No insurance? Then you might want to check out this news from WCNC and MSNBC.com:

A free all-day clinic for the uninsured is set for Tuesday at the Charlotte Convention Center.

Organizers with the National Association of Free Clinics expect between 1,000 and 2,000 people. The group has held eight similar events in cities around the country.

"Some of those people had not been to the doctor in over 10 years," said Laura Allen, a volunteer coordinator for the Charlotte Community Health Clinic who traveled to New Orleans to staff a one-day clinic last year.

Nancy Hudson, executive director of the Charlotte Community Health Clinic, says her clinic serves about 3,500 people per year, but has to turn away about 300 people each month.

The clinic will offer services including dental, eye care, EKGs, cholesterol blood tests, glucose tests for diabetes, urinalysis, pregnancy tests, and strep tests. Walk-ins will be accepted, but an appointment is strongly encouraged. Call 1-877-233-5159 to make one.

The clinic will only accept patients who do not have insurance.

The organizations involved are also seeking volunteers -- both medical and non-medical -- to help staff, set-up and break-down the clinic.

Read the entire article, by Beth Shayne, here.

Here's a video from one of the free clinics the National Association of Free Clinics held a few months ago in Connecticut, so you'll know what to expect if you plan to attend:

Of course, a couple of days ago it was a really obscure rumor about some big bank, but not necessarily Charlotte's big bank. Either way, apparently the whistle-blowing website has five gigs of data, which is a lot when you consider it's probably all text, that will implicate a big bank in, um, something. Rumors, you know, aren't always super specific ... but the leaked documents are speculated to contain evidence of "unethical" behavior.

Is that shocking, though? Not really. Still, we're going to have to wait awhile, at least until the beginning of 2011, to find out what documents WikiLeaks — whose site has been under regular hacker attack lately — has in its possession. Until then, just a reminder: All we have is an expensive game of telephone.

By the way, Bank of America's official line on the matter is that they're not concerned. But, are they ever ... about anything?

We've all been there: You throw, or attend, an amazing party, drink too much, smoke too much, dance too much and stay up way too late. But, by morn, despite the fact that the party is definitely over, its sticky remnants remain. Enter the 'Hangover Helpers.'

According to the Associated Press, a couple of University of Colorado graduates have come up with this ingenious business model. These folks show up the morning after your party with breakfast, Gatorade and the fortitude to clean up your mess. Brilliant!

And now, who's going to take up this banner and run with it in the Q.C.? (Quick, now: New Years Eve is just around the corner.) To supplement the business, might I suggest you also offer coffee and breakfast delivery for the greater Charlotte population ...

What would you pay to clean up this after-party disaster ... especially if you're hugging the toilet with a hangover? (Note the dudes with black eyes.)

Rhiannon "Rhi" Bowman is an independent journalist who contributes snarky commentary on Creative Loafing's CLog blog four days a week in addition to writing for several other local media organizations. To learn more, click the links or follow Rhi on Twitter.

America does NOT need doughnut delivery. We are plenty fat enough — thank you very much. If you're too damn lazy to get out of your car or drive through Krispy Kreme's drive-thru, then you don't deserve any doughnuts anyway.

From The Sun News:

Bringing dozens of glazed Krispy Kreme doughnuts to a business gathering has been a local tradition for decades, sometimes as critical to the setup as a PowerPoint presentation.

Now the doughnut-maker is experimenting with making that taste of Southern hospitality easier to get with a business-to-business marketing strategy - Krispy Kreme Express, a delivery service.

It is being tested in an area around Battleground Avenue in Greensboro. Available by the dozen are original glazed and a classic assortment, Krispy Kreme spokesman Brian Little said.

Read the rest of this article, by Richard Craver, here.

Rhiannon "Rhi" Bowman is a fat, independent journalist who contributes snarky commentary on Creative Loafing's CLog blog four days a week in addition to writing for several other local media organizations. To learn more, click the links or follow Rhi on Twitter.

I've said it a million times: Legalizing pot is one of the best things our government can do. Why? It's beneficial in numerous ways — it's calming, it helps ease pain, it helps extremely sick people eat, our government needs the tax revenue and we spend way too much money on the nonsensical "war on drugs." And, don't forget, it's a boon for small businesses and hemp, it's non-drug relative, is one of the most useful crops on the planet.

In order for this to happen, I truly believe all you tokers out there need to come out of the closet. Statistics show that it's middle class white folks who are smoking, while minorities are most often busted. Whitebread America is driving the demand for a product they love while allowing everyone else to suffer for it. That's not unusual, but it is seriously hypocritical. If you folks would stop pretending like you don't enjoy a fat hootie every now and again, we might be able to convince our legislators — who are ever so interested in our votes and our money — to legalize grass.

Who's with me?

OK, I'll start: I smoke pot most days both for pleasure and to ease back pain. In fact, my pain specialist says she wishes she could prescribe marijuana to her patients because it really does help ease their symptoms, and it's safer than the legal opiates she prescribes. In my family, excluding my grandparents, pot is not considered bad. And, the vast majority of the people I know either smoke pot or don't care if other people do. Meanwhile, I'm still a productive taxpayer who's never been arrested for any crime. Imagine.

Now, it's your turn: Get your asses out of the ganja closet and let's get this magical herb legalized.

There are people working on the impending "green rush." From The New York Times:

It is being called the green rush. With more states moving to legalize medical marijuana, the business of growing and dispensing it is booming, even as much of the rest of the economy struggles.

Now, flush with financial clout, and with their eyes on pushing Congress to further loosen laws, medical marijuana industry leaders are forming a national trade association. While there are smaller, local trade groups, organizers around the country say this will be the first business organization working on the national level.

Based in Washington, the group, the National Cannabis Industry Association, will focus primarily on lobbying, but will also help medical marijuana businesses navigate a patchwork of laws that differ depending on location.

“This is an industry that is emerging — from the dispensaries to the ancillary businesses that are now coming out of the shadows,” said Aaron Smith, a medical marijuana advocate in Phoenix and the group’s executive director. “While there is good work being done, there isn’t anyone out there representing the industry’s interests directly.”

Read the rest of this article, by Dan Frosch, here.

A brief history of weed:

Rhiannon "Rhi" Bowman is an independent journalist who contributes snarky commentary on Creative Loafing's CLog blog four days a week in addition to writing for several other local media organizations. To learn more, click the links or follow Rhi on Twitter.

While we, in North Carolina, are allowing power companies to cut down and burn our trees like cavemen, other states and countries are realizing nature's economic value and taking those figures into account when making decisions about energy, conservation and development.

From The Times Herald, in Montgomery County, Pa.:

Supporters of such preservation efforts often point to studies done around the nation that show that the costs that accompany developed land — schools, fire, water, sewer and police services — vastly outweigh the tax revenue that land generates.

Now they can point to a study — written by the Economy League of Greater Philadelphia, Econsult Corp. and Keystone Conservation Trust — that looks into their own backyard and clearly lays out what you get out of preserving open space there.

“Put simply, when we preserve open space, we protect our pocketbooks,” said Delaware County Councilman Andy Lewis, who is also a member of the DVRPC board.

“Now we have proof that by investing in preserving this land, we are also investing in our local economy, supporting jobs and generating revenue,” said Chester County Commissioner Carol Aichele, who is also a DVRPC board member.

Read the entire article, by Evan Brandt, here.

Even Britain's Prince Charles is urging world leaders to investigate nature's value. Check out a snippet of an article he wrote, entitled, "Value of natural capital: Priceless."

In our human-centred world, with its emphasis on economics, and following decades of apparently unending material "progress", it has become all too easy for us to believe that we can continue to take what we wish from natural systems on the assumption they will indefinitely replenish themselves. As we are discovering, in the real world it doesn't quite work like that.

A famous study, by Robert Costanza and others, published in 1997, estimated the value of nature to the human economy by working out roughly what it would cost us to replace all the things that ecosystems provide to us. Their figure was about $33 trillion a year - or about double the then global GDP.

In other words, the part of the economy that we measure and seek to grow year on year is actually only about half the value of the part we don't measure. Perhaps this is why natural capital is being depleted so rapidly - because we have yet to adequately express in bald economic terms the value of nature.

Read the entire article here.

He's right: The natural world is priceless, which is exactly why we should coddle it, not destroy it. Future generations will thank us.

The trailer for Prince Charles' documentary Harmony:

Rhiannon "Rhi" Bowman is an independent journalist who contributes snarky commentary on Creative Loafing's CLog blog four days a week in addition to writing for several other local media organizations. To learn more, click the links or follow Rhi on Twitter.

In a time when tens of millions of people are uninsured or under-insured, it's no wonder people are looking to the Internet for medical advice. But, how can you determine which information is reliable? And, can you tell the difference between a heart attack and a dislodged rib?

MSNBC's Samantha Murphy reports on the 'cyberchondria' phenomenon:

"It’s important to stay up on health-related information … but because information on the Web is so unfathomably plentiful, so readily available, and so unsorted, it's easy for someone to jump to the conclusion that they have a brain tumor when in fact it’s just a sinus infection,” according to Judy Segal, professor of English at the University of British Columbia who works on the cultural studies of medicine.

To complicate matters further, a lot of the medical information available for free online is actually accurate and reliable, experts say.

"The problem is, though, that even when the information is reliable, our ability to know what to do with it isn’t," Segal told MyHealthNewsDaily. "Medical problems are often complicated, and someone without a medical background may jump to false conclusions."

Segal believes the Internet encourages hypochondria, itself a medical condition. Hypochondriacs are people so concerned about particular diseases that they tend to not trust physicians when they are told there is nothing wrong with them.

"When there’s so much information out there, it’s easy to focus on what could be possible, even if the chances are very slim," Segal said. "The Internet brings out the hypochondriac in all of us."

Read the rest of this article here.

Here are some tips for finding reliable medical information online:

Rhiannon "Rhi" Bowman is an independent journalist who contributes snarky commentary on Creative Loafing's CLog blog four days a week in addition to writing for several other local media organizations. To learn more, click the links or follow Rhi on Twitter.

The Story of Stuff creator Annie Leonard has released a new episode in her ongoing series — which includes cosmetics, cars, bottled water and more — about where our stuff comes from, how it's manipulated, how it gets to us and where it goes after we're done with it.

This time, she's focusing on all of the electronics we've become so attached to:

Rhiannon "Rhi" Bowman is an independent journalist who contributes snarky commentary on Creative Loafing's CLog blog four days a week in addition to writing for several other local media organizations. To learn more, click the links or follow Rhi on Twitter.

Conservative congressional politicians are in the news internationally for shrugging off global climate change realities in favor of rainbows and promises from ancient texts. No shit. Check this out from the United Kingdom's Daily Mail:

A Republican congressman hoping to chair the powerful House Energy Committee refers to the Bible and God on the issue of global warming.

Representative John Shimkus insists we shouldn't concerned about the planet being destroyed because God promised Noah it wouldn't happen again after the great flood.

Speaking before a House Energy Subcommittee on Energy and Environment hearing in March, 2009, Shimkus quoted Chapter 8, Verse 22 of the Book of Genesis.

Meanwhile, our glaciers — aka the earth's air conditioner — are slipping away more rapidly than scientists expected and we're shutting down, not ramping up, their investigations.

From The New York Times' Justin Gillis:

Scientists long believed that the collapse of the gigantic ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica would take thousands of years, with sea level possibly rising as little as seven inches in this century, about the same amount as in the 20th century.

But researchers have recently been startled to see big changes unfold in both Greenland and Antarctica.

As a result of recent calculations that take the changes into account, many scientists now say that sea level is likely to rise perhaps three feet by 2100 — an increase that, should it come to pass, would pose a threat to coastal regions the world over.

In the United States, parts of the East Coast and Gulf Coast would be hit hard. In New York, coastal flooding could become routine, with large parts of Queens and Brooklyn especially vulnerable. About 15 percent of the urbanized land in the Miami region could be inundated. The ocean could encroach more than a mile inland in parts of North Carolina.

And! Get this: Instead of paying attention to reality, Cons(ervatives) are freaking out on their fellow politicians for proposing that we phase out 100-plus year-old, inefficient technology. Really? Oh, yes. From Politico.com's Robin Bravender:

Rep. Fred Upton’s support for eco-friendly light bulbs could leave him in the dark in his bid to chair the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Conservatives on and off Capitol Hill are waging a campaign to show that the Michigan Republican isn’t conservative enough to chair the powerful committee that will be in the center over fight on health care and energy policy next year.

For proof, they’re pointing to Upton’s support for phasing out some incandescent light bulbs in favor of greener alternatives.

Right-wing talk show host Rush Limbaugh cited Upton’s promotion of eco-friendly light bulbs evidence that he shouldn’t take the Energy and Commerce gavel.

And here's the kicker, the Cons are fucking serious. They really believe God is going to swoop down and save us from all of the damage we've created, which makes no sense since you'd think they'd want to protect and preserve God's creation to begin with.

This is just another example of why religion and politics should be kept separate. We do not need people who believe the apocalypse is nigh creating the very types of energy policies that got us into this tragic place to begin with, nor do we need Bible thumpers or people who are more focused on what they believe instead of the hard, cold facts — you know, scientific data — to represent us.

The end of the light bulb, from "Made in Germany":

Rhiannon "Rhi" Bowman is an independent journalist who contributes snarky commentary on Creative Loafing's CLog blog four days a week in addition to writing for several other local media organizations. To learn more, click the links or follow Rhi on Twitter.

Trickle down economics? Please! How about trickle down bullshit? They create it, we wallow in it. Learn to love it, people, because this is our reality.

From Reuters:

Charitable giving by wealthy Americans dropped by more than a third between 2007 and 2009 as the worst U.S. recession in decades put pressure on the nonprofit sector, according to a study released on Tuesday.

While almost all rich Americans -- more than 98 percent -- donated to nonprofit groups last year, the average amount fell to $54,016 in 2009 from $83,034 in 2007 and $91,928 in 2005, the third biennial Bank of America Merrill Lynch study found.

"We obviously did see a decrease in the actual dollars given, that's not surprising given the times," Claire Costello, national foundation executive for Bank of America Merrill Lynch, told Reuters.

More than 800 people with a household income of more than $200,000 and/or net worth of at least $1 million -- excluding the value of their homes -- were surveyed by the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University. The average wealth of the respondents was $10.7 million.

Read the entire article, by Michelle Nichols, here.

Meanwhile, the number of American's without health insurance continues to balloon as Republicans go overtime, bloviating about their desire to strangle health care in Congress — promising to lock up our country's legislative branch for two full years in an effort to benefit their corporate buddies and give the rest of us the finger. Why would they want to accomplish anything productive and helpful? No one's paying them for that, unless you count their paycheck and government health care — which we pay for with little choice.

Also from Reuters:

Nearly 59 million Americans went without health insurance coverage for at least part of 2010, many of them with conditions or diseases that needed treatment, federal health officials said on Tuesday.

They said 4 million more Americans went without insurance in the first part of 2010 than during the same time in 2008.

"Both adults and kids lost private coverage over the past decade," Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told a news briefing.

The findings have implications for U.S. healthcare reform efforts. A bill passed in March promises to get health insurance coverage to 32 million Americans who currently lack coverage.

But Republicans who just took control of the House of Representatives last week have vowed to derail the new law by cutting off the funds for it, and some want to repeal it. Experts from both sides predict gridlock in Congress for the next two years ...

Read the rest of this article, by Maggie Fox, here.

And, no surprise here: People are avoiding emergency rooms these days, even when they need them most. Why? They don't have insurance, and even if they do they can't afford health care.

Again, from Reuters:

Despite expert recommendations to seek treatment if shortness of breath, chest discomfort and other telltale signs of a heart attack don't improve after five minutes, a new study suggests that typical sufferers still stall more than two hours.

Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the U.S., with about 1.25 million heart attacks occurring each year and a quarter of patients succumbing to the event.

About half of all heart attack deaths occur within one hour -- usually outside of a hospital.

So, why have these delays persisted despite educational campaigns to inform people about the symptoms of a heart attack and the importance of seeking timely treatment?

"The fact that the greatest duration of delay in heart attack care is with the patient and not in the health care system goes beyond just an education gap or lack of awareness about symptoms," said Ting. "More complex issues are involved and the solution is not going to be a simple one."

In research published last year, for example, Ting and his team found that people without insurance or underinsured were more likely to delay heart attack treatment.

Read the rest of this article, by Lynne Peeples, here.

Note: Reuters is a news service basted in the U.K., similar to the Associated Press in America. While American media outlets are picking up these stories, they don't seem to be doing too much to further them.

So, here's the scoop:

The rich just bought themselves an election. It's in their favor for the rest of the population to remain uniformed, unintelligent, underpaid, under-insured, on edge and out of their way.

Expect very little to come out of the next Congress as the divided house locks horns with each other in an effort to make their corporate backers happy and preserve their precious, if pathetic, political careers.

It's not about you, and it never was. All of this rhetoric, the promise to avoid compromise and forward movement in our legislature, health insurance companies' stranglehold on your family's health; it's about them and our new plutocracy, which is a government where the wealthy class calls the shots.

Not wealthy? Well, suck it. Until you're willing to educate yourself and stand up for your rights — and until you can convince others to do the same — we're screwed.

Here's the late comedian George Carlin, several years ago, explaining what the real owners of our country want. Sound familiar?

Rhiannon "Rhi" Bowman is an independent journalist who contributes snarky commentary on Creative Loafing's CLog blog four days a week in addition to writing for several other local media organizations. To learn more, click the links or follow Rhi on Twitter.