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Let's talk docs!
I love documentary film. Love, love, love. This is one of my favorite Academy Awards categories, and I love seeking out and watching the nominated films, though they can occasionally be a little harder to come by than the feature fiction film noms. It has definitely gotten easier over the years, what with Netflix and online streaming and more web site accessibility to the filmmakers and whatnot. It was fifteen years ago that I really started paying tons of attention to this category, specifically with my boy Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine, and that very memorable Oscar win which happened the same week we (Dubya/"we") went to war in Iraq and I quit smoking and... that's a story I tell elsewhere.
Here, let's look at this year's nominees:
Documentary Feature:
Abacus: Small Enough to Jail, Faces Places, Icarus, Last Men in Aleppo, Strong Island
Documentary Short:
Heroin(e), Edith + Eddie, Heaven Is a Traffic Jam on the 405, Knife Skills, Traffic Stop
Unfortunately, I have been busy and scattered and unable to complete my Oscars checklist before today's ceremony, and the Documentary Feature category, despite being one of my favorites, is my least complete. I've only seen Abacus: Small Enough to Jail, which I really liked. It's about a family-owned bank in New York City that serves the Chinese immigrant community and was prosecuted in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis for, well, nothing to be guilty of, really, while "too big to fail" banks kept on doing their greedy illegal things. The family in Abacus... is so awesome and it's a really good documentary. I'm so lame for not having seen the others; I've been hearing about Faces Places for months, and I have Last Men in Aleppo recorded off of PBS but haven't found time to watch... I don't know if Icarus or Strong Island will be able to beat the appeal of voting for Agnes Varda's Faces Places, because she is getting an honorary Oscar this year and she would be the first woman to get an honorary and competitive Oscar in the same year. That would be such a fun fact. (Some men have done that, including Walt Disney.)
Documentary shorts, though, I saw. I love Heroin(e) a lot. It follows people, including three main women, dealing with the heroin epidemic and overdose crises in Huntington, West Virginia. The three women are helping heroin addicts in very different ways, some through official work, some through less official outreach, all through compassion, problem-solving, and tackling the problem in ways our societal systems are clearly not. You'll find yourself smiling so big while watching drug court scenes. It's great. But it's also a sobering reminder of how desperately this good work is needed. I would love for this short to win the Oscar.
Knife Skills also documents outreach to people who've had trouble, in this case former convicts who go through a culinary training program and work at a fancy restaurant, and the troubles that ensue along the way. Traffic Stop, very timely, is about a black woman body slammed to the ground by a cop during her traffic stop, and I think it does a really good job of exploring how that was preventable while doing more than issuing general platitudes. It was a strength of that film that you watch what happens and then later hear the cop describe what happened. He never speaks a lie or distorts the facts, really, and when you hear them from him perspective you're like -- oh my god. Yes, that's what happened. And why couldn't you - or thousands of other cops - in that situation make it better instead of worse? It was very interesting. I think a lot of people like Heaven Is a Traffic Jam on the 405, which has very little to do with traffic and is instead a weird, trippy examination of a traumatized woman who grapples with her life and issues, among them childhood and mental health issues, with art and other tactics. Edith + Eddie is a sad story - an old newlywed couple (like 95, seriously) separated when the daughter and legal guardian of the woman take over because she is judged not competent to make her own legal decisions. It wasn't as well made of a film, but was kind of like watching a long, fairly interesting news story.
All right, who's going to win?
Documentary Feature: I can't pick mine, because I'm ignorant here. I think Faces Places might win.
Documentary Short: I want Heroin(e). It could be that or either of the Traffic ones though.
This is Oscar weekend, people! My own personal "New Year's Eve"-level festivity!
Showing posts with label Economists. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Economists. Show all posts
Saturday, March 03, 2018
Tuesday, December 27, 2016
Milk vs. Human Kindness
An Open Letter to Rep. Peter Welch of Vermont, his constituent dairy farmers, et. al.
Representative Welch, I read with interest an article (by Cleve R. Wootson Jr. of the Washington Post printed in the Chicago Tribune) about a letter signed by 20 U.S. legislators demanding the FDA require makers of soy milk, almond milk, and so forth to drop the word "milk" from their labels.
If it doesn't come from an animal, the word "milk" doesn't belong, the article said, summarizing your point. Of course, your own quote a couple of paragraphs later gets to the heart of the matter (or at least, why your heart's in it): these drinks are being placed in the dairy aisle (the outrage!) "right next to milk" you say, adding that dairy is "really crucial" in Vermont and much of "rural America," and dairy farmers are "hanging on by their fingernails."
To which I can only say: really? The end of the dairy industry as we know it? This could not happen soon enough!
Sometimes, we simply have to accept that a job that has been done for hundreds of years won't be with us forever. We have to accept that just because a profession has been in our family for generations doesn't mean we are entitled to it. We also have to accept that this might be for the better.
Often, it's technology that eliminates a job: consider the lamplighter whose gig was made unnecessary by our wired streetlights, or the telegraph and switchboard operators that have given way to ever speedier and more digital technologies, or even the bowling alley pinsetters whose work is now done by simple machine movement.
Sometimes, though, it's a moral goodness that eliminates a job. Where, now, are the slave traders that kidnapped thousands of humans, cruelly confined them, separated them from family members, and forced them into lives of suffering and sorrow that bore no hint of justice?
Please, Representative Welch, and dairy farmers of Vermont, open your hearts and minds to think about WHY people are buying more and more alternative "milks" and less and less of your cruel, unnecessary product.
We don't want to support an industry that relies on confining sentient beings.
We don't want to have adult females impregnated, only to then have their calves taken away (sometimes just to be slaughtered - a true wasted life).
Do you vouch for the health and safety of the cows on your constituents' dairy farms? Can you possibly assure us that the cows of your industry are not living lives of misery? You speak of farmers metaphorically "hanging by their fingernails" but what about newborn calves stolen from their mothers who are actually trying to cling to life? Or adult cows living in years of imprisonment, unable to have the simple freedom to walk or turn or roam?
Perhaps people would buy more of your milk, so "crucial" in Vermont, if you could assure us it isn't manufactured in cruelty.
On the other hand, maybe we would continue to reduce the amount of dairy milk we consume, because as the populace at large learns more and more about how to healthily sustain and nourish ourselves, we logically turn away from your "crucial" product.
We might continue to realize on a grand scale that we simply don't need milk. Despite the years of successful lobbying, despite your oh-so-powerful Vermont/rural America industry that has brainwashed minds young and old with slogans like "Got milk?" and "It does a body good!" we know that it doesn't do all that much "good" for our bodies at all.
Humans do NOT need cows' milk. Drop the tired old argument about calcium (available in plenty other foods). Despite your having convinced so many of them that they do, humans who have been weaned from their mothers after breastfeeding should take a hint from the rest of their fellow mammals and move on to other foods.
Where else in the class Mammalia do you see animals suckling at the breast of another species? Do you see tigers feeding at the breast of camels? Raccoons drinking from wolves? When someone forwards an "aw, shucks" heartstring-tugging photo of a mother dog letting the poor, abandoned kitten drink milk along with the puppy litter, it's interesting BECAUSE it's an anomaly. It's an emergency situation, not a way of life. Yes, humans would be doing right and good to feed an abandoned human baby who had no mother from a cow's udder in order to save the human baby's life. That does not even remotely justify an industry of pain and terror. Those mother-puppy-feeds-the-kitten stories demonstrate the milk of canine kindness -- not a bunch of inhumane humans locking bovine species into captive servitude to create an industry of suffering,
And by the way? Milk and dairy really aren't that healthy. You might be amazed at how much better you feel when you eliminate dairy from your diet, how easily you shed those few pounds of bloated abdomen that just accumulate and hang out when you're a milk drinker,
As a legislator, a position that purports to be about service and leadership, you ought to be spending your time and Congressional efforts creating sustainable, forward-thinking jobs and opportunities, rather than clinging to antiquated notions and perpetuating industries that have become completely out of control in the modern age as they scramble to produce enough for too many millions of greedy, entitled humans. You should be encouraging Vermont and others to build a healthy, happy future.
Is it acceptable for a rural farmer to have a couple of cows, milk them to provide for the family, and perhaps sell to a few local village households, while NOT removing and killing the calves, and while NOT keeping the mother penned but instead allowing her to be a free, roaming animal? Sure.
Is the massive dairy industry lobby that controls our nation now acceptable? Good god, no.
Please reconsider your ideas and strategy, and please try to use your position and your voice to actually do some (human and cow) bodies good.
Representative Welch, I read with interest an article (by Cleve R. Wootson Jr. of the Washington Post printed in the Chicago Tribune) about a letter signed by 20 U.S. legislators demanding the FDA require makers of soy milk, almond milk, and so forth to drop the word "milk" from their labels.
If it doesn't come from an animal, the word "milk" doesn't belong, the article said, summarizing your point. Of course, your own quote a couple of paragraphs later gets to the heart of the matter (or at least, why your heart's in it): these drinks are being placed in the dairy aisle (the outrage!) "right next to milk" you say, adding that dairy is "really crucial" in Vermont and much of "rural America," and dairy farmers are "hanging on by their fingernails."
To which I can only say: really? The end of the dairy industry as we know it? This could not happen soon enough!
Sometimes, we simply have to accept that a job that has been done for hundreds of years won't be with us forever. We have to accept that just because a profession has been in our family for generations doesn't mean we are entitled to it. We also have to accept that this might be for the better.
Often, it's technology that eliminates a job: consider the lamplighter whose gig was made unnecessary by our wired streetlights, or the telegraph and switchboard operators that have given way to ever speedier and more digital technologies, or even the bowling alley pinsetters whose work is now done by simple machine movement.
Sometimes, though, it's a moral goodness that eliminates a job. Where, now, are the slave traders that kidnapped thousands of humans, cruelly confined them, separated them from family members, and forced them into lives of suffering and sorrow that bore no hint of justice?
Please, Representative Welch, and dairy farmers of Vermont, open your hearts and minds to think about WHY people are buying more and more alternative "milks" and less and less of your cruel, unnecessary product.
We don't want to support an industry that relies on confining sentient beings.
We don't want to have adult females impregnated, only to then have their calves taken away (sometimes just to be slaughtered - a true wasted life).
Do you vouch for the health and safety of the cows on your constituents' dairy farms? Can you possibly assure us that the cows of your industry are not living lives of misery? You speak of farmers metaphorically "hanging by their fingernails" but what about newborn calves stolen from their mothers who are actually trying to cling to life? Or adult cows living in years of imprisonment, unable to have the simple freedom to walk or turn or roam?
Perhaps people would buy more of your milk, so "crucial" in Vermont, if you could assure us it isn't manufactured in cruelty.
On the other hand, maybe we would continue to reduce the amount of dairy milk we consume, because as the populace at large learns more and more about how to healthily sustain and nourish ourselves, we logically turn away from your "crucial" product.
We might continue to realize on a grand scale that we simply don't need milk. Despite the years of successful lobbying, despite your oh-so-powerful Vermont/rural America industry that has brainwashed minds young and old with slogans like "Got milk?" and "It does a body good!" we know that it doesn't do all that much "good" for our bodies at all.
Humans do NOT need cows' milk. Drop the tired old argument about calcium (available in plenty other foods). Despite your having convinced so many of them that they do, humans who have been weaned from their mothers after breastfeeding should take a hint from the rest of their fellow mammals and move on to other foods.
And by the way? Milk and dairy really aren't that healthy. You might be amazed at how much better you feel when you eliminate dairy from your diet, how easily you shed those few pounds of bloated abdomen that just accumulate and hang out when you're a milk drinker,
As a legislator, a position that purports to be about service and leadership, you ought to be spending your time and Congressional efforts creating sustainable, forward-thinking jobs and opportunities, rather than clinging to antiquated notions and perpetuating industries that have become completely out of control in the modern age as they scramble to produce enough for too many millions of greedy, entitled humans. You should be encouraging Vermont and others to build a healthy, happy future.
Is it acceptable for a rural farmer to have a couple of cows, milk them to provide for the family, and perhaps sell to a few local village households, while NOT removing and killing the calves, and while NOT keeping the mother penned but instead allowing her to be a free, roaming animal? Sure.
Is the massive dairy industry lobby that controls our nation now acceptable? Good god, no.
Please reconsider your ideas and strategy, and please try to use your position and your voice to actually do some (human and cow) bodies good.
Thursday, June 25, 2015
Moooove over, dairy: how to win my udder loyalty
From the true-true files: I drink a lot of coffee. And the salient point here is not just that I drink it, but I buy it. Regularly. With enthusiasm. (Like most foods and beverages,) I much prefer buying it to making it at home. I like going to coffee shops. I like getting coffee to go on the way to work. I consider stopping for iced coffee an essential first step to any errand. I like barista lingo, the hiss of steaming milk, and rewards programs.
Let's focus on those last two for a moment.
In the circles I run in, or any circles that I would ever want to run in, it's fun to debate the grand question of our era, to wit: Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts? I used to say that Starbucks is like cocaine (addictive, expensive, a definitive part of certain lifestyles, ubiquitous in L.A. and Manhattan) while DD is like crack (cheaper, grittier, arguably more powerful, easy to find on every corner in certain cities). But this is not to say I'm all about the behemoths, because I also dig independent coffee shops. I've done quality time in Insomnia, Buzz Coffee, Someday Cafe, Champion Coffee, and more recently, Beans and Bagels. I also like the coffee chains that haven't reached cartel saturation levels, like your Peet's and your Caribou and your Intelligentsia, and I like the local heroes: Dutch Bros., Biggby, Angel-in-Us. Basically, if you are willing to invest in espresso, ice cubes, and employees, I'm yours. "Iced coffee is civilization!" That's my motto, but I won't turn down a hot one, either.
So we need to talk about milk.
The dairy industry lobby is really powerful in the U.S./world. Disgustingly powerful. They have convinced so very, very many of you that milk is an essential part of your diet. "Got Milk?" "It does a body good," you know. Ha! The non-advertising truth is more like, what's up with suckling at the breast of an entirely different species, something most mammals only do when in dire orphaned straits? Because lattes, cappuccinos, cafe au lait, etc. are the greatest thing in the world, the aforementioned coffee shops buy a whole lot of milk. We are talking unfathomable amounts. The power of the dairy industry and economies of scale mean that milk comes cheap -- well, that and the immense suffering borne by the dairy cows, the calves ripped away from mothers, the mothers locked, immobile, in pens, the milking machines, the unjustified captivity, the industrial nightmare of it all. ("Got torture?" "It wears a body out!")
The coffee shops offer dairy alternatives, such as soy milk and more recently the trendy almond milk and coconut milk. This makes me happy. The coffee shops charge extra for these alternatives. This makes me sad. I have paid these extra charges over the decades because I have to, and I've watched them go from 30 or 40 cents extra to a standard of 50 or 60 and even sometimes 75 cents more for soy. 75 cents extra! For one drink! I can buy a carton of soy milk for $2.75 and get way more than four drinks out of it. (Don't even get me started on having the same upcharge for a latte, which is mostly milk, as for an iced coffee with milk, which is just a splash of soy. Some Starbucks cashiers do the right thing when you get just a splash and note "with soy" not "add soy" but you take your chances on this in general.) But the coffee shops don't pay anything close to retail prices for their truckloads of cow milk, so it makes some kind of economic sense to them to think of the cow milk in a latte as costing them a cent but the soy milk in a latte costing them 50 cents. That's not quite right, but I follow their thinking.
The problem is that the dairy industry is evil, and most coffee shops aspire to be socially conscious. What they should do is make soy/almond/coconut/oat/hemp milk free and charge extra for dairy.
Since the vast majority of people are ordering dairy, they could upcharge a mere ten cents and more than make their money back, but still call attention to the issue that your dairy choice is a bad choice (because it's cruel) (not to mention unhealthy) and that you could make a better choice. Or, hell, they could be brave enough to really speak truth to power and just go ahead and make it a fifty cent upcharge on dairy from the word go, which might light a fire under the ass of some of those who just need reality pointed out to them once in a while but who are willing to do the right thing.
And so here is my announcement:
Despite my love for any and all the coffee places, I hereby declare the I will permanently switch my loyalty to the first coffee place that makes soy and other non-dairy alternatives free while simultaneously charging extra for dairy.
If Starbucks has the socially responsible guts to do it, I'm theirs. If feisty upstart DD does it, something I find hard to imagine seeing as they recently made me pay the 50-cent almond milk upcharge when I got a "free" rewards drink that I had earned in their Perks program, then I will forever more choose to run on Dunkin' even if the mermaid is looking longingly at me from a block closer.If a smaller chain does it, I will visit that smaller chain every time I have the option to do so.
You might be thinking, um, what's the big deal? But if you actually know me, you know that the idea of becoming loyal to one coffee shop is a very big deal indeed. There couldn't be a bigger deal for me, unless I announced that I was going to read only genre fiction from here on out or something. (Note: that would never ever happen.) And whatever coffee shop is willing to make people face a tiny portion of the cost that the cruelty of dairy incurs will get the added benefit of my evangelizing on their behalf forever, too, because when I'm loyal, I can also be loquacious.
If there is some coffee place already doing this, not just giving soy/non-dairy alternatives free but also charging extra for cow's milk, some beautiful little coffee shop somewhere, then let me know, because that place is my next vacation destination (and who are you that you haven't told me about it already?)
In China, Starbucks didn't charge extra for soy. I don't always espouse the benefits of living in China (or, you know, ever espouse those largely non-existent benefits) but that one is a good one. In the U.S., we Starbucks Gold Card members used to get free soy, but it was apparently costing them too much, so they changed their rewards program. They should have changed it to charging all customers for dairy instead.
Who will do it? Who wants my loyalty -- for LIFE?
Let's focus on those last two for a moment.
In the circles I run in, or any circles that I would ever want to run in, it's fun to debate the grand question of our era, to wit: Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts? I used to say that Starbucks is like cocaine (addictive, expensive, a definitive part of certain lifestyles, ubiquitous in L.A. and Manhattan) while DD is like crack (cheaper, grittier, arguably more powerful, easy to find on every corner in certain cities). But this is not to say I'm all about the behemoths, because I also dig independent coffee shops. I've done quality time in Insomnia, Buzz Coffee, Someday Cafe, Champion Coffee, and more recently, Beans and Bagels. I also like the coffee chains that haven't reached cartel saturation levels, like your Peet's and your Caribou and your Intelligentsia, and I like the local heroes: Dutch Bros., Biggby, Angel-in-Us. Basically, if you are willing to invest in espresso, ice cubes, and employees, I'm yours. "Iced coffee is civilization!" That's my motto, but I won't turn down a hot one, either.
So we need to talk about milk.
The dairy industry lobby is really powerful in the U.S./world. Disgustingly powerful. They have convinced so very, very many of you that milk is an essential part of your diet. "Got Milk?" "It does a body good," you know. Ha! The non-advertising truth is more like, what's up with suckling at the breast of an entirely different species, something most mammals only do when in dire orphaned straits? Because lattes, cappuccinos, cafe au lait, etc. are the greatest thing in the world, the aforementioned coffee shops buy a whole lot of milk. We are talking unfathomable amounts. The power of the dairy industry and economies of scale mean that milk comes cheap -- well, that and the immense suffering borne by the dairy cows, the calves ripped away from mothers, the mothers locked, immobile, in pens, the milking machines, the unjustified captivity, the industrial nightmare of it all. ("Got torture?" "It wears a body out!")
The coffee shops offer dairy alternatives, such as soy milk and more recently the trendy almond milk and coconut milk. This makes me happy. The coffee shops charge extra for these alternatives. This makes me sad. I have paid these extra charges over the decades because I have to, and I've watched them go from 30 or 40 cents extra to a standard of 50 or 60 and even sometimes 75 cents more for soy. 75 cents extra! For one drink! I can buy a carton of soy milk for $2.75 and get way more than four drinks out of it. (Don't even get me started on having the same upcharge for a latte, which is mostly milk, as for an iced coffee with milk, which is just a splash of soy. Some Starbucks cashiers do the right thing when you get just a splash and note "with soy" not "add soy" but you take your chances on this in general.) But the coffee shops don't pay anything close to retail prices for their truckloads of cow milk, so it makes some kind of economic sense to them to think of the cow milk in a latte as costing them a cent but the soy milk in a latte costing them 50 cents. That's not quite right, but I follow their thinking.
The problem is that the dairy industry is evil, and most coffee shops aspire to be socially conscious. What they should do is make soy/almond/coconut/oat/hemp milk free and charge extra for dairy.
Since the vast majority of people are ordering dairy, they could upcharge a mere ten cents and more than make their money back, but still call attention to the issue that your dairy choice is a bad choice (because it's cruel) (not to mention unhealthy) and that you could make a better choice. Or, hell, they could be brave enough to really speak truth to power and just go ahead and make it a fifty cent upcharge on dairy from the word go, which might light a fire under the ass of some of those who just need reality pointed out to them once in a while but who are willing to do the right thing.
And so here is my announcement:
Despite my love for any and all the coffee places, I hereby declare the I will permanently switch my loyalty to the first coffee place that makes soy and other non-dairy alternatives free while simultaneously charging extra for dairy.
If Starbucks has the socially responsible guts to do it, I'm theirs. If feisty upstart DD does it, something I find hard to imagine seeing as they recently made me pay the 50-cent almond milk upcharge when I got a "free" rewards drink that I had earned in their Perks program, then I will forever more choose to run on Dunkin' even if the mermaid is looking longingly at me from a block closer.If a smaller chain does it, I will visit that smaller chain every time I have the option to do so.
You might be thinking, um, what's the big deal? But if you actually know me, you know that the idea of becoming loyal to one coffee shop is a very big deal indeed. There couldn't be a bigger deal for me, unless I announced that I was going to read only genre fiction from here on out or something. (Note: that would never ever happen.) And whatever coffee shop is willing to make people face a tiny portion of the cost that the cruelty of dairy incurs will get the added benefit of my evangelizing on their behalf forever, too, because when I'm loyal, I can also be loquacious.
If there is some coffee place already doing this, not just giving soy/non-dairy alternatives free but also charging extra for cow's milk, some beautiful little coffee shop somewhere, then let me know, because that place is my next vacation destination (and who are you that you haven't told me about it already?)
In China, Starbucks didn't charge extra for soy. I don't always espouse the benefits of living in China (or, you know, ever espouse those largely non-existent benefits) but that one is a good one. In the U.S., we Starbucks Gold Card members used to get free soy, but it was apparently costing them too much, so they changed their rewards program. They should have changed it to charging all customers for dairy instead.
Who will do it? Who wants my loyalty -- for LIFE?
Monday, October 06, 2014
When a Habitat build ends...what else begins?
Time passes interestingly when you're on a volunteer trip with Habitat for Humanity. In my experience, the first two days of the build always seem longer, as you sloooowly learn how to do what you're doing, work with new materials, work with new people, get accustomed to the work site, settle in to your accommodations and routine, practice the language, etc.
Then, the third day, often a Wednesday, all of a sudden the week seems to accelerate and the next few days go by in a blur. Regardless of the length of the build (mine have ranged, but usually the trip is between one to two weeks), the second-to-last day seems to go a bit more quickly in the afternoon, like all of a sudden it's almost time to be over. The last day often has a last-day-of-school feeling, although there's no pithy "See you next year!" tossed off in the yearbook signing, because there's a good chance you might not ever again see these people with whom you have worked, sweated, and broken bread.
The whole mud-straw-clay mixture process was one of the dirtier jobs I've done in this world, and I think it will be forever embedded in my Habitat Poland t-shirt and the shoes I wore on the work site, so those might never again be fit for normal daily wear. Our site was really well organized, and I got to try a few different jobs during the course of the build. I enjoyed the inside wall sanding/smoothing work the most. But the whole week was great, and I enjoyed the tunes and language acquisition I got by listening to the Polish radio station, too! Once in a while, the guys had to unplug the radio from the extension cord in order to plug in a drill temporarily and I would be eager for it to come back on.
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| Our work, in progress |
I loved pretty much everything about Poland and traveling there, and turns out the Habitat project itself was also great. As I've previously blog-mentioned, we were building a house for a man who was part of the Barka community of Marszewo, near Nowy Tomysl, west of Poznan, Poland. We, the baker's dozen volunteers, worked with him, our Habitat Poland coordinator, our local construction supervisor, and several other locals. Besides our coordinators, only one of the local guys spoke English, so there was definitely some opportunity to practice my Polish here and there. To be honest, when I'm with twelve people who can't speak a word and only one other North American with any grasp of bits of the language (beyond those who had early in the week mastered "piwo" for "beer"), even my minimal skills could come off as impressive once in a while, simply for being able to ask where something is or tell someone I understand. "Ahhh, you speak Polish very well!" they would respond in Polish. Ha! Don't worry, they'd quickly realize the truth. But it's fun to have even basic conversations, like, "I like the cat." "Me too."
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| There's Donna, up to her elbows in the mud tub |
And, I've already mentioned that the animals on this site were great: the three wonderful cats, the frolicking puppies (really, dogs, but I basically call any dog that I like a "puppy"), the goats who would come say hi when I walked toward their fence and said, "Hey, goats!", the poor pigs who live inside a pen their whole lives, the chickens with their daily greetings...
As I've told a few folks, I think it's really important to go work on a Habitat volunteer project, and not just because I believe in the cause of eradicating poverty housing. I spend a lot of time inside my head and/or staring at a computer screen, and I need to make myself go do real work in the world. Sure, for the physical exercise of it, but also for the mental. Get out of that inner space and out into the world.
As the wise Girls sing, which I've surely quoted here before, "Now I know a refuge never grows/from a chin in a hand and a thoughtful pose/gotta tend the Earth if you want a rose." (that would be Indigo Girls from "Hammer and a Nail"--feel free to play it while you read this blog entry!) I've been listening to that song for more than 20 years now (um--gulp!), and I understand what Emily Saliers means when she looks back on her early lyrics and cringes and sees them as pedantic or wishes she could change them...but really, once you actually do "go out and get a hammer and a nail," you do totally get it, in a way that's even deeper than when you sat in your bedroom playing that song (on cassette) over and over as a teenager. I don't really think she needs to worry too much. I mean, lines like "even my sweat smells clean..." are still, well, true!
And sure, maybe she would tinker with the words and the poetry, I get that, but to actually try to make your life more than a vision, to "get out of bed and get a hammer and a nail" on so many levels, is really a decent goal. Don't worry, Emily! Your youthful expression of this lofty concept still resonates.
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| "Loft"-y concepts, indeed |
One thing we talked about in multiple discussions while in Poland, including one great dinner conversation with the national director of Habitat Poland, was the immense challenge of solving the housing problem. But another thing we talked about was how many of us on this trip have worked with Habitat for a while and we observe it changing and growing, something that is crucial to any organization's success and effectiveness. It's not all about getting out there (with a hammer and a nail) building a new house, but Habitat also does advocacy work, building with eco-friendly materials, renovations, and so on. I personally love that Habitat works to restore and renovate urban housing (including in U.S. cities) because I think that is what we all should be doing (hello, developers, are you listening?) As someone who grew up in Phoenix, I have certainly observed the endless suburban sprawl, encroaching every month further upon the beautiful Arizona desert, while people demand more and more space (and then wonder why there are scorpions in their bathroom...) I may hate millennials (that's a long-running inside joke; don't try to understand it if you don't understand it) , but if they as a generation (if) are more interested in neighborhoods in urban centers than driving to a subdivision every day, they've got one thing right, anyway. I would love to see a moratorium on new home construction (oh my god, you can just hear the heart attacks that economists and politicians would have upon reading that line) and a major societal push (with financial incentives) to build, restore, renovate, and live in already-existing neighborhoods, in cities that have deteriorated AND in cities that have grown by flying ever outward and eating up the land.
(I might add that any of you who freak out about house cats killing birds and therefore advocate keeping cats imprisoned inside for their whole lives? might want to consider your !@#&%* subdivision's part in clear cutting and destroying birds' habitats, not to mention your endless malls and parking lots, and you might want to stop blaming the cats, who would much rather control the mouse population in the city for you anyway, and then everybody wins.)
Well, back to the U.S.A. I come with all my Poland and Habitat thoughts, and all my cares in the world. Gifts to bring, as Emily and Amy sing. Gifts to bring...
Monday, June 30, 2014
End Employer-Based Health Insurance Now
Or, when your hobby is lobbying against health care...
We have a major problem in the United States of America, but no one seems to have articulated it very clearly in the wake of the horrifying Supreme Court ruling in favor of Hobby Lobby and other corporations who don't want their religious liberty burdened. No, the problem to which I refer is not the fact that people in extremely high positions (such as CEOs and Supreme Court justices) think that corporations have religious liberty to be burdened in the first place, although that is, indeed, a problem. (Perhaps we should examine the blurring of religious/corporate lines in another post. It works both ways: churches are big business, you know.)
The problem to which I do refer is the fact that we (by which I of course mean "we") somehow still think it's a good idea for employers to provide health insurance in the first place. Why, oh why, does anyone still think this is a good idea?
It's not a good idea. Employer-based health insurance is a terrible, awful, no-good idea.
This problem has failed to be clearly articulated in the last several years as the debate has raged on (and on and on) about "Obamacare" and health insurance mandates and single-payer systems and Medicaid expansion. Many, many people have glossed right over that part where employers provide health coverage in the first place. We should immediately and permanently do away with that system.
It has never made any sense to me to begin with. A workplace is a random grouping of people who happen to live in more or less the same area, but not even with entirely the same skill sets/interests. For example, a corporation might employ HR gurus, software engineers, and architects, who have nothing in common. But, they are suddenly a "group" for health insurance purposes. It doesn't make any sense, but almost everyone has been conditioned to think it makes perfect sense.
The exception to that "everyone"? People like me who have made a living for a decade from freelancing, indepenent contracting, pursuing an advanced degree, and working abroad. Those noble pursuits will quickly show you how awful employer-based health care can be for someone trying to eke out a living without being on a corporate payroll. I could spend 50 hours working on writing and editing as a freelancer or independent contractor, but because I wasn't on a company's payroll, I was somehow less entitled to group coverage than someone who worked 35-40 hours in a cubicle. And changing employers, from country to country? Yikes! Arguably, the freelancers and independent contractors of the world (whether those contractors are artists or plumbers, whether they build kitchen cabinets or tutor youngsters learning violin) are working even harder to hustle, collect payments, maintain schedules, get clients, and so forth than "full-time employees," but we are apparently "lesser" when it comes to determining if we are eligible for health care. We are asked to buy insurance as individuals, without an employer subsidy, and we are charged at least $400-700 per month, sometimes more, for the equivalent coverage of what was an $80 or so pre-tax paycheck deduction when I was a full-time employee of a company that wasn't Myself.
Why not group everyone by zip code (like auto insurance does) or by some combination of age/smoker-non-smoker/exercise status, or heck, by their favorite NFL team (with all the "no preference" also forming a group?
Why don't these ideas make as much sense as deciding the employees of X company are now an insurance group?
This is hugely important because not everyone is employed by a company, but everyone can have a favorite NFL team (or "no preference"). Sometimes there is an idea that those who are not "employed by a company providing health coverage" are just the deadbeats/unemployed/lazy/illegal aliens/whatever who don't "deserve" health care, an argument we're not even going to waste time refuting, because it doesn't address what I have already pointed out: that it isn't just the "unemployed" who don't have employer health coverage. It is the very hardworking temp employees (I once worked for a YEAR as production assistant paid through a temp agency, before actually being hired as an official employee of the radio program--same desk, same duties, same everything) and the independent contractors and so forth.
There is major resistance to government-provided health coverage, but I don't know why that is any worse or weirder than employer-provided coverage. People change employers during their lifetimes a lot more often than they change citizenship. And wouldn't life be easier for employers as well, not having to deal with employees' health insurance? Which, by the way, has nothing to do with the work of most companies but necessitates having someone/some department deal with benefits all day? It's like a giant colossal waste. Why not have benefits people working for a benefits company that is just about benefits? Allocated by the NFL-team alignment, or zip code alignment, or favorite color alignment, or type of animal that was your first childhood pet, or whatever!!!!
WHY NOT, people??! Tell me why not?!?!
And guess what: then this Hobby Lobby religious freedom nonsense would not even be an issue. Religion would have absolutely nothing to do with it...because employers wouldn't be asked to do anything for health care, so they wouldn't have any religious objections.
Or, we could just divide everyone by religion/lack thereof in the first place and have the religious beliefs/non-beliefs be the health coverage groups (instead of the NFL team preferences). Then the health coverage groups would be the Mormons, the Catholics, the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Orthodox Jews, etc. and naturally the atheists and agnostics and humanists could also have group coverage.
Anything but this horrible system of employer-based group coverage, please. It is deeply flawed because it does not make insurance available to all, and it apparently causes problems because employers have to grapple with decisions they never should be having to grapple with in the first place (like the religious beliefs of anyone in the corporation, from top to bottom).
The federal marketplace/health exchanges are supposedly helping to solve this problem, although I have had such a hideous time trying to enroll in my Arizona health insurance (for which I qualify, freelance income-wise) that I still can't tell you, months later, if all of my paperwork has been finalized and approved. It's a disaster. (Not just a federal government web site disaster, states' rights people, but a state-level disaster as well.)
I don't know why anyone thought employer-based health coverage is a good idea, but today's Supreme Court Hobby Lobby decision proves once again that it is not. I am more than ready to be assigned to a group that has nothing to do with my employer.
I am more than ready to just cast my lot with the Arizona Cardinals fans, or whoever I elect as "my" team.
Imagine somebody worked super-hard for twenty years, saved money, and at age 45 had enough in savings, investments, and so forth to "retire" and just pursue basket-weaving in the garage? Well, if you weren't in the military for your "career," good luck with that. Not because you need to work for the income, but because you need to work for the health insurance. I'd much rather live in a world that groups us by NFL teams.
But even worse is the situation of the person who weaves beautiful baskets for her or his entire life, procuring the materials, creating them, selling them, and providing a much-needed service to everyone who wants baskets and lives a simple but comfortable life, unconcerned with SUVs or six-bedroom houses or 64-inch high-def television screens...but cannot so much as go to the dentist without spending a couple months' income. This latter situation is the world we live in, thanks to employer-based health insurance.
#endemployerhealthcoverage
The problem to which I do refer is the fact that we (by which I of course mean "we") somehow still think it's a good idea for employers to provide health insurance in the first place. Why, oh why, does anyone still think this is a good idea?
It's not a good idea. Employer-based health insurance is a terrible, awful, no-good idea.
This problem has failed to be clearly articulated in the last several years as the debate has raged on (and on and on) about "Obamacare" and health insurance mandates and single-payer systems and Medicaid expansion. Many, many people have glossed right over that part where employers provide health coverage in the first place. We should immediately and permanently do away with that system.
It has never made any sense to me to begin with. A workplace is a random grouping of people who happen to live in more or less the same area, but not even with entirely the same skill sets/interests. For example, a corporation might employ HR gurus, software engineers, and architects, who have nothing in common. But, they are suddenly a "group" for health insurance purposes. It doesn't make any sense, but almost everyone has been conditioned to think it makes perfect sense.
The exception to that "everyone"? People like me who have made a living for a decade from freelancing, indepenent contracting, pursuing an advanced degree, and working abroad. Those noble pursuits will quickly show you how awful employer-based health care can be for someone trying to eke out a living without being on a corporate payroll. I could spend 50 hours working on writing and editing as a freelancer or independent contractor, but because I wasn't on a company's payroll, I was somehow less entitled to group coverage than someone who worked 35-40 hours in a cubicle. And changing employers, from country to country? Yikes! Arguably, the freelancers and independent contractors of the world (whether those contractors are artists or plumbers, whether they build kitchen cabinets or tutor youngsters learning violin) are working even harder to hustle, collect payments, maintain schedules, get clients, and so forth than "full-time employees," but we are apparently "lesser" when it comes to determining if we are eligible for health care. We are asked to buy insurance as individuals, without an employer subsidy, and we are charged at least $400-700 per month, sometimes more, for the equivalent coverage of what was an $80 or so pre-tax paycheck deduction when I was a full-time employee of a company that wasn't Myself.
Why not group everyone by zip code (like auto insurance does) or by some combination of age/smoker-non-smoker/exercise status, or heck, by their favorite NFL team (with all the "no preference" also forming a group?
Why don't these ideas make as much sense as deciding the employees of X company are now an insurance group?
This is hugely important because not everyone is employed by a company, but everyone can have a favorite NFL team (or "no preference"). Sometimes there is an idea that those who are not "employed by a company providing health coverage" are just the deadbeats/unemployed/lazy/illegal aliens/whatever who don't "deserve" health care, an argument we're not even going to waste time refuting, because it doesn't address what I have already pointed out: that it isn't just the "unemployed" who don't have employer health coverage. It is the very hardworking temp employees (I once worked for a YEAR as production assistant paid through a temp agency, before actually being hired as an official employee of the radio program--same desk, same duties, same everything) and the independent contractors and so forth.
There is major resistance to government-provided health coverage, but I don't know why that is any worse or weirder than employer-provided coverage. People change employers during their lifetimes a lot more often than they change citizenship. And wouldn't life be easier for employers as well, not having to deal with employees' health insurance? Which, by the way, has nothing to do with the work of most companies but necessitates having someone/some department deal with benefits all day? It's like a giant colossal waste. Why not have benefits people working for a benefits company that is just about benefits? Allocated by the NFL-team alignment, or zip code alignment, or favorite color alignment, or type of animal that was your first childhood pet, or whatever!!!!
WHY NOT, people??! Tell me why not?!?!
And guess what: then this Hobby Lobby religious freedom nonsense would not even be an issue. Religion would have absolutely nothing to do with it...because employers wouldn't be asked to do anything for health care, so they wouldn't have any religious objections.
Or, we could just divide everyone by religion/lack thereof in the first place and have the religious beliefs/non-beliefs be the health coverage groups (instead of the NFL team preferences). Then the health coverage groups would be the Mormons, the Catholics, the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Orthodox Jews, etc. and naturally the atheists and agnostics and humanists could also have group coverage.
Anything but this horrible system of employer-based group coverage, please. It is deeply flawed because it does not make insurance available to all, and it apparently causes problems because employers have to grapple with decisions they never should be having to grapple with in the first place (like the religious beliefs of anyone in the corporation, from top to bottom).
The federal marketplace/health exchanges are supposedly helping to solve this problem, although I have had such a hideous time trying to enroll in my Arizona health insurance (for which I qualify, freelance income-wise) that I still can't tell you, months later, if all of my paperwork has been finalized and approved. It's a disaster. (Not just a federal government web site disaster, states' rights people, but a state-level disaster as well.)
I don't know why anyone thought employer-based health coverage is a good idea, but today's Supreme Court Hobby Lobby decision proves once again that it is not. I am more than ready to be assigned to a group that has nothing to do with my employer.
I am more than ready to just cast my lot with the Arizona Cardinals fans, or whoever I elect as "my" team.
Imagine somebody worked super-hard for twenty years, saved money, and at age 45 had enough in savings, investments, and so forth to "retire" and just pursue basket-weaving in the garage? Well, if you weren't in the military for your "career," good luck with that. Not because you need to work for the income, but because you need to work for the health insurance. I'd much rather live in a world that groups us by NFL teams.
But even worse is the situation of the person who weaves beautiful baskets for her or his entire life, procuring the materials, creating them, selling them, and providing a much-needed service to everyone who wants baskets and lives a simple but comfortable life, unconcerned with SUVs or six-bedroom houses or 64-inch high-def television screens...but cannot so much as go to the dentist without spending a couple months' income. This latter situation is the world we live in, thanks to employer-based health insurance.
#endemployerhealthcoverage
Monday, May 26, 2014
Fun with divestments!
This is the part where I freely admit that I have paid very little attention to what my city invests in. And not just because I hardly know what city to call "mine" in the first place. (In the five-year period preceding this blog post, I have lived in Guangzhou, Queretaro, Andong, Chicago, and New York, and I have "lived" in Phoenix, Grand Rapids, and Phuket.) Because I don't think I've ever given much thought at all to the fact that cities are investing in anything.
I mean -- if I stop to think (which I don't, ordinarily), "How does my city get money?" then it seems that "Um, sales tax?" is the answer. Isn't that what they tell us all along: property taxes fund schools, sales taxes fill city coffers, and income taxes make possible our roads and social services and all those billions of dollars of soldiers' salaries, education, housing, equipment, ammunition, etc. as they make the world safe/defend our freedom/generate greatness/get applauded at airports/kill people/lay waste to entire villages/stuff like that. (Cue apocryphal Thoreau: "No, Ralph, what are you doing out there?")
But then I go and read a little story like this one in which the city of Portlandweirdly wisely gets rid of 25% of its investments in Walmart, with plans to dump all its Walmart bonds by 2016, becoming the first U.S. city to divest funds from Walmart. Leading to some oh-so-very-obvious questions, among which:
1. Only 25%? Bigger, better, faster, more!! Come on, Portland!
2. Why the !@#%&* are you so invested in Walmart to begin with?
3. The "first" city to divest? *suspicious look* How many other cities are funding fucking Walmart and its horrible, abysmal practices?
4. Um - millions of dollars in Walmart bonds? That each of our major cities is just randomly paying?
That item #4 there is the one that strikes me deepest today. Amid all the talk about "We the Corporations" and the 99% and how freedom isn't free but tax loopholes apparently are and other hullabaloo, I don't think many people have ever really talked about the fact that cities like, say, Portland are investing millions of dollars in corporations like, say, Walmart. That is pretty terrible. Not just because Walmart's evil (it is) but because this whole moneymaking things goes unseen. Our society rolls merrily along with this idea that governments and corporations are separate things going about their business separately. Only, no. No, they are not.
How did cities make money in the past? In the year 1700, what did Boston and Plymouth and Providence do? Was there even a city clerk then? Maybe not. When were city clerks invented? When were city clerks' pensions invented? Who among ye knows anything whatsoever about all this?
Bankers, that's who. Rich ones.
And their CEO pals.
It's pretty grotesque, no?
(But seriously, people. Walmart?? Just: no.)
I mean -- if I stop to think (which I don't, ordinarily), "How does my city get money?" then it seems that "Um, sales tax?" is the answer. Isn't that what they tell us all along: property taxes fund schools, sales taxes fill city coffers, and income taxes make possible our roads and social services and all those billions of dollars of soldiers' salaries, education, housing, equipment, ammunition, etc. as they make the world safe/defend our freedom/generate greatness/get applauded at airports/kill people/lay waste to entire villages/stuff like that. (Cue apocryphal Thoreau: "No, Ralph, what are you doing out there?")
But then I go and read a little story like this one in which the city of Portland
1. Only 25%? Bigger, better, faster, more!! Come on, Portland!
2. Why the !@#%&* are you so invested in Walmart to begin with?
3. The "first" city to divest? *suspicious look* How many other cities are funding fucking Walmart and its horrible, abysmal practices?
4. Um - millions of dollars in Walmart bonds? That each of our major cities is just randomly paying?
That item #4 there is the one that strikes me deepest today. Amid all the talk about "We the Corporations" and the 99% and how freedom isn't free but tax loopholes apparently are and other hullabaloo, I don't think many people have ever really talked about the fact that cities like, say, Portland are investing millions of dollars in corporations like, say, Walmart. That is pretty terrible. Not just because Walmart's evil (it is) but because this whole moneymaking things goes unseen. Our society rolls merrily along with this idea that governments and corporations are separate things going about their business separately. Only, no. No, they are not.
How did cities make money in the past? In the year 1700, what did Boston and Plymouth and Providence do? Was there even a city clerk then? Maybe not. When were city clerks invented? When were city clerks' pensions invented? Who among ye knows anything whatsoever about all this?
Bankers, that's who. Rich ones.
And their CEO pals.
It's pretty grotesque, no?
(But seriously, people. Walmart?? Just: no.)
Tuesday, April 22, 2014
Could we use a man like Herbert Hoover again?
Normally, I write about books over on the ol' Literary Supplement, but what I have to say after finishing An Uncommon Man: The Triumph of Herbert Hoover is far less about Richard Norton Smith's book, which had some pretty serious flaws, and more about Hoover, the man.
Strengths: Efficiency. Thrift. Churned out a lot of words. Anti-militaristic. Fed people (entire starving nations, in fact). Supported equal pay for women, the end of child labor, etc. Worked hard. Worked tirelessly, into his ninth decade. Self-made man, as they say. Traveled the world. Known to offer up a pithy comment or two. They loved him in Belgium. And Poland. Random acts of generosity. Enthusiastically supported young people, from Scouts organizations to Boys' Clubs to answering thousands of letters people wrote to him, well into his old age.
Example: He agreed with a young woman that "the chances of a female president were improving; after all, 'the men have not done too good a job of government...in the last forty-seven years' and wishing her well 'if you are a candidate for President about thirty years hence."
Another girl, Kathleen, told him she wasn't yet born when he was president and she wanted to be not president, but a doctor. He wrote, "My dear Kathleen, You were saved a lot of trouble by not being born earlier. I am glad you want to be a doctor and not President. We do not have enough doctors, and there seems to be a sufficient number of candidates for President." --from p. 383 of An Uncommon Man
Weaknesses: Probably wasn't meant to be a president, namely because he didn't excel at the compromising political schmoozing of it all. (On second thought, maybe this is a strength.) Listened a little too carefully to some of Joseph McCarthy's fears, although not the rabid paranoia.
Fascination factor: High. He was born in 1874 and died in 1964. The year he was born, Thomas Edison was inventing the duplex telegraph, Jesse James was robbing trains, and Hoover's eventual alma mater, Stanford University, did not yet exist. By the time he died, he had gone from meeting with Charles Lindbergh through advising against dropping the atomic bomb to congratulating John Glenn on orbiting the Earth. He also outlived, among others, his wife Lou, his pal General MacArthur, and Eleanor Roosevelt, not to mention his successor FDR and John F. Kennedy, whose father the ambassador to England had known Hoover for a while.
The man got around. He met everyone from Hitler to Eva Peron, and he was friends with other presidents from Woodrow Wilson to Harry Truman, with FDR being basically the exception (he spent time with and was consulted by Eisenhower AND Kennedy). Bottom line is that Hoover had a fascinating decades-long pre-presidency career and an accomplished decades-long retirement, but all most people know about him is "the Depression!" And really, he was unfairly blamed for the so-called Great Depression, as if any one person caused it or could solve it single-handedly, and it's interesting to note the complicating factors of his administration, such as: Congress. The economic policies of his predecessor, Calvin Coolidge. The fact that FDR was his own brand of crazy, when he swooped in to "save" the day -- and the fact that FDR used some of Hoover's ideas and already-started-before-FDR-got-there tactics.
Other fun facts gleaned from this bio, in a more-things-change-the-more-they... way:
*In the aftermath of World War I, "Washington sports fans cheered a uniformed sailor for shooting to death a fellow spectator who refused to stand for the national anthem."
*In a 1935 speech, Hoover noted the way some politicians stifled dissent: "They set up a glorious ideal to which we all agree unanimously. Then they drive somewhere else or into a ditch. When we protest they blackguard us for opposing the glorious ideal. And they announce that all protesters are the tools of Satan or Wall Street. When we summon common sense and facts they weep aloud over their martyrdom for the ideal."
*"If America joined the [World] war [II], he said, and was rewarded with victory, 'then we will have won for Stalin the grip of communism in Russia and a greater opportunity for it to extend in the world. We should at least cease to tell our sons that they will be giving their lives to restore democracy and freedom.'" -p.298
*In a 1954 critique of foreign policy, he noted: "We should cease to jabber about leading the world. Sometime the world will turn on us with remarks as to where we have led to."
Furthermore, I hereby declare that we should bring back the name Herbert. Come on, hipsters, get with me on this! I previously mentioned, during my reading of the William H. Taft bio, that I really like President Taft's brother Horace--he was a fun guy!--and that I kind of wanted to bring back the long-forgotten name Horace. Well, now I'm adding Herbert to my list. If I have twin sons, perhaps they'll be named Horace and Herbert. Or maybe I should just get two puppies or kittens for this purpose.
While I learned a lot about Hoover, I should probably check every fact in this book, because author Richard Norton Smith and his editors apparently couldn't be bothered to do so themselves. I've ranted elsewhere about the incorrect statement that the Hoover Dam is on "the California/Nevada border" (hello, can you read a map?) but that isn't the only fact Smith gets wrong herein. So, I do advise you to learn a thing or two about Hoover, but maybe check out some other sources while you're doing it.
And may we all hope to be as accomplished and prolific in ninety allotted years on this Earth!
Strengths: Efficiency. Thrift. Churned out a lot of words. Anti-militaristic. Fed people (entire starving nations, in fact). Supported equal pay for women, the end of child labor, etc. Worked hard. Worked tirelessly, into his ninth decade. Self-made man, as they say. Traveled the world. Known to offer up a pithy comment or two. They loved him in Belgium. And Poland. Random acts of generosity. Enthusiastically supported young people, from Scouts organizations to Boys' Clubs to answering thousands of letters people wrote to him, well into his old age.
Example: He agreed with a young woman that "the chances of a female president were improving; after all, 'the men have not done too good a job of government...in the last forty-seven years' and wishing her well 'if you are a candidate for President about thirty years hence."
Another girl, Kathleen, told him she wasn't yet born when he was president and she wanted to be not president, but a doctor. He wrote, "My dear Kathleen, You were saved a lot of trouble by not being born earlier. I am glad you want to be a doctor and not President. We do not have enough doctors, and there seems to be a sufficient number of candidates for President." --from p. 383 of An Uncommon Man
Weaknesses: Probably wasn't meant to be a president, namely because he didn't excel at the compromising political schmoozing of it all. (On second thought, maybe this is a strength.) Listened a little too carefully to some of Joseph McCarthy's fears, although not the rabid paranoia.
Fascination factor: High. He was born in 1874 and died in 1964. The year he was born, Thomas Edison was inventing the duplex telegraph, Jesse James was robbing trains, and Hoover's eventual alma mater, Stanford University, did not yet exist. By the time he died, he had gone from meeting with Charles Lindbergh through advising against dropping the atomic bomb to congratulating John Glenn on orbiting the Earth. He also outlived, among others, his wife Lou, his pal General MacArthur, and Eleanor Roosevelt, not to mention his successor FDR and John F. Kennedy, whose father the ambassador to England had known Hoover for a while.
The man got around. He met everyone from Hitler to Eva Peron, and he was friends with other presidents from Woodrow Wilson to Harry Truman, with FDR being basically the exception (he spent time with and was consulted by Eisenhower AND Kennedy). Bottom line is that Hoover had a fascinating decades-long pre-presidency career and an accomplished decades-long retirement, but all most people know about him is "the Depression!" And really, he was unfairly blamed for the so-called Great Depression, as if any one person caused it or could solve it single-handedly, and it's interesting to note the complicating factors of his administration, such as: Congress. The economic policies of his predecessor, Calvin Coolidge. The fact that FDR was his own brand of crazy, when he swooped in to "save" the day -- and the fact that FDR used some of Hoover's ideas and already-started-before-FDR-got-there tactics.
Other fun facts gleaned from this bio, in a more-things-change-the-more-they... way:
*In the aftermath of World War I, "Washington sports fans cheered a uniformed sailor for shooting to death a fellow spectator who refused to stand for the national anthem."
*In a 1935 speech, Hoover noted the way some politicians stifled dissent: "They set up a glorious ideal to which we all agree unanimously. Then they drive somewhere else or into a ditch. When we protest they blackguard us for opposing the glorious ideal. And they announce that all protesters are the tools of Satan or Wall Street. When we summon common sense and facts they weep aloud over their martyrdom for the ideal."
*"If America joined the [World] war [II], he said, and was rewarded with victory, 'then we will have won for Stalin the grip of communism in Russia and a greater opportunity for it to extend in the world. We should at least cease to tell our sons that they will be giving their lives to restore democracy and freedom.'" -p.298
*In a 1954 critique of foreign policy, he noted: "We should cease to jabber about leading the world. Sometime the world will turn on us with remarks as to where we have led to."
Furthermore, I hereby declare that we should bring back the name Herbert. Come on, hipsters, get with me on this! I previously mentioned, during my reading of the William H. Taft bio, that I really like President Taft's brother Horace--he was a fun guy!--and that I kind of wanted to bring back the long-forgotten name Horace. Well, now I'm adding Herbert to my list. If I have twin sons, perhaps they'll be named Horace and Herbert. Or maybe I should just get two puppies or kittens for this purpose.
While I learned a lot about Hoover, I should probably check every fact in this book, because author Richard Norton Smith and his editors apparently couldn't be bothered to do so themselves. I've ranted elsewhere about the incorrect statement that the Hoover Dam is on "the California/Nevada border" (hello, can you read a map?) but that isn't the only fact Smith gets wrong herein. So, I do advise you to learn a thing or two about Hoover, but maybe check out some other sources while you're doing it.
And may we all hope to be as accomplished and prolific in ninety allotted years on this Earth!
Sunday, September 16, 2012
It's the stupid economy
I'm not really sure when we turned the job of President of the United States into the job of Man in Charge of the Economy. (And no, it should not be a job description with "man" in the title, but that's how the powers that be like it. It should not be a man in the White House now, and it should not have been a man that won the Democratic nomination in 2008, but none of this is the point of this particular blog entry, so let's focus.) We are obsessed, it would seem, with the economy, and more importantly with the idea that it is the president's job to manage/control/"fix"/be blamed for the economy. I'm curious about this.
I mean, for example, there's the Constitution. That's a good place to check for presidential job duties. In that document, the prez is more of a foreign powers/treaties guy, who should make recommendations to Congress. Obviously, the federal budget and the national economy are great subjects about which to make said recommendations, but that would simply mean hundreds of People in Charge of the Economy, not one.
I'm not saying that this is a new problem. Grover Cleveland, James Buchanan, and Martin Van Buren are just a few of the presidents who were blamed for dire economic circumstances during the 19th century.But why? What happened? When did we decide that one guy (guy, ugh) is in charge of it all? It's not as if he is called the Economist in Chief, even.
I'm also curious about the way the self-styled conservatives, specifically, talk about this right now. Their general discourse seems to be that Mitt Romney is the better candidate to "handle" the economy. (Notice there is no question as to whether it's the president's job to do this.) But I also hear most of these small-government fiscal conservatives talk a lot about individual responsibility. They like to perpetuate the idea that every man (and sometimes, if we're lucky, every woman too) has the same opportunities to make money, start a business (as if all of us want to/are meant to start businesses), go from rags to riches, "build that," be successful, and maybe even get his own reality TV show one day. Personal responsibility, individual responsibility, freedom, liberty, and don't let those commie-liberals get their hands on my money! Responsibility, responsibility, responsibility, that's the rallying cry. Oh, except the economy sucks. So we need someone to fix it for us.This is what I hear them say: We don't want so-called big government to take away our money/guns/freedom or give too many services to anyone else, because we totally believe that we should be individually responsible. But, the president is In Charge of the Economy.
Doesn't that seem a little bit hypocritical?
I mean, for example, there's the Constitution. That's a good place to check for presidential job duties. In that document, the prez is more of a foreign powers/treaties guy, who should make recommendations to Congress. Obviously, the federal budget and the national economy are great subjects about which to make said recommendations, but that would simply mean hundreds of People in Charge of the Economy, not one.
I'm not saying that this is a new problem. Grover Cleveland, James Buchanan, and Martin Van Buren are just a few of the presidents who were blamed for dire economic circumstances during the 19th century.But why? What happened? When did we decide that one guy (guy, ugh) is in charge of it all? It's not as if he is called the Economist in Chief, even.
I'm also curious about the way the self-styled conservatives, specifically, talk about this right now. Their general discourse seems to be that Mitt Romney is the better candidate to "handle" the economy. (Notice there is no question as to whether it's the president's job to do this.) But I also hear most of these small-government fiscal conservatives talk a lot about individual responsibility. They like to perpetuate the idea that every man (and sometimes, if we're lucky, every woman too) has the same opportunities to make money, start a business (as if all of us want to/are meant to start businesses), go from rags to riches, "build that," be successful, and maybe even get his own reality TV show one day. Personal responsibility, individual responsibility, freedom, liberty, and don't let those commie-liberals get their hands on my money! Responsibility, responsibility, responsibility, that's the rallying cry. Oh, except the economy sucks. So we need someone to fix it for us.This is what I hear them say: We don't want so-called big government to take away our money/guns/freedom or give too many services to anyone else, because we totally believe that we should be individually responsible. But, the president is In Charge of the Economy.
Doesn't that seem a little bit hypocritical?
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Broccoli Insurance
The incessant coverage of the Supreme Court oral arguments about the affordable healthcare law have been fascinating, even without the broccoli fetish. But it has been really annoying when interviewers and reporters talk about the "fact" that the uninsured are going to use these services and not pay for them (therefore insurance companies/the law/lots of people want everyone to pay in to the system, which I think is a fine idea, by the way). They always just gloss over that part about how "the uninsured are going to go to the emergency room and receive care." Well, yes, anyone who is in an emergency will have their condition stabilized; the paramedics at the car accident aren't going to watch you bleed to death or refuse to pry you from the car until you show your health insurance card. But the talking heads keep talking as if that's the end of the story. Have you people ever been to an emergency room, or doctor's office for that matter? You still get billed for the services. It's not like the uninsured just waltz in with their broken leg or ruptured spleen or whatever and get in the Uninsured-So-I'm-Not-Paying line. What planet do these people live on that they don't think uninsured get billed for services rendered? Besides, insured people get billed, too. The most recent health insurance I had in the U.S. was so laughably far from covering things at 100% that of course I got billed after the fact.
The inaccurate, incomplete way people have been talking about getting free healthcare when you are uninsured is a fantasy! I know - because I'm uninsured right now, having returned from my job in Korea (fabulous cheap health care!) and not yet able to cough up the $500/month the companies want to insure a single freelancer. I would love to have some free health care just by showing up at a hospital! I wish!
The inaccurate, incomplete way people have been talking about getting free healthcare when you are uninsured is a fantasy! I know - because I'm uninsured right now, having returned from my job in Korea (fabulous cheap health care!) and not yet able to cough up the $500/month the companies want to insure a single freelancer. I would love to have some free health care just by showing up at a hospital! I wish!
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Stockard, irrational human behavior, and me
So. Then. This has been a doozy of a last few days, only I just realized it today. For those who don't know this about me (uh--is there anyone?), I like to think about things. And I also like to think about myself and how I relate to things. This would explain why figuring out what to do with my life is for me more of a hobby than any sort of finite goal. Anyway, in reading for my Negotiation Seminar today (I love that class) I was confronted with a clear demonstration of the sort of eternal puzzle that is human interaction.
First, the weekend. Well, specifically Sunday: Jenn, Brian, and I attended a Broadway show, Pal Joey, starring Stockard Channing and Martha Plimpton. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I thought they were both amazing, as was the star Matthew Risch, who played Joey. He was an understudy, who took over during previews when the star was injured! How amazing for him! Anyway, fyi, Martha Plimpton can SING. And Stockard Channing, well, she is just fantastic all the time and I was so excited after we got seriously cheap theater tickets to find out I'd be seeing her show.
Probably the most famous song from Pal Joey is "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered," although I hereby confess I did not even know it was from this musical, or any musical. It made so much more sense to us in context. In the playbill profile of Stockard Channing she talks about what it was like to sing this famous song that everybody knows as "just a song," whether sung by Doris Day or Rosemary Clooney or whoever, and she talks about approaching it as her character, Vera's, monologue, and that the audience should be following her every line and seeing the conflict in her. Boy, does she pull it off. She is in bed with this man and she knows, she knows, that he is no good and she mustn't fall for him, and even going in with eyes wide open, as it were, she still falls for him and, specifically, mistakenly, lets him get to her.
Good drama. Back to Negotiation: we study in this seminar the ways in which people bargain, get what they want, and try to resolve conflict. I have a million interesting stories from the readings in there, but I'll stick to just one today. In a study people were presented with the question of an impending disease outbreak, let's say an Asian bird flu type of thing, that is expected to kill 600 people. Which of these two alternative programs would you favor? If Program A is adopted, 200 will be saved. If Program B is adopted, there's a one-third probability all will be saved and a two-thirds probability none will be saved.
Well, 76% chose Program A, and 24% chose Program B. In other words, saving 200 lives for certain was more highly valued than taking a risk, even though the risk has the same "expected value" (I often loathe those economics terms, but meaning that the value of a 1/3 chance of saving all = 1/3 of all = 200 out of 600, that is, the same as the definite # in A. The subjects of the study did not want to take a risk.
But here's the good part! Ready? They also asked a group of subjects the same premise, with the following two options: If Program A is adopted, 400 people will die. If Program B is adopted, there is a one-third probability no one will die and a two-thirds probability all will die. And this time, only 13% chose A and 87% chose B! These subjects chose the risk-taking alternative.
Why? Objectively they are the same. But when it is framed differently, in terms of lives saved (gains) or lives lost (losses), it was enough to shift the majority of the people from risk-averse to risk-taking. Why?
So then I thought about this in terms of myself. Negotiation professor is always encouraging us to look at the negotiations in our lives that happen every day, from "Where are we going for dinner?" to hiring someone to do the flowers at your wedding. Today when I read that story, I thought about myself, my rational/irrational behavior, and whether I take risks. When I read the choices the first time around, I -- unlike apparently 76% of people -- was inclined to choose Program B, and take the risk. Does that make me risk-seeking? Irrational? Is there any difference for me between my willingness to risk when there are losses and not gains at stake?
Personalizing, let's say my student loan is running out, Brian is unemployed, and we've got to do amazing feats of budgeting in order to be able to pay rent for the rest of the semester. Meanwhile, my spring break is coming up and I really want to be able to go on a trip for my last spring break of law school, and I want Brian to come with me. It upsets me greatly to have to cover more than my share of the rent, but I am perfectly OK with paying for Brian's "share" of a spring break trip so that we can go.
Is this irrational? I didn't think it was, and I said as much: my wanting Brian to come on the trip is selfish, not just paying "for" him. I want us to go a-traveling. So, even the economists should be pleased: it's my rational self-interest. But who "wants" to pay the rent, any share of it? Except to avoid the alternative: not having a place to live.
So today while I read, I tried to fit my behavior into this risk-averse/risk-taking analysis. Is it because I am in the minority? That I'll gamble on something and spend big when I see there's something to gain, no problem, but when it's something to lose (i.e. our abode) I kick and scream and fight against it?
And what would Stockard Channing-as-Vera say...
I'm wild again
Beguiled again
A simpering, whimpering child again
Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered am I...
But then at the end of the show, in the reprise, after she has seen the light or come to her senses or stopped this irrational affair, she sings:
Burned a lot
But learned a lot
And now you are broke though you earned a lot
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered no more
Interesting. And I can't even tell you how interesting I find it every week when we talk about so-called rational human behavior in our Negotiation Seminar. One is supposed to stop behaving like that simpering, whimpering child. And yet, in order to please the economists, who like to describe rational behavior, one is supposed to act in one's self-interest. Economists hate it when people don't act in their own rational self-interest. But I propose that it's all the same, and it doesn't have to be pegged as rational or irrational: we are trying to get what we want.
Or maybe I just like how my Girls put it best:
But now you feel that you've got nothing left.
If there's nothing to lose babe,
Ah babe, don't you know by now?
Then there's nothing to gain.
--indigo girls, 'walk away'
First, the weekend. Well, specifically Sunday: Jenn, Brian, and I attended a Broadway show, Pal Joey, starring Stockard Channing and Martha Plimpton. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I thought they were both amazing, as was the star Matthew Risch, who played Joey. He was an understudy, who took over during previews when the star was injured! How amazing for him! Anyway, fyi, Martha Plimpton can SING. And Stockard Channing, well, she is just fantastic all the time and I was so excited after we got seriously cheap theater tickets to find out I'd be seeing her show.
Probably the most famous song from Pal Joey is "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered," although I hereby confess I did not even know it was from this musical, or any musical. It made so much more sense to us in context. In the playbill profile of Stockard Channing she talks about what it was like to sing this famous song that everybody knows as "just a song," whether sung by Doris Day or Rosemary Clooney or whoever, and she talks about approaching it as her character, Vera's, monologue, and that the audience should be following her every line and seeing the conflict in her. Boy, does she pull it off. She is in bed with this man and she knows, she knows, that he is no good and she mustn't fall for him, and even going in with eyes wide open, as it were, she still falls for him and, specifically, mistakenly, lets him get to her.
Good drama. Back to Negotiation: we study in this seminar the ways in which people bargain, get what they want, and try to resolve conflict. I have a million interesting stories from the readings in there, but I'll stick to just one today. In a study people were presented with the question of an impending disease outbreak, let's say an Asian bird flu type of thing, that is expected to kill 600 people. Which of these two alternative programs would you favor? If Program A is adopted, 200 will be saved. If Program B is adopted, there's a one-third probability all will be saved and a two-thirds probability none will be saved.
Well, 76% chose Program A, and 24% chose Program B. In other words, saving 200 lives for certain was more highly valued than taking a risk, even though the risk has the same "expected value" (I often loathe those economics terms, but meaning that the value of a 1/3 chance of saving all = 1/3 of all = 200 out of 600, that is, the same as the definite # in A. The subjects of the study did not want to take a risk.
But here's the good part! Ready? They also asked a group of subjects the same premise, with the following two options: If Program A is adopted, 400 people will die. If Program B is adopted, there is a one-third probability no one will die and a two-thirds probability all will die. And this time, only 13% chose A and 87% chose B! These subjects chose the risk-taking alternative.
Why? Objectively they are the same. But when it is framed differently, in terms of lives saved (gains) or lives lost (losses), it was enough to shift the majority of the people from risk-averse to risk-taking. Why?
So then I thought about this in terms of myself. Negotiation professor is always encouraging us to look at the negotiations in our lives that happen every day, from "Where are we going for dinner?" to hiring someone to do the flowers at your wedding. Today when I read that story, I thought about myself, my rational/irrational behavior, and whether I take risks. When I read the choices the first time around, I -- unlike apparently 76% of people -- was inclined to choose Program B, and take the risk. Does that make me risk-seeking? Irrational? Is there any difference for me between my willingness to risk when there are losses and not gains at stake?
Personalizing, let's say my student loan is running out, Brian is unemployed, and we've got to do amazing feats of budgeting in order to be able to pay rent for the rest of the semester. Meanwhile, my spring break is coming up and I really want to be able to go on a trip for my last spring break of law school, and I want Brian to come with me. It upsets me greatly to have to cover more than my share of the rent, but I am perfectly OK with paying for Brian's "share" of a spring break trip so that we can go.
Is this irrational? I didn't think it was, and I said as much: my wanting Brian to come on the trip is selfish, not just paying "for" him. I want us to go a-traveling. So, even the economists should be pleased: it's my rational self-interest. But who "wants" to pay the rent, any share of it? Except to avoid the alternative: not having a place to live.
So today while I read, I tried to fit my behavior into this risk-averse/risk-taking analysis. Is it because I am in the minority? That I'll gamble on something and spend big when I see there's something to gain, no problem, but when it's something to lose (i.e. our abode) I kick and scream and fight against it?
And what would Stockard Channing-as-Vera say...
I'm wild again
Beguiled again
A simpering, whimpering child again
Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered am I...
But then at the end of the show, in the reprise, after she has seen the light or come to her senses or stopped this irrational affair, she sings:
Burned a lot
But learned a lot
And now you are broke though you earned a lot
Bewitched, bothered and bewildered no more
Interesting. And I can't even tell you how interesting I find it every week when we talk about so-called rational human behavior in our Negotiation Seminar. One is supposed to stop behaving like that simpering, whimpering child. And yet, in order to please the economists, who like to describe rational behavior, one is supposed to act in one's self-interest. Economists hate it when people don't act in their own rational self-interest. But I propose that it's all the same, and it doesn't have to be pegged as rational or irrational: we are trying to get what we want.
Or maybe I just like how my Girls put it best:
But now you feel that you've got nothing left.
If there's nothing to lose babe,
Ah babe, don't you know by now?
Then there's nothing to gain.
--indigo girls, 'walk away'
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