What's wrong with this picture? Michael Moore's "The Cost of War" (OPEN EXCHANGE October-December 2004), while making a good point about the economic cost of the Iraq War ($87-$200 billion plus), neglects to describe the tragic human costs. Don't people matter anymore?

Anna Helms
Berkeley

We like your question! Here's another: Why does Scott Peterson get more press coverage than 100,000 + dead Iraqis? It's up to all of us to demand more of our news media.

Reclaiming Indigenous Authorship

I discovered in browsing your most recent issue (OPEN EXCHANGE, October-December 2004) an error in citation. On page 107 you incorrectly attribute to Malidoma Somé an article that I authored on "Reclaiming the Indigenous Soul." Malidoma and I offered a series of workshops for many years and I often included his name to add to the recognition of the piece. The language in the quoted piece is reflective of someone living in this culture and calling for a movement towards remembering our indigenous souls. It is a call for each of us to do the work of coming home here on this land and to not simply adopt other culture's modalities but to truly listen and hear what is being asked of us in order to become native to this place.

Francis Weller
Santa Rosa

"Reclaiming The Indigenous Soul" was submitted to us and originally published in OPEN EXCHANGE's July-September 2000 edition as authored "By Malidoma Somé and Frances Weller." The first-named author of a collaborative effort is often considered the primary author, and dropping a second author's name in subsequent excerpts is not uncommon. This is no doubt a painful lesson (and no small irony) considering the importance that Malidoma and you (or you and Malidoma, as the case may be) placed on "truly hearing and listening." Credit notwithstanding, your message was on point!

First Do No Harm?

I am sending you this in the hope of effecting positive change. Last October I was in a car accident (not my fault) that has opened my eyes about the standard practice of medicine, and it's NOT good.

I was sitting at a stop sign behind a little pickup truck when a van came barreling off the freeway out of control. The van hit the pickup head on at 50 m.p.h. and it then hit my car head on. Through some miracle, with three cars completely totaled, seven people walked away with what doctors said were "no serious injuries." I don't necessarily agree!

I was checked over at the emergency room and told to go home. They gave me NO information at all about what might have happened to me. Neither did my doctor. He told me what to do but never told me what NOT to do. No one explained "soft tissue damage" to me until I walked into the physical therapy office seven weeks later. For seven weeks I'd been making myself worse! Even though I told my doctor that I felt like my brain was on disconnect, he didn't send me to the neurologist for eight weeks. Yes, I had a bad concussion. A doctor's first consideration is supposed to be "first, do no harm." A printed brochure about the potential problems for accident victims would have saved me at least four months in recovery time. And my experience is not unusual. Nationwide millions of dollars are being wasted and thousands of people are suffering longer than is necessary.

It became obvious to me that the standard practice of medicine today is too disjointed and does not address anything but immediate symptoms. Let's try to get this changed!

Carolyn Oller
Belvedere

Happy New Year, Maggi!

Hope all is well with you and your enterprises, and your cornucopia of gems for your ever-hungry-for-enlightenment changes! I [have] a fabulous script for a drama, especially if I can get my DNA reprogrammed to drop 40 years! Ah well, I'm not dead yet, and strange things have been known to happen. Perhaps to be recorded in some Super Duper Hologra-scope 3-D process! Love and Cheers To All!

Gary Reynard
San Carlos

Gary Reynard, movie maker and student of the esoteric, sends us a series of greeting cards each year, including the image above. "Drop 40 years"? Gary, how about writing a drama about "Approaching Old Age In The New Age"?