1913 or 1938?

I have been chatting with my Chinese American friends for weeks about the geopolitical and global economic outlooks in the next few years. Whichever way I look at it, the barrel of dynamite sitting between China and US is going to blow up in some shape or form. Both sides need it to blow up, because they have run out of alternatives. They just can't help themselves. Martin Wolf of the Financial Times recently compared today to the eve of WWI. The similarities are striking.

Mr. S refuses to heed my paranoia, but I continue to plot my doomsday scenarios. Not that I want the worst to happen, but it really does seem the most logical outcome given the current conditions. All the other options are rapidly receding into the fog.

I have to admit that, beneath the anxiety and dread there is a sliver of thrill. I was born in 1973, barely escaping the horrors of the Cultural Revolution. I never thought that, in my lifetime, I would witness such historical events as Hemingway or Christopher Isherwood or my parents did. From moment to moment you don't even know whether you will survive the next day! Is there anything more life affirming?!

The somewhat comforting elements of peace are two: 1) China does not have nearly enough long-range nuclear warheads to attack across the Pacific Ocean. 2) At the moment Russia has very little reason to get into any conflicts with US (Why would he? Putin's going to run the show of American national politics.)

So I'm sitting here on the brink, dangling my legs over the abyss, and shivering with a morbid curiosity. It is like the moment immediately after the boy king Joffrey unexpectedly had Ilyn Payne chop off Ned Stark's head, and I'm watching in the crowd through the eyes of Arya Stark or Uncle Yoren, with only a vague anticipation of the storm of swords to descend. There's also a faint whisper that I should write it down --- what it's like to live in January 2017 --- and take a snapshot of the sharp smell of snow halfway between the clouds and the earth.

I suppose we'll find out what is going to happen to the world, once George R. R. Martin finishes his damned book The Winds of Winter.

The Logical Conclusion

Elizabeth Kolbert's short article "How Can Americans Trust Donald Trump" in the New Yorker struck me with her incredulous tone. It's as if the more he lies the more people believe him with more certainty and fervor. She is not alone. I've seen this incredulous tone many time from many writers in the mainstream media.

When I first moved to this country almost 24 years ago, I knew nothing about it, except a few pieces of American pop culture that had been deemed culturally clean and "healthy" enough to be imported into China: The Carpenters, the movie "Love Story," and a few country songs. It took me a very long time to pick up things from incessant consumption of television (especially Law and Order), radio in the car, and summer blockbuster movies. That was before the InterWeb became the black hole that sucked everyone in.  

During college, in the late nights driving home from my intern pharmacy shifts, I caught Rush Limbaugh on the radio and some guy called Lyndon Larouche. It was not very interesting and I paid them little attention. I had no idea what it was all about.

After I graduated from university, on my first job as an editor at a biomedical journal, one of my colleagues, a copyeditor, told me some weird things that I had never heard on the radio or read in newspapers --- outlandish stories about UN black helicopters, secret prisons, government conspiracies, and plans to enslave the American people. She had grown up in rural Maryland and all her friends were farm kids. They all believed these rumors. I had only heard vaguely about Ruby Ridge, Waco, and the Elio Gonzales affair, but never thought there was a vast conspiracy behind all of them. But she made it all sound so real.

Against Beauty

Recently a twitter account known as @femscriptintros created a bit of a stir. Ross Putnam, a movie producer who gets to see a lot scripts, is putting cliched introductory notes of female characters onto twitter. To be perfectly honest, at first I didn't see what was wrong with some of the entries, besides the impoverished imagination and writing. It only dawned on me after a bit of thought that every intro refers to the female character's physical beauty one way or another.

Yes, I know, the irony. I never thought of myself as having been indoctrinated by the patriarchal social values, but I had never questioned the insidious effect of "beauty." It is the only way to describe a good woman, a woman who is worth anything. Of course, physical beauty is superior, but if physical beauty is utterly out of the question (for example, a biopic of Mother Teresa), her other attributes, usually her heart and least likely her mind, would be assigned that description -- beautiful. All along I have believed that the highest compliment a woman can receive is her beauty.

But now the question is abundantly clear. Men are good and worthy in many various ways. Damn they don't even need to be good or worthy to be interesting or just ... to live. Men don't need to be anything but themselves --- OK I know this is gross simplification. Men too are imprisoned by their gender and social expectations, but women are still far more restricted. What's more disturbing than the externally imposed limitations is our internalized, self-imposed ones.

Good vs Bad Guys in Stories (Mahabharata Notes #6)

More than a few times, I have heard American voters complain that the kind of leaders who should win elections are exactly those who do not want to be in politics in the first place. What they mean is that they want their communities or state or nation be run by people with no ambitions or are incapable of deception and manipulation. Of course, that's impossible, not to mention probably wrong anyway. Nevertheless, one could find quite the same sentiment described in Mahabharata, despite its time and political system way back when and where. In the ancient story, the rightful emperor to rule the Empire was Yudhishtir, the son of the god representing dharma itself, a man of impeccable personal and public morality and integrity. He is supposed to be every bit the ideal king/leader for average people across different cultures (if one could overlook a minor vice involving gambling).

What is the essential quality of such an ideal king/emperor/president/governor/head of the school board that everyone dreams of? He does not want it. Yes, such is the paradox. We want the assurance that he is doing this not for himself, but for you all! Oh isn't that sweet and lovely? Except this is neither human nor natural. People have to lie to be so saintly. Even if some are occasionally sincere in their selflessness, as we can see in Yudhishtir, such selflessness can be dangerous.

When Will Health Care Ever Cost Less?

The answer is, when you reduce the amount and degree of care provided. It's an answer nobody wants to hear but it's true.

On this year's Veteran's Day, a talk show on NPR mentioned the treatment of war-caused PTSD in veterans. A caller asked why PTSD is so common among veterans of modern wars but was not nearly as common back in WWII or before. The experts and/or insiders of course corrected them that back then the same post-combat neuroses was not diagnosed as PTSD but rather was called other names, such as shell shock. Most of the sufferers were not treated, because the medical community didn't know how. So many of them treated themselves with alcohol and psychoactive drugs, and died premature deaths.

Fifteen years ago when I was in school, managed care and preventive care was all the rage. The argument was that if you give people health care before they get very sick, they would live longer and healthier lives, and the cost of health care for a population would go down or at least not continue to go up. The reality of the next decade and half has proved them wrong.

The logical flaw in the managed care premise is obvious: If people live longer and healthier, they would only get sick later, but they would get sick and eventually die anyway. Why would they need less health care in totality?

One might argue that if a person lives longer and healthier and delays the inevitable aging and illness leading to death, he could work longer and produce more in his life. I would argue, however, that the longer he works, the more disposable income he has to spend on treating his illness and delaying his death. How would that reduce the cost of health care?

Spend some time with old people and it will become abundantly clear. The demand for health care is a bottomless pit, because the thirst for life and fear of death is boundless. It is usually limited only by what medical science and technology can offer at the time. Before an elixir is invented to extend people's lifespan to 70 years, people did not spend money on it and died at 69. After the elixir is invented people spend their money to buy another year of life. The same can be said for any other treatment. Before there was penicillin, where would people with infection spend their money on? Before there was methotrexate and paclitaxel, where would people with cancer spend their money on? Not on health care. Once the treatments become available, how can you not spend money on them?

Very occasionally, spending money on one treatment can save you money on alternative treatments. For example, spending on Prozac has saved a lot of cost on psychotherapy. But such cases of saving are uncommon. Most of time, medical advances are like urban sprawl --- build it and people will come. As long as you have a few more years of life or less pain to sell, people will buy it, if they can afford it.

Built on good intentions, the third-party payers of health care only make the cost balloon. Socially it is a sensible philosophy to want to give most people access to most life prolongation technologies. Psychologically, it removes the financial measurement out of individual person's calculation. How much are you willing to pay to prolong your life for another month? If you have a billion dollars, you may be willing to pay a few hundred million. If you have a hundred dollars, you may be willing to pay fifty, saving the rest for a last meal. If you have none and need your parents or children to cough up their life savings, you might spend nothing and choose to give up the last month of your life.

However, once this contemplation is taken out of individual's consideration and put in the hands of an insurance company or the national payer, I bet everyone feels the urge to want to spend "as much as possible" to prolong one's life. It's no longer your own money you spend on the care you need and want. Everyone wants the longest life money can buy.

If I were to devise a system that can truly stem the escalating cost of health care, I would use the collective money pool (as all medical insurance, be it public or private) to take care a set of treatments that have a finite amount of cost. Beyond that, you or your guardians decide how much you want to spend to prolong your life. If you get pneumonia, the system pays for your antibiotic treatment. If your pneumonia turns into sepsis and spending a hundred thousand dollars may save your life, you or your family will have to decide if you can and want to spend the money on that. Such a system assumes that life has a price. Above that price, the system will not pay for life.

This proposal sounds horrible, I know. Life has a price. Shudder. It also highlights the gross inequality between people --- If you have more money, you can afford to live longer. If you don't, you get the basic but less care and therefore shorter life, most likely. However, in another sense, the system is quite equal. It assumes that, to the system, a rich man's life is worth the same as a poor man's. The system spends the same amount on each person. And, because this system does not endlessly escalate, it is able to sustain itself and ensures the largest number of people get at least basic care. The rest is left to the random draw of luck, be it your wealth or your genes, and your own choice.

Bewildered

Recently I started going to a writers group. As any writer groups, people share their writing and ideas at every meeting. Some time in October, a writer brought in a short narrative of a slightly odd idea. In a world like ours, there are velociraptors running everywhere. They randomly attack and kill about 200 people a month, but they are allowed to run free, protected from human intervention because, supposedly, they can secret something that are medically precious, a cancer-curing substance from their glands.

During the discussion, we scratched our heads over the synopsis. Suggestions veered into all directions. Finally, the writer himself explained. The idea behind the vicious velociraptors was handguns. Approximately 200 people are killed accidentally by handguns every month (I have not confirmed the statistics), but Americans are absolutely and completely unwilling to even have a conversation about gun control laws. As a French immigrant he found it utterly bewildering.

We discussed this some more. Someone pointed out that, unlike his setup for the story, handguns don't cure cancer. There is no reliable, verifiable benefit to handgun ownership comparable to curing cancer, which accounts for about one in five or four deaths. So the premise does not quite work.

For a brief moment the room was filled with sighs as the memory of the Aurora cinema massacre hung over us. This being in a Washington suburb, there were immediate comments all around that gun control is political death. Nobody, but nobody in national politics, regardless of party affiliation or ideology, dares to speak up against gun rights, and everyone who is not backed by NRA knew to avoid the subject altogether. And the Supreme Court, led by Dick Cheney's hunting buddy Scalia, have put the final word on this in DC vs Heller.

But the French immigrant shook his head and said he just did not understand. Why can't people even have a conversation about this? A cloud of threat seems to gag everyone with any connection to politics. If one is elected (except in DC or Chicago), one had better keep one's mouth shut about this subject. In this day and age, one can talk about racism, slavery, torture, legalizing addictive substances, but one can't talk about handgun regulation, because representatives have been effectively and quickly thrown out of office by the NRA again and again. The tide of public sentiment rapidly turned from 2-to-1 in favor of gun control in late 1990s to majority favoring no more gun control in late 2000s, despite the increase in gun-related killing sprees. Whoever is running the show, don't they strike fear in your heart if you were an elected official? When someone mentions children accidentally shooting themselves with daddy's gun in the house, immediately dozens of people spring up to argue that swimming pools kill more children than unlocked guns. But swimming pools are fun and useful and bring joy to families. What do guns do?

So I wonder, because I don't understand it either. What is it about guns that make people feel so strong, tough, and safe? What is the emptiness that is filled by the possession of guns? It has to be related, in some way, to the potential power of killing other people, killing them dead, without soiling your own hands. What does that mean? How urgently do we need to possess this power to kill our fellow human beings? And how much are people willing to pay for the sense of contentment and satisfaction knowing that one possesses the power? Obviously, the blood of a few small children is not enough, as Huckabee has convincingly demonstrated. It's just a perfect opportunity to blast liberals for not requiring Christian prayers in public schools.

I'm a woman and cannot kill anyone with my bare hands. If I were to live in a society full of danger and fear, I'd want to possess guns too. I think, if we look at who are the most fervent gun right activists and believers, it becomes clear why they have become louder and more fervent, for they have reason to fear, fear the loss of their power and privilege, because the world in which they ruled over others is slipping away. This is one of the few conversations they still dictate.

But still, although it is true that people kill people every day, part of me do not and cannot understand. 

盗亦有道

昨晚熬夜看 Fuchsia Dunlop 的鱼翅与花椒，里面提到庄子“庖丁解牛”的典故，今天心血来潮地去翻蔡志忠漫画之“庄子”系列，找到了动漫版，还挺长的。

讲到“盗亦有道”的话题，把我笑死了：能猜到财物藏在哪里，是为圣；偷东西时一马当先，是为勇；偷完东西殿后，是为义；判断状况是否该下手，是为智；分赃均匀，是为仁。

拍桌子大笑，太犀利了。这么简单的道理，但接受它是违反人性的。

Anecdote

为了防止被情节来源者看到（虽然这个可能性微乎其微），这个素材片段必须用中文来写。

 上个星期，联邦劳动数据统计局放出失业人口统计率为百分之七点八，右派保守党一片愤怒，跳出来指责此机构伪造数据，故意让现任总统面子好看，企图操纵大选走向。当然，证据与事实这种事情对于这些人来说是无关紧要的，只要看上去像是操纵，喊的嗓子够响，三人成虎即可。当然，这个局，那个局，领导们关心的终极目的是自己的乌纱帽，在局里几十年爬到顶的官僚，每年每个月每星期都在不伪造不违法的条件下尽量吹嘘自己的业绩，淡化自己的失误。

这个情节是二手见证，从一个认识统计局职员的人那里听来的。据说，这个职员说，伪造数据什么的纯属胡扯，但是其他形式的猫腻随时都有。例如定期的失业统计数据发放，每次是早上八点四十五分向全国媒体公布数据。几家重大媒体（想必有 Reuters, Bloomberg, WSJ 这些机构）抗议说不行，我们收到数据之后还得写稿子贴上网站，会有几分钟的延迟，不行不行，我们要提前拿到数据好做准备写好稿子，我们保证不在八点四十五分之前发放稿件。

这些数据对股市有影响，所以劳动统计局按照法律规定不能提前泄露数据，内部必须保密，更不能放给外人。按理说，这是法律规定统计局做主合理合法的事情，完全可以对媒体说，八点四十五就八点四十五，公平对待，你几点放上你自己的网站关我屁事？但是，美国的联邦政府机构非常软弱，在国会的压力下，不得不让步妥协，允许每个重大新闻媒体派一个记者提前（大概十到十五分钟）进入统计局，到指定的电脑上看数据写稿子。为了防止外泄，进门之前要上交一切与外界联络的工具，包括手机、爱疯、黑莓，手提电脑，平板，等等。

但是，事后有人发现，在八点四十五之前，股市上已经有少量股票浮动跟之后发布出的失业率数据一致，显然有人能够提前知道未曾发表的数据，而且这些股票的买卖与新闻记者进小黑屋的时间吻合，显然还是有人把消息传出去了。

传言者开玩笑说，下次数据发布前记者要进统计局必须脱光了搜查。

DC Mayoral Scandal

The DC mayoral election scandal has been brewing for over a year and is only getting juicier and juicier. I sniffed around on reliable news reports. The way facts come out makes it a bit difficult to figure the chronology of things, which is a bit mind tickling in itself. The news printed today has to include things that happened yesterday and the events and actions two years ago that caused yesterday's event. It's not a conventional novel with a linear narrative or a one-hour police drama --- Well, actually, no, a police drama also presents the cause after or simultaneously with the effect. But I digress.

Below is a summary of the events of the 2010 DC mayoral election, in chronological order, from what I've gathered. Such great materials for a thriller or two.

Why Sulaimon Brown, an unemployed accountant (or so he claims) in his late 30s with no obvious financial backing, entered the election as a minor candidate with no hope of winning, remains unknown. Nevertheless, he was one of the candidates and openly and aggressively attacked the incumbent mayor Adrian Fenty in public debates. Nevertheless, in the summer of 2010, he was one of several candidates in the DC mayor's race.

It is also unknown exactly when the leading Vincent Gray and his staffers made a deal with Brown to act as his "agent" to attach his rival. At least in late summer or early fall, Brown directly made deals with Lorraine Green, Gray's campaign manager. Green and Howard Brooks, who is Gray's close friend and a paid consultant on the campaign, met with Brown and gave him money in exchange for his "assistance." The payments amounted to several thousand dollars. In addition, Brown demanded a promise of a job for himself and a job for his brother in Gray's administration once he came into office. By Brown's own claim, Green and Brooke gave him the promise.

Next, Gray won the election in the fall of 2010, defeating Fenty by about 10 percentage points. Before he took office, however, Brown began to get nervous in the winter of 2010, as he sensed some cooling response to him from Gray's circle. After all, he'd served his purpose, would they abandon him now? He called and texted Gray, Green, and Brooks repeatedly and did extract a promise from Gray to keep his word.

Came January 2011, Gray took office and indeed gave Brown a job in his administration as some sort of special consultant to the health finance office, which paid him a salary of about $110K a year. This appointment drew criticism almost immediately, perhaps because of Brown's recent performance only a few months ago, or perhaps it became obvious that he was not qualified for the job. Someone dug up Brown's record of having been arrested twice before, although he was not charged or convicted. The grumbles made Gray nervous enough to remove Brown from the lucrative appointment after only 2 months in March 2011.

This "betrayal," of course, enraged Brown, and the rest of the drama proves that a politician always has to be careful who they choose to make deals with. Brown made Gray pay. Oh did he make all of them pay.

Once dismissed from the job, Sulaimon Brown called Washington Post and gave them the whole story of how he was bought by Gray's campaign to attack Fenty previously with the promise of a job and a few thousand dollars. He produced his own cell phone's call history and text messages to corroborate his story. He directly implicated Green, who headed the mayoral transition team, Brooks, and Gray himself. The story came out in Washington Post in March 2011. Gray and his staff, of course, denied all the allegations.

The allegations attracted the attention of the FBI and US Attorney's Office. They have the power to raid any office, search and seize any documents, and make anyone talk. Howard Brooks appears to be one of the first they broke. In the fall of 2011, Brooks wore a wire that allowed the feds to tape his conversations with other Gray staffers involved in the scandal, which has trapped at least one person so far and is likely to drag more of them down.

On Tuesday, May 22, 2012, Gray's campaign treasurer Thomas Gore was arrested and pleaded guilty in course for having used Gray's campaign money to forge money orders in Brooks' son's and friend's names to pay Brown. Two days later, Brooks pleaded guilty to paying Brown with this money. Both Gore and Brooks have pleaded guilty, indicating that both have made deals with federal prosecutors to build their cases against others. So far, Lorraine Green and Vincent Gray have not been indicted, but they will be, it seems.

In addition to the Sulaimon Brown transaction, the feds raided the office of Jeffrey Thompson in March 2012. Thompson is a contractor who had contributed to Gray's campaign; his company subsequently won a managed-care contract to provide medical service to poor residents in DC. The contract was worth $355 million a year. Since the raid, the company was quickly sold to a different businessman.

Local politics is smaller and therefore easier to follow than national-level politics, and how very colorful. National politics can be just as juicy and delicious --- see the John Edwards trial --- but is more sophisticated and less likely to be exposed to the public with all the glorious details.