Over 100 Americans die every day from opioid overdose, that’s about 40,000 a year. What can be done to reverse the recent spike in fatalities? In San Francisco, a team of public health workers is focused on treating the most vulnerable: homeless people on the city’s streets. My latest report for the BBC explores how this special ops “Street Team” is finding and convincing people to get the latest medical treatment, wherever they are.
It’s a timely issue as next month, San Francisco voters will decide if the city’s largest businesses, many of them tech companies, should pay a special tax to help fund more homeless shelters and addiction centers like the one I visited. The debate is dividing the tech community. Marc Benioff of Salesforce says “homelessness is everyone’s problem” and backs the special tax, but others like Twitter’s Jack Dorsey say it’s “unfair.” Love it or loathe it, the ballot measure proposes more funding and action to tackle homelessness and drug addiction in our most vulnerable population. These are complex and deep rooted problems with no quick fixes, but I applaud Marc Benioff and others like him for taking a stand.
Several medical workers and a heroin addict shared their ‘dream’ solutions to homelessness and addiction in the city. Their answers may surprise you.
If I had a magic wand, I’d just flash over the Twitter building, the Google building and say: hey guys, how about some compassion for folks, some kindness? When somebody talks to you in the street, look them in they eye. Planting that little seed of compassion and kindness goes a long way and I think that’s how the larger change in our city would happen. There’s a lot of hostility, a lot of misinformation. So if I had a magic wand, I’d just like flash it and say: compassion, compassion, compassion…kindness and a safe injection site! Ana Cuevas, health worker at the Tom Waddell Health Center, SF Public Health [Pictured above]
Here’s a transcript of my full report. A shorter version aired on the BBC World Service on October 24, 2018.
Atmos: San Francisco city street sounds: bus, cars, fans, people…
Alison van Diggelen: I’m here at City Hall in the center of San Francisco. Within yards of the building’s gleaming dome, there are clusters of homeless people, huddled in doorways, sprawled on pavements, or slowly pacing the streets.
Every week, Dr Barry Zevin and his team walk the city streets to build rapport with homeless people with addiction problems and offer on-the-spot treatment. Once trust is established, they encourage patients to visit the city’s public health clinic. Today, there’s a steady stream of homeless people…
Alison van Diggelen: Inside this clinic, known as the Tom Waddell Health Center, I meet James (not his real name) a former medic in the United States army, who recently started treatment for heroin addiction.
James: Right now I got a prescription refilled, and the doctor was like: do you need a shelter bed for tonight? Are there other things I can do for you? I’m very impressed with how kind and helpful they are…going above and beyond to find what else they can do for me.
Alison van Diggelen: James, who’s 30, has been prescribed buprenorphine to help wean him off his opioid addiction. Buprenorphine is a daily pill that reduces opioid cravings and the extreme physical pain of withdrawal. Despite being an addict for over ten years, James sincerely wants to change.
James: This medication allows me to do a detox less painfully and I no longer will have intense cravings for the substance of abuse. It’s definitely more comfortable than cold turkey…
Alison van Diggelen: James has been homeless in SF for about five months, after moving from Seattle. Being on the streets compounds his challenges as he faces fear and loneliness, as well as drug dealers.
James: I moved to this city not knowing a whole lot about it, so the areas I go, I’ve only operated in them under addiction scenarios. So being on something that blocks the receptors…I’m not so prone to go back to using it and therefore I can operate in these areas where there’s a lot of environmental triggers without having to…feel the same feelings of craving, to want to use.
Alison van Diggelen: Sarah Strieff is a registered nurse with the SF Public Health’s “Street team”. They regularly walk the city streets to identify vulnerable patients in need of healthcare and detox. As they pound the pavements, how does she and her team convince homeless people like James to start treatment?
Nurse Sarah Strieff [pictured above]:There’s two ways we identify people: our own outreach and street presence; and through other agencies in the city that bring people to our attention.
Alison van Diggelen: Sarah, who wears ripped jeans and a T-shirt explains how being inconspicuous, non-threatening is key to their outreach.
Sarah Strieff: It’s casual, we dress down, we don’t wear uniforms.
Alison van Diggelen:No lab coats?
Sarah Strieff: No lab coats. No! We talk to people where they’re at…We’ll go to Golden Gate Park, the Haight, Bay View…I do see a lot of people hanging out in the Tenderloin.
Alison van Diggelen: The clinic serves between 10 and 20 homeless people during its daily 4-hour clinic. No appointments are necessary and you don’t need insurance. Ana Cuevas works with Sarah on the “Street Team.”
Ana Cuevas: We try to build a relationship first and check in with folks. That’s the reason why our program is so successful. Everyone who works here sees people first, then patients. Check in and ask what they need and try to deliver, not impose my own agenda on them.
Alison van Diggelen: The clinic delivers a comprehensive health care treatment plan, prescriptions for detox medications and even helps patients find a roof for the night.
Starting conversations about drug use is a sensitive process, and it takes weeks, months, even years for the Street Team to build trust with people on the street and at needle exchange facilities. For that reason, I wasn’t allowed to go on their rounds with them.
Ana Cuevas:It’s not hello: what’s your social security number, what’s your medical history? No, it’s like: who are you? How can we help you? We just listen… we just go with the flow.
Alison van Diggelen: Ana Cuevas describes the process as “Motivational interviewing” which involves a lot of listening, and no judgment.
Ana Cuevas:If someone comes in and says: Hey Ana, I’ve been using a lot. I’m not going to say: you shouldn’t do that! (instead): what are your thoughts around that? What’s happened with that? And then just kinda carry that conversation like that. One of the biggest problems with health care is that there’s often not enough time to listen. That’s the root of motivational interviewing: being present, listening and then figuring out solutions together.
Alison van Diggelen: Dr Barry Zevin is the Medical Director of Street Medicine and his team treats about 500 homeless patients a year, many of whom are addicted to opioids.
Dr Barry Zevin:When we treat them with buprenorphine or methadone – long acting, continuous stimulation of these receptors in the brain, without the sudden highs and sudden withdrawals that come with a short acting drug – these longer acting medications can really change and repair what the dysfunction of the brain is and all of the physiological stress responses people have. The physiology of someone using street opioids has really gone wrong, and that causes depression, anxiety, stress, physical disease, decreases in the immune system…a whole cascade of things go wrong that can go right when we replace that with long-acting, high affinity to the opioid receptor in the brain medication.
Alison van Diggelen: The health worker, Ana Cuevas, recalls a twenty year-old woman the team was able to help and within a week she was reunited with her family and on the road to recovery.
But Dr Zevin admits such cases are outliers.
Dr Barry Zevin:We’re in era of fentanyl contaminated drugs. It’s found its way into the drugs…They’re super potent…The risk of overdose is much higher now than it was 5 years ago. I’m talking with people every day and any day they’re at risk from having an overdose or fatal overdose bc of this new trend in drug supply.
Alison van Diggelen: The clinic treats a small percentage of the estimated 20,000 intravenous drug users in San Francisco, but Dr Zevin insists it has ripple effects. By targeting the most vulnerable people and achieving results, he’s convinced it inspires others to get treatment. He considers it a remarkable success that about one third of his patients are still in touch with the team and on treatment after a year.
Dr Barry Zevin: I always describe our model as effective but not very efficient.…We see them a lot. Once a week is not enough for some patients. With the level of instability, the level of things that can happen to people..If people are in a street or a park or a shelter, it’s a lot easier to bring the medical care to them, than wait in an office for them to finally make it to an appointment.
Alison van Diggelen: This SF program is just one of several similar schemes across the United States in Boston and in Texas. They’re often run in conjunction with needle exchanges and low barrier shelters, so that addicts can get the full support they need. Is the solution policy changes, more shelters and more funding? Healthcare worker, Ana Cuevas offers a more profound insight.
Ana Cuevas:Honestly, the most challenging part is changing the way our larger community views our population. Our folks, a lot of their humanity has been taken away…
If I had a magic wand, I’d just flash over the Twitter building, the Google building and say: hey guys, how about some compassion for folks, some kindness? When somebody talks to you in the street, look them in they eye. Planting that little seed of compassion and kindness goes a long way and I think that’s how the larger change in our city would happen. There’s a lot of hostility, a lot of misinformation.
So if I had a magic wand, I’d just like flash it and say: compassion, compassion, compassion…kindness and a safe injection site!
Alison van Diggelen: This viewpoint is echoed by James, the drug addict who recently started treatment.
James:It’s a matter of empathy I think. I would ask anybody in charge of policy…people might not seem kind or deserving of help, but they’re all people who may be in different stages of grief or suffering and to realize that it takes kindness to bring it out.
Alison van Diggelen: What are his hopes for the future?
James:I’m trained as a chef, I worked as a medic in the military. There’s things in both these fields I’d like to be doing…
It’s estimated that there are over half a million tech job openings in the United States. A new initiative, the Tech Jobs Tour aims to connect “non-traditional” talent with tech job opportunities. It targets women, people of color, LGBTQs, veterans and disabled workers. Alison van Diggelen attended the San Francisco stop, on assignment for the BBC World Service.
“This is a crisis. There are so many open jobs. We have to come together as a country and solve this problem. We’re bringing people together…making connections to the Googles and Amazons of the world,” Leanne Pittsford, Founder Lesbians Who Tech
“Let’s make it so people can really build their own creative confidences, so that we can field the whole American team, the whole world team,” Megan Smith, former CTO for the Obama Administration
Or to the segment below, which includes bonus material that didn’t make the final BBC cut: a provocative rap by cyber security student, Chris Brooks (starts @6:00).
Here’s a transcript of the segment and a longer version my report (including highlights from Chris Brooks’s rap):
BBC Click Host, Gareth Mitchell: There are half a million vacancies in technology in the United States, so lots of people re-skilling. To help that along is a Tech Jobs Tour. It’s part road show, part boot camp, part job center. Alison van Diggelen was taking part in one recently. The tour rolled into San Francisco…
[Event atmos fade in…]
On stage:Service designer, front end designer, UX designer, full stack developer…
Alison van Diggelen: This is the Tech Jobs Tour. Stop number 8 on a 50 city tour of the US. Its aim: to connect “non-traditional” talent with tech job opportunities. This national initiative target women, people of color, LGBTQs, veterans and disabled workers.
Chris Brooks is here with his brother Dontay. They’re doing a 6-month coding bootcamp at the Stride Center in Oakland. Their dream jobs? Cyber security…
Dontay: We saw the opportunity for school and we just ran with it. We seen this conference right here and it looked exciting. We want to network, get our names out there. You gotta show up to do anything!
Alison van Diggelen: Do you feel through tech you can make your life better?
Chris Brooks: Taking advantage of any opportunity, any avenue we can go down…Really, I’m just trying to get my foot in the door…
Alison van Diggelen: The brothers are part of an eclectic group of aspiring techies who queued up around the block for this rare chance to meet some tech movers and shakers. I spoke with an Air Force vet, ex-entertainers, burned-out math teachers, fashionistas and an unemployed retails workers.
Megan Smith, former CTO of President Obama’s White House is one of the keynote speakers tonight and a powerful advocate for diversity…
Megan Smith: It’s like a career fair meets kind of a revival…All around are people from this community desperate for talent. 2000 people signed up tonight…people are coming out, they want to understand. The businesses need this talent. Really, it’s an ecosystem lift.
Alison van Diggelen: The evening features onstage Q&A with diverse speakers, face time with reps from major tech companies via “speed mentoring” and lots of networking opportunities. Tech Jobs Tour founder, Leanne Pittsford, paints their mission in stark terms, describing the half a million unfilled tech jobs…
Leanne Pittsford: There’s talent everywhere. This is a crisis. There are so many open jobs. We have to come together as a country and solve this problem. We’re bringing people together…making connections to the Googles and Amazons of the world.
Megan Smith extends that message globally.
Megan Smith: Let’s make it so people can really build their own creative confidences, so that we can field the whole American team, the whole world team. People would opt in with the passion of what they want to solve…
Alison van Diggelen: Be that social justice, the environmental crisis, poverty, etc…As well as tech hubs like Silicon Valley, the Tech Jobs Tour is stopping at a regions hardest hit by tech disruption and job off-shoring including Tennessee, Kentucky, and Wisconsin.
Leanne Pittsford: We really need investment in the middle of the country in places that typically don’t get funding from Silicon Valley.
Pittsford is also a women’s rights activist and founder of Lesbians Who Tech, an advocacy group.
Leanne Pittsford:We believe in intentional inclusion…there’s no way to remove bias. We’re programmed to hire people like us…that feels less risky. We believe in quotas, setting goals: all of our speakers…50% women, 50% people of color. We urge companies to set the same type of quotas…goals.
Photo caption: Stride Center instructor, Willie Lockett brought his class to the Tech Jobs Tour in SF. Photo by Alison van Diggelen, Fresh Dialogues
Alison van Diggelen: Pittsford says that about 60% of new technical people are getting their education* from short online courses and coding boot camps…a more affordable path for what she calls “non-traditional” talent. *It’s a trend highlighted this week by Hari Sreenivasan on the PBS Newshour
I chat with Audrey Zwibelman, one victim of tech disruption. A former apparel merchandiser at Macy’s, Gap and Levi’s. She’s doing what she describes as a mid-career pivot.
Audrey Zwibelman: My job moved to NY. It’s an industry that’s kind of dead or dying. The customer is shopping in a different way…
She’s bullish about training and job opportunities both here in Silicon Valley and across the world.
Audrey Zwibelman: No matter where you live, you can find those resources online. The remote accessibility that everyone has to be part of a company, means that people can work wherever they are. I think the opportunities are kinda limitless.
Leanne Pittsford sums up her goal for the Tech Jobs Tour…
Leanne Pittsford: Helping American innovation thrive… changing the face of tech and helping American innovation thrive. Diversity is better for your products, your team, and your bottom line. It affects all of us as an industry and as a country.
We have a community here today that is working really hard to change the landscape…trying to build a strong pipeline that represents the diversity of America…so if you’re hiring…
Alison van Diggelen: As yet, the model is unproven, but the team is traveling in hope.
Bonus Material
Here are highlights from Chris Brooks’s rap:
Chris Brooks: Climbing up a mountain
Young brother how come
Everybody’s dying by these guns?
I keep walking without one
Not trying to kill my brother
I’m trying to kill an album
Sell my story
Cos a good income’s a good outcome
Coming in due time
Millennials’ new minds
They tell them you look here
I tell you, you’re too blind
Just take a look around
My brother you’ll soon find
That the world is yours
Don’t let the hesitation haunt you…
Photo caption: Chris Brooks and his brother Dontay. Both are cyber security students at the Stride Center in Oakland.
In the beginning…there was no word from Silicon Valley tech leaders on Donald Trump’s presidency, despite his kingly proclamations: Let there be Two Pipelines, Let there be a Wall…Let there not be TPP!
But on the seventh day, tech leaders arose against Trump’s dominion over them when his immigration order unleashed chaos for their people. And so, on the 16th day, they filed a legal brief saying the order inflicted “significant harm on American business, innovation and growth.”
Today in San Francisco a US Court of Appeals will decide oral arguments in the case: State of Washington et al. vs Donald J. Trump et al..
I joined the BBC World Service’s Business Matters last night to report on Silicon Valley’s furious reaction to Trump. Venture capitalist, Jean-Louis Gasse spoke for many in the valley:
“The danger with an administration or a president like Donald Trump is that he gives permission to lie…to be offensive, to be homophobic, to be xenophobic. Cultures are nothing but a system of permissions and those come from the top. When you see the President of the US lying – you have to stand up and say: it’s a lie!”Jean-Louis Gasse, Silicon Valley venture capitalist
Here’s a transcript of our conversation (edited for length and clarity) and a longer version of my report:
Fergus Nicoll: Donald Trump says he is pro-business. But a lot of businesses, it seems, are not pro-Trump. They’re certainly not in favor of his attempt to restrict immigration. Almost 100 mainly tech companies have filed an amicus brief arguing that the ban – already the subject of a separate legal process – inflicts significant harm on American business. Who’s signed up? Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter and belatedly Tesla. I’ll hand over to Alison in a moment – but first, let’s hear from Emily Dreyfuss at the tech news website Wired in Boston.
Emily Dreyfuss: By some estimates, half of unicorn startups in America were founded by an immigrant. These big companies, Apple, Google, Facebook: they depend on H1-B visa holders. 85,000 H1-B visas go to the tech community every year in America. This is affecting their bottom line. Yes, there is some risk but I think these technology companies are calculating that together they are stronger which is why they’ve signed on to this amicus brief. I think what we’re seeing here is a clash of ideology and business acumen. In this instance, Trump saying he’s pro-business is actually just talk.
Fergus Nicoll: Is that a fair summary then, Alison…the way it’s seen on the west coast?
Alison van Diggelen: Trump is saying that he’s pro-business (and I believe he intends to be), but it looks like his immigration ban has not been thought through… as to the impact it’s going to have on business. It’s been severely criticized .
I’ve been closely watching Silicon Valley’s reaction to the Trump presidency since inauguration day. When Trump issued that immigration order some Silicon Valley leaders were compelled to break their silence and take action. It’s an issue that’s split the US in two. A CNN poll shows about 53% oppose the ban. But today Trump has said that negative polls about the travel ban are “fake news.” He accused the NY Times of making up stories and sources. So my report explores why Trump is getting under Silicon Valley’s skin via this travel ban and the role of lies and fake news.
The day after he was inaugurated, Silicon Valley took to the streets to protest. Tens of thousands of marchers carried placards saying “Stop the hate”; “Words Matter”, and “Never Again.” I asked Patrick Adams, a local science teacher…What’s your message for Trump?
Patrick Adams: Get out of the way…this is a tsunami, this is people who care deeply about what this country really stands for – which is inclusion and love and hope – it’s unstoppable. This idea: that the trickle down economics of neoliberalism and the strange backward thinking of racism is going to lead us to a better world? It’s not, it’s a dead end.
Alison van Diggelen: In the first week of Trump’s presidency, it appeared like “business as usual” here in SV. On day seven, Trump’s immigration order lit the fire under SV.
By day 10, protests had broken out at several tech campuses; and business leaders came out of their bunkers to voice concerns about the order’s morality, not just its economic impact. It was personal: almost 60% of Silicon Valley engineers are foreign born.
I spoke with Meg Whitman, CEO of Hewlett Packard Enterprise, a company born here in 1939:
Meg Whitman: Our view is that this was a mistake. We are a nation of immigrants and a broad-brush sweep of seven countries, of Muslims in those seven countries, is not what America is. So I hope that the president rethinks…
If you think of the innovation that’s been done in the valley over the last 75 years, much of it is from people who came here from someplace else … that’s an economic engine of the country and an economic engine of the world…
Alison van Diggelen: Alphabet’s chairman, Eric Schmidt even described the Trump administration actions as “evil” but many responses were muted.
I contacted companies, from oil to solar; from startups to Fortune 500, but many declined to talk, even LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman who was an outspoken critic of candidate Trump. Why the silence?
Is it the prospect of Trump unleashing his Twitter followers? Kevin Surace, CEO at Appvance, a software company, sums it up:
Kevin Surace:No one wants the current leader of the free world to unleash something against them. And frankly as a CEO of a corporation, it’s your duty to your shareholders to not have the US government hate you…the last thing you want is the president saying: I’ve had it with your company, I’m going to slap tariffs on you…
Alison van Diggelen: Surace emphasizes that the stock market is up over 8% since the election and the Dow hit the symbolic 20,000 point milestone last month. Trump even hosted a “cordial” tech summit with many of the valley’s leaders. Three juicy carrots are now dangling their way: the prospect of infrastructure investment, a corporate tax cut and a huge tax break for the repatriation of $2.5 Trillion in corporate profits lying offshore.
Kevin Surace: If that all comes back to the US, it’ll be the biggest boom to the US economy, possibly ever. For the next 10 years, the economy will be on fire.
Alison van Diggelen: Nevertheless, venture capitalist, Jean-Louis Gasse addresses the disquiet in Silicon Valley. He points to H1-B visa concerns as well as a flood of uncertainties:
Jean-Louis Gasse: The stock market is up, up, up right now which we know could turn around on a dime…
It’s not good for biz to have too many uncertainties on immigration, on trade wars, on interest rates, on spending, on building a wall with Mexico…
Alison van Diggelen: Gasse was Steve Jobs’ right hand man when Apple first expanded into Europe. I asked him to sum up the Valley’s reaction to Trump:
Jean-Louis Gasse: They’re waking up to the fact that just like you need clean air and clean water… you need clean information for society to be healthy. It’s an issue of conscience for the people in tech to get up and say we’re going to fight fake news – especially the ones that stem from the top. The danger with an administration or a president like Donald Trump is that he gives permission to lie. … to be offensive…to be homophobic, to be xenophobic… Cultures are nothing but a system of permissions and those come from the top. When you see the President of the US lying – you have to stand up and say: it’s a lie!
Continues….
Check back soon for part II when we discuss:
Elon Musk’s role in Trump’s economic advisory council and why his decision to stay is so controversial, especially after Uber’s CEO stood down.
And Silicon Valley Leadership Group’s CEO Carl Guardino’s advice to Trump.
It’s day four of the Donald Trump presidency and he’s already infuriated women’s rights campaigners, the environmental movement and free trade advocates by signing controversial executive orders. Tech mastermind, Steven Levy put it best in his latest tech report: God help us all.
Millions around the world took to the streets within hours of Trump’s inauguration, in anticipation of these actions and more to come. The San Jose Women’s March took place here in Silicon Valley on Saturday, and in my twenty years in the South Bay, I’ve never witnessed such an outpouring of alarm, dismay and rage. One 70-year old educator I interviewed said that this was the first time in her life, she’s ever felt the need to stand up and take to the streets: not for women’s rights, not for civil rights, but to protest Trump’s presidency. And she was fired up. Today, my report aired on the BBC World Service.
One protester had this message for Silicon Valley tech leaders:
“Lead with faith, lead with truth, and lead with a kind of human dignity that is absent in a lot of our daily conversations…They gotta get rid of the fake news, people are being led down a kind of primrose path, thinking that by being angry and violent they’re going to create a better world for the future…that’s not the path, the truth, the reality that everyone can see here today,” Patrick Adams, science teacher at Bellarmine College Preparatory School in San Jose
Gareth Mitchell: The President Elect became President on Friday….the crowds were back on the streets on Saturday, this time in protest at the new administration. The marches around the world were led by women, but in Silicon Valley, the tech people, male and female were venting their concerns too, along with scientists, and entrepreneurs, all of them worried by Trump’s stance on trade, innovation, science and the climate. It comes in an era of disquiet about Facebook and fake news, of post truth and cyber threats. To gauge the sentiment, our reporter in Silicon Valley, Alison van Diggelen, was at one of the marches.
Alison van Diggelen: I’m here at the San Jose Women’s March in the center of Silicon Valley and the women are out in force…
Alison: That was Yogacharya O’Brian, founder of the Center for Spiritual Enlightenment and one of the rally’s powerful speakers.
Alison van Diggelen: Silicon Valley took to the streets in record numbers on Saturday to protest the country’s new president. Donald Trump’s proposed tax cuts and infrastructure investment could benefit the tech community; the U.S. economy and many of those marching in Silicon Valley. As could his plans to repatriate millions of dollars of tech companies’ overseas profits. Last month Trump even hosted a cordial summit with some top tech leaders. Despite all this, many in this community are fearful of what his presidency might mean for innovation, transparency, multiculturalism, and social progress.
Nick Shackleford: I’m here because of Trump’s election…he is bringing America back in time instead of leading us forward. As a nation we need to go forward and not backwards.
Alison van Diggelen: Here in the world tech center of innovation, what do you expect from this community of innovators?
Nick Shackleford: Like you said, we are innovators and I think we’re going to continue to innovate and lead the country – and sometimes the world – in the innovations that are being developed here in the Silicon Valley. And we have a lot of millionaires and billionaires who are liberal, believe in the cause and are true Californians and they will continue their fight, be it with their money, and their power or just lending their voice to causes that are important to our nation.
Alison van Diggelen: What would you say to Mark Zuckerberg and people like him with power?
Nick Shackleford: I think Mark Zuckerberg did not to enough to stop the fake news. I think he cared more about (getting it re-shared and) his personal stake in his company…and he can’t convince me otherwise. He’s to blame for a lot of the fake media.
Alison van Diggelen: What would you have him do?
.
Nick Shackleford: I’ve reported about 100 things in the last six months and nothing has been in violation of their policy, but I’ve seen other people get the same picture and be sent to Facebook jail for it. So he’s not consistent, there needs to be more transparency on this fake news fight.
Patrick Adams: They gotta get rid of the fake news, people are being led down a kind of primrose path thinking that by being angry and violent they’re going to create a better world for the future…that’s not the path, the truth, the reality that everyone can see here today.
Alison van Diggelen:Patrick Adams was one of many men who came out to support the women’s march. Like many protesters who couldn’t keep quiet, he was energized by the proliferation of fake news, and Trump’s use of “alternative facts” which continues this week in the heated dispute over his inauguration numbers. Adams had a message for Silicon Valley’s tech leaders….
Patrick Adams: Lead with faith, lead with truth, and lead with a kind of human dignity that is absent in a lot of our daily conversations …Everywhere I go I see wonderful, amazing, beautiful people working together to make this future happen and I also see people who’re giving up…either to escape into an alternate world of the Internet or they want to pretend that this doesn’t affect them. But if affects everyone. Everyone is involved.
Yogacharya O’Brian: We do not wait for you to lead with sons and with daughters in hand, with husbands and with wives, lovers and friends by our side…we march!
Crowd chanting, cheering
[End of report]
Gareth Mitchell: What do you make of the comments you heard there, Bill Thomson?
Bill Thomson: It was fascinating to hear via Alison’s excellent report just how confused people are, and how uncertain they are; and how many different perspectives there are. For me, as a member of the press, what we need to be doing is reporting effectively on what’s actually happening, not just reporting on an agenda set by politicians…So the limitations on women’s reproductive rights, the Keystone XL pipeline, the Dakota Access pipeline, the Transpacific Trade Partnership, the nomination of the Supreme Court justice, are all far more important than the size of Trump’s inauguration crowd.
There’s a real sense from Alison’s report that many people are confused because they don’t know what’s actually going on and are trying to project on that. It’s the role of us in the press to cut through that and be much clearer about what’s actually happening and not get dragged into debates or agendas set by other people.
On this historic inauguration day – that most of us thought we’d never see – I was invited by the BBC to opine on Trump’s likely impact on the economy, Silicon Valley tech in particular. My remit: to balance some of the pro-Trump hoopla from other guests, businessmen from the U.K. and U.S. who seem to believe that he will “make America (and the UK) great again” overnight. You can listen to the BBC podcast here. Our conversation starts at 20:50.
BBC’s Colletta Smith: Also joining us is Alison van Diggelen, a Silicon Valley journalist. Good morning Alison.
Alison van Diggelen: Good morning. Good to join you.
Colletta Smith: You’re in Silicon Valley where businesses have voiced quite a lot of concern about the incoming president. What are your feelings this morning, waking up in Silicon Valley ahead of what’s going to be such a momentous day?
Alison van Diggelen: It’s going to be a very historic day…But the fact is, over 140 tech leaders signed a letter saying Donald Trump is a danger to innovation* and as you know Silicon Valley is an innovation hub, it’s one of the engines of growth for the United States. So there’s a deep feeling of malaise and fear…but at the same time business leaders are pragmatic, they’ve accepted that he will be our president and there’s a “business as usual” mentality amidst that underlying feeling of fear and uncertainty.
*The exact words of the letter were: “Trump would be a disaster for innovation. His vision stands against the open exchange of ideas, free movement of people, and productive engagement with the outside world that is critical to our economy — and that provide the foundation for innovation and growth.”
We also discuss Trump’s protectionist, anti-science, anti-environment stance, the fears of a trade war; his cabinet picks and his potential negative impact on jobs, especially clean tech jobs.
James: Right now I got a prescription refilled, and the doctor was like: do you need a shelter bed for tonight? Are there other things I can do for you? I’m very impressed with how kind and helpful they are…going above and beyond to find what else they can do for me.
Alison van Diggelen: The clinic delivers a comprehensive health care treatment plan, prescriptions for detox medications and even helps patients find a roof for the night.
