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  • Who Was Marjory Stoneman Douglas? Had a High School Named After Her, A Defender of the Everglades, Feminist, Short Story Writer and A Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient

    Marjory Stoneman Douglas

    “There are no other Everglades in the world. They are, they have always been, one of the unique regions of the earth; remote, never wholly known. Nothing anywhere else is like them…”

    These opening words from Marjory Stoneman Douglas’ immortal book The Everglades: River of Grass crystallize the uniqueness of the Everglades. These words could also be used to describe Marjory herself, who was as rare and unique as the Everglades she worked so hard to protect.

    Marjory Stoneman Douglas*, born April 7, 1890 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, graduated from Wellesley with straight A’s with the elected honor of ‘Class Orator.’ That title proved to be prophetic.

    In 1915, following a brief and calamitous marriage, she arrived in Miami to live with her father, the founder and editor of the Miami Herald. Before long her father asked her to fill in temporarily for the society editor. Marjory soon took over the job full-time, much to her delight. A year later she began to write editorials and stories. During this time she met Carl Fisher, George Merrick, William Jennings Bryan, Cyrus H.K.Curtis, Henry Flagler and John Sewell, among others.

    WORLD WAR I

    It was 1917 and the First World War was raging in Europe. The Navy had sent a ship from Key West to Miami to enlist men and women into the Naval Reserve. Marjory went to cover the story of a local woman she heard about, who was to be the first woman to enlist. As it turned out, Marjory herself was the first woman to enlist. She joined the Navy, became a yeoman first class, and was stationed in Miami. After a year, she was discharged, joined the American Red Cross and went to Paris. The war ended, but Marjory stayed on in Paris. She traveled around Europe and wrote stories about the turning over of Red Cross clinics to the local authorities. As the Red Cross was closing down in Paris, her father cabled to offer her a job as an assistant editor of the Miami Herald.

    THE MIAMI HERALD

    Marjory arrived back in Miami in January, 1920. She worked on the editorial page and had a column called “The Galley” for three years. She wrote poetry at the head of every column. It was in her column that she began to talk about Florida as landscape and as geography, to investigate it and to explore it.

    Toward the end of 1923 Marjory was feeling the pressure of friction between her and the publisher, disagreements with her father, and the demands of writing stories and her column. She began to experience blackouts. She was diagnosed with nerve fatigue. She left the Herald and lived at her father’s new home. She recovered by being quiet, sleeping late and by beginning to write short stories. The Saturday Evening Post published her early stories, along with those of Fitzgerald and Hemingway. This was the beginning of her independence from the newspaper. As she said, writing fiction was the perfect job for her. She hadn’t been a good employee, she hadn’t liked regular hours, or being told what to do, or working for other people. She was a loner. She wanted to be an individual rather than an employee or merely a female.

    HOUSE ON STEWART AVENUE

    In 1926 Marjory, with some help from her friends, designed and built the cottage in which she lived for the rest of her life. It was a great influence on her life. Here, Marjory took on the fight for feminism, racial justice, and conservation long before these causes became popular. Her social life blossomed during these years. She loved to swim, and would frequent Tahaiti Beach, and later Matheson Hammock, in the big lagoon. 

    EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK

    One project that Marjory supported in print and by serving on the committee was the creation of Everglades National Park. Mr. Ernest F. Coe was the moving force behind this idea. David Fairchild, John Oliver LaGorce of National Geographic magazine and other notables served on this committee. She visited the Everglades often. In the Ten Thousand Islands at the edge of the Everglades, she saw “great flocks of birds, amazing flights of 30,000 to 40,000 in one swoop…”  In 1934 the park was designated by Congress. It took another 13 years to acquire land and secure funding. The park officially opened in 1947.

    THE EVERGLADES: RIVER OF GRASS

    One of Marjory’s long-time friends, Hervey Allen, dropped by her house to see her. He was the editor, for Rinehart and Company, of its Rivers of America series. He asked Marjory to write a book about the Miami River. She asked him if she could write about the Everglades as being connected to the Miami River. He agreed. Thus began Marjory’s research into the Everglades ecosystem. The book took five years.  It was published the same year Everglades National Park was dedicated, 1947. The Everglades: River of Grass has become the definitive description of the natural treasure she fought so hard to protect. After several reprints, the revised edition was published in 1987, to draw attention to the continuing threats — unresolved — to “her river.”

    In 1948 Marjory began to get money from her book. During this time she traveled, spent a little money and wrote. She corresponded with Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, and they became friends. Marjory was asked by Rinehart Publishers to write another book, this one about hurricanes. It was published in 1958. Other books followed. At the age of 77 Marjory embarked on research to write a biography of W.H.Hudson. She traveled and wrote, but her eyesight failed, and it was given to an editor.

  • Taxpayers Don’t Want to Pay for Lawmakers’ Sexual Misdeeds, But Alternatives Pose Problems: Allegations of Wrongdoing Went Away After Victims Received Payouts From Public Funds

    When Pennsylvania state Rep. Thomas Caltagirone was accused of harassing a staff member, the Legislature settled the matter outside of court. The state’s insurance paid out $250,000 in 2015, and no one said a word — even during the next year’s elections when Caltagirone retained his seat.

    Right, Emily Martin, general counsel at the National Women’s Law Center, a nonprofit that provides legal defense for victims of harassment

    This secret settlement is one of many involving state lawmakers or legislative aides that have been exposed in the last few months, as a wave of sexual misconduct allegations has flooded the country. And in state after state, the allegations of wrongdoing quietly went away after victims received payouts from public funds.

    The revelation that legislatures frequently use taxpayer money to protect lawmakers and staff accused of harassment or assault has sparked outrage and prompted reporters to try to tally up the bill.

    The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette exposed Caltagirone’s settlement in December. California newspapers this month revealed that the state Legislature has spent $290,000 on settling harassment-related claims since 2006. The Detroit News last month revealed that the Michigan Senate spent $269,000 to investigate and settle sexual harassment claims from 2000 to 2007.

    And the Wisconsin State Journal in December revealed that the state Legislature in 2015 spent $75,000 to settle a claim against a state senator who was accused by a former aide of talking about her breasts and making other sexual comments. The accused — Democrat Spencer Coggs — is now treasurer for the city of Milwaukee.

    Lawmakers in at least five states — California, Illinois, Iowa, New York and Pennsylvania — have proposed banning the use of public dollars for settlements or payouts related to sexual harassment allegations against state lawmakers.

    Advocates for taxpayers, such as Pete Sepp, president of the nonprofit National Taxpayers Union, say lawmakers need to be held responsible for their actions.

    “They are supposed to be answerable to the people who pay the bills,” Sepp said, “and those people are saying right now that this situation is untenable.”

    But some employment lawyers, such as David Yamada, a law professor and director of the New Workplace Institute at Suffolk University in Boston, say the issue is more complicated than it seems.

    Holding individual lawmakers, and not the government, responsible for sexual harassment may lessen the incentive for legislatures to offer sexual harassment training and to police their own, Yamada said. And, because some lawmakers may not be able to come up with the money for a settlement, it also may make it less likely that the victim will receive compensation for her claim.

    “There are better ways to spend public money than to have to spend it to atone for the misdeeds of public servants,” Yamada said. But, he said, “We have to hold public employers liable.”

    Legislatures are often on the hook for the bad behavior of lawmakers because, like other employers, they are responsible under the Civil Rights Act for creating a workplace that is free from harassment and discrimination. Employers that don’t attempt to prevent harassment — and report and investigate claims when they arise — can be held liable.

    It’s part of an employer’s job to prevent a toxic culture, said Emily Martin, general counsel at the National Women’s Law Center, a nonprofit that provides legal defense for victims of harassment. But Martin said the bills raise an important question about why the state is paying for the transgressions of lawmakers, who do not have a traditional employer-employee relationship.

    Lawmakers don’t really have managers, other than the public, she said. “In order to really hold that legislator accountable, maybe it makes sense to have them pay for it.”

    The effort to hunt down secret settlements involving state lawmakers began in November after reporters revealed recent cases in which taxpayer money was used to settle sexual harassment claims against members of Congress, including payouts related to accusations against Democratic Reps. Alcee Hastings of Florida ($220,000) and John Conyers of Michigan ($27,000), and against Republican Rep. Blake Farenthold of Texas ($84,000). Congress is considering a bipartisan bill, like the state bills, that would bar the use of taxpayer money to settle harassment claims.

    It’s hard for the public to find out about settlements agreed to by state legislatures, and even when the payments are made public, the details of the allegations usually are not. In some states, legislatures aren’t subject to public records laws, and in other states, officials say the law doesn’t apply to these records. It’s also hard to know what records to ask for — sometimes the settlements are paid by state insurance, sometimes by the legislatures’ administrative offices, and sometimes by individual party caucuses.

  • CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention): 6 Things You Need to Know About This Flu Season

     

    Sick boy lying in bed having his temperature taken with a thermometer.

    Seasonal flu activity has been intense this season. As of January 20, 2018, all 49 states in the continental United States reported widespread flu activity for three consecutive weeks. This is a first since CDC’s Influenza Division began tracking flu this way. It’s likely that flu activity will be elevated for many weeks to come.

    Influenza A (H3N2) viruses have been most common so far this season. H3N2-predominant seasons have tended to be more severe. However, other flu viruses are circulating too, contributing to serious illnesses. This season, the highest hospitalization rates have been in people 65 years and older, followed by people 50-64 years, then children 0-4 years of age. About 90% of influenza A-related hospitalizations in people 65 and older have been associated with H3N2 virus infections. About 20% of influenza A-related hospitalizations in people 50-64 have been associated with H1N1 virus infections. This is the H1N1 virus that emerged in 2009 to cause a pandemic and that had a big impact on younger people at that time.

    Here are some important things to know right now to protect yourself and your loved ones from flu:

    1.  What are the symptoms of flu?

    Flu viruses can cause mild to severe illness, and at times can lead to death. The flu is different from a cold. The flu usually comes on  suddenly. People who have the flu often feel some or all of these symptoms:

    • Fever* or feeling feverish/chills
    • Cough
    • Sore throat
    • Runny or stuffy nose
    • Muscle or body aches
    • Headaches
    • Fatigue (tiredness)
    • Some people may have vomiting and diarrhea, though this is more common in children than adults

    * It’s important to note that not everyone with flu will have a fever.

    2.  What do I do if I get sick?

    Most people with the flu have mild illness and do not need medical care or antiviral drugs. If you get flu symptoms, in most cases you should stay home and avoid contact with other people, except to get medical care.

    CDC recommends that antiviral drugs be used early to treat people who are very sick with the flu (for example, people who are in the hospital) and people who are sick with the flu and are at high risk of serious flu complications, either because of their age or because they have a high risk medical condition.

    3. Is it too late to get a flu shot?

    No!  As long as flu viruses are still circulating, it is not too late to get a flu shot.  Flu vaccination is the best way to prevent flu illness and serious flu complications, including those that can result in hospitalization. Unfortunately, flu vaccines don’t work as well against H3N2 viruses, which means that some people who got vaccinated will still get sick; however, there are some data to suggest that flu vaccination may make illness milder. Flu vaccines usually work better against H1N1 viruses, which is another good reason to get vaccinated, since H1N1 is circulating too.

    4.  Why should I get a flu shot?

    In addition to protecting yourself, getting vaccinated also protects people around you, including people who are more vulnerable to serious flu illness, like babies and young children, older people, pregnant women and people with certain chronic health conditions.

    5.  Does the flu shot work?

    Vaccine effectiveness data for this season are not available yet, but we know that flu vaccines do not work as well against H3N2 viruses, which are predominant so far this season.

    6.  What else can I do to protect myself from flu?

    Definitely try to avoid close contact with sick people.  If you do get sick, limit contact with others as much as possible to keep from infecting them. Stay home for at least 24 hours after your fever is gone without the use of fever-reducing drugs (unless you need medical care or other necessities).

    Other tips for stopping the spread of germs:

    • Make sure you cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it.
    • Wash your hands often with soap and water.
    • Avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth. Germs spread this way!
    • Clean and disinfect surfaces and objects that may be contaminated with germs like the flu.

    Posted on February 5, 2018 by Blog Administrator

    Categories Flu, Prevention/Vaccination, Public Health

    Tags , , , , , , 

  • My Mother’s Cookbook, Winter Soups: Tomato, Cheese, Potato and Bretonne Bean

    by Margaret Cullisonsoup tureen

    Gardiner Museum, Toronto, Ontario, Canada; tureen from the Mollendorff service, c. 1751, Meissen. Wikipedia by Daderot

    In winter, a healthy warming soup appeals to most of us, often evoking childhood memories. I think of coming into our toasty house, after walking six blocks from school for lunch, cold and hungry, to the aroma of soup simmering on the stove. 

    Iowa winters extended from November through March, but the best time for soup was January when we were satiated with rich holiday fare and wanted comfort instead of indulgence. The soup was usually homemade because it tasted better, always an important consideration in our house. 

    My father came home for lunch until I was fifteen when he became a circuit court judge and began traveling daily to other county seats to hold court. His mother lived with us, so six of us sat down together for the noon meal. 

    The word soup comes from sop, sliced bread with broth poured over it. My paternal grandmother, Buddy was born in 1866, and she’d grown up eating sop. When roasted meat was on the table, more likely for an evening meal, she’d ask Dad to make her some sop. He obliged by putting a piece of bread in meat juice on the serving platter. After it was well soaked, Buddy enjoyed delectable sop to finish her meal. 

    My mother used few shortcuts when preparing food because she preferred the “real thing” to convenience foods that became more readily available in the mid-1940s. The popularity of canned soups was well established by that time. Quick dishes that relied for flavor on canned mushroom soup or dehydrated onion soup were much in favor after World War II but not by Mom. 

    She may have fixed condensed tomato soup with grilled cheese sandwiches on a busy day for us kids. But I doubt she ever served such a meal to Dad, her champion and companion in their adventures in good eating. 

    Her recipe for tomato soup demonstrates a depth of flavor that no canned soup can equal. When fresh local tomatoes aren’t in season, as was true every season but summer in the Midwest, a 14-ounce can chopped tomatoes may be substituted. However, this substitution results in a slightly sweet soup, because of the sugar usually added to commercially canned tomato products. 

         Tomato Soup
          6 fresh tomatoes, peeled and chopped 
          1 clove garlic, minced
          1 stalk celery, chopped 
          1 medium onion, chopped 
          2 bay leaves
          3 tablespoons butter
          3 tablespoons flour
          1 cup milk

    Simmer tomatoes, garlic, celery and onion with the bay leaf until vegetables are soft. Cool and then puree the mixture in a food mill; should render about two cups. Return to pan to keep warm. 

    While vegetables are cooking, melt butter in another pan, add four, blend well and then slowly add milk. Cook until sauce is thickened. Gradually stir sauce into the tomato juice. Add salt and pepper to taste, stir until steaming hot and well blended. Serves two to three. 

    Mom’s Note: Add more milk if desired, but I like a rather tart soup. 

    Mom devised her recipe for cheese soup after I’d grown up and moved away from home. With her children gone, she had more time to entertain her friends “the girls,” as she called them. She usually wrote to me, letter writing being our primary means of keeping in touch until well into the 1970s, about her current culinary experiments. 

    I remember hearing about the soup, but it was not family fare. Members of her bridge or book clubs more likely enjoyed this elegant soup, rich in butter and cheese. 

    Cheese Soup
    2 tablespoons butter
    2 small onions, chopped  
    1 celery stalk, cut fine
    1 carrot, grated
    1 14-ounce can chicken broth
    Dash of cayenne pepper
    1 cup whole milk or half and half
    1 rounding tablespoon flour
    1 cup sharp cheddar cheese

    Simmer the onion, celery and carrot in butter until partially cooked. Add the broth and cayenne. Cook until vegetables are just done. Mix flour with milk until lumps are gone; add slowly to broth and vegetables. Cook until thickened. Stir in the cheese until melted; do not boil. Serves two to three. 

    Mom’s Note: Use your own judgment about amounts. You can eliminate the celery and carrot if desired. 

    Vichyssoise was another soup that Mom became interested in when she no longer had to concentrate on food that appealed to growing children. The cold soup made with potatoes and leeks may have been featured in a magazine or the Des Moines Register, and she liked the flavor combination.

    A stickler for grammar and pronunciation, Mom asked me how to pronounce vichyssoise, since I was a first-year student in college French. She didn’t speak a language other than English but was interested, so I gave her a small book of French words that are frequently used in our language. The little blue book sat by her reading chair for years.

  • Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s Dreamers (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) Record-breaking Speech

    Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, February 7, 2018

     

     

    :

     

    https://www.c-span.org/search/?searchtype=Clips&sort=Most+Popular&programid[]=496481

    FEBRUARY 7, 2018

    House Session, Part 1 House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) gave an uninterrupted speech of over eight hours, saying she would not leave the floor until Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) agreed to allow a vote on a bill that addresses the plight of undocumented migrants who arrived in the US as children, also known as “Dreamers.” The Obama administration’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) executive order that permitted DREAMers to remain the US was rescinded by President Trump and set to expire on March 5, 2018. Leader Pelosi throughout her monologue read testimonies written by Dreamers about their lives and sent to their members of Congress.

    The House since 1841 has not allowed filibusters, although custom allows the speaker and majority and minority leaders unlimited speech time. According to the House historian, Leader Pelosi’s was the longest-ever House floor speech. (C-Span.org)

  • *FOIA Response from HUD Reveals 646% Increase in Foreclosures against Seniors in 2016; HUD Must Do Better Monitoring Servicers When They Report “Non-occupancy” As Reason For Foreclosing

     

    Editor’s Note: We regret not having seen this report earlier but hope that it’s helpful to those considering a reverse mortgage in order to retain home ownership. Published November 15, 2017Foreclosure sign

    Credit Taber Andrew Bain / Flickr Creative Commons

    Advocates Question If HUD Should Be Doing More to Protect Seniors From Needless Foreclosures

    New data (fact sheet) from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request indicates that there was a 646% increase in foreclosures last year against seniors with federally insured reverse mortgages as compared to the previous 7 years. In January 2017, the California Reinvestment Coalition and Jacksonville Area Legal Aid submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, seeking data about reverse mortgage foreclosures in HUD’s Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) program, and about a new HUD program meant to keep widowed and widower non-borrowing spouses in their homes after the death of their spouse. The FOIA response includes state by state foreclosure numbers for Financial Freedom and the industry.

    Increase In Foreclosure Numbers From Foia 10.35am

    “This new data adds to our concerns that HUD is asleep at the wheel when it comes to protecting vulnerable seniors from foreclosures that shouldn’t happen,” explains Kevin Stein, deputy director at the California Reinvestment Coalition. “Seniors are losing their homes at an alarming rate, and HUD appears to be doing little more than rubber-stamping foreclosure requests by servicers who should be making every reasonable effort to preserve senior homeownership whenever possible.”

    “Each reverse mortgage I have reviewed contains a clause that requires the lender/servicer to “reinstate” the mortgage as soon as the condition of default is cured, either before or after the foreclosure lawsuit is filed. It is very difficult to understand why lenders and servicers continue to ignore this requirement and create arbitrary servicing hoops for seniors to jump through so, ostensibly, the servicer can foreclose, explains Lynn Drysdale, Division Chief, Consumer Advocacy and Litigation Unit at Jacksonville Area Legal Aid which filed the FOIA request with CRC. “Seniors deserve protection from servicer mistakes, and HUD needs to dramatically step up its monitoring and enforcement of this industry before it’s too late.”

    Alys Cohen, staff attorney at the National Consumer Law Center adds: “The steep rise in reverse mortgage foreclosures reflected in this data is extremely concerning. From our experience working with advocates around the country, we know that seniors struggling to pay property taxes and homeowners insurance represent a significant chunk of reverse mortgage foreclosures. HUD’s initial response suggests that the data on reasons for reverse mortgage foreclosure are not being collected or analyzed adequately. Older borrowers need the opportunity catch up on these property charges through reasonable loss mitigation options, which will only happen if HUD changes its policies to require that lenders make those options available.”

    “The dramatic increase in reverse mortgage foreclosures is alarming, both in New York state and nationwide. Reverse mortgage foreclosures are especially devastating because they put some of our most vulnerable homeowners at risk of homelessness over what is often a relatively small amount of money. We hope this new data analysis serves as a call to action for policymakers, regulators, and lenders to reverse this disturbing trend,” said Christie Peale, Executive Director of the Center for NYC Neighborhoods.

    Top 5 States

    The new data from HUD show that in a mere 9 month time period (April 2016 to December 2016), there were 32,976 foreclosures on federally insured reverse mortgages. In comparison, HUD disclosed in an earlier FOIA response that from April 2009 until April 2016 (a seven-year period), there were 41,237 total reverse mortgage foreclosures in the HECM program. When the total number of foreclosures is computed as a monthly average, it shows the dramatic increase, from 491 per month from April 2009 to April 2016, to 3,664 foreclosures per month (3,173 more each month) from April 2016 to December 2016.

  • Issues Addressed in Congress: Sexual Harassment, Discrimination and the Opioid Crisis Hearings

    On January 30, President Trump delivered his first State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress. For the full transcript of the president’s remarks, please click here.
     
    Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-MA), right, delivered the Democrats’ response to the State of the Union address. For the full transcript of Rep. Kennedy’s remarks, please click here.Rep. Joe Kennedy and STEM

    Floor Action: Appropriations – On January 30, the House passed, 250-166, H.R. 695, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act of 2018, as amended.

    House passed, 406-3, the Protecting Young Victims from Sexual Abuse and Safe Sport Authorization Act of 2017, as amended.*

     Violence Against Women

    – On January 30, the House passed, by unanimous consent,  a resolution designating January 2018 as “National Stalking Awareness Month.”

    Hearings:

    Human Trafficking –  On Tuesday, January 30, the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations held a hearing, “Following the Money: How Human Traffickers Exploit US Financial Markets.” 

     
    Floor Action:
    Appropriations—This week, Congress is scheduled to consider legislation making continuing appropriations for FY2018.
     
    Mark-Ups:
     Employment—On Monday, the House Administration Committee will mark up a resolution requiring each office of the House of Representatives to adopt anti-harassment and anti-discrimination policies (as-yet-unnumbered), and the Congressional Accountability Act of 1995 Reform Act (as-yet-unnumbered), a bill to further address sexual harassment.
     

    Miscellaneous — On Tuesday, the House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee will mark up several bills, including H.R. 4188, a bill to designate the Amelia Earhart Post Office Building, and H.R. 4463, a bill to designate the Mabel Lee Memorial Post Office.

    Hearings:

    Health—On Thursday, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee will hold a hearing, “The Opioid Crisis: Impact on Children and Families.” 

    Bills Introduced:

    Health

    H.R. 4897—Rep. Frank LoBiondo (R-NJ)/Energy and Commerce (1/30/18)—A bill to require a study on women and lung cancer, and for other purposes.

    S.2358—Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)/Health, Education, Labor & Pensions (1/30/18)—A bill to require a study on women and lung cancer, and for other purposes.

    S.Res. 722—Rep. Bobby Rush (D-IL)/Oversight and Government Reform (2/2/18)—A resolution supporting the goals of “Black Women’s Heart Health Awareness Week.”

    Miscellaneous

    H.R. 4912—Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA)/Financial Services; House Administration (2/2/18)—A bill to award a Congressional Gold Medal, collectively, to the American women who joined the workforce during World War II, providing the vehicles, weaponry, and ammunition to win the war, that were referred to as “Rosie the Riveter,” in recognition of their contributions to the National the inspiration they have provided to ensuing generation.

    Violence Against Women

    S. 2349—Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO)/Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs (1/29/18)— A bill to direct the director of the Office of Management and Budget to establish an interagency working group to study federal efforts to collect data on sexual violence and to make recommendations on the harmonization of such efforts, and for other purposes.

    H.R. 4893—Rep. Ann McLane Kuster (D-NH)/Judiciary (1/29/18)— A bill to direct the director of the Office of Management and Budget to establish an interagency working group to study federal efforts to collect data on sexual violence and to make recommendations on the harmonization of such efforts, and for other purposes.

    Information was supplied by Women’s Congressional Policy Institute

  • Reading Recommendations from Radcliffe’s Fellows and SeniorWomen’s Editor

    Looking for a Good Book?
    The 2017–2018 cohort of Radcliffe fellows include scholars, scientists, artists, and writers. Below, a selection of Radcliffe fellows share books that inspired their research, activated their imaginations, and sparked their enjoyment. 

    Hala Aldosari
    Independent Scholar (Saudi Arabia)
    Biology and Medical Sciences

    Hala, this year’s Robert G. James Scholar Fellow, is currently reading two books that investigate the roots of health: The Social Determinants of Health: Looking Upstream (Polity, 2017), by Kathryn Strother Ratcliff, and Gender and Health: The Effects of Constrained Choices and Social Policies (Cambridge University Press, 2008), by Chloe E. Bird and Patricia P. Rieker. Hala was also inspired to pick up Malcom Gladwell’s bestseller The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference (Little, Brown, 2000) “because of my personal pursuit of meaningful change.”

    Michael Bronstein
    University of Lugano (Switzerland)/Tel Aviv University (Israel)
    Computer Science

    Michael recommends The Keepers of Light: A History and Working Guide to Early Photographic Processes (Morgan & Morgan, Inc., 1979), by William Crawford. Michael explains, “I am interested in old technology and photography in particular, and this book combines both a historic overview and practical recipes.” Michael’s second recommendation is The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory (W. W. Norton, 2003), by the author-physicist Brian Greene ’84, who recently gave a Davis Lecture at the Radcliffe Institute.

    Rana Dajani
    Hashemite University (Jordan)
    Biology and Medical Sciences

    Rana, this year’s Rita E. Hauser Fellow, suggests a quintet of books whose themes range from family ties and memory to the joy of reading and the central role ambiguity plays in our world: Teta, Mother, and Me: Three Generations of Arab Women (W. W. Norton, 2007), by Jean Said Makdisi; Pedagogy of the Oppressed (Continuum, 1970), by Paulo Freire; The Rights of the Reader (Candlewick, 2008), by Daniel Pennac and illustrated by Quentin Blake; Ishmael: A Novel (Turtleback Books, 1995), by Daniel Quinn; and Nonsense: The Power of Not Knowing (Crown, 2015), by Jamie Holmes.

    Robert Darnton
    Harvard University
    History

    Robert, this year’s Joy Foundation Fellow, recently finished Gabriel García Márquez’s Love in the Time of Cholera (Knopf, 1988) as part of his personal resolution to read his way through recent Latin American literature. Robert recommends the novel “as a way to get some sense of a fascinating and remote world — Colombia at the turn of the last century.”

    Erica Edwards
    Rutgers University
    Literature

    Erica recommends Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less (Basic Books, 2016), by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang. Pang’s book reveals the startling benefits that prioritizing rest can yield for creativity and innovation. Erica reports, “As it turns out, long walks, vacations, hobbies, and naps give us what we need to perform at our best (whatever our fields of work may be). A beautifully stimulating (and soul-enriching) book.”

  • A Plea for Imagination: Once There Was a Time When It Was an Anomaly to See Gratuitous Brutality

     Cats at play

    by Joan L. Cannon

    George Eliot said (in Middlemarch) “…we do not expect people to be moved by what is not unusual. That element of tragedy which lies in the very fact of frequency, has not yet wrought itself into the coarse emotion of mankind; and perhaps our frames could hardly bear much of it. If we had a keen vision and feeling for all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow and the squirrel’s heart beat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence.”

    I have had those words pinned to my bulletin board for perhaps 20 years. Of late, it seems that their significance is multiplying day by day. Surely, there is a real danger to what we like to call civilization when so many people appear to have lost the ability to imagine.

    Cruelty is a quality that is not understood by nonhuman creation. A cat feels nothing except the excitement of the chase, and thus releases the mouse as often as it can for the fun of catching it again, unless the cat was hungry and decided to satisfy its appetite. Wolves need not consider the terror of the prey and its parent as they circle the buffalo calf and cut it off from its dam.

    Men, however, have the capacity to be distressed by the pain and horror of the victim. There was a time when in western cultures it was an anomaly to see gratuitous brutality. Laws are on the books providing punishment for ill treatment even of animals. Most of us have been reared in a tradition that makes us feel shame for what we term the “excesses” of zealots and megalomaniacs. War is horrifying to nearly everyone.

    It is the word “nearly” that appears so often to be implicit in the daily news and reports of new video and computer games and lists of movie titles. From suicide bombings that we attribute to an insane fanaticism to the growing market for pay-for-view “extreme fighting,” some sort of virus seems to be infecting a larger and larger population. The recent trampling of a clerk in a store by a mob of self-involved materialists is only one of far too many other examples.

    Is there any way to reeducate our children when the adults appear to be the source of this behavior? Tradition in the psychiatric community has held that there are childhood clues to later sociopathic behavior in such activities as animal cruelty. What has happened to our ability to foresee the callousness of adults and its dangers?

    It is a given that some people can afford to be more sensitive, even craven, than others. As long as we are omnivores, someone has to do the butchering, and those who do must learn to live with any after-effects of killing for a living, or they will go mad. That does not excuse the same imperviousness in so many of the population.

    Modern human beings need to continue to progress along the evolutionary chain, not fall back into the prehistoric mindsets required for survival. We need to use the human ability to imagine, if only to learn how to fear something that may not yet be evident, if we are to prevent it. Above all, we need to be able to imagine not only what it would be like to be a victim, a sufferer, or without hope. We have to revive the childish world view that allows for seeking out beauty and fun and affection so that we can envision a better world.

    ©2008 Joan Cannon for SeniorWomen.com


     

  • Two Stories: Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase & Co. to Partner on US Employee Healthcare; As Trump Attacks the Federal Health Law, Some States Try to Shore it Up

    The goal is to improve US employee satisfaction while reducing overall costs

    Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase & Co. announced today that they are partnering on ways to address healthcare for their US employees, with the aim of improving employee satisfaction and reducing costs. The three companies, which bring their scale and complementary expertise to this long-term effort, will pursue this objective through an independent company that is free from profit-making incentives and constraints. The initial focus of the new company will be on technology solutions that will provide US employees and their families with simplified, high-quality and transparent healthcare at a reasonable cost.

    Tackling the enormous challenges of healthcare and harnessing its full benefits are among the greatest issues facing society today. By bringing together three of the world’s leading organizations into this new and innovative construct, the group hopes to draw on its combined capabilities and resources to take a fresh approach to these critical matters.

    “The ballooning costs of healthcare act as a hungry tapeworm on the American economy. Our group does not come to this problem with answers. But we also do not accept it as inevitable. Rather, we share the belief that putting our collective resources behind the country’s best talent can, in time, check the rise in health costs while concurrently enhancing patient satisfaction and outcomes,” said Berkshire Hathaway Chairman and CEO, Warren Buffett.

    “The healthcare system is complex, and we enter into this challenge open-eyed about the degree of difficulty,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO. “Hard as it might be, reducing healthcare’s burden on the economy while improving outcomes for employees and their families would be worth the effort. Success is going to require talented experts, a beginner’s mind, and a long-term orientation.”

    “Our people want transparency, knowledge and control when it comes to managing their healthcare,” said Jamie Dimon, Chairman and CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co. “The three of our companies have extraordinary resources, and our goal is to create solutions that benefit our US employees, their families and, potentially, all Americans,” he added.

    The effort announced today is in its early planning stages, with the initial formation of the company jointly spearheaded by Todd Combs, an investment officer of Berkshire Hathaway; Marvelle Sullivan Berchtold, a Managing Director of JPMorgan Chase & Co.; and Beth Galetti, a Senior Vice President at Amazon. The longer-term management team, headquarters location and key operational details will be communicated in due course.

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    As Trump Attacks the Federal Health Law, Some States Try to Shore it Up

    Repeatedly rated one of the healthiest and happiest places to live in the United States, this medium-sized college town with spectacular views of the Blue Ridge Mountains tends to attract entrepreneurs, freelancers and creative types who can live anywhere they want because they’re not tied to a corporate job.

    Charlottesville, Virginia, (right) has the highest health insurance premiums in the country for individuals who do not qualify for federal subsidies and are not enrolled in employer-sponsored insurance. Market uncertainty, spurred by White House efforts to chip away at the Affordable Care Act, has resulted in heftier premiums nationwide. Some states are trying to mitigate further hikes. Christine Vestal, The Pew Charitable Trusts

    But this year, many of those untethered workers may be wishing they lived anywhere but here. Residents of Charlottesville and three surrounding counties who buy health insurance without employer support or government subsidies have been hit with the highest health insurance premiums in the country — more than three times the price they paid last year.

    Premiums are also substantially higher than average, although not as high as in Charlottesville, in southwestern rural Georgia, certain Colorado ski resort towns, the Connecticut suburbs of New York City, and large parts of Wisconsin and Wyoming, among other places.