Author: Andrew Sullivan

Quote For The Day

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“After the funeral, while I was downtown desperately celebrating my birthday, a Negro soldier, in the lobby of the Hotel Braddock, got into a fight with a white policeman over a Negro girl. Negro girls, white policemen, in or out of uniform, and Negro males—in or out of uniform—were part of the furniture of the lobby of the Hotel Braddock and this was certainly not the first time such an incident had occurred. It was destined, however, to receive an unprecedented publicity, for the fight between the policeman and the soldier ended with the shooting of the soldier.

Rumor, flowing immediately to the streets outside, stated that the soldier had been shot in the back, an instantaneous and revealing invention, and that the soldier had died protecting a Negro woman. The facts were somewhat different—for example, the soldier had not been shot in the back, and was not dead, and the girl seems to have been as dubious a symbol of womanhood as her white counterpart in Georgia usually is, but no one was interested in the facts. They preferred the invention because this invention expressed and corroborated their hates and fears so perfectly. It is just as well to remember that people are always doing this. Perhaps many of those legends, including Christianity, to which the world clings began their conquest of the world with just some such concerted surrender to distortion. The effect, in Harlem, of this particular legend was like the effect of a lit match in a tin of gasoline. The mob gathered before the doors of the Hotel Braddock simply began to swell and to spread in every direction, and Harlem exploded,” – James Baldwin, “Notes of a Native Son“.

(Photo: A protester waves a “black and white” modified US flag during a march following the grand jury decision in the death of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, on November 24, 2014. By Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images.)

Faces Of The Day

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From left to right, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, Greek Foreign Minister Evangelos Venizelos and US Secretary of State John Kerry as they pose for a group photograph at the Foreign Affairs ministers’ meeting at the NATO headquarters in Brussels, on December 2, 2014. By John Thys/AFP/Getty Images.

The Costs Of Poor Hospital Design

They’re considerable:

Most of us have been lost in a hospital. The corridors all look the same, the signs for the department you want are there one minute and then gone the next. Everybody seems too busy for you to bother them asking for directions. Getting lost is not only a cause of stress to patients and their families, but, when staff have to give directions, it is also a waste of clinical time. One study in a 600-bed hospital estimated that poor wayfaring cost over $220,000 a year. Much of this was due to the 4,500 hours of clinical time a year – approximately two full-time positions – that was spent giving directions to lost patients and even staff.

Nostalgia As The Most Important Special Effect

Responding to the megaviral new teaser for the upcoming Star Wars sequel (seen parodied above), Ian Crouch reflects on George Lucas’ mixed legacy with the franchise, as well was what we might expect now that other creative forces have the reins:

Lucas, having created the “Star Wars” movies, committed the great sin in his prequels (“The Phantom Menace,” “Attack of the Clones,” and “Revenge of the Sith”) of not being much interested in re-creating the original trilogy. He gave up the spit-and-glue aesthetic of those films, whose clunky reminders of real-world physical realities were a key to their charm, in order to explore the early limits of digital filmmaking. Matters such as characterization or narrative (never mind acting) got lost along the way. It turned out that Lucas didn’t have much to say beyond the fact that he had new ways to say things. What resulted were technical marvels and boring, soulless movies. And then Lucas, perhaps chastised by the mass revolt against his new creations or else no longer interested in prolonging the space opera that built his career and maybe, in its way, derailed it, sold “Star Wars” to Disney, in 2012. Even in its low moments, “Star Wars” has been a cash cow, and Disney has promised not only a new trilogy but stand-alone spinoff movies as well. We’re about to get a lot of a galaxy far, far away—and whatever sanctity the franchise possessed in the eyes of its fans will ultimately get sequelled and prequelled out of us in the end.

But it hasn’t happened yet. In [J.J.] Abrams, Disney has chosen not only a director for its new movie but a dedicated librarian of a particular version of the franchise, a curator of the sights and sounds of his own childhood at the movies. (Abrams has performed something similar with his “Star Trek” reboots; here, he is attempting a rehabilitation, if not a resuscitation.) The teaser is less a preview of a movie than an assurance of Abrams’s bona fides as a fan, and his commitment to righting the wrongs of the prequels. By getting the details right, he has shown himself to be a trustworthy protector of the best parts of the original “Star Wars” movies. As to whether or not he has a new story to tell: wait til next year.

Dressed To Diagnose

Anna Reisman explains why doctors’ clothing matters:

In days of yore, the doctor was clearly identifiable by the white lab coat over shirt and tie, his agreeable nurse counterpart unmistakable in white dress and cap (which, depending on one’s school, 1024px-Paul_Fürst,_Der_Doctor_Schnabel_von_Rom_(Holländer_version)might be shaped like a coffee filter, sailor’s cap, or a hamantaschen).  But in the 21st century, especially in primary-care medicine, much has changed; with more categories of clinicians (nurse practitioners, physician assistants) in every sphere of medicine, the traditional clinical clothing boundaries have blurred.

The definition of what counts as professional clothing is also in flux, thanks to increasing knowledge of infectious risks. Earlier this year, the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology Association (SHEA) published new guidelines for healthcare-personnel attire in hospital settings. Their goal was to balance the need for professional appearance with the obligation to minimize potential germ transmission via clothing and other doodads like ID badges and jewelry and neckties that might touch body parts or bodily fluids. The SHEA investigators’ take-home points regarding infection: White coats should be washed weekly, at the minimum; neckties should be clipped in place (70 percent of doctors in two studies admitted to having never had a tie cleaned); and institutions should strongly consider a “bare below the elbow” (BBE) policy, meaning short sleeves and no wristwatches or jewelry.

(Image via Wiki: “Paul Fürst, engraving, c. 1721, of a plague doctor of Marseilles. The plague doctor’s costume was the clothing worn by a plague doctor to protect him from airborne diseases. The costume consisted of an ankle length overcoat and a bird-like beak mask often filled with sweet or strong smelling substances (commonly lavender), along with gloves, boots, a brim hat, and an outer over-clothing garment.”)

A Marijuana Breathalyzer

It’s in development:

WSU chemistry professor Herbert Hill says that the team is using ion-mobility spectrometry – the same tech used by airport security and custom agents to detect drugs and explosives – and repurposing it for the new device. Unlike an alcohol breathalyzer, the WSU solution won’t determine how stoned a driver is, but instead just detect the presence of THC. After that, police would follow up with a blood test to be used as evidence in court, similar to an alcohol DUI.

David Knowles provides context:

While driving while stoned is against the law in all four states—Washington, Colorado, Alaska, and Oregon—where marijuana has been made legal for recreational use, as well in those where the drug has been given the green light for medical use, police have had to rely on blood tests and traditional standardized field sobriety tests such as walking a straight line. A 2012 studyfound that just 30 percent of those under the influence of THC failed the standard sobriety tests, and the results of blood tests can take up to twenty-four hours.

Samantha Murphy Kelly notes that this “isn’t the first time a product intended to keep marijuana-influenced drivers off the road has introduced”:

Earlier this month, a breathalyzer called Cannabix, which also detects THC in one’s system, was revealed at the National Marijuana Business Conference in Las Vegas. Cannabix is slated to roll out first to law enforcement and businesses, then to consumers; it is scheduled to hit the market next year.

Putting Government Programs To The Test

Ron Haskins declares that “the last six years have seen the most impressive expansion of evidence-based policy in the history of federal social programs”:

The Obama administration has launched a series of evidence-based initiatives that have the potential to revolutionize the way the federal government funds social programs and what program sponsors at the state and local level must do to win and retain federal dollars. Specifically, grantees must show they are spending their federal dollars on programs that have evidence from rigorous evaluations of producing positive impacts on children’s development or achievement as measured by outcomes such as teen pregnancy, educational achievement or graduation rates, performance at community colleges, employment and earnings as young adults, or reducing rates of incarceration. Second, they must evaluate their programs using scientific designs to ensure that they are continuing to have impacts and to reform the programs if they are not.

This strategy requires a pipeline of social programs that have been tested and shown to be effective by rigorous evaluations. However, experience shows that most social programs, including some of the most celebrated such as DARE and Head Start, produce modest or no impacts that last when subjected to rigorous evaluations. An important virtue of focusing on evidence is not simply that the public will have reliable information about whether programs work, but that the evidence places pressure on programs to change and improve when they are not working.

He lists five examples of programs that work. One is a promising early-education initiative:

Success for All is a comprehensive school-wide reform program, primarily for high-poverty elementary schools, with a strong emphasis on early detection and prevention of reading problems before they become serious. Key program elements include daily 90-minute reading classes, each of which is formed by grouping together students of various ages who read at the same performance level; a K-1 reading curriculum that focuses on language development (e.g., reading stories to students and having them re-tell), teaching students the distinct sounds that make up words (i.e. phonemic awareness), blending sounds to form words, and developing reading fluency; daily one-on-one tutoring (in addition to regular classes) for students needing extra help with reading; and cooperative learning activities (in which students work together in teams or pairs) starting in the grade 2 reading classes.

The impact:

On average, 2nd-graders at Success for All schools score approximately 25-30% of a grade level higher in reading ability than their counterparts at the control schools.