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The Smurfs and Culture

July 29th, 2011

The other day, I was imagining a conversation between our U.S. elected officials about the Smurfs.  On one side of the aisle, the rhetoric would go something like this: “I believe that Poppa Smurf  represents Karl Marx. He is not the leader of the Smurfs but an equal who is admired by the others for his age and wisdom.”  Then they might say, “And Brainy Smurf represents Trotsky, as he is the only one who comes close to matching Papa’s intellect.  He wears round glasses, is often isolated, ridiculed for being too professorial and is even ejected from the village for his ideas.”

Photo Credit: AP/Richard Drew

Furthermore they might add, “The smurfs don’t have private property, have adopted a collective-style economy and no individual Smurf is represented as either superior or inferior to others.” Someone would yell out, “They probably even have healthcare for everyone!” Consequently, the conclusion from one side of the aisle would be that the Smurfs are Socialists and are destroying the fabric of our society.

Then the other side might say something like: “Gargamel represents capitalism and embodies all the negative attributes associated with that economic system, such as greed, ruthlessness and the pursuit of personal gratification.”  “Gargamel is the quintessential symbol of Wall Street and will take his billions in tax cuts but never create even one job,” this side would say. At the same time, they might surmise that, “Azrael represents the worker in the ruthless, free-market state that is Gargamel’s house, and his union must be busted!”  Their final conclusion would be that, “The wealthy are taking all of our money and destroying the middle class.”

Is it any wonder we can’t get a debt ceiling bill?

One of my last professional trumpet playing jobs, “Smurfs on Ice,” was nearly 25 years ago. So, Brainy, Jokey, Grouchy, Greedy, and Stinky were all part of my early years, and now they are coming back, but the world is not the same!  So, be careful Smurfettes. Don’t invest in the market, real estate or dot.coms.  Try to avoid those outrageous credit card interest rates.  Don’t, whatever you do, don’t believe what the heads of the big banks and insurance companies are saying, and, for goodness sakes, buy gold, or maybe buy precious blue stuff.

When I was a kid, I was on journey to learn. So, when my dad bought me a box of vocabulary words and helped me learn ten new words every night, it wasn’t because he wanted us to grow up and be rich.  To him, the most important thing that he could do for his children was to make sure that they got an education.  He was all about the awareness that comes from exposure to information.

It started for me as a simple challenge to read the Bobbsey Twins books, and then the Hardy Boys, and from there, works by Mark Twain, Shakespeare, Dickens, Poe, Roth, Hemmingway and Tolstoy. Going through life without all of these friends would have been an empty and lonely journey. I’ll never forget when my brother, a young teacher at the time, introduced me to his classical record collection.  Yes, I was a trumpet player, but when I discovered Mahler, Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Wagner, Brahms, Handel, Stravinsky, Chopin, Mendelssohn, Berlioz, Bartok and Sibelius, my life was changed forever.  Between the written word and the music, the mysteries, joys, challenges and humanness that is life became more apparent to me every day.

We have migrated away from anything but basic education and our favorite pastimes are video games, celebrity magazines and reality TV shows. Maybe that’s why we seem to have lost our way in this country.  We no longer embrace a culture of open mindedness, understanding and compromise.  Is it any wonder our U.S. Representatives can’t work together?  Maybe they are simply unenlightened…Maybe they all need to spend some time with the Smurfs and read a few blue books.

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Posted in Current Affairs, Leadership, Music

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Treating People With Dignity

June 9th, 2011

As part of my continuing series of anti-bullying blog posts, this week’s post was inspired by a WDUQ/NPR interview of the authors of a book entitled: Unleashing the Power of Unconditional Respect: Transforming Law Enforcement and Police Training. It was written by Jack Colwell, a police veteran and trainer, and Chip Huth, who heads a SWAT team for the Kansas City, Missouri Police Department. The interview was inspired by the Pittsburgh police beating of CAPA (Creative and Performing Arts) student Jordan Miles, a who hadn’t done anything wrong. The interviewer stated that this beating, and the subsequent ruling regarding its legality, has seriously eroded the support of law-abiding citizens in the African American community and beyond toward the Pittsburgh Police.

CAPA student Jordan Miles and his mother, Terez

CAPA student Jordan Miles and his mother, Terez | Photo credit: Justin Merriman, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

Why, in a healthcare blog, would I select this topic? It is my firm belief that treating people with respect and dignity, regardless of the situation, leads to a more harmonious environment. Chip Huth, one of the two authors interviewed by WDUQ,  commented that the he believes that the Kansas City police force’s policy of holding meetings that allow community members to express their points of view and to feel understood may open them up to understanding the police point of view. He went on to say that “after a SWAT raid…when the situation is secure, his teams sit down with the suspects and explain the terms of the search warrant, answer questions, advise of rights, etc.” Convicted felons heading off to jail have told him how much they respect the way his team treated their families.

So, read between the lines. It’s not any different from healthcare work when it comes to “Treating People With Respect and Dignity.” It is what it is, and that care and treatment must transcend all races, colors and creeds. More importantly, it crosses all professions. By analogy, think of us as the SWAT (caregiving) team. We break into your life and scare you. It’s a well known fact that those individuals who are most often sued in healthcare are those with the weakest interpersonal skills  and worst “bedside manner.” They are often mean, curt or simply uncaring in their attitude and responses. Or else they make sure that they just don’t communicate at all with the family or patient.

Not so many years ago, I was taken to task by a group of physicians who were upset because I had written an article about those docs “who make rounds before the families are present and the patient is awake.” The good docs were indignant — and in some cases rightfully so — because they were communicators, but the “bullies” that I targeted, who were not patient centered, came at me from all directions: letters, phone calls, and attempts to have me censured by my hospital’s board. It really reminded me of the often-paraphrased Shakespearean line, “methinks he doth  protest too much.” If they were truly “caregivers,” and not technical health scientists, they would want to communicate with the patients and their families, to answer their questions, to help them understand what is happening (or about to happen) to them, and they would be sensitive so as to ensure that the fears being expressed by those involved were ameliorated about as well as could be expected under the circumstances.

If the SWAT team can kick in your door, throw in flash grenades, tie your hands behind your back, and arrest you, but take the time to heat the baby’s milk and explain to everyone involved what exactly is going on and what to expect, there will be a marked difference in response from those who are being impacted by their work. A hospital does not attain 98 or 99% patient satisfaction scores by ignoring patients and their families, treating the employees and administrators like they are minions and ignoring the kindness and respect that should be part of their jobs.

Respect - Nick Jacobs, FACHE - healthcare - anti-bullying - Healing Hospitals

Okay, I’m done. Like Aretha Franklin sang, “R-E-S-P-E-C-T / Find out what it means to me.” Look up the Jordan Miles story online, or better still, buy the Unleashing the Power of Unconditional Respect book and see what can happen when you treat people with dignity.

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Posted in Communication, Current Affairs, patient-centered care, workplace

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The Food Crisis

May 24th, 2011

Each year American farmers must feed an additional 80 million people internationally.

Food is The New Oil (c) ForeignPolicy.com - Nick Jacobs, FACHE - Healing Hospitals

Image credit: ForeignPolicy.com

During the first two decades of my adult life, it was commonplace to see story after story about the starving people in places like Biafra. Some three decades later, I now understand more deeply the geopolitical ramifications of these tragedies. A friend of mine sent me an article from the May/June Foreign Policy magazine. It detailed the food supply challenges facing this planet’s  growing population. The intensity of concern that this essay raises is palpable.

The article, The New Geopolitics of Food, by Lester R. Brown, opens with an example of what a 75% increase in wheat prices might mean to the average American who spends less than 1/10th of their income at the supermarket.  The answer is…probably a ten cent increase in a loaf of bread. As a result, a $2.00 loaf of bread will become a $2.10 loaf of bread. He then contrasts that difference with the impact it would have in a place like New Delhi where that same wheat is carried home to be ground into flour. The cost of the wheat there is actually double what it was. Consequently, Brown states, the world’s poorest two billion people — who spend 50 to 70% of their income on food — will go from two to one meal a day. His evaluation of this situation is that it can, will, and has already resulted in revolutions and political upheaval.

When the reasons for these shortages are explored, it quickly becomes apparent that changes in our climate represent a major contributing factor.  Be it too much hot dry weather, too many storms contributing to excessive rainfall, or soil that is simply exhausted from a lack of nutrients caused by depleted aquifers, the result leads to food becoming the hidden driver of world politics. As land and water become more limited, as temperatures go up and world food security deteriorates, scarcity is emerging as the norm, rather than than the exception.

Infographic: The Food Price RollercoasterUntil recently, the food supply was primarily in the hands of the world markets which were primarily monitored and sometimes driven by the United Nations’ World Food Program, but because of recent shortages and population growth, several countries have taken it upon themselves to secure their food supply in nontraditional ways. We are seeing unprecedented land grabs in developing countries, and water grabs from geographies where the end result creates shortages and where grain is being directly purchased from U.S. farmers.  All of this is contributing to a global power struggle for food security.

According to Brown, “With grain stocks low and climate volatility increasing, the risks are also increasing.  We are now so close to the edge that a breakdown in the food system could come at any time.”  For example, a 40% drop in grain production in the U.S. would be equivalent to a loss of 160 million tons of grain as opposed to a 40 million ton drop in Russia from the same percentage loss.  This would be devastating to the world food supply. As long as oil is expensive, ethanol production will remain high and corn will be pulled from the food chain to the fuel chain. “Oil exporting countries that import grain would…barter oil for grain, and low income grain importers would [lose] out.”

Brown concludes:

“If we cannot produce higher crop yields with less water and conserve fertile soils, many agricultural areas will cease to be viable. Each year, 1,400 square miles of land in Northern China turn to desert. If we cannot move at wartime speed to stabilize the climate, we may not be able to avoid runaway food prices. If we cannot accelerate the shift to smaller families and stabilize the world population sooner rather than later, the ranks of the hungry will almost certainly continue to expand.”

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Posted in Current Affairs, Nutrition, Public Policy

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Fracking, Beiber Fever…and Bedbugs

May 12th, 2011

Every once in a while, it’s important to write about things that are hot. (It keeps the blog numbers up.) Well, hydraulic fracking, Justin Beiber and bedbugs… yes, bedbugs are all very hot and in the news again. While the D’s and the R’s sort out the nuances of cutting $14 trillion or so from the U.S. federal budget over the next few centuries, we still have to deal with the day to day challenges of living on this planet. In Pennsylvania and New York at least, the hot news — according to the New York Times — is the radioactive water that is reportedly being forced from deep below the surface of the earth as a means of releasing natural gas reserves:

“The relatively new drilling method — known as high-volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing, or hydrofracking — carries significant environmental risks. It involves injecting huge amounts of water, mixed with sand and chemicals, at high pressures to break up rock formations and release the gas.”

“With hydrofracking, a well can produce over a million gallons of wastewater that is often laced with highly corrosive salts, carcinogens like benzene and radioactive elements like radium, all of which can occur naturally thousands of feet underground. Other carcinogenic materials can be added to the wastewater by the chemicals used in the hydrofracking itself.”

Of course, the essence of those two paragraphs will be the source of numerous heated discussions between environmentalists and the gas and oil lobbyists until this issue can be sorted out. In the meantime?  Well, that’s the question du jour.

On a lighter note, my five year old grandchild, Nina, is madly in love with Justin Beiber. She knows every lyric from every one of his songs and regularly either dances or does gymnastic flips to his music. On Saturday, she, her brother, sister and I worked to clean up their two car garage sized playroom. She turned on the Karaoke Machine and let it rip. We were all dancing and singing to the Bieb as we put the toys away, cleaned up the miniature kitchen, folded baby doll clothes and stacked their books.

Justin Bieber - photo credit: celebrity-gossip.net - Nick Jacobs FACHE - Healing HospitalsImagine my shock when one of my Google news alerts appeared spouting the fact that young Justin suddenly had become violently ill at one of his concerts in Manila, then quickly returned to the stage. He had been diagnosed with a bad chest infection prior to the show, but insisted on performing, having tweeted before the show, “Sick as a a dog… But the show must go on.” As a non-medical/non-science healthcare guy, the diagnosis made me a little curious, (remember, I’m a musician, too), but Yahoo Answers cleared things up for me with this patient testimonial: “I’ve spent so many years of my life convincing myself that I have emetophobia, because when I was about 11, I was sick from a chest infection and I threw up…” So, there you have it:  Justin is not the only person who gets sick from being sick. So, relax, Nina, he’s going to be okay.

Now, some additional disconcerting news. After having  personally survived a bedbug attack at a top-notch hotel in a major U.S. city last year,  I read with trepidation that it has recently been discovered that MRSA infection has now been associated with the scratching that comes after the bed bug bites.  This dangerous, antibiotic-resistant bacteria (usually acquired from hospital visits or things like high school wrestling mats), is a strain of the bacteria Staphylococcus aureus which is called Community Associated MRSA or CA-MRSA.  Because it is resistant to oxacillin, penicillin, amoxicillin and other antibiotics, it is not to be ignored.  My medical friends tell me that the best treatment for bed bug bites is to keep the area clean, use antibiotic ointments or gel and keep a close eye on the bite to ensure that it doesn’t become infected.

So, all of you frackers, Bieberbots and bedbug-dreaders …should have a sip of some Grey Goose or Courvoisier.  They’re not radioactive, may calm your fear of tossing your cookies, and would probably – in the right quantities – kill bedbugs…or at least make you stop caring if  they didn’t.  And, if you still want to learn more…well, there’s an app for that.

Bedbugs 101 mobile app - Nick Jacobs, FACHE - health 2.0 - healthcare

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Finding the Cure…for Bullying

January 21st, 2011

No workplace bullying - Nick Jacobs - healinghospitals.comThis week, NBC’s Today Show featured another story about bullying. As I have have mentioned in previous posts here and elsewhere, I believe that bullying is the quintessential cancer on our lives in places of business, in the military, politics, and relationships of all types.  The good news – actually the very good news –  is that there has been some incredible work being performed on this topic through the efforts of Dr. Matt Masiello at my former place of employment, the Windber Research Institute in Windber, PA.  Grants through the Highmark Blue Cross Foundation of Pittsburgh have fueled this initial effort and the academic and quantitative analysis being done by Clemson University has documented this work.  I believe that this joint effort is a magnificent  example of what can be done to change the future course of events currently being controlled by bullies.

The Today Show story that I saw featured the Massachusetts school where, due to cyber-bullying, a young girl committed suicide last year.  Apparently, another girl is now having the same experience at the same school. With the help of programs like this comprehensive anti-bullying program, the former Secretary of Education from PA, Jerry Zahorchak, (now Superintendent of the Allentown PA school system), embraced the effort to quell and discourage this type of destructive behavior.  And the program, under the direction of Dr. Matt Masiello has successfully been introduced across the  entire State of PA. (Matt had started the Allegheny County’s Goods for Guns program in 1994, when he was the head of pediatric intensive care at Allegheny General Hospital. To date, this program is responsible for collecting more than 11,000 illegal guns from the streets of Pittsburgh.) Matt has had the same success with this anti-bullying program. Now, both Massachusetts and Maryland are looking into embracing this effort.

This anti-bullying program is based on a European program with which Dr. Masiello had become familiar.  This is a school system-wide effort that is very well documented and results in tremendous awareness and reduction of bullying at all grade levels.

The trainers bring a group of teachers and administrators together in the school system, and then “train the trainers” as to how this effort can become part of the philosophy of the school.  They start the training in the spring, typically launch the school wide effort in the fall and run it for at least a year. During that time, detailed records are kept measuring outcomes.

Matt Masiello, MD - Windber Research Institute - Nick Jacobs - Taking the Hell OUt of Healthcare

Matt Masiello, MD

Matt is a wonderful physician, a truly giving person and a saint of a man who is the only U.S. representative on the board of the World Health Organization’s Health Promoting Hospitals program. I hired him before I left Windber Research Institute, and he has worked tirelessly to address both this problem and the problems of childhood obesity.

The Olweus Bullying Prevention Program (Olweus.org on the web, @Olweus on Twitter) has impacted more than 400 school districts and 20% of all school-aged children in Pennsylvania. It has also had up to a 50% reduction in student reports of bullying …and bullying others.

For more information, please contact me or Dr. Matthew Masiello at the Windber Research Institute.

Michael & Marisa’s anti-bullying song – “The Same”

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Posted in Current Affairs, Healthcare, Hospital Administration, Hospitals, Leadership

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Making Sense of Tucson

January 11th, 2011

It was 1991 when one of  my professors at Carnegie Mellon University began discussing health policy in the United States.  He told us about Arizona, where the state government had decided to stop paying for transplants.  Then he went on to explain that desperate families were moving from Arizona to Pittsburgh, just so they could establish residency in Pennsylvania, and their loved one could receive a transplant.

At around that same time, an outspoken politician from Colorado, former Governor Richard Lamm, who ran for President of the United States on the Reform Party, described the travesty of Medicare vs. Medicaid.   He described the older generation as committing “generational murder” because, even though many times there was no hope  for their survival, for extending their life or for having any quality to their life, we, as a nation, spend 60% of our Medicare dollars on the last  30 or so days of life.  He advocated being honest and allowing people to decide if they wanted palliative care.

What he also pointed out was that, as a country, we continue to have one of the highest infant mortality rates in the industrial world. The reason, he theorized, was because the seniors voted and the young mothers didn’t and no politician would dare vote against that senior coalition.  (This is not about death panels, it is about honesty in healthcare. It is about transparency and explaining the facts to the families so that they could make rational decisions.) None of his words were well received, but nevertheless, they were filled with candor and embraced very difficult ethical views.

Giffords Tucson tragedy - Nick Jacobs, FACHE - Healing Hospitals

The bottom line?  It is a very sad situation when we have to, in effect, sentence people to death at any age because resources are not available to save them, but this is emphatically not about rationing of care, because rationing infers giving everyone a little less.  This is about making a government decision to take away everything. So, this is about making rational  resource allocation, not based upon the number of votes needed to get re-elected, but based on the value of a life at any and all ages.

Finally, the elephant in the room?  Those people killed and wounded in Arizona were killed and wounded because of a man who is most likely mentally ill.  We, as a country, must begin to address this mental health issue with parity, with commitment and without judgment.  No family is without some member who is suffering from some mental health issue, but  this discussion is still ignored, hidden or buried.

So, when the pundits ask if it is about the rhetoric? We don’t know. When they ask if it is about the availability of weapons and ammunition?  The answer seems to fall under that same category. BUT, when the question is properly directed toward mental health?  The answer seems to be absolutely, yes without a doubt.

During this time of reflection, let’s get serious about the very real and very big challenges that this nation faces. We must, as a nation, take these challenges head-on and deal with “problem solving,” and if this Congress does not begin to take action and begin to solve problems, then we must vote again in May and November to continue to make our voices heard.

Unless we can begin to talk with each other with dignity and respect, we will not make progress.  Until we begin to respect the other person’s point of view and understand that debates are healthy again, we will not make progress. Our leaders need to debate, but at the end of that debate, it is essential that they walk out of the room together and agree that they are all here to do a job, and that job is to solve problems.

My heart goes out to all of those families who were impacted by this awful tragedy.

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Wikileaks and Transparency

December 9th, 2010

LONDON (Dec. 8th) —Held without bail in Wandsworth prison, Julian Assange has been deprived of his trusty laptop, so the WikiLeaks founder can’t supply an inside scoop on life behind bars. But if the pro-transparency campaigner could leak just one word about conditions in Britain’s biggest jail, he would probably settle for “cramped.”   (via AOL NEWS)

Wikileaks' Julian Assange at TED - Nick Jacobs, FACHE

At my last CEO position, there were about 650 employees on the hospital side and another 50 at the research institute, but in the position that I held as the Chief Communications officer immediately before that,  there were over 4,500 employees.  Any one of those employees could  potentially have become PFC Bradley Manning.  Manning is the young man being accused of leaking millions of pieces of information to Assange’s Wikileaks. Every disgruntled, well-intentioned and sometimes naive employee who either had an “axe to grind” or who simply embraced a philosophy of openness would have potentially presented a major problem to any organization that was built around secrecy at all costs.

In my 20+ years as a hospital administrator, there were hundreds — no, thousands — of incidents that could have been “leaked” to family, friends and the media regarding incidents that may or may not have been problematic.  My memory goes immediately to an online discussion forum where the death of Congressman John P. Murtha was being dissected by a group of Bethesda Residents;  specifically, young U.S. Navy physicians who were venting and expressing their fears regarding their “being held responsible for the death of this powerful Congressman.”  The amazing thing to me was the it was a running dialogue that was, yes, online. The discussion topic thread was etitled Did we kill Congressman Murtha? The anonymous user names went through case-by-case analysis of other undeserving patients who did not emerge with their lives from surgeries at the hospital over the previous weeks and months.  These were individuals who, according to their estimations, should have. Imagine my shock when I came upon the casual page which, at minimum represented a potential HIPAA violation.

Well, it’s all about transparency, my friends, and this movement is only the beginning.  Unlike Kevorkian’s efforts which were almost single-handed, this is a movement, a viral, well-funded, philosophical movement that feels like “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.” And it’s “coming to a theater near you.”   Not unlike the content of the sensitive documents that have been appearing online recently where peoples’ lives are at stake,  hospitals and physician offices face many of the same realities every day.  How many people, like PFC Manning, may not be truly insane or wish to destroy the government, but simply believe that their assistance in exposing the truth will “set us free?”

Transparent Butterfly - Nick Jacobs, FACHE - Healing HospitalsAs business leaders not many decades ago, we were urged to treat every e-mail and every comment as if it was being reported by Mike Wallace on 60 Minutes.  Of course, not many of us did, nor could we stick to that difficult rule of communicating, but think of the potential ramifications if Mr. Wallace had been as potentially ever-present as Mr. Assange.

What is my formula for success?  It’s always been the same.  Be as transparent as you can possibly be. Seems simple, but try it sometime. Don’t break the law. Don’t give out information that is inappropriate as in personally destructive regarding individuals, but be as open about your operation as you can possibly be.  Encourage an environment of openness when it comes to issues, mistakes, etc. and the frustration levels will go down, down, down…sometimes to the point of having employees telling you, “I wish I didn’t know so much.  Life was easier when I was in the dark.”  That’s when you’ll know you are beginning to provide a truly transparent business environment.

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Light Up Night

November 20th, 2010
Courtesy of Michael D. McCumber Photography

50th anniversary Light Up Night - Nick Jacobs, FACHE - HealingHospitals.comMy apartment is about two blocks away from Pittsburgh’s Cultural District and the same distance from the Sports District where the theaters, stadiums and plenty of restaurants are all nearby. Last night was the 50th anniversary celebration of “Light Up Night,” when the Holiday trees, choirs, and seasonal celebrations begin. Literally tens of thousands of people make their trek into the City for this special night. Zambelli puts on its finest fireworks display of the year, while lighted, horse drawn carriages, food vendors, and music fill the city. It is intended to be a special night for families, and last night was no different. Except for a few distractions.

Because my place is on a main drag and literally one apartment up from street level, activity sometimes feels like it is taking place directly in my living room. Most of the time, this reminds me that I’m alive and it is stimulating, exciting and always evolving. Last night, however, things were somewhat reminiscent of a war zone. Literally a block away, the Clemente Bridge was the staging point for some magnificent fireworks and the crowds were everywhere.

Not long into the celebration, however, it began to feel like Chicago during the filming of the Blues Brothers. Sirens were raging past my apartment at the rate of one a second to what could have been a gun battle. Instead, it was one gun and one victim with plenty of other potential participants standing by ready to mix it up. Then, a few minutes later, another burst of sirens went in the other direction toward an Irish Pub about a block from my apartment. There, another man had been shot. When the news came on, it was apparent that every available policeman in the City had been called to the Wood Street scene to attempt to keep things from boiling over as young men were escorted in handcuffs toward waiting police vans.

I am NOT a sociologist, but it seems very clear that this is just the beginning of what could literally escalate into a form of anarchy as we continue to pursue our current philosophy of greed in this country. While working on a grant a few months back I saw a statistic that was mind numbing. Young African American men in what are considered high crime areas of this city are experiencing an unemployment rate of about 75+ percent. The national average for young black men is about 45 percent and in Pittsburgh, with a few point differentiation due to my sometimes less-than-precise memory, that more global average jumps to about 55 percent.

This week, however, we heard that unemployment compensation would probably not continue to be extended, and last week we heard that education was only one of the potential targets for domestic budget cuts. Not unlike the hospital employees who consistently take all of the premium parking spaces so that their walk into the building is the very closest possible, there seems to be a breakdown in logic. If we don’t correct the problems that we have in our education system; if we don’t help people who have, for no reason of their own become jobless or disabled; if we stop caring about the middle class, and stop helping the poor to establish themselves; where will it lead as a nation?

My personal belief is that we can cut both domestic and military budgets; we can delay some gratification, and we can tweak some of the laws that allow profits to benefit the one or two percent of us who are clearly now in the elite class of protected citizens. The question is, can we do this in a way that does not destroy those who are struggling to survive? Take away the parking places, and you discourage patients from using your hospital which leads to lay-offs. Take away the safety nets, and we might soon have an out of control population that will cost us more than any of the tax breaks or safety net cuts give us. Let’s cooperate in repairing this mess. PLEASE.

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<a href=”http://www.michaelmccumber.com/” class=”michaelmccumber-title”>Courtesy of Michael D. McCumber Photography</a>
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Things People Are Thinking About

October 14th, 2010

Every few weeks or so, I take the time to read articles produced by The Pew Research Center, a non-partisan fact tank. Pew does not take sides in policy disputes, but they do provide a valuable information resource for political leaders, journalists, scholars and citizens. I believe that I come under that last category, citizen. The only requirement that Pew has relative to their findings is that their sources are cited accurately and in context.

Recently, they provided some fun statistics:

For example, among the public, one-in-four (25%) believe in astrology (including 23% of Christians); 24% believe in reincarnation, nearly three-in-ten (29%) say they have been in touch with the dead; almost one-in-five (18%) say they have seen or been in the presence of ghosts. If none of those statistics surprise you, then you clearly are not me.

Here was another great poll finding: 87% of scientists say that humans and other living things have evolved over time and that evolution is the result of natural processes such as natural selection, but only 32% of the public accepts this as true. (From the work of Jodie T. Allen and Richard Auxier, Pew Research Center)

Conference on Climate Change, Poznan, Poland

Well, this next poll was even more interesting to me. As both a business person and a humanist, it has been difficult for me to hear large numbers of my friends and acquaintances literally “going off” about how ridiculous global warming is. They say things like, “Global warming and global cooling happen all the time; it’s just a natural course of events.” Others say, “Al Gore filled us with lies about global warming for his own financial gain.” Finally, I have heard over and over, “Well, we can’t do anything about it anyway, so why worry.”

Then there’s the opposite side where experts say things like, “If we stopped using all fossil fuels right now, the earth will continue to heat for another 60 years, and all of the devastating floods and fires that we’ve seen this year were the result of only a 1 degree increase in the world’s temperatures, and in 60 years we will heat up by 5 degrees.”

What did Pew find about the current global attitudes about climate change?

Pew - global attitudes about global climate change - Nick Jacobs, FACHETheir international polling shows that publics around the world are concerned about climate change. In the recent spring 2010 Pew Global Attitudes survey, majorities in all 22 nations polled rate global climate change a serious problem, and majorities in ten countries say it is a very serious problem. There are some interesting differences among the countries included in the survey. Brazilians are the most concerned about this issue: 85% consider it a very serious problem. Worries are less intense, however, in the two countries that emit the most carbon dioxide — only 41% of Chinese and 37% of American respondents characterize climate change as a very serious challenge.

Even though majorities around the globe express at least some concern about this issue, publics are divided on the question of whether individuals should pay more to address climate change. In 11 nations, a majority or plurality agree that people should pay higher prices to cope with this problem, while in 11 other nations a majority or plurality say people should not be asked to pay more.

These findings remind me of numerous other examples of confusion created by the short term winners and losers in what are serious economic discussions. There are 1.5 B Chinese, and over the next several years, many of them are going to want a car. Regardless of your own personal stand on this issue, that’s some serious potential pollution.

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Evolution or Devolution?

July 16th, 2010

There’s a part of me that celebrates each and every day because I’m evolving. For example . . . being a mature person usually feels pretty good.  I’m more settled, less angry, less needy, less . . . well, you get the idea.  On the other hand, I would never want to own a, vintage car.  Why?  They usually don’t have air conditioning, air bags, seat belts, or CD changers. . .with auxiliary jacks for MP3 digital audio players.  Driving one would be taking several steps backwards in safety, comfort, and style.

How else have I evolved?  Let’s see.  I have air bags.  Okay, maybe they’re not air bags,  but I have a protective coating of extra stuff around my organs. (I’ve gained at least one additional pound a year for the past 30 years.)  Oh, and I am a lot smarter, too.  In fact, my IQ test gained at least 10 points over the last few decades.  (It would probably have been 20 points higher if I hadn’t been on cholesterol medication, but I’d probably be dead and that higher IQ wouldn’t help much.)  On the other hand, the fish oil is supposed to make your brain work better.  Mom used to say, “Nicky, eat your fish.  It’s brain food.”  (Forget the fact that it was deep fried and heavily battered.)

Nick Jacobs, FACHE at the beach with his grandchildrenThis evolution thing could all be summed up by saying that I’m finally starting to mature.  Even though I’ve missed it by decades; it’s happening now.  I’m wiser.  Honestly, there couldn’t be that many things left to learn about running stuff; four decades is a lot of  experience.  I’ve learned about politics, human relations, sociopaths and wonderful souls; and I’ve learned about construction, child birth, heart attacks and ground moles.  I’ve lived through the birth of my kids, my grandkids, and my friend’s kids.  I’ve lived through the deaths of every aunt, uncle, and a few cousins; friends, neighbors, mentors and a half dozen family pets, and I’ve held both of my parents in my arms as they passed, too.

Having observed all of this, what is the devolution?

On NPR the other day, there was a short story that the American public’s view of capitalism has deteriorated.  The exact percentage of those still embracing capitalism was about 44% and those who think it’s outlived its appropriateness was around 47%.  (I guess the other 9% might have thought that capitalism had something to do with that white building in Washington D.C.)  Interestingly, before I heard this story, my impression of capitalism had devolved as well.  In fact, the litany of sins observable to me because of the extreme capitalist approach that we have embraced is long and includes:  BP, Enron, Tyco, Bernie Madoff, and the fat food industry . . . I mean, the fast food industry.

But then I read a rant by Jonah Goldberg of National Review Online:

“Every good thing capitalism helps produce — from singing careers to cures for diseases to staggering charity —  is credited to some other sphere of our lives. Every problem with capitalism, meanwhile, is laid at her feet. Except the problems with capitalism — greed, theft, etc. — aren’t capitalism’s fault, they’re humanity’s. Socialist countries have greedy thieves, too.”

So, what’s the answer?  It seems simple enough.  Once again, from Mom, “It’s moderation.”  The far right and far left seem to be providing a daily whipsaw of entertaining cable news shows from Beck to Olbermann and from Hannity to Maddow, but these extreme views are not helping us solve the problems.  In fact their rhetoric contributes to this devolution.  Does Rush really believe everything that he says or does he say it because it’s so outrageous that he can continue to earn nearly $38 million per year?  And Keith? And Glenn?

I like my air conditioning, my air bags, and my computer assisted brakes, but I’m really getting tired of “bags of air,” greedy anybodys and anythings.

Let’s be less angry, less needy, and more settled . . . come on, guys, grow up.

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