I thought I’d share two worthwhile programs that I watched on PBS this week. The Lobotomist is a documentary that tells the story of Dr. Walter Freeman’s rise and fall in medicine. He was the creator of a surgical procedure that was once used for a wide array of psychological conditions, known as a transorbital lobotomy. While some questioned his methods, Freeman’s treatment became so common and easy to perform that many thousands of patients underwent it. In fact, he once personally performed twenty five transorbital labotomies in one day, while another physician outdid him with seventy five in a single day. The arch of Freeman’s career truly is fascinating.
Now we move from science to the economy. The Frontline program produced an insightful episode on how Wall Street and our credit markets collapsed a few months ago like a house of cards. Inside the Meltdown is a gaze into the current economic disaster, beginning with the Bear Stearns bailout last spring. The documentary paints a terrifying portrait in a language that allows for anyone not familiar with the banking industry to understand what happened, why and who the major players were. Unfortunately, this is just the first chapter in a story that is far from over.