The Problem with Lisa Jackson

The EPA turned 40 years old yesterday.  Tavis Smiley interviewed Lisa Jackson, EPA Administrator, on KUOW today, asking her about highlights and lowlights of the EPA over the last 40 years.  Jackson listed lots of accomplishments of the EPA: banning DDT, stopping acid rain, etc.; finally Smiley asked her about the BP Gulf oil spill: was that one of the "lowlights"?  Jackson's response disturbed me.  She said that the Gulf spill was not the company's fault, they're "in the business of making money", so you can't expect them to think about protecting the environment.

Lisa Jackson's answer hit the nail on the head of what is wrong with America; she has bought into the notion that business is value-free.  We have elevated profit-making above all else.  Making money has its own intrinsic value, it is above reproach and we cannot judge it with moral standards.  While businesses are making money the rest of us play catch-up trying to figure out how they have cheated or diverted rules and regulations, or gotten away with murder.  Businesses are not responsible because they are "in the business of making money".

This kind of thinking is rotting the core of the nation.  We worship money, and whoever makes lots of it must be right.  Even those who seem to have other values bow down at the altar of money.  How can we begin the change if we don't see the need to?  Obama, who spoke eloquently about "hope and change" is giving us more of the same: banks and rich people first, they are, after all, what counts.

What did Jesus say about the rich man?

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America Needs Universities to Drive Innovation — More Than Ever!

Flip The Media

Hanson Hosein from the University of Washington interviews Margaret O'Mara, a history professor at the same university about what really created Silicon Valley.  This is a very interesting interview that gives you some perspective on how creativity and innovation are encouraged and nurtured over time.  It really does take a village to establish a supportive environment for something like the Silicon Valley; it doesn’t just happen by an “invisible hand”.  Somehow this message is not coming across American culture though.  Americans are known for their lack of historical perspective, and the prevailing myth is still that of Horatio Alger’s: you alone are responsible for your own success (or failure), and government should stay out of the business of business.

According to a recent report by the U.S. Congress Joint Economic Committee 

http://www.aau.edu/assets/0/76/400/4544/07043e259cc743768bb63142edbb813e.pdf

the Federal government provided 57% of all funding for basic research in the United States in 2008, and the study concluded that the funding should be doubled to be sufficient.  This is easy to understand when you think about the risk associated with basic research - businesses cannot afford to invest as much in research that may not produce commercially viable results.

Margaret O’Mara’s interview prompted me to think about Richard Florida’s book “The Rise of the Creative Class”.  

Florida examines what it takes for one region to draw a creative work force versus another that loses its most creative, dynamic population.  He posits that geography is more important than ever in attracting highly educated and highly skilled people to “places that are centers of creativity and also where they like to live”, such as Seattle, San Francisco Bay Area or Austin.  These places are “multidimensional and diverse” and they also offer lots of choice in recreation and other activities.  To top it off these locations are also known for high quality universities and hight tech jobs.

The United States needs to continue funding university research and partner with businesses in creative ways to be able to compete with other rising (technology) powers.

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Don't Worry, You Can Still Make Money!

   The Cluetrain Manifesto declared in 1999, that digital technology will change the way we do business. The relationship between companies and customers is going to change because people have access to information - and to each other, like never before.Information flow will not be one-way any more as digital technology becomes as common as the morning cup of coffee. The average consumer will be empowered with real-time information about the products he or she buys and about the companies that produce them. This enables consumers to make informed choices about how they spend their money. Businesses can no longer afford to remain distant or indifferent to their customers’ needs.

One of the theses in the Cluetrain Manifesto states: “Don’t worry, you can still make money. That is, as long as it’s not the only thing on your mind” (Levine, Locke, Searls, Weinberger, & McKee, 1999, p. #80). This is a bold statement spoken to American businesses, which seem to have only been concerned about making money, at any cost. The business culture in America has increasingly become more cut-throat, winner-takes-all, and value-less (other than making money). I experienced this personally when working in the exhibits business, which is on the cutting edge of ‘making money’. I was involved in creating million-dollar exhibits that stood for a few days glamorizing a sexy new product, only to be thrown in a trash pile a few days later. The same applied to how people were treated: they were used to exhaustion, and thrown under the bus when they weren’t useful any more.But businesses were making money - a lot of it, it seemed - and that seemed to justify the means.

Since my exhibit days the economic collapse of 2008 happened, and the exuberance of ‘money growing on trees’ has ended. Does this mean that businesses are going to change their desire only to make money? Is the era of ‘end justifies the means’ over?With the internet maturing and people becoming more internet-literate business leaders must consider their customers in their business plans. Is this the perfect storm that creates a new set of values for businesses? Charlene Li discusses this in her book “Open Leadership: How Social Technology Can Transform the Way You Lead” (2010). She asserts that the new business-customer relationship must be built on trust, and humility:

Leadership requires a new approach, new mind-set, and new skills. It isn’t enough to be a good communicator. You must be comfortable sharing personal perspectives and feelings to develop closer relationships… You must come to embrace each openness-enabled encounter as an opportunity to learn. And it is not sufficient to just be humble. You need to seek out opportunities to be humbled … (Li, 2010)

This is the polar opposite of winner-takes-all culture permeating American business. I would like to believe that Li is correct in her assessment, but such a cultural shift does not happen overnight. It took at least thirty years for the business culture to become so audacious, so thoroughly lacking a sense of reciprocity or humility. It will take some time to regenerate a new business culture that embraces moderation, or, as Cluetrain Manifesto declared, a business culture that does not focus only on making money.

According to Li the new business leadership model requires mutual respect and an acknowledgment that customers and employees also have power (Li, 2010, p. 123 iPhone). This power is to be shared “constantly to build trust” (Li, 2010, p. 124 iPhone). Only then will the companies survive the upheaval of the cultural shift brought about by digital technology and a more informed customer base. The notion of ‘trust’ also goes against the grain of American (business) culture. You are considered naïve and exploitable if you show openness or vulnerability. But due to our new capability to communicate cheaply, quickly and spontaneously via digital technology, the old economic model has turned upside down. Trickle-down communication from top to bottom in a fully controlled environment is no longer possible. Perhaps, as Clay Shirky states: “When we change the way we communicate, we change society” (Shirky, 2008).

American style business with its raw, greed-based hunger for profit and growth is the most finely-tuned capitalist machine, five centuries in the making. Like the mythical phoenix, who burns itself to death every 500 years only to emerge anew out of the ashes,a new economic model will rise. A model that is based on reciprocity, information-sharing and respect. I am not sure if this will be the case, but I do believe that history goes in cycles, and it seems as though our current cycle is coming to an end.

Bibliography

Levine, R., Locke, C., Searls, D., Weinberger, D., & McKee, J. (1999). Cluetrain Manifesto. New York, NY.

Li, C. (2010). Open Leadership: How Social Technology Can Transform the Way You Lead. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Shirky, C. (2008). Here Comes Everybody. New York, NY: The Penguin Press.

Hawaii

We spent a week in Maui, Hawaii.  It was such a pleasure to relax on the beach and let the ocean waves wash over all the stress and worry of the past...  year or more?  Wow.  A very needed vacation.  The sun's warmth made us all realize how pale and vitamin D-deficient we all were.  Ahhh!

Hawaiians are a joy.  Their outlook seems different from the rest of America: positive, laid back, playful, and genuine.  "Island Music" [Native 92.5] took over our car radio and brought us daily amusement as we drove to a new beach each morning.  Reggae in various forms was in.

Aloha!

William K. Black

Bill Moyers interviews William K. Black: Fraud is deceit. And the essence of fraud is, "I create trust in you, and then I betray that trust, and get you to give me something of value." And as a result, there's no more effective acid against trust than fraud, especially fraud by top elites, and that's what we have.


A criminogenic environment is a steal from pathology, a pathogenic environment, an environment that spreads disease. In this case, it's an environment that spreads fraud. And there are two key elements. One we talked about. If you don't regulate, you create a criminogenic environment because you can get away with the frauds. The second is compensation. And that has two elements. One is the executive compensation that people have talked about that creates the perverse incentives. But the second is for these professionals. And for the lower level employees, to give the bonuses. And it creates what we call a Gresham's dynamic. And that just means cheaters prosper. And when cheaters prosper, markets become perverse and they drive honesty out of the market.


Watch the whole interview here:


Bill Moyers Interviews William K. Black

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Terveydenhuollon reformi

Eilen illalla katsoimme silmät tarkkana kun edustajainhuone äänesti terveydenhuollosta Yhdysvaltain kongressissa.  219 "jaa" ääntä riitti lain läpipääsyyn.  Tiukkaa se oli, sillä yhtään republikaania ei äänestänyt lain puolesta.  Salaa mielessäni ajattelin, että ehkä yksi tai kaksi äänestäisi omantunnon mukaan, mutta ei.

Laki ei ole vasta kuin ensimmäinen askel terveydenhuollon uudistuksessa; mutta se on erittäin tärkeä askel.  Uudistusta on yrittänyt usea presidentti jo vuosikymmenien ajan, mutta aina on tullut seinä vastaan.  Tästä saavutuksesta on nostettava Obamalle ja Nancy Pelosille (edustajainhuoneen puhemies) hattua.  Kaikesta vastustuksesta ja mielenilmauksista (lue: 2-vuotiaan raivokohtaus) huolimatta Obama pysyi tyynenä ja piti tavoitteen silmissään.

On helppo kritisoida Obamaa siitä, että hän antoi ajan kulua liikaa ja salli vastustajien saada kansan mielipiteet kääntymään uudistusta vastaan, mutta hän osoitti olevansa kärsivällinen (kärsivällisyys ei kuulu amerikkalaiseen persoonallisuuteen) ja yhteistyökykyinen jopa kovassa puristuksessa.  Ehkä tästä eteen päin me epäilevät tuomaat annamme hänelle enemmän aikaa työstää vaikeita asioita, emmekä menetä luottamustamme niin nopeasti (tämäkin taipumus valitettavasti kuuluu amerikkalaisuuteen).

Nancy Pelosi kykeni pitämään edustajainhuoneen demokraatit yhdessä, vaikka kovin moni progressiivinen tai konservatiivinen demokraatti ei innokkaasti kannattanutkaan terveydenhuollon reformilakia.  Laissa on paljon korjattavaa, mutta demokraatin tajusivat, että tämä oli ainoa mahdollisuus saada uudistus läpi.  Näitä mahdollisuuksia tulee eteen vain kerran 20 vuodessa; ja jo nyt terveydenhuolto on aivan kestämättömällä pohjalla; jotain oli saatava aikaan.

Yes we can.

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International Women's Day

Thousands of events are being held around the world to celebrate International Women’s Day, an idea that was launched 100 years ago when a group of women from seventeen countries gathered in Copenhagen, Denmark to champion the rights of women. Activists across the globe are drawing attention to a variety of concerns, including discriminatory laws, the high rate of pregnancy-related deaths in many parts of the world, the skewed sex ratio in China and India, the disproportionately high number of women who are killed and victimized by wars, the comparatively heavier burden of poverty on women, and the continuing disparity between men and women in terms of the quality of available employment and wages received.
[Democracy Now!]


Yes, a hundred years of women's rights, but still it seems as though we haven't come very far.  Women in the United States are getting paid less than men for the same work, even if they are more educated and more experienced.  How do you explain this?  Many men seem to despise women competing for 'their' jobs.  Women are either bitches or bimbos.  Guess which ones men prefer...  Hillary v.s. Palin...


There is so much more work to be done.  But there are good signs too.  I worked at a Habitat for Humanity construction site last week, and to my pleasant surprise there were more women volunteers than men wearing a hard hat and ready to get dirty.  Women outnumbered even the site supervisors.   


Last night a woman won the best director oscar for the first time.  For a war movie.  Well, that is a huge accomplishment and I loved that fact that Barbra Streisand announced it.


Go girrrls!

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I Love Spring In Seattle!

Naiset asialla

Tänään on ollut mahtava päivä Vacouverissa sillä Suomen naiset ovat tuoneet Suomeen kunniaa  monella tasolla!  Pronssia sekä lätkässä etta joukkueviestissä.  Lätkämatsi oli todella upea ja näin sen suorana.  Joukkueviesti näytetään vasta illalla täällä Seattlessa joten en ole sitä vielä nähnyt.  Täytyy odottaa ja teeskennellä etten tiedä vielä lopputulosta.

T

Missä suomalaisten mitalit?

Täältä Seattlesta katsottuna olympialaiset on ihan naapurissa.  Mutta suomalaiset ovat kadonneet aivan näkymättömiin - tai eivät ole edes saapuneet Vancouveriin?  Ainoa laji jossa on suomalaisia nakynyt on ollut naisten jääkiekko - päihittivät Venäjän.  Hyvähän se on.  Mutta katsotaan mitä tapahtuu kun Kanada tai USA ovat vastassa...

Mutta missä ovat hiihtäjät ja mäkihyppääjät?  Nyt voittavat sveitsiläiset, ranskalaiset ym. etelä-eurooppalaiset - eihän heillä ole edes lunta...

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Richmond Beach On A January Morning

Health Care Costs Will Bankrupt the Nation

Below is a story from the Seattle Times columnist Danny Westneat. It is a very descriptive account of what is wrong with the American health care system. You get plenty of care and it's generally very good. But how much it costs and who pays, is another story.

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The sting of a broken system

By Danny Westneat

Seattle Times staff columnist

In what world can the word "in" mean "out?" And the number "one" actually mean "two," at least when it comes time to pay your bill?

In American health care.

Where Keo Capestany has learned the hard way, strange math can mean a bee sting will cost you eight thousand bucks.

"I have to warn you, this is a pretty ridiculous story," Capestany said when he introduced himself the other day.

It started last August, when Capestany, a Seattle 73-year-old, was at a picnic and plopped a slice of steak in his mouth.

A yellow jacket was clinging to the bottom side. It stung or bit him right on the tongue.

Capestany is not allergic to bees. But over the course of the next 24 hours, his tongue swelled so much he worried it might choke him.

He drove to Seattle's Harborview Medical Center. After a few hours' wait, he was put on an IV drip with the antihistamine Benadryl, placed in a bed and admitted to a hospital room.

Or so he thought he was admitted.

He was there for the rest of that day and night. He ate lunch, dinner and breakfast. He continued to get antihistamine through the IV.

"I felt I got good medical care," Capestany recalls. "The doctors wanted to make sure I was OK. By the morning it was clear I was, so they sent me home."

Two weeks later, though, he got stung again: The bill was $8,200. The IV costs alone were $2,469. The emergency room fee: $2,822. The pharmacy tab ran to $964.

He also had room charges for two days, Aug. 4 and 5, totaling $1,488. Even though he was there only one night.

Eight grand seems pretty steep for a bee-stung tongue. It's far more than Harborview's Web site says it charges for everything from a broken arm ($262) to a colonoscopy with removal of a tumor ($1,796.)

But the story went further down a rabbit hole next.

Capestany found out that though he spent about 22 hours there in a room, his treatment is considered "outpatient."

His insurance (Medicare Part A and his wife's policy) only give broad coverage for inpatient hospitalizations, not outpatient visits.

"Your records show that although your tongue and neck were swollen, you denied any respiratory distress in the Emergency Department," Harborview officials wrote after Capestany appealed his bill.

"Your respiration was stable at 16/minute, your other vital signs were stable and your airway was not compromised. To be considered inpatient status, you would have to have some airway compromise and a respiratory rate greater than 24."

Translation: He wasn't sick enough to be "in." Yet he was too hurt to be "out." So they put him kind of sort of "in." Leaving only his money to go "out."

"For the purposes of my insurance, I never stayed there. For the purposes of my bill, I stayed for two days!" Capestany says.

Have I mentioned that Capestany worked 25 years as an insurance adjuster? He's not some naïf about how this stuff works. Or doesn't.

He's not saying Harborview or Medicare has done something illegal. Harborview couldn't discuss Capestany's bill with me, but said it's Medicare that sets the rules on whether someone is an inpatient or out.

In fact, Medicare puts out a six-page guide — with charts — on how to tell which is which. It's so complicated, they advise that if you're ever in a hospital for more than a few hours, you better ask about your status. I wonder: Would staff even know the answer?

Capestany's story is a microcosm of a broken system. Outrageous costs. Bills with little relation to the services provided. Rules too complex or hidden to be of any use to distraught patients.

We used to be debating how to fix these things. Now it's whether health-care reform is even worthwhile for Congress to consider.

Meanwhile, medical spending rose faster in 2009 as a share of the economy than at any time since the issue was first tracked in 1960.

I sure don't know what would work. A single-payer system, competing insurance exchanges, health savings accounts — all seem better than what we have now.

Yet some say no, slow down. Leave health care until we repair the economy.

At $8,200 for a bee sting, health care could become all that's left of the economy.

Obama Shines

President Obama met with House republican leadership in Baltimore yesterday taking questions from a hostile crowd. He was quite impressive with his intelligent, knowledgeable responses to questions that sometimes weren't so intelligent. Of course, that may be exactly why some dislike him: he's just too smart. Like Bill Clinton.

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Obama And Reagan

January 27, 2010, 6:27 AM

Same As He Ever Was

Paul Krugman

These days quite a few people are frustrated with President Obama’s failure to challenge conservative ideology. The spending freeze — about which the best thing you can say in its favor is that it’s a transparently cynical PR stunt — has, for many, been the final straw: rhetorically, it’s a complete concession to Reaganism.

But why should we be surprised? Here’s one from the vault. Two years ago, I was deeply frustrated with Obama’s apparent endorsement of the Reagan myth.

There was a lot of delusion among progressives who convinced themselves, in the face of clear evidence to the contrary, that Obama was a strong champion of their values. He wasn’t and isn’t.

That doesn’t mean that there’s no difference between the parties, that everything would have been the same if McCain had won. But progressives are in the process of losing a big chance to change the narrative, and that’s largely because they have a leader who never had any inclination to do so.

Make School Buses Green

Washington State legislature is considering a 'green makeover' of schools. The school buildings would become more energy-efficient, thousands of jobs would be created locally, and we'd save money in the long run. Washington unemployment is officially 9.5% (the real rate is much higher), so it would be good to get more jobs - even if temporary - especially in construction where we've lost so many jobs lately.

I think that we should start the 'green makeover' of schools by updating the school buses first. Have you ever driven behind a school bus? They are the nastiest things on the road! The pollution emitted from just one bus is overwhelming. Has anyone ever looked into that?

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Haiti

(Image from The Seattle Times)

The devastation in Haiti is very upsetting. A nation so poor they don't have the machinery to dig up dead bodies from the rubble. No food or clean water for days because the help cannot arrive? It s shameful that such a poor nation exists on the doorstep of the most powerful, rich nation. Perhaps Obama will do the right thing and help change US policies toward Haiti? Policies that will support self-reliance, not dependence?

Carl Lindskoog's article explains, at least partially, why the country is so vulnerable.

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Why I Don't Trust Obama

Matt Taibbi and RFK Jr. on Obama's Sellout to Wall Street

Matt Taibbi and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. discuss Obama's ties to Wall Street. It burns me that we have thrown so much money to banks that have utterly failed the nation and its people (and the world). Yet our "progressive" president seems to take their side on every issue. I cannot finish Obama's book "Dreams from My Father" (although recommended by my mother - and I read most everything she recommends), because I am so disillusioned by him. Not that I was ever quite comfortable with his quick rise to the top; but I wanted to believe, to give him a chance. And, compared to the previous president, everyone is a superstar.

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In The Kitchen Window

Richmond Beach, WA