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whatdoesshedotothem · 3 years ago

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Saturday 1 August 1835

6 25

11 20

No kiss. At my desk at 7 25 at which hour F65° and fine morning - at George’s account and settled with Turner for stones and to come again tonight with estimate for stones for the tail goit - then breakfast at 8 50 - meant to have been off to Halifax to the District bank but Greenwood came convenient enough - I wanted to speak to him about sawyers etc but he came to speak about the letting Nelson have the Northgate house job - poor G- in a nervous agony about it - could scarce speak - damp cold pallor over his face - almost in tears - it was unfairly let - Helm’s the lower estate and it was to go to the lowest - Helm a very honest man - should have his Greenwoods buildings without estimate - it was not he (Helm) who said anything against me - no ! he said perhaps it was for the best - ‘I had been over-seen’ but I had told him I might have other building to do and I should not forget him - G- hoped I should excuse his coming to tell me - it was for my interest - ‘they’ (the town I suppose) might oppose me - might oppose my getting a licence - I had done wrong - I heard him very quietly then said what I had done could not be altered now - but I had done right according to my own judgment and conscience and if the town could act so unjustly as to oppose me, they might - if I could not get a licence I had immediately change my plan, and trouble myself very little about it - I wished Mr Harper to decide but he declined doing so, and I had therefore decided as I had told Brian Helm in a moment as every might and ought to do in a case like this where right principle was the only guide - I had taken the lower estimate - the case Mr Harper said was singular - yes! but I thought it clear - the price given for the old materials had nothing to do with the estimate of the work - I had a right to do as I liked about the materials - N-‘s estimate of the work was the lower by about £3.15.0 I believed and I had taken - when G- heard the price of the old materials he said he himself would have given £200 for them - if, said I, I had known that in time you should have had them - these were mine to do as I liked with - on hearing my explanation and seeing me so clam yet decided, G- began gradually to cool and said the thing was misrepresented - it only wanted explaining - I told him what I had said both to Nelson and Helm - adding that after the inquiry I had made, it certainly appeared to me that N- was the more experience person - BH owned he had never done any columns - à la longue - G-

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became reconciled and talked what he could do if he did set up the Inn - I mentioned his wife’s remark that they might as well put a stick into the house as herself and that G- had as many irons in the fire as he could cool - he said well! but he was master - yes! but said I, she must be mistress or it will not do -‘well! but she does not say so much to me’ - perhaps said I she might be fearful of speaking so plainly before you - however you must judge as well as you can - he said people asked if he would ruin Carr - no! he answered he would say all he could for him to me; but if he C- did not get it, it was another thing - well! said I, I will exonerate you on this point - you have already said enough to save your credit if you never say anymore - but I have not said C- shall have it - he has made no application to me - what have to expect from such a character? Remember the trick he played me about the manure - besides, his immorality is a disgrace - G- said yes! it was and he was very domineering and disagreeable - then inquired about the Hope coach - said I was going to London - bade G- take the 4 inside places and one outside for Monday morning to Sheffield if he could - ordered about hat-bore lined with coarse flannel to be sent home tonight - spoke about Charles H- G- said 2 1/2d. per yard in length would be enough for sawing up rails and settling them - the oaks-logs to remain where they are till my return and then go to Greenwoods to be cut up - G- thinks the Inn will pay me 7 ½ pc. in ten years - on going out found Wheatley the veterinary surgeon come to look at A-‘s pony - something of a splent and liquid blister should be applied - said I was satisfied to find him of my own opinion - George to call tonight for stuff and directions - W- agreed with me, it would be well to let the pony be from 8 to 9 am and from 6 to 7 pm in the paddock, and this would save the trouble of walking her above and would answer much better - then desired W- to examine the old mare – her jole already affected - thinks her not that bad enough to infect the other horses, but she ought to be kept apart - better to put her out of the way - then with my father and Marian - spoke about the mare - my father said nothing against it, but seemed hurt - perhaps it will be best to put the mare away and say no more about it - then had Mr Husband who brought the plans of the water wheel etc from Mr Harper - told Mr Husband merely to make me out an account of Charles H-‘s work done on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and in fact this week, and keep an account of what more he did during my absence - said I had spoke to him this morning he was now gone about wood and making a sluice for Spiggs loose a job which the coal agent would settle about - Reminded Mr Husband that he was in a situation where 100 eyes would be upon him, he must do the best he could and his best plan would be to consult no interest but that of his employer - if there was the least rent to be found, it would be torn from top to bottom - I was anxious for him to be cautious - I said this in consequence of what G- told me - in his agony, he said, he admired Helm who had acted quite independently and never gone near Husband who had said in his G-‘s presence 3 times, and he G- would swear to it and had once thought of telling Mr Harper last night that he (Mr H-) could put £500 into any mason’s pocket and G- thought that very strong and improper language - yes! said I and very wrong and imprudent - I shall not forget it - but if there is anything to be laid against him it must be proved and then he will be off at a tangent - well, said G-, but he shall be watched - I thanked G- said I should be much obliged to him to keep a sharp look-out, and only advised him to do it as quietly as possible - Perhaps G- had some interest in being for BH-? I shall ponder these things - I am more and more persuaded that the choice of N- was right G- said at last, he had no doubt, he could get a licence - no! no! the house will be licensed - I told G- if he meant to set it up, he had better say nothing and go and consult Gunter in London as to the manner of setting out tables etc G- having said he had seen as much of this sort of thing as Carr, and could buy in horses as well, but did not so well understand coaching - Having G- Wheatley and Husband for 3 or 4 minutes and writing the whole so far of today took me till 2 5 - then counting over the money to take to the bank A- in bad humour about something and copying old parchments again so I kept aloof A- off on her pony to Cliff hill at 3 - I wrote and sent John off immediately with note to ‘Messrs. Rawson, Bankers, Halifax’ enclosing to Mr R- fifty pounds in Bank of England ‘on account of the new museum, making the amount of her subscription paid on that account £150’ - a little while talking to Marian and then at 3 ½ off to Halifax down the old bank to the Yorkshire District bank - asked what they would charge upon remitting £100 to London - answer 5/. i.e. 1/4p.c. their usual mode of doing business - to those who have an account with them they give and take 4p.c. and charge ¼ p.c. on all on business done - all bills paid whether in London or elsewhere but that ¼ p.c. includes postage and everything - said I had found fault at another bank with the charge of ¼ p.c. on remittances to London - I would consider about it - walked off up the street round into Waterhouse street - doubted when opposite the Join stock whether to see what I could do with Mr Carr - then remembered Marian’s telling me her friend was one of the managers to whom all my concerns must be known - turned back to the Yorkshire District bank - asked to be shewn into their private room and opened an account with them leaving £1800 in Bank of England 20s.10.and 5s. and gave Mr. Rawson’s £5 for an order for £4.10.0 payable to ‘George Buckle Esquire’ (on a sheet of letter paper - in payment of his bill for the copies of wills for A- received this morning per parcel) - returned up the old bank by Whiskam road to where Robert S- and his man Joseph Sharpe were gas-tarring the railing that parts off the new field road - left orders for all the gas-tarring to be done and the railing between Carr and my father to be done over again (i.e. 2nd time) and then if any time to spare during my absence Park-farm wood the little seedling oaks to have the grass cut from around them for 4 or 5 inches breadth and hedges to be cleaned - passed Walker pit - nobody there- sometime in Conery wood - saw A- returned about 5 ¼ - Mark Town came to me in the approach road - I see he would be glad to take the purchase of the cottage himself and said if George N-‘s farm was to sell Mr Ackroyd’s manager Mr Ingham would advance him (Mark) money to pay for it with - told him to make up

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his mind to leave things as already agreed upon - I would take the cottage and do what he wanted he remembering his own proposal to pay me 1/. in the pound on all laid out - I wanted no better agreement - Had Charles H- also in the approach road - told him to saw up and set double railing round Mytholm dam, and to guard the trees in the Wheat field and in George R-‘s upper daisy bank, and enlarge 2 or 3 of the guards in Carr’s Shibden Land but 1st to get the Spiggs Loose shuttle done, and his work should be examined and reckoned upon on my return - told him to put up notice against hunters and trespassers in such places and as many as he thought would be best and enough, the printed notices being left with my aunt - paid Charles H- and Robert Schofield up tonight, and gave the latter £2 on a/c of walling done along the ft. of Bairstow - Dinner at 6 ½ - coffee - A- went upstairs I to my father and Marian for ¼ hour - said A- had a headache - It was bad humour did not like sometimes going from home with me and sometimes not very different from what she expected I could not at first guess what she meant on explanation after coming up from my father she did not like my not taking her to Richmond Park but leaving her to call on or rather spend the day with Mrs Plowes I explained affectionately and calmly she cried and said she knew I should think it nothing and only turn it against her as I had done two or three times before she thought the sooner we parted the better I said my greatest and first wish was her happiness if I could not make her happy I only hoped someone else might succeed better etc etc very kind and affectionate said were I in her place I should not like being taken as it were to be looked [at] I thought it bad taste but it should be as she liked oh no but she had expected very different something led to my recalling my expression about old Mrs Saltmarshe that perhaps it might be in her power to introduce Catherine Rawson then said A- you should not not have claimed powers you did not possess I reminded her of my saying I hoped to succeed but if I could not my failure would be better than many people’s success but if left to do my own way I did not despair - she by and by came round kissed me etc. I took all well but thinking to myself there is danger in the first mention the first thought that it is possible for us to part time will shew I shall try to be prepared for whatever may happen 25 minutes with my aunt till 10 20 - very fine day F69° at 10 20 pm

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pamphletstoinspire · 6 years ago

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Is Religion Responsible for the Most Wars and Deaths in History?

"Religion has been the cause of the most wars." Have you ever heard this line?

George Carlin once said to rapturous applause, “More people have been killed in the name of God than for any other reason.” Is he right?

This is one of history's greatest misconceptions. Nevertheless, it's held as an historical fact - even Gospel!

"When I hear someone state that religion has caused most wars," Rabbi Alan Lurie said in a Huffington Post article, "I will often ask the person to name these wars. The response is typically, 'Come on! The Crusades, The Inquisition, Northern Ireland, the Middle East, 9/11. Need I name more?'"

How would you respond to this? That's a lot of wars, come to think of it. Right? Not really. That's just where the magician wants us to look.

What about the Crusades, the Inquisition, etc.?

An objective look at history shows a very different picture. Wars in the name of religion have been only a tiny fraction of the history of warfare.

Charles Phillips and Alan Axelrod in their 3-volume Encyclopedia of Wars identify 1,763 separate wars as forming the entire history of recorded warfare.[1] Of these, only 123 were classified has having a religious cause. That's not much at all.

That's only 7% of all wars in recorded history! 7% isn't even close to a majority. In fact, you know what that's called? A minority.

Aren't the Wars of Religion the bloodiest of all wars?

That 7% of wars represents the bloodiest of all wars, right? The ones with the highest body counts, right? Let's see ...

Here are the bloodiest wars in history:

World War II (1939-1945) - 70-118 million people died

Mongol Conquests (13th century) - 60-70 million, according to legend around one million Chinese people committed mass suicide just to avoid the Mongolian conquest

World War I (1914-1918) - 40 million

Three Kingdoms (184-280 AD) - 30-40 million, the division of China into the Kingdoms of Wei, Shu, and Wu, following the end of the Han dynasty and the Yellow Turban Rebellion, a Taoist uprising

The Manchu Conquest of China (17th century) - 25 million

None of these were religious wars.

What do you think was the bloodiest "religious" war in history? The Crusades, right?

No. The first one on the list that could be construed as "religious" was the Taiping Rebellion.

An estimated 20-30 million died in this Chinese uprising. The uprising was led by Hong Xiuquan, who called himself the Son of God and the brother of Jesus. Hong sought to convert the Chinese people to his religious movement, The God Worshiping Society. Ultimately, the goal of the Taipings was the overthrow of the Manchu dynasty.

It is difficult to classify the Taiping Rebellion as a religious conflict, much less a Christian one. Hong's appeal was not his Christian message, but his economic one. He advocated an early version of communism, which, as we know, would eventually take root in China.

So in the history of warfare, what percent of people who died in religious conflicts?

Less than 2 percent of all people killed in warfare. While, for example, it is estimated that approximately one to three million people were tragically killed in the Crusades, and perhaps 3,000 in the Inquisition, nearly 35 million soldiers and civilians died in the senseless, and secular, slaughter of World War 1 alone.

Where do the Crusades rank among the deadliest wars in history?

Top ten, right? Nope.

According to this list of the top 100 wars and armed conflicts with highest estimated death tolls, the Crusades rank at No. 24.

Also, remember, the Crusades were a defensive maneuver against the ongoing Muslim conquest of Europe:

Bloodiest Christian conflict in history?

The Reconquista. This was the nearly 800-year period of Spanish history following the Muslim conquest of Spain and Portugal, the Iberian Peninsula. Like the Crusades above, this was a defensive effort.

The Reconquista was, more of less, the precipitating event which led to the ...

The Spanish Inquisition killed millions, right?

How bloody was the Inquisition?

There are some wild claims about the Inquisition floating around. One such claim is that 95 million people died during the Inquisition. If this were true, virtually the entire population of Europe would have been wiped out. The Black Plague killed only 25 million, for example.

In fact, it is estimated that only 6,000-8,000 people were executed during the 350 years of the Inquisition. Not the Spanish Inquisition alone, but the entire Inquisition throughout all of Europe.

According to Professor Agostino Borromeo, a historian at Sapienza University in Rome, only 1% of the 125,000 people tried by church tribunals as suspected heretics in Spain were actually executed.

Many of the thousands of executions conventionally attributed to the Church were in fact carried out by non-church tribunals.

Edward Peters, professor at the University of Pennsylvania and author of Inquisition, states the following: “The best estimate is that around 3,000 death sentences were carried out in Spain by Inquisitorial verdict between 1550 and 1800, a far smaller number than that in comparable secular courts.”[2]

Henry Kamen, a fellow of the Royal Historical Society and professor at the University of Wisconsin Madison, wrote the following: [3]

Taking into account all the tribunals of Spain up to about 1530, it is unlikely that more than two thousand people were executed for heresy by the Inquisition. [...]

It is clear that for most of its existence that Inquisition was far from being a juggernaut of death either in intention or in capability. [...] It would seem that during the 16th and 17th centuries fewer than three people a year were executed in the whole of the Spanish monarchy from Sicily to Peru, certainly a lower rate than in any provincial court of justice in Spain or anywhere else in Europe.

No matter the death toll, the Inquisition is still a black mark on the Church

Don't get me wrong, this was not a proud moment in the history of the Church. It's a black mark, for sure. Pope John Paul II publicly apologized for the Inquisition in 2000.

Summary: Is Religion the cause of the most wars?

No, absolutely not. Religion has been the cause of 7% of all wars, accounting for 2% of the deaths caused by war. The same cannot be said of atheist communist or nationalist governments in just the last century.

Even so, the Crusades and the Reconquista were both the result of Muslim aggression.

Can it be said that Christianity is a Religion of Peace?

Absolutely. Islam, not so much. This begs the question, then. Is it even fair to lump Christianity in with Islam when accounting for the bloodiest wars in history?

There is one glaring omission in all this discussion of warfare: Jihad.

Total Death Toll of Muslim Jihad

Professor Bill Warner, author of several books on Islam, estimates the total number killed in Muslim jihad to be 270 million. Warner is a somewhat controversial figure, however. In today's political climate, it is difficult to find sources providing the historical death toll of Islamic Jihad. Post 9/11, we find many forcing a narrative of Islam being essentially peaceful in nature.

Nevertheless, here are some more sources on the topic of Jihad, including Robert Spencer's and Raymond Ibrahim's new books on the subject:

Footnotes: [1] Charles Phillips, Alan Axelrod, editors, Encyclopedia of Wars (2004), New York, NY [2] Edward Peters, Inquisition (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), p. 87 [3] Henry Kamen, The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), pages 60, 203.

BY: SCOTT SMITH

From: www.pamphletstoinspire.com

#is religion responsible for the most wars and deaths in history

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massielandnetwork · 3 years ago

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Thriving in an Economic Bubble during Anarchy

15. The Christian Succession – Navigating Chaos without a Compass except God

Executive Summary:

Crossing the Atlantic in the 15th century was done without the aid of a compass so boat captains dragged a rope off the stern to guide them in a straight line while navigating/ setting their course by the stars at night. In effect, they measured their direction by checking progress from where they had been. That is also the benefit of understanding history and why Marxists destroy historical landmarks a society uses to measure their direction and progress. It creates chaos.

As those in public office today destroy our historical markers, attempt to force Americans to behave in a manner opposite to their desire, and treat Americans with contempt, confusion is leading to chaos. Is the accelerant in this volatile mix a fraudulent election that put in elective office folks who do not reflect the desires, hopes and dreams of the majority? College football stadiums across the country the last two Saturdays have displayed in dramatic fashion a disconnect which will get worse until it is resolved. We may see a constitutional crisis.

Meanwhile, the China Evergrande situation deteriorates. A Bloomberg article stated that in addition to the $300 Billion in Bonds, Evergrande also owes approximately $147 Billion to suppliers and trades PLUS 1.5 million home buyers their deposits. Evergrande has an estimated 200,000 employees but the ripple effects will impact an estimated additional 3 million jobs with suppliers, etc. The article also estimated that Evergrande would have an impact equivalent 10 Lehman Brothers. The ripple effects will hit the USA. Cinch up your saddle.

Background:

An email from my Republican Party County Committee informed me that early voting starts September 17 and urged me to vote early because last November folks that waited to vote on election day were often told that they had already voted. Do you think that just happened to Republican voters? Vote fraud here in Virginia? Yep.

After four years of unrelenting abuse and disruption did the DMs underestimate the number of fraudulent votes needed to steal the election from Trump forcing an error when they had to scurry to complete their plan? Something resulted in perhaps 10,000 affidavits signed by Americans of both parties, genders, and races who were appalled at the fraud they saw.

That exposure led to a series of events which will begin to bear fruit with the report on the Arizona Senate’s audit of Maricopa County. A separate canvass in Arizona has already determined that approximately 300,000 fraudulent votes were counted. I believe seven states have now announced their intent to audit the 2020 election. A petition is being circulated by Arizona State Senator Wendy Rodgers to DE-Certify the Arizona election.

Viewed from the perspective that a thread of logic exists, the last five years were the crescendo of at least a fifteen-year effort of events designed to set the stage for November 2020. Fifteen years of abuse capped with nonsensical “mandates” by the current administration has led Americans to display amazing disrespect for Biden. The first Saturday of college football I saw three streaming videos of college stadiums “saluting” Biden. This past weekend I counted videos of eight stadiums “saluting” Biden capping a week of some amazing similar events.

The disconnect between American “leaders” and the average American citizen is approaching a truly dangerous level. Equally fascinating is the fact that the DMs in Congress continue to pursue legislation that is out of step with the desires of the Average American as they champion “the largest tax increase in history” as an accomplishment along with CRT aka racial hatred.

Add to the toxic mix the discontent with Biden’s retreat from Afghanistan which:

1. Armed muslim terrorists with $85 BILLION Dollars of our military equipment (described by Victor Hanson as the financial equivalent of 7 new nuclear powered aircraft carriers);

2. Both showed China, Iran, North Korea, and the other evil actors in the globe that the USA is in retreat and our allies that we are undependable.

3. Abandoned American citizens leaving their recovery from Afghanistan to private citizens thus demonstrating Biden’s complete disregard for them.

4. Showed our military leaders supported this absolute disaster, no resignations nor firings.

Economic Forecast:

The major event you need to watch is Evergrande. One analyst estimated the impact of the coming Evergrande default to be the equivalent of 10 Lehman Brothers. It is the ripple effects, the ripple effects, the ripple effects! Similar to the early days of Lehman Bros, no one is asking “What will be the ripple effects of Evergrande?”. The American stock markets have ignored it so far.

In the last week, there are three other items buried in the news are enormously significant:

1. The Dallas Fed President, Robert Kaplan, announced that he would be selling his stock in 27 companies valued at over $1M each and putting the funds into cash and/or a managed stock fund to “address criticism he has received”. But consider this – a member of the very small group of folks in the country with the most control over our economy is moving his money out of the stock market into cash, in whole or part.

2. In another report The Fed is interested in replacing our paper currency with digital currency because it will enable them to employ negative interest rates more effectively.

3. Meanwhile, reports from China suggest internal turmoil including a possible “purge” of the CCP which may be President Xi eliminating opponents. Xi’s threats against Taiwan include the frequent invasion of Taiwan’s air space by as many as 19 planes including bombers. Practice runs? Economic turmoil?

Both the Reagan and Trump administrations proved that slashing taxes, decreasing the size of government, and providing tax incentives to build the American manufacturing economy made us more secure while increasing the size of the American economic pie allowing more assistance to those who need it. America prospered under the hand of God because our country enjoyed the combination of Christianity, capitalism, and democracy.

In contrast, Biden and the DMs have us on a path to Marxism which fails because it everyone is a victim and so the pie needs to be redivided. That is a self-destructive exercise that decreases the size of the economic pie. Everyone loses except the “Elites”.

Add to that the increased risk of China’s economy experiencing a financial panic and devaluing its currency as a ripple effect of the Evergrande collapse. The Fed would either delay tapering their Quantitative Easing (QE) and would have to increase QE which will devalue the Dollar leading to higher inflation and creating a downward spiral of our economy. Our economic decline will be worsened by Biden having made us dependent on OPEC for oil, forcing us to more expensive and less reliable “Green Energy”, an unsupportable increase in our national debt plus dramatically raising taxes. That combination is known as “Stagflation”. Get ready for UGLY.

Pray that our Lord and Savior raises up and protects the Patriots that demand forensic audits of the 2020 election in every state. Honest elections are the fulcrum of our American experiment. It is not vengeance to demand honesty and that everyone play by the same laws. Men make plans, but God ALWAYS wins. Every portfolio should contain some cash and a great piece of land remains The Best investment long term.

“For I consider the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.”

(Romans 8: 18) New Revised Standard Version, Oxford University Press)

Stay healthy,

Ned

September 15, 2021

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kristinsimmons · 6 years ago

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Obsessive Measurement Disorder: Etiology of an Epidemic

By KIP SULLIVAN JD

Review of The Tyranny of Metrics by Jerry Z. Muller, Princeton University Press, 2018

In the introduction to The Tyranny of Metrics, Jerry Muller urges readers to type “metrics” into Google’s Ngram, a program that searches through books and other material published over the last five centuries. He tells us we will find that the use of “metrics” soared after approximately 1985. I followed his instructions and confirmed his conclusion (see graph below). We see the same pattern for two other buzzwords that activate Muller’s BS antennae – “benchmarks,” and “performance indicators.” [1]

Muller’s purpose in asking us to perform this little exercise is to set the stage for his sweeping review of the history of “metric fixation,” which he defines as an irresistible “aspiration to replace judgment based on personal experience with standardized measurement.” (p. 6) His book takes a long view – he takes us back to the turn of the last century – and a wide view – he examines the destructive impact of the measurement craze on the medical profession, schools and colleges, police departments, the armed forces, banks, businesses, charities, and foreign aid offices.

Foreign aid? Yes, even that profession. According to a long-time expert in that field, employees of government foreign aid agencies have “become infected with a very bad case of Obsessive Measurement Disorder, an intellectual dysfunction rooted in the notion that counting everything in government programs will produce better policy choices and improved management.” (p. 155)

Muller, a professor of history at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC, makes it clear at the outset that measurement itself is not the problem. Measurement is helpful in developing hypotheses for further investigation, and it is essential in improving anything that is complex or requires discipline. The object of Muller’s criticism is the rampant use of crude measures of efficiency (cost and quality) to dish out rewards and punishment – bonuses and financial penalties, promotion or demotion, or greater or less market share. Measurement can be crude because it fails to adjust scores for factors outside the subject’s control, and because it measures only actions that are relatively easy to measure and ignores valuable but less visible behaviors (such as creative thinking and mentoring). The use of inaccurate measurement is not just a waste of money; it invites undesirable behavior in both the measurers and the “measurees.” The measurers receive misleading information and therefore make less effective decisions (for example, “body count” totals tell them the war in Viet Nam is going well), and the subjects of measurement game the measurements (teachers “teach to the test” and surgeons refuse to perform surgery on sicker patients who would have benefited from surgery).

What puzzles Muller, and what motivated him to write this book, is why faith in the inappropriate use of measurement persists in the face of overwhelming evidence that it doesn’t work and has toxic consequences to boot. This mulish persistence in promoting measurement that doesn’t work and often causes harm (including driving good teachers and doctors out of their professions) justifies Muller’s harsh characterization of measurement mavens with phrases like “obsession,” “fixation,” and “cult.” “[A]lthough there is a large body of scholarship in the fields of psychology and economics that call into question the premises and effectiveness of pay for measured performance, that literature seems to have done little to halt the spread of metric fixation,” he writes. “That is why I wrote this book.” (p. 13)

A short history of Obsession Measurement Disorder in medicine

I read Muller’s book because I share his astonishment at the persistence of the measurement craze in the face of so much evidence that it is not working. Over the three decades that I have studied health policy, I have become increasingly baffled by people who promote various iterations of managed care in the face of evidence that they don’t work. In search of an explanation, I have, as Muller has, read books and news stories about the misuse of measurement in other fields, particularly education and banking. I have been especially baffled by the managed care movement’s enthusiasm for measuring the cost and quality of all actors in the health care system, an enthusiasm that emerged in the late 1980s when it was obvious that the propagation of HMOs, the movement’s founding project, was failing to control inflation. [2]

By the 1990s the enthusiasm for documents that handed out grades to insurance companies and providers on “consumer satisfaction,” mortality rates, etc. had become an obsession. Proponents of “report cards,” as these documents were called, hoped that “consumers” would read them and reward the good actors with their business and punish the bad actors by leaving them. That, of course, did not happen.

Frustrated by consumer disinterest in report cards, managed care proponents, such as the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) and the Institute of Medicine (IOM), declared in the early 2000s that it was time to punish doctors and hospitals directly by rewarding them if they got good grades on crude measurements and punishing them if they didn’t. The term they used to describe this direct method of punishment was “pay for performance,” a phrase borrowed from the business world. By about 2004, that phrase had become so common in the health policy literature it was shortened to “P4P.”

The complete absence of evidence that P4P would improve the quality of medical care didn’t matter to MedPAC and other P4P advocates. [3] As evidence has piled up over the last decade indicating P4P doesn’t reduce costs and has mixed effects on quality, P4P proponents, true to form, have ignored it. [4]

Taylorism: Ground zero of the epidemic

It is impossible to identify a single Typhoid Mary responsible for the metrics-fixation epidemic, but it is fair to say a very important Typhoid Mary was Frederick Winslow Taylor. Muller identifies the rise of “Taylorism” in manufacturing in the early 1900s as a primary cause of the epidemic. Taylor, an American engineer, studied every action of workers in pig iron factories, estimated the average time of each action, then proposed to pay slower workers less and faster workers more. According to Taylor, determining who was slow and who was fast and paying accordingly required “an elaborate system for monitoring and controlling the workplace,” as Muller puts it. (p. 32) Taylor called his measurement-and-control system “scientific management.”

“Scientific management” assumed that managers with clipboards could distill the wisdom of their work force into a set of rules (later called “best practices,” another buzzword catapulted to stardom in the 1990s) and enforce those rules with pay-for-performance. The outcome of “scientific management,” according to Taylor, was that “all of the planning which under the old system was done by the workmen, must of necessity under the new system be done by management in accordance with the law of science.” (Muller, pp. 32-33) Here we see the beginning of the double standard now prevalent in health policy: People who flog faith-based P4P schemes hold themselves out as the bearers of “scientific” values (“evidence-based medicine,” to use the lingo invented in the early 1990s), while doctors who criticize metrics madness are said to be stuck in a “paternalistic culture.” [5]

The obvious corollary to “scientific management” was that leaders of corporations didn’t need any hands-on experience or training in the production of whatever it was their corporation produced. If you had a degree from a business school that taught “scientific management,” it shouldn’t matter to Sunbeam, for example, that “Chainsaw” Al Dunlap had no knowledge of how appliances are made. As long as he knew “management,” he was qualified to be Sunbeam’s CEO. Decades after Taylorism arose, this same logic would justify allowing managers of insurance company executives, Fortune 500 companies, and government insurance programs who never went to medical school to measure and micromanage doctors.

By the 1950s, this notion that standardized data in the hands of managers trumped experience had become deeply embedded in American business culture. By the 1960s, reports Muller, it had spread to the US military (Robert MacNamara’s background in accounting got him a job running a car company, and from there he jumped to the Pentagon where he and his “whiz kids” told the generals to count enemy corpses). By the 1980s it had infected other government agencies and much of the non-profit world, and by the late 1990s it had infected the services sector, including medicine.

Measuring the doctor and patient from afar

“Nowhere are metrics in greater vogue than in the field of medicine,” writes Muller. (p 103) The following statement by report-card and P4P guru Michael Porter, which Muller took from an article Porter co-authored for the Harvard Business Review, is a good illustration of how P4P proponents think and talk.

Rapid improvement in any field requires measuring results – a familiar principle in management…. Indeed, rigorous measurement of value (outcomes and costs) is perhaps the single most important step in improving health care. Wherever we see systematic measurement of results in health care … we see those results improve. [p. 107]

From this excerpt plus other sections of the Harvard Business Review article, we learn that Porter is absolutely convinced it’s possible to measure “outcomes and costs” accurately, and then divide cost into quality to derive “value.”

Note first the voice-of-God tone. God doesn’t have to document anything, and neither does Porter; there are no footnotes in this lengthy essay. Note next the grand assumption that improvement is only possible if “results” are measured. How do we know this? We just do. It’s a “principle of management,” says Porter (no doubt going all the way back to Frederick Taylor). Third, note the misrepresentation of the evidence. It simply isn’t true that “wherever” managers conduct “systematic measurement” of “performance” by doctors and hospitals, costs go down and/or quality goes up.

Muller compares the groupthink represented by Porter with research on both report cards and P4P schemes. The small body of research on report cards finds they have no impact on “consumer” behavior or patient outcomes. The large body of research on P4P indicates it may be raising costs when the costs providers incur to improve “performance” is taken into account, and it has at best a mixed effect on measured quality.

Muller suggests that the net effect of P4P on the health of all patients, that is, those whose care is measured and those whose care is not measured, is negative. Sicker patients are the ones most at risk in a system where P4P is rampant. Because the measures of cost and quality upon which P4P schemes are based are so inaccurate (because scores cannot be adjusted with anything resembling accuracy to reflect factors outside provider control), it induces a variety of “gaming” strategies, the worst of which are avoiding sicker patients and shifting resources away from patients whose care is not measured to those whose care is measured (“treating to the test”).

To illustrate how P4P damages sicker patients, Muller devotes two pages to the damage done by Medicare’s Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program (HRRP). This program, which began in 2012, punishes hospitals that have an above-average rate of 30-day readmissions (admissions that occur within 30 days of a discharge from a hospital) for patients with a half-dozen diagnoses. Muller reports that the HRRP has clearly had two negative effects. First, it has incentivized hospitals to keep sick patients away for at least 30 days after discharge, and if that’s not possible, to let them in but to put them on “observation” status, which means they are not counted as “readmitted.” [6] Second, it has led to the punishment of hospitals that treat sicker and poorer patients.

When Muller publishes a second edition of this book, he’ll no doubt add a page describing research done since his book was published showing that the HRRP appears to be killing patients with congestive heart failure (CHF). CHF was one of the three diagnoses that has been measured by the HRRP since it began (readmissions for heart attack and pneumonia were the other two).

Reversing the epidemic

Muller ends his book with a series of recommendations. He suggests, for example, that measures be developed from the bottom up and that financial rewards and penalties should be kept low if they are to be used at all. He does not attempt to offer political solutions. For this I do not criticize him. His book, which must have required years of research, is a valuable contribution to the largely one-sided debate about P4P in medicine, a debate which has only recently become more audible.

Here are my two cents on the politics of this issue. Groups representing doctors and nurses must take the lead in rolling back measurement mania. Doctors and nurses have great credibility with the public, and they have to cope every day with the consequences of measurement mania. They should focus on rolling back the P4P schemes now inflicted on the fee-for-service Medicare program because Medicare is so influential (“reforms” inflicted by Congress on Medicare are typically mimicked by the insurance industry). Groups working to reduce the cost of health care or improve quality of care for patients should also join the fight. They too have an interest in undermining the tyranny of metrics.

Of course, it would be nice if those who make a living promoting the inappropriate use of measurement would practice what they preach and examine their own behavior to see how it could be improved. Here’s a question that people in that business might pose to themselves now and then: Would you like your work to be subjected to measurement of its cost and quality by third parties, and would you like those third parties to alter your income based on the grades they decide to give you?

Footnotes:

[1] Just to test NGram, I entered other terms. “Automobile,” for example, rises up from zero mentions just before 1900 to a peak during about 1938-1942, then declines rapidly so that the rate by 2000 (the last year on the graph) is equal to the rate of 1910. “Database,” on the other hand, stays at zero mentions until about 1970, then skyrockets in the late 1970s.

[2] Accurate measurement of the cost and quality of insurance companies and providers was an essential element of “managed competition,” a proposal introduced in 1989 by Alaine Enthoven and enthusiastically promoted by Paul Ellwood (the “father of the HMO”), insurance industry executives, Bill and Hillary Clinton, and the editors of the New York Times, to name just a few of Enthoven’s most influential disciples.

[3] A 2006 edition of Medical Care Research and Review devoted entirely to the emerging P4P fad stated, “P4P programs are being implemented in a near-scientific vacuum.”

[4] We are seeing rare exceptions to the P4P groupthink only in the last two or three years. In January 2018, MedPAC formally voted to reverse its decision to recommend P4P at the individual physician level. Donald Berwick, a leading proponent of measurement, announced in 2016 that it was time to reduce the reporting burden on doctors by 50 to 75 percent and to eliminate P4P at the individual level.

[5] The IOM, for example, has peddled measurement and control of providers for decades on the basis of no evidence, yet it maintains a “roundtable” of P4P disciples the IOM deems to be “science-driven.”

[6] “Observation stays” were designed for Medicare beneficiaries who were not clearly in need of inpatient care but who were not clearly ready to go home either. Such patients are typically placed on the same wards with admitted patients but not treated.

Kip Sullivan is a member of the Health Care for All MN advisory board, and of MN Physicians for a National Health Program.

Obsessive Measurement Disorder: Etiology of an Epidemic published first on https://wittooth.tumblr.com/

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The Heartbreak And Confusion Of A 19-Year Missing Child Case

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The Heartbreak And Confusion Of A 19-Year Missing Child Case

As if losing a child to kidnapping wasn’t horrifying enough, ineffective law enforcement agencies and predatory private investigators only add to the confusion and pain. Deana Hebert’s long, maddening search for her daughter — and the ex-husband who took her — may be the rule, not the exception.

We’re sitting in a rented Kia minivan, watching a house. We’ve been at it for hours, just staring, and nothing has happened. No one has come in or out, nobody has even walked by. It’s amazing how little can transpire on a sunny Sunday in January on a suburban cul-de-sac in San Bernardino County, California. When the rare car turns down the street, I hold my breath before it inevitably turns into a neighboring driveway.

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Private investigator Monique Lessan in her home office Photograph by Chris Tuite for BuzzFeed

I’m sitting alongside Monique Lessan, a private investigator hired to find Bianca Lozano, a 21-year-old woman who was abducted by her father, Juan Lozano, 19 years ago. The house we’ve been ogling is an otherwise unremarkable, well-tended beige two-story in a neighborhood of similar-looking dwellings in Fontana, a parched, charmless city 50 miles east of Los Angeles. It belongs to Juan’s cousin “Pablo” (his name has been changed to maintain the integrity of the investigation), whose identity Lozano has been using for years as he’s eluded detection, living in Mexico with Bianca. Lessan’s theory — or one of her many theories — is that Juan and/or Bianca could be in the house today. As she told me yesterday, “It’s my feeling these two have crossed the border and are back in the U.S.”

At the moment, though, there’s no sign of anyone. Three cars are parked in front and Lessan has jotted down the corresponding license plate numbers, but none have moved in the three hours since we got here. We’re in the backseat, partially obscured by the tinted windows — “If we sit in front, it looks suspicious,” Lessan says — studying photos of Lozano and Bianca so we’ll be able to recognize them should we spot them.

That’s all Lessan is hoping for today. She’s considered simply knocking on the door, but ultimately decided doing so could “burn” her — if Lozano isn’t there, Pablo might tip him off, and then Lozano would go even deeper underground.

Lessan has been a licensed investigator for 21 years but hardly fits the traditional gumshoe profile. She’s a woman in a field dominated by men and has never worked in law enforcement or the military. From the minute I meet her, she’s warm and chatty. She’s slender, with long black hair, and today is wearing a black T-shirt, tight jeans, and sunglasses. Her words tend to tumble out in a stream-of-consciousness rush, and she’s prone to darting from subject to subject. Often these digressions slingshot the conversation back to Lessan’s favorite subjects: She hosts a weekly internet radio show devoted to discussing UFO sightings, the Illuminati, weather modification, and the like. On the ride out to Fontana, she casually, almost dismissively, explained how a small group of families, including the Rothschilds, the Clintons, the Bushes, and the Windsors, run the world, and that Dwight Eisenhower shook hands with aliens in 1954.

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Deana and Bianca Courtesy of Deana Hebert

Lessan has been working on this case since August 2013, and she represents something of a Hail Mary in this nearly two-decade-long search. Bianca’s mother, Deana Hebert, whose Twitter handle is @missingbianca, has exhausted all of her resources and enlisted anyone and everyone she can — the police, the FBI, the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security, the DA’s office, the Mexican Consulate, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, her congressman, multiple private investigators, several lawyers, family members, friends, volunteers — to look for her daughter. That they’ve all failed says as much about the slapdash, numbingly bureaucratic — if well-intentioned — system we have in this country for finding long-term missing children as it does about anything else. As Hebert put it, “Nobody wants to be responsible for anything in this case. Nobody wants to be in charge. It’s just me pushing and pushing.”

If you were a parent whose daughter was abducted, how much would you pay for her safe return? Even the most well-meaning PIs must navigate the murky moral quandary of what is appropriate to charge a desperate parent to deliver the very thing in the universe they hold most dear. A friend of Hebert’s paid to hire Lessan — the third PI who’s been on the case — and right now this house in Fontana is her only viable lead. If we see either Lozano or Bianca today, the plan is to call Hebert so she can fly out from Texas to meet the fully grown woman she hasn’t seen since she was her 20-month-old toddler, and to contact Lessan’s friend who works as an investigator for Homeland Security, who could arrest Lozano.

As morning turns to afternoon, Lessan’s getting antsy. She begins to consider going against her original instinct and knocking on that front door — there’s a yearning to do something, anything, to make the time spent feel like it wasn’t a total waste. Just as she’s on the verge of going to the door and potentially ruining six months of investigation, she catches a break: Girl Scouts. Walking down the street are two young girls and a mother, pulling a wagon behind them, going door to door selling cookies.

We duck down in the van’s backseat as the Girl Scouts pass by. They ring Pablo’s doorbell, wait, then begin to walk away, when the door opens. A little girl, about 6 or 7 years old, stands in the doorway. Soon after, a woman who looks to be her mother comes out. Then a third woman emerges, and walks out onto the driveway to inspect the wagon. The third woman has dyed, red-tinged hair and looks to be in her late teens or early twenties.

Lessan crawls toward the front of the minivan and snaps photos of the unfolding scene. From our vantage point, about 20 yards away, this third woman bears a resemblance to some of the photos of Bianca that have been found over the years on various social networking sites.

“Could that be her?” I ask Lessan.

“I don’t know,” she says. “Maybe.”

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Images of Bianca, including two digital simulations by the National Center For Missing And Exploited Children Courtesy of Deana Hebert and the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children

Every year, 200,000 children in the United States are abducted by a family member. Or maybe it’s 350,000. Or 2,000. In truth, no one really knows. The last year a study was done by the Justice Department was 1999. It claimed an estimated 1.3 million kids went missing that year and that 203,900 of those were taken by a family member. Those stats have been regurgitated for 15 years, and while there are significant questions as to how accurate they were back then, they’re certainly next to useless a decade and a half later. (A Justice Department spokesperson says there is a new report in the works, but it’s not expected to be published for at least a year.)

The FBI tracks annual crime statistics and reported that in 2013, 462,567 children went missing. Of those, 2,310 were abducted by a noncustodial parent. This is a number that, according to FBI statistics, has remained relatively static going back to at least 2007. It’s also a number rendered mostly worthless by the methodology behind it: When missing persons reports are filed by law enforcement, specifying the cause of the disappearance is optional.

“Missing person entries are made primarily by the local law enforcement agency shortly after the missing person report is made,” Stephen Fischer Jr., chief of multimedia productions in the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division, explains in an email. “Having the correct name, date of birth and basic physical description is the primary concern. While the circumstances surrounding the incident will be collected as the investigation moves forward, the missing person entry will often not reflect this data.”

This partially accounts for the enormous discrepancy between the FBI’s count and the Justice Department’s 1999 research. Still, nearly half those 2013 missing child reports did specify a cause, so following that logic, the number of children abducted by a family member each year falls somewhere between 4,620 and 203,900. Maybe. Robert L. Snow, a retired captain with the Indianapolis police who has written multiple books about kidnapping, thinks even the DOJ’s study undercounts parental abductions.

“People don’t realize that a lot of abductions, particularly family abductions, are never reported,” he says. “People don’t want to air their dirty laundry. I have found research that says it could be as high as 350,000 parental abductions a year. … That’s why there’s so much apathy. No one realizes how big a problem this is.”

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Elizabeth Smart Getty Images

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Jaycee Dugard Carl Probyn / AP Photo

This is pretty much how it goes when it comes to missing children in America. Despite huge amounts of sensationalistic coverage lavished on a few rare cases — Elizabeth Smart, Jaycee Dugard, etc. — for the most part, hardly anyone is paying attention. This is especially true of parental abductions, which everyone agrees — terrible stat-keeping notwithstanding — are far more common than the classic “stranger-danger” kidnapping most parents live in mortal fear of. (The 1999 DOJ study counted a grand total of 115 of these so-called “stereotypical kidnappings” that year.)

According to Snow, most parental abductions tend to get resolved pretty quickly. In a percentage of these cases — again, who knows exactly what percentage — the parent is merely a few hours late returning with the child. In others, a call from the police or a lawyer threatening harsh consequences resolves the situation. Sometimes, the abductor has the intent to stay gone but no real plan, and authorities track him or her down in a matter of hours or days. It’s when days become weeks, months, and even years that whatever systems we have in place seem to break down completely.

When the abductor leaves the country, the situation grows even more complicated. The Hague Abduction Convention, a 1980 treaty that has been agreed to by 92 countries, including the U.S. and Mexico, sets guidelines for the return of children kidnapped across international borders, but, in reality, even many countries that have signed it don’t comply with it.

“When you go to a foreign country, an American warrant doesn’t mean much,” says Snow. “A lot of times you can’t get the local authorities to cooperate. A lot of countries are of the opinion that children are better off being raised in their country than in the United States. The U.S. can try to put pressure, but they don’t have much leverage. They’re not going to cut off aid or start a war over one child.”

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Courtesy of Deana Hebert

Deana Hebert was worried the minute her then-husband walked out the door with their daughter. The couple were in midst of an ugly divorce, and Lozano had arrived on a Friday in April in 1995 to pick up Bianca for the weekend. Hebert was living with her parents in a small house in Baytown, a Houston suburb, and their custody arrangement meant Bianca spent most of the time with her. Lozano had her on Wednesdays and every other weekend.

Hebert was born and raised in Baytown, and Lozano had moved there from Monterrey, Mexico, when he was a child. They were an odd couple: He was 6-foot-2 and 300 pounds; she was 5-foot-5, 100 pounds, and five years younger. These days, with all that’s happened, Hebert has trouble remembering what first drew them together. “I guess he made me laugh,” she says. They dated for about two years and married a month before Bianca was born, when Hebert was just 21. Lozano lost his job, leaving Hebert the family’s sole breadwinner. He grew moody and eventually abusive toward Hebert.

“He was so scary,” she says. “He’s like Jekyll and Hyde. He can be so sweet and then so extreme opposite. If I’d stayed I would’ve ended up dead.” She and Bianca moved into her parents’ house, and she filed for divorce.

Every time Lozano came to pick up Bianca, it was an ordeal. One Wednesday in January, Lozano got rough and dragged Hebert outside. She called the cops and filed charges for assault, but their custody arrangement remained unaltered.

That Friday in April, Hebert sensed something was wrong. With Lozano scheduled to appear in court for the assault, their already troubled relationship was near its lowest point. Although Lozano and Bianca weren’t due to return until Sunday evening, Hebert was on edge the whole weekend. When he didn’t show up at 6 p.m., as agreed to, she was sure they weren’t coming back. Her mother tried to reassure her.

“My mom goes, ‘You know how they run late. He’s playing games. He’s probably going to tell you he had to change her diaper.’” She sighs. “I said, ‘No. They’re gone.’ And I was right.”

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Photograph by Chris Tuite for BuzzFeed

It’s two days after the Fontana stakeout, and Lessan and I are driving, talking about the case — specifically why and how Bianca and Juan Lozano would be in the U.S. at the moment. Lessan had texted the photo of the red-haired woman outside the house to Hebert, who couldn’t say definitively whether it was her daughter or not but seemed inclined to think it wasn’t. Lessan suddenly gasps so loudly that I’m sure she’s stumbled upon a case-breaking revelation.

“Chemtrails!” she says, pointing out the front windshield.

She motions toward the lines of airplane exhaust crisscrossing the blue sky, and launches into a conspiracy-laced diatribe about their nefarious origins. Part of me wonders if her willingness to question conventional wisdom makes her a good detective — she says she first got the idea to start searching Southern California for Lozano after a psychic told her he was in Los Angeles. Then she found Lozano’s cousin in Fontana.

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Photograph by Chris Tuite for BuzzFeed

At the moment, we’re on our way to Burbank, where she has an appointment at a production company that’s looking to make a reality show about a private investigator who finds missing children. In a shockingly bright lime-green office, a producer shoots video of Lessan on his iPhone while asking questions like, “What’s your daily schedule like?” and “Do you carry a gun?”

The reality of Lessan’s daily routine involves phone calls, database searches, and sitting for hours on end in parked cars more than it does high-speed chases or knocking down doors. Her rate normally ranges from around $3,000 up front for a local abduction case to a minimum of $10,000 for an international one, not including expenses. As a case progresses, costs escalate. She tries to cut her rates as much as she can in order to accommodate a client’s financial situation but has to be careful not to get into a position where she can’t even cover her own costs.

“On this trip, I’m making very little money,” she tells me. “They don’t have any more to pay me.” But having come as far as she has, she wants to see it through. “I told them I have to do these last parts. I can’t quit now. I feel like I’m really getting somewhere, but I also feel like it’s just like water falling through my fingers.”

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Facebook: Nina-Suarez-seguimos-buscandote

Hebert made all the calls you’d expect her to in the hours and days after her daughter’s 1995 kidnapping. Lozano’s parents. Her lawyer. The police. The FBI. As the weeks turned to months and eventually years, a dizzying number of government agencies got involved: Besides the Baytown Police Department and the FBI, an incomplete list includes the U.S. Marshals Service, the Harris County district attorney’s office, the State Department, the Mexican Consulate, and the Department of Homeland Security.

“What I found is that the agencies don’t communicate with each other,” she says. “So any information I got, I’d make sure I sent it to the DA’s detective, Baytown police, FBI, the congressman’s office. I was the hub.”

Managing the investigation into her daughter’s abduction while simultaneously trying to mourn the loss was not ideal, but during the first year or two she was grateful in some ways to have something to do. For a while, she clung to the belief that the man she once married would eventually come to his senses and bring Bianca back. “I still remember feeling like, Oh, this is going to blow over,” she says.

It didn’t. Her divorce was finalized. After a year or so, the trail was cold. Soon, Hebert was out of money, out of ideas, and trying to figure out how to go on living when her main reason for doing so had been replaced by a giant, unfathomable void.

“I was so busy at first, involved in everything, and then all of a sudden everything just stopped,” she says. “I didn’t know how to grieve. I just put everything in a compartment in my head and kind of left it there.” But she eventually realized if she didn’t want to live out her days as the empty shell she felt like, she had to start filling them with something. “Being in my twenties and being single, it was hard when you’d meet somebody and they’d say, ‘Oh, do you have kids?’ Sometimes it was easier just to say no, because when you tell some people that your child was kidnapped, they say, ‘Oh, OK,’ and just go on with the conversation. Then some people freak out and start crying like you’ve dropped a bomb on them.”

Eventually she met someone else and got remarried in 1999. She had another child, a boy, two years later.

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Hebert with her son. Courtesy of Deana Hebert

“My son, he’s 12 now, but when he was 4, we decided to tell him he had a sister that was missing,” she says. “I remember our son saying, ‘Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?’” She laughs. “I’m thinking, You wanted me to tell you when you were 2?”

Through it all, Hebert kept searching, mostly on her own, for Bianca. She scoured the internet for any signs of her or Lozano. The month after Bianca disappeared, she had sued Lozano’s parents, who she believes have been helping him, and at one point won a $2.2 million judgment, though after several years and various appeals, a retrial was ordered and Hebert, her parents, and her attorney made the decision not to go forward. Years later, she tried to repair relations with his family in the hopes that they could facilitate Bianca’s return. Nothing worked.

“There’s two different parts of me,” she says. “There’s one part that’s Bianca’s mom, searching and doing all these things, and there’s the other part that goes on with life and tries to do normal things. But nothing has ever replaced her.”

In 2009, 14 years after Bianca’s initial disappearance, Hebert turned to her congressman, Pete Olson, for help, and met Kimberli Reed, who was Olson’s director of casework at the time. They forged an immediate bond: In 2002, Reed had had her own children literally snatched from her in a parking lot by her estranged husband. It took five months for her to track them down, and a year before she was granted full custody.

“I know what I went through for five measly months,” says Reed. “I have no idea what it would be like to go through this for all this time. It’s amazing she hasn’t gone insane.”

By the time Reed met Hebert, the investigation into Bianca’s whereabouts had deteriorated to the point where it could hardly even be called an investigation.

“It was dead,” says Reed. “There were probably seven or eight years in there that no one was doing anything, except for Deana. Baytown PD had totally written it off. Harris County district attorney’s office had washed its hands of it. The State Department had closed the case. There wasn’t a notice or a flag put into Homeland Security for Juan. Mexico knew nothing about the case.”

Reed took up the cause, and “for the next four years,” she says, “I literally spent every day searching for Bianca.” She tried to use her clout at the congressman’s office to knock heads together at various government agencies. In 2009, she helped convene a roundtable meeting that included representatives of the FBI, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Harris County DA, the Mexican Consulate, and the Mexican attorney general’s office, with a representative from the State Department conferenced in on the phone. She asked if anyone could contact and question Lozano’s family.

“All of them looked at Deana and me and said, ‘There’s nothing we can do,’” Reed recalls. The Mexican representatives told her they did not consider Lozano a criminal because Bianca is his daughter. The FBI said that its hands were tied because it had no jurisdiction in Mexico. The State Department staffer said it couldn’t do anything and made clear that once Bianca turned 18 and was no longer a missing child but a missing adult, the department wouldn’t work the case at all.

“Everyone kept saying, ‘We can’t do anything until we locate her, and we can’t locate her so we can’t do anything,’” says Reed. Even if it did manage to find Lozano, the Harris County DA wasn’t even sure if it would extradite him.

A warrant for Lozano’s arrest was eventually issued in the U.S., and a few years ago Interpol, which tracks fugitives across international borders, put him on a watch list. At one point, Hebert discovered that if she could pinpoint Lozano in Mexico, U.S. marshals were authorized to bring him back to the U.S. and arrest him. But the Marshals Office told her it wouldn’t, “because the original warrant was filed by the FBI, and the FBI and the U.S. Marshals Office [wouldn’t] work together,” Hebert tells me.

“There were certain detectives in certain agencies that have been very dedicated,” she continues. “Other times, I try to get in touch about something and don’t hear from them for months. I know they’re busy, they’re on other things, this is an old case, but it’s just frustrating. It would be nice to have one central agency that only worked on missing children’s cases.”

According to Snow, this is a key failing of the current system. “No one really takes responsibility for abducted children,” he says. “It’s a criminal offense, but there’s no specific agency meant to take these cases.” Even within the agencies that end up saddled with kidnapping cases, there’s a distinct lack of expertise. “In Indianapolis, we’ve got a huge police department, 1,500 officers,” says Snow. “We’ve got no abduction unit. Very few police departments have a unit specifically trained for this. It just goes to a general officer and he handles this like he handles other cases. So that officer has very little experience and training in it.”

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Photograph by Chris Tuite for BuzzFeed

The Department of Homeland Security’s San Diego office is in a modern downtown office building a few blocks from the Pacific Ocean. Lessan is there to meet with her friend, Maurice Wrighten, who works as an investigator in the cybercrimes division. Lessan has known him for 15 years, and he seems willing to help but isn’t certain exactly how. From a manila folder, she pulls out a copy of a Mexican ID card: It’s Lozano’s picture but Pablo’s name and information, and Lozano used it to get a job in Mexico a few years ago. She then pulls out two birth certificates. One is a copy of Bianca’s legitimate American one; the other is a Mexican one that Lessan has uncovered, with an alias, “Fabiola Suarez Elizondo,” a birth date of more than a year earlier, and Pablo listed as the father.

Wrighten studies the documents. One of the many complications of Bianca’s case is that although she was abducted as a child, she’s now 21. Technically, she’s an adult, making her own decisions. Since Bianca’s broken no laws herself, Wrighten can’t really investigate her.

Lozano is a different story. Wrighten says the identity fraud is a way in, but “if he’s using a fake Mexican ID in Mexico, that has nothing to do with us. He’s not breaking any U.S. laws.” As long as he’s in Mexico, he’s beyond the reach of Homeland Security. He looks again through the manila file.

“There might be a way I can do this, but I can’t tell you how right now,” he says. He promises to be back in touch. As Wrighten walks us to the door, Lessan thanks him and asks, almost pleadingly, “What do you think?”

He nods. “There’s hope.”

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The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children is the one entity that seems best positioned to step into the breach and bring order to all this chaos. Although the NCMEC is ostensibly an independent nonprofit, it gets considerable funding — $67 million in 2014 — from the federal government. Opinions on its effectiveness vary wildly. Reed says that the NCMEC is “completely inept.”

“All they do is run a website, create fliers, and that’s it,” she says. And when newer photos of Bianca were found, getting it to update the fliers proved an ordeal. “The entire time I was with the congressman’s office, they essentially did nothing. ‘She’s on our website,’ ‘We have flyers out there,’ was all they’d do.” (A recent check of Bianca Lozano’s profile on the NCMEC website had an updated photo, but in one spot it misstates the date of her disappearance by 17 years.)

On its website, the NCMEC claims to have helped recover over 199,000 children since its founding in 1984, with a recovery rate of 97%. When I spoke to Bob Lowery, vice president of the NCMEC’s Missing Children Division, he said the actual number now is closer to 98% or 99%. Some question these figures, noting that the NCMEC takes credit for “helping” to recover children in cases it had virtually no involvement in. In some cases, these children were never actually missing (merely reported so by a panicky parent), or were returned by a noncustodial parent within hours of being reported. Critics of the NCMEC say it overstates its usefulness to justify its federal funding, and in doing so distorts public perception about the nature of the problem.

When I spoke to Marc Klaas, who founded the KlaasKids Foundation to aid in the recovery of missing children after his own daughter, Polly, was abducted and murdered back in 1993, he launched, unprompted, into a bitter condemnation of the NCMEC.

“I’ve got a real beef with these characters,” he says. “They don’t really go in the field. They don’t really get involved in any except the high-profile cases. They’ve done more to harm the missing child — I don’t want to call it an industry, but missing child nonprofit organizations — than any other single entity out there. They work very hard to make sure every dollar involved in missing children goes directly to them. They don’t share any resources whatsoever, and I can tell you from personal experience they’ll go out of their way to undermine anybody that might threaten their position. … They’re just guys in the middle vacuuming up money. I loathe the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and think missing kids would be better served if they didn’t exist.”

Lowery, not surprisingly, takes issue with these portrayals.

“Those are misinformed impressions about the National Center’s work,” he says. “The work here in the Missing Children’s Division is much more comprehensive than simply creating a poster and distributing it. … All our teams are former law enforcement or social services with a great deal of experience in finding children. We do extensive case analysis work, we work social media, we have law enforcement partners in our building working side by side with us, so when leads come in that need law enforcement activity right away, we’re getting it.”

There are dozens of other nonprofits that focus on recovering missing children, though sorting the merely well-intentioned from those actually well-equipped to help can be tricky (never mind the ones devoted mostly to collecting donations, including the Committee for Missing Children, Operation Lookout National Center for Missing Youth, and Find the Children, three of the 50 worst charities in the country, according to an investigation by the Tampa Bay Times and the Center for Investigative Reporting).

A few years after Bianca went missing, Hebert met with Mark Miller, founder of the American Association for Lost Children, a nonprofit that, according to its website, conducts “hands-on investigations, while traveling in and outside the country performing surveillance and undercover work searching for and rescuing missing children.” Hebert says Miller convinced another mother whose own children were missing to date one of Lozano’s cousins in order to try to get information on Lozano’s whereabouts.

“After a few dates, in the throes of whatever they were in the middle of, she confessed that she was working for Miller and the whole thing blew up in her face,” Hebert says. Later, when Hebert was organizing a concert to raise money for her continuing search efforts, she got into a dispute with Miller over what percentage of the proceeds would go to his organization. In the end, she says, “I don’t really know a lot of what he did or didn’t do working on Bianca’s case.”

(When contacted, Miller says that he encourages all parents to “be on our team,” and help out with cases other than their own. He contends that although the other mother blew their cover, she did help procure useful information. He also insists that the money he wanted Hebert to donate to his charity was going to directly fund her case. According to Miller, the foundation spent thousands of dollars on Hebert’s case and she “never donated one penny to the charity.”)

With both government agencies and nonprofits often creating more confusion than they alleviate, many parents turn to private investigators. Unfortunately, the world of PIs is possibly even more opaque. Licensing varies from state to state, and in most cases doesn’t seem particularly rigorous. According to Lessan, the main advantage a licensed investigator has over an unlicensed one is a badge. “To be honest,” she says, “people don’t know that there’s no difference.”

Given this landscape, it’s not surprising that nightmare stories of PIs ripping off parents are legion. In 2009, an investigator in Arizona was indicted on five counts of wire fraud relating to charges that he created a fake abducted child recovery company, Delta International, which collected huge fees from parents and delivered virtually nothing in return. Gus Zamora, an ex–Army Ranger whose renown for recovering children abducted internationally has garnered him features on Dateline and in The Atlantic, has also been accused, multiple times, of defrauding parents.

Hebert first hired a PI based in Houston a few months after Lozano absconded with Bianca. She says she traveled to Mexico four times with this investigator, who insisted he’d seen Bianca while doing surveillance down there for her.

“We were going to go down there again, rent a plane, hire these guys with guns, kidnap my daughter, and bring her back,” says Hebert. But she wasn’t too confident in this plan, and was running out of money. Around the same time, she met Don Feeney, an ex–Delta Force commando working in private security consulting, who’d helped retrieve kidnapped children before. She decided to spend the last $10,000 she could get her hands on — money that her mother had to borrow from Hebert’s grandparents — to pay Feeney to follow up on the earlier investigator’s information. “They came back and said, ‘This is not your daughter and not your ex-husband. You would’ve been in a world of trouble if you’d kidnapped that girl and tried to come back here with her.’ It was crazy.”

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In April 2013, Hebert finally caught a break. A man got in touch via a Facebook page she’d set up, telling her that his sister Norma had had a baby with Lozano, whom she knew as “Pablo.” She had lived with him and Bianca — whom she knew as “Nina” — in Monterrey, Mexico, but Lozano was abusive, and now Norma was on the run from him. She’d begun to grow suspicious about his past, and after finding the Facebook page Hebert had set up, was concerned Lozano would kidnap her own son, so she took the boy and went into hiding.

In a series of conversations Hebert and a Spanish-speaking friend had with Norma’s brother and father, Hebert began hearing the first details of her daughter’s life, most of them heartbreaking: Bianca had been told that her mother died during childbirth. She lived in fear of her father. She had no idea she was a U.S. citizen and didn’t even know her real name. She was diabetic, played the guitar, and although she had no formal education, took classes at a music school in Monterrey.

“I desperately wanted to talk to Norma because she’s the only person I know that knows my daughter,” says Hebert. But Norma’s family kept her hidden, fearing for her and her son’s safety. Still, working off these leads, Hebert and Reed found a Russian pen pal of Bianca’s named Natalia, who told them they thought Lozano monitored all of Bianca’s online communication. Around this time, Hebert was also directed to some short YouTube clips of her daughter playing guitar.

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“That was when I saw her for the first time in 18 years,” says Hebert. “I knew it was her. I’ve seen thousands of pictures of other girls and people would say, ‘Don’t you think this looks like her?’ And I’d say, ‘No. I know it’s not.’ Then I saw this girl and I knew it was her.”

Bianca’s music school friends told Hebert that Bianca had abruptly withdrawn from the school earlier in the year and left town with her father. Nobody had heard from her since. Still, this new information provided the investigation with a momentum it had been lacking for years.

By this time, Reed no longer worked in the congressman’s office, but as she puts it, “I still couldn’t let it go.” She approached a few staffers in other congressional offices, “people I’d known for years, and asked them point blank, ‘Can you please help us?’ No one would help.”

Hebert and Reed made calls, and tried to get any of the various federal, state, and local agencies they’d been working with to take this new information and renew the investigation with vigor.

“It was out of sheer frustration that my husband and I decided we were going to hire our own PI with our own money,” says Reed. “That’s what led us to Monique.”

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Photograph by Chris Tuite for BuzzFeed

Two days after our visit to the Homeland Security office in San Diego, Lessan and I are back in Fontana, staring at that house once again. Hebert has mostly dismissed the possibility that the red-haired woman we saw here days earlier could be her daughter but believes if we talk to Pablo, he might have some clues as to where Lozano and Bianca might be. Lessan wanted to wait to see what Wrighten came up with, and still worries that if she confronts Pablo, he’ll immediately call Lozano with the information. But as Hebert put it during a three-way call with Reed and Lessan the night before, “What’s he going to tell Juan? That I have an investigator? I think he knows that from what we’ve put on Facebook. We’re not going to be any worse off than we are now.”

It’s late afternoon and the plan is to wait until Pablo gets home from work, then knock on the door. If he doesn’t slam it in our faces, Hebert has given us a letter for him that explains her plight. So we wait. And wait. One of the women we saw the other day — short, ponytail, late thirties or early forties — arrives home and goes inside. We wait some more. It’s now almost 7 p.m. and getting dark outside. Where is Pablo? We discuss the possibilities. Maybe he works from home. Maybe he’s unemployed. Maybe he’s out with friends. Time isn’t on our side. Waiting any longer as it gets darker is going to make an already tense doorway confrontation all the more unsettling. Lessan decides it’s time.

She knocks on the door and a female voice from the other side asks, “Who is it?”

“This is Monique. I just wanted to show you something.”

The door opens to reveal the woman with the ponytail, presumably Pablo’s wife. Lessan flashes her private investigator license and explains that we are looking for Pablo, but refuses to explain why. Pablo’s not home, we’re told, but will be soon. The woman asks if Lessan would like to leave a message for him.

“I can just wait,” says Lessan. “I prefer to talk to him, actually.”

“OK,” the woman says warily. “I’ll let him know.” Then she closes the door.

So the wait continues, now on the sidewalk in front of the house. We debate whether Pablo will ever come home tonight, what he’ll say if he does, and how long we can stand around out here on a Wednesday night before someone calls the cops.

By the time Pablo pulls up it’s past 8 p.m. We walk toward him in his driveway, just as his wife comes out the front door again. Lessan introduces herself and asks if we can come inside to show him some information. He looks at us the way you would look at any two strangers who just accosted you in your driveway on a dark Wednesday night insisting, somewhat frantically, that they wanted to come into your house. Lessan presses the case, asking again if we can just come inside for a minute. Pablo and his wife don’t look wary anymore, they look downright scared.

Lessan changes tack and tries to hand Pablo the letter Hebert wrote for him. He recoils from the envelope as if it was radioactive, and mumbles something about not knowing what legal implications might come with accepting the letter. I offer to read it aloud. Nobody objects, so I do.

The letter explains Hebert’s entire agonizing, Kafkaesque, two-decade-long ordeal — the kidnapping, the identity theft, the fruitless searching, the pain of not knowing. It seems to settle the moment. Pablo and his wife look stunned. Lessan asks if she can show them some documentation right here in the driveway. We move under an outdoor floodlight and she lays out the same documents she showed Wrighten on the hood of the family’s car, building the case, piece by piece.

When she’s done, Pablo shakes his head. He hasn’t seen his cousin Juan Lozano since they were kids. He doesn’t know anything about the kidnapping. He didn’t even know he had been married or had kids. He saw Lozano’s parents last year when they came to California for a funeral, but other than that, he’s had hardly any contact with that branch of the family in decades. He expresses a willingness to help find out where his cousin is, but quite sensibly, seems most concerned with the fact that Lozano — an international fugitive — is running around using his identity.

It’s possible that Pablo is lying about all this, and that Lozano and Bianca are hiding in the house right behind us, but I don’t think so. Standing here in the driveway, he and his wife don’t look like accessories to an international abduction. They look like shell-shocked parents. Lessan thanks them for their time, and Pablo promises to get in touch once he’s talked to some of his family.

Back in the minivan, Lessan phones Hebert and Reed. As she drives and talks, she’s emotional, buzzing with adrenaline. She offers a blow-by-blow account of the evening, pausing every few seconds to take a deep breath, and concludes that it went very well.

“He wants to help,” she says, exhaling deeply. “He was very concerned. He wouldn’t give us his phone number but said, ‘Don’t worry, I’m going to make some calls and get in touch with you.’ I’m glad at his response. Hopefully something will come out of it.”

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For a long time, nothing does. For months, there’s no word from Pablo, nothing of note from Wrighten, and after the momentary excitement in Fontana, the investigation has settled back into low gear. There’s no more money for Lessan. All the leads from Norma have been chased down and come to nothing.

In late March, I call Hebert and ask how she’s feeling about the state of the search. “It’s the same old thing — another dead end,” she says. “We spent all this money, and yeah, we made contact with the cousin, but he hasn’t done anything. I don’t know if he’s ever interested in helping.” She sighs. “Everything I do turns up nothing, so I don’t know what to think anymore. I don’t let myself get too excited about anything because honestly I can’t handle it anymore. I’m at the point where — I’m not done, but it’s getting to be too much.”

Then in May, Pablo calls. He’s apologetic for not getting in touch sooner, but as Hebert puts it, “He was shocked and felt kind of violated. … He has had to process it on his own.” He suggests the outlines of a possible deal: If Hebert drops the charges against her ex-husband, maybe Lozano would allow Bianca to return to the U.S. and be reunited with her. Hebert immediately agrees. Pablo says they’d need the agreement in writing.

Hebert emails the Harris County assistant district attorney, who makes clear this isn’t something they normally do — “She said, ‘We don’t negotiate with felons. This is not justice’” — but they’ll make an exception. Hebert sends the letter to Pablo, and for the first time in a very long time, she allows herself a measure of optimism.

“Who knows what this is going to turn into, but I have a little hope this is going to work out,” she says. I tell her that it seems like a smart move for Lozano. Whatever his situation in Mexico might be right now, having to keep hawkish watch over a 21-year-old woman is hardly the same as doing so with a young girl. That can’t be much of a life for him. Perhaps he wants out.

“That’s what I think,” she says. “Everybody I’ve talked to says, ‘He’s stupid if he doesn’t do this. He’ll be free.’” She’s thought a lot about what a reunion with her daughter might actually be like. They haven’t seen each other in nearly 20 years. Her daughter has no memory of her. They’d effectively be strangers. Would Bianca move in? Would she call her “Mom”? Who knows, but if nothing else, she’d know the truth.

“Her friends [at music school] told me her dream was to be an American citizen and play music here,” she says. “Everything in her life is a lie: her name, her birthday, her dad’s name, where he came from. … It’s got to be a terrible life. She could have so much if she came here.”

For the next few days, there are droplets of news. An uncle of Lozano’s believes the deal is a good idea and will try to talk to his sister — Lozano’s mom — about it. Other family members apparently agree.

Then for a month, there’s little word at all. Finally, Pablo calls Lozano’s mom himself but can’t reach her. He sends a letter to Lozano’s sister that goes unanswered. When I speak to Hebert in mid-June, she’s frustrated.

“I don’t know why they’re dragging their feet,” she says. “Maybe they don’t want to tell Bianca. I’m not sure how you tell someone their entire life is a lie.”

Two more months pass and I call to get an update. Hebert sighs deeply. “I haven’t heard from them at all,” she says. “I think it’s going to fizzle out.”

She sounds as low as I’ve heard her. After all this — not just these recent events, but years of struggle with cops, private detectives, federal agencies, a congressman, Mexican authorities, nonprofits, volunteers, friends, family, acquaintances, and yes, journalists, with those who were helpful and those who weren’t, dealing with a system seemingly incapable of marshaling its best resources to grapple with a problem that should be solvable — Hebert finds herself no closer to getting her daughter back than she was in 1995. She hasn’t exactly lost hope, but having been through so much with so many people, at the moment, she’s feeling very much alone.

“The thing is about stories like this, people will see it, read it, maybe post it on Facebook, but then they move on with their lives,” she says. “And I’m sitting back here waiting for my daughter to show up.”

Want to read more stories like this? Sign up for our Sunday features newsletter, and we’ll send you a curated list of great things to read every week!

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Read more: http://www.buzzfeed.com/djpeisner/how-the-19-year-search-for-bianca-lozano-explains-the-chaos

#bianca lozano #divorce #kidnap recovery #monique lessan #private investigator

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johnclapperne · 7 years ago

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7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health

“What supplements should I take?”

It’s easily one of the most common questions I’ve been asked during the past 10 years, as supplements transformed from a niche market into a perceived quick fix for everything from fat loss to increasing your strength 1.675%.

And while the supplement industry clearly doesn’t need any help selling their products—they make an estimated 25 billion dollars, consumers clearly need more help deciphering what they really need.

That’s why I went to nutritionist Dr. Chris Mohr, one of the leaders in the industry. Chris developed Dietary Supplement U to become a trusted source on supplements to help you find the information you need, so that you could make more informed decisions.

Here are 7 supplements that are worth your money, according to Dr. Mohr.

Fish Oil

While the human body can produce many vitamins and minerals naturally, fish oil is something we can’t make naturally, so you need to supplement to supply your body with what you need. Which is why Mohr calls fish oil a supplement “you must take.” And while you can receive some from eating fish, you’ll have to eat a lot of fish consistently. For most people, eating fish 1 to 2 times per week will not do the job, which means you need to supplement.

The key is making sure you’re taking more omega 3’s. You see, most people’s diets are higher in omega-6 fats, which are inflammatory. You want more omega 3s, which have anti-inflammatory benefits. Increasing intake of a high quality fish oil, can reduce triglycerides, reduce the risk of heart disease, help with recovery from exercise, brain health, potentially diabetes and may even help with losing body fat. The key is getting a high ratio of EPA to DHA (these are 2 of the 3 omega-3’s), so look for brands that offer a high concentration and aim to get a minimum of 2 g EPA + DHA daily.

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Fish Oil

Vitamin D

If fish oil is most important, than Vitamin D is arguably tied for the title of “most important supplement to take,” says Mohr. Data suggests a majority of Americans have less than optimal blood levels, primarily because it’s difficult to get from food (sources included canned salmon, milk, sardines are all good sources). While most know that sunlight is a great source of vitamin D, the sun is not strong enough from November to March in most places to provide you with sufficient amounts. And even when you are outside, you’re mostly covered with clothing and/or sunscreen, which block the beneficial (and harmful) rays.

Vitamin D researcher, Dr. Robert Heaney said in a recent interview “Vitamin D won’t cure anything, but supplementing with it will make everything better.” Most experts agree that supplementing with a minimum of 1000 IU’s daily is a good start.

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Vitamin D

Whey Protein

While a high quality omega-3 and vitamin D are both essential to take daily, whey protein isn’t a supplement you “need,” but it’s probably a great idea to take it, says Mohr. Whey does certainly offer some unique benefits; it’s high in the ever-important branched chain amino acids (BCAA’s), which can play an important role in muscle building, muscle recovery, and even fat loss. More importantly, whey protein is a quick, convenient source of quality calories. Add some fruit a scoop of nut butter and you’ve got a perfect, on the go meal that takes 60 seconds to make.

Born Approved: BioTrust Low Carb Protein

Greens products

While not quite a replacement for fruits and vegetables, these are a good “insurance” policy. Greens supplements can help improve a diet that is low in fruits and vegetables, says Mohr. That’s because less than 1 percent of men and 4 percent of women ages 18 to 24 eat the recommended 5 servings (or more) of fruits and vegetables each day. And for people ages 25 to 34, those percentages on jump to 6 percent and 9 percent, respectively.

Again, your best bet is to just eat more fruits and vegetables. Food is always a better option than supplements. But if you’re not going to eat them, or you’re not going to eat enough, it’s better to supplement with greens than completely neglect this essential part of your nutrition.

Born Approved: Athletic Greens

Cinnamon

Cinnamon might seem like an odd addition, but this spice is actually loaded with antioxidants, which as most people know help with everything from fighting disease to protecting your body against the effects of aging. But maybe more importantly, studies have shown that cinnamon may improve insulin sensitivity, an important hormone that plays a key role in the process of storing fat. And the more you improve your insulin sensitivity, the more you can control your blood sugar and enjoy carbohydrates.

Most studies have shown 1 g (about 1/2 a teaspoon if adding your own) daily is sufficient.

Turmeric (curcumin)

Turmeric is a spiced commonly used in Indian dishes. One component of turmeric is called curcumin and with 100’s studies and counting, it is gaining some serious traction in the supplement world, says Mohr. A 2010 study suggested curcumin has anti-cancer, anti-viral, anti-arthritic and anti-inflammatory properties.

Here’s the caveat: Several of these studies have been done for with animals and for specific clinical situations (Alzheimer’s disease, cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, etc), but there seems to be one undeniable major benefit of turmeric that can help you even if you are disease free; turmeric has strong anti-inflammatory benefits. And if there’s a point to be driven home, it’s that the more you can fight inflammation, the better your body will respond and the healthier you’ll be.

Born Approved: You can add curcumin to your foods, or supplement with about 500 mg daily.

Probiotics

We all eat (a lot) of food every day, and yet we really pay attention to our digestive system. Healthy gut bacteria plays an important role in overall health, digestion and immune system, says Mohr. More specifically, probiotics can help replenish and nourish our internal supply of good bacteria. What does this mean for you? Possibly less gas, bloating, abdominal pain, and inflammation. You see, there are millions and millions of different strains of bacteria in our guts. Probiotics help keep a healthy GI “ecosystem” and keep things in balance.

Born Approved: I’ve recently been using BioTrust Pro-X10 and been very pleased. But if that doesn’t work for you, supplemental doses are typically expressed in billions of live organisms. Aim for a product from a trusted brand that lists at least 3 billion organisms per serving — and keep it refrigerated after opening to protect those organisms. Food such as Kimchi and live sauerkraut are great natural source.

Are these the only supplements you should take? Honestly, it depends on your diet. In fact, some people need to take very few supplements, while others will benefit more to make up for deficiencies in their diet. And there are several other supplements not listed here—such as creatine—that have a long line of research supporting their benefits and safety.

In an upcoming post, I’ll share exactly what I take each day and the amounts. Until then, your best bet is usually to take a minimalist approach to supplements, and instead focus on improving the foods you eat and not looking for a cure-all pill or powder.

Make it count,

Born

Want A Personalized Supplement Plan?

If you want access to nutrition programs and catered supplement plan, join me in online coaching. Here you’ll work directly with me (and some of the best strength and nutrition coaches) to create your training and diet program, ask your questions, and receive exclusive access to an exercise library.

Just want supplement information? The best guide on the market can be found here.

Want to Burn More Calories? Add This to Your Fat Loss Plan

Why Creatine is Even Better Than You Thought

What is the Best Protein Powder?

The post 7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health appeared first on Born Fitness.

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#7 Good #Trusted Supplements For Your Health

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joshuabradleyn · 7 years ago

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7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health

“What supplements should I take?”

Here are 7 supplements that are worth your money, according to Dr. Mohr.

Fish Oil

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Fish Oil

Vitamin D

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Vitamin D

Whey Protein

Born Approved: BioTrust Low Carb Protein

Greens products

Born Approved: Athletic Greens

Cinnamon

Most studies have shown 1 g (about 1/2 a teaspoon if adding your own) daily is sufficient.

Turmeric (curcumin)

Born Approved: You can add curcumin to your foods, or supplement with about 500 mg daily.

Probiotics

Make it count,

Born

Want A Personalized Supplement Plan?

Just want supplement information? The best guide on the market can be found here.

Want to Burn More Calories? Add This to Your Fat Loss Plan

Why Creatine is Even Better Than You Thought

What is the Best Protein Powder?

The post 7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health appeared first on Born Fitness.

http://ift.tt/2gPEgpy

#7 Good #Trusted Supplements For Your Health

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almajonesnjna · 7 years ago

Text

7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health

“What supplements should I take?”

Here are 7 supplements that are worth your money, according to Dr. Mohr.

Fish Oil

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Fish Oil

Vitamin D

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Vitamin D

Whey Protein

Born Approved: BioTrust Low Carb Protein

Greens products

Born Approved: Athletic Greens

Cinnamon

Most studies have shown 1 g (about 1/2 a teaspoon if adding your own) daily is sufficient.

Turmeric (curcumin)

Born Approved: You can add curcumin to your foods, or supplement with about 500 mg daily.

Probiotics

Make it count,

Born

Want A Personalized Supplement Plan?

Just want supplement information? The best guide on the market can be found here.

Want to Burn More Calories? Add This to Your Fat Loss Plan

Why Creatine is Even Better Than You Thought

What is the Best Protein Powder?

The post 7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health appeared first on Born Fitness.

http://ift.tt/2gPEgpy

#7 Good #Trusted Supplements For Your Health

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ruthellisneda · 7 years ago

Text

7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health

“What supplements should I take?”

Here are 7 supplements that are worth your money, according to Dr. Mohr.

Fish Oil

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Fish Oil

Vitamin D

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Vitamin D

Whey Protein

Born Approved: BioTrust Low Carb Protein

Greens products

Born Approved: Athletic Greens

Cinnamon

Most studies have shown 1 g (about 1/2 a teaspoon if adding your own) daily is sufficient.

Turmeric (curcumin)

Born Approved: You can add curcumin to your foods, or supplement with about 500 mg daily.

Probiotics

Make it count,

Born

Want A Personalized Supplement Plan?

Just want supplement information? The best guide on the market can be found here.

Want to Burn More Calories? Add This to Your Fat Loss Plan

Why Creatine is Even Better Than You Thought

What is the Best Protein Powder?

The post 7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health appeared first on Born Fitness.

http://ift.tt/2gPEgpy

#7 Good #Trusted Supplements For Your Health

0 notes

albertcaldwellne · 7 years ago

Text

7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health

“What supplements should I take?”

Here are 7 supplements that are worth your money, according to Dr. Mohr.

Fish Oil

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Fish Oil

Vitamin D

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Vitamin D

Whey Protein

Born Approved: BioTrust Low Carb Protein

Greens products

Born Approved: Athletic Greens

Cinnamon

Most studies have shown 1 g (about 1/2 a teaspoon if adding your own) daily is sufficient.

Turmeric (curcumin)

Born Approved: You can add curcumin to your foods, or supplement with about 500 mg daily.

Probiotics

Make it count,

Born

Want A Personalized Supplement Plan?

Just want supplement information? The best guide on the market can be found here.

Want to Burn More Calories? Add This to Your Fat Loss Plan

Why Creatine is Even Better Than You Thought

What is the Best Protein Powder?

The post 7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health appeared first on Born Fitness.

http://ift.tt/2gPEgpy

#7 Good #Trusted Supplements For Your Health

0 notes

neilmillerne · 7 years ago

Text

7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health

“What supplements should I take?”

Here are 7 supplements that are worth your money, according to Dr. Mohr.

Fish Oil

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Fish Oil

Vitamin D

Born Approved: Athletic Greens Vitamin D

Whey Protein

Born Approved: BioTrust Low Carb Protein

Greens products

Born Approved: Athletic Greens

Cinnamon

Most studies have shown 1 g (about 1/2 a teaspoon if adding your own) daily is sufficient.

Turmeric (curcumin)

Born Approved: You can add curcumin to your foods, or supplement with about 500 mg daily.

Probiotics

Make it count,

Born

Want A Personalized Supplement Plan?

Just want supplement information? The best guide on the market can be found here.

Want to Burn More Calories? Add This to Your Fat Loss Plan

Why Creatine is Even Better Than You Thought

What is the Best Protein Powder?

The post 7 Good, Trusted Supplements For Your Health appeared first on Born Fitness.

http://ift.tt/2gPEgpy

#7 Good #Trusted Supplements For Your Health

0 notes

whatdoesshedotothem · 4 years ago

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Monday 4 June 1838

8 10

11 ¾

Rain in the night – fine morning – F67° at 9 ¼ and breakfast – read over A-‘s letter to her aunt – sent George to Laffittes’ – no letters – had the man from Meurices’ and paid up his bill I myself adding 22/. to it = 26/30 to pay in addition to the 200/. in a/c paid on Saturday – then had the girl from Madame Figarlos’ and pothering over 1 thing or other till 11 ½ - no letters at Laffittes’ – then added a few lines dated this morning to my note to Lady S. de R- 4pp. of ½ sheet written and dated Friday merely to say the little entresol at Meurices’ was so terrible I had hunted about for another apartment on Saturday and come here at 10 that night 3me looking into the gardens and we were recovering –surely Lady S. de R- would send my note to Lady Stuart and should be obliged to my Lord to frank my note to Vere – had merely written before that ‘we are only just arrived having been touring in Belgium, and lastly spending a few days at Spa........’ ‘the Hotel Voltaire r. de Lille was full, ditto a host of other hotels’ – had just read in Galignani ‘the whole history of their arrangements with Comte Stroganoff prince..... I wonder whose clever idea it was, to make an opening between the 2 houses’ (i.e. Lord Stuarts and Lord Caledons’) conclude the S. de R- will all be with Lady S- at the Lodge – mention having just had Dr. Double who sends us ‘off to the Pyrenees for 2 months for a necessary rétablissement; and St. Sauveur in the panacea proposed – Perhaps its associations may do more good than its waters – we ought to be off in ten days – I shall see whether it be possible at that time, or at all, and shall write again before leaving here – If there be anything I can do for you now or on my return, you know I shall do it with great pleasure – there is an amusing article in Galignani (from the spectator) on Tory influence in small towns, regretting that ‘the Tory gentry are fasting themselves in the old fashion’ ..... ‘and will be enabled to get the masses at defiance, thro’ the quiet but irresistible influence of property’ I hope you will be quite struck and well for the coronation, and Louisa in all her bloom of beauty – you will be proud of both your daughters – Believe me, my dear Lady Stuart, very truly yours A. Lister’ – my note to Lady S- 4pp. of ½ sheet the 1st p. and 1 ½ line of 2nd p. written and dated Friday 1 June – the rest written and dated yesterday – ‘you will have guessed, dearest Lady Stuart, from my not writing, that I was still en route somewhere, and certainly not arrived in Paris – we had a rather boisterous passage of 24 hours, 17 of which, during the ‘stiff breeze’ I was as you can imagine – I thought of you very often in retracing our old route from Brussels to Spa’.... great improvement in the face of the country – went to the bottom of one of the deepest coal pits at Liège – regretted not being able to go to Aix-la-chapelle – returned by Namur, Dinant, Mézières, Reims, and Epernay – our troubles began here’ – mention our ‘little back entresol over the rez de chaussée at Meurices’, which was so intolerable from closeness and bad air, that I could not finish my letters or do anything, and, after much trouble yesterday, I took a 3me here (hotel de la terrasse) and got into between 10 and 11 last night’ – Paris very hot and full of English –‘If I come again in this way, I seriously think of putting up at the little pied-à-terre near the Jardin des Plantes’ –mentioning having had Dr. Double yesterday – to be off to St. Sauveur in 10 days – ‘If we really go there, I shall think every day of the happy 3 weeks I spent there in 1830’ mention Galignani telling the whole history of Lord S. de R-‘s house letting ‘the length of time and all things considered fairly, I really do not think the rent too great – I hope you are enjoying your pretty garden at the Lodge – If you are at home, and alone when all the bustle of the coronation is over, I shall count upon spending a little while with you – Perhaps I shall feel differently by and by – I hardly think of, or own to myself, that I feel much otherwise than well – and yet there is a something – but it matters not – I know it is a trouble to you to write much – but I shall be delighted to hear of you, and shall not leave here without writing again – perhaps you may think of something that I can do for you – Half the most useful tradespeople that I was accustomed to here, are dead or gone, that I feel as if I was in a new place – the rich daughter of our house in the Place de la Madeleine, is just married to Monsieur de Grouchy and gone to Turin as secretary of legation – Ever, dearest Lady Stuart, very truly and affectionately yours A. Lister’ – my note to Lady V.C. 3pp. of ½ sheet written and dated and all copied yesterday – very small and close – account of our tour etc. as much as would fill 2 common sheets of letter paper written à l’ordinaire – had just written so far of today at 12 25 then wrote as follows to Mr. Okey – ‘Mrs. Lister will be much obliged to Mr. Okey to forward her packet, by the bag, to Lord Stuart de Rothesay, and will be glad to see Mr. Okey if he can call upon her any time from eight to nine this evening Hotel de la Terrasse. Monday Morning’ –

SH:7/ML/E/21/0116

sent off at 1 40 my packet undercover to ‘Mr. Okey Rue du Faubourg St. Honoré’ containing my note to himself and my letters undercover to ‘Lord Stuart de Rothesay’ to ‘The Lady Stuart de Rothesay’ and to ‘the honourable Lady Stuart’ and to ‘the Lady Vere Cameron’ – and at 12 25 wrote as follows to Mr. S. Washington – ‘Paris. Monday 4 June 1828. Sir I received your letter on Wednesday, the 30th ultimo – I do not wish to be at the expense of a ten-horse power engine, and shall be obliged to you to get estimates of an eight-horse-power engine from Low moor, or any other respectable firm – I have understood that there are several good makers of small engines at and about Rochdale – If Mr. James Holt does not like to take upon himself the whole responsibility of advising, you had best consult with Mr. John Oates – I have no objection to Mr. Taylor or anybody else who will make a good engine, and do the whole job well at a reasonable price – Give me the substance of all the estates (on one sheet of paper) and your own opinion and that of Messrs. Holt and Oates as to which estate you would each of you fix upon, were the case your own – Direct to me as before, to the care of Messrs. Hammersleys and I shall probably receive your letter in about a week from its date – Let me know what you have paid to the Manns and if the meer-embankment is done, and how much is done of the walling against the road, in front of the house – and if either Robert Mann or John Booth has any message to send – I am sir, etc. etc A. Lister’ –A- having omitted an order on her H-x bank for £200 to be paid on Hammersleys

A- had not done till 5 ¼ too late by ¼ hour

we were both obliged to write out respective portions of the letter over again, so that I had my letter to SW. to re-write and added to it the last 2 ½ lines – and has just written so far at 3 ¾ having had the washerwoman about two – from 3 ¾ to 4 ¾ inking over accounts – then 10 minutes reading over A-‘s letter to SW. then 20 minutes more till 5 ¼ finishing inking over from Friday 25 at Rethel to Tuesday 31 May after Versailles – i.e. to end of the day 31 May - A- and I took George and walked out at 5 40 – told the little coiffeur Carré r. St. Honoré corner of r. d’Alger to come at 8 ½ am tomorrow – then to the r. de Rothan (Perrelets’) about our watches and white we were there came on such heavy rain with thunder and lightning that we were obliged to return in a fiacre – home about 7 ¼ - dinner – Dr. Double called for about ¼ hour about 8 ¼ - Mr. Okey at 9 for about ¼ hour – mentioned to him the power of attorney I had forgotten to send to Messrs. Hammersleys when last in London – he will sent it on Friday by the bag – my letters went or would go this evening – could have got the power of attorney off if I had wished it – the courier sets off at midnight – the bag made up at 10 am – Lady Granville has been very ill – both she and Lord Granville here and will be here during the coronation – Mr. Heneage here – gave Mr. Okey my passport Mr. Heneage will get it visaed at the embassies of Austria Spain and Sardinia – Soult had taken Lord S. de R-‘s house for £1000 – Lord S- very angry on Soults’ giving it up – S- said it was the affair of his maître d’hotel – asked if Dr. Tupper is in Paris – said I had a high opinion of him as a medical man – O- had seen him lately but he now lives at or near Meudon – had had it in contemplation to take patients at a private maison de Sauté there – Mr. O- was hardly gone before Dr. Tupper came – had just Mr. O- who had told him what had passed – expressed my regret at supposing him (Dr. T-) gone – said I had therefore sent for Dr. Double who had been of great service to a friend of mine 14 years ago – Dr. T- sat 1/2 hour perhaps and said he would call as a friend tomorrow morning – he just asked a question or 2 of A- said her face (the [?]) was caused by her stomach – a little medicine to stimulate her liver would be good – But A- told me afterwards tho’ she liked Dr. Tupper very well she was very well satisfied with Dr. Double and glad she had him – liked him better than T- glad to escape medicine – Dr. T-‘s maison de Sauté scheme given up – an English gentleman and lady were to have kept the house – the lady was taken very ill – Dr. T- called in – found her in the evening very ill – the pupil would not contract – she had taken something – she denied it – but T- sure she had – she died at 6 the next morning – it was a love affair he thought – he mentioned her having taken something to the husband – but she was buried and so the matter passed over, and the maison de sauté scheme was given up – they had paid ½ years’ rent – the house proved to be not secure at the time – the landlord readily accepted their proposal and returned ½ what they had paid – they might by law have had the whole but did not know at the time – an old picture bought the other day at the public sale for 45fr. – the gentleman soon afterwards refused 50,000 fr. – Government heard of this and by law made [Expressively] many years ago got the picture back paying the gentleman only the 45/. the picture having been stolen – sat talking – finish day till about after 6 (vid. line 25 last p.) rainy evening till 8 or 9 – and rain in the night

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kristinsimmons · 6 years ago

Text

Obsessive Measurement Disorder: Etiology of an Epidemic

By KIP SULLIVAN JD

Review of The Tyranny of Metrics by Jerry Z. Muller, Princeton University Press, 2018

A short history of Obsession Measurement Disorder in medicine

Taylorism: Ground zero of the epidemic

Measuring the doctor and patient from afar

Reversing the epidemic

Footnotes:

[3] A 2006 edition of Medical Care Research and Review devoted entirely to the emerging P4P fad stated, “P4P programs are being implemented in a near-scientific vacuum.”

Kip Sullivan is a member of the Health Care for All MN advisory board, and of MN Physicians for a National Health Program.

Obsessive Measurement Disorder: Etiology of an Epidemic published first on https://wittooth.tumblr.com/

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