Public Policy

Now that I'm in a public policy program, I should know what it means to pursue a policy degree. The concept of a public policy education is hard to define because while it's a professional track, it can lead to so many diverse places. It's not like going to law school or medical school, or even going to grad school in, say, mathematics. With those tracks, there is a generally-comprehended purpose for the degree. With public policy, the doors to open are largely carved by one's own desires. Yet given this flexibility, it's important to recognize that the degree can be described. I'll to address two misunderstandings about the public policy degree at William & Mary that have people thinking it's something other than what it is.

First, "public" should be taken out of the phrase altogether. The degree should be a Master of Policy, not Public Policy. Many people with a policy degree do not end up as public servants. They end up as analysts in private firms, making lots of money and working long hours. They end up as economists, financiers, and planners at enormous international corporations. Most do end up in a job that could be deemed as working for the "public"--as opposed to working for "profit"--such as working for the Government Accountability Office, a senator, or a nonprofit organization. Yet given the fact that the degree leads to a significant number of jobs in the private sector, it's worthwhile not to think of it simply as public service degree. So, while "public" is the employer for many people, we learn things here that translate well into either the public or private sector.

Second, it's a quantitatively biased degree. There is a lot of economics, statistics and mathematics in the program. In fact, eight of the fourteen credits I am taking in my first semester are based in those three subjects. (When my mother heard that I was going beyond algebra for the first time in my life, her reaction reflects my background: "You're taking calculus?!") The "public" as well as private employers want numbers to back up--and sometimes to create--policy proposals, modifications, and counter-proposals. Waning are the days when politicians can base their arguments on personality alone.

That should clear up the meaning of a policy degree at W&M.

Most Embarrassing Moment

I’m not one to get really embarrassed…usually. But now I have a story when people ask that perennial lame question, “What’s your most embarrassing moment?”

It was my FIRST day at work. I am a summer intern for Stanley, Frank & Rose. Of course, right when I walk in one of the associates gives me a research project, so I get down to business. After five or six hours I realize that I haven’t moved and that my bladder is about to explode. So, I grudgingly, but rapidly, make my way to the bathroom. Being so excited to do a good job and crank out a little memo by the end of the day, I rushed from the bathroom back to my work area. It just so happened that the work area was inside an office, and in order to get into that office one must pass through a door. It also so happens that the door is one of three side-by-side panels—two of which are glass. Finally, it so happens that the door is not in the logical middle spot. It’s on the left. Now, this would not have been a problem if the door had been closed, because I could have easily distinguished the brown wood from the clear glass. Alas, the door is always open. So here I come down the hall, rushing to get back to work. Naturally, I take the logical middle spot as my entrance of choice. I smacked the glass so hard the floor shook. The entire office heard it, and immediately people began poking their heads out of doorways, laughing, “Hey! Who ran into the glass?” But one associate in particular, the one who had given me the assignment, was right in front of the glass when I leveled my face into it. My smudge marks are still there…

1,000 Miles to Louisiana (Warning: This Post is NOT Appropriate for Young Children)

I left Williamsburg at 7:00 AM yesterday. More than 1,000 miles and three bathroom stops later, I went to sleep in an overpriced Days Inn in Hammond, LA. It's the bathroom stops that I want to talk about. The first: a BP station somewhere in North Carolina, just off the freeway. After pumping gas, I walked into the station. A couple guys were loitering by the door. One, with shorts on, had no calves. His legs just went straight down from his knees to his ankles. On one ankle was a little tattoo. They were talking about "truucks" and holding cigarrette butts. I strolled by and went into the men's restroom. I noticed first that it was tiny--about six by six feet or less. I noticed second that it was insecure--the door would not lock. I noticed third that it was dirty--the floor was grimy with who-knows-what, the open garbage can was filled with dirty toilet paper and unwrapped stinky diapers, there was an empty box of flourescent condoms on the floor and an exotic condom dispenser on the wall above the urinal. The toilet stall was worse--in order to get into the stall, I had to push the door inward, past the toilet. But the door was so wide and the stall so small that I had to squeeze between the door and the toilet, scraping my legs along the dirty toilet rim. Finally I got in. The toilet was disgusting, but after wiping the pee from the seat and trying to disregard the brown stains I started doing my business. When I looked to my left where the toilet paper is, I noticed the following poem scratched into the stall:

I came in here
Brokenhearted,
Had to shit,
But only farted.

I got out as soon as I could, again scraping past the toilet. Luckily they had soap... I strolled past the loiterers again--this time they were talking about "gettin' off work the third u' July".

The second: a Chevron station outside Atlanta, GA (on I-75, not I-85, because I got a little lost in the rain and had to turn around). As I opened the door, I noticed that there was no urinal, that the walls were supposed to be white, and that it smelled worse than anything I had whiffed since the Elko sewage treatment plant broke down fifteen years ago. I didn't notice that 1) there was no soap; 2) the sink and water knobs looked like long-neglected Petri dishes from a high school experiment gone wrong; 3) the only method of hand-drying, the air dryer, had been dismantled. So I went number one as fast as I could, flushed the toilet, and went to wash my hands. Instead, I just opened the black-and-brown-stained white door and left, hoping that the millions of bacteria that had just found a new home on my body would play nice.

The third: an Exxon station outside Mobile, AL. I thought I might never smell something so foul as the Chevron station. I was mistaken. Since there was a Subway restaurant in this station, I figured the bathroom would be sanitary. Mistaken again. After waiting in line, I finally got my chance. Locking the door, I turned around and took a breath--that is, I tried to breath. The stench of urine was thick and sticky, a smell so potent that my lungs are still moist with it. I quickly went to the urinal, hoping to survive the ordeal. The floor was wet. I mean, it was really wet. A quarter-inch deep puddle about 25 square feet in size--all pee. It was jaw-dropping, but I resisted the urge to actually drop my jaw at the risk of tasting the air. When I was done with the urinal (again with an exotic condom machine at eye level), I went to wash my hands. The soap dispenser on the wall was broken. I spotted a big bottle with yellowish liquid in the bottom. When I made sure that it too was not urine (it was too viscous) I tried to get some soap out. The push-spout on the top was gone, so a stem came out from the top but there was no way to get the soap out. The top wouldn't screw off. Finally, I turned it over and squeezed. The plastic bottle was so decrepit that cracks opened up at the corners when I squeezed and soap came dripping out onto my hand and arm. Even better: the air dryer worked.

Supply and demand has a funny way of slapping you in the face sometimes. Prices give consumers information. When I see a low price for gasoline, I want to get gas there. But in order to keep the prices low, some gas stations find it necessary to leave their restrooms unattended. Now when I see a low price I will remember that there is more information being conveyed that just a few pennies' savings: lower price could be the death of me.

Culture War?

O'Reilly, Hillary, Cheney, Boxer, and the list goes on. These are the people shaping our political sphere these days, presenting increasingly extreme "purist" forms of liberalism and conservatism. As they present extreme choices for voters, the majority, who are actually in the middle and not tagging along the extremities, are alienated. Even worse, politicians imposing their extremism on the electorate (given that the electorate only has two viable choices in any given major election--both of which are extreme--politicians can claim that the electorate is following the candidates) can create the facade of a "culture war", which they attempt to use to their advantage. Thus, the majority of Americans are in the middle, understanding both sides of arguments and sympathizing with both or neither candidate while being forced to choose a) between two extremes or b) to not vote or participate at all. 

In the end, there is a culture war, but it is not between the "polarized electorate" but between polarized factions--bits of extremism who are fanatical enough to run for office, to donate money to like-minded organizations, to become infotainers, to stage rallies and get recognized. Meanwhile, America's main doesn't diverge too much on issues like abortion, homosexuality, immigration, or even national security. The talking heads leading both parties from the extremes make it look like that, but they are actually representing small and intense minorities from each side. The culture war is not a battle between the religious and the non-religious or the traditionally moral and the progressive. It's between black-and-white purists who focus on one or two issues without compromise and are crazy enough to constantly advocate their positions in public. 

I admit that I'm leaning toward that direction on a few issues, namely abortion and immigration, though I have yet to run for office or even affiliate myself with a party. I have a long way to go before I can call myself a soldier in this tiny but media-grabbing and therefore deceiving culture war.

The President for whom I Voted: Destroying our Unusualness?

In his 1999 book "America the Unusual" John Kingdon states that no American party has successfully advocated for socialist principles, and he specifically mentions the Democratic Party as not being socialist. Particularly, he says, "no viable American party has advocated state ownership and control of economic production, close state regulation of the economy, or a really thoroughgoing welfare state that is financed, owned, and operated by the government" (p.72).

In reading this book, I have become convinced that in comparison with other Western countries, America is unusual in her political culture (largely individualistic and demanding of equal opportunity) and political institutions (strong separation of powers, checks and balances, and federalism). In a nutshell, the main of America is far to the RIGHT of the main of otherwise similar Western nations. When I arrived at the above-quoted passage, I realized that things might have changed a great deal since Kingdon typed those words on Microsoft Word 98: state ownership and control of economic production is now no shock to hear about on the news, close state regulation of the economy seems like all we ever talk about anymore, and our welfare state (of which I partake) is becoming more thoroughgoing all the time. 

I'm not necessarily saying that these things are evil, bad, or wrong. However, it seems apparent to me that America is losing some of her unusualness. If we can assume together that our unusualness is a good thing, then it is being eroded to our detriment. Unusual? Unique? Well, at least we used to be.

Contradiction: Abortion of Viable Fetuses vs. Saving of Starving Children

I will talk about contradiction in this post--one contradiction in particular: broad abortion rights and human rights being advocated by the same people--often in the same paragraph. It's a topic that has received some attention in media and scholarship, but one that has never been (and cannot be) resolved. I don't plan to resolve it here. I merely want to point out to reader(s) of this post that the contradiction exists. 

(Note: I do not mean anything regarding cases of rape, incest, or when the mother's health is at risk. Those are complex cases and fodder for a separate post. Further, I do not speak as much to abortions before viability--I see them as abhorrent, but they do not present as stark a case as I wish to present here.)

I started studying the so-called "right to privacy" as created by the Supreme Court a few weeks ago. While studying the abortion category of the "right", I wandered onto the internet to find exactly what an abortion is--medically speaking. So I Googled it. I found a "Christian" site that purported to have comprehensible descriptions of abortion procedures, distinguished by the time during pregnancy in which each is used. As soon as I entered the site, I was struck by the ads there. Three in all, they consisted of an abortion information hotline, a Christian dating service, and a "save children" sponsor-a child-in-poverty-so-she-doesn't-starve organization. The latter ad  struck me as contradictory to the purpose of the site. The purpose, which I found after a few minutes of browsing, was to promote any and all types of abortion (in any trimester) and to understand the promotion in Christian terms. If abortion is the destruction of life, or, before viability (the point at which the baby will survive if removed, alive, from the mother--usually after about 20-23 weeks), the destruction of potential life, how is it that the same site can advocate saving life and not be incongruous?

I use this example to show that some people who believe in "human rights" also believe in "abortion rights" which include the killing of viable fetuses. Indeed, many of these people see abortion in particular as a fundamental human right. How is this congruent? It is not, and cannot be. Some arguments say that a fundamental right of autonomy exists, which calls for the ability to make personal decisions that go to the heart of "personhood" and "existence" for one's self, personal decisions like whether to carry a pregnancy to term. If this were so, then laws prohibiting homegrown (or home-cooked) drugs and drug use, laws prohibiting child abandonment, and laws prohibiting ceremonial sacrifice of children, would be subject to strict constitutional scrutiny and likely stricken down. If society is going to have any laws at all, then those laws will necessarily impede upon one's ability to be autonomous. 

What, in the end, is the difference between a viable fetus, which will require some money from the "state" or private sources to live and yet which nobody in particular wants/can raise, and a starving child in the Congo whose relatives are dead? Why care more about the latter than the former? There is no cognizable reason, aside from the fact that the latter child is older. 

If we are to shape society by our votes, by our participation in politics and the judicial system, then how should we approach a question like this? I think it is far-fetched to say that Roe v. Wade will be overturned. That is something we should hope for and fight for, but most of our resources should be focused on changing hearts. The problem with the viable fetus, which has to be called a "life" since, although it is in the mother's uterus, does not need the mother for survival, is that it is not WANTED by the mother and/or father that is pushing for an abortion. The CHILD, which can be saved by international aid agencies, is wanted. Sadly, tragically, we allow one of these to be killed while we send money to save the other. Indeed, some think it is RIGHT that one be killed while the other saved. 

So in the end, the contradiction remains: how is it that neither of these children need a mother to survive, yet one is saved while the other slaughtered? How is it that human rights can circumscribe the saving of one and the slaughter of the other? Answer that, won't you? As for me, I think both should be saved, if possible. Whether it becomes possible will depend on the changing of hearts. If people can only agree that life is worth saving, then the law will reluctantly follow.

May Activism Never Die

In the film (and book) Not Without My Daughter, Betty Mahmoody’s husband, Moody, takes her and their daughter, Mahtob, to his home country of Iran for what Betty believes to be a short visit. There, Moody undergoes a sudden and unexpected transformation into a controlling, vicious partner who goes to all lengths to make Betty stay in Iran. Moody has sole legal control of Mahtob in Iran, so Betty cannot legally remove her from the country. Betty has few rights, but at least she can leave if she wants to--alone. Moody and his family abuse Betty relentlessly. She stays with them for her daughter’s sake, accepting the abuse with the hope that some day she can find a way to smuggle herself and her daughter out of Iran. Of course, there’s a happy ending: Betty and Mahtob get out of Iran after much travail and sneakiness and arrive at a US embassy in Turkey. The testy Moody is never heard from again. Betty and Mahtob live happily ever after in the Land of the Free.

Today in Norfolk a woman, Sandra, is trying to gain custody of her daughter. Sandra happened to be born just south of the US border in a small Mexican town. Sandra’s husband, Francisco, happened to be born just north of the border in a large Texan city. They grew up in the same small Mexican town. They fell in love. Francisco, an American citizen, moved to Norfolk and got a job as a fisherman and then took Sandra there. She did not have paperwork from the United States government saying she could be in Norfolk. This, it turns out, makes all the difference for her daughter. A few months ago Sandra had to drive her knee into Francisco’s groin as he lunged at her with an ice pick. She had endured abuse in the past, and would show the black and blue photos to the judge, but Francisco really tried to kill her with that ice pick. Going before the judge, Sandra found out that the photos and witness statements meant little in comparison to her seemingly grave sin of lacking the United States’ permission to be in Norfolk. Too bad, said the judge. Too bad for you, but your daughter must live with her father--abuser or not. I don’t care if you are a loving mother, a capable caregiver. I don’t care that you are a hardworking taxpayer. I don’t care that Francisco is gone for weeks at a time on his boat, leaving your daughter in a trailer with his brother. The fact of the matter is that he gets her, because you do not have a piece of paper. Sandra can still hear the ice pick rattling to the floor. It’s almost as frightening as the sound of the judge’s gavel passing a sentence of cruel and unusual childhood for her daughter. Another happy ending in the Land of the Free.

Luckily, this might not be the end of the story. With help from pro bono attorneys, Sandra has a chance. For now, however, Francisco has their daughter. Support your local oppressed.