judderwocky
Senior Member
- Messages
- 328
So this is the carry over from the other thread.... the first XMRV conference....
We have been discussing some of the behind the scenes poltics in Nevada and I some thoughts after several emails and phone conversations with the WPI... they clarified a few things to me, and it has helped me to understand what is going on ...
here goes...Former Gov. Guinn ... who died yesterday.... had a huge amount of rep in the state... it seems he ran into the term limit.... he was well liked and pushed the original funding through as a favor to the whittemore family whom he was close with. The current gov (2007-) who has been in office for several years has continued the funding.... but from what i gather this has been a difficult sell and its possible without Guinn's continued presence in the Nevada political system, that the funding would not have remained. it was a battle to keep the funding.
The current govenor is almost out... which means we will soon have a fresh new govenor...or the same.
my guess is....if you have been following the political news lately it seems that Nevada is going to be facing some big budget decisions... lots of money issues. they will probably be running on fiscally conservative platforms.... its possible you will see platforms to cut the budget by flat rates... if so... this could really hit organizations like the WPI that no longer have strong "guardians" in the govenors office.
We need to ensure before the election that the people running on both sides have been carefully educated about these issues. Whatever kind of communication we can figure out, we have to make sure as the budget crunch comes up, that we individually target every single candidate and help them understand our condition.
we need to sell them on two things: finding cures and treatmens will ultimately be more fiscally conservative. we will be helping peole to be healthy, require less treatment and care, and to be more productive and happy.
secondly to understand the signifigance and trailblazing nature of the research being done by the University of Nevada and the WPI. The WPI gets 12 million in state funds, and the CMM at UN gets the 77 million from the federal government (grants i think). the NIH by comparison gets a measly 5million for cfs research... Nevada's approach however is being shown to have international signifigance.... we have to make them understand that this research is ahead of the curve.... that more and more research across the country and globe is demonstrating that their researchers were right. this is a prestigous thing for the State of Nevada and serious credit to their medical and research systems.
I think if we can program them something along these lines we could really help to secure the funding.... prevent its loss.... and i gather its going to be getter tougher and tougher to preserve medical research across the country.
the issue is that they will be chomping at the bit to find money to take from programs.... 12 million is A LOT right now... especially if you are operating under the belief that its a fake illness..
remember... as far as funding for CFS goes... this would be a huge chunk of the money going into research right now ... i think we should do everything to protect that value.... especially since Gov. Guinn is no longer able to do so... if you read between the lines notice that some of the staff at the WPI used to work for Guinn... he has been very influential in securing good labs ... pr... help etc... but he's not out there anymore.
It might be good to take a different approach here in Nevada... we could start a positive sort of campaign... thanking nevada elected officials for their "trailblazing support of research in Nevada.... research that will lead the world in....." <insert stuff>?
"you catch more flies with honey than vinegar"
We have been discussing some of the behind the scenes poltics in Nevada and I some thoughts after several emails and phone conversations with the WPI... they clarified a few things to me, and it has helped me to understand what is going on ...
here goes...Former Gov. Guinn ... who died yesterday.... had a huge amount of rep in the state... it seems he ran into the term limit.... he was well liked and pushed the original funding through as a favor to the whittemore family whom he was close with. The current gov (2007-) who has been in office for several years has continued the funding.... but from what i gather this has been a difficult sell and its possible without Guinn's continued presence in the Nevada political system, that the funding would not have remained. it was a battle to keep the funding.
The current govenor is almost out... which means we will soon have a fresh new govenor...or the same.
my guess is....if you have been following the political news lately it seems that Nevada is going to be facing some big budget decisions... lots of money issues. they will probably be running on fiscally conservative platforms.... its possible you will see platforms to cut the budget by flat rates... if so... this could really hit organizations like the WPI that no longer have strong "guardians" in the govenors office.
We need to ensure before the election that the people running on both sides have been carefully educated about these issues. Whatever kind of communication we can figure out, we have to make sure as the budget crunch comes up, that we individually target every single candidate and help them understand our condition.
we need to sell them on two things: finding cures and treatmens will ultimately be more fiscally conservative. we will be helping peole to be healthy, require less treatment and care, and to be more productive and happy.
secondly to understand the signifigance and trailblazing nature of the research being done by the University of Nevada and the WPI. The WPI gets 12 million in state funds, and the CMM at UN gets the 77 million from the federal government (grants i think). the NIH by comparison gets a measly 5million for cfs research... Nevada's approach however is being shown to have international signifigance.... we have to make them understand that this research is ahead of the curve.... that more and more research across the country and globe is demonstrating that their researchers were right. this is a prestigous thing for the State of Nevada and serious credit to their medical and research systems.
I think if we can program them something along these lines we could really help to secure the funding.... prevent its loss.... and i gather its going to be getter tougher and tougher to preserve medical research across the country.
the issue is that they will be chomping at the bit to find money to take from programs.... 12 million is A LOT right now... especially if you are operating under the belief that its a fake illness..
remember... as far as funding for CFS goes... this would be a huge chunk of the money going into research right now ... i think we should do everything to protect that value.... especially since Gov. Guinn is no longer able to do so... if you read between the lines notice that some of the staff at the WPI used to work for Guinn... he has been very influential in securing good labs ... pr... help etc... but he's not out there anymore.
It might be good to take a different approach here in Nevada... we could start a positive sort of campaign... thanking nevada elected officials for their "trailblazing support of research in Nevada.... research that will lead the world in....." <insert stuff>?
"you catch more flies with honey than vinegar"
