Private equity companies are buying up medical specialist clinics in the US, and creating local monopolies that systematically gouge, and even defraud.

This problem afflicts many areas of medicine, just as it affects many other areas of life in the US.

For medicine, the full solution is a national medical system. It would save the US money overall, but might require taxing the rich more.

However, the problem of concentration of industry needs a general solution too.

The documentary "Tantura" tells the story of Israel's expulsion of the Palestinians of a town near Haifa, in 1948. The film-maker, Alon Schwarz, faces revulsion for this.

I wish that Uri Avnery were alive to talk about the film and the events. His article, Truth Against Truth, provides some context.

*Far-right extremist [Ben-Gvir] to be Israel's national security minister.*

He wants to give immunity to Israeli soldiers that shoot at Palestinians, and execute Palestinians for various sorts of crimes. In this ministry he would be in charge of thugs, and would surely encourage them to commit violence. In Israel I was told that the border police were especially cruel and violent towards Palestinians.

Does it matter that Julian Assange has Asperger's syndrome? (I avoid the term "autistic spectrum" because it is a misleading overgeneralization.)

In principle, no. Publishing leaks about the horrible crimes of governments is admirable and no one should be punished for that.

In practice, if it helps prevent Assange's extradition, I will be glad. However, to avoid putting journalism in danger globally, saving Assange from US vengeance based on personal grounds will not be enough. We need to protect journalists and whistleblowers from punishment for serving the public.

The iMonsters' app store client program collects many kinds of data about the user's actions.

There is a command to disable this collection, but it seems not to have an effect.