Kevin Drum has multiple myeloma. My thoughts, and I am sure the readers here, are with you.
Damnit.
by John Cole| 82 Comments
This post is in: Ugh
Kevin Drum has multiple myeloma. My thoughts, and I am sure the readers here, are with you.
Damnit.
Comments are closed.
Trollhattan
Oh no. Fight the good fight, Mr. Drum, and beat this!
Also, too, fuck cancer.
Keith G
As I just posted on the previous thread I’ve been reading Kevin for awful long time and he was the one who sent me here many years ago too. We have traded emails over the years and I consider him the consummate blogger and a decent man and a friend.
BGinCHI
Drum is one of those great bloggers that even when you don’t agree you learn something. He has been fighting the good fight for a long time.
Best wishes, sir.
smintheus
What a devastating diagnosis. As Kevin says, though, some cancer treatments are advancing rapidly now. If he can get through the next few years in good shape, he could benefit from breakthroughs that seem to be in the pipeline now. Hoping for him.
Linda Featheringill
That is terrible news!
But it is true that cancer treatments are progressing. Best of luck.
dmsilev
@Trollhattan:
Yeah, that. Went to a funeral earlier this week for a coworker who was taken down by colon cancer. Not good.
Baud
Of all the people I don’t read often enough, he’s up at the top. Horrible news.
beth
My husband’s been cancer free for over a year. It’s still always there in the back of our minds. Fuck cancer.
Rex Everything
He’s a good guy. I really hope he beats this.
srv
Fuck cancer and fuck death. I just got back from one funeral and have to go to another. Was making reservations and all I could think of was Bad News Comes In Threes…
lurker dean
best wishes to kevin, he’s certainly one of the good guys.
Kerry Reid
Sucks so much.
divF
Drum’s work on the Political Animal / Washington Monthly blog got me hooked on the damned things. I now read lefty political blogs far more than is good for my professional productivity, but just enough to keep me sane. I owe him a debt of gratitude, and hope he can hang tough with this disease.
Linda Featheringill
@beth:
Good wishes to you and your hubby.
[crossed fingers]
Elie
Wish him the very best. Lots of progress on many leukemias so wish him spirit and energy for the fight ahead. Dig in, Kevin…
Betty Cracker
Fuck! That is awful news. Wishing him the very best of luck and much strength and courage.
Jane2
I probably read Kevin’s first post as Calpundit and have followed him through the years and the lives and deaths of the Drum kitties. Wishing him, Marion and the latest kitty additions to the household the best.
Ruckus
I’ll second/third/whatever the “Fuck Cancer”.
Won’t go into the family members that have not survived cancer, suffice it to say that it is a multiple number.
Rob
Damn. My best wishes to him. I’m sorry to say I’m not familiar with his blog, but I reckon that will change now.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@Baud: The only reason I don’t read Kevin Drum often enough is because he doesn’t post more. He’s at the beginning of my list of blogs every time I cycle through them. He is my absolute favorite, bar none, political blogger. Moderation, restraint, decency, a focus on policy, and intellectual honesty are far too often denigrated in today’s climate. Drum displays them all and this just pisses me off.
Motherfucker.
WereBear
How massively sucky. Good luck to him!
Linnaeus
I’ve certainly disagreed – sometimes quite strongly – with Drum in the past, but I wish all the best for him. He seems pretty positive about his prognosis and that’s good to hear.
Egosion
I am sorry, but fuck death? Fuck cancer? Really I am aware that disease is something that most people try to avoid especially if it happens to someone you kno, respect and/or love. But it’s part of being alive (at least mammalian multicellular life). It is not to be wished upon anyone and sadness is an appropriate response, but fuck death is certainly not. It makes us human and humane to encounter death and illness is part of our existence and it would be meaningless without it.
eemom
Have not read KD much, but wish him all the best.
Since it’s a grim thread anyway, can I share my heartache over the now-confirmed death of the UVA student who’s been missing since September? As some folks know, my daughter is at UVA and in the same class, and I’ve been gripped by the horror of this thing the whole time it’s been unfolding.
NineJean
I started reading Kevin’s blog ages ago, just for the catblogging… Stayed for the interesting commentary.
Has he said, or does anyone know just what hospital he’s in? Or what med group/network he has.. Being SoCal, it’s probably decent to good, but just wondering.
Crusty Dem
Kevin is one of the few bloggers i enjoy reading even when i strongly disagree and just generally seems like a very nice guy. Dammit.
JPL
How sad and I’m going to add my f..k, f..k, f..k, also. Cancer doesn’t care whether it strikes the good guy or bad. Kevin is one of the good guys and I, too, found him on Calpundit and followed him to mother jones. Fight the good fight, Kevin.
cokane
Damn that news just made me sick to my stomach :[
MomSense
Sad news. I wish him all the best as he fights this disease.
My Dad is now two years cancer free and I am so grateful for the doctors and improved treatments that saved his life.
Oh and fuck cancer.
gogol's wife
I’m praying for Kevin. He seems like a nice man.
p.a.
First read him as Calpundit. Fine writer. Have not read much in a while, but I remember he gives those with different opinions the benefit of the doubt re: their aims and motivations. That should not be the default setting towards many in the public sphere at this time. Wish him all the best in his treatments; get well soon
Fuck cancer.
VFX Lurker
Sorry to hear this. :-( I wish him the best, too.
scav
All the best, to everyone involved.
Gypsy Howell
I never comment over there but I read Kevin every day, and have since back in the CalPundit days. If you’re reading this Kevin, all best wishes and positive energy sent your way. Get well buddy. (I consider you a buddy even though you have no idea who I am.)
-Gypsy
RSA
Kevin Drum’s blog has been a regular read for me since I don’t know when; back when I was living in Venice, CA, in 2005, I went to a couple of his (monthly?) group lunches at the Santa Monica Farmer’s Market. It’s nice to meet someone you feel a connection with, in person. I wish him the best of luck.
Villago Delenda Est
To say this sucks is to understate by orders of magnitude.
My thoughts are with Kevin as he fights this good fight.
Alison
@Egosion: Seriously?
I’ve lost two people in my family in the past few weeks, one of them very unexpected and shocking and awful, and I’m sure you think you’re being very deep here, and maybe when you’re removed from it you can have fun frolicking in your philosophy. Yeah, death is a fact, I’m okay with that…but it’s a shitty, sad, painful fact, and it’s perfectly fine for humans to resent it. It doesn’t mean you’re rejecting the facts of reality, it means you’re grappling with them in all their awfulness.
RobertDSC-iPhone 4
Ugh, indeed.
Best wishes to Kevin and his loved ones during his treatment.
Violet
That sucks. I hope his treatments are successful and continuing advances in cancer treatments provide additional options going forward. Best wishes to him during his treatment.
marvel norton
my darling husband died from this disease 12 years ago.
now a good friend has the same disease and doing very well.
we do have evidence of progress. wishing him well
mazareth
I’m also a long time reader/lurker of KD’s since the Calpundit days. I hope he has a full recovery.
Just got my own sh*tty cancer news this afternoon, so this really hits home at the moment.
@Egosion Dude! Really?
JDM
@smintheus: my dad died of the same cancer. At that time, not even all that long ago (less than 20 years) there was only a slim chance that some new experimental stuff could help. A couple years later there was more of a chance already, and it’s gotten better since then. It’s a tough haul, but Kevin in now in a position where he has a tough road ahead, rather than a death sentence. Not something anyone would choose, but so much better than a few years back.
JPL
@mazareth: Please take care and my wishes are with you also. Cancer treatment sucks but there have been amazing improvements.
mai naem mobile
Kevin says hes got a decent short term prognosis. Good luck. Read him a lot more when he was at WM. Definitely one of the good guys. And,yeah fuck fucking cancer.
Morzer
@Alison:
My mother died of cancer earlier this year. I think saying “Fuck death” is a fully human and honest reaction.
Here’s hoping Kevin Drum spits in the old bastard’s eye and rams that scythe where the sun don’t shine.
WRye
Fuckity fuck Fuck fuck
Fuck Cancer. Fuck it so much.
Scott S.
I’ve lost too many friends to cancer in the last few years. It’s gotten to be the thing I hate the most.
Wishing best of luck and incredibly excellent doctors to Kevin.
A Humble Lurker
At the very least, he sounds optimistic. That’s something. Here’s hoping for remission.
TooManyJens
Well, shit.
Another Calpundit reader from back in the day, here. Best of luck to Kevin and his family.
Egosion
@Alison @mazareth
yes really.
and no i do not consider myself deep or even remotely philosophical.
I am an outlier as I have been planing my death for the last 20 some years and i am aware that this is not a rational behavior and it certainly taints my perspective I am sad, devastated even when i encounter death in my family, but i do not resent death or cancer, this motion seems utterly misplaced.
SiubhanDuinne
Devastating news that just puts the shit cherry on an already fuckawful week.
I wouldn’t even wish this on Erick Erickson or Sean Hannity or Ann Coulter. To have it happen to one of the good guys is beyond sad. I’m heartened by the optimistic short-term prognosis, though.
john fremont
@dmsilev: Went to my uncle’s funeral for the same thing, colon cancer. I got it last year ,but have made a complete recovery after several rounds of surgery. Fuck those Repeal Obamacare yahoos, I recovered because I had decent health insurance. I want other people to have that too.
Manyakitty
@mazareth: Sh*t. Hang tough.
I actually logged into my Discus account to wish KD the best. Damn.
smintheus
@JDM: I’m sorry, JDM. My thesis adviser died of the same, very quickly, in 1994. It was devastating to lose him at such a young age.
Bonnie
@NineJean: I think he said he was at a Kaiser hospital in Santa Clara.
chopper
Fuck cancer. Right in its fuckin ear.
Ruviana
@Bonnie: Irvine.
chopper
@Egosion:
Just to demonstrate the old rule that there’s a contrarian for every subject on the internet…
Morzer
@chopper:
He’s the contrary in the Cole mine….
SiubhanDuinne
@Morzer:
Uh huh.
Uh huh.
karen
@Egosion:
Really? It’s easy to say that when cancer and death is an abstract. I had breast cancer, lost both breasts this year and I’ve started taking the hormone blockers so the cancer doesn’t come back. They make me nauseous and cause such bone pain that it feels like my hip bone is being drilled into.
I had sympathy for people who had cancer before. Now I have true empathy because I know the gambling that happens where you start a course of treatment, hoping it’ll be the magic pill that keeps you alive knowing the effect it has on your body.
You tell someone who is suffering through torture just for the chance of survival,
Say it to their face. I fucking dare you.
And fuck cancer. Fuck death.
Unabogie
I wrote this on his blog:
burnspbesq
@NineJean:
Drum lives in Irvine, CA (not too far from Martin, in fact). Unless he’s a Kaiser Permanente member, he’s probably being treated at the Irvine branch of Hoag, which has a pretty good rep for cancer care. And USC-Norris and City of Hope are also within striking distance.
Best wishes, KD. Kick its ass.
rikyrah
Prayers to him.
Miki
For those who give there’s this – http://bethematch.org/About-Us/How-we-help-patients/Be-The-Match-Registry/?gclid=CKTf8cPXxsECFZKCfgodP3sAWQ. They’re nationwide so it matters not where you live. Be The Match.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
I’ll be thinking of Kevin and his family, and hoping that the treatment is successful. I know it’s much better that in earlier times.
I lost a dear friend to the same disease a few years ago. He worked the door of a local club, which is how we met. He knew everybody, was genial to all and fond of quite a few. He’d sometimes stop by after a club closed and talk books. I loaned him The Plague, which he’d always refer to as “the book with the rats.” I loved him fiercely. He’s the man who introduced me to Bootsy Collins.
I so hope KD has a better course battling the illness. He’s a terrific blogger, and no doubt a fine man as well.
Barbara
@mazareth: hope you have a treatment plan in place as soon as possible, that the side effects are tolerable, and that the dumb comments you hear are at a minimum. Also, don’t be reluctant to manage your moods pharmacetically. Sign me, been there, done that.
LT
Oh, damn. Rotten. Best thoughts to KD.
kc
Oh, no. I hate to hear that. Kevin Drum just seems like a genuinely decent person.
Comrade Mary
Oh, I had a terrible feeling from his early, cryptic reports from the hospital. I’m another Calpundit reader who’s followed Kevin to all his new gigs, and I really wish him the best.
Yeah, and fuck cancer.
Bonnie
@Bonnie: Ruviana has it correct. From his blog: “I have to say that the Irvine Kaiser hospital is excellent.”
Susan S
I know a very brave woman who was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in 1998..and is still here, still leading an active giving life. What she went thru to beat this was indescribably painful..but she did it. The key seemed to be that she could tolerate Velcade. So, don’t despair for your friend.. But, if the worse happens, remember these words: It took my over a year to tell a friend, a gruff attorney, how sorry I was that he had lost his all-star teenage son after a long battle with cancer. Ted looked at me and said “Susan, cancer is a mean disease. When you have watched someone fight for so long..you almost have to believe it is a blessing when they finally can get out of here.” Cancer is a mean disease..but according to a world class surgeon I know, a specialist in sarcomas which are truly nasty , much of it is a matter of luck. If you are lucky, you get one that can be beat. If you aren’t..I wish Kevin Drum the best..he will need it. Thank you all for listening.. Cancer is a mean disease.
NCSteve
@Egosion: this week, I went to the funeral of a man who died in his early 30s of Hodgkins after a year long battle. He left a wife, his high school sweetheart with whom I worked for more than a decade, and a five year old daughter to whom he was utterly devoted and hundreds of friends, because he was the kind of guy who made friends by the hundred.
He was a cop and the right third of the church was filled with them, many of them openly weeping. By the time the pipes played and the flag was presented, the rest of us joined them.
All of us have known it was coming for weeks now, but it doesn’t make it any easier for a little blond wisp of a girl who is so much like her jaunty, joking daddy, a young professional woman coming to grips with the word “widow” or hundreds of friends and family whose hearts are aching when they imagine her trying to figure out how to start a second life after you’ve lost the love of your life.
And now Kevin Drum, voice for moderation and reason and decency in an increasingly immoderate, irrational and indecent world.
So spare me the circle of life crap right now. Fuck cancer and fuck death.
jonas
This is such a kick in the gut. KD is one of the good guys. He’s what I think we all hold up as the ideal in progressive punditry — he’s right-thinking, level-headed, and just so….decent: a fair-minded, reasonable, and generous observer of politics and society whose commentary says what so many of us think, but delivered more politely and more effectively. So many of his posts are just these quiet, calm smackdowns of whatever idiot conservative meme is slobbering its way across the internets that day, and its just a few well-aimed paragraphs, always with some stone cold facts and stats to back them up, and drop the mike on the stage and walk off. Job done. No fireworks. And, to be fair, he calls out liberals when they don’t have their shit together. I discovered him back when he was Calpundit in the early aughts and he’s been one of my daily go-to blogs ever since. Here’s hoping for many more productive years. And moar kitties!
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Susan S:
Dad was diagnosed with m.m. three years back. He was 66 at the time. The doctor told him that stem cell treatment would extend him at least nine years. Dad considered his family history and said that the stem cells were probably going to outlive the rest of him.
Dad’s doing fine now- as far as the m.m. goes. The asthma and the ticker worry us more.
slag
Such sad news! Love KD. If his comment section were better, his blog would be near the top of the list.
Chet
Jesus. And didn’t he just lose his kitty, Domino, last month?
john fremont
Hoping the best for Kevin Drum. As many of the commenters here said, cancer is a mean disease.
Aaron
fuck fuck fuckity fuck, that sucks.
Get well soon Kevin!
A
Darkrose
Well shit. That sucks.
If there’s a tiny bit of good news, it’s that the treatment has gotten a lot better for this particular cancer since my wife’s father was first diagnosed in 1983. At the time they gave him six months to live; he died in 1999. Hopefully they caught it in time to be able to treat it for Kevin.
RaflW
Multiple Myeloma killed my mother in 1996, when she was just 63 years old. It killed my aunt (only related to my mom by marriage, and they never lived in the same city). It is awful, though treatments had improved by the time my aunt had it.
My heart goes out to Mr. Drum. And here’s hoping that his diagnosis attracts more attention to this cancer that is clearly accelerating in frequency. We need to find out why. I suspect it is an environmental toxin at work. Some research is pointing to dioxin. Whatever it is, it’s likely widespread and persistent.
Dammit.
mazareth
Thanks to everyone who wished me well. AFAIK, my news isn’t as bad as Kevin’s. Part of the difficulty is getting the news at 4:15 PM on a Friday, so I don’t get to find out next steps until sometime Monday.