From as early as Hippocrates, doctors began diagnosing women with a condition called hysteria that had a broad range of symptoms, including anxiety, insomnia, crankiness, and nervousness, and that brought on erotic fantasies and heaviness in the pelvic region.

The treatment for hysteria was a vulval and clitoral massage performed by a doctor in order to achieve what was called "hysterical paroxysm"—an orgasm.

In other words, you went to the doctor, he got you off, and you went home feeling better. At the end of the 19th century, the first vibrators were invented in order to make the doctor's job easier.   more »

I cannot state strongly enough the irrelevance of academics as opposed to the intellectuals who truly did affect culture and steer the avant-garde from their rootless place at society’s margin.

There is probably nothing particularly glorious in that life of insecurity, even if it does generate truly penetrating critiques of society from an “unattached” outsider’s perspective.

But that critical awareness didn’t prevent most 'outsiders' from selling out at the earliest opportunity.

Consumer capitalism was able to thrive so vigorously in post-war America in part because it found a place for these erstwhile rootless intellectuals, who primarily became apologists and heralds for the new order.   more »

"Giving" is filled with a lot of vapid, feel-good stories about ordinary and wealthy Americans setting out to make the world a better place.  It smacks of the philanthropy-as-publicity that characterized the largesse of the robber barons - the Mellons and the Rockefellers - and has become a pastime for our own oligarchic elite. 

Clinton’s call for charity is the equivalent of well-scrubbed prep school students spending a day in a soup kitchen, doling out food to the people whose jobs were outsourced by their mommies and daddies. 

It does little to alleviate suffering. But it is a balm to the conscience of the oligarchic class that profits handsomely from the impoverishment of the working class, globalization and our anti-democratic corporate state.  The rich love to dine out on their own goodness.

The misery sweeping across the American landscape may have begun with Ronald Reagan, but it was accelerated and codified by Bill Clinton.   more »

Asked in Tehran earlier this year about the possibility of a US military strike on Iran, a senior official laughed out loud. "Are you serious?" he asked.

"They will never attack us. That would be madness." His amusement was genuine - and chilling.

Ignorance and complacency about American motivations and intentions abound in equal measure in the land of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Uniquely among the countries of the world, Iran has been almost entirely cut off from US cultural, social and economic influence since the Islamic revolution of 1979.   more »

On the foreign exchange markets, by contrast, the dollar fell sharply to a new record low against the euro as dealers had less incentive to hold the US currency.

Last night's move marked a change of strategy, despite the risk that it will rekindle inflation and make it more difficult to attract foreign capital.

Peter Schiff, of Euro Pacific Capital, said: "I think it is completely irresponsible of the Fed, but it's par for the course. We have too much borrowing and too much consumer spending and the recession that is coming is necessary.

"This is not going to stop a recession, it's not going to stop home prices from collapsing. It might slow down the process a few months but it's just going to make it worse."   more »