Oldies

1. Rant about Zakaria/Job creation
I was watching Fareed Zakaria GPS this weekend. He had an interesting debate on who creates jobs. The whole section itself was very interesting, but what I want to discuss right now is this: 
At some point on of the guest speakers said the following “You're making a moral argument as opposed to an economic argument” (This was in response to an argument that the so called risk takers are not really taking any risks, but that is besides the point I am trying to make). Later on he said “It doesn't matter whether it's moral or not, it's what's the economic cost to get those guys to walk away, to create the next Google, the next Facebook”
I guess where I am trying to get at is that it seems like I have heard this exact same argument from a lot of my republican and libertarian friends. I have also heard this argument and read this argument from politicians, journalists and commentators. And I think this clearly helps me pinpoint what it is that I so much dislike about republicans… I believe that morality should never be a different conversation. I think morality should always be part of the equation regardless of whether you are talking about economics, health care, education or anything for that matter.

2. Election night

Today I get to vote for the first time ever! To commemorate such a historic occasion I want to write down some thoughts to immortalize this day.

Not too long ago I was asked why I would be voting for Obama. Is it because he is a democrat? Do I really know what his plan is? Am I aware that he has not accomplished a lot of his promises and flat out lied?  Can I even mention anything he has done that I like? The answer to all this questions is yes.

I will vote for him because he is a democrat. I believe in their overall ideology. I consider myself lucky to have been born to parents that could give me everything I ever needed and more and thanks to them I consider that I have succeeded in life. I wish everyone had the same opportunities I did, which is why I am perfectly fine with the government lending a hand to those who want to succeed even if it means me paying some extra taxes. I am OK with a big government that will impose some regulations that will ultimately protect us as costumer and as citizens. I believe everyone should be afforded the same rights regardless of who they choose as a life partner. I find it funny that people often refer to Obama as a socialist as if it was the biggest insult and such a dirty word, however, modern socialism is not necessary Cuba and it is definitely not the Soviet Union. Some nations have managed to embrace a socialist system mixed with a free market and they happen to have the best standards of living in the world: they have the highest literacy rates, highest GDPs, best health systems.

I don’t know every detail of Obama’s plans, but I know where he stands on those things that are important to me (education, health care, environmental issues and immigration to mention  a few) . I know a lot of his previous plans went unfinished, which is why I want him to have a second term. I believe he will get a better chance to get a lot more done.

I don’t think Obama is a saint. I am aware that he is a politician. As so, I believe he has been campaigning for reelection since January of 2009. This may have something to do with some of his “broken promises” or his compromises, but that is the game that has to be played which is why I think his second term could be more successful. There is no reelection agenda and he will be freer to make decisions that will anger people who support him (I think he has been dilly dallying with the XL pipeline to avoid angering some environmental groups that are against it) . That being said I also think the opposition has a lot to do with his shortcomings. Let’s be honest here, no other president has faced an opposition that has openly admitted that their only job is to make sure Obama is a one time president. Do we need examples? The debt ceiling debacle. I can’t believe how people still blame Obama for the S&P downgrade when it was the congress who hijacked the budget and it was Obama who showed some willingness to compromise. Also, let’s not forget that Obama tried on several occasions to pass a jobs bill that got filibustered by the GOP. I often hear that Obama’s presidency has lead to the greatest number of deportations, but I don’t think this has much to do with Obama, after all, he is not the one out there hunting people down for deportation. During his presidency several states have passed very strong immigration laws that probably have a lot more to do with deportation rates. Also, immigration enforcement officials have actually sued Obama over his policy to stop deportations of the dreamers showing their unwillingness to respect his orders.

So, what has Obama done that I agree with? Well, for starters his first move as president was to end the ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. You may not have heard about it, you may not care about it, but to me it is a big deal. For the last 4 years I have been working on embryonic stem cell research under a federally funded grant that has paid for my tuition and stipend. Obamacare is also a big one. I don’t think it is the ideal system, but I think it is a step in the right direction and I would hate to go back to the way things were. I particularly like the ban on pre-existing conditions and I am perfectly fine with the individual mandate being a tax. I was asked if I did not feel like Obama lied by stating the mandate would not e a tax, and I really don't. I think it is all a matter of semantics. There is the repeal of don’t ask don’t tell which I know was a democratically started policy. I think DADT was the right step towards progress at the time, but times have evolved and the policy needed to be repealed. There is the amnesty program for the dreamers. It is no dream act, but, once again, it is a step in the right direction. There is the end of the war in Iraq which was a senseless war to begin with. Those are the things I most agree with and care about.

Very briefly I need to mention that I don’t hate Romney. I just don’t agree with the republican ideology and I don’t really know what he stands for (not for the lack of trying). It would be hard for me to vote for someone who said “On day one, I will announce deficit-reduction measures that end the era of big government ushered in by President Obama” on his facebook page this morning. How can one be expected to vote for someone without a clear idea of their plan or their beliefs for that matter? For someone who at some point implemented a plan similar to Obamacare but then claims he would repeal Obamacare and then says he would only cut parts of it? Someone who says that his plan for immigration would be to make immigrant’s life so miserable that they would self-deport, but then says that he would staple a greencard to every diploma, but opposes to the dream act?

But that is enough about my reasons to vote for Obama or against Romney, and that being said, if Obama loses today I hope to wake up one of these days and find that Romney is the best version of himself. If he is not, I would hope to be proven wrong about many of the things I believe in. I wish he can indeed put people back to work and ensure everyone has a fair shot at a good life. I hope this partisan BS ends and both sides of the aisle learn to play nice and remember that they are there to make this country a better place for all their citizens (not just the 1%, not just 53%). I will understand that if Romney wins it is because the people spoke and that is what they wanted. I will never question the legitimacy of his presidency and while I will likely disagree with his plans I will give him the respect he deserves. Conversely I hope that if Obama wins we can end this birth certificate or college transcript debacle. I hope the GOP learns to play nice and work with him instead of trying to stop him every step of the way. I hope we all learn to stop rooting against a guy we disagree just for the satisfaction of being right, even if it is at the expense of the American people. 

Guilt

Despite coming back from my winter break feeling motivated, I am having a really hard time at work recently. I need to write it out to find some clarity and a way to snap out of this.

I think partly is that the working parent guilt is catching up. The crazy part is that I don’t think it comes from within me, but rather from social pressures and expectations.

So, for one, I sometimes feel bad that I don’t have that much to do at work, and yet I am here from 8-4…everything feels like I waste of time. Hopefully, things will pick up at work and I will soon be busier that I am right now and therefore the guilt of not being very productive at work, while also sending my kid to daycare will subside.

The other part is reading articles and comments from other parents regarding parenthood which leave me feeling slightly inadequate. I recently joined a group of grad school classmates that have become parents. They all talk about how hard it is not to sleep in bed with their babies, or how hard it has been to go back to work, and it makes me feel inadequate. When I went back to work I don’t remember having a hard time. I only got 6 weeks off, which sucked because it took me 4-5 to get the hang of staying home with a baby, and I had to go back very soon after that. Maybe part of it is that I had absolutely no help. Nobody cooked and brought me any food, my mom was there for the first week, which actually ended up being stressful for me due to the relationship I had with her at the moment. On top of it, she stared at me while I tried to breastfeed to make sure I was doing it right, never cooked for me, always took the baby away from me or told me I was holding her wrong, criticized me for not getting my hair brushed or makeup on…and we actually ended up getting into a fight. My husband’s family didn’t help either. They were actually mad at me and engaged in a full blown war over a number of things ranging from me not wanting anyone but my husband at the hospital before the baby was born, to my mom and sister being at my house when they wanted to come meet the baby. My mother in law made a few meals with explicit directions that they were just for my husband as the ingredients may cause the baby gas and the entire time I obsessed about the house being clean, laundry being done and life being in order….so in retrospective, going back was probably a lot less stressful and fun than staying home. Part of it is that by the time I had to go back, my mom came back and took care of the baby and I was able to do it gradually, so I started with a few hours a day and ended with however long I needed. Part of it was that when the time came to send her to daycare, I tried to look at it from a rational perspective, which was that they had more experience caring for babies than I did, therefore she was probably in better hands. Shortly after I went back, I started a new job at a terrible terrible place…and that was a bit harder. I remember there were days when I just lingered forever when I dropped of my daughter at daycare, or sat and play with her and the other babies for a few minutes before I left.

I just saw a petition to make maternity leave with partial pay for a whole year mandatory and ,against all my principles and core (believe me,  am shocked about this), I am completely against this. I sort of got into a debate with someone about it and the arguments for it were that “maternity leave, aside from being good for children (and therefore society), encourages mothers to go back to work after having kids - many women don't because they find leaving a 6-12 week old in daycare unthinkable and because daycare is so expensive. And women going back to work is extremely important for GDP and income tax revenue. So really it makes sense for everyone, even employers and those without kids, to expand maternity benefits”. And while it all sounds nice and good, I still could not agree with it…so I decided to analyze in a little bit more depth.

Let’s leave the maternity leave being good for children and society statement for last and concentrate on the economics of the issue. Economically, daycare doesn’t make sense if your salary is less than the cost of daycare, so this law would be financially helpful if the partial pay represents more than the difference between salary and childcare. That may be the case for a lot of low income people, but there are other ways to financially support women going back to work after having kids. The main reason that I would advocate in favor of other solutions is that a year of maternity leave would put a lot of women at a disadvantage when looking for a job. Any employee would much rather hire a man than a woman who could potentially stop working for an entire year, while still receiving a salary….and as much as I hate to admit this, I think I agree with that. I have been trying to come up with scenarios and this is the best one I can come up with….let’s say that I finish my post-doc and get a great idea that I am able to use for a start-up company. Let’s say that I am going to need clinical trials and animal studies and therefore need to hire a highly specialized employee to take care of that. I find Cindy, a recent PhD graduate with all the necessary qualifications and experience….everything is going great and then, boom, Cindy tells me she is pregnant and will be taking a whole year of maternity leave… But this is a start-up company..it is a unstable situation and I hired Cindy because of her highly specialized skills…so now, I have to find someone as specialized to replace her..Probably have to bring that person in before Cindy leaves in order to have enough time to get trained and then continue paying her and Cindy (partially) for a whole year. This in itself is a big stretch to my budget and therefore I can’t commit to hiring the other person for more than a year, upon which the poor soul has to go back to being unemployed. And what happens if after a year Cindy decides that she doesn’t want to go back to work? Do I get to ask for the money back? Wouldn’t it make more sense to maybe hire someone without highly specialized training and ask Cindy to work part-time after let’s say 12 weeks of maternity leave…. that way I can hire someone at a lower pay rate to be supervised by Cindy who gets to spend some considerable time with her baby and everything is good! Other solutions (that big companies can implement) is having subsidized in-site daycares, allowing some flexibility to telecommute when the job allows for it, and a number of other solutions that could financially and emotionally help support mothers without implying a huge loss to companies.

So, now for the part where maternity leave is good for children and therefore for society…. it just strikes a chord with me… Although it doesn’t quite say it, it implies that mothers who go back to work are not as good as mothers who stay and that children of mothers who go back to work are damaged goods. Look, I support your choice to be a stay at home mom if that is what you choose. It is your life and your priorities are different from mine, so I have no right to judge or tell you what you have to do, but all I ask is the same in return. The way I see it, there are advantages and disadvantages to both choices. In my case (from the perspective of a mother who chose to work and the daughter of a mother that worked a lot too) being a working mom instills certain values in children. My mom worked really really hard, and granted, our relationship has had some ups and downs, but her career was actually one of the things that has created a bond between us. Growing up I was so proud of my mom! She was so hardworking, and smart, and her lab was so cool, and I wanted to be just like her when I grew up. I spent so much time in her lab, and she was always able to help me with my science fair projects, and with my science classes in school! These days my work is a common topic of conversation for us and something that brings us together. When I finished my PhD, it meant the world to me to have my mom sitting during my defense and telling me how she thought my work was beautiful and she was so proud of me.

From the perspective of a mother who went back to work,  I see the advantage of making me an equal partner to my husband in all senses. Not only I feel good about the fact that I financially provide, but it has also made us equal partners in terms of childcare. My husband changes diapers, and is getting great at doing my daughter’s hair, and sometimes is in charge of bath time. If she gets sick or has a doctor’s appointment, we share the responsibility of making alternative plans. I often hear other mothers talk about how hard motherhood has been for them, and, don’t get me wrong, there have been challenges, but it has been relatively “easy” for me, and I wonder how much of that I have to attribute to the fact that my husband is more than just someone who helps….he actually shares the responsibility equally with me.

Parenting Advise

I am pretty sick or articles, blogs and studies about parenting and what methods are best to be adopted. Every time I read this I feel like I am breaking my child by choosing to go to work, not breastfeeding until they are 3, technically, not breastfeeding (exclusively pumping instead), not co-sleeping, letting self sooth, etc, etc, etc.

I have come to the following conclusion…. my mom worked, didn’t breastfeed me, didn’t co-sleep and was terribly strict with me…. if the worst case scenario is my daughter turning a little bit like me, I think I can live with that.

Seriously speaking, I try to be auto-critical and be aware of my shortcomings. I’d like to believe that they are a result of more deep seeded issues than whether my mom chose to sleep in the same room (or bed) as me when I was growing up. I think everyone’s circumstances and personalities are different and there are so many combinations of these that it is impossible to come up with a universal parenting solution. Besides, what is the outcome of being a good parent? That can also vary depending on what your priorities are. In my case, I want my child(ren) to be happy, but be good people. I want them to have a sense of responsibility and find a meaning in trying to make the world a better place. Most of those are things I can try to teach and set an example for…however, happiness is a bit trickier. I think that beyond looking at studies and reading articles, the best thing I can do to help my children be happy is to examine my life. In order to be most successful I need to be honest to myself and find the things that make me unhappy and try to find the root of such unhappiness. The beautiful thing is that I don’t have to share this with the world, so I can be completely honest and then try to apply those teaching into my parenting style…..

So, for instance… my biggest source of unhappiness is that I have a lot of insecurities. Where do these insecurities come from? Well, I think partly from being bullied as a child… which I can’t stop from happening to my kids, but I can teach them to stand up for themselves…beyond that, I can make sure that I try to minimize unnecessary criticism and praise them when they deserve to be praised. There will be times when I’ll get frustrated because they are disorganized, or not doing well in school….and I think it is important to be strict with them because at the end these are things that will help them be happy and successful, but I should never put them down. I also struggle with people. I am too critical and resentful and at the end of the day it only damages me. I can try to change that so that my kids don’t learn to hold grudges like I do, or be critical as I am. I can try to purposely say good things about other people so they learn to be positive.

So…..that is the rant of the day. Sometimes I think I need to stay away from parenting articles and groups….they make me just feel inadequate and bad. I need to remind myself that I am trying my best and that is what matters the most.

I am back!

Okay…..so, I took a hiatus from my blog….and a lot happened since then…. I am not sure if we can really call it hiatus, since I only posted 7 thins before, but, the blog is still there, and I have decided to write on it again…..

So, first of all, I am a mom…. I have to admit that back then I had some strong opinions about parenthood, and I ll be the first to admit that some of the things I felt or said back then came back to bite me in the ass….. But overall, most of my sentiments from back then still stand, although there may be an added perspective.

I still think people should be more careful about procreation. As expected, I really struggled during pregnancy because of the environmental and the carbon footprint my kid would have….so, I have taken some measures to, at the very least, ease my guilt. I tried the cloth diapers, but it was just not for me…however, I did find some Scandinavian diapers that claim to be like 70-80% biodegradable and have been using those since the beginning. I have not bought baby clothes, unless they come from consignment stores, and have been dressing my kid for 2 years on hand me downs. I went back to work, finished my PhD and got a post-doc, so the whole family relocated to a new city. I can sincerely say that I have barely bought any toys and did ask both families to try to exercise some control and not go overboard with gifts (this was not received with overwhelming joy, and created a whole lot of drama, but ultimately, I think ended up being sort of accepted and respected). When I do buy gifts I try to make it so they are sustainable….it is more expensive, but I much rather give one good gift than a million crappy ones.

My biggest hope for raising this child is to bring up a human being that understands how big the world is, and how there are people out there who live in circumstances we can’t even conceive. I hope this brings her a sense of responsibility and at the very least does enough with her life to not be a burden on this planet and humanity.

With that being said, sit back and enjoy as I will be posting some stuff I have written in this past years, but never posted.