Call Me a Socialist or a Pirate

Avast Yusaf Hamied,

Call me a socialist, but I like what you are doing, have done, etc. Let capitalism fall if it must. (It won't.) I am also willing to call it good. (See Survey on this topic.)

I know that lots of people call you a pirate. Maybe being a pirate is good too, when what you are doing is saving Aids victims and heart patients, not just downloading MP3s. (I heard that your company provides the drugs for 40% of the Aids patients in third world countries. Is that so?)

Of course large pharmaceutical firms want to make a profit. And they should on some level, but I wonder what ever happened to motivation that comes from saving peoples lives? I'm thinking that since the government already pays for a good share of the research that sits behind most drugs, the idea of patents that block people from getting life-saving medicine is ludicrous and uncivilized. (Let's reserve the patents for Viagra.) If pharmaceutical companies find it hard to be motivated to make drugs without accruing the level of profits that will provide yachts ("It's a Sailor's Life for Me!") for every drug rep in the lower 48 states, then perhaps we could outsource the work to India.

I don't have much more to say, except, thanks, matey.

Betsy