the commonwealth august/september 2012

TheCommonwealthTHE MAGAZINE OF THE COMMONWEALTH CLUB OF CALIFORNIA AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2012

Nancy Pelosi CONGRESS’ DUTIESpg 43

Paul Krugman: THE “D-WORD”pg 9

Dr. Gloria Duffy onHIGH SPEED RAIL pg 50

Ornstein/Mann:YES, IT’S A MESSpg 14

$2.00; free for members | commonwealthclub.org

Colin PowellFrom Four Star General to Secretary of State:

Lessons From a Life of Leadership

Tue, Jul 31, 2012 - 6:00pmMedical Careers: New Roles for Growing Demands

Wed, Aug 1, 2012 - 5:15pmNot-Obvious Things Every Career-Minded Person Must Know in 2013 and Beyond

Thu, Aug 2, 2012 - 6:00pmAhead-of-the-Pack Job Search Strategies

Thu, Aug 2, 2012 - 6:00pmOlivia Fox Cabane: Charisma and Leadership - What If Charisma Could Be Taught?

Mon, Aug 6, 2012 - 12:00pmCongressman John Garamendi: Jobs for Veterans

Mon, Aug 6, 2012 - 5:15pmRethinking the Job Search: Winning Strategies for People over 50

Thu, Aug 9, 2012 - 6:00pmKeys to Beating the Odds in Starting a Business

Thu, Aug 9, 2012 - 6:30pmClimbing the SF Food Chain

Mon, Aug 13, 2012 - 6:00pmThe New Slavery

Tue, Aug 14, 2012 - 6:00pmHow to Build a Great Com-pany, Step by Step

Thu, Aug 16, 2012 - 6:00pmGetting Promoted (or at Least Not Laid Off)

Mon, Aug 20, 2012 - 5:15pmThe Psychological Impact of Unemployment

Tue, Aug 21 2012 - 5:15pmBaby Boomers Defer Retire-ment for “Encore Careers”

Tue, Aug 21, 2012 - 6:00pmUpdating Bayard Rustin’s Dream of Work for All

Wed, Aug 22, 2012 - 6:00pmInclusive Diversity and Talent Management

Thu, Aug 23, 2012 - 6:00pmWhen Should and Shouldn’t You Follow Your Passion

Thu, Aug 23, 2012 - 6:00pmHow Do You Do That?

Mon, Aug 27, 2012 - 6:00pmHow Volunteering Can Lead to a Dream Job

Wed, Aug 29, 2012 - 6:00pmMaddalena Bearzi: Dolphin Confidential – Confessions of a Field Biologist

For more information on these and other exciting up-coming events, check out our program listings, begining on page 28 of this issue.

THE FUTUREOF WORKHow to Identify

and Prepare for the Jobs

of Tomorrow

Join us for this August’s special series devoted to one of the most important issues of our time: jobs. How to get them, how to create them, how to keep them, how to plan for them. Presented by the Club’s Member-Led Forums, The Future of Work is a month of can’t-miss events.

putting you face-to-face with today’s thought leaders

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THE COMMO N WE AL TH 3AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2012

25 PROGRAM INFORMATION

26 EIGHT WEEKS CALENDAREvents from July 30 to September 22, 2012

28 PROGRAM LISTINGS

42 LATE-BREAKING EVENTS

42 LANGUAGE CLASSES

4 EDITOR’S NOTEA House Divided: Club speakers look (aghast) at what has become of Congress

5 THE COMMONSColin Powell’s cadet credentials; Miles Jackler’s photographic memories

50 INSIGHTDr. Gloria C. Duffy High speed rail

Photos by Ed Ritger

About Our Cover: Former Secretary of State Colin Powell spoke to the Club about the skills of leadership.

“Almost 4 million Americans have been unemployed for more than a year. That means lives destroyed; it means families losing their homes, losing their prospects – it means losing hope.” – Paul Krugman

9 THE “D” WORD

VOLUME 106, NO. 05 | AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2012

INSIDE The Commonwealth

FEATURES

EVENTSDEPARTMENTS

ON THE COVER

6 COLIN POWELLLearning the lifelong lessons of leadership

14 WORSE THAN IT LOOKSNorman Ornstein and Thomas Mann wrote a book about Congress, then they threw the book at Congress

18 RISE OF POLITICAL ISLAMAkiva Tor on Israel’s view of the effects of the Arab Spring

43 NANCY PELOSIThe House minority leader looks at health care and women’s issues

46 DOING IT BETTERFormer Senator Bill Bradley calls for a new citizen movement

49 DAVID WESTINWhat if you got into an argument with Peter Jennings? What if you won the argument?

THE COMMO N WE AL TH4 AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2012

A House Divided

In this issue of The Commonwealth, you will find a number of articles that are related to Congress. I have to admit that their collection in this magazine was entirely ac-cidental, a result of the speakers coming to our stage within a compressed timeframe.American Enterprise Institute scholar Norman Ornstein is one of the most quoted

sources regarding our national legislature. When he recently came to The Commonwealth Club, it was a return engagement for him and his writing partner, Brookings’ scholar Thomas Mann. Together, they practically have created a cottage industry of exploring how Congress works. Now, they’re chronicling how it doesn’t work. As you will see on page 14, even these two ultimate Washington insiders have become exasperated – and alarmed – by the degree to which Congress has become a nonworking branch of govern-ment. They also point fingers at the party they blame for most of it. Some Republicans might not like what they read.

Former Senator (and former basketball star) Bill Bradley spoke at the Club just one day after Ornstein and Mann. Though he displays his well-known optimism, he, too, presents a picture of serious trouble on the national stage, trouble that’s not being dealt with effectively. A couple weeks after Bradley, Representative Nancy Pelosi, leader of the House Democrats, took our stage, 25 years after she joined the U.S. House, and she spoke about the work that is and isn’t getting done there today. Even Colin Powell marvels at the dysfunction of Congress.

Though most – not all, but most – of the criticism of this relatively nonconservative group of speakers is aimed at the Republicans, people would be mistaken if they assumed that alarm about the state of affairs in Congress was not more broadly shared. David Frum, the conservative former speechwriter for President George W. Bush, wrote about Ornstein and Mann’s ideas on CNN.com:

The radicalization of the GOP is a function of changes, not only in U.S. poli-tics, but also in the U.S. economy. Americans are living through an era of disap-pointment. It’s becoming obvious that the U.S. government cannot meet all the expectations that built up in better times.

The tax status quo, the Medicare status quo, the social safety net status quo, the defense status quo – they can’t all be sustained. Something must give, and almost everybody senses it. In good times, we debate whether government should expand programs or cut taxes – new benefits in either case. In these times, we are debating whether government should impose large reductions in programs or impose big increases in taxes – taking from people benefits that they now enjoy. ...

The Republican ... constituencies together fear that almost any conceivable change will be change for the worse from their point of view: higher taxes, less Medicare, or possibly both. Any attempt to do more for other constituencies – the unemployed, the young – represents an extra, urgent threat to them. That sense of threat radicalizes voters and donors – and has built a huge reservoir of votes and money for politicians and activists who speak as radically as the donors and voters feel.

Maybe one day Mr. Frum will explore that idea from the stage of The Commonwealth Club of California. For now, read in this issue what these folks have to say and write us with your thoughts on the matter, and we’ll print responses in a future issue. What’s the prob-lem? Who’s at fault? What’s the solution? Write to us at [email protected].

Editor’s Note

John ZippererVice President, Media & Editorial

TheCommonwealth

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CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERSBeth Byrne Ed RitgerRikki Ward

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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, secretary of state, four-star general, national security advisor. Colin Powell achieved it all, and he was marked for greatness early in life.

When Powell spoke at the Club in early June, Club member Jim Myers brought the yearbook from the Fort Bragg summer 1957 ROTC program, which included both Myers and Powell; the young Powell was even rec-ognized as Outstanding Cadet.

“He was so impressive that I remembered him years later, when he became nationally known, and I said to myself, ‘I went to camp with him,’” says Myers.

It also adds power to Powell’s comments about trying to see the potential in people (see p. 6). He certainly realized his potential.

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People are watching the month-ly jobless reports for indica-tions of where the economy is

going, as well as trying to figure out the political implications of the stubbornly high unemployment rate.

This August, the Club’s Member-Led Forums decided to take a much deeper and broader look at jobs for today and tomorrow. They’ve lined up an exciting batch of programs covering everything from what jobs will be here tomorrow to how to pursue a job in today’s brutal employment market.

See the inside front cover of this is-sue for a list of programs in the series.

A rt doesn’t just line the walls of The Club’s offices; it also walks the floors in the guise of Miles

Jackler, the Club’s facilities manager.Readers of San Francisco magazine re-

cently got a sample of the photographic work of Jackler when the publication printed a photo (below, left) he had taken of a landscape work of art by Jim Denevan. Jackler came across the design

when he stopped at San Francisco’s Cliff House, overlooking Kelly’s Cove. “It’s a great vantage point and allows you to see much further down the coast,” he remembers. “I almost overlooked this massive sand drawing. I had a Canon AE-1 with me and snapped a few shots before racing home to get my board and go surf.”

Jim Denevan (jimdenevan.com) is a

local artist who “makes massive drawings by simply making marks in the dirt, ice, or sand with driftwood, rakes, and his car,” says Jackler. “The drawings he does with his car have to be viewed from a plane – massive geometric patterns expanding out from a central point or simply scat-tered across an earthen canvas.”

Jackler has been a photographer for 11 years (see photos center and right, be-low). You can see more of his work, much of it focusing on surfing along California’s coast, at milesjackler.com.

CommonsThe

Talk of the Club

Jobs, Jobs, JobsAugust series on work

A Multitalented PhotographerOur own Miles Jackler shoots for San Francisco magazine

Colin Powell’s ROTC RolePotential was recognized long before his ascension


The veteran of military and political service discusses his career, America’s challenges around the world, and the lessons for good leadership in military and civilian life. Excerpt from “General Colin Powell,” June 7, 2012.

GENERAL COLIN POWELL Former U.S. Secretary of State; Former Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff; Author, It Worked for Me: In Life and Leadership

in conversation with DAN ASHLEY News Anchor, ABC 7 TV; Member, Commonwealth Club Board of Governors

Colin PowellColin Powell

ASHLEY: I want to start with a question that I know you never go anywhere without being asked. Many Americans felt that you should have been the first African-American president in this country. You detail in your book why you chose not to try to become the first African-American president. Why didn’t you want that job?POWELL: A lot of people were encourag-ing me to run, and a lot of people were tell-ing me they didn’t want me to run, so it was not quite as unanimous as Dan suggests. I was not a political official at the time that this came up in my first book, my memoirs in 1995. I was a career soldier until 1993, so I never expressed any political views.

Nobody ever knew what party I might be in, and this was because I was a career soldier; we didn’t do that. In fact, when I worked for President Reagan as his national security advisor, I was still an active duty military officer, and I never talked politics, and they never asked me, in the White House, what party I might be in – to pro-tect my military status, but I think they were afraid that I might answer, so they didn’t ask. When I got out, and then wrote my memoirs in 1995, I was a civilian, and people started pressing me, and I gave it a lot of thought for about, oh, six weeks or so. You feel an obligation when people are pushing you this way, or encouraging you to do something – and I’ve always tried to

serve my country in whatever assignment I have been given. But after a number of weeks, let’s say six weeks, I remember one morning waking up thinking that this was the right thing for me, but I didn’t have the passion and the drive that one needs to be successful in American political life. My family was not anxious to do this either. It was a 100 percent judgment within the fam-ily that, “Let’s find other ways to serve the

country. We’ve served for 35 years; we’ll find other ways to serve, but not in political life.”

What I have found in the course of my life: You have to do that which you think you do well, and which you love doing, and you have to really follow your instincts after bringing in all the information that’s available. My instincts told me that this was not the right thing for me or for my family, and so I announced that I would not be seeking political office. People have asked me almost every day since, “Do you regret it?” The answer is no. I made a deci-

sion that I thought was right for me and for my family. Therefore, I have no regrets. We found other ways to serve: secretary of state for four years, and all the work my wife and I do with youth programs, in some way is probably as important as anything else that’s going on in this country. ASHLEY: You mentioned, as an aside, [that] you relied on your instinct for that decision. You relied on your instinct for another decision, and that is some of the opportunities that you were afforded to get involved in the financial services industry as you left public life. You chose not to. POWELL: I was very flattered when I left my position as secretary of state at a number of offers that came my way from different fi-nancial institutions, and other organizations in the New York community, principally. They were very flattering, very remunerative, but I essentially was just going to be more a figurehead than an actual financial expert. I even said to one of these companies, “What do you want me for? I don’t know anything about hedge funds.” It turned out they didn’t either, but ... [Laughter.].

They said, “Don’t worry about it. We have people who do know about it; they’ll advise you.” Well, then they didn’t really want me. They just wanted my name. A good friend of mine in the financial busi-ness, whom I trusted very much, said to me, “Why wear one of their T-shirts? Wear your

“When I gave that U.N.

speech, the decision [to go to war with Iraq] had

already been made.”

Lessons from a Life of Leadership


own T-shirt. Remain independent. Stay loose. Do lots of different things, and you can serve in many, many important ways.” I turned them all down. You talk about a close call, because all three of the principal companies that were soliciting my services almost went belly-up in 2008. I would’ve been among the 8.2 percent of our fellow Americans who are unemployed.

Sometimes you think you’re passing up an op-portunity, but if after informing your instinct – after you’ve thought about it, considered all options, and your instinct is still sort of there nagging, and you say, “Don’t do it; it’s not for you,” then I always try to follow my instinct, because it is not a guess. It is an informed instinct. I cover in the book many examples of great leaders who’ve made the most critical of decisions based on their instinct that was informed by the information they had collected. ASHLEY: Let’s talk about a decision that I wonder if you do have any regrets about – your speech to the United Nations about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, that was so pivotal in the decision to go to war. How did that come about? As we now know, there were no weapons of mass destruction. How did you get put in that position?POWELL: Well, let me just correct one point you made, that it was “so pivotal in the decision to go to war.” When I gave that speech, that decision had already been made. The president had decided in January of 2003 that he would have to take the war to Saddam Hussein. Three months before that, in the fall of 2002, the United States Congress – with an overwhelming resolution, a three-to-one vote in the Senate, better than two-to-one in the House – had given the president authority to undertake military action if the diplomacy did not work. So the decision had already been made, and the way it came to be was that after the president had made the decision but had not announced it, and troops were in place – we were just a few weeks short of war – he thought it was important that we present our case to the international community through the United Nations. They were the offended party, the United Nations. He asked me to do it, and work had been done on such a speech to be given by someone, and I was the one who was going to give it.

The speech that I was given, in the draft, was not adequate. It wasn’t backed up by the intelligence com-

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munity; we couldn’t cross-reference things. So for four days, I lived with my staff out at the CIA, with a room full of experts, and with the director and deputy director of the CIA on top of all of this, and we put together that speech. Every word of it was verified and substantiated by the

intelligence community, all 16 agencies of the intel-ligence community, so when I gave it I was

quite comfortable that even though it was a mostly inferential case, it was a good inferential case, and it would stand the test of examination. I understood how important that speech was, not for making the decision but [for] communicating to the world what we saw and what we thought, and putting my credibility and reputa-tion behind it.

The war came, and we didn’t find any weapons of mass destruc-tion. We found a Saddam Hussein that, if left to his own devices and released from U.N. sanctions, would go back to creating weapons of mass destruction, but the actual presence of such weapons – we got it wrong. Then, we discovered that some of the sourcing that we were using was not accurate, and should

never have been used. The whole case with respect to the presence of weap-

ons of mass destruction fell apart, and I’ve got to tell you that I deeply regretted

it, because I’m the one who presented that case most publicly. I’ve even had members of Congress say to me, “You know, it was your speech that convinced me to vote for the reso-lution.” I say, “Sorry, sir, you voted for it four months before my speech. Nice try.”[Laughter.]

The reason I tell you it that way is because a lot of people suggest that I was the key – and that speech was the key – to all of the deci-sion process that led to war. In fact, it was an explanation of why we thought that it was necessary to use military action. It’s a war that I had hoped we could avoid. I persuaded President Bush and he bought into it to take it to the U.N., to try to get Saddam Hussein to fess up to all he had and what he was do-ing or not doing. Saddam Hussein did not do that to our satisfaction, and the president decided that military action was appropriate. I fully supported that decision, and I took the case to the U.N., and in the rest of the spring period, in all my testimony and presentations, I supported the decision he made.

(Continued on page 20)

CST: 2096889-40 Photos: (top to bottom) bf_o_bawoodvine, n/a, n/a, GaryPaulson, Taekwonweirdo / Flickr

Itinerary & Reservations: visit commonwealthclub.org/travel call (415) 597-6720 email [email protected]

Cost: $1,095 per person, based on double occupancy, & $1,295 based on single occupancy.

Join Cathy Curtis and the Bay Gourmet Member-Led Forum on another Bay Gourmet Get Away.

This Bay Gourmet Get Away gives you three days of touring and tasting, two nights in downtown Paso Robles, five wonderful meals and round-trip transportation from San Francisco. All fees and gratuities are included. This is an easy way to get out of town, enjoy fabulous food and wine, and have everything taken care of for you.

• Explore wine caves and barrel rooms as you taste the creations of some of the top winemakers of Paso Robles – Eberle, Robert Hall and Justin, to name a few.

• Discuss the factors that make this region unique with the president of the Paso Robles Wine Club, Coy Barnes.

• Enjoy a private lunch and tast-ing hosted by the owners of Pear Valley Winery.

• Meet organic farmers Bill and Barbara Spencer during a visit to Windrose Farm.

• Learn about Studios on the Park from Founder and Artistic Direc-tor Anne Laddon.

• Sample walnut oils during a tour at Limerock Orchards.

• Savor organic farm-to-table good- ness during our gourmet dinners.

PASO ROBLES WINE COUNTRY

Friday, October 12 – Sunday, October 14, 2012

CommonwealthClub Travel


The Nobel laureate economist calls our current economy a voluntary depression, one that he says could be ended fairly quickly if policymakers did something the public opinion polls say is anathema: Raise spending. Excerpt from “Paul Krugman: End This Depression Now,” May 22, 2012.

PAUL KRUGMAN Columnist, The New York Times; Professor of Economics and International Affairs, Princeton University; Author, End This Depression Now!

THE“D”WORD


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L et me actually start with the “D” word, because in the title of my new book, I use the word depres-sion, and some people get shocked.

Is it really that bad? Let me just spend a couple of minutes just to remind you how bad it is. It’s kind of easy.

Actually, I’m still a little surprised; many people do seem to find ways of not quite understanding how bad it is, because you do look [and see] there are stores open; there are people out there; life goes on; some of the restaurants are full.

But surely, surely, unless you live in an incredibly rarified circle, you have to know people who are suffering from this really terrible environment out there.

“D” is for depression

You can put numbers to it: Almost 4 million Americans have been unem-

ployed for more than a year. There’s always some unemployment because the economy’s always changing. But people who can’t find work for more than a year – that hardly ever happens in normal times. Normally, that’s a few hundred thousand people; now it’s 4 million, which hasn’t happened since the 1930s. Think about what that means: That means lives destroyed; it means families losing their homes, losing their prospects – it means losing hope. This is the kind of environment that destroys people’s lives.

There are young people. The prospects for recent college graduates have never – at least not since the 1930s – been as bad as they are now. You look out there, and the numbers show us that if you think a college education protects you from the bad stuff – people say, “Oh, you know, getting an edu-

cation is the key” – well, the unemployment rate among recent college graduates is higher than the average national unemployment rate. And you look at the jobs that recent college graduates are getting: First of all, many of them are part time – involuntarily part time – and the average wages of recent college graduates have plunged. That’s not because any individual job has seen a drastic cut in wages; it’s because an awful lot of re-cent college graduates have graduated with their heavy load of student debt and then find that all they can get is being a barista at Starbucks. They’re finding that the jobs are just not there.

All of this is casting a huge shadow over our society, not just now but for the future. The longer this goes on with people who have been unemployed for a year or more, many of those people – some of them my age or older – will never get another job. The more this goes on, where there are no jobs for the young, the more of them will never get started on their career properly, so we’re sacrificing a lot of our future as well as our present by allowing this to go on.

The thing is, it’s all unnecessary. It sounds wise and sophisticated and serious to say, “Oh, well, stroke your chin; these are deep problems and there can be no quick fixes” – but that’s all wrong. This is in fact something for which there are quick fixes. This is in fact a very narrow technical failure. It’s something we could solve very quickly if only we had the intellectual clarity and the political will.

So what is the nature of the problem? It is basically that there is not enough spend-ing; that collectively, as a society, [we’re] not spending enough on each other’s products

to keep ourselves fully employed. We kind of understand how that happened. We were in a long period without a severe economic crisis, and in particular the Great Depression faded into the mists of history to the point where lots of people sort of pretended that it never happened and that the things we did to prevent it from happening again were all unnecessary. But anyway, we had a long period of complacency, and what happens in periods of complacency – some people may know of this as the Minsky hypothesis – is that people get relaxed about certain kinds of risks. Actually, they get relaxed about all kinds of risks, but what they get relaxed about in particular is debt. They start to for-get the dangers of having high levels of debt.

For the most part, by the way, this is a problem of private, not public, debt. It’s a problem of households borrowing too much. We reached a level of household debt relative to income not seen since the 1920s, and somebody should have looked at that and said, “Hey, you know, 1920s – boy, that’s interesting.” We reached levels of leverage in banks that were not seen since a long, long time ago. We steadily removed the prudential regulations on banks that were supposed to prevent the kinds of finan-cial crisis that swept the world in the early 1930s, and, even more important than the actual deregulation that took place, we failed to extend regulation as banking evolved. As new forms emerged, we should have said that we need the same kind of regulation of these new kinds of banking that we had. But we didn’t do that, so there came a point of steadily rising levels of debt – some people call it the Minsky moment, after Hyman Minsky, the economist who warned us about this – and not enough people paid attention. I also kind of prefer sometimes [to say] it’s the Wile E. Coyote moment. For people who are not familiar with the classics, in Road Runner cartoons, Wile E. Coyote always runs off the cliff, and, according to the laws of cartoon physics, it’s not until he looks down that he falls.

So there came a moment, which was now almost five years ago, when people said, “Oh my God, too much debt,” and for the most part, people who were heavily in debt were forced to cut back, to slash spending. The trouble is, if everybody tries to slash spending at the same time, it’s self-defeating.

We’ve been talking about new eco-


nomic ideas; there’s even an institute for new economic ideas, which is doing good work, but as people have pointed out, a lot of new economic ideas really involve rereading old books, because we’ve been here before. That’s part of the point: We’ve been here before.

Another great economist, Irving Fisher, explained all of this in the early 1930s. He said, “When everybody tries to pay down debt, when everybody tries to spend less, the result is actually self-defeating, because my spending is your income, and your spend-ing is my income, and if we all try to slash our spending at the same time, the result is that the economy slides into a depression, and the burden of debt actually becomes worse, because you’re trying to pay it down but your income has fallen, and your debt position relative to your income has gotten even worse.”

“D” is for debts

And that’s the story. That’s what hap-pened. It happened essentially to us

and to the Europeans; they really are twin crises. I sometimes think of it as a North Atlantic crisis rather than a U.S. crisis; the details are different, but the broad picture is pretty much the same.

So what do you do at a time like that? Well, the answer is somebody has to spend. Somebody has to make it possible for the people who have overextended themselves to pay down that debt, which means somebody has to step in and play the role of spender. And that somebody is – in the first instance – the government.

This is a time for the government to spend, not because you favor more govern-ment spending all the time – that’s a differ-ent discussion we can have, but that’s not the point now – but because somebody has to step in there. We can talk about budget deficits; we can talk about the need to rein in spending or raise more revenue or both, which probably needs to be done eventu-ally, but not now. Again, Keynes: “The boom, not the slump, is the [right] time for austerity,” he said. And for those who say, “Well, we do need to deal with these issues of debt,” I actually would like to quote Saint Augustine here, who said, “Oh Lord, make me chaste and continent, but not yet.” This is not the time for that, because it is literally self-defeating.

Try to do austerity now, and it actually just deepens the depression. It actually prob-ably even makes the budget position worse, because it shrinks the economy, shrinks revenues, hurts the future. It’s just a deeply destructive thing. So this is the time for the government to spend.

“D” is for deficits

Then somebody says, What about the deficit? And, yeah, deficits can be a

problem, but, really, not now, not at a time like this.

And every time somebody says, “Well, where will the money come from?” the markets are willing to lend the U.S. gov-ernment long term. The interest rate on 10-year bonds was about 1.75 percent last I looked today, which is what you would expect, because we have a situation where everybody’s trying to spend less, trying to pay down debt, and the trouble is no one is willing to spend. So we actually have in effect a lot of saving, a lot of money looking for someplace to go, and the U.S. govern-ment, which is solvent in the long run, is a place that can borrow. It can spend more; it can boost our economy.

This is not the time to be worrying about deficits. And anyone also who says, “What about our children and our grandchildren?” my answer is: What about our children who are graduating from college and can’t find jobs? What about our infrastructure, which is deteriorating because state and local governments aren’t doing – not only are they not doing new projects; they’re not even doing the maintenance that they would normally be doing. Those things are a much bigger drain on our future than anything we’re doing on the deficit.

What would that translate into, if you were going to say, “What policy am I ac-tually advocating?” All we really need to do to get out of this is to have the federal government provide aid to the state and local governments so that they can reverse this austerity, so they can rehire those schoolteachers.

It really is that simple; it’s not a hard thing at all. There are other things you can do: You can talk about monetary policy, housing, debt forgiveness; we’ve done a terrible job at providing debt relief that would actually be in everybody’s interest, so we should do those things, too. But the

central thing is just spend more, and it will be over faster than you can imagine.

Question and answer session with Dr. Ruth Shapiro, social entrepreneur in residence at The Commonwealth ClubSHAPIRO: Dr. Krugman, can you talk a little bit about banking reform and what role that plays in our economic recovery?KRUGMAN: Banks are dangerous – useful, but dangerous. They make it possible for people to have liquidity – ready access to their money – but at the same time, they make it possible for those savings to be used for longer-term, more productive invest-ments. This is a good thing, by and large, but it can go terribly wrong, because if a bank gets in trouble or even if there’s just a rumor that a bank is in trouble, people try to pull their money out; there’s a bank run, and the bank collapses.

So banks need to be regulated. They need to be limited in the kinds of risks they can take; they need to be supported. You need things like deposit insurance. We’ve known this forever. If you actually go back and read Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, 1776, the book that starts economics, he has a section about the need to regulate banks carefully, because Scotland basically invented modern banking and therefore

actually invented modern banking crises back in the 18th century.

So all of this is stuff we used to know, and a lot of what we’ve had is a great forgetting. We forgot those rules, or some people were lavishly paid to forget those rules, and so we developed a very dangerous, unstable bank-ing system. Fixing that system doesn’t bring us out of the depression we’re in, because at this point, the problem isn’t the banks any-more; the problem is the overhang of debt

“John Maynard Keynes said,

‘The boom, not the slump, is the right

time for austerity.’ To do

austerity now just deepens

the depression.”


is something we needed. This is not the health-care reform anyone

would have designed from scratch. It’s a Rube Goldberg device, but it’s improvable, and if we can get the principle of universal coverage established, then we can do a great deal. Then we can make that system better. SHAPIRO: As we know, the federal govern-ment can borrow and go into debt, but states can’t. You focus on the federal government, but could you talk about what states should be doing? This is a national broadcast, but we’re sitting in California, and I’m sure Governor Brown would love to hear what you have to say. KRUGMAN: Governor Brown faces po-litical constraints that are if anything even worse than those facing President Obama, because of the craziness of California’s con-stitutional setup. In past downturns, states have responded with a mix of spending cuts

and tax increases. This time around, it’s been almost all spending cuts. Almost surely, that has made things worse.

There also have been a fair number of gratuitous cuts. States have been forced to do a lot of contracting; some have done more than others without obvious reasons. Very interesting factoid: If you look at those cuts in government employment, they have been concentrated in states that switched in 2010 from Democratic- to Republican-controlled. So there are choices. No question that even with the best will in the world, even a governor who totally agrees with everything I’ve written in this book, is going to have very limited room to maneuver, but there is some room to maneuver.

It’s the same in Europe. if you’re the prime minister of a small European country, you do have the option which a U.S. state does not have, which is leaving the euro; but that is an extreme nuclear option that will be invoked only if the worst is happening –

on the part of households, and that’s what’s holding us down now. But we certainly want to fix them, so we don’t do it all over again.

We had financial reform legislation – Dodd-Frank – which is a lot weaker than we should have had but is a lot better than nothing at all, and if it were fully in place, it might have prevented the risk-taking that just turned J.P. Morgan into a cautionary tale – which is a useful one, by the way; I’m actually very grateful to Jamie Dimon, because he was out there posing as the re-sponsible banker and saying, “See, people like me know what we’re doing; we don’t need to be carefully regulated,” and, well, it turns out, yes you do. So that was very helpful, and we need more of that, much more, because otherwise, we will just do this all over again. Actually, what was really striking, as we’re getting more details about the J.P. Morgan story, is that the kinds of risky investments they were making – not only were they taking risks like banks did just before the big crisis; they were tak-ing the same risks. They’d bought almost half of the mortgage-backed securities in Britain. It’s as if they were determined to have a repeat, remake that movie when the first one’s still in the theaters. This is going to be crucial, because we could do it all over again and again. Mitt Romney has promised to repeal Dodd-Frank, so take away even the inadequate but at least step-in-the-right-direction regulation and get rid of it.SHAPIRO: You have written quite a bit about the need for health-care reform and how it would contribute positively to the economy. Given the passage of the health-care reform act and the political fallout from that, do you re-evaluate your position at all?KRUGMAN: No, I don’t think so. First of all, I think that the lousy economy is prob-ably the main explanation of what happened in the midterms.

And there really was one chance to get health-care reform passed. If we didn’t do it in 2010, I don’t know when the next op-portunity would have come. Now we might lose it, and that scares me. We might lose it either because of a politicized Supreme Court or because President Romney undoes it, but you have to make that try, because ultimately, politics is not about winning elections. Politics is about trying to make your country better, and health-care reform

Club Leadership

Karin Helene Bauer

Hon. William Bradley

Dennise M. CarterRolando Esteverena

Steven Falk

Amy Gershoni

Heather M. Kitchen

Amy McCombs

Hon. William J. Perry

Ray Taliaferro

Nancy Thompson

ADVISORY BOARD

Dan AshleyMassey J. BambaraRalph Baxter Dr. Mary G. F. Bitterman**

Hon. Shirley Temple Black*John L. BolandJ. Dennis Bonney*Michael R. Bracco Helen A. BurtJohn Busterud*Michael CarrHon. Ming Chin*Dennis A. Collins Jack CortisMary B. Cranston**Dr. Kerry P. CurtisDr. Jaleh DaieEvelyn S. Dilsaver Lee J. DutraJoseph I. Epstein*Jeffrey A. FarberDr. Joseph R. Fink*Carol A. Fleming, Ph.D.Lisa FrazierWilliam German*Dr. Charles GeschkeRose Guilbault**Jacquelyn HadleyEdie G. HeilmanHon. James C. HormelMary HussClaude B. Hutchison Jr.*Dr. Julius Krevans*

Lata KrishnanDon J. McGrathRichard Otter*Joseph Perrelli*Hon. Barbara PivnickaHon. Richard PivnickaFr. Stephen A. Privett, S.J.Dr. Mohammad H. QayoumiDan C. QuigleyToni Rembe*Victor A. Revenko*Skip Rhodes*Dr. Condoleezza RiceFred A. RodriguezRenée Rubin*Robert Saldich**Joseph W. SaundersGeorge M. ScaliseConnie Shapiro*Charlotte Mailliard ShultzGeorge D. Smith, Jr.James StrotherHon. Tad Taube Charles TraversThomas VertinRobert WalkerDaniel J. Warmenhoven Nelson Weller*Judith Wilbur* Dr. Colleen B. WilcoxDennis Wu*Russell M. Yarrow

* Past President ** Past Chair

BOARD OF GOVERNORS

Board Chair Maryles Casto

Vice Chair Anna W.M. Mok

Secretary William F. AdamsTreasurer Lee J. Dutra

President and CEO Dr. Gloria C. Duffy

OFFICERS OF THE COMMONWEALTH CLUB OF CALIFORNIA

“This health-care reform is

a Rube Goldberg device, but it’s

improvable. We can make

that system better.”


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You can download the free app from the Google Play Marketplace. On your Android smartphone, just open the Play Store, select Apps, and search for “Commonwealth Club” to find the app and follow the instructions for dowloading it to your phone.

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which might be just around the corner. But not so much you can do.

Finally, you should be thinking about the future. There ought to be priorities on things that are long-term investments in things that matter. I have my pet peeve. It’s not just trivial. It’s actually the biggest infrastructure project in America and one of the most needed – [and it] was just canceled by my governor, known locally as Governor Yells-at-People, of New Jersey. [He] has decided, based on almost no money saved, to cancel [the rail project]. The greatest city in the world is linked to the West by one rail tunnel, which was completed in 1910 and runs at 100 percent capacity during rush hour. And we’re not going to build a replacement? Incredible.SHAPIRO: But your state governor is actually considered one of the most popular and elect-able Republicans today in the United States. So I wonder: Do you think there is an appetite among the American people to vote for some-one who says, “I’m going to have to raise your taxes; I’m going to spend for stimulus”?KRUGMAN: We had a little bit of a politi-cal lesson last fall. President Obama came out with a job creation proposal. It was a fairly modest thing, but it was bigger than expected. It turns out there was a lot of in-ternal debate within the White House, with people saying, “That’s too big of a number, it’s going to hurt [popularity].” Turned out, he went up in the polls. It showed that he stood for something. There’s a lot to be said about standing for something.

Obama spent most of 2011 saying, “Basically, I agree with the Republicans, but I’m going to do it less so.” That didn’t work, even as a political strategy. If you are in a position to actually put policies into effect, then the important thing to remember is that whatever voters may say in focus groups or whatever, they vote on results.

FDR’s greatest mistake was that in 1936, polls said people wanted to balance the budget and cut government spending, and he went ahead and did it in 1937, sending the economy into the second great leg of the Great Depression, and lost terribly in the 1938 midterm elections. What he should have remembered is do what’s right for the economy, the votes will follow.

This program was made possible by the generous support of Accenture.

putting you face-to-face with today’s thought leaders


Two longtime congressional observers try to point toward a better future for our national legislature. Excerpt from “Is Political Compromise Possible?,” May 17, 2012.

THOMAS MANN Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution; Co-author, It’s Even Worse Than It Looks

NORMAN ORNSTEIN Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute; Co-author, It’s Even Worse Than It Looks

JOSEPH TUMAN Professor of Political and Legal Communications, San Francisco State University; Political Analyst, CBS 5 TV – Moderator

Ornstein: Tom and I met 45 years ago at the University of Michigan. We have been friends since, and we’ve been partners in a whole series of projects and books over more than four decades, during which time we’ve been immersed in the politics in Washington at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, but particularly in the corridors of Congress.

We wrote this book because, in the more than four decades that we have been there, we haven’t seen it this bad. Believe me, we’ve seen some bad times. We’ve seen dysfunction in Washington.

When we first arrived, the city – and the country – were riven down the middle by the Vietnam War. The passions were high.

I remember distinctly a moment in our first year there. We were working on Capitol Hill as congressional fellows of the American Political Science Association – George McGovern on the floor of the Senate taking his own chamber to task for the war and saying, “The walls of this chamber reek with blood,” which brought a collective gasp; you didn’t talk that way. A


short while later Bob Dole, then a freshman senator, took to the floor and just ripped the bark off of McGovern. But before that year was out, I saw the two of them walking arm in arm in the corridors of the Senate. They forged a friendship, which remains to this day – both of them now in their upper 80s – over the question of hunger. They shared a passion for dealing with the problem, coming at it from very different perspectives.

But it wasn’t unusual to find those kinds of relationships, just as the divisions over Vietnam were not partisan ones. Some of the strongest supporters of President Nixon’s approach to Vietnam were Southern conser-vative Democrats; some of the strongest op-ponents were moderate liberal Republicans, many of them from right out here on the West Coast.

The world has changed since then. Now the level of polarization, partisan and ideo-logical – the tribalism that we have that’s not just in Washington but has metastasized out into the states – alarmed us enough that we wanted to issue a kind of clarion call. We’ve written a number of books that have lamented the loss of the regular order in Congress. We have been passionate crusaders, but mostly on process issues. This time, having spent 40 years building reputations – in part as people without axes to grind, not pushing for one party or for a particular ideology – we figured it was time to spend some capital. While we see a larger structural problem – parliamen-tary parties that are now far apart, internally cohesive and oppositional – one party has been much more culpable of late, and it’s what we refer to as “asymmetric polarization.”

Photo courtesy of Brady-Handy Photograph Collection, Library of Congress / Wikimedia Commons

We’re going to take some heat for that, and it’s going to be a little difficult for us in the future to have the same credibility across the board, but we felt it was necessary because the stakes are so high. We are hoping that this book will have enough resonance that it will become a part of the larger conversation in the campaign. Mann: We wrote a piece in The Washington Post Outlook section that was put online three days before it ran in the Sunday section and five days before the official publication date for our book. It was a summary of one feature of [our] argument. We had a very clever editor who gave it a title: “Let’s just say it: The Republican Party is the problem.”

Well, that piece went viral. Within 24 hours, The Washington Post online stopped counting their comments. We put a little


pressure on their servers. We’ve lived and worked in Washington, but never have we found something we’ve said or written the focus of argument and attention, and always preceded by “the widely respected and fair-minded, nonpartisan Mann and Ornstein.” People really just couldn’t dismiss it as part of the partisan rhetoric that poisons our politics. We haven’t had one Republican elected official speak out on the record de-nouncing what we have said. We’ve had hun-dreds of emails from people, some really long and thought-ful and poignant, and many were self-identified Republicans who were distressed about what had been occurring within their own party. They watch the coverage in Washington, and what they see is either a “Crossfire” show or intensely partisan news outlets. Then our traditional news organiza-tions, fearful of being charged with political or partisan bias, sort of find the norm of balance. You get a quote from someone here and someone there, and that sort of does the story. Someone made the comment that one of the most under-reported and least under-stood transformations in American politics has been that of the Republican Party, over three decades but then over the last three, four years.

The two basic themes of [our] case are as follows.

One is the mismatch between our contemporary political parties and our governing system.

The second is the fact that one of our parties doesn’t really believe in the legitimacy of the other, and the other doesn’t believe in working with the other and wants to negoti-ate a hundred years of economic and social policy in the name of dealing with the crisis of deficits. Ornstein: If you look at what happened in Indiana with [Republican Senator] Dick Lugar’s [primary] defeat by Richard Mourdock, a good part of the thrust was condemning Lugar because he had worked

hand-in-glove with President Obama. They neglected to say what it was that they’d worked together on, which was ridding the world of loose nuclear weapons that other-wise would fall into the hands of terrorists.

We don’t want to remove or destroy the Republican Party; we want a vibrant,

important party that can be there competing with

Democrats. This isn’t

about ideology. Rich-ard Lugar is no moderate;

he’s a very conservative fellow by his voting record. Bob Bennett, who lost in Utah, was one of the five most conservative in voting records. The difference is, they were problem solvers, and now we’re leaching out the problem solvers.

Speaker [John] Boehner said they were going to use the debt limit yet again for hostage taking. We’ve had political games played with [the debt limit] over many years, but the leaders were never going to let the full faith and credit of the United States be jeopardized. It’s not as if we have the stron-gest economy and can weather these storms. You’re playing with the future of the country in a way that we just haven’t seen. Tuman: What makes [you] credible in mak-ing this argument for the book is that you come at this from different places, certainly in terms of the perception of your affiliations with your employers. Are you really different at this point, or have you gravitated toward one another in terms of your views of policy and ideology? Mann: Brookings is not a left-wing organiza-tion. I suppose there’s a certain progressive orientation among many of the people there, but our job is to understand the intersection of process and policymaking. For 40 years I’ve built a career being an analyst of Ameri-can politics and the constitutional system, and that’s what’s driven me. And that’s why Ph

otos

by

Ed R

itger

– working alone and with Norm over all these years – we’ve been listened to by people on the Hill on both sides of the aisle. There’s a moderation in our whole orientation and, I hope, an honesty and integrity about the way we go about our work. Ornstein: Our different institutional identi-ties have worked to our advantage in many of the projects that we’ve done. I also think we rise or fall on the quality of what we’ve said.

We h a v e really tried to reach a goal, wherever we’ve spoken, [where-b y ] p e o p l e would come up afterwards and say, “I’m not sure where you’re coming from.” We are

now not going to be able to do that as much. We got, from the Washington Post piece, a lot of liberal blogs that started out by saying, “We’ve been saying that for years, and nobody paid attention to us!” It was an “emperor has no clothes” moment, because it came from people who started without that sense of, “We’d dismiss it right off the bat.” Tuman: What do you think might be a solution toward increasing opportunity to develop [collaborative] relationships, [both in Congress and at] the state level? Mann: Efforts to deal with dysfunctional government tend to attach themselves to ideas that aren’t very promising, and could ac-tually do more harm than good. One of those was the idea of a third-party independent presidential candidate. A balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, an amend-ment to limit terms – terrible ideas. We have examples from the states. Do we really want to carry California rules on budgets and taxes to the whole country? You are a model for dysfunctional fiscal policy.

There’s also the idea, prominent among academics, “Relax. We’ve been through tough times, pre-Civil War” – that’s a nice period to compare ourselves to – “and it’ll adjust over time.” We think that’s irresponsibly complacent.

One thing that people rally to is, “Let’s get all private money out of politics and fund our elections publicly.” We can’t get it [out] because of the nature of our Constitution

“We have lots of ideas,

some of them really radical,

including mandatory attendance at the

polls.” –Mann


and how it’s interpreted by the courts, and especially the Roberts Court. There are many forces operating in our politics. We need to reform money in politics, but full public financing cannot work in [our] era.Ornstein: Let me talk for a minute about term limits. It relates to a broader problem in the society, which is this yearning [to] purge the system of politicians. To use the old joke, if the framers were alive today and heard that, they’d be rolling in their graves. They were politicians. They understood that you want people who respect the institutions that are political institutions, who work within a set of rules and boundaries that are the regular order.

You’ve got to understand other people’s points of view, put yourselves in their shoes. The idea in this extended republic was [that] you were going to bring people together; they would see each other, talk to each other, un-derstand each other and then work together, and even if they didn’t agree on things, they would come together enough, and discuss and deliberate enough, that people would believe the legitimacy of the decisions that were made. Term limits work against that at every level. You don’t bring in the kinds of people who have commitment to institutions or longer-term things. Tuman: What can the average voter do to change this dysfunction?Mann: One [idea] is to maximize citizen participation in the elections. If you have a 90 to 95 percent turnout, as op-posed to 50 to 55 percent, you get to the polls p e o p l e w h o don’t have as searing a set of beliefs, and who tend to be a little more open to someone who’s willing to talk to a member of another party. We have lots of ideas, some of them really radical, including mandatory attendance at the polls. The Aussies do it; they have since 1925, producing turnout above 90 percent in every election since then. It changes the conversation. Instead of mobilizing and demobilizing efforts, it’s addressing broader audiences and talking about more substan-tive problems. We have lots of ideas on that

participation but we don’t address money, won’t money’s influence be even more perni-cious than before?Mann: There is no silver bullet. We’ve got to work on a whole host of things. We have an agenda of changes on the money side that tries to attack the flight from disclosure, the utter fraud of so-called “independent spending” activities. We have to get more individual donations, and we have ideas for doing that as well. It’s difficult reaching a huge nation like ours. A lot of money in and of itself is not a bad thing; it’s the source of the money, and the opportunities for all interests in the society to have their views represented.Ornstein: Tom and I have spent a lot of years working on campaign reform. We did a working group that had something to do with the McCain-Feingold law that passed, and we’re quite proud of that. We were dis-mayed with the Citizens United decision, which demonstrates that the dysfunction and tribalism isn’t just in Congress or in state legislatures; it’s in the Supreme Court as well. It’s also the Federal Election Commission; it’s now an IRS that isn’t enforcing its own regulations. We’re right in the middle of it, and we see how much this is corrupting the process. It’s the new Gilded Age.

Absent a change in the Supreme Court, we’ve got to try to find ways to ener-

gize agencies. We’ve called on President Obama to use

his recess appointment authority to replace

five members of the FEC whose terms have long expired. That alone would have a signifi-cant impact in creating a sense

of enforcement of the rules. As Tom said,

there’s no magic bul-let in the money world

– you’re not going to suddenly have sweetness and light because you take private money out of campaigns – but leaving the system as it is is a formula for utter disaster.

side of things, but there are other ways, even electoral reforms.Ornstein: We have to get voters to look at the world in a different way and behave in a different fashion. If somebody pops up and says, “I’m not like the rest of those clowns,” don’t listen to them. Focus on trying to get candidates whose orientation is toward understanding that there are problems and that you’ve got to work with others to solve those problems.

Don’t believe every negative ad. Negative ads dominate this process because there is an automatic assumption that they’re all a bunch of scoundrels. We’ve got to guard against that.

Mandatory voting is a steep uphill battle in a country where we don’t like mandatory anything, but I think it’s going to happen at some point when people come to realize that if we have politics dominated by a sliver of voters who represent the bases, it’s not going to work.

A 95 percent turnout in and of itself is not such a wonderful thing. The former Soviet Union had that all the time; it didn’t represent function in the system. Chicago gets to 110 percent, on a good day. The difference is, as Australian politicians of all stripes will tell you, that if you’re not in a system that’s driven by the bases, politicians focus on the voters in the middle. You don’t talk about guns or gays or abortion; you talk about jobs and education and the economy and

the climate, and the big things that matter. If voters come to believe that politicians actually are intent on trying to figure out how to solve those problems, then you’re likely to get a greater interest and a sense of efficacy about the system. Tuman: [With the rise of ] super PACS and independent expenditures, money is more important than ever. If we increase voter

“You’ve got to

understand other people’s points of view,

put yourselves in their

shoes.” –Ornstein

This program was made possible by the generous support of Chevron.


Israel’s departing consul general shares his thoughts on his country’s rapidly changing geopolitical neighborhood. Excerpt from “Foundations for Peace in the Middle East,” May 16, 2012.

AKIVA TOR Consul General for Israel for the Pacific Northwest

Photo by failiru / Flickr

In the Middle East, [Israel sees] a region going through a prolonged political earthquake, where almost every regime and society is undergoing some sort of

fundamental change; the outcome is as yet unclear. But a number of aspects of how the political terrain will look in the Middle East are clear, and that is primarily the rise of political Islam in the region.

In Morocco, the parliamentary elections delivered a victory for the parties of political Islam. In Tunisia, considered by many to be the most cosmopolitan Arab state in north Africa, the parliamentary elections delivered a similar outcome. In Libya, it is unclear what will be the political configuration once the regime stabilizes. Likewise in Syria; though if the Assad regime is defeated – as may well happen – it seems a possibility that the Sunni political opposition will coalesce around the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood and we will see a

victory of political Islam there as well. But first and foremost, as always in the

Arab world, Egypt is at the forefront of all political and cultural transformation in the region. Here, the parliamentary elections after three rounds, which were free and fair, delivered a clear victory for political Islam. The Muslim Brotherhood received approximately 46 percent of the vote; the Salafist Party approximately 25 percent. In other words, [about] three-quarters of the Egyptian parliament is represented by parties of political Islam, with the liberal and secular parties representing no more than 15 percent.

We may not know exactly who will be the next Egyptian president or the precise place of the military in the continuing political life of Egypt, but one political fact is undeni-able: political Islam won the elections. This political ideology represents the free choice of the majority of Egyptians, and probably

the majority of Arab voters in every place in which free elections are held or will be held.

What does it mean for Israel? It’s quite a question. We have not yet had a relationship with a government dominated by political Is-lam. With the government of Hosni Mubarak, we had a relationship which was with an Egypt defined formally as a secular, nationalist Arab state. In many ways, secular Arab nationalism perhaps leaves place for an accommodation with the national movement of the Jewish people, Zionism; perhaps there is less place for that in the viewpoint of political Islam, which might see history in the Middle East through the lens of a religio-historical rather than a secular-historical outlook. Therefore, we are understandably curious how things will be.

With the [Egyptian] military, we’ve had quite a good relationship and a lot of security cooperation in the past in the Sinai and in carrying out the requirements of the Camp

THE RISE OF POLITICAL ISLAMand Israel’s place in the M iddle East



David agreement.In the current politics of Egypt, there are

analytical reasons supporting both optimism and pessimism, but Israel prefers to take an optimistic and constructive approach. For our part, we welcome the new Egyptian gov-ernment that is emerging. We will welcome any elected president of Egypt, and we will seek to engage the new Egyptian government in as deep a relationship as possible for the mutual benefit of both our states.

If things go really well, or even just reason-ably well, this will be the first case where Israel has a working political peace and relationship with an Arab government of political Islam, and perhaps that will open doors and possibili-ties for peace in other places in the region that have not been susceptible to peace until now.

Right now, we do have some emerging chal-lenges, in particular in Sinai. The security situ-ation in Sinai has deteriorated. We don’t think this is because the Egyptian military wants it to deteriorate, but there has been a loss of control, and our southern border has become less safe. Pretty much everything that can go into Gaza – Mercedes Benzes, refrigerators, TNT, and advanced munitions – is going into Gaza right now. The gas pipeline between Egypt and Israel was bombed more than 10 times.

Our other neighbor, Jordan, with whom we have a peace treaty, remains stable throughout the political earthquake. We are gratified to see it. We view the Kingdom of Jordan as a fine and excellent neighbor, as a country ruled by a decent and modest monarchy which cares for their people, and we believe that is an abiding national security interest of Israel that Jordan continue to suc-ceed; all indications seem to indicate that.

Regarding our relations with the Pales-tinians, the situation is quite complicated, interesting and requiring analysis. From the Israeli perspective, everything that is going on in our region – in Syria, Egypt, North Africa, in the Emirates – is out of our control. We have to analyze it, understand it to the best of our capacity, and prepare for all eventuali-ties; but we cannot control it. But with the Palestinians, we do have a relationship and we do have a political process.

The Egyptian revolution has affected Pales-tinian politics. One way is the greater strength and political popularity, to a certain extent, of Hamas. Hamas is a movement that is politi-cally aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood. But whereas the Muslim Brotherhood in

Egypt has accepted the peace treaty as a sov-ereign obligation of the Egyptian state and has voiced no intention of abrogating [it], Hamas does not recognize Israel, does not recognize any of the agreements between Israel and the Palestinian Authority and does not recognize our legitimacy in the region at all.

But the emergence of the Muslim Broth-erhood as a majority power in Egypt has affected Palestinian politics and made Hamas perhaps more popular. Between the Palestin-ian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in Gaza there is a continuing dance, which has been going on for some years, and talks about the possibility of the establishment of a Palestinian national unity government. We understand the desire of a stateless people to want to be ruled by one unified leadership. At the same time, we Israelis have to live with the outcome and the security dilem-mas that will be entailed. It would be a very,

very deep challenge for us if Hamas and the Palestinian Authority do unite and Hamas ministers enter into an Authority govern-ment. It would make it very difficult to move forward toward a peace agreement when we would be signing with a government where many of the ministers do not even recognize our legality or morality of our presence, state-hood, and national ambitions as a sovereign Jewish people.

The West Bank, on the other hand, is still succeeding economically, with high levels of growth. We very much respect our Palestinian interlocutors. Ramallah and Nablus are thriv-ing cities with functioning self-government and law enforcement. We are very happy about this; the success of the Palestinian economy is an abiding Israeli national interest, as well as an abiding Palestinian interest.

The question is, What will happen in the next couple years? Here I fear that we may find ourselves facing conditions in which the opportunities for concluding a permanent

peace treaty between Israel and the Palestin-ian Authority may have receded.

On the one hand, the political picture of how an agreement between us should look is clear. And we actually agree on the basic out-lines. Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority agree that the correct way to achieve peace between us is through the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, living in a formal agreement of peace and friendship and as much economic and governmental coopera-tion as each side can accept, which hopefully would include a very deep and strong coopera-tion in as many spheres as possible.

The Arab Awakening and the strengthen-ing of political Islam and everything that has been happening in Egypt have weakened Pal-estinian moderate leadership in its capacity to reach an agreement with us. Egypt under Mubarak was always a stalwart and the most important Arab political support for peace making between Israel and the Palestinians. That leadership is not there anymore. The Egyptians are involved with their own affairs, and it is unclear to what extent a government dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafists will be supportive of such a peace process between us.

But in any case, the Palestinian Author-ity in the West Bank finds itself with less political support for moving toward us to an agreement. Because in order to sign such a peace treaty, we have to agree on and end of claims; end of the state of war; and in our view Palestinians have to acknowledge that Palestinian refugees will be resettled within a Palestinian state and not within Israel. We have to reach an agreement on Jerusalem, which will surely be difficult for both sides. I don’t think that the Palestinian governance is able to take the decisions like that, given the political situation in the region.

From our perspective, any Israeli govern-ment looking at the political scene also has to ask itself how will the Middle East look in three months, six months, nine months, two years from now. I’m not certain any Israeli government at this time would be willing to repeat offers made previously in the last decade, which were extremely far-reaching in terms of territorial concessions, given the current situational uncertainty in the Middle East and in Palestinian governance.

This program was made possible by the generous support of Bank of America.

“The Arab [Spring] ... has weakened Palestinian

moderate leadership in

its capacity to reach an

agreement with us.”




My real regret is that we didn’t prosecute the war as effectively as we might have. We thought that once Saddam fell, and the government fell in Baghdad, it would all snap together again somehow, whereas what I had been saying to the president is, “If you break it, you’re going to own it.” If you take out a government, and the people are standing around wondering what comes next, you become the government; you are responsible for their security and for their well being. We didn’t handle that part of the campaign well, and then, as you all know,

an insurgency broke out. The pressure that Saddam Hussein had kept on the Sunnis and the Shiites and the Kurds to get along or else – that pressure was gone, and we saw that they weren’t going to get along that eas-ily. That ethnic conflict is still playing out, but when you read the papers today, you see that Iraq is doing better with respect to its economy, its infrastructure. It’s pumping more oil than it ever did under Saddam Hussein. The Iraqi people have every op-

portunity to put together a solid country with a representative form of government but, like any democracy growing up from infancy, it’ll take time and there will be difficulties. That’s the story. I was asked to present it. I was assured it was correct, and it wasn’t correct, and I regret that very, very much, and I essentially have become the example of it being incorrect, and I always get the question. ASHLEY: How painful was that for you, personally?POWELL: It was very painful. When you put yourself on the line and you’re represent-ing not just yourself, but the president and the United States government, and you’re working from information that’s been given to the Congress, given to the president, given to our commanders, given to the world as being an accurate picture, and nevertheless you become the symbol of that accurate pic-ture, and then it all starts to fall apart – and you’re sitting in your office and then suddenly somebody else comes in and says, “No, that turns out not to be the case. No, it isn’t a biological van; it looks like it’s just a truck,” you can see the case fall apart. It was painful, because you knew that all the attention would be focused on your presentation. Do you go fetal and climb under your desk? No. I’m still secretary of state. I’ve got to get on with the work that is before me. As I learned over the years, when you have something that is as stressing as this, you have got to manage it as best you can, but then you’ve got to get on with the other work that you have. Don’t let failure cause you to not be able to func-tion any longer.

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ASHLEY: How much friction, General, was there between you and the rest of the Bush administration in those last couple of years?POWELL: In my last couple of years, we had differences and challenges with respect to Iraq and Afghanistan and other things, and that’s gotten most of the press atten-tion over the years. But what’s interesting is that we did a lot of things that didn’t get much attention, that were very, very good. We increased aid to Africa and other undeveloped parts of the world. We helped with the expansion of NATO. We supported the expansion of the European Union. We put huge sums of money against some of the worst diseases that we are facing in the world, HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases like malaria and tuberculosis. We did a great deal to stabilize our relationship with China, with the Russian Federation, but people don’t remember that or don’t focus on that as easily as they focus on the disagreements we had. In early 2004 I said to the president that I only intended to serve one term, “and, frankly, we’re not operating as we should as a team, Mr. President, and so I think you should change us after you win in the fall of 2004,” which I expected he would, “and the change should begin with me, because my views tend to be so much out of alignment with the views of some of your other advisers, and so I think I should be the first to go.” I suggested that and he agreed, and so I left in January of 2005. ASHLEY: Thirty-five years in the Army, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, secretary of state – your thoughts on gays in the military, serving openly? POWELL: Yeah. When we put in Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in 1993, when President Clinton came into office, it was very controversial. People forget that the policy that existed then was far more stringent than the DADT policy we came up with. As chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, I had to represent the views of the senior leadership of the military and the noncommissioned officers, and the chaplains, who had very strong views about this, considering the denominations we generally draw chaplains from. Everything taken into consideration, I, my colleagues and the Joint Chiefs did not think it was appropriate for us to go all the way with gays in the military at that time, so we put in place DADT, meaning, “Keep your sexual preferences and activities to yourself.

“That’s the story. I was

asked to present it. It wasn’t correct, and

I regret that very, very

much.”

Colin Powell(Continued from page 7)


We won’t ask. Don’t tell. Keep it private.” It was a discriminatory policy. It’s not a policy that I would expect to see anywhere else in American life, but the military is different. We tell you who you’re going to sleep with. We tell you who you’re going to live with, who you’re going to die with, and so we have always been allowed by the Congress to set rules that we feel are necessary for good order and discipline in the armed forces, and that’s the basis upon which we rested it.

I also said that times are changing, and as our society evolves we have to keep review-ing this issue, and if the day comes when the senior military leaders who came after me say to the president and to the Congress, “We can now accept and live with a new policy of eliminating DADT,” I’m all for it. When Admiral Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff several times after me, made that statement to the Congress under President Obama’s administration, I fully supported it. I think that the country has evolved to the point. The new law has been in effect for a year and, in my conversa-tions with the senior military officers, it is not causing any difficulties within the force. They’re able to handle it, and that’s good. ASHLEY: Let’s talk world affairs. Syria, which has become an increasing concern around the world and around the region – what role should the United States play? Is there a military role that the United States should play?POWELL: The United States should continue to play a diplomatic and political role, working with the international com-munity. It is a very difficult situation. President Assad is somebody I know. I’ve worked with him. I’ve met with him on a number of occasions, and he is a total liar. He cannot be trusted on anything he says or anything he ever told me. But he is maintaining control of the country and he has an army that is still loyal to him. So he has the wherewithal to fight this insur-gency, this revolt, whatever you choose to call it. It’s not clear who is in the opposi-tion – who’s revolting, and what do they represent? He is not only trying to protect himself; he’s trying to protect his tribe.

There is not going to be a simple solu-tion to this. I do not think it is appropriate or in our interest to intervene militarily with U.S. troops. This is something they have to resolve, and it may be resolved

these days, Mr. Minister?” expecting him to say something like, “Israel.” He said, “Find-ing 600,000 jobs a year. We have a young, growing population. We have to find jobs for them.” Well, you’re not going to find jobs for them if you’re under sanctions because you’re fooling around with nuclear weapons and nuclear programs. You can’t eat it; you can’t do anything with it except polish those things. They’re worthless – but that’s as far as the conversation went.

Having said, that, I don’t know that it would be the proper thing to do – or that the case can be made that a military strike from anyone at this point is the appropri-ate action. They can reconstitute whatever you bomb, and the response from the rest of the world might be more difficult than you imagine. So I continue to believe in a diplomatic and political push.

Then, I have to put my old hat on as the person who is in charge of, or supervised, the nuclear weapons of the United States of America. We had 28,000 of them under my supervision when I was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. As a core commander, I was prepared to use nuclear weapons against the Russian army and Germany when we were still back in the Cold War, and as a young captain, age 25, I was taught how to employ them, how to actually fire them at somebody. The one thing I’ve been per-suaded about, out of all these experiences, is that these things cannot be used. They should never be used. They can be used to deter, to contain an enemy, as we did with the Soviet Union, but the thought of loosing these weapons on the world is very existential in nature. I do not think that any leadership in Iran – either Ahmadinejad, or Khamenei, or any of them – would sit down one day and say, “Gee, fellows, you know, I’m so mad at Israel,” or, “I’m so mad

through the force of arms. Hopefully, a diplomatic solution might be found. That may not be the case.

The other suggestion is, should we give arms to the opposition? I think you have to be very careful. If the opposition is not able to use these weapons, or if we don’t know who we’re actually arming, we might end up with a more dangerous situation, and more people being killed as President Assad’s response to this. Continue the support: economic sanctions, diplomatic efforts and political efforts, but I support the position of the president and almost all the other members of the international community, that it is not appropriate to send in outside armed troops. There are a lot of countries that are going through this kind of turmoil. Should we send armed troops into Sudan because it is so vivid on our television screens? There are just so many places that you could send your sons and daughters to fight, and you have to really think, “Is this in our national interest?” ASHLEY: Your thoughts on Iran and the nuclear ambitions of its leader? How you expect Israel to respond?POWELL: None of us wants to see Iran with a nuclear weapon. Iran can claim, “We don’t want a nuclear weapon, either. We’ve been telling you for years that all we want to do is to have a power program that al-lows us to generate electricity, but we don’t want a nuclear weapon.” They’ve gotten to the point where they are about to create a nuclear weapon and put it on a system that will deliver it. So I still think there’s an opportunity for diplomacy to convince the Iranians, as we put more and more eco-nomic and political pressure on them, that it is in their interest to prove to us beyond a shadow of a doubt, by the most rigorous inspection regime, that all they’re doing is trying to create rigorous nuclear programs, produce electricity, and that they’re not on the road to a weapon.

They’re hurting; the economic sanctions are hurting them. I only had a couple of meetings with the Iranian foreign minister when I was secretary of state, and at one of the meetings in Egypt, we were just mak-ing small talk. We had to be very careful; we both were under instructions not to get too close to one another here. Just to make small talk, I said, “What is the most significant problem that you have in Iran

“It was a discriminatory

policy. It’s not a policy

that I would expect to see

anywhere else in American

life, but the military is different.”


at the United States, that we’re going to fire the one or two weapons we have at them.”

That’s suicidal. They know what would happen the next day. Their principal interest is remaining in power, and the easiest way for them to lose power would be, either through overt threats or the use of these weapons, to be taken out. Same thing with North Korea. North Korea has a weapon. They keep shooting up rockets that don’t go anywhere. We still have to see that as a threat to the region and a danger, but at the same time, as I used to say in hearings when I was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the North Koreans know full well what will happen to them the day after they use one of these things. They will cease to exist as a society and as a nation, and they are not stupid. They only look stupid and act stupid, but they are not stupid. [Laughter.]

I mean this, now. They have a very clear idea of who they are and what they are, and they have this weird regime. But within that weird system, they’re very rational. The North Koreans are the toughest, best negotiators I’ve ever dealt with in my career, but they also know that if you want to stay in power, you have to find a way to deal with the rest of the world and give up these programs, and if you ever use them you’re no l o n g e r

in in power. Therefore, they do not have incentive to use them. ASHLEY: What made the North Koreans such good negotiators?POWELL: They’re tough, because they don’t have the same relevant basis that we have. They lie, and they don’t see a lie as a lie. When we lie our feelings are hurt, and, “Oh, woe is me; I shouldn’t have done that.” With them it’s merely a negotiating point, and so they’ll tell you something tonight, and we’ll agree to something, and tomorrow morning they’ll come in as if they’ve never heard of it before, and they’ll start all over again. It’s like water torture in the negotiations, and

they are superb at it. Admiral C. Turner Joy was our nego-

tiator in the Armistice talks in the early 1950s with the North Koreans. He wrote a marvelous book on the process of nego-

tiating with them that I studied when I became chairman and secretary of

state. He tells one story where they negotiated for weeks over whether they should have an agenda for a meeting. Every day the North

Koreans had a new objection. No matter what they agreed to yesterday, tomorrow morning they’d agree to something else.

We kept getting mad. You know Americans: “Oh, come on! Let’s

go! Come on! Can’t we have a deal?” Finally we reached a deal with them,

and everyone was happy, and Ad-miral Joy was happy, and then

we discovered that the North Koreans really weren’t ar-guing about whether we had an agenda or not; they were arguing about what should be

the first item on the agenda. We

were worrying about the agenda, but they were beyond us: “Once we get the Ameri-cans so mad that they will accept anything, they won’t notice what the first item is, which is the only thing we care about.” They have not lost that ability to negotiate, and in the last years of the President Bush 43’s administration they got their money back, they got taken off the terrorist list, and all we got was a tower that was blown down that they could put back up in a couple of weeks. They’re good. They’re very good.ASHLEY: Now, General, I’d like to talk with you about this fascinating book that you’ve written that has, I think, implica-tion and instruction across a wide range of American life – terrific advice for young people, in many respects, and also for older folks, executives, and all those in a leadership position or all those who aspire to a leader-ship position. The things you start with that seem to have guided you and formed you over the years are a list of rules, and you highlight 13 of those rules. One of the ones that you’ve probably faced a number of times: “It’s not as bad as you think.” Tell us why that is important.POWELL: It’s the first of the 13 rules, and it’s, “It’s not as bad as you think, and it’ll look better in the morning,” but then I say, “This is not a prediction; it might be worse. This is just an attitude to have.” [Laughter.] The reason I like that rule – and I use it all the time – is [that as] a leader, when faced with difficulties or tragedies, that’s the time you have to be most optimistic and display confidence that you can get on top of this tragedy. If you feel that way and you can communicate that positive attitude to your followers, to your employees or to your soldiers, you’re on the way to a solution. It has been very typical of America. When you look at terrible crises we’ve had – let’s say Pearl Harbor, or 9/11 – our leaders stood up the next day and said, “We’re going to get on top of this, and as bad as it looks it’s going to look better in the morning, and the morning after that, and the morning after that, and on and on until we prevail, until we get on top of it.” It’s a way of reminding myself all the time to have an optimistic attitude.

The last rule – the 13th rule – is related to it. It says, “perpetual optimism.” Feeling that way all the time, that you can make things better, is a force multiplier, meaning in mili-tary terms [that] you enhance the ability of

“The one thing I’ve been

persuaded about is that

[nuclear weapons] cannot

be used. They should never be used.”


necessary, because the person receiving it probably needs it a lot more than you know.” I’ve always found it to be a good thing to live with, and I’ve found it to be true on many occasions.ASHLEY: [You also talk about] this notion of, “Pick people based on potential, not just performance.” Tell us a little bit about what you mean by that, and why that’s important.POWELL: It applies in any capacity, in any occupation, but in the military it means a great deal to us, because in the military you’re creating your own leaders. If you need a battalion commander or a fighter pilot, you can’t go hire one from IBM or

somewhere in Silicon Valley. You’ve got to grow ’em from being brand new of-ficers or privates. In my case, a hundred lieutenants came in with me, let’s say; only one of us is going to make general. Which one is it? We measure our people, both enlisted and officer, constantly. How are they performing? The more senior you become, the more the focus is on not only performance but potential, and that’s a different thing. OK, he’s a great battalion commander, but has he broadened himself? Has he learned new skills? Does he have a better understanding of how to work with other services? Does he seem to have the potential to do just as well at the next higher level? That is a much more subjective determination. You look at all of the reports of how this man or woman did in the past, and then you have to put your experience to work and your instincts to work. Will this guy do a good job if I promote him, or will I be mak-ing a mistake?

your team – you enhance your ability to do something well – if you are always optimistic that you can do something better. ASHLEY: One of the things that you talk about in terms of a key principle of solid leadership is the notion that kindness works. That is an interesting perspective from a military man, when often the military is so austere and so disciplined. Why is kindness so important in terms of leadership, both in the military and in civilian life?POWELL: The only reason I wrote it that way is because it works. Kindness works. To get things done you have to bring people together, especially in the military where you’re going to be asking them to put their lives on the line. You can be tough and you can be demanding, and you can set high standards, but I’ve also found that if you do these things in a spirit of kindness, and showing the reason why we have to do these things – and kindness in the way that gets their respect and shows that you respect them – you can build a very, very powerful team on a basis of trust.

I’ve always found that I got more things done with kindness than without kindness. What’s the alternative to kindness – being a jerk? Yes, and so I’ve always found that, even in the most difficult situations I’ve faced, where I’ve had to deal with people who are adversaries, I never converted those adversaries into enemies. I understand how to deal with an adversary, but I want to make that adversary a friend. By approaching it in a way that reflects kindness – reflects my strong feelings, but at the same time I want to learn about your strong feelings – let’s see if we can find a deal here, a compromise. It’s something that’s missing too much in our life in Washington now. The kind of kind-ness that used to exist even among some of the most adversarial relations within Wash-ington doesn’t seem to exist now.

We had a minister come to our church for a year. He was in trouble – we didn’t know what was wrong – and the bishop assigned him to us for a year. We just took him in. We took him in as a member of our family, and we were very kind to him. On his last sermon, as he was leaving – and I was sitting in the back of the church; I was a senior warden of our Episcopal church – he got up to give his final sermon, and I’ll never forget one sentence he used. He said, “Always display more kindness than seems

It’s a very human calculation you have to make, but that’s what we do in the military all the time.

Usually performance gives you a pretty good indication of what future potential is, but I’ve seen a lot of mistakes made, where people have been promoted when they shouldn’t have, and if you’d really had a serious talk with them they might have said, “Don’t promote me.” They knew that they were at their level of peak performance and potential, and they were doing a great job, and we needed them, but to move them up another level was putting them in a range of expectation that they couldn’t meet, and you were doing a disservice to that person. This also applies in any corporate or business or educational institution. Measure per-formance, but make that very, very human judgment as to what that person’s potential is for higher affairs. If you don’t see it there, don’t think it’ll suddenly emerge. It won’t, and you’ll find you’ve made a mistake. ASHLEY: General, role models are impor-tant in all of our lives, and I’d be interested to know who your role models have been, when you were younger and even today.POWELL: I’ve had role models throughout my career, and it starts with my parents. I don’t want to be too corny with this, but it was my two immigrant par-

ents who

“Measure performance, but

make that very, very human

judgment as to what that

person’s potential is for higher affairs.”


What they said to me was, “Just keep press-ing on, and let racism be a problem for the racists, not you. They’re the ones who are wrong, and don’t ever forget that, and don’t let them ever get you down.” ASHLEY: Do we have the right level of leadership in the United States, and are there enough leaders demonstrating, as you detail in your book, to truly be an involved, effective leader? It seems that we have a culture that is screaming at one another a lot without, necessarily, a lot getting done sometimes, or a lot of guidance, particularly for young people. Are you concerned about the state of leadership in America?POWELL: We have great leaders in this country. They’re all over the country. I see them in so many different capacities. I see governors who are doing great things. Sili-con Valley has been a breeding ground for great leaders in the information revolution.

What I would say to get to the heart of your question is, in our political system, particularly in Washington, there are great people who are great leaders, but the system increasingly makes it very, very difficult to exercise that leadership. The two parties in Washington have essentially gone to their corners, and they now have to reflect the orthodoxy of the extreme. If you stray the slightest from the orthodoxy of the extremes, you get hammered. You get ham-mered on cable talk shows, and if you feel a certain way you only listen to the cable talk shows that re-enforce the way you feel. You don’t look on the other side to see if you ought to be learning something differently, and that makes it very hard for our leaders, who are attacked for having any lack of orthodoxy, to essentially exercise the kind of leadership we’d like to see.

This is far different than the Congress I knew when I was just starting out 30 years ago in high politics in Washington, where they would get together and talk and find a compromise. That’s become much more difficult now, because of the orthodoxy of their positions. We’ll get through this, but I’m deeply troubled that we don’t have enough people stepping forward who could be leaders, and trying to break through this encrustation of orthodoxy that we have in our political system at this time.

make excuses for yourself.” When I went into the army in 1958, I was among the first in a generation of young officers in an un-segregated army. The army finally was desegregated in 1954. Four years later, here I came out of Harlem in the South Bronx. I still remember the message that the army gave me: “Powell, we don’t want to hear any

hard immigrant stories about you and your immigrant parents. Don’t tell us about you being poor and all the rest of that stuff, and don’t tell us anything about you being black. We don’t care. The only thing we care about is performance. You perform, you’ll go well. You don’t perform, you ain’t going nowhere. Got it?” “Yeah; I got it!” “OK.” [Laughter.]

The other thing I learned, which was important to me, that I got from my family and from the early leaders in my life, was that you’re going to be subjected to racial discrimination. Even though you’re in an Army that has slowly desegregated, you’re living in a country that has not. You go off base, and you have to go in the back door of stores and theatres and things like that.

This program was made possible by the generous support of the Koret Foundation.

“We’ll get through this, but

I’m troubled that we

don’t have enough people

stepping forward.”

came here with nothing and built a life, a low-income life; we lived in the tenements. They had two children, and they had ex-pectations for us. My sister was a teacher, and I was a soldier. This extended family of relatives that I had – we kept all of the cousins in play. There was no question about dropping out of school or anything like that. If you ever came to them and said, “I want to drop out of school,” they’d drop you out and get another kid, and so help me God they would. [Laughter.] “Don’t shame the family, and mind” – remember that word? – “mind your manners; mind your adults; mind your teachers.” That was drilled into us.

If I hadn’t had that kind of a start in life, it wouldn’t have made any difference who my role models were in the future. That’s what we’re missing so much in this country today, and this is why my wife and I spend so much time in youth programs. If you don’t give kids the right start in life, then they’re behind the curve. That’s why we have the highest incarceration rate in the world.

The role models were my parents, my relatives, my uncles and aunts who kept me in play, and then when I entered the Army, the people who really taught me how to be an officer were not generals. They were the people just above me, captains when I was a lieutenant, who taught me what it was like to be a soldier and what was expected of me. They were good at it. Good, old-time soldiers, and that’s where I picked it up. Those were my role models. Yes, I studied the works and actions of senior generals, and yes, I worked for great generals and I worked for presidents and all that, but that was just building on what I learned in my early years as a kid and my early years in the Army.

What I say to students now is, “Look around. See people who are doing good things. You might want to see a general or a basketball player as a role model, but maybe, when you walk to school, if you see a woman at 6:30 in the morning waiting for a bus to go to work at a low-wage job in order to make enough money to come home and take care of her children, you’re not going to get a better role model than that.” My final message to kids is, “Stop looking for somebody to model after. Be your own role model. Set your own stan-dards. Behave. Study hard. This isn’t brain surgery, kid. Behave, study hard, believe in yourself, believe in America, and don’t


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Hear Club programs on about 200 public and commercial radio stations throughout the United States. For the latest schedule, visit commonwealthclub.org/broadcast. In the San Francisco Bay Area, tune in to: KQED (88.5 FM) Fridays at 8 p.m. and Saturdays at 2 a.m. KRCB Radio (91 FM in Rohnert Park) Thursdays at 7 p.m.KALW (91.7 FM) Inforum programs on select Tuesdays at 7 p.m. KOIT (96.5 FM and 1260 AM) Sundays at 6 a.m. KLIV (1590 AM) Thursdays at 7 p.m. KSAN (107.7 FM) Sundays at 5 a.m. KNBR (680 and 1050 AM) Sundays at 5 a.m. KFOG (104.5 and 97.7 FM) Sundays at 5 a.m.


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Eight Weeks CalendarJuly 30 – September 23

Labor Day

Club offices closed

5:30 p.m. Middle East Discussion Group FE6:00 p.m. The Arts as a Medium for Peace FM6:00 p.m. Week to Week FM6:30 p.m. A Taste of Place

5:30 p.m. Middle East Discussion Group FE6:00 p.m. 16 and Pregnant FM6:00 p.m. How Volunteering Can Lead to a Dream Job FM

6:00 p.m. The America’s Cup6:00 p.m. Meg Jordan: Medical Careers7:00 p.m. George Lakoff

6:00 p.m. The Illusion of Building Green

5:15 p.m. Not-Obvious Things Every Career-Minded Person Must Know

6:00 p.m. Maddalena Bearzi: Dolphin Confidential6:00 p.m. Quarterback Trauma: Injuries in the NFL

Noon Congressman John Garamendi FM5:15 p.m. Rethinking the Job Search FM5:30 p.m. Book Discussion: The Sense of an Ending FM

6:00 p.m. Startups, VCs, Design and the Jobs of the Future6:00 p.m. Arts Careers: Who Gets the Job?

5:30 p.m. Book Discussion: The Warmth of Other Suns FM

6:00 p.m. Michael Rossi: The Jobs Outlook in California

6:00 p.m. Understanding the Deep Sea

6:00 p.m. The New Slavery FM

6:00 p.m. Video Games as Cognitive Enhancers FM6:00 p.m. The Media and Presidential Politics FM

6:00 p.m. City of White Gold: San Francisco in the Gilded Age6:00 p.m. How to Build a Great Company, Step by Step

6:00 p.m. Geoffrey Nunberg

5:00 p.m. Book Discussion: Tender is the Night FE6:00 p.m. George Lakoff6:00 p.m. Social Capital Markets

5:15 p.m. The Psychological Impact of Unemployment FM6:00 p.m. EV Riders FM

5:15 p.m. What a Skilled Eldercare Manager Can Do for You FM

5:15 p.m. Baby Boomers Defer Retirement for “Encore Careers”6:00 p.m. I Must Resist - Updating Bayard Rustin’s Dream of Work for All

6:00 p.m. Hedrick Smith

6:00 p.m. Inclusive Diversity and Talent Management

6:00 p.m. The Great Debate: Are We Alone?6:00 p.m. Grading California’s Economy


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Free program for members

Free program for everyone

Members–only program

Noon Academy of Art University: A Model for Arts Job Training?6:00 p.m. Olivia Fox Cabane6:00 p.m. Ahead-of-the-Pack Job Search Strategies

7:00 p.m. Joel Garfinkle2:00 p.m. Russian Hill Walking Tour

6:00 p.m. Keys to Starting a Business6:30 p.m. Climbing the SF Food Chain6:30 p.m. Business Model Innovation7:00 p.m. The Green Economy

6:00 p.m. Paul Saffo 11:00 a.m. Green Buildings

2:00 p.m. Chinatown Walking Tour6:00 p.m. Getting Promoted (or at Least Not Laid Off)6:30 p.m. The Shared Economy

2:00 p.m. San Francisco Architecture Walking Tour6:00 p.m. The Future of Our Water

Noon America and Rogue States FM

Noon Janine Zacharia in Conversation with Joel Brinkley FM

2:00 p.m. Alejandro Garcia

6:00 p.m. When Should and Shouldn’t You Follow Your Passion6:00 p.m. How Do You Do That? In Conversation with David Perry

6:00 p.m. Aging and the Persistence of MindTBA The 2012 Elections: Another Year of the Woman?

12:30 p.m. Steve Forbes 2:00 p.m. William J. Clancey


Not-Obvious Things Every Career-Minded Person Must Know in 2013 and Beyond

Marty Nemko, Career Coach; Former Columnist, SF Chronicle’s Career Col-umn; Host, “Work with Marty Nemko,” KALW

In today’s tough job market, career and job seekers are wise to consider under-the-radar careers. Nemko will reveal some rewarding but little-known gems. He’ll also share what is working best for his clients in landing a job. (Hint: Networking and a good resume are far from enough.) He’ll talk about the art of onramping: how to get off to a great start in your new job so you succeed rather than finding yourself soon needing to look for a job. Finally, he’ll present his favorite low-risk/high-payoff/high-ethics small businesses you can start. Nemko was named “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach” by the San Francisco Bay Guardian and “Job Coach Extraordinaire” by U.S. News. In his private practice, he has had more than 4,000 clients and enjoys a 96 percent client-satisfaction rate. He is the author of seven books, including Cool Careers for Dummies.

Nemko will also be leading four Thursday night minigroups throughout August focusing on various aspects of career growth and the job hunt. Sign up for one or all of these discussions.

MLF: PSYCHOLOGY

Location: SF Club Office

Time: 4:45 p.m. networking, 5:15 p.m. program

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, $7 students (with valid ID)

Program Organizer: Patrick O’Reilly

Timeless Explorations: Views from Cuba, Chile, Vietnam, Cambodia and Turkey

Berkeley photographer Thea Bellos con-tinues to unveil images from her travels around the world. Her interests in story-telling and documenting global change are evident in her portrayal of people and the natural and built environments. Many of her images were taken in some of the most fragile places on the planet, including the Atacama Desert, Angkor Wat and Isla de Chiloé. Bellos will be speaking at the Club on Monday, Sept. 24, 6 p.m., in the Gold Room.

MLF: THE ARTS


Time: Regular Club business hours

Cost: FREE

Program Organizer: Lynn Curtis

Ahead-of-the-Pack Job Search Strategies

Marty Nemko, Career Coach; Author; Former Columnist; Radio Host

Have you or someone you love been unsuc-cessful in landing a good job? Nemko will help troubleshoot your approach and offer new strategies. Nemko was named “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach,” by the San Francisco Bay Guardian. In his private practice, he has had more than 4,000 clients and enjoys a 96 percent client-satisfaction rate. For six years, he wrote a career column in the San Francisco Chronicle and is in his 24th year as host of “Work with Marty Nemko” on KALW.

MLF: PSYCHOLOGY


Time: 5:30 p.m. networking reception,

6 p.m. program, 7 p.m. book signing

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, $7 students


Olivia Fox Cabane: Charisma and Leadership – What if Charisma Could Be Taught?

Chief Charisma Coach, Spitfire; Author, The Charisma Myth

What makes people charis-matic, and which aspects of charisma can be learned? Cabane takes a scientific ap-proach, covering what charisma actually is, how it is learned, what its side effects are and how to handle them. She breaks charisma down into its components.

MLF: BUSINESS & LEADERSHIP / SCIENCE &

TECHNOLOGY





Program Organizers: Chisako Ress and

Nafeesah Rasheed

Academy of Art University: A Model for Arts Job Training?

Dr. Elisa Stephens, President, Academy of Art University, San Francisco

President Stephens will discuss why and how the Academy of Art has developed its leadership of educa-tion and training programs that prepare graduates for successful employment in varied arts fields.

MLF: THE ARTS


Time: 11:30 a.m. check-in, noon program


(with valid ID)

Program Organizer: Anne Smith

J u l y 0 6 – S e p t . 2 8

T H U 0 2 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T H U 0 2 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T H U 0 2 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

W E D 0 1 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

August 01–07


The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

Booker Prize-winning The Sense of an Ending follows a middle-aged man as he contends with a past he has never much thought about – until his closest child-hood friends return with a vengeance. Tony Webster thought he’d left all this behind as he built a life for himself, and by now his marriage, family and career have fallen into an amicable divorce and retirement. But he is then presented with a mysterious legacy that obliges him to reconsider a variety of things he thought he’d understood all along. Come discuss this work with fellow book lovers. A re-minder: The author will not be present.

MLF: SF BOOK DISCUSSION


Time: 5:30 p.m. program

Cost: $5 standard, MEMBERS FREE

Program Organizers: Barbara Massey and

Howard Crane

Congressman John Garamendi: Veterans and Jobs

Member, House of Representatives (D-CA); Member, House Armed Services Commit-tee; MBA, Harvard School of BusinessJohn Diaz, Editorial Page Editor, San Francisco Chronicle – Moderator

What can be done to help veterans re-enter the domestic workforce on finan-cially and psychologically sound footing, particularly in an unsettled job market? Garamendi brings nearly four decades of public service to the House Armed Services and Natural Resources com-mittees. He is the author of H.R. 3860, the Help Veterans Return to Work Act.

MLF: MIDDLE EAST



Cost: $20 standard, MEMBERS & STUDENTS FREE

Program Organizer: Celia Menzcel

Rethinking the Job Search: Winning Strategies for People over 50

Noreen McKeon, Program Manager, Coming of Age: Bay AreaMark Guterman, Career Coach, JVS

Whether you’ve been laid off or are simply seeking a job change, extra income in retirement or a move into a new field, in this economy there are challenges to job seekers over 50. This workshop will look at the changing face of employment and retirement, offer strategies for job hunters and suggest new ways to sharpen skills, expand your network and position yourself to take advantage of opportunities.

MLF: PSYCHOLOGY



Cost: $20 standard, MEMBERS FREE, $7 students


Startups, VCs, Design and the Jobs of the Future

Ryan Howard, Founder and CEO, Practice FusionBruce Gibney, Partner, Founders FundBen Nelson, Founder and CEO, Minerva; Former CEO, SnapfishTamara Wayland, Former Managing Director, CooperKevin O’Malley, President, TechTalk / Studio – Moderator

What are the jobs of the future, and how are leading startups and venture funders both preparing and providing for them? How has design and an expanded understanding of business systems opened up new approaches for workers to help create their own roles within these new organizations – and to respond as active co-creators ? What role will higher education and learning play in these new jobs and organizations?

MLF: BUSINESS & LEADERSHIP


Time: 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, students free (with valid ID)

Program Organizer: Kevin O’Malley

Arts Careers: Who Gets the Job?

Ken Foster, Executive Director, Yerba Buena Center for the ArtsGrace Stanislaus, Execu-tive Director, Museum of the African DiasporaClayton Lord, Director of Communications, Theatre Bay Area; Edi-tor, Counting New Beans

A panel of local arts industry leaders discusses changing opportunities today and the quality of skills they look for in hiring artists as well as administrators.

MLF: THE ARTS


Time: 5:30 p.m. networking, 6 p.m. program,

7 p.m. signing of Clayton Lord’s book


Program Organizers: Anne Smith and

Thomas Simpson

M O N 0 6 | S a n F r a n c i s c o M O N 0 6 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

T U E 0 7 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T U E 0 7 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

M O N 0 6 | S a n F r a n c i s c o


August 08–16

Michael Rossi, Senior Business Advisor to Gov-ernor Jerry Brown: The Outlook for Jobs in California

Senior Advisor for Jobs and Business Development, Office of the Governor

With an unsteady economy and an uncertain jobs outlook, what’s ahead for California’s employment market? Governor Brown’s top advisor on jobs and the economy provides the latest insights on employment in California. The governor has charged Rossi with streamlining and invigorating the state’s economic development infrastructure.


Time: 5:30 p.m. networking, 6 p.m. program

Cost: $20 standard, $12 members,

$7 students (with valid ID)

Climbing the SF Food Chain

Anthony Myint, Chef and Founder, Mission Street Food, Mission Bowling Club, Mission Chinese Food, Mission Burger and Commonwealth RestaurantRichie Nakano, Chef and Owner, Hapa RamenIso Rabins, Founder, ForageSF, The Underground Market and Forage KitchenAdditional Panelists TBA

San Francisco is teeming with talented cooks and innovative eating spots. So what is an aspiring Thomas Keller to do? Though the excess of local food culture might seem to present an access barrier for future food stars, individuals like Myint and Nakano are proving that success in our overstuffed city is not out of reach. With creative business models, unflagging passion and open minds, San Francisco’s foodies are forging unique paths to the top of the food chain. Whether it be from farmers market to food truck, or line cook to celebrity chef, our gustatory gurus will dish on their journeys to the top, what you’ll need for the climb and how they define success in today’s food scene.


Time: 6 p.m. check-in, 6:30 p.m. program, 7:30 p.m. reception

Cost: Regular: $20 standard, $12 members, $7 students (with valid ID). Premium (priority seating

and VIP after-party) $45 standard, $30 members.

The Green Economy: Where Are the Opportunities?

Parag Chokshi, Clean Energy Public Affairs Manager, GoogleLinda Keala, Vice President of Human Resources, SolarCityAlison van Diggelen, Host, “Fresh Dialogues,” and Contributor, KQED’s “Climate Watch” – ModeratorAdditional panelists TBA

According to the U.S. Labor Department, more than 3 million Americans have green jobs. The green economy is one of the fastest growing segments of the Bay Area economy, but where are the jobs and investment opportunities? And what’s the best way to find them? Join us for a panel discussion with green jobs experts from Google, SolarCity and other leaders in the green economy.

Location: Adobe Systems, 345 Park Ave., San Jose

Time: 6:30 p.m. check-in, 7 p.m. panel discussion

Cost: $15 standard, $10 members

Also know: In association with Deloitte Services

The Business Model Innovation Factory

Saul Kaplan, Founder and Chief Catalyst, The Busi-ness Innovation Factory

How do you stay relevant when the world is changing? Business models just don’t last as long as they used to. Today, all organizations must be capable of de-signing, prototyping and experimenting with new business models. Learn the sur-vival skills, used by a global community of over 5,000 innovators, to create a pipe-line of new business models in the face of disruptive markets and competition.



Time: 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m.

program

Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, students

free (with valid ID)


W E D 0 8 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T H U 0 9 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

T H U 0 9 | S i l i c o n V a l l e y T H U 0 9 | S a n F r a n c i s c o


City of White Gold: San Francisco in the Gilded Age

Geordie Lynch, Director, City of White Gold

The discovery of silver in 1859 propelled San Francisco from a dusty mining boomtown into a world-class metropolis. Lynch shares the subject and story of his historical documentary film, City of White Gold, which tells of the epic struggle for wealth and power in the Wild West, beginning with the fateful unearthing of the Comstock Lode. Lynch intersperses video clips from the film-in-progress and readings from letters of the era with a fas-cinating account of how silver shaped San Francisco in the 19th century Gilded Age.

MLF: HUMANITIES




Program Organizer: George Hammond

The New Slavery

Matt Cantor, Columnist, Berkeley Daily Planet

Monday Night Philosophy investigates one aspect of the future of work and finds a resurgence, in different dress, of the institution of human slavery. We’ll look at the controversial topic of prison populations in the U.S., which are con-tinuing to surge; the labor of many of those forcibly idled inmates is being put to use. Are long prison terms for petty crimes a recruiting tool? Hear Cantor’s arguments and concerns about the re-emergence and social acceptance of this ancient form of exploitation.

MLF: HUMANITIES



Cost: $20 standard, MEMBERS FREE,



How to Build a Great Company, Step by Step

Steve Blank, Serial Entre-preneur; Founder, E.piphany; Professor, UC Berkeley and Stanford Engineering; Author, The Startup Owner’s ManualDan’l Lewin, Corporate Vice President of Strategic and Emerging Business Development, Microsoft

Join Silicon Valley serial entrepreneur-turned-educator Blank in a lively discussion with Mi-crosoft’s Lewin. This program will introduce best practices, lessons and tips that have swept the startup world, offering proven advice and information for entrepreneurs of all stripes.

MLF: BUSINESS & LEADERSHIP/

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY





Chinatown Walking Tour

Enjoy a Commonwealth Club Neighborhood Ad-venture. Join Rick Evans for a memorable midday walk and dis-cover the history and mysteries of Chi-natown. Explore colorful alleys and side streets. Visit a Taoist temple, an herbal store, the site of the first public school in the state and the famous Fortune Cookie Factory. There will be a short break for a tea sample during the tour.

Location: Meet at corner of Grant and Bush,

in front of Starbucks, near Chinatown Gate

Time: 1:45 p.m. check-in, 2–5 p.m. tour


Program Organizer: Kristina Nemeth

Also know: Temple visit requires walking up

three flights of stairs. Limited to 12 people.

Participants must preregister. Tour operates

rain or shine.

Geoffrey Nunberg: The A-Word

Adjunct Full Professor, UC Berkeley School of Information; Author, Ascent of the A-Word: A--holism, the First Sixty Years

It went from the mouths of WWII service-men to the typewriter of young Norman Mailer. By the 1970s it had become a staple of plays and movies. In 2000, George W. Bush accidentally uttered it on a live mic and sparked a debate about whether that made him a man of the people or just an a--hole. Ours has been called the age of a--holism. The word has become an ex-pression of contemporary American values – about civility, about relationships, about pretension, about class. Yet the media are obliged to bleep it or disguise it with as-terisks. Nunberg takes us behind the slur.



program, 7 p.m. book signing


M O N 1 3 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T U E 1 4 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

T H U 1 6 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

Keys to Beating the Odds in Starting a Business


Have a business idea you want to run by career coach Nemko? Don’t have an idea? Already in business but struggling? Succeeding but wanting to take your business to the next level? Considering a franchise? Let Nemko help address your tough issues. Nemko was named “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach” by the San Francisco Bay Guardian. He is in his 24th year as host of “Work with Marty Nemko” on KALW.

MLF: PSYCHOLOGY



program, 7 p.m. book signing



T U E 1 4 | S a n F r a n c i s c o W E D 1 5 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

T H U 0 9 | S a n F r a n c i s o


August 16–23

Getting Promoted (or at Least Not Laid Off)


Being politically astute, communicating like a leader and staying ahead of the curve are key in forging ahead on your career path. Tell your story, and we’ll help you create a plan for moving up. Nemko was named “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach” by the San Francisco Bay Guard-ian. In his private practice, he has had more than 4,000 clients and enjoys a 96 percent client-satisfaction rate.

MLF: PSYCHOLOGY






America and Rogue States

Thomas Henriksen, Ph.D., Senior Fel-low, Hoover Institution, Stanford Univer-sity; Author, America and Rogue StatesDr. Dina Ibrahim, Assistant Professor of Broadcasting and Electronic Communi-cation Arts, SFSU – Moderator

Dr. Henriksen, who specializes in foreign policy and defense issues, will discuss U.S. policies and interaction with rogue states posing terrorist and/or nuclear threats. These include Iran, prewar Iraq and North Korea.

MLF: MIDDLE EAST


Time: 11:30 a.m. check-in, noon program,

1 p.m. book signing

Cost: $20 standard, MEMBERS FREE, stu-

dents free (with valid I.D.)

Program Organizer: Celia Menczel

EV Riders

Felix Kramer, Chevy Volt, Nissan LEAFNancy Pfund, Tesla Model SAdditional EV Owner TBA

Do you own an electric vehicle? Do you want one? This program will feature owners of battery, electric and plug-in hybrid cars discussing their lives on the cutting edge of a new paradigm of per-sonal mobility.


Time: 5:30 p.m. check-in, 6 p.m. program,

7 p.m. networking reception



The Psychological Impact of Unemployment

Jeffrey D. Yergler, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Management and Chair of the Undergraduate Management Department, Golden Gate University; Principal, Integer Leadership Consulting

Unemployment can impact marriages, children, friendships and social par-ticipation. However, there is a far more insidious psychological toxicity that carries deeper and broader implications for unemployed persons. Yergler explores the psychological issues that result from unemployment and the implications of unemployment for the U.S. labor force.

MLF: PSYCHOLOGY





F R I 1 7 | S a n F r a n c i s c o M O N 2 0 | S a n F r a n c i s c o M O N 2 0 | S a n F r a n c i s c o


The Shared Economy: Doing Business with the Joneses

Lisa Gansky, Author, The Mesh: Why the Future of Business Is SharingShelby Clark, Founder and Chief Community Officer, RelayRidesLeah Busque, Founder and CEO, TaskRabbit Cory Smith, CEO, Hub Bay Area and SOCAPLiz Gannes, Senior Editor, AllThingsDigital – Moderator

Walk a block and borrow your neighbor’s lawn mower. Co-work in a friendly office space with other companies. The one time a month you actually need a giant SUV, just jump in the one parked down the street. Born from the woes of a struggling economy, folks everywhere are reverting to the age-old mantra “sharing is caring.” The last five years have seen an upsurge in companies and groups that are pooling resources to increase savings, efficiency and green-friendly practices. Peer-to-peer marketplaces like RelayRides and TaskRabbit have the potential to revolutionize how we view both business and personal pursuits, with an emphasis on accessing rather than owning. Hear leaders of the shared economy dish on their visions for the future of collaborative consumption and how we can all contribute and benefit. Afterward, we’ll put our brainwaves into action at the INFORUM Trading Post. Come ready to exchange ideas, memberships, business cards, secrets and anything else that falls on the table, with some of the most innovative collaborative companies!


Time: 6 p.m. check-in, 6:30 p.m. program, 7:30 p.m. trading post and reception




I Must Resist - Updating Bayard Rustin’s Dream of Work for All

Michael Long, AuthorAndrea Shorter, CEO, Atlas Strategies

The March on Washington was largely about jobs and equality. Gay activist Rustin was a driv-ing organizer behind the march, at the culmina-tion of which Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have A Dream” speech. The community organizing legacies of Rustin and King continue today. Long talks with Shorter about the patriot Rustin and opportunities for civic engagement.

MLF: LGBT




Program Organizer: Julian Chang

Also know: In association with Bayard Rustin

LGBT Coalition and the Alice B. Toklas LGBT

Democratic Club

Baby Boomers Defer Retirement for “Encore Careers”

Marc Freedman, Author, The Big Shift; CEO, Civic Ventures

Remember “the golden years”? How quaint. These days, more and more Americans are nixing the notion of retirement in their 50s, 60s or even 70s. One of them is Freedman, of Berkeley, who paints a bold picture of the new paradigm. Freedman will discuss how people are working well into their senior years because a) they need the money, b) they’re living longer, healthier lives and c) they like being productive and don’t want to be idle.

MLF: GROWNUPS




Program Organizer: John Milford

Inclusive Diversity and Talent Management

Johanna Steans, Senior Program Manager for Diversity & Inclusion, Esur-anceMarcella Kutek, Diversity & Inclusion Manager, Kaiser Permanente Erby Foster, Director of Diversity & Inclusion, The Clorox CompanyAntoine Andrews, Senior Director, Talent Diversity & Inclusion, Gap Inc.

Inclusive diversity and talent management are critical to long-term business success. Join the discussion with companies that engage and leverage their top talent to remain innovative and competitive. Explore the value of corporate initiatives that encourage employees to embrace diversity, which in turn helps companies attract and retain top talent.

MLF: LGBT




Program Organizer: Stephen Seewer

When Should and Shouldn’t You Follow Your Passion


It’s almost a mantra: “Do what you love and the money will follow.” Alas, too many people do what they love – and starve. How do you decide what’s right for you? Join Nemko for an in-depth discus-sion. Nemko was named “The Bay Area’s Best Career Coach” by the San Francisco Bay Guardian. In his private practice, he has had more than 4,000 clients and enjoys a 96 percent client-satisfaction rate.

MLF: PSYCHOLOGY







T U E 2 1 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T U E 2 1 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

How Do You Do That? In Conversation with David Perry

David Perry, CEO, David Perry & Associates

Perry has been entrusted with managing public, media and community relations for signature events on behalf of the City and County of San Francisco, ranging from the 2008 Olympic Torch Relay to the 2011 Fleet Week to the upcoming 2013 America’s Cup Race. How does he juggle thousands of moving parts to deliver consistently excellent results, and how can you, too, get a job traveling the world and meeting fascinating people? Come find out!

MLF: LGBT




Program Organizer: Julian Chang



Steve Forbes: Simple Ways to Get the U.S. Economy Growing Again

Steve Forbes, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief, Forbes Media; Former Republican Presidential Candidate

One of the nation’s most prominent eco-nomic forecasters presents an outlook for jobs and business as we head toward the November election. Publishing maven and political candidate Forbes has cre-ated dozens of publications and launched Forbes.com in 1996, which now averages 30 million unique visitors each month.


Time: 11:45 a.m. lunch, 12:30 p.m. program


Also know: Must register by noon August 22

William J. Clancey: Working on Mars

Chief Scientist, Human-Centered Com-puting Intelligent Systems Division, NASA Ames Research Center and Florida Insti-tute for Human and Machine Cognition; Author, Working on Mars

Working through programmed robotic laboratories called the Mars Exploration Rovers, scientists have a virtual experi-ence of being on Mars. How does work-ing remotely through a robotic labora-tory change the nature of field science? A cognitive scientist with privileged access to mission operations, Clancey explains this remarkable mission and its impact.

Location: Tech Museum, 201 S. Market St.,

San Jose

Time: 1:30 p.m. check-in, 2 p.m. program


Also know: In assn. with The Tech Museum

How Volunteering Can Lead to a Dream Job

Wylie Greig, Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (RPCV), India; Retired Head, Global Research RREEF, Division of Deutsche Bank; Chair, One World Children’s Fund BoardJanet Greig, RPCV/India; Retired Agent and Field Executive, State Farm Insurance; Board Member, One World Children’s FundChristopher Greig, Volunteer, Stanford’s Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital and Cystic Fibrosis Research Inc.; Specialty Account Manager, Sigma-Tau Pharmaceuticals Libby DeMeo, Former Volunteer, Scripps College; Former Coordinator, Regis McKenna, Inc.; Senior Business Consultant, The DeMeo GroupJessica Manzi, RPCV/Benin; Senior Transportation Coordinator, City of Redwood City

A local family whose careers were influenced by their early commitment to volunteer work, the Greigs will share their stories and explore the benefits of stepping into areas completely new to them. Whether the volunteer experience was Peace Corps work overseas or unpaid internships locally, their life/work stories speak to the benefits of taking some time to explore new areas by volunteering. Their careers and community involvement were launched in their early volunteering experiences.

MLF: INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS



Cost: $20 standard, MEMBERS FREE, $7 students (with valid ID)

Program Organizer: Karen Keefer

Also know: In association with the NorCal Peace Corps Association

F R I 2 4 | S a n F r a n c i s c o S U N 2 6 | S i l i c o n V a l l e y



16 and Pregnant: The Reality and Politics of Adolescent Reproductive Care

Lynn Ponton, M.D., Child and Adoles-cent Psychology, UCSFLupe Rodriguez, Director of Public Af-fairs, Planned Parenthood Mar MonteJane Mauldon, Associate Professor of Public Policy, UC Berkeley

Teen pregnancy and young motherhood have received great attention recently with the federal decision to block over-the-counter sales of an after-sex contraceptive pill to girls under age 17. What is the reality of teen pregnancy and reproductive care? How are our communities addressing this issue? Hear from experts from the fields of health care, psychology, politics and more.



Cost: FREE

Also know: Underwriter: CA Wellness Foundation

August 24–30


Middle East Discussion Group

Make your voice heard in an enriching, provocative and fun discussion with fel-low Club members as you weigh in on events shaping the face of the Middle East. Each month, the Middle East Member-Led Forum hosts an informal roundtable discussion on a topic fre-quently suggested by recent headlines. After a brief introduction, the floor will be open for discussion. All interested members are encouraged to attend. There will also be a brief planning session.

MLF: MIDDLE EAST



Cost: FREE



The Illusion of Building Green: How Our Fight for Environmentally Responsible Building Design Is Falling Short

Rick Chitwood, BSME, HVAC: Insulation Contractor, Field Researcher; Code Writer; AuthorFrank Bergamaschi, California Registered Architect, LEED Accredited Professional

The way we approach the marketing of environmental design and technology rarely includes practical, cost-saving methods. Often the marketing message is: more money = best energy practices. Today, the way we construct and operate our buildings, including our homes, uses a tremendous amount of energy, contributing to environmental harm. Two practitioners and on-the-job experts demonstrate that we have the technology now to make tremendous reductions in energy and installation costs for businesses, buildings and homes. Join us for a fascinating program on changing how we can use the technology we have today for money savings, economic impact and environmental protection. After the program, Rick Chitwood will sign copies of his book Measured Home Performance: Guide to Best Practices for Home Energy Retrofits in California.

MLF: ENVIRONMENT & NATURAL RESOURCES


Time: 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program, 7 p.m. book signing


Program Organizer: Ann Clark

Quarterback Trauma: Injuries in the NFL

Dan Fouts, Hall of Fame San Diego Chargers Quarterback; Sports NFL Analyst, CBS TelevisionA. Brent Eastman, M.D., Trauma Surgeon, Chief Medical Officer and Corporate Sr. Vice President, Scripps Health; President-Elect, American College of SurgeonsJohn York, M.D., Co-chairman, San Francisco 49ers; Chairman, NFL’s Health & Safety Advisory Committee

The recent wave of lawsuits filed on behalf of former NFL players has brought to the forefront the dangers of sports injuries, as well as the question of liability. From broken noses to broken feet and everything in between, get an up-close-and-personal view of the health and safety issues related to playing in the National Football League. Six-time Pro Bowl selection and Chargers legend Dan Fouts will be joined by 49ers co-chair and physician York, as well as Eastman, whose expertise as a trauma surgeon has made him a leader in the field of emergency medical care.



Cost: $20 standard, $12 members, $7 students and parents (if accompanying a student age 18 or

younger)

Joel Garfinkle

Founder, Garfinkle Execu-tive Coaching; Author, Get-ting Ahead: Three Steps to Take Your Career to the Next Level

What exactly makes one person more successful than another? Garfinkle re-veals his signature model for mastering three skills that he asserts will help take your career to the next level. Learn how to put yourself in front of the competi-tion by improving your perception, increasing your visibility and exerting your influence.

Location: Kellogg Auditorium, Silicon Valley

Bank, 3005 Tasman Dr., Santa Clara

Time: 6:30 p.m. check-in, 7 p.m. program,

8 p.m. book signing


T U E 2 8 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

W E D 2 9 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T H U 3 0 | S i l i c o n V a l l e y


Maddalena Bearzi: Dolphin Confidential – Confessions of a Field Biologist

Ph.D., President, Ocean Conservation Society

Ever fantasized about working among dolphins in the wild? Bearzi traces her evolution as a woman and as a scientist from her earliest travails to her transforma-tion into an advocate for conservation and dolphin protection. She takes us inside the world of a marine scientist and offers an understanding of marine mammal behav-ior, as well as the frustrations, delights and creativity that make up dolphin research.

MLF: SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY





Program Organizers: Chisako Ress & Tom Devine


Russian Hill Walking Tour

Join a more active Commonwealth Club Neighborhood Adventure! Russian Hill is a magical area, with secret gardens and amazing views. Join Rick Evans for a two-hour hike up hills and staircases, and learn about the history of this neighborhood. See where great artists and architects lived and worked, and walk down residential streets where some of the most historically signifi-cant houses in the Bay Area are located.

Location: Meet in front of Swensen’s Ice

Cream Store, 1999 Hyde St., at Union. No

parking lots or street parking. Muni: 45-Union

Stockton will drop you off at the corner of

Union and Hyde, right in front of Swensen’s.

Time: 1:45 p.m. check-in, 2–4 p.m. tour


Program Organizer: Kristina Nemeth

Also know: Steep hills and staircases, recom-

mended for good walkers. Limited to 20.

Must preregister. Tour operates rain or shine.

The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson

In this epic masterwork, Pulitzer Prize win-ner Wilkerson chronicles one of the great stories of U.S. history: the decades-long migration of black citizens who fled the South for northern and western cities in search of a better life. From 1915 to 1970, this exodus of almost 6 million people changed the face of America. The author interviewed more than a thousand people and gained access to new data and official records to write this definitive and vividly dramatic account of how these American journeys unfolded, altering our cities, our country and ourselves. As a reminder, the author will not be present.

MLF: SF BOOK DISCUSSION




Program Organizers: Barbara Massey and

Howard Crane

Solving the Iranian Impasse

Ambassador Seyed Mousavian, Visit-ing Research Scholar, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University; Author, The Iranian Nuclear Crisis: A Memoir

Mousavian served as spokesman for Iran’s team in nuclear negotiations with the EU and the International Atomic Energy Agency from 2003-2005. In 2007, Amb. Mousavian was arrested and charged with espionage and leaking information to Eu-ropean nations. Though he was cleared of the initial charges, he has been barred from serving as a diplomat for five years due to his opposition to the Ahmadinejad administra-tion’s foreign and nuclear policy.


Time: 5:30 p.m. networking, 6 p.m. program,

7 p.m. book signing

Cost: $20 standard, $12 members, $7

students

The Great Turbulence: Economics and the New Global Order

Paul Saffo, Managing Director, Foresight, Discern Analytics

The 2008 crash was more than a downturn: It marked the end of the “Great Modera-tion,” a two-decade period of mild business cycles and growth. Now many fear we face a prolonged recession (or worse), while others predict a new boom just around the corner. Who’s right? Saffo asserts that we have entered a new era defined not by boom or bust, but by a new kind of volatility, a decade-scale new order that will be characterized by high amplitudes, short cycles and scarce equilibrium, which will transform politics and policy globally.




T H U 3 0 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T U E 0 4 | S a n F r a n c i s c o


W e d 0 5 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

Understanding the Deep Sea: Oceanography Meets Business

Tony Haymet, Director, Scripps Institu-tion of Oceanography; Vice Chancellor for Marine Sciences, and Dean, Graduate School of Marine Sciences, UCSD

What useful chemicals will be discovered from the ocean? Will the trend in move-ment of California precipitation from snow to rain continue or accelerate? What is the average recurrence time for earthquakes near nuclear reactors? Dr. Haymet describes the ways in which the business community has partnered to address these questions.

MLF: HUMANITIES/ SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY/

ENVIRONMENT & NATURAL RESOURCES/

BUSINESS & LEADERSHIP





August 30 – September 12

Write UsPleased at what you see

in these pages? Outraged? Send a letter to the editor!

We welcome your thoughts and suggestions.

LettersThe Commonwealth Club

595 Market Street, 2nd Floor San Francisco, CA 94105

[email protected]


Video Games As Cognitive Enhancers

Dr. Adam Gazzaley, M.D., Ph.D., Found-ing Director, Neuroscience Imaging Cen-ter, UCSF; Associate Professor of Neurol-ogy, Physiology and Psychiatry, UCSF

Our brains exhibit an amazing abil-ity to modify both their structure and function in response to new experiences throughout our lives, a phenomenon known as neuroplasticity. There is emerging evidence showing the power of commercially available video games to improve cognitive function and transfer skills to different domains. Gazzaley will demonstrate the range of cognitive abili-ties enhanced by action video game play.

MLF: HEALTH & MEDICINE




Program Organizer: Patty James

Green Buildings

Building Innovation Kevin Surace, Chairman, Serious Energy (invited) • Additional speakers TBA

Offices and homes waste energy and leave money on the table. A new generation of startups aims to change that by bringing innovative technology and finance to the building sector. We’ll discuss the opportunities, risks and obstacles to constructing and operating smarter buildings. Time: 10:30 a.m. check-in, 11 a.m.-12 p.m. program

12-12:30 p.m. break for finger-food lunch

Building Green Cities Michael Deane, Chief Sustainability Officer, Turner Construction • David Gensler, Executive Director, Gensler • Craig Hartman, Design Partner, SOM • Phil Williams, Vice President, Webcor Builders

Commercial real estate is one of the most promising areas for cutting carbon with quick paybacks. What are the biggest financial and technological successes and challenges? What lies beyond LEED? How much green building is driven by policy? Economics? Join in a broad discussion about innovation in architecture, building and urban planning.Time: 12:30-1:30 p.m. program


Cost: $65 standard, $45 members, $20 students (includes all sessions)

The Media and Presidential Politics

Diane Dwyer, News Anchor, NBC Bay Area Tom Sinkovitz, Media Strategist; Former News Anchor, KRON and NBC Bay Area

Monday Night Philosophy welcomes two news anchors to discuss the media’s role in shaping presidential politics. Televised politics has shifted emphases and made certain types of politicians obsolete, but has it been a game changer? The game as it’s currently being played follows modern rules. Two local news veterans discuss how those rules are a reaction to the reality that one can only gain access to the levers of power through media mastery.

MLF: HUMANITIES





Humanities West Book Discussion: Tender is the Night, by F. Scott Fitzgerald

The group will discuss F. Scott Fitzger-ald’s intensely autobiographical account, set in France after World War I, of a caring man who disintegrates under the twin strains of his wife’s derangement and a lifestyle that gnaws away at his sense of moral values. The discussion will be led by Lynn Harris.

MLF: HUMANITIES



Cost: FREE


Also know: In association with Humanities

West

F R I 0 7 | S a n F r a n c i s c o M O N 1 0 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

M O N 1 0 | S a n F r a n c i s c o W E D 1 2 | S a n F r a n c i s c o W E D 1 2 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

George Lakoff: Rhetoric and Politics

Professor of Cognitive Science and Linguistics, UC Berkeley; Co-author, The Little Blue Book: The Essential Guide to Thinking and Talking Democratic

Language matters – especially when it comes to politics. With the 2012 election season upon us, linguistics expert Lakoff dissects the way we vote on important issues and presents his progressive, in-depth guide to changing political rhetoric and ideology.







The Future of Our Water: Can We Learn from the Past?

Peter Gleick, Water Ex-pert; Co-founder, Pacific Institute; MacArthur Fellow

The global water crisis is real and, in many parts of the world, worsening. Growing populations, increased competition for scarce resources, the impact of climatic changes and other risks and threats are all contributing to local, regional and international concerns over freshwater. Gleick will look at the future of our wa-ter challenges here and abroad. He will offer suggestions for moving to a more equitable and sustainable future.

MLF: ENVIRONMENT & NATURAL RESOURCES




Program Organizer: Christie Batterman Jordan

Social Capital Markets: Designing the Future

David Hodgson, Founder and CEO, Edge LabKevin Jones, Founder, Good Capital; Convener, SOCAPKevin O’Malley, President, TechTalk / Studio – ModeratorAdditional panelists TBA

A new form of capitalism is emerging that recognizes our ability to direct the power and efficiency of market systems toward social impact. SOCAP12 will gather global innovators – investors, foundations, institutions and social entrepreneurs – to celebrate directing the power and efficiency of capitalistic market systems toward social impact. Join us for an exciting and informative preview of the ideas and issues of SOCAP 2012 in conversation with the team leading the upcoming conference.




Cost: $20 standard, $8 members, students free (with valid ID)


San Francisco Architecture Walking Tour

Explore the Financial Dis-trict with historian Rick Evans and learn the stories behind the city’s structures, streets and public squares. Hear about the architects who influenced the rebuilding after the 1906 quake. Dis-cover rooftop gardens, Art Deco lobbies, open spaces and historic landmarks. This is a tour for locals, with hidden gems you can only find on foot! We will conclude at a local watering hole.

Location: Lobby of Galleria Park Hotel,

191 Sutter St.

Time: 1:45 p.m. check-in, 2–4:30 p.m. tour;

no-host socializing to follow


Also know: Operates rain or shine. Limited to

20 people. Must preregister. Covers less than

one mile of walking in the Financial District.

Involves walking up and down stairs.

The Physics of Animation

Alejandro Garcia, Professor, San Jose State UniversityAngie Coiro, Radio Host, “Live from the Left Coast” – Moderator

Computer animation in feature films is a modern-day nexus of art and science. Gar-cia discusses the animation industry from both the scientific and artistic perspectives and the process of making illustrations come to life. He recently served as a physics consultant for DreamWorks Animation’s film Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted.

Location: The Tech Museum, 201 S. Market

St., San Jose

Time: 1:30 p.m. check-in, 2 p.m. program


Also know: In association with The Tech

Museum


T H U 1 3 | S a n F r a n c i s c o S U N 1 6 | S i l i c o n V a l l e y

Janine Zacharia in Conversation with Joel Brinkley

Janine Zacharia, Journalist; News Ana-lyst; Visiting Scholar, Stanford UniversityJoel Brinkley, Professor of Journalism, Stanford University; Journalist

Hear firsthand experiences from seasoned Middle East reporters. Zacharia was The Washington Post’s Jerusalem bureau chief and has reported on the Middle East for Bloomberg, Reuters and Washington Week in Review. She will discuss her experiences in the region, especially in Israel and the Palestinian territories, with her Pulitzer Prize-winning colleague Brinkley, former New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief.

MLF: MIDDLE EAST




students free (with valid I.D.)


F R I 1 4 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

September 12–20


The Great Debate: Are We Alone?

Geoff Marcy, Professor of Astronomy, UC BerkeleyDan Werthimer, SETI Program Director, UC Berkeley

The arguments for and against tech-nologically advanced life in the galaxy have sharpened in recent years. Evidence abounds on Earth of the hardiness of life, even in extremely harsh environments. Other evidence suggests the Earth may be a rare type of planet, unusually suited to life as we know it. Which one is right? Renowned SETI scientist Werthimer will debate planet-hunter and skeptic Marcy.

MLF: HUMANITIES/SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY





Here I Am to Save the Day! What a Skilled Eldercare Manager Can Do for You

Kira Z. Reginato, Eldercare Manager; Radio Show Host

If you’re a caregiver for an aging spouse or one or more parents, you’re in good compa-ny with 66 million other Americans. Many will spend more years at this than they did raising children. Reginato explains that there is no need to struggle alone anymore. She will describe how using an eldercare manager can save you time, money and costly missteps by assessing the “Ms” of older adults (medication, meals, memory, mood, mobility and money) and provide resources where the Ms are problems.

MLF: GROWNUPS




Program Organizer: John Milford

Hedrick Smith: Who Stole the American Dream?

Hedrick Smith, Former Reporter, The New York Times; Producer, PBS; Author, Who Stole the American Dream?

Is the American Dream becoming a lost ideal of the past? Pulitzer Prize- and Emmy-winning journalist Smith sug-gests that it is, as a result of four decades of erosion induced by corporate and political decisions. Smith will discuss the extent to which the American Dream has declined, as well as the future.






Grading California’s Economy: Prospects for Economic Recovery

John Chiang, Controller, State of CaliforniaJoel Kotkin, Professor of Urban Development, Chapman University; Author, The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050 Ross DeVol, Chief Research Officer, Milken Institute - ModeratorAdditional panelists TBA

A high-level panel looks at California’s economy as we head toward year’s end and discusses what California’s situation might bode for the rest of the nation. Chiang is California’s chief fiscal officer and uniquely positioned to take a hard look at the state of California’s finances. Kotkin is an internationally recognized authority on global, economic, political and social trends and has been described by The New York Times as the nation’s “uber-geographer.”




Also know: Part of the Innovating California Series, sponsored by Chevron

M O N 1 7 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T U E 1 8 | S a n F r a n c i s c o W E D 1 9 | S a n F r a n c i s c o


Aging and the Persistence of Mind

Jonathan Canick, Member, Departments of Psychiatry and Neurology, California Pacific Medical Center; Assistant Clinical Professor, UCSF

Canick posits that aging is not simply a neurodegenerative process resulting in serious memory decline or cognitive loss. On the contrary: Some mental abilities actually improve and are only seen in the mature brain. He will explain that under-standing myths and aging bias, as well as pursuing activities that enhance cognition and stopping harmful actions, is essential for healthy and successful aging.

MLF: HUMANITIES







Timeless Explorations: A Creative Odyssey

Thea Bellos, Artist; Photographer; Global Marketing and Management Consultant; President, Global Stewards Institute

Berkeley photographer and professor Bel-los speaks about “Timeless Explorations: Views from Cuba, Chile, Vietnam, Cam-bodia and Turkey,” on view at the Club of-fice. Underlying her work, which captures some of the planet’s most fragile places, is her interest in storytelling and document-ing cultural and environmental change.

MLF: THE ARTS





Also know: In association with the Environ-

ment & Natural Resources MLF

The 2012 Elections: Another Year of the Woman?

Panelists TBA

After the last election, the number of women in Congress dropped to 16.8 per-cent, and the number in state legislatures declined by nearly 80 seats, the sharpest drop since researchers began tracking this nearly four decades ago. Internationally, the U.S. Congress ranks below 95 other countries in gender parity, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union. The up-coming elections present an opportunity for women to increase their numbers in office due to redistricting, reapportion-ment and term limits. Could 2012 be the next Year of the Woman?

Location: TBA

Time: TBA

Cost: TBA

In association with: The 2012 Project

Middle East Discussion Group

Make your voice heard in an enriching, provocative and fun discussion with fellow Club members as you weigh in on events shaping the face of the Middle East. Each month, the Middle East Member-Led Forum hosts an informal roundtable discussion on a topic frequently suggested by recent headlines. After a brief introduction, the floor will be open for discussion. All interested members are encouraged to attend. There will also be a brief plan-ning session.

MLF: MIDDLE EAST



Cost: FREE


Joan Walsh: What’s the Matter with White People?

Joan Walsh, Editor at Large, Salon; Contributor, MSNBC; Author, What’s the Matter with White People?

Walsh addresses a demographic and political puzzle: President Obama leads a coalition of African Americans and other minorities, plus women, younger voters and college-educated whites. Mitt Romney’s GOP gets a majority of its support from white voters, particularly an unlikely coalition of wealthy and working-class men. Walsh examines what this means for the GOP, the coun-try and American race relations.


Time: 5:30 p.m. networking, 6 p.m. pro-

gram, 7 p.m. book signing


T H U 2 0 | S i l i c o n V a l l e y M O N 2 4 | S a n F r a n c i s c o M O N 2 4 | S a n F r a n c i s c o


70 Years On: The Japanese-American Curfew, Exclusion and Detention Orders and Civil Rights Today

Karen Korematsu, Co-founder, The Korematsu Institute; Civil Rights ActivistDale Minami, Partner, Minami Tamaki LLPDon Tamaki, Partner, Minami Tamaki LLP

In 1942, President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, and as a result, 120,000 Japanese Americans, more than half of whom were U.S.-born citizens, were uprooted from their homes, businesses and friends and held in camps. A few, including Fred Korematsu, brought legal challenges against the imprisonment, and the Supreme Court ruled against them. Decades later, their convictions were overturned based on serious governmental misconduct. Join us to hear the daughter of Fred Korematsu, who is carrying on her father’s civil rights work, and the lawyers on the pro bono team that succeeded in overturning his conviction and those of others for defying the incarcera-tion order. They will discuss the curfew, exclusion, detention, the legal challenges and their reflections on how the Japanese-American experience informs the debate today about national security and civil liberties in the United States.

MLF: ASIA-PACIFIC AFFAIRS




Program Organizers: Lillian Nakagawa and Cynthia Miyashita

T U E 2 5 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

September 20 – October 02


El Maghreb: Reconstructed Memories

Deb Siboney, Printmaker

Siboney’s work derives from her North African heritage and her upbringing in Italy. She travels into history, memory and imagination, looking for connec-tions among regions and cultures, which elements cross, which are repeated. Us-ing a variety of printmaking methods, Siboney employs intricate patterns and lines, layering and the power of color in the exploration of her ideas.

MLF: THE ARTS


Time: Regular Club business hours

Cost: FREE


Nob Hill Walking Tour

Nob Hill became an ex-clusive enclave of rich and famous West Coasters who built large mansions in the neighborhood. Residents included promi-nent tycoons such as Leland Stanford and other members of the Big Four. Highlights include the history of four landmark hotels: The Fairmont, Mark Hopkins, Stanford Court and the Huntington. Visit the city’s largest house of worship, Grace Cathedral, and discover architectural tidbits and anecdotes about the railroad barons and silver kings. Enjoy a true San Francisco experience of elegance, urbanity, scandals and fabulous views.

Location: Meet in front of the Stanford Court

Hotel, 905 California St.

Time: 1:45 p.m. check-in, 2–4:30 p.m. tour


Also know: Limited to 20. Must preregister.

Tour operates rain or shine.

Mellody Hobson and Paul Schott Stevens: The Future of Retirement

Mellody Hobson, Finan-cial Commentator, ABC TelevisionPaul Schott Stevens, CEO, Investment Company Institute

More than 90 million Americans have a stake in the financial markets through the more than $12 trillion in mutual funds that comprise part of their savings and retirement plans. What is the likely future financial health of America as waves of boomers hit retirement age? How can a younger and more diverse generation best prepare to save in an unpredictable mar-ket? Hobson and Stevens offer economic insights and basic advice for saving today.




Antimatter, Anti-Atoms, and the Big Bang

Joel Fajans, Professor of Physics, UC Berkeley

Antimatter has long fascinated scientists, science fiction writers and laymen. The Big Bang should have produced equal amounts of matter and antimatter, and one of the grand challenges in science is to explain why there is very little anti-matter in the universe. Fajans describes antimatter and how his research team (the ALPHA collaboration) was able to trap and study anti-atoms.

MLF: HUMANITIES/SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY





Arthur Brooks: Making the Moral Case for Free Enterprise

President, American Enterprise Institute; Author, The Road to Freedom: How to Win the Fight for Free Enterprise

The president of one of America’s most prestigious conservative think tanks ar-gues that free enterprise and morality can and must go together. Fairness, opportu-nity and earned success, says Brooks, are at the heart of free enterprise but have been dramatically weakened by policymakers trying to reorient American culture from rewarding merit to redistributing wealth. He demonstrates how to turn this trend around with a strong moral defense.




T H U 2 7 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T H U 2 7 | S a n F r a n c i s c o S e p t . 2 8 – N o v . 3 0

M O N 0 1 | S a n F r a n c i s c o M O N 0 1 | S a n F r a n c i s c o T U E 0 2 | S a n F r a n c i s c o

Chris Dodd: Creative Content and the Cloud

Chairman and CEO, Mo-tion Picture Association of America; Former Senator, Connecticut

MPAA chief Dodd is charged with advo-cating for the film, home entertainment and television industries around the world. With technology advancements and the migration of content to the cloud, it is more important than ever to make sure industries and, where appropriate, governments work together to ensure the Internet works for everyone. Dodd will discuss why technology and creative communities are essential to the economic well-being of their industries, consumers and the country.






California Votes: What’s at Stake for the Golden State

Gabriel Metcalf, Executive Director, SPURLenny Mendonca, Board Member, California Forward; Chairman Emeri-tus, Bay Area Council; Chairman, Economic Institute of the Bay Area; Director, McKinsey & Company, Inc.Additional panelists TBA

This fall’s elections promise to effect sweeping change both in Washington and closer to home. California voters will be asked to consider measures aimed at rectifying the looming budgetary crisis (including Governor Jerry Brown’s proposed tax increases), campaign finance reform, redistricting, the three-strikes rule, revoking the death penalty and much more. What challenges face the state as we head into the election? If the proposed measure passes, what are the implications of these proposed measures? We’re bringing together representatives from some of California’s most eminent institutions to shed some light on these issues.


Times: 5:30 p.m. networking reception, 6 p.m. program


T H U 0 4 | S i l i c o n V a l l e y

Week to Week: The News Commentary Program

Terry Christensen, Professor Emeri-tus, San Jose State University; Member, Commonwealth Club Silicon Valley Advisory CouncilJohn Zipperer, VP of Media and Edito-rial, The Commonwealth Club – HostAdditional panelists TBA

Join our panelists for informative and fun commentary on political and other major news, plus an in-depth look at one topic in the news, audience discussion of the week’s events and a news quiz. (See additional Week to Week dates at commonwealthclub.org/w2w)

Location: Adobe Systems, 345 Park Ave., San Jose

Time: 6 p.m. check-in, 6:30 p.m. program


J U S T A D D E D !

For details on these late-breaking events, visit commonwealthclub.org

September 17: Michael Grunwald: Green New DealSan Francisco 6 p.m. program

September 20: Resolving Caifornia’s Budget Crisis: Lessons from A New Six-State StudySan Francisco noon program

A N D L AT E R T H I S FA L L . . .

For details on these late-breaking events, visit commonwealthclub.org

October 8: Patrick Iber: What Is the Purpose of Democracy? San Francisco 6 p.m. program

October 9: Steven Pinker, Professor of Psychology, Harvard University; Author, The Better Angels of Our NatureOshman Family JCC, Palo Alto 7 p.m. program

October 22: Sandra Day O’Connor, Retired Associate Justice, U.S. Supreme Court San Francisco noon program

October 03–04

FOREIGNLANGUAGEGROUPSFree for members Location: SF Club Office

FRENCH, Intermediate Class Thursdays, noon Pierrette Spetz, Graziella Danieli, [email protected]

FRENCH, Advanced Conversation Tuesdays, noon Violaine, [email protected]

GERMAN, Int./Adv. Conversation Wednesdays, noon Sara Shahin, (415) 314-6482

ITALIAN, Intermediate Class Mondays, noon Ebe Fiori Sapone, (415) 564-6789

RUSSIAN, Int./Advanced Conversation Mondays, 1:30 p.m. Rita Sobolev, (925) 376-7889

SPANISH, Advanced Conversation (fluent only) Fridays, noon


On the occasion of marking her quarter century in the House of Representatives, Pelosi talks about recent successes and about women’s issues. Excerpt from “Nancy Pelosi, Democratic House Leader: Commemorating 25 years in Congress,” May, 29, 2012.

NANCY PELOSI Minority Leader, U.S. House of Representatives

in conversation with GLORIA C. DUFFY President and CEO, The Commonwealth Club

Photo by polytikus / Flickr

DUFFY: The Supreme Court has taken un-der review the health-care reform act. How do you think that will result, and where do you think we are going? What has been the impact of the legislation in the two years since it has passed?PELOSI: The health-care reform bill, in our view, is right up there as a pillar of economic and health security for all Americans. Social Security in the ’30s, Medicare and Medicaid in the ’60s, now health care as a right, not a privilege, and a path to that affordability, better care, a lower price.

Let me just say this: If there were no other reason to do health-care reform, if everybody loved their situation, we would still have to do it, because the system that was present a couple of years ago and that we’re still working our way out of was un-sustainable financially. It was unsustainable to individuals, to families, to businesses, to local and state and national governments; the budgets just cannot withstand the rising cost of health care. And it’s unsustainable to an economy, because it’s a competitiveness issue. Other countries that we compete with

don’t really have health care as an issue, be-cause they have health care as a right in their countries. So, it was very essential that what we did would reduce the deficit and reduce the cost of health care, [and] take us on a curve that was going down. Of course, the quality of care, the disparities in our com-munity that 30 million or more people did not have health care, was a driving moral urgency, and Senator Kennedy said it so beautifully: “The great unfinished business of our society” [is] that we do not have health care as a right, [but as] a privilege.

Celebrating25 Years in Congress


[Regarding] the Supreme Court, we believe in judicial review, we believe in the constitutionality of whatever we pass in Congress, so we believe that this bill, constitutionally, is ironclad. We did not win the public relations battle on it, but from the constitutionality, it is ironclad. I predict a 6-3 aye verdict from the Supreme Court, but I really don’t know. Only those within that inner sanctum know what is going on there, but in terms of its constitutionality, ironclad.

The forces that we’re up against were the health insurance industry and another component, which was anti-government ideology, which [says there should be] no government role in any of this. Surprisingly, some of the same people who were saying “no public role” were also saying, “Keep your hands off my Medicare,” but anyway. The arguments that were made against it about no public funding of abortion – not a real issue. The death panels – not in the bill. That it’s going to increase the deficit – no, its purpose and its plan are to reduce the deficit. Job killer? No – it creates 4 mil-lion jobs. So people were saying things just because they wanted to be negative but not because they were basing it on fact. The facts are that over 80 million people have already benefited from the bill, whether it’s young people who can stay on their parents’ policy until they’re 26 years old; whether you’re a child with a pre-existing medical condition, already you cannot be discriminated against

on the basis of a pre-existing medical condi-tion; millions of people benefiting from the preventive care free annual checkup – in that regard, the list goes on. What I like very much is that no longer will being a woman be a pre-existing medical condition. Just be-cause you’ve had children or could possibly have children doesn’t mean you should be discriminated against. But the list goes on, whether it’s shrinking the donut hole for those of you who are my age – “shrinking the donut hole” means lowering the cost of prescription drugs – so it has benefited tens of millions of people already. It has not won the public relations battle that is to come, but there’s a lot to lose that is already in ef-fect even before we go into 2014, when it is fully implemented.

This is about life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. It’s what our founders intended: a healthier life to pursue your happiness, to have the liberty to pursue your happiness. Imagine if you wanted to be a photographer, a musician, an artist, if you wanted to start your own business, if you want to change jobs; you have the freedom to do this and not be job-locked because you have a pre-existing condition in your family or that just being sick can pauperize a family. So this is an emancipation, this is a right that frees people, and think of what that means to society and to the economy if people can follow their aspirations and make a living doing what they love if they have the talent and not have that decision taken from them.

DUFFY: One challenge for legislation and public policy is keeping up with science, and science is a constantly changing input into our public policy decisions. This is not a question; this is really just a comment about the importance of re-looking at something like pre-existing conditions, because what might have been a pre-existing condition that couldn’t be mitigated by medicine some years ago may no longer be so dif-ficult, given the change in the science and the treatment options and medication, so it’s really important to continue looking at what is a pre-existing condition.PELOSI: We have a fight about science in Congress. Can you imagine that? For a long time now, it was faith or science: Take your choice, but you can’t have both. And we keep saying science is an answer to our prayers – God sent us this wisdom – and that doesn’t go over too well with some of them. But there is an anti-science mental-ity that is really dangerous to the health of our people, the condition of our planet and our environment, that is detrimental to our competitiveness internationally in terms of innovation that springs from science, that springs from the classroom, and it’s something that I think has to be part of a national debate. I think not this time but the time before, you saw when they asked how many people believed in evolution among the presidential candidates on the Repub-lican side, it was stunning to see how few hands went up. But the fact is, it’s a national security issue, how we defend our country; how we preserve God’s precious gift to us, this planet; how we advance health-wise; how we compete with jobs. We really have to win this fight as to what the role of science is, and it is certainly not contradictory to it being God-given.

Re-ignite the American Dream, being ladders of opportunity for people who want to work hard, play by the rules, take responsibility to succeed. And some of the rungs of those ladders of opportunity are about education and affordable health care and the rest of that. So, again, that should be something that I think is a given and, if that is so, there is an imperative to create jobs and to do so, by the way, in a fiscally sound way, in a balanced way about how we create jobs, which create revenue, which help reduce the deficit, and how we have fairness in terms of revenue coming in. So

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1. Nancy Pelosi with Club CEO Gloria Duffy. 2. Pelosi presented with a framed photo of her last Club appearance. 3. On stage before a sold-out crowd at the Fairmont Hotel.


this battle of the budget is a place where we have to bring some level of maturity to the issue as to how it serves the values of our country – not the difference of issues but the fundamental role that the public and private sector play vis-à-vis each other, which is very important to recognize.

Part of it is the role of women. Noth-ing, nothing, nothing isn’t improved with the increased participation of leadership of women. Let me say it in the reverse. The leadership of women, the empowerment of women, whether it’s in the military, whether it’s in the financial [sector] or in business, whether it’s in education, whether it’s in politics, health care, you name it – any of these endeavors are enhanced and improved by the increased participation of women in the leadership. We had the vote 91 years ago, we had women in the workforce during World War II, then we had the higher education of women, and we have women in professions, but the one place we didn’t build the bridge was child care, affordable, quality child care that would unleash the power of women – and men. I’m not saying that women are the only caregivers of the children, but none-theless, you know where it usually falls. This is something that we have to think of as a country: Are we going to benefit from the fullest participation of the leadership of women? And if we are, we have to make a decision about the quality of child care that we have – it is a missing link, and we will have more economic growth, we will have better government in politics, we will have better national security, you name it – it will all be better with more women in the leadership. Not a substitute for men, but the sharing of ideas, the interaction – very important.DUFFY: On this issue of access for women on child care, are you talking about legisla-tion now? Does Congress have a role in this? What can be done?PELOSI: The fact is, all of it is consensus building. It’s not as if we try to sell some-thing to somebody. You all come together. This has to be a national debate, where the American people decide whether this is a priority and how we deal with it in a way that rewards the work of people who are caregivers so the quality is there for the children. So it’s all about consensus build-ing. We had the bill, it was before I was

in Congress, but there was a bill that was going to be signed by President Nixon. It was passed by the Congress –President Nixon was ready to sign it, and then some folks who shall be nameless went to him and made this case that it was something he shouldn’t sign. I won’t go into it, but it wasn’t a pleasant characterization of what child care would be. So it almost happened then; it should certainly happen as we go into the future.DUFFY: Otherwise on women’s issues, I understand that you’re going to do a hearing next week on the Paycheck Fairness Act. Tell us about that and what would it do.PELOSI: The Lilly Ledbetter [Fair Pay Act of 2009] was ending discrimination in the workplace [so] that a woman could sue if she thought she was being unfairly discriminated against in terms of pay. But the Paycheck Fairness Act takes us to a dif-ferent place. It says that women performing the same duty should receive the same pay, and it’s a step further down the road. It is legislation that is very long overdue in our country, and we’re interested in hearing the testimony next week because what

we’ve been hearing in the press from some in the campaigns has been that there is no discrimination against women, that it’s just a made-up thing. Mostly these are guys saying this – that it’s just a made-up thing and that if women get paid more, men will get paid less. It’s simply not true. It’s just rewarding work in a way that does not discriminate against women, and it’s important.

We had Lilly Ledbetter, we have Paycheck Fairness now coming up, we have the Violence Against Women Act; this is a very im-portant piece of legislation. It was passed in the ’90s. Joe Biden was chair of the [Senate] Judiciary Com-mittee; he was the big

leader on this issue in the country, and many of us worked with him in the House of Representatives as well. So we had to fund it, I was part of that on the Appropria-tions Committee. Now it’s come up again, and there was a decision made by some in Congress to go backward. Violence Against Women has saved lives – 50 percent more situations remedied than before the bill. It’s been quite impressive in terms of its results. But now they’re saying, “We’re going to have a Violence Against Women Act, so everybody – all you women, step forward if you think you’re going to be pro-tected. Not so fast if you’re an immigrant, if you’re a Native American or if you are gay, transgender or bisexual.” But that’s just not real. We’re sanctioning violence against some women and trying to pass off that we’re protecting all women in our country. The House Republicans, if I just may have a moment of differentiation here, have put forth this ridiculous bill that takes us backward.

“The House Republicans

have put forth this ridiculous bill that

takes us backward.”


The basketball-star-turned-

politician issues a call for

better citizenship and better

leadership in Washington.

Excerpt from “Bill Bradley: We

Can All Do Better,” May 18, 2012.

BILL BRADLEY Former U.S. Senator (D-New Jersey); Author, We Can All Do Better

Bradley photo courtesy of Bill Bradley; Earth photo courtesy of NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

– the accountability of the private sector and the motivation of the nonprofit sector.

The inspiration for this book came from Abraham Lincoln’s second State of the Union address, in 1862. The war’s been going on about a year; it’s not going well for the North. It’s about six to eight months from the Emancipation Proclama-tion. Lincoln sends this incredible address to the Congress. It’s one of the great addresses in American history, and he says so many memorable things, but there are one, two or three sentences that caught my attention in our current context. He says in there, “We can only succeed by concert” – working

W hen we talk about our national politics, we must never lose sight of who we are as a people. From the

very beginning [of our country] – you re-member the stories: The neighbors helped each other raise the barns in the early days of the country. There are always people who give to other people without any expectation of return. Indeed, government is at its best when it takes the ethos of that nonprofit sector, which is “Give to somebody with no expectation of return,” and the ethos of the private sector, which is “Perform or die,” and puts into public policy – into government


Bradley photo courtesy of Bill Bradley; Earth photo courtesy of NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

together. It’s not, “Can any of us imagine better?” but “Can all of us do better?” That’s the question that Lincoln posed, that I pose in this book: Can we all do better? Very relevant, when you look out at the fragility and inequality of our economy, the direc-tion of our foreign policy, the paralysis of our national dialogue. But it goes deeper than that. It goes to us as individuals as well, because if we’re going to meet the challenges of our country in the next 30 or 40 years, each of us is going to have to be at our best, and yet at the same time we must seek to be at our best with an awareness that even if we’re at our best, our fate as individuals

will be determined by the success or failure of our national community.

Politics today is really a battle between two competing ethics. There’s the ethic of caring, collective action, usually associ-ated with Democrats; and the ethic of responsibility and individual action, usually associated with Republicans. You see the presidential [race] beginning to heat up, and if we can get beyond these very important issues like, “Did President Obama ever eat a dog?” or, “Did Romney beat up a kid on the playground when he was 12 years old?” If we can get beyond those, to the real issues, then I think it’s a very relevant question: Can we all do better?

We need politicians to put country ahead of party and tell us the truth – the truth is that we need both. Each is incomplete. Only when collective caring and individual responsibility are together can we be at our best as a nation.

For example, health care. Everybody in America should have access to health care. That’s a basic value. Do you believe that, because this is a fellow human being, or do you not believe that? You only do that with collective caring, action that flows from that. At the same time, individual responsibility would say, “You’re in charge of one thing, really – your own body – so the better care you take of your own body, the less you’re going to cost the health-care system, and the more money that would be available to cover people who don’t have health insurance.” Collective caring; individual responsibility. Take pensions, Social Security: collective caring. For 35 percent of the elderly, that Social Security check is the only income they have. They live on it, and yet if you want a full retirement that’s better than Social Security – and Social Security is collective caring – individual responsibility would say, “You’ve got to save.” [There are] people who wake up when they’re 55 and say, “Oh, I’ve got to start saving.” My father taught me very early the power of compound interest. Save a little bit all along. That’s individual responsibility.

The economy

With the economy, what is the issue? The issue is that middle income

people have not been moving up in America; that in 2010 the median income was the same as it was in 1996; that there are 66 million Americans who are one paycheck

away from economic catastrophe; that who we are as Americans has always been defined by our belief that if you work hard and abide by the rules, you can move up. That upward mobility has driven ambition and it’s driven achievement. For a generation now – because this has been going on for 25 years, 30 years – people have begun to say, “Am I ever going to get ahead?” If that income that one earner in the family makes is not enough, what’s happened of course is a second earner in the family, and when that wasn’t enough, and the family had one asset – their home – they borrowed up to the value of their home and spent it like it was a raise, and then 2007 [and] 2008 came, and suddenly they were in deep trouble.

In foreign policy, the 21st century will be determined by economics more than military action. Twentieth-century military action – two world wars, the Korean War, Vietnam War, all the other little wars; we were deploying forces all over the world; we can go anywhere and fight two wars simultaneously, maybe three – that’s where our power came from. [In the] 21st century, it’s got to come from our economic strength, because we have to understand the world we’re living in, and the world we’re living in is one in which there is a burgeoning economic power: China.

Lee Kuan Yew, who is the founder and former prime minister of Singapore, said, “The 21st century will be determined by intelligence.” He said, “Look at China. They have a talent pool of 1.3 billion.” He said, “The United States has a talent pool of 7 billion,” meaning as long as we are open – as long as we don’t shut off immigration – our value systems, the openness of our society, can attract the best people in the world to come to America and help us excel even as we develop our home-grown talent. That’s even more relevant when you look at replacement rates, the number of people who are born versus the number of people that die. In order to replace your population there has to be [about] 2.1 per 1,000, and we’re now like 1.8, so immigration is also relevant to being able to keep our promises to the elderly in health care, Medicare and other things.

China is making very long-term deci-sions. They’re building the structure for economic power in the 21st century. They’re talking about a high-speed rail line from China into Southeast Asia to Singapore;


across Central Asia to Turkey; across Siberia to Moscow and to Berlin, from which they will be able to drain resources into China. They’re talking about building dams on the Mekong, the Ehrolati, the Bama Putra; all rivers originate in the Himalayas and flow-ing south to Southeast Asia and Asia, and by building those dams they’ll be able to have an influence on these countries by control-ling the water supply without firing a shot.

These are long-term decisions. We have to begin to think that way, and we have to begin to act that way.

On October 29th, the front page of The New York Times [featured] two stories. One says, “Europeans Go to China to Seek Investment in Euro Rescue Fund.” The story continues, “The Chinese say they would consider it if Europe would agree to changing their status on the WTO so that they’d be a market economy, and therefore not subject to the kind of sanctions that they can be subject to in their current state.” It was a story of a growing economic power using its muscle, economically.

Right next to it was the following story, “Western Business Looks for Investment in Libya.” It was the story of us, picking over the bones of our latest Mideast adventure. There’s a tremendous opportunity cost for the last 12 years to pouring our best talent, the thinking of our best people, the lives of some of our loyalest citizens into the desert sands of Iraq and Afghanistan. Not that we don’t need a strong military; not that we don’t need a strong navy. Of course we do, but adventures far away from the United States for dubious purposes, and taking all that talent that is then not available for thinking about long-term economic things in our country, has real costs.

The last area is our political institutions. Two problems. First: gerrymandering, draw-ing congressional district lines. Out of 435 congressmen, only 50 are competitive, and the rest play not to the center – because they’re going to get re-elected if they’re in a 60/40 district, Republican or Democrat – but they worry about a challenge in their primary so that if they’re in the Republican Party, they’ve got to play to the Tea Party; and if they’re in the Democratic Party, they’ve got to play to whatever is to the left of where the mainstream is. Until we deal with that – and California actually is on the cutting edge here, with this idea of

commissions drawing lines – we’re going to continue to have this polarization.

Second problem: money in politics. When I ran for the Senate the first time, in 1978, I spent $1.68 million on the primary and general elections. John Corzine ran for that seat in 2000 and spent $63 million, a large part of it his own [money], courtesy of the Supreme Court, who said in 1976, “You can’t limit the amount of money a person spends on his or her campaign, because you’re limiting that person’s right to free speech.” As a result, when a campaign com-mittee says, “Who are we going to get to run in this district, or this state?” and they inter-view people, and they always ask the same question – “Can you raise money?” – and of course the person says, “Well, I can write the check.” That’s why today 47 percent of

the [House] and Senate are millionaires; 9 percent of the people are. Not that that skews policy, but it just simply makes the point about the role of money in politics.

On top of that, in 2010 the Supreme Court ruled in Citizens United – that mind-bogglingly disastrous ruling – [to] repeal Teddy Roosevelt’s law in 1907 that said corporations can’t contribute to politicians, because Roosevelt had been appalled at what he’d seen as the vice president to William McKinley in 1900.

This court ruling repealed that law. The thought process was to say [that] since, un-der rulings of the 19th century a corporation was considered a person, under the law, that you can’t limit what a corporation spends on politics; because that corporation is a person, you’d be limiting that person’s – cor-poration’s – right to free speech. There[after]was born the Super PAC. I guarantee you, before this campaign is over you’re going to see an orgy of money, and it’s going to be full of destructive lies.

The only way you’re going to deal with it is a constitutional amendment that says, simply, “Federal, state and local govern-ments may limit the amount of money spent in a political campaign.” That has to pass the Congress and Senate, and then it has to be ratified by three quarters of the states. Then we can begin to say, “OK, now what can we do?” and of course at that point, I’d like public financing. For $3 billion a year out of a $3.5 trillion budget, you could take special interests totally out of politics.

No sidelines

In 2008, remember that election night in Chicago? We made a mistake of believing

that a leader can renew the country all by himself, but even somebody who touched our hearts as much as Barack Obama couldn’t do that. It takes citizens, people who realize that a democracy is not a vicari-ous experience, and that in the Internet age, there is no excuse. Apathy can’t be an excuse for inaction.

Citizens have power that we do not even realize we have. Just look at a little history. In the 1830s, a group of people got together and said, “Slavery is immoral. We’re going to end it.” Abolitionists. In the 1880s, a group of people got together and said, “Women should have a right to vote.” The suffragists. In the 1950s, a group got together and said, “We need to perfect this country’s laws so that African Americans have a real shot at a good life in this country.” Civil rights workers. In the 1970s, a group said, “We can’t have this dirty air and dirty water encroaching on natural spaces. We need en-vironmental laws.” The environmentalists.

We ought to be able to have a citizen movement today that says, “Deal with the real issues, like blocking money in politics, like having a plan to raise the living standard of middle-income Americans and create more jobs. Follow a foreign policy that recognizes the reality of the 21st century as opposed to looking in the rear-view mirror at the reality of the 20th century. Make major investments for all of us, not for some of us, in infrastructure.” ...

Unless you grab for the levers of power, you become interesting but people don’t pay attention to you.

“These are long-term decisions. We have to

begin to think that way,

and we have to begin to

act that way.”

This program was made possible by the generous support of Ernst & Young.


INSIDER NEWSABC News’ former president remembers winning an argument with Peter Jennings but learning the value of the legendary anchor’s point of view. Excerpt from “David Westin: Exit Interview,” May 30, 2012.

DAVID WESTIN President and Chief Executive Officer, NewsRight; Former President, ABC News; Author, Exit Interview

INSIDER NEWSPh

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T he death of Princess Diana happened early in my tenure [as president of ABC News]. I had been in the job for about four and a half months. Peter Jennings was, of course, one

of the people I worked with; I got to know Peter very well; we became quite close personally and profession-ally. But in the fall of ’97, he was a great journalist and as a great journalist was very skeptical of everything

– including me. He was not all sure why I was running ABC News, as [I was

not] a journalist, and he wasn’t very shy about it.

The first time we really clashed was over the death of Princess Di-ana, and it was not comfortable. It was Labor Day weekend, so most people were away. I found myself in the newsroom largely alone without people like Peter, because they were out of town.

One of the first decisions I made was that we would prepare a primetime spe-cial. Peter called at 11:20

at night, when he c augh t up with the

coverage. Peter could

be very firm and very to the point.

He said, “David, I understand Princess Diana has died and you’re considering a primetime special.” I said, “Yes, that’s right; we’re working on it.”

He said, “That is your right. But I feel

I owe it to you to tell you that if you do a primetime special on Princess Diana, no one will ever take you seriously as the president of ABC News.”

So here I am, four months into my tenure, having come from outside journalism, and I have Peter Jennings, a bona fide legend, somebody I had enormous respect for, telling me I was blowing my first big news call, and blowing it by a good margin. I didn’t have a lot of journalism to fall back on, at that point, so I fell back on my family. I said, “Peter, I understand she wasn’t the head of state, but I have a sister back in Michigan who never reads tabloids, but she has read every detail about Diana’s life since the moment she got engaged to Prince Charles. I think there are other people who will feel that way.”

He said, “Well, I said it’s your right. I will have nothing to do with it.” That was the end of the conversation. In fairness, Peter called the very next morning and said, “David, I’ve read all the cover-age. You were right, I was wrong. So I would like to do the special.”

So we aired a two-hour special that night.In that particular instance, Peter was wrong and

I was right. But that’s not what I took away from this. What I took away is a much more important point. Peter was saying you have to keep in mind the line between entertainment and news; you have to be thinking about why you are reporting the story. Are you reporting it because it’s really of historical significance, or are you reporting it because people just want to know about it?

That line, by the way, has moved substantially. If Princess Diana died today, there wouldn’t be any debate in any newsroom about a primetime special, and probably it was right for the line to move. But what I took away was the importance that there be a line and that people always be wrestling with that. There’s no clear answer; it’s not easy.

This program was made possible by the generous support of Wells Fargo.


B ecause my husband Rod Diridon is one of the leaders of the effort to build a high speed train in California, I have care-fully not taken a public position on the question of whether,

how and when to build this system. At the Commonwealth Club, we have sponsored several neutral panel discussions about the issue over the past few years, reflecting the range of views on the topic, as the Club does with many controversial issues.

Now that the California state legislature has voted to proceed with the system, I am able to express my views on the train and the debate that has surrounded it. I have been puzzled and bemused by the tone and quality of this debate. That is, in part, because I am one of the people likely to use such a train frequently. I see northern and southern California as closely tied together economically and culturally, and I will welcome a way to get to Los Angeles that does not involve transit time to an airport, an hour wait at the airport, security checks and other inconveniences. I will also welcome a clean form of transportation that does not create carbon emissions on the scale that short-haul aircraft trips do. I think I am more typical than not, in my propensity to use the planned train.

Though a Bay Area native, I attended college in LA, at Oc-cidental College. Many of my friends also went south to attend UCLA, USC, Pomona or other institutions, as today’s young Bay Area residents also do to attend college or perhaps graduate school in law, medicine or film. After graduate school in New York, my first job was at the Rand Corporation, in Santa Monica.

Over the years, I have traveled back and forth to LA constantly, for school, business, conferences, and professional meetings, to give speeches; for consulting projects; as a funder to review projects for possible grants; and to attend art exhibits, fundraisers, social events, memorial services, retreats and film openings. For the past seven years, I have served on the Board of Trustees at Occidental College, so I attend board meetings or events there at least five times a year. I am an investor in some properties in LA and had an LA attorney in a legal case. I have departed for and returned from many international trips through LAX. I frequently fly in and out of LAX, Burbank, John Wayne Airport, Long Beach and other Southern California airports.

So the debate about who would use the bullet train between the Bay Area and the nation’s second largest city has seemed strange to

me. Many of the people I know – attorneys, bankers, filmmakers, writers, architects, entrepreneurs, investors, journalists, physicians, politicians, artists, philanthropists, educators, speakers at The Com-monwealth Club and others – move constantly between the Bay Area and Southern California and I know would also welcome a high-speed rail option. And this does not even include those who travel for pleasure, to visit Disneyland or the beaches or family members who live in LA.

The other aspect of the debate that has baffled me has been the discussion of the cost of the system. The figure of $68 billion needed to construct the system has often been cited, along with doubts about where the funds would come from. Of course, 30 other countries have made the investment to build this kind of system, indicating their belief in the cost-effectiveness of the system. My reaction to the debate in this country, after using high speed rail systems in Japan and Italy, is that we are a bit provincial.

All large public works projects are costly, and virtually none of them have had all of the funding identified before the projects have begun. The high-speed rail system will be 432 miles long. The cost of building the Golden Gate Bridge in today’s dollars would be $1.2 billion, and it is only 2.7 miles long. Building a single mile of freeway through an urban area costs approximately $39 million, while a mile of freeway through a rural area costs approximately $8 million. Building any transportation or infrastructure system is expensive.

How will high speed rail be paid for? By tax dollars, private in-vestments through bonds and the boost to the California economy provided by higher employment during construction. Once the system is operating, it will generate user fees and provide economic benefits through more efficient movement of people and expanded commerce. As Alan Greenspan was fond of pointing out, better infrastructure is what has always allowed quantum leaps in the U.S. economy, from the initial building of the railroads to the develop-ment of the Internet. All of these new technologies have made our economy more efficient, and the same will be the case with high speed rail linking the two most important economic centers on the West Coast.

InSight column archive: commonwealthclub.org/publications/insight

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InSightwith DR. GLORIA C. DUFFYPresident & CEO, The Commonwealth Club

How I Will Use the Bullet Train

Journey to CubaOctober 19 – 28, 2012

• Explore the old city as we learn about Havana’s history, and take an architect-led tour of some of the city’s most interesting buildings.

• Meet with tobacco farmers in the Viñales Valley and take in views of the dramatic limestone mogotes.

• Visit Las Terrazas, a small community and nature reserve located in the Sierra del Rosario mountain range, and sample local coffee when we visit a working plantation.

• Converse with students during an art school visit, and enjoy a private flamenco performance by some of Cuba’s best dancers.

• Discuss U.S. foreign policy during a visit to the U.S. Interests Section and during a lecture with Cuba’s former ambas-sador to the E.U.

• See how small businesses are taking root in Cuba, and speak with an expert on the economy about Cuba’s transition.

• Meet artists and musicians and witness the vibrant artistic talent for which Cuba is known around the world.

• Spend 6 nights in the cultural jewel of Havana, 2 nights exploring the colonial city of Trinidad and the historical sites of Cienfuegos, and 1 night in the Viñales Valley.

For Information & Reservations: visit commonwealthclub.org/travel call (415) 597-6720 email [email protected]

$4,995 per person, double occupancy, including round-trip charter flight to Havana from Miami. Limited to 25 participants. CST: 2096889-40

The Commonwealth Club is licensed by the U.S. Treasury Department to operate People to People tours in Cuba. A copy of our license and an authorization letter will be provided to you with your final trip documents. Pending license renewal by the U.S. Treasury Department, The Commonwealth Club will be offering additional trips to Cuba in early 2013. Please check our website for details and to put down an early deposit to hold your space.

Explore this fascinating island nation in Commonwealth Club fashion. Through meetings, special visits and lectures, learn about Cuban art, dance, history, education and the economy. This is an extensive learning experience built on the foundation of meeting Cubans and creating a meaningful exchange of ideas and information.

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The Commonwealth Club of California595 Market Street, 2nd FloorSan Francisco, CA 94105

Purchase event tickets at

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Steve Forbes The Future of RetirementMellody Hobson Financial Commentator, ABC Television

Paul scHott stevens CEO, Investment Company Institute

Chairman and Editor in Chief, Forbes Media; Former Repub-lican Presidential Candidate

for event details, see page 34 for event details, see page 41

What is the likely future financial health of America as waves of boomers hit retire-ment age? How can a younger and more diverse generation best prepare to save in an unpredictable market? Hobson and Stevens will discuss the latest research and offer economic insights for saving today.

One of the nation’s most prominent eco-nomic forecasters presents an outlook for jobs and business as we head toward the November election. Publishing maven and political candidate Forbes has created dozens of publications and launched Forbes.com in 1996, which now averages 30 million unique visitors each month. The company’s flagship publication, Forbes, is the nation’s largest business magazine, with a circulation of more than 900,000.

PROGRAMS YOU WON’T WANT TO MISSAugust 24 September 27

The Green Economy The Shared EconomyParag cHoksHiClean Energy Public Affairs Manager, Google

linda kealaVice President HR, SolarCity

alison van diggelenHost, Fresh Dialogues, and Contributor, KQED’s “Climate Watch” – Moderator

lisa ganskyAuthor, The Mesh: Why the Future of Business Is Sharing

sHelby clarkFounder & Chief Community Officer, RelayRides

leaH busqueFounder and CEO, TaskRabbit

cory sMitHCEO, Hub Bay Area and SOCAP

liz gannesSenior Editor, AllThingsDigital – Moderator

for event details, see page 30 for event details, see page 32

The green economy is one of the fastest growing seg-ments of the Bay Area economy, but where are the jobs, and what’s the best way to find them?

August 16August 9

the commonwealth august/september 2012

Documents

club speakers

colin powellfrom

lifelong lessons of

program information26

skills of leadership

pmhow volunteering

cover6 colin powelllearning

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