Garrison Keillor's mother

Is Garrison pulling our leg?

The real American dream | Salon

...I took my mother fishing last year and discovered she'd been in the Johnson & Swanson Circus. She did backflips on a tightrope and swallowed flaming torches and exhaled a stream of flame 10 feet long. Recently we found a photograph of her in spangly tights, a hibiscus in her hair, standing blindfolded on the trunk of an elephant with a lit cigarette in her mouth which a swarthy man in a gypsy outfit is about to shoot out of her mouth with a pistol aimed over his left shoulder using a small mirror with a mother-of-pearl handle...

It would be like him.

It is also true, however, that even as a young doctor I knew some of those "spry" aged women with the proverbial twinkly eyes had stories they weren't about to tell me.

The problem with Afghanistan - we're broke

Kaplan has a good summary of the intelligent debate about how to approach Afghanistan (CT is counter-terrorism, this approach is said to be favored by Joe Biden) ...

Obama must choose this week between two radically different Afghanistan policies. - By Fred Kaplan - Slate Magazine

... Some in the CT camp realize that the COIN-dinistas (as critics call them) have a point. Their real gripe with counterinsurgency is that it costs too much and promises too little. Even most COIN strategists acknowledge that a successful campaign, especially in Afghanistan, would require lots of troops (way more than President Obama has committed so far), lots of time (a decade or so), and lots of money (wiping out most or all of the savings achieved by the withdrawal from Iraq)—and even then the insurgents might still win.

A "targeted" CT campaign, its advocates say, would at least demonstrate the West's resolve in the war on terrorism and keep al-Qaida jihadists contained. It's a type of fighting that we know how to do, and its effects are measurable. One might also argue (I don't know if anyone on the inside is doing so) that it could serve as a holding action—a way of keeping Afghanistan from plunging deeper into chaos—while we focus more intently on diplomatic measures to stabilize neighboring Pakistan. If Pakistan blows up, curing Afghanistan of its problems will be irrelevant and, in any case, impossible.

Some in the COIN camp have sympathy for this argument—especially for the part about the high cost and the uncertainty of success—but they would argue back that a purely CT approach is sure to fail in the long run...

I think we ended up going the COIN route in Iraq. It's too early to know how well it worked, but it seems to have been an improvement on than every other approach that was tried there.

One thing we know, however, is that we're financially and militarily exhausted.

So the real debate is between containment, and a Pakistan stabilization strategy, and a big investment in Afghanistan.

I sympathize with everyone, and especially the people of Afghanistan.

The one consolation is that I think we have a good team struggling with the problem.

Is it time to listen to customers again?

For the past eight years or so my friends and I have been saying things like "the customer is the enemy".

This is a joke.

What we meant is that if you painstakingly listen to customers, and give them what they ask for, you end up with stone soup. With real stones.

The joke was a necessary antidote to the "customer is always right" product management mantra of the 80s and 90s. It's a tough road, and I'm not a master at it, but there has to be a conductor for the orchestra, a writer for the book, a vision for the product. "A" as in "one". There are a thousand paths to most goals, but you can only take one of them.

So do listen very carefully to customers, but don't take their advice as is. Use what you hear as a clue to what's wrong, maybe even to the solution -- but remember the road.

Or at least that's what I used to think. Problem is, now everyone is channeling the spirit of Steve Jobs ...

Hate Facebook's new look? You'll like it soon enough. - By Farhad Manjoo - Slate Magazine

... Zuckerberg sent a memo to his staff telling them to ignore the latest cries because "the most disruptive companies don't listen to their customers." That's not very politic, but if Zuckerberg did really say it, he was only describing recent history...

Hmm. If everyone is saying it then it can't be right.

Maybe it's time to listen to customers again.

Minnesota's Michele doesn't disappoint

Michele Bachman is Minnesota's Loon ...

Michele Bachmann: Constitutional scholar - How the World Works - Salon.com:

...The look of disgust on Bernanke's face? Priceless. You could practically hear him thinking: 'I've got an economy on the edge of disaster to save, and I have to spend precious moments of my time answering questions from Michelle Bachmann?'...

Well, not my district of course. She was elected by an exurban district that's solidly GOP, but even the GOP tried to dump her last go round.

The good thing about Michele is that besides being entertaining, she shows that voter stupidity is alive and well in the midwest too ...

Ecco Pro on Amazon's VM

I never used Ecco Pro much, but I used a distant relative, MORE 3.1, very heavily. [1]

These were fantastic software products, usually coded in Pascal, C and maybe some C++. The extraordinary power of modern software platforms doesn't seem to translate into qualitatively better products -- in fact, few modern products have the reliability and performance of those old apps.

Incredibly Ecco Pro is still in use, twelve years after it was sunset ...

Scott Rosenberg’s Wordyard -- Ecco in the cloud with Amazon

... Regular readers here know of my dependence on and infatuation with an ancient application called Ecco Pro. It’s the outliner I have used to run my life and write my books for years now. It has been an orphaned program since 1997 but it still runs beautifully on any Win-32 platform; it’s bulletproof and it’s fast....

It's also a testament to Microsoft that it still runs.

It's surprising enough that Ecco Pro is still around, but it get stranger. Rosenberg got it running on Amazon's VM service ...

[1] Ecco Pro was closer to GrandView, the DOS equivalent to MORE.

New resolution: No signup without an account removal option

I sign up for a lot of online services. Some I abandon quickly, others, like bloglines, I use for years before moving on.

I'm more aware now of the security risks of leaving account information in corporate servers that may end up in bankruptcy proceedings, perhaps to be purchased by the Bank of Ferengi.

So these days I try to cleanup when I quit. Today that meant Bloglines (no account removal option) and Ustream's Watershed ...

... After my initial testing I was never able to get it to work. Tech support was responsive, but it didn't clear up the trouble I was having. I decided to step back and wait until there are more players in this market. Then I discovered there was no way to remove my account information...

I can delete the "account", but when I log in it still shows my sign-up information and the "valid credit card" is still there.

So now I have a new resolution.

I don't sign up for services that lack an appropriate account deletion function.

If we all followed that rule the world would be a better place.

Aaronson stomps Rand

I really need to try to at least skim Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged or the Fountainhead. I've only read bits of the originals; the stupidity burned.

I think I was too old when I came across them, they need to be read in early adolescence.

I need to read them now because, like Intelligent Design and climate change denialism, they're a form of pseudo-rationalism with impressive cultural persistence. If I read them, I can join the rationalist counter-attack with a clean conscience.

In the meantime I can only point to Scott Aaronson's monster takedown: Shtetl-Optimized - The complement of Atlas Shrugged.

I can't recall such as smash job outside of the, well, the past 8 years of reviews of the Bush administration. Aaronson doesn't merely rend Randism, he burns the shreds in a plasma canon.

Number 3 is just one of 10 ...

... Family. Whittaker Chambers (of pumpkin patch fame) pointed out this startling omission in his review of 1957. The characters in Atlas mate often enough, but they never reproduce, or even discuss the possibility of reproduction (if only to take precautions against it). Also, the only family relationships portrayed at length are entirely negative in character: Rearden’s mother, brother, and wife are all contemptible collectivists who mooch off the great man even as they despise him, while Dagny’s brother Jim is the wretched prince of looters. Any Republicans seeking solace in Atlas should be warned: Ayn Rand is not your go-to philosopher for family values (much less “Judeo-Christian” ones).

If Rand had had to deal with the disability of childhood, injury, heredity or age her stark brutality would have been inescapable.

The non-existent iPhone Calendar API - it's Android's fault

This is the fault of Android and of Palm.

A developer of mobile software solutions shares my dismay at the lack of an iPhone Calendar API ...

Mobile Open Source :: Fabrizio Capobianco

...My goal was to find the new Calendar API (we need it to provide calendar sync with Funambol). They claimed 1,000 new APIs in the slides ... It must be there, I thought.

Unfortunately, it is not there ... 1,000 new APIs and none to give access to one of the two basic data elements in a smartphone (the other being the address book)...

The problem is that Apple is not feeling much competitive heat these days.

Android has been very slow to take off. There's no buzz. There are zero Android phones among the geeks I know.

The Palm Pre sounds wonderful, but there's lots of doubt that Palm and Sprint can deliver -- and nervous rumors that they can't.

Nokia and Microsoft aren't in the competition. RIM is growing, but after 9 months with Emily's BlackBerry Pearl I admit I don't understand how they can play outside the enterprise.

Apple is precisely as open as it needs to be. It's not feeling much need these days.

Update: Another praiseworthy app that needs the calendar api.

The Sci Am robot roudup - classics from Moravec and Kurzweil

In honor of the Robot issue Scientific American has assembled some classic articles ...

• Hans Moravec - sentient robots by 2050
• Ray Kurzweil - artificial sentience by 2020

Later in 2008 Kurzweil moved his armageddon out to 2045. If I personally had to pick a date I'd go for 2100 or so.

JAMA scandal continues to unfold

JAMA has a deep organizational problem ...The Journal of the American Medical Association Does a Fine Impression of Vito Corleone (or is it Fredo?) — Crooked Timber.

JAMA needs a board meeting and DeAngelis needs another job.

The bullseye on Goldman Sachs

If we can set aside the AIG bonus smokescreen for a minute, maybe we can turn the spotlight on a more interesting beast ...

The feds must investigate AIG's fishy $12.9 billion payment to Goldman. - By Eliot Spitzer - Slate Magazine

...It is time the government realizes it has two simple options: tightly regulate entities that are too big to fail, or break them up so they aren't.

Goldman Sachs is doing rather well these days.

It's clearly in the too big to fail category. On the other hand, it's not regulated either.

Too big to live.

Break up Goldman Sachs.

Kodak to customers: We have your children. Send money now.

You sent your children's images to Kodak. They've been happy frolicking there, free of all charges.

You didn't listen to mad Uncle Gordon and his "data lock" ravings.

Now Kodak has the children, and if you ever want to see them again you'll send money now ...

TidBITS Tech News: Kodak Gallery Joins Parade of Free with Payment Services

... Kodak Gallery (originally Ofoto and later Kodak EasyShare Gallery) becomes the latest firm to make this seemingly sensible move. The online photo-sharing and print-ordering service has no limits on the size of photos uploaded (it notes that 10 MB is the highest size beyond which improved print detail won't be seen), nor on what you store. (Sadly, the service also dropped its film processing service that combined photofinishing and digital scanning.)

In the past, photos were stored by Kodak indefinitely at no charge. Now, Kodak has imposed the equivalent of a yearly service fee made through a purchase. Storage is free for 90 days after creation of an account. For accounts with less than 2 GB of stored photos, you must spend at least $4.99 over 12 months; more than 2 GB, $19.99....

There would be two ways to do this honorably.

Kodak could institute the policy only on new photos, but that wouldn't bring in much revenue.

Alternatively, Kodak could add the ability to transfer an entire photo library, with comments, titles, album names and other metadata to any "standards compliant" rival, such as Google's Picasa Web albums. Of course Picasa already charges for storage (I pay), but that's a healthy market with competition.

At the very least, and it's not enough, Kodak could provide a way to ship an entire Library, with all metadata, on one or more DVDs (for a reasonable fee).

They're not doing any of those things though.

They got your (virtual) children by offering free "child" care. Now, if you want the little tykes to keep breathing, you pay.

That's one way data lock can work.

Try to remember. Support Google's Data Liberation Front.

Geithner plan: Krugman nay, DeLong yay

Krugman says the Geitner plan is a disastrous retread.

DeLong's FAQ is encouraging....

...Q: What if markets never recover, the assets are not fundamentally undervalued, and even when held to maturity the government doesn't make back its money?

A: Then we have worse things to worry about than government losses on TARP-program money--for we are then in a world in which the only things that have value are bottled water, sewing needles, and ammunition...

We've been betting on antibiotics, but the sewing needles are a good point.

This is not the first time my usually well aligned economics team has been at odds, but they rarely take such clearly opposed stances. Paul's opinions are always clear, but Brad often opposes with strategic silence. This break is more overt; I hope Paul will not take it personally.

We are truly in uncharted waters.

Obviously everyone should read both the above links in full. It's a nasty world when the President breaks his daughter's hearts, but it is something to be able to pick up the Sunday morning blogs and get opinions of world experts laid out more clearly and honestly than any likely Presidential briefing.

Obama and the dog (corrected)

FMH is right.

Most Disturbing Moment in Obama’s Leno Appearance - Follow Me Here…:

...[I]nevitably, he talked about the long-promised family dog, joking that he might not get one after all. “This is Washington,” he said with a sly smile. “That was a campaign promise."...

You can't fix the economy Mr. President. You probably can't deliver health care reform. You can get the damned dog.

Now.

Update 4/12/09: My apologies to President Obama. Now that the famed dog has been identified, the BBC gives us a bit more quote context:

"This is Washington. That was a campaign promise," Mr Obama said, as the audience roared with laughter. "No, I'm teasing. The dog will be there shortly."

That last bit was important. It turns the statement from nasty humor into just funny.

I wonder if FMH fell into the same trap I did -- an out of context quote.

Three whacks to me.

Health care reform – lessons from Quebec

Recently a woman hit her head while skiing and died.

That’s not news by itself. Downhill skiing is reasonably dangerous, and death from head injury is a yearly event at a major resort. In Colorado, for example, about 10 downhill skiers die every year, mostly from head injuries. So a major resort will have an average of 1-2 deaths a season.

The newsworthy part of this sad story is that the accident happened to a wealthy celebrity. The noteworthy part is that it took place in my birthplace – Quebec, at Mont Tremblant. I did my medical training in Quebec, and several family members, including my parents, still live there. So I have a reasonable sense of how well Quebec’s health care services work, and how well they don’t work.

In this case, the services didn’t work so well. Anyone with an epidural bleed, whether wealthy or poor, needs emergent neurosurgery. This patient was a long way from a neurosurgeon -- she needed a helicopter. Instead she got an long ambulance ride and she died. She might have died anyway, but the ambulance ride didn’t leave a lot of options.

The helicopter wasn’t available because Quebec’s government run health care system puts its limited money into other services.

Visiting nurses, good. Trauma care, not so good.

Which brings me to my old one slide summary of health care reform ..

(Or you can read the text version).

I’m certain Quebec could spend its health care dollars more wisely, but even a perfect government would make hard choices. Quebec provides universal health care coverage (more or less, meds not included) and it’s not a particularly rich region. Decades of stuttering separatism, political incompetence, and institutionalized corruption have taken their toll.

One choice Quebec has made is to spend less on costly air ambulance services. That means some people will die of trauma that, in the US or Ontario, might live.

And that’s the lesson for health care reform.

Health care costs money.

Sure, some people think computerized medical records will make everything affordable. Since I make things like that I must say that I agree completely and we’ll all soon drive our new Lexi to the Apple Store where our MacBook Pro will be ready for pick-up.

What?

Still here?

Ok, for the sake of argument, let’s assume that EHRs won’t turn out to be a miracle cure.

So what do we do then?

Well, we probably can’t do what Canada did when it introduced universal health care coverage. Most provinces banned private insurance, and then gave everyone top notch coverage. In other words, a Lexus for all. Then they ran out of money and, very painfully, started to make harder decisions.

We can’t do it because we’re massively in debt and more or less broke. We can’t pull that trick. Besides, it’s been done before, it might not work as well a second time.

So what can America do?

America can keep its luxurious waiting rooms and hospital Spas for people with money, and provide an effectively universal second tier health care delivery system that uses far fewer physicians, negotiates for cheap meds, and uses obsolete "netbook-grade" technology[1]. That system will be affordable.

Call it "Crummy Care". "Good Enough Care". It would be a huge benefit to our society.

People would hate it.

Or we can do nothing. We’re good at that.

Update: [1] On second thought, I think that analogy was obscure even by my standards. I'm pointing out that netbooks are cheap because they use obsolete technology. The best made netbooks perform like a 2004 stat-of-the-art laptop. I don't mean that netbooks have any impact on health care affordability. Sorry.