Signs and Signifiers--Restroom Signs

Eszter Hargittai has an interesting discussion of signs on restroom doors at Crooked Timber � � Dress optional,
which leads to interesting commentary. I'm vaguely aware of post-modernism (don't understand it but I've heard of it) and a couple of the comments veer into that, or parodies of that, I can't tell which. Anyhow it's a fun Saturday morning read.

Bush and Competent Executives

The new videotape of President Bush meeting by teleconference with emergency officials before Katrina struck has drawn lots of comment.

Eugene Robinson at the Post: This Is 'Fully Prepared'?:

"At least now I know why the White House is so obsessively secretive about its decision-making process. The leaked videotapes and transcripts of pre-Katrina briefings that were obtained this week by the Associated Press leave in tatters the defining myth of the Bush administration -- an undeserved aura of cool, unflinching competence and steely resolve. Instead, the tapes show bureaucratic inertia and a president for whom delegation seems to mean detachment."

John Dickerson at Slate:

"It's [the video] a blow to a key Bush myth. The Bush management philosophy relies on him as an interrogator. He delegates, but that's OK because he knows how to question those he empowers to make sure they're focused. Question-asking is also a central public tool in the "trust me" presidency. We aren't supposed to worry that the NSA wiretapping program goes too far because the president has asked all the questions. When the president was wrong about the level of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq or the strength of the insurgency, it wasn't because he didn't ask enough questions, we have been told, it was because he was given the wrong answers."

But maybe Steven Pearlstein inadvertently had the best take in his discussion of the Rudman report: Fannie Mae Report Is Long, but It's Not the Whole Story:

"As I was reading through that and other chapters of the Rudman report, I had a nagging feeling that I had read the story before. And then I realized where: in a management book about blowups of other once-successful corporations, written by Sydney Finkelstein, a professor at Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business.

Finkelstein's insight is that big corporate mistakes aren't caused by stupidity, or venality, or by an unexpected bit of bad luck. Nor are they the result of flawed strategy or inability to execute, although those may sometimes appear to be the cause.

Rather, Finkelstein says, the most spectacular corporate failures occur in companies that are so blinded by their own competence and past success that they instinctively tune out legitimate outside criticism. Inside, a positive can-do culture tends to snuff out criticism, dissent or negative feedback. Executives at these companies tend to be obsessed with the company's image, underestimate major obstacles, assume they have all the answers and stubbornly rely on what worked for them before. [emphasis added]

The reasons behind most corporate collapses, according to Finkelstein, entail the deep-seated psychological need people have at all levels of a company to belong and get along, to rationalize what has already been done or decided, and to put off loss or failure."

You don't need to ask questions if you assume your team has all the answers.

My New Car

I discussed buying a new car here but didn't say what I got. It was a Toyota Corolla. (Bought a VW Beetle in 1966, and Corollas in 78, 91, and 2006.) Each time I've bought I'm struck by the improvement in the cars. Cars don't improve on the same time scale as PC's, but they do improve. Of course, not everything is an improvement, just like with PC's and software. The manual is bigger for my new car and I feel more need to study it. There are "features" that I doubt I'll use (like the I-pod connection socket), which is certainly true of software.

I recommend Henry Petroski's books--he teaches engineering history at Duke, writes on the history of technology, like pencils, paper clips, bridges, and a very nice memoir on growing up as a paper boy on Long Island. One of his themes is the need for tradeoffs, which I do see in the new car. For example, the back seats now have the head/neck rests, a safety measure. However they reduce the visibility for someone who learned to drive by craning his neck instead of checking the nonexistent right side mirrors. Another of his themes is that we learn from failure, which I firmly believe.

Some Days I Feel Like Preaching

There's several Presbyterian ministers in my ancestry, which may explain why today I had a moralistic reaction to the conjunction of these two items in the NY Times:

[With regard to the US/India deal on nuclear power] Dissenting on Atomic Deal

"The Defense Department issued an unusually explicit statement hailing the deal for opening a path for more American-Indian military cooperation.

'Where only a few years ago, no one would have talked about the prospects for a major U.S.-India defense deal, today the prospects are promising, whether in the realm of combat aircraft, helicopters, maritime patrol aircraft or naval vessels,' the Defense Department statement said."

Report Warns Malnutrition Begins in Cradle

"Some of the facts about malnutrition, familiar to experts but not widely understood, seem counterintuitive. For example, rates of malnutrition in South Asia, including India, Bangladesh and Nepal, are nearly double those in sub-Saharan Africa, which is much poorer.

India's programs to feed children in school have multiplied in recent years, but its nutrition program for preschool children mainly assists those between the ages of 3 to 6 — too late to prevent the stunting and damage to intellect that occur by age 2, bank nutritionists and other experts say.

A spokesman for the Indian Embassy in Washington said yesterday that he had not yet read the report and could not comment on it.

The problem of malnutrition in India, known for its well-educated, high-tech workers, is striking. Almost half the children are stunted by malnutrition, but the problem is not limited to the poor. A quarter of the children under age 5 in the richest fifth of the population are also underweight and nearly two-thirds are anemic, the report says."

So we'll sell arms to India to offset the arms we sell to Pakistan to get their aid against Al Qaeda while half their children are malnurished? [From the article, the malnutrition isn't from lack of food, it's from lack of knowledge.]

Modernity Means Loss of Privacy?

I often read pieces which seem to imply there's a tradeoff between modern life/globalization/the new and privacy. That we lose privacy whenever we use credit cards, surf the Internet, talk on cell phones, use Onstar-type navigation systems, and so forth. There might be a little truth to this--certainly lots of data on us is recorded on various hard drives. But there's a big difference between having data stored away and being observed by living people. (Grow up in the country and you'd know what I mean.) An example was buried in a recent NYTimes article on those Indians who are returning to India to enjoy and exploit the new opportunities there.

A Reversal of the Tide in India:

"The cultural impact on their nation is visible and visceral. The New Delhi suburb of Noida boasts a collection of luxury homes known as an 'NRI Colony.' Meanwhile, returning stay-at-home spouses confess they miss the freedom and distance of America, far from the prying eyes of in-laws and nosy neighbors."

The writer observes someone who in the U.S. enjoyed driving herself now has a chauffeur to drive her. Nations with a servant class have a whole etiquette governing how they should act and be treated. If I can trust British movies and tv shows it boils down to the idea that servants are invisible--see Gosford Park.

Buying a Car, Now and Then

Bought a new car yesterday (the reason I didn't post Monday or Tuesday). It's the first one since October, 1990. As I waited for the paperwork yesterday I thought about the differences. (My memory of 1990 may not be totally reliable.)

• Dealership--it changed ownership and is in a new building. It now claims to be the biggest Toyota dealer in a wide area.
  
• In 1990 the showroom had 3-4 cars on display, yesterday none. Does that mean the sales experience is less about flash and glitter?
• In 1990 the showroom had 4-5 white salesmen standing around, yesterday maybe 10 salespersons, mostly male, mostly, maybe even entirely minority, sitting at desks in the "showroom". (At the other dealership I went to in my shopping, the two salesmen (used and new cars) were both minority.) The minorities represented all the continents, except Antarctica. Management may not have been as integrated as the sales/finance staff. I wonder whether such sales jobs aren't particularly attractive to people who are aggressive, work long hours, have people skills. As such, they may be one of the ways for the upwardly mobile to bypass the need for credentials (i.e., college degrees).
  
• In 1990 my purchase started by walking in the door, in 2006 it started with an Internet search and query.
  
• In 1990, my salesman stumbled in using the computer terminal, yesterday every salesperson had a PC and seemed reasonably proficient (though I did see one guy about 50 typing with 2 fingers).
• In 1990 I consulted Consumer Reports and still felt at a loss. In 2006 a salesperson printed out data from Edmunds to compare the Honda and Toyota I was considering. He was open about the change in the power balance between salesman and buyer because buyers have access to lots more information now.
• In 2006 there was more paperwork, including more concern for identification and consumer rights and information.
  

Of course, the biggest difference was in the car I was buying.

If a Tree Falls and There's No One But a Microphone?

The NY Times had an article on data mining Taking Spying to Higher Level, Agencies Look for More Ways to Mine Data which includes this quote:

"But by fundamentally changing the nature of surveillance, high-tech data mining raises privacy concerns that are only beginning to be debated widely. That is because to find illicit activities it is necessary to turn loose software sentinels to examine all digital behavior whether it is innocent or not.

'The theory is that the automated tool that is conducting the search is not violating the law,' said Mark D. Rasch, the former head of computer-crime investigations for the Justice Department and now the senior vice president of Solutionary, a computer security company. But 'anytime a tool or a human is looking at the content of your communication, it invades your privacy.'"

If a tool is doing the looking, is that the same as a having a microphone in the famous forest where the tree falls? I disagree. It's when a human eyeball sees the content or a human ear hears it that there may be an invasion of my privacy.

Mr. Broder's Column, Revisited

Having done my mea culpa, let me take another crack at the plans of Secretary Leavitt for four "breakthrough projects" in health care and the column written by David Broder here.

1. Either Leavitt or Broder gets the genesis of the projects wrong--they aren't HHS initiatives; they're done under direction from President Bush with HHS as the "managing partner" with OMB's Tim Young as "portfolio manager".
   
2. The column reveals what may be a problem--according to Broder: "worthy as these big projects may be, it is clearly the New Orleans challenge that stirs Leavitt's juices." Why is this a problem? Leavitt may be doing NIH (not National Institutes of Health but "not invented here"). The four projects evolved over years and HHS got the job of managing them back when Tommy Thompson was the Secretary. (See the April 2004 Executive Order.) Assuming that Leavitt has the healthy ego of most successful politicians, Satan will tempt him with the idea that he will do more for the world by his work in the Big Easy, rather than supervising the four project effort. If Bush is a lame duck, so is Leavitt, so he may be tempted to push hard to get the Big Easy project done. Pushing hard is incompatible with maintaining good relations with DOD and VA. It's also likely to take people and money away from the four projects.
3. Another problem may be Broder's. In the piece he says Leavitt is "modest," "creative," "attacking the problem," "experienced", and interested in "empowering" people. Quite the description of the modern Presidential candidate.
   
4. It certainly made a better story for both Leavitt and Broder to slight the involvement of White House, DOD, VA, state and local government, and private "stakeholders" in the four project effort. I'm sure as good bureaucrats the members of the various workgroups will soldier on regardless of how much credit they get in the Post. But an effort as complex as this has low odds of success in any case and doesn't need any more straws added to its back.
   

Why I Got It Wrong

My post on Mr. Broder's column was wrong, at least in part. Why did I screw it up?

1. Impatience. As I grow older I seem to be more slapdash, meaning I focus on some things and miss others. I read the piece as Secretary Leavitt pushing his four "breakthrough projects" and missed the segue into the fact that he's more interested in treating New Orleans as a clean slate to redo healthcare.
2. Laziness. In my defense I flagged the fact I hadn't done research, but that's hardly valid in the days of Google. Just a minute of drilling down the http://www.egov.gov site brought up lots of background on Leavitt's four initiatives. The effort began in Clinton's time, includes an executive order from Bush, and this American Health Information Community (the Community) Workgroups Web site.
3. Misplaced self righteousness. Because I knew so well the problems and processes of trying to redo areas of USDA, I thought the same was true of Secretary Leavitt's effort. I jumped to conclusions--taking a couple bits of information from Broder's column and fitting them into an overall structure derived from past experience. I didn't allow for change and difference.
   

These faults are characteristic, both of me and often I think of others on the Internet.

Invading Privacy II

The Post reprinted this article from the Chicago Tribune | They've got game--and hijab " discussing Muslim girls playing basketball in the Chicago area.

"Duaa Hamoud holds a basketball to her hip. She is standing in a long blue gown in a gym at Bridgeview's Universal School. Her head is covered in a white scarf pulled tightly around her neck. Not a wisp of hair is showing.

Around her, other high school girls dressed in similar flowing robes shoot a few casual baskets while they wait for practice to begin. There are no men in the gym--no male coaches, no boys from school, no dads or brothers in the bleachers.

So when the coach arrives and the real training starts, they can peel off their Islamic dress, exposing their sweat pants and short-sleeved T-shirts underneath."

What interested me was the accompanying picture, taken by a woman, which showed some of the girls on the court, most of whom were in the robes, but one of whom was in sweat pants and shirt. It's not clear whether that was a mistake, whether the particular girl was less particular about the rules, or what. Anyhow it raises the subject of Islamic privacy and the rules of the various bodies within Islam as to what is appropriate dress in which contexts. I take it as saying that Islam wants its adherents to control their privacy, to be able to say how much of their body/face is revealed to which others. This seems to me to be an attractive metaphor for overall issues of data privacy. We as citizens want the ability to control how much data is visible to different groups.