Paul Stone writes: >I never said that it IS self-indulgent for people who _need_ to get the vaccine to get it. I tried to set out in my last email that the 'problem' with this year is not just that there is a severe shortage of flu shots, it's that the inoculations were progressing as normal (i.e. millions of people getting them -- and desiring them -- who DON'T need them) and so this exacerbated an already bad situation with the people who really need them< I don't know where the notion that 'millions of people...[who don't need flu shots] are getting them' comes from. That certainly hasn't been reported locally ornationally (although Marlena did suggest that her library staff didn't want to be making decisions about who did and didn't need innoculation and was giving everyone a pass). In Oregon there's no flu vaccine for anybody, let alone those who are in the 'at risk' category. The lines shown on TV and reported in the press are made up of aged folk, some in wheelchairs, most assisted by abler persons. The innoculation of people who fall outside the guidelines didn't create the present US flu vaccine shortage. And later: >They are not being altruistic, whining about how their grandmothers and kids can't get it.< Who are 'they'? I guess I'm asking which planet's newspapers you read. Yet further: >It's like air bags, car safety, seatbelts etc. How about learning how to fucking drive so that you don't smash into anything? How about more difficult driving tests? How about making sure that people who are not extremely competent drivers DON'T DRIVE?< 'It's like'? I have a hard time seeing how it is. It seems odd to say that because most accidents are caused by people who don't know how to fucking drive, there is no need for seatbelts and airbags in general (if that _is_ what's being said). Although there are lethal one car accidents, I think there are far more multiple car accidents, and it takes only one incompetent driver to ruin your day, however competent you may be. Are you saying that if the Kingdom of God on earth resulted in only 'competent' drivers there'd be no need for safety devices on cars? I'm waiting for the Paul Stone isolation-satisfaction unit, which is modeled on early brain-in-a-vat technology, to come on the market. When it's available it will be so attractive that nobody will want to leave its cozy confines and expose themselves to germy people and Massachusetts drivers. Robert Paul Reed College ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html