Timewarp Tuesday: A Chat with Larry Soler

I'll admit it: I've read some of my fellow d-blogger's "flashback" posts and while some of them were interesting reading, I also said "that's just a cop-out, kind of re-hashing stuff that was already covered". But in retrospect, I must also admit they've proven somewhat helpful to have a look back to see where I was (and my colleagues, some of whom I hadn't met at that point) a few years ago, and what issues still remain open when it comes to the never-ending issue of diabetes management.

From my own perspective, I still remain focused on the prospect of a cure. I'm really no more tantalized about the prospect of an artificial pancreas than I was 5 years ago. My knowledge of the subject has grown, to be sure, and I see what's on the horizon is more of a semi closed-loop system than it is a truly smart artificial pancreas. That's a conversation for another day, however.

I've dubbed my posting today "Timewarp Tuesday", mainly because I was ready to post something last night, but I wasn't quite ready to adopt "Wayback Wednesday" so I needed a somewhat catchy (or maybe just a lame, but easier to say) title, and this was the best I could come up with. If you don't like it, I remain open to suggestions!

Anyway, I remain a tough cookie when it comes to interviewing big names in the world of diabetes. A case-in-point:
Larry Soler, who's JDRF's big cheese on the Potomac. I'd call Larry as the chief political strategist for JDRF, but officially, his title is "Executive Vice President, Government Relations & Operations". I hosted an online chat with Larry back in 2004, and the hot issue of the day was stem cell research.

That was driven primarily by then-CEO Peter Van Etten (JDRF is now on it's third CEO since then, as more recently, Arnold Donald stepped down rather unexpectedly, and has since been replaced by Alan Lewis). Mr. Van Etten's rationale was pretty understandable, at least from a business perspective.

Needless to say, since Yahoo! will be dismantling it's free Geocities web-hosting service, I'll be forced to move all my stuff there (rest assured, I already have a new, paid host I've had for quite a few years, but I still have to move everything before the October 24 deadline, so that's a work in progress), but since I'd saved my DiabetesStation.com transcript of that September 23, 2004 program, I thought it was worth sharing with everyone today. Have a look here!