Laura Novak
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Dr. Romer on the Truman Balcony

1/14/2012

 
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I was very fortunate to be invited by friends to hear
Dr. Christina Romer speak on the economy and assorted economic topics the other night.

I've met her several times, at church, at the grocery store, and at a school our sons once attended. Mrs. Romer is a delightful woman, always smiling, very friendly and approachable.

The other night at her son's school, she was disarming and charming as usual. And while she addressed heady subjects with a brilliance that only someone with a CV like THIS can do, Dr. Romer did it with great warmth and to lots of laughter. (In fact, when the moderator of the evening introduced her, and outlined Dr. Romer's education and accomplishments, I turned to my friend and said, "I should just smack myself."  What losers most of us in the audience were by comparison!)

At any rate, to my regret, I did not take notes. It was too cramped and I could not even move my arms. But I have a few take aways from the two-hour talk and discussion with one of her colleagues at UC Berkeley. The best is about the vote on heath care reform. At 11 o'clock that night, President Obama invited everyone involved with the legislation back to the White House to celebrate on the Truman Balcony. 

That included even the researchers who worked for Dr. Romer. FLOTUS and the girls were away, and at 1am, POTUS said he was tired and was going to retire for the night. But he invited everyone to stay and even "look around."

Well, of course the Truman Balcony is on the second floor, in the private residence. So many took the President up on his offer, and wandered around, even sitting on the bed in the Lincoln Bedroom. A few might have even bounced up and down on it. Great fun was had by all.

There were more anecdotes that painted a president who was humane, human, very smart and capable of absorbing immense amounts of information. When she brought him unemployment numbers one month that were staggeringly low, he misunderstood her, thinking she said 110,000 instead of 11,000. When he took in Dr. Romer's correction, the president then hugged her four times and gave her one kiss on the cheek.

President Obama is a man interested in facts and analysis, not politicking among his staff or vying for his attention. He wanted the data brought to him and he wanted to hear recommendations and assessment of a situation. Who was right and who was in power did not matter. He then made up his mind based on facts.

Dr. Romer one day asked Rahm Emanuel why she was appointed to head up the Council on Economic Advisors. And he pointed out that she was a leading expert on the great American Depression. They figured they might need her again because were this close to seeing history repeating itself. How close? "Terrifyingly close."

TARP was the right thing to do and the money has been paid back. But the banks are still not lending sufficiently, and bankruptcy laws prevent them from restructuring primary mortgages in bankruptcy filings. She'd like to see that changed.

Administration lawyers are confident that health care reform will stand up to legal challenges. And it is our children who will stand to benefit the most from the specific reforms in the legislation.

I wish I could give you more detail on her comments about the economy. But I don't want to make this post any more vague than it already is. And I had to pass/fail economics in college. Though my professor was incredibly handsome.

I'll leave off with the assessment that Europe is screwed, absolutely screwed, unless they take more direct action and advice. And if they go down, yes, it will affect us.

A final question on Bain Capital was handled with great poise and dexterity. Suffice to say that there are arguments for and against capitalism (my words more or less - hers were far more eloquent.)

All in all, I'll say this: I recall waking our son and watching the inauguration in 2009. And I recall clearly seeing Dr. Romer and her husband, David Romer, enter the balcony at the Capital where they would sit with other cabinet members and distinguished guests. They were both beaming, from ear to ear, and 3,000 miles away I felt what must have been the "shock and awe" of being part of something great. 

Now that Mrs. Romer is home and back at Cal, I still see her beaming. Even if it's in the produce aisle at our local market. Now, go look at her CV and tell me if you want to smack yourself upside the head with me. What a loser. I need to go work on the second novel!

V-A
1/14/2012 03:17:07 am

Tsk, tsk, Laura. I know Mrs. Romer would be the first to correct your usage of the word "loser." The idea that we're all winners or losers has replaced The American Dream. Competition against others, imo, is rarely the impetus for anything good-- unless you're a quarterback. I say, let Mrs. Romer inspire you but never denigrate yourself, even in jest, by comparison. (hmmmm, good material for a character?)

Laura Novak
1/14/2012 03:22:40 am

I know. That's just the thing about her, she seems so open and warm. It's MY sarcastic use of the word. And yes, she is inspirational b/c on top of all of it, her kids are brilliant and very successful. Not like another politician who seems to want to compete on the national stage.

Ottoline
1/14/2012 03:39:05 am

V-A, you are right as usual. My first impulse, too, upon looking at that spectacular resume (format! clarity! content!) was not in my best interest either. Laura, you have given us inspiration and a great reading list. Thank you!

Did Dr R point to any one of her writings as the ONE we should read? (I see I am not wrong in thinking "stimulus now [much more stimulus]; austerity during prosperity" is the solution.) Did she say more about why she was not allowed to leave UC for Harvard in 2008? Or why she left the Obama camp? Or anything about the coming elections, esp how we can help? Or anything about MSM's blackouts on certain topics?

Buzzing in my brain is how to get Colbert to add to his presidential campaign satire: add Amy Sedaris for VP as someone who is/was faking a pregnancy. I'm sure with their wit they could do more than I can imagine, but even just following the Palin script would be hilarious enough. Does anyone know how to get word to Colbert? Any connection that might work? I asked for help on politicalgates' yesterday's post, but what else could convince Colbert to address the hoax? I don't actually consider this O/T because it would help the election to expose and rid ourselves of this distraction with all its seamy implications. And make Obama's reelection a little more certain.

Ottoline
1/14/2012 03:46:29 am

BTW, to support V-A's last phrase, I cite Anne Lamott, who started off a bookstore talk one night yrs ago in distress about some interaction with her mother that had gone wrong, pushed all the bad buttons. She then perked right up and said she has learned, when in great despair, to remind herself ASAP that she can use this in her writing. So one side of her has the normal response, and the other side of her cheers with "Yessssssss! I can use this!"

Ottoline
1/14/2012 04:31:12 am

So I posted again on the latest Colbert video. Oh, please, go there and do something to support "Amy Sedaris for VP"

http://tinyurl.com/6q2qs75

I wish we could think of something more to do.

Up
1/14/2012 11:02:22 am

Thank you for sharing your experience. What a lovely opportunity. I can't even begin to put myself in the same universe as Dr. Romer.

And I too remember sitting up with my husband watching the election results in awe, and the thrill I had when I told my daughter the next morning! Once Colin Powell declined to pursue the presidency I felt I wouldn't see a president of color until all my hair was gray.

Laura Novak
1/15/2012 05:22:40 am

Thanks, Up, for that nice comment. I know, it's hard to imagine how someone can reach a certain age and have accomplished so much, while some of us live lives within expected, or more usual, boundaries. It's just so nice that she's so pleasant on top of it all.

And no, she did not address why she left D.C. But it's great to know that she was there for a while.

Laura Novak
1/15/2012 05:22:45 am

Thanks, Up, for that nice comment. I know, it's hard to imagine how someone can reach a certain age and have accomplished so much, while some of us live lives within expected, or more usual, boundaries. It's just so nice that she's so pleasant on top of it all.

And no, she did not address why she left D.C. But it's great to know that she was there for a while.

Ottoline
1/15/2012 07:30:36 am

I ask about her leaving because a book came out that quoted her and another woman staffer as leaving because their views were not taken seriously. (Kinda murky quotes.) And I remember reading something about Romer's views not being in synch with the Obama teams. This is esp distressing to me because I believe her view (massive gov't spending now; serious gov't austerity once prosperity returns) is correct. Paul Krugman says so too. Of course, I might be misunderstanding.

It really bothers me that Obama made a mistake in turning away from the Romer view. That's why I hoped Romer might have shed more light on it.

My guess is that Obama knew he could not (in practical terms) follow the Romer/Krugman/Keynsian approach, even though he should have. So he wanted her to pipe down, even though her job would be to keep the correct view alive. A not unusual management phenomenon.

V-A
1/16/2012 12:55:18 am

Otto: an interesting question. If Romer is an authority on the Depression, might she have been an advocate for powerful govt programs like the CCC and WPA. These were programs that not only put people to work, but taught them valuable skills and used their work to enrich the lives of others-- like building state parks. These programs also taught social skills and brought together disparate groups of people to work together. I dream on. . .

Ottoline
1/16/2012 01:21:28 am

V-A: I think YES! But also just plain spending.

If I understand this correctly, spending is spending and serves to get money into the economy because whoever gets it first spends it, and then those folks spend it, etc., And that's the part the "cut govt spending" adherents don't seem to get.

The second issue is what do you spend it on.
--CCC/WPA-like programs could help our crumbling infrastructure, do LOTS of good. But they would help the very people that (I suspect) the RW wants to "depopulate." So I don't see that getting passed.
--Reducing war spending would be such a hardship on the (undertaxed) war profiteers that they would fight that tooth and nail.
--Increasing spending on services is clearly not happening, although it should. But then the first to benefit would be academics and their world (or the health-care world, renewable energy, etc.), so the war-profiteer kleptocracy is not in favor of that. The fact that it would benefit our children and society is not so important to the war-profiteer RW fundie kleptocracy.

Sorry to be so negative on a beautiful Sunday AM. The pregnancy hoax and its larger issues (and my reading over the last 3 yrs) has brought me to a v cynical place.

V-A
1/16/2012 01:01:13 am

Eudora Welty, the writer, was a photographer for the WPA in Mississippi. Her photos from that time are only a few of the historical representations we have of black american life of the period. She was paid a pittance to travel and document, and she did. I could go on and on.

--

What I think about Dr Romer is an idea which I'm stuck on. It's replays in my head daily. That the young today think of Winning Big. One huge score and you're done. But an older idea of success, is the life that's lived in process and growth. Bill and Hillary Clinton and Picasso, Georgia O'Keeffe and Helen Frankenthaler, Billy Carter, Lou Lou dela Fallaise. . . a pathetic list of what I mean-- but people who produce for a lifetime.

Ottoline
1/16/2012 01:34:10 am

So seldom do I see Frankenthaler mentioned. Always LOVED her work.

Re one big score: as an antidote to that view, I give you the start-up multi-millionaires in Silicon Valley, the lovely nerdy folks who worked night and day before their stock options paid off, and who continue afterwards -- wearing the same tee-shirts and jeans, doing much the same work. Because they loved it before and they love it after. This is a bunch of people we can expect a lot of in the years to come, both in more solid lifetime work and philanthropy.

Ottoline
1/16/2012 01:39:59 am

OMG: just feast your eyes on this!

http://tinyurl.com/79ybaty

V-A
1/16/2012 02:23:09 am

thank you, dear friend. beautiful.

Ottoline
1/16/2012 03:16:02 am

:-)

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    Laura Novak

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