Affirmative Action In Miss America Contest

I have mixed reactions to Nina Davuluri becoming Miss America on Sep. 15.  While someone of Indian origin has won, my first thought on seeing the news footage was "Really? Is this the best that USA (or the Indian community for that matter) can offer?"  I wonder what proportion of Americans and Indians feel this way.  A poll on this would be interesting. In each of the Indian marriages I've recently attended in India and the US there were some female guests I'd regard as having a better presence than Nina.

It looks like the contest has evolved away from what I expect.  Given that it's highly visual, I thought having stunning looks that would turn heads should be table stakes for all contestants.  That means scoring close to a 10 when men rate them in appearance on a 1 to 10 scale for, say, whom they'd like stranded with them on an island.  Sure, the winner should have a lot more - charm, poise, intelligence, talent, etc. But these attributes should complement, not substitute for physical oomph.   I'd score Nina as a 7, may be even an 8, but that still falls short.  We're talking of Miss Totally Outstanding here, not Miss Quite Above Average. 

Beauty of course lies in the eye of the beholder.  You'd then want judges whose choices reflect mass appeal but that isn't happening here.  It may be overly politically correct judges who want to signal some social message with their decision.  That's unfortunate and the reason I have long stopped watching these pageants, national or international.  Fair judging should pick winners regardless of their ethnicity, color or creed, not because of it in a misplaced push to deliberately inject diversity.  By all means choose a Chinese American as Miss America in the next year or two, but only if judges truly assess her to be the best, and not driven by any inclination to represent this group.  And do give those poor statuesque, blond and blue eyed girls a chance even if they don't have any serious disability.

This system can be corrected to reflect mainstream sentiment by replacing the celebrity judges with a large representative group of men who vote by secret ballot. And for the Q&A please, no questions on charged political and socially divisive issues like an attack on Syria or gay marriage where the listeners' prejudices can color how they evaluate answers.  Well, they regrettably did have these types of questions in Miss America for the top five finalists and four of them got through with (about equally) good answers.

What about other parts of the contest?  Nina's Bollywood fusion dance item in the talent show was impressive but I didn't find it exceptional.  I've seen similar standards of performance by non-professionals and semi-professionals at larger Indian festivals.  The ballet number by Miss California and River Dance by "our" Miss Connecticut look at least as good to me.  And Miss Kansas who got the most online votes and wasn't allowed under the rules to display her marksmanship and archery prowess did a good job in her second choice of singing.

Other than reactions in the media, Twitter or blogosphere are there ways to assess if pageant winners are well chosen?  I can think of a hypothetical measure as well as a one based on subsequent history as under:

• The contest winner should pass a "stand out" test.  That is, if you placed her among a fairly large group of randomly chosen American girls of similar age, onlookers who are told Miss America is among them should be easily able to pick her out.  Most shouldn't be going "Where? Where?" or guess it's someone else as I think would happen with Nina.  Though to be fair to her many of her fellow contestants could also have been lost in a crowd.  This can be due to the criteria of evaluation being skewed so much away from looks at all levels of competition - local, state, national and even international.  That's why there can be similar surprises and unexpected outcomes even in the Miss Universe and Miss World contests.

• The test of history - what these winners achieve down the line.  By this measure the likes of Vanessa Williams (first African American crowned Miss America 1984), Gretchen Carlson (Miss America 1989), Aishwarya Rai (Miss World 1994), Sushmita Sen (Miss Universe 1994), Priyanka Chopra (Miss World 2000), Lara Dutta (Miss Universe 2002) were great choices. So were also-rans Diane Sawyer, Michelle Pfeiffer, Sharon Stone, Halle Berry and yes, Oprah Winfrey. 

So on the positive side if Nina has notable achievements hereafter, even if it takes decades, I'll eat my words and apologize for any mean things I've said.  And regardless of anything else I'm happy for her and congratulate her - she parlayed all she had to win beyond most Americans' (and my) expectations. 

And while I carp about this de facto affirmative action permeating various aspects of our life it at least speaks to the amazing open mindedness of Americans.  I've been struck by the wide acceptance and appreciation of other cultures by most of them, and the Miss America 2014 results reflect this.



 

Aftermath Of Two More Shootings

In my last post I mentioned the July 27 mass shooting in an Aurora, CO movie theater as the latest example of the toll taken by lax US gun laws.  Since then there have been two more shootings that grabbed headlines with thankfully decreasing number of casualties.  Amidst these tragedies I'll talk for a change about some positive aspects, including those that touched us personally.

The Aug. 5 shooting by a white supremacist that claimed 6 Sikh lives in their Milwaukee temple also brought out the good and noble aspects of life and social values in America.  Over 40 people are murdered on average in the US every day, yet the media gave this wide, sympathetic and extended coverage because the crime targeted a specific minority community.   Politicians and leaders of all stripes including Republican VP candidate Paul Ryan and First Lady Michele Obama made it a point to personally visit and console the afflicted community.  President Obama even ordered flags to be flown at half mast to mourn the victims.

Despite some obvious and recurrent cracks in ethnic and religious harmony in India I've been proud of the general secular traditions and systems in the country of my birth.  After coming to the US I've seen that the overall acceptance, tolerance and politeness towards minorities here is of an even higher order.  Some of my Indian friends and relatives perceive racism and profiling that I mentioned on Aug. 10, 2009, a little of which is inevitable since everyone can't be perfect.  Still, it's probably less in the US than anywhere else in the world, and largely offset by sustained outreach to minorities.

After the Sikh temple shootings I got emails of concern and support from half a dozen friends in the US and Canada who know I'm from this community though my wife is Hindu.  While all these friends happened to be Asian (a Chinese and the rest Hindus, one of whom is married to a remarkable Muslim woman) I believe their decades of living here have infused them with additional sensitivity.  Most asked if our family was okay and hoped that we hadn't lost anyone close to us.  Logically speaking they shouldn't have worried.  I know about a couple of hundred Sikhs in the US among the estimated 200,000 to 500,000 living here so the chance of my knowing any of the victims is 1 in 200.  Still, it's their thoughts and sentiments that count.

The other and latest shooting on Aug. 24 outside the Empire State Building involved a single murder followed by police firing in which the gunman was killed and nine bystanders injured.  It was big news mainly because it took place near a national landmark in broad daylight in Manhattan. 

Our daughter Rubina works about a mile away at the Wall Street Journal and has recently taken up a new assignment dealing with social media.  Last Friday she too was sucked into the rapid fact gathering and dissemination as the news broke.  She was also interviewed on camera for the first time to give an insider's perspective of how information is gathered, verified and shared using the new tools of social media.  In a fast paced day she had an hour to prepare before her debut appearance.  She can be seen in this 5 minute clip, and did a good job. 
 

How Did He Get It So (Largely) Right?

Paul Krugman's article last week in the Times "How Did Economists Get It So Wrong" was remarkable in two ways.

First, it neatly captured the essence of how two schools of economists (which includes finance academics) differ in their approach to markets. Krugman presented this so skillfully that it can be grasped by readers without a background in economics. At the same time it was immensely useful and interesting as a recap and to put issues in perspective even for practitioners in the field.

Second, the article is fully eight pages long - much longer than his Op-Eds, and I thought it would be too "heavy" for most readers. Yet to my surprise it was the most popular and emailed article for a couple of days. That's as much of a tribute to the caliber of the Times' readership as to Krugman's writing. I strongly recommend this piece to anyone who wants to get an insightful overview (admittedly from Krugman's eyes) of the rival schools of thought and of the issues separating them.

Though I studied at Chicago, I find myself agreeing with much of what Krugman says. This is particularly so in regard to the Keynesian belief in helping the economy through temporary stimulus spending, and events showing markets can be grossly inefficient for long periods of time. In fact, in my post back on Feb. 10 I had voiced strong misgivings about the statements of some prominent Chicago professors who opposed the fiscal stimulus plans.

However, Krugman is still a little unfair to the Chicago school by painting them as largely unified against Keynesian beliefs, firmly believing in efficient markets, and lumping them all as "freshwater" economists. Krugman did acknowledge that the danger of a financial market meltdown was first pointed out by another Chicago economist, Raghuram Rajan. But Krugman didn't mention that a leading academic of the theory of "behavioral economics" (rival to efficient markets theory) also belongs to the Chicago school. That professor is Richard Thaler who is at least as well known as the other proponent of behavioral economics, Robert Shiller, whom Krugman repeatedly mentioned.

In fact, during my time there I had found it great about Chicago that rival theories could be freely and vigorously debated in the weekly finance workshops and other academic forums. I remember how Eugene Fama (dubbed "the father of the efficient market theory") in his highly popular fnance class had included Thaler's papers as required reading. And though a lot of friendly riffs about opposing beliefs were exchanged, Thaler used to be invited to Chicago's finance workshops to discuss his papers even when he taught at MIT or Cornell. Then about 10 years ago he was welcomed into Chicago as a tenured professor.

But apart from setting the record straight about Chicago and other other schools (about their not having monolithic, misplaced beliefs) I really like and commend Krugman's article.

Rubina a Graphics Editor - What's That?

For the couple of years after graduating from the Columbia School of Journalism our daughter Rubina has worked as a graphics editor, the last 18 months with the Wall Street Journal (WSJ).

What does she do as a graphics editor? She obtains the data and material and then uses it to create charts, tables, inset summaries and other visuals (except pure photographs) that accompany news stories. For her and her colleagues it can be a charged - some will say stressful - environment with tight deadlines. But she has a passion for it.

For the most part she and her colleagues walk into work in the morning, learn about developing stories and then conceive of the graphics in consultation with reporters, columnists and editors. Then it's data and materials search, verification, creation, iterations and all to be completed before "press time" by late evening.

They each do anything from two to five graphics on a typical day, depending on the complexity and the workload. To maintain an efficient and collaborative environment without worries about who gets credit the graphics folks generally do not put their names on their creations. We don't know about her precise handiwork till she tells us, though we can make some guesses.

Want to see a sample of Rubina's work? Unfortunately, most of the online versions are not the same as the ones in print, and need a subscription to view. If you have one, here's one from May 12 that she did on the US federal highest bracket tax rates going back all the way to 1913. The print version was better. It is overlaid with the terms and pictures of US Presidents. Rubina had to work with some IRS folks to get a major part of the information. When the story came out the IRS called to compliment the WSJ on the graphic.

Addendum on July 22: Today, Rubina had a graphic on childhood obesity so I thought I'll add it. Here's what she had to say:
I have a U.S. map on today's Currents page on child obesity rates by state. Rather than color-coding the states like we usually do, we decided to make the heights of the states correspond to their obesity rates. This was done using a program called Cinema 3-D, which I used for the first time on Monday. You can see the print version on page A11 or online here by clicking on the small map: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124821547930269995.html

Much Ado About Trivial Congress Expenses

There should be a journalistic equivalent of the Razzies, a kind of an anti-Pullitzer Prize, awarded for the worst of the prominent media stories. For this I'd like to nominate a series of front page Wall Street Journal (WSJ) articles on Congressional travel and other expenses that have been appearing since mid-May. These have obviously been inspired by the British MP expense controversy that should have been a non-event if only the public were more astute. But it isn't, and the resultant scandal ended the political careers of many MPs and Ministers.

Of all papers, business-oriented ones like the WSJ should make the case as I did about compensation for US lawmakers being substantially boosted in line with their responsibilities. They should also have a public funding option for their election campaigns if they agree to forego private fundraising through campaign contributions. Even at salaries of $1 - $2 million annually and an equivalent amount for election expenses the annual taxpayer tab will be $3 billion. That's money well spent to reduce lawmaker vulnerability to petty Abramoff style inducements and lobbyist influence. It's a natural extension of campaign finance reform efforts, for which McCain and Feingold deserve a lot of credit even if they've had very limited success.

As I've said before, the WSJ has instead tried to whip up a UK style news storm about lawmaker "splurges" in the US. To some extent it has succeeded. Starting with its May 16 article, Expensing It, the US Way" the WSJ has played up travel and office expenses of at most a few thousand dollars per individual Congressmen that also happen to conform to all the rules and are available for public scrutiny in hard copy. But the WSJ wants to go further and sought full online disclosure of every expense detail. After its strident articles and reporting of May 20, May 30, June 1, June 3, Nancy Pelosi decided on June 4 to require all expense details to be posted online, with the Senate promising to follow suit.

All this detracts from the lawmakers focusing on infinitely more serious matters facing the country. Such journalism reflects poorly on a prestigious publication like the WSJ, and yet it hasn't stopped there. It has continued with these front page expose's including on July 2 highlighting the foreign travel tab of lawmakers of a whopping $13 million in 2008 (costing the average American 4 cents) and a July 3 article about such official records understating these expenses. Even so, the listed expenses are so trivial as to be laughable, but politicians know too well that they shouldn't over-estimate the wisdom of (at least a significant proportion of) the readers.

Ridicule by another part of the media may be the best way to stop such cheap and irrelevant reporting. Any takers, Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert?

Deepak Chopra on Michael Jackson

I was always sympathetic and supportive of Michael Jackson, even through his court trials and "Wacko Jacko" labels used by the media while covering some of his later activities. Now that he's gone, it's good to see that in the broader populace positive memories and feelings for him far outweigh any negativity. He and Madonna have been my favorite pop icons and his untimely death ahead of his comeback concert is tragic.

Of all the interviews about Michael that I saw on TV the one I liked best is this one last night by Deepak Chopra with Keith Olbermann on MSNBC. It not only gives great insights into Michael's psyche, life and the trauma that he faced, but also shows Deepak to be forthcoming, as well as a true and caring friend.

More Ado About Nothing

I don't know what's more deplorable. The awful journalism or the misplaced outrage of the public that reacts to such stories. First there's this continuing fallout from the UK lawmaker's so-called expense scandal that has put the hapless British PM Gordon Brown's career in severe jeopardy. I've already expressed my disgust at this storm in a teacup and want lawmakers to be paid a lot more so they can do their job better, without falling victim to petty temptations or distractions.

Now across the pond a top paper like the WSJ began orchestrating a move to require all members of the US Congress to post their expenses online. The Congressmen's expenses are already available in hard copy for anyone who is interested, but this apparently isn't enough. In three front page articles (imagine, they thought THIS was the most important news to report) the WSJ had big scoops about some members using their allowances on certain items. These included a lease of Lexus or other cars costing an average of $640 a month, 7 HD screens costing $2K each, uniform shirts costing $12K (total, not each) and so on...

You call THIS in the WSJ articles sensational or top news? The WSJ and other media drumbeat ultimately succeeded on June 4 in getting the House to agree to post all expenses online. Whoopee. I'd have liked some prominent journalists or leaders to point out how misplaced and ridiculous this whole coverage is. There's some hope. Mayor Bloomberg opined that the US President is grossly underpaid. There were predictable howls of indignation but at least one journalist Dan Thomasson supported his views and also advocated much higher pay for other public servants.

I'd like such views to be the rule rather than the exception.

Misplaced Outrage - The UK Scandal That Isn't

So what do you think about the UK's MP expenses scandal that has forced the resignation of Speaker Michael Martin and several Ministers and MPs? The media reports talk of public outrage about these excesses and one poll shows the effect on UK voters. 63% have not been swayed by all this coverage and it won't change their voting preference, but a whopping 27% say that it has.

I think this whole controversy is deplorable, and a commentary on the quality of our media coverage. In an August 2007 post I disagreed with criticism of what we pay our lawmakers. I am strongly of the view that we should pay our apex lawmakers well, considering the enormous responsibilities and the public trust we place upon them.

That's not only fair but also expedient, as it will insulate them somewhat from the petty blandishments (like sports event tickets, rides on private jets, or stays in vacation homes of people seeking favors.) This won't prevent misdeeds by the heavily corrupt, but at least give the fundamentally decent lawmakers (hopefully the majority) the financial cushion to better follow their conscience. I'd also like to reduce the dependence of candidates to Congress (or Parliament in the case of UK or India) on special interests for raising funds for elections. This can be achieved, for example, by providing them public funding to contest elections, with the amount depending on their poll performance.

So how much should we pay them? I'd say $1 - $2 million a year to US members of Congress, and about 1 million GBP annually to UK MPs. For UK's 646 MPs it will work out to about 1 billion GBP including associate expenses, a drop in the bucket as compared to the UK central budget of 600 billion GBP. In the current MP scandal the total amount claimed by all MPs put together was 92 million GBP, not all of it improper. Given UK's population of 61M, that's less than 2 pounds per capita.

So yes, I consider this whole scandal to be a storm in a tea cup. And I know of no opinion leader or journalist of standing who has had the sense - or the courage - to pronounce it as such.

Change They Don't (Want Us To) Believe In

I was surprised to see these two articles by reputed and brilliant professors in "my" University of Chicago Booth School of Business. One argues against capping CEO / executive pay in taxpayer bailed out companies, and the other against the government spending as part of the Obama fiscal stimulus plan.

The first by Steven Kaplan appearing in a Feb. 17 Op-Ed in The Chicago Tribune warns that "Restricting bank executives' pay would stall recovery." He acknowledges that high and flawed financial incentives were at the root of high risk-taking and illusory profits that brought down these banks, and that the massive taxpayer bailout justifies "some" government say in executive compensation. But he then asserts, "Even though $500,000 is a lot of money, banking executives have a different salary market. They would find the compensation low, and that is likely to create four problems:

• Banks would avoid accepting government assistance unless the situation is grave. Only the worst firms would accept government help.
• Many executives would leave the "bailed-out" banks for jobs that pay more, and the best employees would leave the troubled firms at exactly the wrong time.
• It would be difficult to hire new executives because the best ones would choose other opportunities.
• Stronger firms that have accepted federal money would give it back to avoid the restrictions.

All these factors would slow the recovery of the financial system."

I find these arguments to be deeply flawed. To his first and fourth points, most banks seeking and continuing to receive government help, even the so-called stronger ones, have little discretion in the matter. They know full well that their failure to do so will expose them to a ruinous bank run or its equivalent with depositors. Their leeway can be further curtailed by imposing regulatory capital requirements that forces them to seek timely government help. Further, the push towards better governance and heightened awareness of potential conflicts of interest will make vigilant bank boards compel their management to do the right thing.

Mr. Kaplan's second and third points are anchored on a "greed is best" premise that the most suitable executives for bank turnaround are lured by outsized financial awards alone. But it is this brand of managers and the existing compensation structure that substantially contributed to the crises in the first place. They stood to make enormous fortunes by fudging numbers, taking massive gambles with other people's money and limiting themselves to short-term "on my watch" perspectives. Instead, we need managers who want to establish their legacy of building or rescuing great institutions. A lack of outsized compensation structure is more likely to attract these types of managers, encourage sounder decisions and reduce their temptation to gamble. Just compare the CEO salaries and the fortunes of Japanese and US automakers. Or consider if hiking the annual pay to a billion dollars will really get us a much better US President.

So I largely disagree with Mr. Kaplan though there is ambiguity in the stimulus amendment limiting top executive pay as reported in a Feb. 14 CNN story. That can lead to some loopholes and confusion even if the measure is directionally correct.

The other article is a Jan. 21 Op-Ed in the Wall Street Journal by Alberto Alesina of Harvard and Luigi Zingales of Chicago Booth. They repeat the Republican refrain of stimulating the economy by cutting taxes, homing in on the complete elimination of capital gain taxes in 2009, and to the exclusion of government spending. Here's a quick counter to their main contentions:

a) Regardless of it starting as a financial / credit crisis, the US economy obviously now fits their description of a "bad equilibrium." That's where layoffs and job loss fears lower consumer demand that makes firms cut back that causes more layoffs that... They concede government spending can change this "bad" equilibrium into a "good" one, yet they still oppose it.

b) Their proposed solution of tax cuts (eliminating all capital gains for investments "begun" during 2009, etc.) is an extension of the Bush efforts for the past eight years. Where did that get us? Plus they want to make all capital expenditures and R&D investments tax deductible. Wouldn't that mean losing a lot of government revenue on the bulk of such expenditures that the companies would have incurred anyway, incentive or no incentive?

They see their role here "... to courageously propose the right economic policy, even when it is unpopular." I wouldn't call it particularly courageous for business academics to write in support of the finance industry and business interests that directly or indirectly sustain them. My friend RS wryly alluded to this equation as one hand washing the other.

To be fair RS thinks highly of Luigi Zingales and his writings in general, and considers this particular WSJ Op-Ed by him to be an anomaly.

Other writings by the Chicago business professors are more insightful and objective, including those relating to the current state of the economy. For example here's a good commentary in the Feb. 12 New York Times by Doug Diamond, Anil Kashyap and Raghuram Rajan on the Geithner Plan. They express reservations about elements of the plan, in particular the public-private partnership to buy up toxic assets, though they don't come up with an alternative. That's why I find Paul Krugman (alas, not of Chicago) to be better. In his Feb. 22 Op-Ed in the New York Times (among other writings) he makes a clear and cogent case for the temporary nationalization of banks. I'd like anyone opposing his proposals including the Chicago crowd to address his arguments head on.

Surprising Detractors Of Economic Recovery Plan

Yesterday in the Wall Street Journal I saw a full page ad by the conservative Cato Institute slamming the whole concept of Obama's economic recovery plan. This (apparently repeat) ad is signed by hundreds of economists and financial academics.

Denying the need for the "right" government stimulus plan seems so preposterous that I expected the signatories to be clueless economists from lightweight institutions. Or charlatans and political hacks who are selling debunked ideology for their narrow ends.

But I see Nobel laureates and prominent figures from top universities like "my" University of Chicago in this list. They include two renowned professors who were on my Ph.D. dissertation committee, and one of these professor's son-in-law who is a top academic in his own right. Why they have signed on is beyond me, as I totally subscribe to Paul Krugman's rationale of the need for massive governmental intervention to get us out of this economic crisis. Krugman actually argues that the current economic stimulus plan is too small and misdirected towards Republican causes to do the job.

On the Cato website there is more of this criticism of Obama and the Democratic efforts. On the lower right of this web page there is a YouTube presentation with sleazily deceptive arguments against the Obama / Democratic approach. Reagan's virtues are extolled while Obama's approach is likened (of all people) to that of George W. Bush whose overspending drove the economy to ruin.

I can't address all of the Cato fallacies here. But some comments:
(a) Heavy spending (and ill-conceived at that) in GWB's time could not counteract bad governance and lack of oversight that landed us in this mess.
(b) Japan's "lost decade" of stagnant growth in the 1990's is widely ascribed to its failure to quickly overhaul its ailing banks and credit infrastructure. That was a necessary condition that didn't happen, for other measures (like public spending on infrastructure) to work. Keep this in mind the next time you hear a Republican mouthing off on Japan's lost decade in spite of spending 6 trillion yen on infrastructure.
(c) We therefore need better governance and more regulation to complement a heavy fiscal stimulus.
(d) I'd heed Krugman and drop this nostalgia for Reagan. Even the "supply side" linkage that Republicans like to make between tax cuts and revenue increases in the Reagan era is misconceived.
(e) Reagan's nearer term focus and budget deficits created cumulative problems that haunted his successor.
(f) In the debate on stimulus options tax cuts have the value of immediacy as they get more money across to the consumer quickly. But the recession-wary consumer may save rather than spend most of it (a personal virtue but it defeats the objective of a stimulus.) Government projects and continuing grants to cash-strapped state and local governments on the other hand will spend the allocations dollar for dollar.
(g) To my knowledge none of the Cato signatories warned against the consequences of insufficient regulation of mortgage lenders, or deplored Alan Greenspan's role in opposing such regulation. Nor did they see the housing crisis and the bursting of the bubble coming. Krugman did all three and years ago, way before it happened. So to me he deserves his 2008 Nobel prize (officially given for unrelated research done decades earlier) as well as greater credibility than the Cato crowd.

While our University of Chicago is synonymous with the ideas of free markets and deregulation we had plenty of faculty teaching and researching the concepts of necessary government oversight and intervention, public goods and anti-trust responsibilities. I'm perplexed to see so many respected economists including some of my U. of C. professors having signed on to the Cato ad. I hope they have better arguments than the YouTube presentation on the Cato website.
Meanwhile, today's (Feb. 10) issue of The Journal has the more nuanced views of two other U. of C. economists, Nobel laureate Gary Becker and Prof. Kevin Murphy. In "There's No Stimulus Free Lunch" they concede that government stimulus measures can create net jobs and expand GDP, especially during a recession. At the same time they warn that such benefits will dissipate once the economy recovers and works closer to full capacity, and that such measures carry a price.

No one is arguing against that, or we'd have a permanent stimulus budget for every past, present and future year. The stimulus package is being worked now to fix our present recession and job losses. And that part about it not being absolutely "free", the question is, do we want to starve by forsaking a substantial lunch just because it carries a small price, or to go for it since the benefits far exceed the costs?

Rubina At The Journal

New York parlance or universal acronyms? Only recently did I realize that "The Journal" unequivocably means The Wall Street Journal, and "The Times" refers to The New York Times. Both of these are great publications, and getting to work here is pretty good for aspiring journalists like Rubina.

So we were happy when Rubina got an opportunity to join The Times as a freelance graphics editor last year, and then subsequently at The Journal. In case you're wondering what she does as a graphics editor, it is gathering the information for visuals that are not just photos, and then creating them. This includes charts, tables. diagrams, schematic summaries and maps that usually accompany news stories or articles.

Newspapers are facing a tough environment trying to hold on to readership and ad revenues in the face of competition from the internet. They are pressured on headcount and typically take on only freelancers or people on temporary contract. Rubina is passionate about her work so her working this way without any job security or benefits was fine. She creates about 2 - 3 graphics daily and we used to cut and save all these till the novelty of this declined somewhat. We knew she enjoys her work and is productive and appreciated by her group and supervisors. It's also great experience so that was good.

Then I got her call a few days back. The editor of the front page of The Journal said he wanted to talk to her. Don't worry, he said, it's good news. Then over lunch he offered her a regular, full time position. She's very happy and so are we (Anita, Sheena and I - her family) especially since she loves living in Manhattan. I saw she hasn't yet updated her personal website in respect of her employment status at The Journal since she's still going through the formal process, and will probably do so subsequently.

Currently she's working on the "A" (main) section of the paper. Her group traditionally do not put their name on their graphics, but typically one third of the ten or so of them are hers.

Offshore Drilling And Poor Journalism

I often wonder at the failure of these US multi-billion news agencies to address the most basic questions that arise from the very news that they cover. Here is an example.

For the past couple of months we've heard arguments flying back and forth about lifting the ban offshore drilling around the US. Given the skyrocketing crude prices and that we're not going to avoid importing oil 10, 20 or 30 years out, I'm now all for it. Safety and pollution concerns are now very low, and we don't have the same wildlife refuge conservation considerations in offshore drilling as in ANWR.

The Democratic leadership (till recently including Obama) have opposed lifting the ban. They say that it won't help in the short term, and that oil companies have plenty of offshore areas that they can use first.

The first argument is silly - does it mean Congress and government should only limit itself to the most short-term measures? But the second argument about idle leases merits serious consideration, and no news agency that I know has asked the oil companies or Republicans to respond to this specific point, and then reported upon it. Instead the election coverage on energy issues by the likes of CNN is an endless blather of cross-talk among candidates, their surrogates and political pundits.

One place where I found a partial rebuttal to this "use idle leases first" argument is on this QandO blog. In short it says that leases take a very long time to work, are held up by many procedural steps, and require a lot of capital investment that is costly or hard to come by. It's only a partial rebuttal because it doesn't fully answer the question: if the oil companies have their hands so full that they can't get through these existing leases, then where will they find the capacity to explore the new areas?

Still, at least this little blog tries to answer this most obvious of questions. That's a lot more than has been done by the large and sophisticated media outlets.

All is not lost. Some new programs with welcome depth are coming on air. My favorite is CNN's Fareed Zakaria's GPS (Global Public Square) that started a few weeks ago and covers central global and foreign issues.

Thank You, New Hampshire

I was pleasantly surprised by the Democratic election results last night in the New Hampshire primaries. Most pundits and polls had predicted a huge win for Obama, so it was good to see that NH voters did not ape Iowa. Hillary's slender victory has obviously huge implications though her path to nomination is still uncertain.

I also welcome the McCain win in NH on the Republican side. He's my favored candidate on the Republican side though well behind Hillary because I do not share his stances on taxes, healthcare or choice vs life issues.

A nice graphic created by daughter Rubina for the New York Times today shows the detailed profile of New Hampshire voters supporting both the Democratic as well as Republican candidates.

While I'm happy about Hillary in NH, here are my other comments:

• I regard Obama to be superficial (especially compared to Hillary) even though he's a great talker. Still, I'll give him his due. His concession speech last night was gracious, as were his comments on today's news shows. This is something Hillary can emulate. And yes, someone who can speak so well without notes as Obama has to have good clarity of thought.
• Why is Hillary so keen to project confidence in the outcome of the primaries? I was turned off to see her campaign manager babble about how they expected to win NH on the eve of the elections because of the enthusiasm of the crowds who greeted her. Hillary in news show appearances also said something about how she was the only one predicting victory when all others didn't. I think it'll be more honest and also better in winning voter goodwill and sympathy if they admitted to their worries and anxiety, and then said how gratified they are by the outcome. Doesn't political psychology 101 say that it is good to play the underdog, lower expectations and then beat them? That's accepted wisdom in debates, so why not in poll outcomes? Over-confidence and a I-knew-it-all-along refrain comes across as arrogant, while a little humility wins voter sympathy and support.
• Hillary's emotional moment and her fighting back tears was a genuine and unplanned act, in my view, despite allegations to the contrary in some of the media. It seems to have won over voters for her, which supports my contention above. Few people doubt her strength, so she doesn't have to hide her emotions to prove it. So many in the media say that she comes across as so much warmer and likable in smaller private gatherings. I hope she opens up more in public appearances as well from now on.

The outcomes are wide open. Thanks to you, NH, exciting (and hopefully happy) days are ahead.

Green Ideas Of My Favorite Journalist

The journalist I admire the most is Thomas Friedman, columnist at the New York Times, and bestselling author of "The World Is Flat."

Earlier his writings on globalization, free trade and competition in an ever closely connected world attracted international acclaim. These hopefully affect US and worldwide policy in a major and positive way. Now a lot of his emphasis is on green energy, conservation and ways to reduce dependence on oil. I couldn't agree with him more, including on the need for higher and permanent taxes in the US on gasoline. This will discourage excessive consumption, fund alternative energy R&D and can offset other taxes.

Today his OpEd in the New York Times talks of how much we have already lost by failing to curb oil consumption through a $1+ per gallon gas tax over the past six years. Read his article since he puts things so much better than I can. The opportunity to lower demand for oil in the US could have significantly lowered crude oil prices which are currently hovering around $95 a barrel. After all, the US consumes a fourth of the world's oil at a time when supplies are increasingly constrained so slight global shortages make prices spike up. If our own reduced oil consumption lowers prices we benefit not just ourselves but also most of the rest of the world that imports oil.

Of course Friedman has been talking about a lot more than simply taxing gasoline and looking at crude oil imports. You can see his many writings on going green through his NYT columnist page (now available online for free in a welcome change of NYT policy.) It's still not too late. Friedman obviously hopes that his views can influence the Democratic presidential candidates who can then follow the right policies after the next elections (don't expect Bush & Co to do anything meaningful in their remaining time.)

I doubt any leading candidates including Hillary and Obama will advocate a higher gas tax in their campaigns, and they'll be wise to avoid this. It's too risky and unlike Friedman I've less faith in the ability of the average voter to think straight on this. Still, it's what the President and lawmakers do after the election that matters, and people like Friedman may yet become a decisive influence. Let's see.

Rubina's Openers At The New York Times

Interesting things have happened since my last post, many of them to do with daughter Rubina. First, she had knee surgery in mid-August and can now largely manage without crutches. More happily she started work as a graphics editor on contract basis at The New York Times on September 4th.

A couple of days earlier she moved into a shared Manhattan apartment in the hip (as I now know) East Village side. It's a 5th floor walk-up so it was pretty brave of her opting for it after the knee surgery, but she managed fine and it's no longer an issue. Helping her move into that (unfurnished) apartment turned out to be easier than I thought. The biggest challenge in Manhattan seems to be to secure a suitable apartment - it's almost like applying for a job, with loads of paperwork. She has two nice room-mates, each having a decent bedroom and good common spaces, so that's worked out well.

But back to the NY Times: as a graphics editor Rubina is a reporter who plans and very often herself makes the pictures (other than photographs) that accompany news stories. It is interesting work and rounds out her journalism experience. And a picture is better than a thousand words..... They didn't waste time utilizing her. In the two weeks since she started Rubina has already had four pieces of her work appear in both the print as well as the online editions.

Here are links to three of her works (the fourth appeared in the September 18 print edition on page A24 but we can't find the URL. It compares and contrasts Hillary Clinton's healthcare plan with that of John Edwards and Barack Obama - so it's useful and interesting, even more so to me.):

- Her first graphic in the paper on September 5 which describes the dichotomy (and commonalities) on Iraq assessment between the two wings of the Bush Administration. It appeared in gray in the newspaper and orange online. It's more text-heavy than her other ones will be... You can see it by clicking "multimedia" after first clicking here.

- Her first credited graphic published on September 9th in Sunday Business. It's on Second Life. Pretty simple, but it involved some reporting because she had to find all the items, take pictures (screen shots), edit them and do some other research. Click on "multimedia" to see "A Luxurious Second Life" but after first clicking and getting to the article here.

- A census snapshot capturing some interesting features of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut states that appeared on September 18th.

In sum Rubina is having a good time, being productive, gaining experience and making us happy in the process. By the way, I'm writing this from Paris, two days before Anita and I return to the US. Enjoyable city with nice people who are more polite to English-only speakers than I'd been led to expect.

So What Would You Pay Our Lawmakers?

I don't want to influence your initial reaction so I'll reserve my comments till you see this email I've received multiple times. (The US context and debates in the press are similar. For those unfamiliar with India, $1 = Rs 40, i.e., a US dollar is worth 40 indian rupees, and a "crore" equals ten million, i.e., a one followed by seven zeroes. Also, an MP is elected every 5 years, and is like a cross between a US Senator and a Congressman.) Here goes:

----

I want to be an MP in India....

Salary & Govt. Concessions for a Member of Parliament (MP)
Monthly Salary: Rs. 12,000
Expense for Constitution per month: Rs. 10,000
Office expenditure per month: Rs. 14,000
Traveling concession (Rs. 8 per km): Rs. 48,000
(e.g., For a visit from kerala to Delhi & return: 6000 km)
Daily DA TA during parliament meets: Rs. 500
Charge for 1 class (A/C) in train: Free (For any number of times) (All over India )
Charge for Business Class in flights: Free for 40 trips / year (With wife or P.A.)
Rent for MP hostel at Delhi: Free
Electricity costs at home: Free up to 50,000 units
Local phone call charge: Free up to 1,70,000 calls.

TOTAL expense for a MP per year : Rs. 32,00,000
TOTAL expense for 5 years : Rs. 1,60,00,000
For 534 MPs, the expense for 5 years : Rs. 8,54,40,00,000 (nearly Rs. 855 cores)

Do they really deserve this? And they are elected by THE PEOPLE OF INDIA , by the largest democratic . process in the world, not intruded into the parliament on their own or by any qualification. This is how all our tax money is been swallowed and price hike on our regular commodities....... Think of the great democracy we have.............

-------

Here are my comments - let's look at all these numbers another way:

Rs. 855 crores is Rs. 8.55 billion even if you accept all these aggregations.

India's population is 1.13 billion.

So all the MPs put together cost an average indian less than Rs. 8 or under 20 cents for 5 years.

Another way of looking at it: So we spend Rs. 1.6 crores per MP every 5 years. How much do candidates spend to get elected? Counting all the major candidates per contest I'm figuring it's between Rs. 10 and 100 crores.

The media plays up the same kind of story here in the US as well. It becomes big news when the lawmakers vote themselves a salary increase, and their health benefits are criticised as being too generous. Instead, I'd argue that it is better to pay Congressmen and Senators handsome salaries and benefits, say $1-2 million a year each. The total tab will come to $1 -2 billion annually, which is miniscule compared to the multi-trillion dollar federal budgets and decisions that Congress votes upon. Then lawmakers are less likely to be bought over Abramoff style with pettty bribes like games show tickets or rides in private jets.

This is one reason why I found the You-Tube CNN debate questons posed to democratic presidential candidates so inane. Candidates were asked if they'll be willing to accept minimum wages as their presidential salary if elected. Couldn't CNN choose any better questions in the final 30+ to air, when they had received almost 4,000 entries? If we want good, smart, enlightened leaders for our president, why would we pay them the lowest wage?

What do you think?

Rubina's First AP Story

How many of you know that the first capital of the US was Philadelphia and that George Washington operated from there as the first President? It may have been in my sub-conscious somewhere but I'd have flunked an open-ended quiz show question on this.

No more. Just last Friday I dropped off Rubina in Philadelphia for her summer assignment with AP (Associated Press) and she started work four days back on Monday.

So we were pleasantly surprised to learn that her first story while at AP about slaves owned by George Washington has already been published nationally:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/07/AR2007060701655.html

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-washingtons-slaves,1,6593195.story?coll=sns-ap-nation-headlines

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19100886/
http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2007/06/07/ap3800752.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6692506,00.html

The story has been published in papers in Australia and China as well. Typing her name (Rubina Madan) in Google News gets the full list.

We're proud of her. At this time I don't even mind that she thinks well of Obama. :-)

The Graduate(s)

Yesterday my parents, Anita and I attended our younger daughter Rubina's graduation from the Columbia School of Journalism. Amidst the fun and revelry I found almost all of Rubina's classmates that we met to be remarkably pleasant and friendly. They were bright as I expected of Columbia students, and (from all the hugs enthusiastic hugs exchanged) had warm family ties.

Columbia may have done a good job profiling and selecting the right people into the program but is there also a self-selection dynamic at work here? Journalism is typically a tough career with lousy pay. So it may attract people for whom money is less important, and have a sense of idealism or a passion for sharing their news and views. So could such profession/schools attract more of the "nicer" types? This is analogous to the Anita's belief that school teachers tend to be nice people. Not that all journalists or media are ethical or objective by a long shot. Think Fox News. While in public service in India I saw a couple from The Indian Express (one of whom's now a bureau chief) who concocted news to make sensational headlines and try extorting favors.

So I do have some concerns about the type and nature of media coverage. But at least these graduating students show that many people of good caliber and outlook are entering and sustaining the profession in the US and abroad.

Here are some pictures of the graduation and related events (click left for more.) I'm glad my parents could attend this graduation ceremony - their first in the US. Rubina's in most of them, with a couple of our family (sans Sheena who is in Austin.)
http://www.divshare.com/download/667819-c3b