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Iams Dog Active Maturity Formula (Archived)
Date of last review
Sun March 5, 2006
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Corn Meal, Chicken By-Product Meal, Ground Whole Grain Sorghum, Fish Meal (source of fish oil), Chicken, Ground Whole Grain Barley, Dried Beet Pulp (sugar removed), Dried Egg Product, Chicken Fat (preserved with mixed Tocopherols, a source of vitamin E, and Citric Acid), Natural Chicken Flavor, Brewers Dried Yeast, Potassium Chloride, Salt, DL-Methionine, Choline Chloride, Ferrous Sulfate, Vitamin E Supplement, Beta-Carotene, Zinc Oxide, Ascorbic Acid, Manganese Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, L-Carnitine, Manganous Oxide, Vitamin A Acetate, Calcium Pantothenate, Biotin, Rosemary Extract, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Thiamine Mononitrate (source of vitamine B1), Niacin, Riboflavin Supplement (source of vitamin B2), Inositol, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride (source of vitamin B6), Vitamin D3 Supplement, Potassium Iodide, Folic Acid, Cobalt Carbonate.
Guaranteed Analysis:
Crude Protein (minimum) 24%
Crude Fat (minimum) 10%
Moisture (maximum) 10%
Crude Fiber (maximum) 5%
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Registered: October 2005
Posts: 3953
Review Date:
Sun March 5, 2006
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Insufficient meat content, by-products, low quality grains and other controversial filler.
The primary ingredient in the food is a low quality grain. Corn is a problematic grain that is difficult for dogs to digest and thought to be the cause of a great many allergy and yeast infection problems. We prefer not to see this used in dog food, yet it is the primary grain in this food.
The next ingredient in this food is by-products. It is impossible to ascertain the quality of by-products and these are usually products that are of such low quality as to be rejected for use in the human food chain, or else are those parts that have so little value that they cannot be used elsewhere in either the human or pet food industries. The AAFCO definition of chicken by-product meal is a meal consisting of the ground, rendered, clean parts of the carcass of slaughtered chicken, such as necks, feet, undeveloped eggs and intestines, exclusive of feathers, except in such amounts as might occur unavoidable in good processing practice.
Sorghum is a carbohydrate source low in digestibility. We consider it primarily filler.
Fish meal, fourth on the ingredient list, is the sole named meat product in the food. We note that the manufacturer does not claim to use ethoxyquin-free sources (ethoxyquin is a chemical preservative commonly added to fish destined for meal, and is believed to be carcinogenic). There is a further meat meal ingredient 7th on the ingredient list, but this is a bit too far down to make up an appreciable portion of the food.
Barley is a decent quality grain but beet pulp is further filler and a controversial ingredient it is a by-product, being dried residue from sugar beets which has been cleaned and extracted in the process of manufacturing sugar. It is a controversial ingredient in dog food, claimed by some manufacturers to be a good source of fibre, and derided by others as an ingredient added to slow down the transition of rancid animal fats and causing stress to kidney and liver in the process. We note that beet pulp is an ingredient that commonly causes problems for dogs, including allergies and ear infections, and prefer not to see it used in dog food. There are less controversial products around if additional fibre is required.
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Anthony Bordain
It may be unprecedented for one of the hippest shows on TV to be devoted to food and travel, but Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations, the Travel Channel's megahit, has a devoted following obsessed with the host's "food and travel porn," as he's described it. Whether Bourdain is reporting from Cuba, Thailand, Japan or the Ozarks, he's irreverent, irrepressible and irresistible. His travels take him from New York, where he ate cowboy rib eye with Bill Murray, to a private dinner in Nicaragua, where the menu included bull testicles. Bourdain is proudly anti–politically correct and opinionated. The New York Times called him an "acerbically funny raconteur and takedown artist who generates clouds of web traffic each time he eviscerates a bloated personality or calls out a restaurant for bogus tactics." Acknowledging the colorful language that's often bleeped on his show, The Boston Phoenix has said, "The things that come out of Anthony Bourdain's mouth are frequently as bold as the things that go in."
Bourdain, who was born in New York and raised in New Jersey, attended the Culinary Institute of America before running the kitchen at such Manhattan restaurants as One Fifth Avenue, Sullivan's and Brasserie Les Halles, where he became known for his rustic French cooking. His life took a detour into what he describes as a harrowing cocaine and heroin addiction before he kicked drugs and began his career as a writer of best-selling books, including Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly, about his exploits as a chef, which led, in 2005, to No Reservations. These days the Travel Channel sometimes seems it could be renamed the Anthony Bourdain Channel—he's a ubiquitous presence, with his shows often airing more than 20 hours a week. On certain days it's possible to sit in front of the television and watch Bourdain from breakfast to dinner. The latest: a new Travel Channel series called The Layover, which he describes as "faster, more democratic and more caffeinated than No Rez. But just as obnoxious."
Besides producing, hosting and writing his shows, Bourdain is also an occasional judge on Top Chef. He has written novels—he's at work on a new crime novel—has co-written a soon-to-be-published graphic novel and is a regular writer for the HBO series Treme. Bourdain, who is 55, is married to Ottavia Busia, whom he met on a blind date. Although he once said he'd be a "shit parent," he dotes on his four-year-old daughter.
To interview Bourdain, we sent Contributing Editor David Sheff, who recently interviewed Congressman Barney Frank and MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell for us, to New York City. "Bourdain lives up to his reputation," Sheff reports. "He's charming and amusing and never shy about sharing his opinions of famous chefs, aphrodisiacs, politics or the nation's best barbecue. It's the first interview I've done that caused me to laugh, inspired wanderlust and made me hungry."
PLAYBOY: You're just back from Cuba and Hong Kong for a few days, and then you head to Naples and the Congo, which is a typical schedule for you lately. How often are you away from home?
BOURDAIN: I travel about 220 days a year.
PLAYBOY: Are you perpetually jet-lagged and burned out?
BOURDAIN: I don't get jet-lagged, and I look at long flights as an opportunity to sleep. I smell jet fuel, I pass out. It's a Pavlovian response.
PLAYBOY: You've done shows from places such as Japan, Beirut and Egypt that have been in the news after natural disasters and upheavals. What has been your reaction?
BOURDAIN: For me these places become about the people I meet. My first thoughts go to them. Japan is overwhelming. What can you say about it? I'm still trying to figure out what the fuck is going on in the Middle East. I don't know that I'm smart enough to say anything intelligent about what's going on over there, but listen, if Thomas Friedman can disappear up his own ass and not see daylight, what hope is there for me to understand it? Who knows who's going to end up in power in Egypt or Libya or any of those places? We don't know if the next asshole is going to be any better than the previous asshole, but at least it's a new asshole. In Egypt we saw that most people's diet was bread and some lentils, nothing else. We wanted to film that, and our government handlers suddenly got very upset. What were they so frightened of? They wanted us to show the wealthy two percent who live spectacularly.
PLAYBOY: Do foreign governments often try to control what you film?
BOURDAIN: In some countries it becomes clear that our driver's or translator's day job is working for the secret police. It's not a problem, because at the end of the day I can come back to America and say whatever the fuck I want. I can say, "Look at these assholes." I come home from Romania and I'm free to say, "Look at the dog-and-pony show they put on for us." So yeah, sometimes the government shows us what they want us to see, but sometimes they take a chance; they trust us not to screw them. They go against their instincts and let a Western crew in. It can be harder when they let us do whatever we want. There's a responsibility. We'll go to a country that doesn't have the kind of freedom of speech that we enjoy, where there are consequences for what you say, particularly about certain issues. A lot of nice people are open with us, are frank with us, both on camera and off. Afterward it's easy for me to go back home and say what I think about Chinese policy on Tibet, but I have to think about all the people who were nice to me, who let me into their homes, who were openhearted and kind and helped us—people who may have hard questions to answer if we do a show critical of their country. I try to find a way to balance that. It's a constraint, but I'm not fucking Dan Rather. Presumably this is a food and travel show, but sometimes the elephant in the room is unavoidable. If you're in Laos and your host is missing two limbs, it's worth mentioning. "Hey, fella, how'd you lose those limbs?"
PLAYBOY: Your host was missing two limbs? What happened?
BOURDAIN: Thank you, America. So you state the fact that we dumped a hell of a lot of cluster bomblets into Laos on the way back to Saigon many years ago. One week I'll get a lot of angry mail from couch Rambos on the right, and the next my brethren on the left are screaming bloody murder because I'm taking a sustained piss on Danny Ortega.
PLAYBOY: What exactly happened when you tried to feed starving kids who'd gathered around your film shoot in Haiti?
BOURDAIN: It turned to shit.
PLAYBOY: It was reported that there was a mini riot—hungry children totally out of control.
BOURDAIN: What happened was something I would never in a million years have considered. You make a feel-good gesture, like I'm going to feed these kids, and then it all turns to shit.
PLAYBOY: Why did you decide to air it?
BOURDAIN: What am I supposed to do, make myself all noble because I'm feeding these kids and then cut away before the shit happens? I feel I have a contract with people who watch the show, so if a scene turns to shit like that and I pretend it didn't happen, it's grotesquely dishonest and a betrayal of everybody concerned. I don't mind looking like an asshole on television or looking like an idiot if that was the reality of the situation. I'm not looking to make Jackass, but by the same token, if things don't work out for me or are uncomfortable, or what I thought was reality turns out to be the opposite, well, there it is. I mean, I'm vain—I'm just not that vain.
PLAYBOY: If you found yourself in a situation like that again, how would you handle it?
BOURDAIN: I'd probably make the same mistake again. I'd try to do it better, though. At the end of the day, I'm trying to find a way to feed the kids. Who wouldn't?
PLAYBOY: You went to see Sean Penn in Haiti. You tweeted, "Don't know what he's like in L.A. In Haiti? Not a dick." How did you end up with him on your show?
BOURDAIN: I called him. [Penn has been doing relief work in Haiti since the earthquake.] I said, "I'm going to be in Haiti. I want to come by." We're in a position now that we can do that, call up whoever we want, and some of them want to come on the show. We're getting a little cocky over it. It started with the Bill Murray thing.
PLAYBOY: How did he wind up on your show?
BOURDAIN: My sidekick for a lunch dropped out, and the chef at the restaurant we were going to said, "Well, how about Bill Murray? Do you want him?" and I'm like, "Yeah, right." The next day, Bill Murray's there, and for the whole scene I'm sitting there thinking, I can't believe Bill Murray's on my show. Why is Bill Murray on my show? How is this happening? We reached a point where we suddenly realized the shockingly high number of people we worship and revere who actually like the show and might actually come on if we ask.
PLAYBOY: Like Ted Nugent, who, given your liberal politics, seems like an odd choice.
BOURDAIN: I like mixing it up, even with politics. What do I share with Ted Nugent? Barbecue and rock and roll, but I want different kinds of people on. I don't have a lot of respect for people who preach to the converted. You know, it's too fucking easy sitting up there with your smug-ass face and your fancy suit, saying, "Look at these idiot Tea Party people. They're so stupid." I don't know about Bill Maher or Glenn Beck. I don't think either of those assholes are coming out of their trailers, frankly. Why the fuck can't I get along with Ted Nugent, eat some barbecue on a person-to-person basis? I'm not saying it's the answer to world peace, but why not? I know he has a lot of views that I loathe, but I also know he's a hardworking fucking rock-and-roller. We have things in common. He's an ultraconservationist. Rock and roll. He's a hard worker. But he does have an insane loathing of the Obamas that I consider ugly. We were on a radio show together talking about the Michelle Obama school lunch initiative. I said, "This is a matter of military readiness and patriotism, Ted."
PLAYBOY: How is her campaign against childhood obesity patriotic?
BOURDAIN: We might need to draft these kids to fight off terrorists and invaders. Sarah Palin and all these others, are they arguing that one out of seven or two out of seven kids having type 2 diabetes within the next few years is a good thing? I fully support your right as an adult to eat yourself to death. I would greatly prefer that if you're going to eat yourself to death, you enjoy yourself while doing it. But a morbidly obese kid? No, that is wrong. What happens when all those evil Canadians and Mexicans and Al Qaeda come pouring across the border and rape our families on our shag carpets right in front of us, and we're too fat and unhealthy to do anything about it?
PLAYBOY: How would you convert kids to eat healthier when McDonald's is a normal dinner for many families?
BOURDAIN: I'd scare the living shit out of a kid.
PLAYBOY: How would you scare them?
BOURDAIN: Come on, Ronald McDonald's a clown! He's already scary. You don't tell your kids to read Michael Pollan. They won't. Instead you lie. I'm not suggesting that one do this, because that could cause liability problems, but what if, hypothetically speaking, one were to suggest that Ronald was implicated in the disappearance and dismemberment of a number of small children?
PLAYBOY: Do you acknowledge that many people like McDonald's?
BOURDAIN: I understand why people eat at McDonald's. It's convenient, it's fast and it's relatively cheap. Snobbery is not the way to convince people to stay away. It's the food you need right now when you want it. You may hate yourself afterward, but you feel that way about crack, too.
PLAYBOY: Will you ever eat a quick burger on the run?
BOURDAIN: I'll go to In-N-Out. They're much better. Eric Schlosser writes about it in Fast Food Nation. I'm all for cheap burgers but not so cheap that you use outer parts of the carcass that have potentially been exposed to feces and other contaminants. No extremities.
PLAYBOY: But you're famous for eating extremities—testicles and tails, for example.
BOURDAIN: Not these. The New York Times said that some of these big meat producers use ammonia. I don't want ammonia in my burgers. They use it because they are now using outer-exposed areas of the carcass that used to go to make cat food.
PLAYBOY: And yet you'll eat sheep testicles?
BOURDAIN: Sheep testicles are good, though I don't like beef testicles that much.
PLAYBOY: Apparently you have also eaten seal eyeballs.
BOURDAIN: Yeah, who wouldn't?
PLAYBOY: Many of us. It sounds creepy, even the texture.
BOURDAIN: Compared to what, cottage cheese? What do you think cottage cheese looks like to a Thai?
PLAYBOY: How's iguana? You've said that when it isn't skinned it's like "gnawing on foreskin."
BOURDAIN: I've had really bad iguana, and I've had really pretty good iguana.
PLAYBOY: Where do you the draw the line? What won't you eat?
BOURDAIN: The only thing I won't eat is something that's rotten. But sometimes you've got to take one for the chief. If someone's serving you something and they're proud and they've worked to prepare it, to decline would be a worse offense.
PLAYBOY: Do you get sick sometimes—versions of turista?
BOURDAIN: Two times on this show. That's seven years.
PLAYBOY: What made you ill?
BOURDAIN: I was eating rotten, unhygienic food with people for whom sanitation was not a priority, or even something imaginable, but they were nice. Both times it was a tribal situation. I'm not going to disrespect my host. It happened in Liberia and Namibia.
PLAYBOY: On the other extreme, the upper classes in the Western world are eating finer and finer food—organic, local, sustainable. Do you support these trends?
BOURDAIN: Those who can afford to make those decisions, great, but I'm definitely not going to get down on anybody who's taking their family to the Colonel. A lot of neighborhoods don't have good food. But sure, it's great. The food can taste better. If something I didn't care much about before, like a carrot, tastes particularly good, I tend to notice that and appreciate it, but it's not giving me a boner.
PLAYBOY: What do you remember as the best meals you've ever had—high end on one hand and street food on the other?
BOURDAIN: The sushi dinner I had at Sukiyabashi Jiro in Tokyo was breathtaking. Sushi at Masa in New York. The difference between high-end sushi—really good sushi—and just good sushi is interplanetary. For street food, pho in Saigon.
PLAYBOY: Are you appalled by the trend toward packaged premade sushi in grocery stores?
BOURDAIN: I'm not against it. When I grew up, a grilled slice of canned ham with a pineapple ring and a maraschino cherry was state of the art, so all this new stuff is good. The more people who eat sushi, even utility sushi, the better.
PLAYBOY: Let's go back to hamburgers. What's the best way to make them?
BOURDAIN: I'd go to a butcher and tell him to grind up the shit I want.
PLAYBOY: What cuts?
BOURDAIN: A mix of maybe short rib, neck and maybe some aged rib. Then salt, pepper, that's it. Grill it rare to medium rare, pull it off and let it rest a little bit, throw it on a damn bun, ketchup—done.
PLAYBOY: Does grass-fed beef taste better than traditional corn fed?
BOURDAIN: No. I'm glad we have the option, though. It's a positive thing that you're seeing these people raising free-range, hormone-free, entirely grass-fed beef. I'm glad they're out there, but I prefer an animal that is free-range, grass-fed and then finished with some healthy feed without drugs. I like a fatty fucking animal.
PLAYBOY: Do you have any barbecuing secrets?
BOURDAIN: I wouldn't make you barbecue. Or sushi. Those are disciplines in which I would never presume to be an expert. It took me my whole life to get French bistro food right, and I enjoy making Italian food. I'm not so arrogant as to ever do barbecue, sushi or pho.
PLAYBOY: What's the best barbeque you've ever had?
BOURDAIN: If I was looking for brisket, ribs, the burnt ends, I'd go to Oklahoma Joe's in Kansas City. If I wanted a whole hog, I'd go to Mitchell's in North Carolina.
PLAYBOY: What advice can you give to a man who wants to impress a woman with his cooking?
BOURDAIN: Learn how to cook a fucking omelet. I mean, what nicer thing can you do for somebody than make them breakfast? You look good doing it, and it's a nice thing to do for somebody you just had sex with. I think it's good for the world. It's a good thing all around. It's easy. If you're a screaming, fucking asshole a woman would regret sleeping with, then you will probably never be able to make an omelet. The way you make an omelet reveals your character.
PLAYBOY: In your travels have you encountered aphrodisiacal foods?
BOURDAIN: No such thing exists. In Asia I can't tell you how many times in my life they've said, "We have something very special for you," accompanied by various embarrassing boner-signifying hand motions. No such thing exists.
PLAYBOY: What things have been passed off to you as aphrodisiacs?
BOURDAIN: Anything wriggling, anything with a dick or balls, parts of endangered species, animals still alive. Like you're supposed to get some towering hard-on right away, go home and impregnate whoever falls into your path. But it's all a myth.
PLAYBOY: What do you have against vegetarians?
BOURDAIN: They make for bad travelers and bad guests. The notion that before you even set out to go to Thailand, you say, "I'm not interested," or you're unwilling to try things that people take so personally and are so proud of and so generous with, I don't understand that, and I think it's rude. You're at Grandma's house, you eat what Grandma serves you.
PLAYBOY: Apparently you have a special loathing for vegans.
BOURDAIN: I don't have any understanding of it. Being a vegan is a first-world phenomenon, completely self-indulgent.
PLAYBOY: In restaurants, if you don't like a dish, do you send it back?
BOURDAIN: Never. I'll still tip 20 percent and I'll be polite, but I won't come back.
PLAYBOY: There's a controversy about foie gras, which is often made with livers of geese that have been force-fed. Should it be banned?
BOURDAIN: I'll say this on foie gras: I don't know any chef who would buy the kind of foie gras that is produced the way they show in those PETA films. No restaurant I know of would buy the product of a stressed-out, terrified, abused goose or duck. That equals bad foie gras. But it's a straw-man issue to start with, because every duck and goose raised for foie gras in this country, at least that I know of, lives a far more luxurious, happier, better life than any chicken ever killed for the Colonel or Popeye's, as the PETA people well know. They're picking on foie gras because it's French, it's expensive, most people haven't had it and it looks ugly in the scary films they show. It's a French thing, and you know those French.…
PLAYBOY: Do you eat shark fin or fish that are endangered?
BOURDAIN: I won't eat shark fin. Well, if I find myself at a Chinese banquet where I'm the guest of honor, and it is served to me by a proud Chinese host, okay, I'll soldier along and I'll eat. But it's incredibly cruel. It's wasteful. They cut the fins off and throw the shark back in. And yeah, I respect those chef friends of mine who have decided they're going to serve only sustainable fish. There are only so many fish in the sea.
PLAYBOY: What wines do you drink?
BOURDAIN: I don't care about big and expensive wines anymore. I like rough trade when it comes to wine—whatever the local wine is.
PLAYBOY: What if you're in a high-end restaurant in New York? What do you order?
BOURDAIN: I like Côtes du Rhône. But generally the wines that give me the most pleasure these days are young, inexpensive and local. I don't care if you're talking Paris, I'm not a wine snob. I don't care if it's $2 or $2,000. I'm happy.
PLAYBOY: Beer?
BOURDAIN: The same with beer. I mean, major American beers taste like piss. Usually I'm not a craft-beer guy. I get a lot of shit from viewers who are like, "I saw you drinking a Heineken." It's perfectly good beer. It's not the best beer in the world by a fucking long shot, but there are better things to do in this world than be a beer nerd. There are some craft brewers I really, really admire, though. I think the Dogfish Head guys are doing God's work. But even if I usually don't drink it, I admire somebody who drinks shitty beer. If you can sit there drinking a pitcher of Bud Light all day and be happy, you know what? I'm happy for you.
PLAYBOY: What do you think about the highly caffeinated and alcoholic drinks like Four Loko that have landed some kids in the hospital?
BOURDAIN: Caffeine and liquor together? What's the fucking problem here? Unless you put teddy bears on the front and say it's for kids, what's the problem? Kids shouldn't be drinking this shit in the first place. I'll drink my Red Bull and my vodka in separate glasses. Is that the problem? It's not an issue I care about, honestly, but it's an indicator of how politically incorrect and how stupid we are that idiots drink this shit in the first place.
PLAYBOY: Do you like Red Bull?
BOURDAIN: It tastes like warm urine, but I drink it regularly. If I'm doing a public speaking gig and I've been going from city to city and I'm exhausted and I want to get fucked up enough to sort of feel a little casual and comfortable, back in my dressing room I'll alternate between Red Bulls and beer, trying to find that perfect zone.
PLAYBOY: Is that combination your buzz of choice these days?
BOURDAIN: Yeah. Well, I'll smoke weed when I'm on the road.
PLAYBOY: Why only on the road?
BOURDAIN: When I'm in New York, I'm a dad. I'm with my daughter, or I have to be available for her, and I want to keep an active brain. If somebody suddenly calls up and says, "Your daughter needs you," and I'm in a position to do something about it, I'm not going to be, like, "Oh, dude, wow, what do I do?" If I'm sitting in the Empty Quarter of the Arabian Desert, though, and it's two in the morning, we've finished shooting with a tribe of bedouins and my crew and I want to stagger up a dune and smoke some hash and look at the moon, that's a nice thing. Who is it hurting?
PLAYBOY: Do you use any other drugs?
BOURDAIN: I've kind of burned all my bridges there. I can't do heroin. I like it, but I can't do it. I'm an addict and there's no fucking way.
PLAYBOY: According to many experts on addiction, addicts can't smoke pot or drink, but you do.
BOURDAIN: Yeah, well, they say you can't.
PLAYBOY: But you can? What makes you different?
BOURDAIN: Vanity. Vanity and self-regard.
PLAYBOY: But vanity and self-regard won't do it for most addicts. If they drink or smoke, they're likely to relapse.
BOURDAIN: I had a long and extraordinarily painful relationship with heroin and, following that, methadone. Having physically kicked it, I would greatly prefer not to have to go through that again. When I remember the good times and the good feelings on heroin, sure, but when I think about the bad, it hurts and I don't ever want to go through that again. I'm clear about it. Same with cocaine. Honestly, it's not a day-to-day struggle. No. It's fucking bad. I don't want to do it again. It was humiliating; it brought me low. Some people make personal decisions; others don't think they deserve to get well. Just about everybody I know who got out of dope went into 12-step programs and now don't do anything. That is the way it works for most people, just about everybody.
PLAYBOY: How bad did it get for you?
BOURDAIN: I had a lifelong relationship with cocaine starting when I was like 13, 14 years old. My whole life was about, Let's get some coke. Who's got the coke? Do I have enough coke? When I was fucking done with it, I was done with it. Same with heroin.
PLAYBOY: Did you stop using because you were arrested or were taken to an emergency room?
BOURDAIN: Oh, I've been arrested.
PLAYBOY: Did that stop you from using?
BOURDAIN: I finally stopped because it's fucking embarrassing. Like I said, self-regard. It's fucking humiliating. And I didn't have any money. I was whining and whining and begging and lying to people. I look at some people who are still doing it, who have been smoking base for 30 years. I don't know how they still do it. I reached a point where I thought, This is horrible. I'm not saying it's any particular strength of character or anything like that. I'm definitely not saying that. This notion that I'm so fucking tough and such a badass that I can kick dope without a 12-step program—that's not what I'm saying. I don't hold myself up as an example or an advocate or as anybody, okay? I made my choices. I've made fucking mistakes. I made it through whatever confluence of weird, unique-to-me circumstances—I'm not going to tell anybody how to live, how to get well or any of that shit.
PLAYBOY: You mentioned that you want to stay sober for your daughter. A while back, before you had a child, you said you'd make a shitty parent. What changed?
BOURDAIN: I remember the precise moment it changed. I was living in a crummy walk-up apartment in New York, above Manganaro's Hero Boy, and I'd met this woman who's now my wife—a woman like me, who came out of the restaurant business. We were lying in bed spooning, as I recall, and for the first time in my life I thought, Not only would I like to make a baby with this woman, but I'm up to the job. I could actually be a good father. I thought, I'm at that point in my life for the first time, and I think it would be a beautiful thing to have a baby with this woman. I've finally grown up enough to be a good dad. And I've loved everything about it. I loved living with a pregnant woman. This was something I never would have understood before, not having done it; it just didn't sound good. I loved it. I miss it. I loved the entire process, loved every minute of fatherhood, all of it, every fucking second. It's very hard leaving, hard being away.
PLAYBOY: Where did you meet your wife?
BOURDAIN: It was my first and only blind date. She was general manager of a restaurant and was insanely busy. I was traveling all the time. We're both type-A personalities. The last thing on our minds was getting involved in a serious relationship, but six months later we were already talking about having a child.
PLAYBOY: Do you cook for your daughter? What do you make for her?
BOURDAIN: My wife does most of the cooking for our daughter. She eats organic food for the most part, to whatever extent we can provide it, because we can afford it. She likes pasta and butter and grilled cheese and hot dogs and mashed potatoes, but she'll eat out of her zone. She's an ordinary kid who every once in a while surprises us by eating a raw oyster. She also spends a lot of time in Italy. Mom's Italian, so what we have on our table is often very different from what ordinary families have. She eats anchovies, capers, olives and pecorino, and she knows prosciutto cotto and prosciutto crudo.
PLAYBOY: How about when you were a child? What did your parents make for you?
BOURDAIN: It was not just 1950s food—you know, mac and cheese and frozen dinners. My mom also had a small repertoire of dishes, mostly out of Craig Claiborne or Julia Child, that she did very, very well. For company she had a tight repertoire of credible French dishes.
PLAYBOY: Was it a special occasion for your family to go to a restaurant?
BOURDAIN: No, fairly common. Or we'd order in. First I was in New York, but I grew up in New Jersey. What was New York–New Jersey food? It was Chinese, Italian or deli, and every few weeks to go into New York City to try something, like a Chinese place, a smorgasbord.
PLAYBOY: How would you characterize your childhood?
BOURDAIN: I was born in Columbia-Presbyterian in New York, then whisked off immediately to a little bedroom community in Leonia, New Jersey. For the first couple of years we lived in an unimpressive house, then moved across the street to a much nicer one. I was something of a reading prodigy. I grew up in a house full of music and books. I was a shy, awkward, terribly insecure kid who overcompensated. I learned early on that the baddest, most dangerous, reckless kid who seemed sure of himself got the good things in life. I suddenly portrayed myself as the baddest, most reckless and most sure of himself. Clearly not giving a fuck or pretending to not give a fuck was a successful strategy to gain popularity and girls, and that was my act, honestly.
PLAYBOY: Did it work?
BOURDAIN: Yeah. You get the things you think you want.
PLAYBOY: What was your first restaurant job?
BOURDAIN: It was a dishwashing job in a crappy vacation, seasonal fish house on Cape Cod. It was okay to get fucked up in the kitchen. We all did. In restaurants from when I started, we were all working for cocaine, essentially through the 1970s, 1980s and well into the 1990s. It was the way the restaurant business worked. In the 1990s things changed.
PLAYBOY: What caused the change?
BOURDAIN: I think it was when working in restaurants got a prestige about it, when chefs started to be noticed, when people in the restaurant business started to get wind of the fact that, Wow, I might actually have a fucking future in this. I might make some money. I might have health insurance someday. I might get some respect. So it changed.
PLAYBOY: And the era of celebrity chefs began. What has been the impact?
BOURDAIN: The better chefs feel about themselves, the more hopeful they are about their future, the better they do, the better we all eat, the better we all live. It's all good. I say that for selfish reasons, and I say that because I believe it.
PLAYBOY: Is the elevation of chefs to movie-star status a passing phase?
BOURDAIN: I hope not. Actually we're just catching up to the French. Over there people know who's cooking for them, and they pay attention. In America we haven't done it, but we are now. We should. Who better than chefs? Food is important in our lives, even at its silliest.
PLAYBOY: What's an example of silly?
BOURDAIN: At some point you saw a lot of excessive behavior, like a giant plate with a tiny little fan of poached chicken breast in the middle of a slice of kiwi.
PLAYBOY: Are there recent food trends that have gone bad?
BOURDAIN: Marcel Vigneron on Top Chef is talented, but he kind of lost the plot. I think molecular gastronomy—I hate to use the term because nobody who does it will call it that—has gone over the top. Not all the people who admire Ferran Adrià, Grant Achatz or Wylie Dufresne—people who were impressed by them, blown away by them or are trying to emulate them—are as talented as those guys, and they're going to make silly food.
PLAYBOY: What's it like being a judge on Top Chef?
BOURDAIN: It's fun. I love hanging around with Tom Colicchio. He's a serious guy, so I view it as a challenge to crack him up on camera, to see his Mount Rushmore composure crumple. Unlike similar shows, the level of competition on Top Chef is high. The judges take their jobs seriously. I sure don't do it for the money, because they're cheap as fuck.
PLAYBOY: How difficult is the competition for the contestants?
BOURDAIN: What's asked of these guys is really hard. It's emotionally difficult. You're cut off from friends and family for weeks. You're asked to do things that chefs would never do. I don't know if I could do it if I was asked to make a 10-course meal out of a fucking vending machine. Also, the competition itself is brutal. It doesn't matter if you're a great chef or not; whoever's food sucked the most that week goes home.
PLAYBOY: What about other celebrity chefs? What do you think of Emeril Lagasse?
BOURDAIN: As I've said to him many times, "I hated your show, dude." I made my career making fun of the poor bastard. I miss him now. He has good restaurants and is a good chef, but the stuff he made on TV was ridiculous.
PLAYBOY: Do you like Bobby Flay?
BOURDAIN: Again, an accomplished restaurateur. But I don't understand why these guys would make this candy-colored sort of crowd-pleasing television. Why would they compromise themselves so much?
PLAYBOY: Some people might accuse you of that.
BOURDAIN: Fine, you know.
PLAYBOY: What do you think of Wolfgang Puck?
BOURDAIN: Listen, I'm not eating in his shitty pizza restaurants. I think it's bullshit, and it breaks my heart to see him on QVC or whatever, but the fact is he paid his dues. He's an important guy. It's an Orson Welles thing: He made Citizen Kane, so it doesn't matter what he does after that. If Wolfgang Puck wants to open crappy pizzerias in airports all over America, that's fucking fine. Wolfgang was a guy who changed things for chefs. You don't have to be on TV—everybody knew who Wolfgang was. It was about the chef now. Marco Pierre White in England was another one. It was the first time you opened a cookbook and the chef looked like you did—long scraggly hair, sunken cheeks, prison camp rings under the eyes, smoking a cigarette in the kitchen. Chefs and cooks saw that and said, "Wow, I don't have to be a fat Frenchman to be a great chef. There's room for me in this world."
PLAYBOY: Is Mario Batali a good chef?
BOURDAIN: He's a monster of rock and roll. He's done everything right from the beginning. Mario's managed to balance making a lot of money, opening a lot of restaurants, world domination and his personal happiness and quality of life in a remarkable way. He's the smartest chef there is. There is no chef smarter or funnier or faster.
PLAYBOY: What do you have to say to food critics?
BOURDAIN: Some do a good job or at least try hard to do a good job. I appreciate that one administration after another at The New York Times has continued to have critics who are serious and who write well, whether I agree with them or not. I think there is a certain integrity to a Timesrestaurant review.
PLAYBOY: Apparently you feel differently about GQ's reviewer, Alan Richman.
BOURDAIN: For Richman and me it's personal. He wrote an article about New Orleans that I found offensive, and I nominated him, jokingly, for a ridiculous fake award, Douche Bag of the Year. He took offense and reviewed my former restaurant without mentioning our previous history. He called it, like, the worst restaurant in the history of the world. So my problem with him is personal. He's a good writer, and to the best of my knowledge, to his credit, he's not bent. I don't know of anyone who's ever suggested he is corrupt. But I don't like the son of a bitch.
PLAYBOY: Do other reviewers use their positions for personal gain?
BOURDAIN: I would just ask John Mariani, the reviewer at Esquire, a simple question: Have you ever received a free meal, services, vacations or other things of value from the subjects of your reviews? If so, please list them. That's all I fucking ask, just an honest question.
PLAYBOY: You're suggesting that you know the answer.
BOURDAIN: I'm asking the question because I've lived in this world a long time. I have a lot of friends. I have reason to believe that the answer would not portray him in a positive way. I'm not suggesting or asking anything that everybody I know in the restaurant business and everybody I know in the food-writing community doesn't fucking know.
PLAYBOY: Now, because of the internet, everybody is a critic. You go online—on Yelp, for example—and people praise or rip into chefs or restaurants, and they're anonymous. Does it bother you?
BOURDAIN: What are you going to do?
PLAYBOY: Could it be a good thing, because it keeps restaurants on their toes?
BOURDAIN: It doesn't matter what I think, because it's there. The barbarians are over the gates. They're in the house. We're overrun. Embrace it. To do otherwise is like complaining about cable television, saying, "It'll never last." Or the electric guitar: "This'll never catch on." We read differently now. You're looking at a big bathroom wall with a lot of stuff written on it, and people are smart enough and fast enough and reading and speaking a new language that allows them to pull from that wall and all those opinions—many of them valid, some not—a consensus.
PLAYBOY: Overall, how have Americans' tastes changed?
BOURDAIN: Everything continues to change. The sea change began with sushi. It was a real high watermark when Americans started eating sushi. It was a river crossing, because we were eating something that was traditionally loathsome to Americans—I mean, eating raw fish. Sushi was a leap of faith, a real tectonic shift in what your customers were willing to do. Only a few years earlier, if you cooked a piece of tuna medium rare, people would have fucking freaked on you. If you tried to serve them octopus, no way. Since then, food's gotten to be a bigger deal, and there are more and more choices, at least if you have money.
PLAYBOY: What accounts for the change?
BOURDAIN: Maybe a decline in filmmaking and other forms of entertainment. When I grew up, in the Mad Men period, you'd go to a movie, then you'd go out to dinner and talk about the movie you just saw and the movie you were about to see. Now you just go to dinner. You talk about the dinner you had last week and the dinner you're going to have next week while you're eating this dinner. You're sure as hell not talking about the movie, because it sucks.
PLAYBOY: Does TV suck? We're asking someone who now writes for the HBO show Treme.
BOURDAIN: I think some of the best writing out there right now is on television. Justified,Episodes, Californication, Treme. It's fucking awesome.
PLAYBOY: How did you get involved as a writer on Treme?
BOURDAIN: The show's creator, David Simon, called me up. Thank you, Jesus. It's been the most satisfying professional experience of my life. Dude, I'm working with David Simon! It's the greatest. It's fun. I've never done anything like it before. I'm honored to be at the same writers' table as David Simon and the people he works with. It is the greatest honor of my professional career. It was the greatest joy. It is the most fun I've ever had writing.
PLAYBOY: How about other writing? Are you writing new books?
BOURDAIN: Next is a crime novel. It's going to take place on a Caribbean island where displaced, exiled New Yorkers do bad things to one another. It's a love story with peripheral violence, probably extravagant violence.
PLAYBOY: With No Reservations and The Layover, traveling and writing for those shows, writing graphic and crime novels, and being a father, are you sometimes overwhelmed?
BOURDAIN: I'm at the point in my life where I'm doing only those things that are fun and interesting. If it isn't fun and interesting, I'm walking away from it. I've found myself in a position where I'm able to do cool things with cool people and make enough money. Unlike heroin, which feels good now and feels bad later, this feels good now, and when I wake up tomorrow and look in the mirror I'm going to say, "Dude, I'm working with interesting people, making things, however long they last, and feeling pretty good about it." It's fucking fun.


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Not yet, but then again, I don't live on the west coast - lucky bastards!I can't believe the WC guys found the new clonies already (red, black pilot, etc.)I'm still looking for Tarkin, 500th Vader, & Anakin Evolution.....And we are still waiting for the deluxe clone 3 packs - one sighting of the blue pack and that lasted for a couple hours.
I head one rumor of these guys hitting, and with respect to the guy who reported it, I think the person who told him didn't know what they were talking about. Let's just hope they treat these like the cantina scenes an put out pleanty.
Like the Cantina Sets these will be plentiful.
I sure as hell hope they are plentiful. I need several of these blue Clones, and don't want to have to try and paint my own!
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The types of cyberattacks aren't new, but the speed and number of them are on the rise
For the past year, the cyber threat landscape has been dominated not by new vulnerabilities and exploits so much as by the sheer number of attacks against information technology systems and the growing professionalization of the bad guys behind them.
In this report:
New threats emerge from once-trusted protocols and services
"The sexiness of the threat has not increased," said one industry observer who met with a multiagency task force on intrusion. "But the exposure in terms of the number of exploits is growing exponentially."
The numbers are sobering.
"Malware is at the highest point we've ever seen it," said Dave Marcus, director of security research at McAfee Avert Labs. "2008 was the biggest year so far. The first half of 2009 has eclipsed all of 2008," with 8,000 new variants appearing each day. "It's easier to create new malware than ever before."
Symantec reports similar activity. The company created 1.6 million new threat signatures in 2008, or about one new signature every 20 seconds. It has created 2 million signatures in the first half of this year, or about one every eight seconds.
The most visible results of this epidemic of malware are the periodic distributed denial-of-service attacks that generate a lot of attention. The most high-profile recent example was the July 4 outbreak that apparently originated in North Korea and targeted government and commercial Web sites in the United States and South Korea. Smaller outbreaks have targeted popular social-networking sites, such as Twitter and Facebook.
Such attacks have become a part of online life, observers say. Because of the prevalence of denial-of-service attacks and the volume of transactions now conducted online, some experts rate the attacks as a greater threat than compromises inside a system that can be used for the remote execution of malicious code or theft of information. But most experts agree that in the long run, a successful exploit that executes code inside a system is more likely to do significant damage.
"I see them happening more and more," George Schu, vice president of Booz Allen Hamilton, said of denial-of-service attacks. "But in general, they aren't a very serious problem."
Denial-of-service attacks can disrupt business and online availability of resources but do little or no long-term damage. Organizations need to be prepared to identify and recover from such attacks, but in the end, "you still are going to be attacked," Schu said.
Yuval Ben-Itzhak, chief technology officer of Finjan, agrees. "There is nothing much you can do about it," he said.
One difficulty in responding to online attacks, whether they are denials of service or intrusions, is determining their source. Because botnets that launch denial-of-service attacks can be global, the immediate source of the malicious traffic offers little information about the ultimate source of the attack or its motive. Last month's so-called North Korean attacks appear to have been controlled from a server in the United Kingdom. Reports of infiltrations of U.S. government and power grid systems by Chinese hackers also could be only speculation.
"Just because it is located in China doesn't mean that a Chinese [person] is behind it," said Patrick Peterson, a Cisco fellow and security researcher.
Although denial-of-service attacks can be mitigated, the availability of large-scale botnets — global networks of compromised computers under remote control — as a platform for delivering the malicious traffic makes the attacks difficult if not impossible to prevent. It's hard to say just how big botnets are. McAfee reports as many as 3 million to 4 million new infections a month, but the lifespan of a botnet can be short, sometimes only a day or two before an infection is discovered and removed. However, some machines also are reinfected regularly.
"You have to be updating and scanning regularly" to avoid becoming part of a botnet, Marcus said.
The spread of malware
These highly distributed malicious networks are created and kept available by the proliferation of malware to infect computers and recruit more zombies.
"The explosion of new malware variants is what keeps me up at night," said Zulfikar Ramzan, technical director of Symantec Security Response.
Attackers are getting around signature-based anti-malware tools by changing the code just enough to sneak it past the filters. Not every variant works, but enough of them are successful to keep signature writers busy.
"The model is shifting from a massive distribution of a few threats to the microdistribution of a large number of different threats," Ramzan said. "There can be a unique variant of a threat for every person who downloads it."
This mass production of variants is being enabled by automated tools and services available to hackers and criminals, a commercialization of malware that Peterson calls "infection as a service."
"Capitalism is a big motivator," Peterson said. "A lot of the things they do, they need to do at scale. Twelve or 24 months ago, a lot of criminals were doing everything themselves."
Underground developers now are specializing in providing professional tools and services to their community at a profit, such as online services with a tool to run new malware variants against the most popular antivirus engines to identify ones that can make it through undetected.
"What we're seeing is that there is a lot of collaboration going on in the development of malicious code," said Eddie Schwartz, chief security officer of NetWitness. Collaboration and specialization facilitate the rapid production of designer malware that can target specific groups, types of systems and data.
Growing specialization coupled with the persistence of known vulnerabilities in IT infrastructure is a dangerous combination. Old vulnerabilities persist partially because the infrastructure and user base are so large and complex. For example, old versions of software and hardware are unlikely to be completely replaced over any short period of time and are so embedded that they often are overlooked in patching, Schwartz said.
"I don't think we're ever going to get to the point where we can throw out certain vulnerabilities," he said. That base of vulnerabilities, coupled with more sophisticated exploit delivery tools, "enables malware writers to throw the kitchen sink at people."
The ability to throw multiple exploits against a system is another growing threat. Automated toolkits allow attackers to bundle exploits in a single package so that a computer or system can be searched for many vulnerabilities. Often, a successful cyberattack does not require a zero-day exploit, just a toolkit of tried-and-true exploits. The attacker needs to find only one unpatched flaw in the system to take advantage of.
Turning pro
Exploits and attacks are becoming not only more automated but also more professional, said Roger Thornton, chief technology officer of Fortify Software. The most serious attacks can go unnoticed because they are difficult to detect.
"Some of the attacks are brilliant in finding a system and compromising it," Thornton said. "But the system wasn't even the target." The compromised system is used to plant code somewhere else in the network, where it gathers data and then leaves while covering its tracks. "Man, these guys are good," he said.
Bad guys also are getting better at defense, he said. The wide-spreading Conficker worm uses cryptography to protect its command and control communications. When weaknesses were found in a hashing algorithm used by Conficker, it was upgraded to a new algorithm.
"They fix security vulnerabilities," Thornton said. "These adversaries are doing security better than us."
Compromised computers also can provide computing power and bases of operation for the criminals controlling them. Thornton described one case in which a financial services company was infected.
"The hackers had uploaded much more data than they had downloaded," he said. It appeared that the objective had been to upload stolen credit card numbers. The hackers then used this database of numbers to test personal identification numbers used to validate them for transactions.
Trying to find the four-digit PIN for a given card could take 10,000 tries, which would be time-consuming and would tip off the service validating the card after too many repeated failures. But testing one PIN against a database of hundreds of thousands of card numbers is almost certain to be successful. This method creates no suspicious number of failed attempts on any one card, and the traffic it generated was not noticed on the company's network.
The criminals also covered their tracks well, Thornton said. "All of their logs were encrypted, and encrypted well. There were no artifacts left behind."
Targeting social media
Another threat trend is the speed with which these rapidly evolving tools are used against new targets, especially social-networking sites. One example is the widely used Twitter microblogging service. Within a month of its appearance, phishers were targeting Twitter, Marcus said.
"I don't remember anything else that was attacked that quickly," he said.
Twitter is not alone. Popular networking services, such as Facebook and the YouTube video service, often face attacks that attempt to use them as vectors for delivering malware. They also are subjects of phishing attacks that lure users into visiting inappropriate sites and surrendering personal information.
Despite the innovations, the attacks being delivered through these new sites are often the same types that most people have learned to avoid in e-mail. "A lot of the new technology tends to get exploited in all the old tried-and-true ways," Marcus said. "Whatever the new technology is, you are probably going to see spam, phishing and password stealing."
The nature of social networking helps to enable the use of social engineering in malicious attacks, Symantec's Ramzan said. Social engineering involves crafting an attack with specific information to calm a victim's fears and convince him or her that a communication is genuine.
"The idea of social engineering has been around for years," he said. "But with social-networking sites, information that used to be private is now public, so it can make it easier for attackers to inject social context into an attack."
All of which means that administrators and users need to constantly re-evaluate how they defend their systems, experts say. People need to be as suspicious of tweets and videos as they are of e-mails, and administrators need to think offensively and understand the attacks being used against them when protecting their systems.
Security vendors also need to constantly upgrade their tools and products. For some time, static defenses, such as firewalls and signature-based antivirus and intrusion detection, have been inadequate by themselves. Ben-Itzhak, whose company does content analysis, said real-time content analysis is the critical to defending systems. Organizations should scan incoming code to determine its intent before it is allowed in.
"You can read the code like a book and see what it does," he said.
Vendors of traditional signature-based tools such as Symantec and McAfee are adding new tools to their products because the rapid proliferation of malware is making signatures inadequate. They are using heuristic and behavior-based detection in addition to signatures and are moving to reputation-based security by monitoring suspect traffic on millions of machines to determine the sources of malicious traffic that should be blocked.
However, no one recommends doing away with signature-based defenses. Because so many known exploits still work and are in circulation, antivirus companies update their signature files as quickly as possible to provide an efficient first line of defense.
"These kinds of threats are still best handled by signatures," Ramzan said.
No matter how good tools get at warding off the wave of rapidly morphing malware, they are not likely to remain adequate for long.
"In a year or two years from now, there will be another way to attack that will get around these," Ben-Itzhak said. "Security is dynamic."
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Are you struggling to stick to your new low-carb diet? Here are 4 common reasons why so many of us find it such a challenge to keep to a low carbohydrate diet.
The BMI (Body mass index) is currently used around the world to determine whether an adult is of a healthy weight for their height. It can however, be deceiving. A 5ft 10inch man that weights 80kg would be considered overweight and Arnold Schwarzenegger in the prime of his life (Not now) considered obese according to the body mass index.
The first thing to acknowledge about losing weight is that it's no easy task. It takes time, determination and consistency. Unfortunately there are no magic tricks to transform you into Beyonce or David Beckham over night. Forget the lose 21 pounds in 21 day or the build a six-pack in a week crap! Don't buy into the hype. If you do, it'll only chomp into your motivation when you don't get the results you expect.
You arrive at the gym excited and determined at the prospect of transforming your exercise deprived body back into the form of its life. You hop on the stationary bicycle, spend 10 minutes spinning the peddles, hop off, look around and think, now what?
As we all know, losing weight is never easy and whether you're goal is to lose 5 lbs or 100, we could all use a helping hand from time to time. Make the task of losing weight a little easier by incorporating the following foods into your diet.
If you're not squatting, you're doing it wrong!
I really can't emphasise this enough. If you're anyway at all serious about getting into shape, DON'T neglect squats. If you have just one fitness goal, make it to learn how to squat properly. The immense health benefits of squatting are undeniable.


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Forgive Assholes | Have a Little Faith
Pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber's life lesson for the day: The bigger the asshole, the better to forgive and forget them
Amy McGrath, Former U.S. Marine, Congressional Candidate in Kentucky
Katherine Johnson, NASA Mathematician
America Ferrera, Actress and Activist
Slay your Student Loan Debt | MAKERS Money
NADIA BOLZ-WEBER: I really believe that when someone else does us harm, we're connected to that mistreatment like a chain. Because forgiveness is nothing less than an act of fidelity to an evil-combating campaign. So it's not an act of niceness. It's not being a doormat. It really to me is more badass than that. Maybe retaliation, or holding on to anger, about the harm done to me doesn't actually combat evil. Maybe it feeds it.
Because in the end, if we're not careful, we can actually absorb the worst of our enemy, and on some level, even start to become them. So what if forgiveness, rather than being like a pansy way of saying, it's OK, is actually a way of wielding bolt-cutters and snapping the chain that links us? Like it is saying, what you did was so not OK that I refuse to be connected to it anymore.
Forgiveness is about being a freedom fighter, and free people are dangerous people. Free people aren't controlled by the past. Free people laugh more than others. Free people see beauty where others do not. Free people are not easily offended. Free people are unafraid to speak truth to stupid. Free people are not chained to resentments.
That's worth fighting for. There really is a light that shines in the darkness, and that the darkness cannot, will not, shall not overcome it.
GWYNNE SHOTWELL: Engineers are nerds, right? I'm a geek. I'm a total nerd. And it wasn't OK to be nerds then. But the geeks won. They became the cool guys.
I'm a problem solver. I guess I always was a problem solver. And math and science attracted me. There's a certainty to mathematics that I love.
My mother said, you should be an engineer. I was a 15-year-old girl. I didn't know what an engineer was. I had no idea.
One day, we ended up on a Saturday afternoon, and there was a Society of Women Engineers event. I was very irritated. I had better things to do.
And this fabulous woman, a mechanical engineer, ran up for the panel discussion. And she had my attention.
That day I learned what engineers were and did. They're creators They're makers. They build things. They test things. And they make life a better deal.
I started on Halloween. I flew in on my broom and stayed there almost exactly 10 years.
Aerospace engineering is not well known to have a ton of women. I've always liked a challenge. I got to learn a lot. And I was an analyst.
Then I started leading teams. We call it a people engineer, which is a little unusual. But it's really important now.
The industry moved at an incredible pace in the '60s and '70s, and then it stagnated quite a bit. And so we were all kind of mavericks. And we wanted to do something.
One of the issues that the space industry suffers from is the massive costs associated with developing and deploying these technical systems. So we were going to change the whole face of launch by doing it at a dramatically reduced price without sacrificing reliability.
It was a risk, but I figured if I was going to take a shot, this was the shot to take.
When we heard from NASA that we were one of the two winners, I knew that SpaceX was fundamentally on its way, that we would make it to orbit, as well as a business.
We started small. The first rocket that we built we called Falcon 1. We struggled with getting that vehicle to orbit on that first launch. That failure was pretty dramatic for us. We grew up overnight.
We analyzed what went wrong. We went back to launch a year later, but we still had an issue. And then it took almost another year.
- 1. We have liftoff.
- We have liftoff.
GWYNNE SHOTWELL: And failed again. But we were super close that time. We knew exactly what was wrong. You don't learn anything from success, but you learn a lot from your failures. And we had three good ones under our belt.
It was 4:00 in the morning, and we were struggling a little bit as we were approaching the station. So we'd creep up, back away, rewrite some software.
And we finally got there. We got into what we call the berthing box. And then they command a kind of shut down of the spacecraft. And that's when you go quiet, and then the arm comes down and grabs you and lifts you in.
It was historic. The room erupted. And there were thousands of people outside of mission control, screaming, crying, jumping up and down. It was the only time that a private company had ever done that. Governments had done it before, but not a little company like SpaceX.
I think the key about bringing more women into engineering is to make it accessible. When I was considering a career in engineering, I didn't have any good role models. If you have that curious mind and you like to solve problems, then it's almost inevitable that you would want to be an engineer.
It's extraordinary. You're building and making real things. There's this enormous sense of satisfaction that comes from that.
CARLA HARRIS: People ask me all the time, how do you nail the job interview? Well, the key to nailing a job interview is to understand what the buyer, i.e., the interviewer, is really buying. You must think of your interviewer as a buyer of talent, and what are they buying? Is it a job where you have to have strong selling skills, good analytical skills, quantitative skills, attention to detail, relationship-building skills?
And when they ask you that first question, Carla, tell me about yourself, you should tell and sell your story using the words that are consistent with what the buyer is buying. I went to this college because I wanted to focus more on my analytical and my quantitative skills. I ran for president of the student body because I knew I had strong relationship-building skills and I wanted to enhance my organizational skills. So no matter what it is, tell and sell your story using the words that the buyer is really buying.
I'm Carla Harris, and I'll see you next time on Daily Hustle.
NADIA BOLZ-WEBER: Blessed are the agnostics. Blessed are they who doubt, those who aren't sure, those who can still be surprised. Blessed are those who have nothing to offer. Blessed are they for whom death is not an abstraction. Blessed are they who have buried their loved ones for whom tears could fill an ocean.
Blessed are they who have loved enough to know what loss feels like. Blessed are they who don't have the luxury of taking things for granted anymore. Blessed are they who can't fall apart because they have to keep it together for everyone else. Blessed are those who still aren't over it yet. Blessed are those who mourn.
Blessed are those who no one else notices, the kids who sit alone at middle school lunch tables, the laundry guys at the hospital, the sex workers, and the night shift street sweepers. Blessed are the forgotten. Blessed are the closeted. Blessed are the unemployed, the unimpressive, the under-represented.
Blessed of the wrongly accused, the ones who never catch a break, the ones for whom life is hard for Jesus chose to surround himself with people like them. Blessed are those without documentation. Blessed are the ones without lobbyists. Blessed are those who make terrible business decisions for the sake of people. Blessed are the burned out social workers and the overworked teachers and the pro-bono case takers.
Blessed are the kindhearted NFL players and the fundraising trophy wives. And blessed are the kids who step between the bullies and the weak. Blessed is everyone who has ever forgiven me when I didn't deserve it. Blessed are the merciful for they totally get it. You are of heaven and Jesus blesses you.
CONNIE CHUNG: The business that I've been in requires sticking your neck out. You can't sit back and wait for the story to come to you. You have to go pursue it. Dig, push, and be bold.
My parents and my four older sisters were all born in China. They arrived in Washington, DC. Less than a year later, I was born. In China, all you want are boys. So when they had yet another girl, it was like, eh, all right. I always wanted to be the son that my father never had. So I was going to make Chung memorable. With five girls, I could never get a word in. So I was the quiet little sister.
I'm Connie Chung.
They couldn't believe it when I got into television news and I had to speak to the world. And my father was such a news buff. We would watch Uncle Walter every night, Walter Cronkite. He was the man. So early on, when you could only see my hand holding a microphone-- that's Connie's hand. He was just eating it all up.
It was a little local station, and the only job they had open was for a secretary. And I thought, oh god, typical. I did that for several months, but they had an opening for a writer. It was the late '60s. The Civil Rights Act had passed in '64. There was a heavy push to hire women and minorities. So I became the writer in charge of the assignment desk.
There was this one reporter who was really lazy. So I'd say, why don't you watch the desk, and I'll do the story? I know you don't want to do it. So then I'd do stories. They finally let me go on the air, and then a short time later, CBS News, the network, was getting such pressure to hire women.
So in 1971, I was hired along with Michele Clark, black, Leslie Stahl, a nice Jewish girl with blond hair, and Sylvia Chase, a shiksa with blonde hair. Everybody was a male. I mean, everybody, the staff, the producers, the executive producers, the Bureau Chief, the people we covered on Capitol Hill, the White House, the State Department, men.
We all went through a very rigorous hazing period. There were camera people who, they didn't want to take orders from us. Or else I'd be covering some senator on Capitol Hill, and he'd say, "Well, sweet little lady, what sweet little question do you have for me?" And I just stuck it to him. They pitted the women against each other. Who would get the woman job? Leslie Stahl and I would frequently be told to go cover the First Lady doing something that we knew would never get on the air.
Ed Bradley would go up to the assignment editor and say no. But I really had a hard time saying no. There is this mentality on my part-- the good little girl, fear of being fired, fear of being uncooperative, fear of being the five-letter B word. Every step of the way, there were issues being a woman. The only way we could move forward was to do our job and do it better than anyone else.
- Here's to Connie Chung.
- (SINGING) Here's to LA. News to LA. And from our newsroom comes the history of the day.
- This is the CBS Evening News with Dan Rather and Connie Chung.
DAN RATHER: Good evening, and welcome, Connie.
CONNIE CHUNG: Thank you, Dan. When I was first told that I would be co-anchoring with Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News, I couldn't believe it. Walter Cronkite was my idol, and I always wanted to be Walter Cronkite. I didn't think that that would ever happen. There are always these self-doubts, but I felt like I did know how to do the job. But it was very clear from the beginning that Dan Rather didn't want me there. He would not have wanted anyone there. He was very gracious upfront.
DAN RATHER: See you tomorrow.
CONNIE CHUNG: But you ask someone who's been in the job forever to move over and make room for somebody else, it's a recipe for disaster. It was a constant battle. I would have appreciated it if the boss had said, you know, it's over. I want to tell you face-to-face. But that didn't happen. They told my agent, and then he told me.
DAN RATHER: I'd like to take this moment to wish my longtime friend and colleague, Connie Chung, good luck and godspeed.
CONNIE CHUNG: I lost my dream job. It was completely devastating. Remarkably, though, my husband and I had been working on adoption for a couple years. The firing occurred on a Friday. The next day, we get a call that our son was going to be ours. It was, oh my god. My life just went flip. Lose the job, get our son. Woo! I had a baby when I was almost 50. It worked well for me. Everything that happened in my career was meant to be.
One thing that women really need to remember is sing your praises the way the men do. Sing your own praises. I was indispensable. You're welcome.
- I realized that as First Lady you can bring so much attention and marshal so many resources to really help on whatever issue that you're focused on so I have always taken that responsibility very seriously. I'm a Chicago native, I grew up on the South Side in a really small apartment with my parents and my older brother Craig. My dad worked as a pump operator at the city water plant. My mom stayed at home and so we didn't have a lot of money but my brother and I were blessed with something far more valuable because our parents truly gave us unconditional love and encouragement to go places they never imagined for themselves. Neither of them had a college degree but they made it very clear that they expected me and my brother to get the best education possible so school was always, always the center of our lives. So I made it my point to give it 120%. The early part of my life was focused on sort of reaching those traditional markers of success. I focused on getting the right degrees, going to the right schools. So by the time I was in my mid 20s and working at a firm I had everything that I was told I should want but I could still feel that there was something missing. I started to ask myself some more important questions like what do I really care about and how do I give something back? I wanted to be in a position to help folks from neighborhoods like mine, especially young people, have the opportunities that I had. So I quit my job at the law firm and found myself working in careers where I could spend my time lifting up the kinds of communities that I grew up in. The inauguration was one of the coldest Januaries that I've spent here in Washington D.C. It was freezing. I really remember what it felt like to walk out the steps of the Capitol and stand there with Barack as he took the oath of office and look out at what felt like endless amounts of people standing as far as the eye could see from every race, age, background you could imagine would come from every corner of the country just to witness this historic moment. It was probably one of the most profoundly moving experiences that I've ever had. And to have our girls there with us, those two little bitty girls standing on that stage is a moment I'll never forget. This role, it's a real gift because it brings with it this big bright spotlight and that's why I've worked hard to choose work on issues that I care deeply about, that I feel really defines me or that I'm connected with, that will really make a difference in peoples' lives. We've really worked to raise the profile of this issue. I've had the opportunity to travel the world and everywhere I go I meet these amazing young women and they impress me with how bright and how hungry they are no matter what their circumstances are, they'd risk their lives for an education. And they have so much promise that we can't afford to waste. I see myself in these girls so I want Let Girls Learn to be part of my life's work for decades to come because for me this issue is personal. I hoped that I've used my big spotlight to move the needle on a whole range of issues but I feel honored and blessed to have served this role for my country.
AMERICA FERRERA: We want to feel like we're in community and we're surrounded by people. It's what makes our lives worth living. My friends, my mentors, they have helped me through every single moment and they make everything that much better when there's something to celebrate or, you know, something that's hard and I need to get through.
When I have doubts, when I get tired, when I feel like I just can't do it today, I look up and there's my friend using her voice. There is my friend breaking boundaries. There is my friend doing something that terrifies her. And it helps me keep going.
AMY MCGRATH: A lot of times you're going as a fighter pilot, you go up in the air and you're waiting for something to happen. The other times, it can be quite scary. Flying a fighter jet is the most intense job you can do on the planet.
I grew up in Kentucky. Youngest of three children. My mother was a medical doctor, and that was very rare. This was the 1980s. And I was always very proud of her. So when she wasn't there at night because she was on call, I would just say, well, mom's saving lives.
I was very much a tomboy who just wanted to play sports. I have an older brother who would be one of the captains, and he would always pick me first. And all of his friends would say, why are you picking a girl? And he would say, well, she's the best player. I knew that if I was beating all the boys in football or basketball, that there was nothing I couldn't do.
He wrote me back a very nice letter that was fairly condescending, which basically said, you're a girl, and Congress doesn't believe that women should be doing these things. And I said, well, so what? You know, they just haven't met me yet. I can do this.
So I wasn't deterred. Pat Schroeder was a Congresswoman at the time. She was considered so radical. And what she said was, the military of our nation exists to fight and win the nation's wars. And we should have the best people in those positions. Stick to your dreams. I'm working on it.
The executive officer comes in and looks at me and looks around the room and says, we've got to put you in a jet. And I had just barely gotten my qualification. So we suited up, pulled out into the runway with six air-to-air missiles loaded up to possibly launch and shoot down an airliner. Thank god we didn't have to shoot anyone down.
I think that 9/11 changed the mindset of all of us. It was on. This is what we had trained for. We were going to go into combat. Our job was necessary, and I was prepared.
The Marine Corps was the toughest thing a woman could do in the military. And that is exactly what I wanted. I remember going into Afghanistan and looking out at the men who were working and having them look at me-- and the wonder in their eyes. And they had never seen a woman who was treated with the same type of respect as all the other Marines, a woman as an equal. When you go to these other countries, especially as a woman, and you're just doing your job, that's showing people American values. That's changing minds.
My commanding officer pulled me in and told me, and my heart just stopped. I thought to myself, all right. I worked my whole life to do this. Flying, itself, is dangerous. You have to make sometimes life and death decisions when it comes to ordnance. When you can come through with putting the bombs on target on time, that's when you know your training and your work mattered.
Now we have all of these former military women running for Congress. Well, it's about time. We see what's happening in our government. We basically say, I fought for my country, and I am a woman, and I'm not going to stand for that. Is it going to be easy? No, it's going to be a challenge. And I love that. I mean, that's me. That's what Marines do. I don't want to be there just to fill a seat. I want to make a difference.
The 2017 MAKERS Conference: Gabby Douglas on Love from Leslie Jones
KATHERINE JOHNSON: Math. It's just there. It has always been a part of whatever I was doing.
- All engines running.
KATHERINE JOHNSON: You're either right or you're wrong. That I liked about it.
They tell me I counted everything. Everybody studied at a big table, and after I finished mine, I helped them get theirs. And I was the youngest. I wound up ahead of my brother, maybe two grades. I don't remember how many. I entered college. I was 15. I was gonna be a math teacher because that was it. You could be a nurse or a teacher.
He said, you'd make a good research mathematician. I said, oh? What do they do? He said, you'll find out. So he had me take all the courses in the catalog. Sometimes I was the only person in the course. I said, where will I find a job? He said, you'll look till you find it. Took me seven years, but I found it.
He said, you're very lucky. Langley has a post for black mathematicians, just opened it up to women. They had a pool of women mathematicians. They just wanted somebody to do all the little stuff, while they did the thinking. We were called computers, women computers. I had been there less than a week, when this engineer came in and wanted two women computers, and Mrs. Vaughn sent me over to the flight branch. And we never went back.
- Today, a new moon is in the sky, placed in orbit by a Russian rocket.
KATHERINE JOHNSON: Oh, they felt terrible that, here we sat, and the Russians had a vehicle riding around, looking down on you. So we set out to send somebody up there and look down to. They'd called up a group of engineers and have a briefing as to what they were gonna have to do. And I asked, could I go? They said, women don't ever go to those. I said, is there a law against it? They said, no, well, let her go ahead. I wanted to know what it was they were looking for. So I wound up doing what it was they were trying to find out.
- Commander Alan B. Shepard was to become the first man sent into sub-orbital flight. The Mercury capsule is right on course.
KATHERINE JOHNSON: Our office computed every mission that went out at that time-- the height, the speed, and so on. It became a geometry problem.
- Ignition sequence start.
KATHERINE JOHNSON: I felt most proud of the success of the Apollo mission.
- Zero. All engines running--
KATHERINE JOHNSON: They were going to the moon.
- We have a lift off.
KATHERINE JOHNSON: I computed the path that would get you there. You determined where you were on Earth when you started out, and where the moon would be at a given time. We told them how fast they would be going, and the moon will be there by the time you got there.
- Beautiful, just beautiful.
KATHERINE JOHNSON: We were really concerned when they were leaving the moon, going back. He had two adjusters, we said. If he'd missed it by a degree, he doesn't get into orbit. I was looking at the television. I said, boy, I hope he's got that right.
And I was sitting there hoping I'm right, too.
John Glenn said, tell her. He knew that I was the only woman that worked on it. He said, if she comes up with the same answer that they have, then the computer's right. It took me a day and a half to compute what the computer had given them. Turned out to be the exact numbers that they had.
It was my job. And I did my job correctly and well.
AMERICA FERRERA: I was born and raised in Los Angeles. My parents are immigrants from Honduras and they split up when I was quite young. My mother raised six children on her own. Watching her do whatever it took to provide the life that she came here to give us was a real testament of what we're capable of.
I grew up feeling, first and foremost, American. Very aware of the fact that I didn't speak perfect Spanish. The girls who did speak Spanish made fun of me for not speaking Spanish. The very first audition I ever went to wasn't specified Latina. The casting director asked me if I could do it again, but please try to sound more Latina this time. And I was really confused.
I thought, do you want me to speak in Spanish? No, I want you to speak in English. I just want you to try and sound more Latina. And what she was asking me to do was to speak broken English. It became very clear, very quickly that the industry looked at me and saw a brown person, and that there was a specific box for that.
I was playing a young girl whose parents didn't understand her dreams for herself. The fact that it was this 17-year-old chubby Mexican-American girl, who no one would ever imagine would get to be the star of her own movie, I think that really opened up people's ideas of what was possible in terms of storytelling and who got to be the center of their own life.
I went to a professor of mine and started crying and saying, you know, what do I do? It was what I felt completely passionate and drawn to, and then there was go to school, get a really important job, and try and change the world. He said to me that he'd been mentoring a young girl. She was a young Latina girl. He'd been mentoring her for years and he couldn't really break her shell. She came to him and said, "Come watch this movie with me, it's called "Real Women Have Curves."
And so he took some of her friends to see the movie and she was actually going through a very similar thing with her own parents. And so it gave her the opportunity to start that conversation. And they did ultimately support her in her dream to go to college. I had no idea that he knew I was an actress. And he said to me, "She would have never been able to do that if she hadn't seen a reflection of herself." What I realized was that being an actress, it had already become something bigger than me.
Donald Trump announced his candidacy by calling Mexicans rapists and murderers, and talked about attacking women. So as a woman, as a Latina, as the daughter of immigrants, as an American, it did feel like a death of an idea that I had built my American identity around. And that made me realize that there was just work to do.
So what I chose to focus on was empowering communities to use their voices. So often the narratives about social issues leave out the very people who are most impacted by them. There were people on the front lines living these issues and fighting for their communities. And they know much better than those of us who just got woke yesterday.
I gain strength and encouragement from those around me who are being courageous, and brave, and stepping out. I need them to keep doing that, because it's what keeps me going.
[MUSIC PLAYING] NADIA BOLZ-WEBER: I think at its best and most useful, faith allows us to speak the truth about our lives.
Like, here's one. I think that whole "we can have it all" thing is bullshit. I don't actually hear the message "you can have it all" as a liberation. I hear it is an accusation.
Several years ago, like many women my age, I was trying to not disappoint my family, not disappoint my job, not disappoint my friends. I wanted to prove that I could have it all, and it was important to me that nothing got dropped.
And if the occasional need for sleeping pills and Netflix and chocolate-induced catatonic states was the price I paid, then so be it. But as it was, I decided on six days a week of CrossFit and an 8:30 PM bed time.
But that was the problem. On the outside, my plan looked like "good self-care" but really, it was just a list of habits I adopted to ensure I could over-function.
Until the day I seriously disappointed somebody I loved, and their response was to say, "That really sucks, and I forgive you." Which immediately made me cry, because I didn't need to "have it all." I needed to be set free.
I needed someone to say, "Nadia, let the fucking plates drop." Because fear of dropping them was torturing me, and in the end, was way worse than having them drop.
And faith is the thing that tells me that I am already enough. Faith tells me that I am loved quite apart from anything I do or not do. Faith tells me that my worthiness is not in my busyness.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: Money is power. And ladies, it's time to level the playing field.
Hi, everyone. Welcome to Makers Money. I'm Sallie Krawcheck, CEO of Ellevest, the top-rated investing platform for women. Today we're back at happy hour in New York City, and we're talking about student loan debt.
OK, I know, I know. You are not allowed to turn off this video. Because I know it's not a topic that thrills, but it's so important. In case you missed it, graduates in the United States oh an effing fortune in student loan debt, more than $1.3 trillion. And we women, we women hold nearly 2/3 of it, averaging more than $20,000 each for a bachelor's degree. And that's $30,000 if you're a woman of color. Ugh.
And here's a double ugh, yuck. The research tells us that paying back student loan debt is slower going for us women than it is for the guys, due in large part to that frustrating gender pay gap. And so you know I'm bringing some tips. And I've got four tips to help you pay down your student loans faster and without pain.
Number one, put your student loan payments on Auto Pay. Now this will typically save you 0.25% in interest expenses, and it's going to ensure you're never going to pay a late fee, not to mention taking one more thing off your to do list.
Number two, not all student loan debt is created equal. If you've got multiple loans, they're likely to have different interest rates. So you want to pay off the loans with the highest interest rate first. If you can pay more than the minimum, which is terrific, always make sure you specify which loans you want the additional payment to go towards.
We're on to number three, and number three is, pick up the phone. Have you been paying on time? If so, then make a call to your lender, and ask for a lower interest rate. This is where a boring task and the speaker phone are your friends. It doesn't always work, but no one's going to penalize you for calling every quarter and asking, so ask.
And finally, number four, don't let student loan debt make you put everything else on hold. I've heard from some of you that it can be tempting to pour all of your extra money into chipping away at the debt. And if it's keeping you up at night, I totally get it. But your student loans should not keep you from contributing to your 401(k), or starting an emergency fund, or living your life.
For more on this, I'm delighted to be joined by Tiffany Aliche, the Budgetnista. I love that name.
TIFFANY ALICHE: Thank you.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: Tiffany has been called America's favorite financial educator, and her Budgetnista blog is one of the top personal finance blogs in the nation. Welcome, Tiffany, and cheers.
TIFFANY ALICHE: Thank you, Sallie.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: So happy to have you here.
TIFFANY ALICHE: Thank you.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: So Tiffany, a lot of women tell me they want to make progress on their student loan debt, but they just don't know how to go to it. What are you advising them?
TIFFANY ALICHE: Well, I say don't avoid it. Call your loan provider. There are two specific programs you're going to ask about. There's a Forgiveness program. And there's something called the IBR program, and that is the Income Based Repayment program. And so, if you don't make much, you might qualify for the IBR program. And what that means is that, based upon what you do make, that's what your payment's going to be.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: Forgiveness and IBR programs, important to remember. But what do you think about college these days. I mean, it's awfully expensive. Is it right for everyone?
TIFFANY ALICHE: Well, I say this: knowledge for all, college for some. So college should be an investment, so you want to have a return on your investment. And so you might find that you want to be a plumber, or you want to be an actor.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: My son, my son, an actor. Should he go to college?
TIFFANY ALICHE: So you want to invest in training and trade school versus college, because it might not be a fit.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: Right, too late. Now, this situation comes up again and again. You are so in love, and you are ready to be married. And he or she is swimming in student loan debt. What do you do?
TIFFANY ALICHE: Well here's the thing, I'd be more concerned if they had a really bad money mindset. Because debt is something that you can work toward. You can call that loan provider. You can even really adjust where you work and say, you know what, I'm actually going to work for the state or for the federal government so I can get that loan forgiven. But if this is someone who's consistently making bad and poor financial choices, that's what you want to be worried about.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: And so what do you do, sit down with them and have the money talk?
TIFFANY ALICHE: Yes, certainly. I mean, I asked my husband date three, what's your credit score.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: And you got to date four?
TIFFANY ALICHE: Yes.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: Yeah, but it's all about being mindful, right?
TIFFANY ALICHE: Yes.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: OK. All right. We love to ask this question of everybody who joins us. What's the stupidest thing you've ever done with your money?
TIFFANY ALICHE: I can top anybody's stupidest thing with, I invested with an-- air quotes-- friend of mine. And I said that I wanted to learn how to invest, so he said to open up two credit cards. And I did.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: What, I'm sorry. You took money out on your credit cards to invest?
TIFFANY ALICHE: Yes.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: OK, we are headed towards the stupidest move ever, right now. And it turned out super well, right?
TIFFANY ALICHE: No. It ended up, I took out $20,000, and, based upon what he said I'd be making, I spent another $15,000. Ended up with $35,000 in credit card debt, and he was gone.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: OK. I also love to ask, what's the smartest thing you've done with your money?
TIFFANY ALICHE: So, smartest thing for sure, I learned the lesson. And I said I'm going to invest in education. So, just taking courses and lessons and reading books. And just investing in knowing better so I could do better.
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: Well, you rock. Thank you so much for being here with us today.
TIFFANY ALICHE: Thank you for having me. [GLASSES CLINKING]
SALLIE KRAWCHECK: And now it's time for my favorite part of the show, which is questions from all of you. And we received a lot of great questions from you on student loans. So clearly this is a challenge that hits home for many of you. So let's go ahead and tackle them question.
Question number one, I have to choose between paying down my student loan debt and starting to save for my own kids to go to college. What should I prioritize? This one hurts me a little bit, because as a parent, we all want to give our kids everything. And we want to do as much for them as we can. But in most cases, you should pay off your own debt first. Because if you prioritize your child's finances at the expenses of your own, what you're really doing is creating a position in which they may need to take care of you financially down the road. As a rule of thumb, as they say on airplanes, put on your own oxygen mask before assisting others. It'll be better for both of you in the long run.
The next one, question number two, asked, I'm making big monthly payments on my student loans, but it doesn't feel like I'm making a dent in my balances. Should I refinance? If it's going to take down your interest rate, you certainly should. Now to do so, you're generally going to need a credit score of 700 or higher. And from there, it's best to take that and take the application and shop a few different vendors, whether it's your traditional bank or one of the online student loan lenders like CommonBond or Earnest. Scope out several, and compare the options.
Question number three, I'm a senior in college and plan to attend graduate school this fall. I'm worried because I already have student loans from college and likely will take on more during grad school. Any advice? Depending on your intended grad program, you might consider working for a year or two before going back to school. Here's why. It's going to give you some time to get some financial stability, and you'll also get valuable work experience that may make what you learned during your studies even more valuable. I know it did for me when I went back to grad school. Another thought, if you find a job you love, someone employers will provide assistance by paying for part-time graduate school programs as long as they're related to your work.
OK, look. I know it may sometimes feel like your student loan debt is going to leave future you eating the same Ramen noodles you did in college. But I'm telling you now, if you take it one step at a time and you are dogged in your pursuit, you can be on your way to slaying that debt once and for all.
Ladies, we want to hear from you. So tweet at @MAKERSWOMEN and use #MAKERSMONEY. Or send in your questions to me at makers.com. Thanks to Tiffany Aliche for joining us. And until next time, remember, more money, more power.


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- Jimmy Proof Locks
- Decorative
- Hardware
Safe Locksmith Services:
- Safe deposit box services including: drill, repair and interchange.
- Vault safe and locker combination changes and service.
- Timelock cleaning and service.
- Preventive maintenance of all physical security products.
- On-site key duplication.
- Emergency safe and vault opening.
- Obsolete vault door refurbishments.