Paca questions

Paca has asked me a couple of very different questions recently. I'll post my replies here.

First, he asked for more details on the database design. "What DB backend will they be using, and what sort of front-end. Are these web services of some sort, or are you talking about building something in Access?"

We will be designing both the structure and the interface using an Access-like product called "My SQL". Mike has used it before and recommends it, so that's what we are going with. Web service would be nice, but it probably won't happen. We are going less complicated than that. The interviewers will use pen and paper; once a week or once a month these will be returned to a central office where someone will physically input the data into the database. While I have dreams of creating a PDA interface that can then download via an internet connection to our server, the reality is that 1) that's beyond my ability to code, 2) most of Bangladesh doesn't even have internet access, and 3) they have specifically requested the simpler method.

As to the second question... you asked earlier about my take on the G8 debt cancellation for a few heavily idebted poor countries. Well...

Poverty in the developing world is a very complex issue that nobody really understands. There's been years of attempts to get at the problem, and so far there has been far too many failures and not enough successes. But it is pretty safe to say that there are both external and internal causes of poverty in these countries. External factors include barriers to trade with the West, the draining of money from the local economy by multi-national corporations, and, of course, the huge debt burden's these countries carry. In some cases debt service may consume up to 60 or 70% of a country's annual budget. It's hard to feed your citizens or create investment incentives or even provide basic security when so much of your revenue is already committed to debt service. Also remember that the money servicing the debt is leaving the country... so not only is it not being used for development, it's not benefitting the local country in any way at all. That's where the drive for debt relief comes from... if we can eliminate that money drain, then perhaps those countries can use the money that was going to debt repayment to instead go to development activities.

But just cancelling their debt will not work. The main reason for doubt is because of the internal reasons for poverty... most notably, corruption. If by cancelling the debt these countries then use their newly freed resources to invest in development, then there's no problem. If these countries though start rewarding favorable contracts to friends and family of those in power; building unneeded projects that benefit the wealthy elite of the nation and not the working poor; or even just flat out taking a big chunk of the taxes for themeselves, then the extra money does not help development at all. Remember, these are some of the poorest countries in the world; they didn't get like that by chance. All of them have suffered from severe government corruption at different times in their past. And once corruption is entrenched, it is very, very difficult to remove. Just look at the Philippines - that is one of Asias oldest democracies, rich with natural resources, with strong ties to the West. And yet they lag far behind other SE Asian nations such as Thailand, Singapore, and even Malaysia (not too mention Korea and Hong Kong). Why? Because of the culture of corruption and class entitlement. They are struggling to get through it... but 20 years after the fall of Marcos and we again have a case today where the President is accused of buying the election. Not coincidentally, the Philippines also has the largest external debt of all southeast asian nations (with the possible exception of Indonesia).

All of the countries that the G8 is eliminating debt from are ones that have demonstrated "good governance". That is, they have behaved in a way that the West deems relatively uncorrupt... usually this is just a nice way of saying that they have a relatively open free-market economy which welcomes foreign investors. If their politicians truly are unselfish and looking to develop the country, then cancelling this debt is a good idea. But it could just turn out to be another opportunity for a few wealthy and powerful individuals to add another few million dollars worth of import cars to their collection.

There are other problems, as well. First, cancelling debt means that their credit rating will fall, making it harder for them to get new loans in the future, and the loans they do get will be at a higher rate. Second, the G8 can only cancel their official development aid loans that come from teh government, which is a relatively small portion of the debt these countries carry (most of it is in private bank loans). Third, cancelling debt while the west still maintains huge agriculture subsidies and other barriers to trade means that the country will still be unable to find an export market for their goods, guaranteeing continued poverty. I don't have the data, but many people believe that the single best thing the West could do to help these countries is to simply cease their agriculture subsidies. Of course that would never fly in the U.S. farm belt... but the subsides we and the Europeans give to our farmers keep food prices artificially low, making it virtually impossible for poor countries to compete.

Like I said, it's complex. Cancelling debt is a nice gesture, but it will not, by itself, do much to eliminate the poverty in these countries.

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Once again, Democrats are out-played

This will be an off-the-cuff political post filled (I'm sure) with factual inaccuracies and hypocrisy. Sorry about that, I just need to vent.

Once again the Dems are getting outplayed by the Republicans. Over the weekend Carl Rove said something about liberals wanting to understand the terrorists that attacked us on 9/11 and put them into counseling. The Dems got up and denounced that statement, as they should. But now the Republican spin machine is emphasizing that Rove didn't attack democrats, but "liberals." The Dems, from what I've been reading, have largely responded by saying that is horsepucky and that of course it was an attack on Democrats... why, later in the interview Rove actually identified two Democrats by name!

Here's my take on it. First, it's a stupid thing for Rove to say... most (not all, certainly) liberals that I know were 100% behind going into Afghanistan. But we are also for trying to address the source of terrorism, rather than just throw bullets at the problem. Poverty, cultural imperialism, Israel/Palestine, U.S. support for middle-east dictatorships... these are just some of the issues that can help to breed the kind of anti-American sentiment that culminated in 9/11. Invading Iraq or even Afghanistand does NOTHING to addressing these core issues. Until they are addressed in some way more and more "terrorists" will be created in reaction to the perceived injustices.

Now, is that such a crazy idea? I think not, and I further think it is both the only rational approach to our problems and the liberal approach. To be sure, some liberals on the far left were opposed to Afghanistan, but it's not the consensus (of course I'm speaking out of my butt, here, I have no data to prove what is actually the consensus "liberal" position... anecdotally, though, most "liberals" who I know believe something close to this).

Rather than address the question head-on, however, Democrats have allowed the Republicans to paint "liberalism" as this extreme pacifist goody-goody kind of non-sense. By allowing them to even draw that dichotomy they are tacitly admitting that being a liberal is bad. Then when Democrat X runs for congress or president, and the Republicans trot out the term "liberal", the candidate has to try to hide from that label. They've been doing it since the 60s, and I know at least one reader of this blog that buys into that hogwash.

Liberalism is not bad. I think it's very, very good. To me, being a liberal means being open minded, thoughtful, worldy, and emphathetic. It means behaving according to reason, not faith. It means a constant search for the right balance between the preservation of personal liberty and the promotion of common good. It means taking a balanced approach to threats, including terrorism, that includes both military response and policy review.

Seeing the world in black and white is naive and dangerous. Only a Sith thinks in absolutes.

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In the throes...

Not the last throes, mind you. Still very much in the beginning throes. But throes they are.

What throes? The throes of report writing. Oh, the joy, the happiness, the pure pleasure of writing down in words what is plainly in front of you in graph form.

I complain to much, it's really not bad. And it's nice to be doing something different than what I've spent the last month on. That's one reason this is such a cool job... I get to do many different things. In another couple of weeks I'll go off to Bangladesh to help them set up a data collection system. I'll get to (help them) design the database, implement it, and then (help them) code the front end.

Long term details are still hazy... I doubt very much I'll get what I really want, which is a permanent staff position. But things are very much shaping up so that I'll stay here while taking phd classes from Tulane. Mike has now offered to pay my tuition in the event that Tulane doesn't offer a waiver. That's very kind of them, but it implies that I'll still be a Fellow in the fall, since if I were in a paid position I would be able to afford to pay the tuition myself.

That's ok, though. If they are paying tuition and giving me a larger "stipend" (which he's already offered), then presumably they'll also still be paying for my apartment. Which means that, so long as my student loans are deferred then my only expense is CC bills (relatively minor) and car payment (not so minor). Mike says to figure out how much more I need to meet my expenses and TASC will cover it. Hard to beat that deal.

I found a new apartment... I could move in as early as 2 weeks, but it will probably have to wait until the lease on my current apartment expires. This new one is nice... a wee bit smaller than my current place, but not by much. But it's off in this little corner of Bangkok, away from all the hustle and bustle, so it's very quiet. The aunties that own it live next door. There's only 9 apartments in the building, which is only a year old. It's all freshly painted and decorated with wooden carvings from Chiang Mai. Comes with weekly cleaning service, and it's about 10K baht less than where I'm staying now. All of that difference will go to my pocket. It's much more of a "home" feel, you know?

Today's walk into work was almost pleasant... the heat is finally dissapting a little. Hopefully things won't be too hot in Hua Hin for Shannon, the kids and I to enjoy ourselves. She'll be here next week; I'm looking forward to seeing them. Too bad they can't bring the dogs, I miss them too!

Ok, off to writing I go!

Thupt.

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So maybe Rush is partly right...

One of the things that drives me batty is when the right-wing talking heads call anyone with a viewpoint to the left of their own "wackos", "crazies", "extremists", etc. I consder myself very reasonable and thoughtful in my opinions, many of which these guys deride as a matter of course.

However, I've just realized that there really are some wacko lefties out there. I was just reading a post on a Prince fan site that had turned political. This one poster was going on about how capitalism isn't all its cracked up to be and doesn't provide equal opportunity for everyone.

I was thinking, "right on, brother."

Then the poster talked about how the G8's attempt to eliminate debt for some heavily indebted countries was a good start.

I was thinking, "a bit naive, but yeah, it's encouraging."

Then the poster stated that what we really needed to do was to revert to a 13 month lunar calender.

I was thinking, "whahhh?"

Then he wrote that we next needed to abandon money. Without money, he reasoned, there be no more poverty, no more impediments to finding a cure for cancer.

I was thinking, "Good lord, this person's an idiot."

I am left, but that doesn't mean I'm insane. The advent of money as a means of economic exchange is one of the greatest milestones in human development. It allows people to exchange the fruits of their efforts without having to physically drag a barrel of milk or a bushel of wheat with them to town. It allows one to adequately judge the relative value to society of answering a phone call or flipping a Big Mac, or even doing cancer research. It allows one, through loans, to fund current productive efforts using projected future results. Eliminating money would certainly eliminate poverty, if poverty is measured by the amount of money one has compared to everyone else. But it would do nothing to eliminate hunger, disease, homelessness, social stigma, or any of the other consequences that derives from being non-productive, for whatever the cause.

I guess this guy is to the left what some of these militia groups are to the right... their idealogy is the same as the mainstream (militia groups want personal liberty, this lefty guy wants to end poverty); but the conclusions that they then draw from that ideology is anti-social, impractical, and just an all-around bad idea. Rush is right, there are left-wing kooks. But I'm not one of them. And, for the record, neither is Hillary, Dean, or Bill.

That's why it's important for us reasonable people, we who are friends and family, to be able to listen to each other about issues of war and peace, economic growth, the place for religion in government, government funding of art and science, the role of the our country in the global society, the environmental effects of consumption and how to measure those effects, and so on and so on.

Reason. The stuff of which reality is made.

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What's going on in Bangkok?

Well... I'm all by myself here in the office, for one. Mike has left for a month-long trip to the U.S. and Ross has also gone back to the U.S. to be with his wife, whose sister just died. Pete is off doing Pete things... in Australia, most likely, which means it's just me and the secretary, Gail. Does that mean I can relax for a while? No, not really. I've got a month to write the first draft of a report on the Thai data set. We've finally completed (almost) the analysis... just a few formatting changes to make (which I should finish today) and one more discussian with the statistician that created the sample design and we'll be done. With the completion of the analysis, it's time to write the report... so that's the next task. We had a meeting with some foks at UNICEF yesterday and Mike told them the first draft would be ready in a month; these are people that were originally told it would be available last November, so they are ready to get some results.

It was fun to go to UNICEF, though. My work the past few weeks has involved doing the statistical analysis and then exporting the results into Excel for easy viewing. I created a pretty neat spreadsheet that automatically graphs the data based on user-defined selection criteria. It's somewhat complicated but nothing anyone that knows Excel couldn't do. Nonetheless everyone that sees it is blown away... it's nice to have one's efforts appreciated, but it's good to remember that the real value was created by those that went out and collected the data. All I'm doing is moving numbers around.

Shannon is coming in about 3 weeks. That'll be fun. I'm taking a few days off to go to the beach with her and the kids. Other potential ideas for the itinerary include a trip to the Grand Palace and to Chatachuk, the weekend market. I just hope I'm able to leave work here when I leave... I don't want to have to write a report while on the beach at Hua Hin.

Not much progress on my future here; Mike has had a single email exchange with the Tulane chief, in which he agreed to discuss it with Mike when he gets to New Orleans. I have to say I'm a little less confident that everything will work out. Yesterday Mike and I chatted about it. Mike discussed finding funds for me, and all of the options he mentioned were for a fellowship position. I reiterated that I would prefer a professional position. I thought I had made that clear in our last discussion, but either I was not as clear as I believed or it's just much easier to find funds for a fellow than for a permanent staff post. Nonetheless, there's a donor's meeting in the fall, and Pete is trying to push some money through Congress which could eventually benefit me. How odd is it to have my potential salary dependent upon a Congressional vote? Discomforting... Anyway, the whole discussion left me feeling less than secure.

Odd things I've recently seen:

A 20-something man showing a young boy (~8 yrs) how to put a clip into somekind of automatic machine gun (had to be a replica, right?).

A Thai woman with blue eyes (had to be contacts, right?).

A older woman, 60+, walking down the sidewalk, hand in hand with a 20-something Thai girl (had to be her friend, right?).

An older man, 60+, dressed up as a woman, complete with sundress and lipstick, hanging around the hospital neighborhood (the hospital is famous for its quality and affordability of plastic surgery, including transgender operations).

I helped this brown-skinned fellow one night about 6:00 who had obviously had wayyy to much to drink. He kept saying, in English, "I like Thai people, but I am not Thai. I am Filipino." Over and over and over... he wanted to go to the busstop, but his English was too nonsensical for the Thais to understand him and he didn't speak any Thai, even though he looked Thai. He likes Thai people, but he is not Thai; he's Filipino.

Thupt!

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The Everexpanding Universe

The world just got a little bigger today... well, the blogging world, anyway. Ms. Courtney Hatfield has joined the ranks of "those-who-deluded-themselves-into-thinking-people-give-a-sh**". It's getting to be a crowded club ;). A link to her blog is in the links section, so click on down if you want to peep into the life of a Louisiana/Oregon/Mississippi/Texan/Martian transplant.

Speaking of Martians, I went to the dentist a couple of days ago. Dentists... ugh. The shots, the drilling, those things don't bother me as much as just having to keep my jaw pried open for an hour and then the stern lecture afterwards. I had some fillings, and then afterwards I asked her if I could eat anything at all immediately. She said yes... I asked specifically about soda (knowing the acidity might cause a problem), and she blithely responded that "we don't drink soda here, it's bad for your health." Well, sure, it's not the best, but it's totally rubbish that Thais don't drink soda. They drink it almost as much as we do in the U.S. And she never answered my question. So I left that place and immediatly grabbed a 12-oz Coke and chugged it, just to spite her. Bah, dentists!

Thupt!

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