisor of External Affairs to U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Michael O. Leavitt where she dealt with health insurance access, value-driven health care, and health information technology. She served as the main HHS liaison to the White House Office of Public Liaison and to the Partnership for Value-driven Health Care, an employer health care reform coalition.

NACDS's mission statement reads in part:

"Creating a favorable political and business climate in which NACDS member companies can carry out their business plans. Developing and promoting policies and programs aimed at improving merchandise distribution and retail operations efficiency."