Conferenza

Aspen IdeasFestival: Clinton has query for Rove, some praise for W.

Former President Bill Clinton needs little provocation when it comes to questioning Karl Rove's tactics.

Clinton showed no hesitation reeling off three sharp questions for White House adviser Karl Rove - when asked for one - and he offered some muted praise for his successor in an interview at the Aspen IdeasFestival, where he graced the stage for the second straight year.

Clinton told an audience of about 600 that President George W. Bush had been more successful getting congress to support funding to fight AIDS, and said it was natural for a president after 911 to assert stronger executive powers. He also praised the Bush administration for its position and rhetoric regaring genocide in Darfur, saying the administration "actually has been quite good" in taking a stand.

But the Democrat's most animated moments came when Atlantic Monthly correspondent James Fallows asked him what question Clinton would want to ask President Bush's top aide, who speaks here Sunday.

In short order, Clinton came up with three.

"I would ask him to give an honest answer to the following," he said, asking whether if top Clinton adviser Raum Emanuel [now a congressman] had blown the cover of a CIA agent, thus undermining the cover of untold number of other agents probably working to fight terrorism, and that agent's husband happened to be Joe Wilson, who had failed to support an administration claim regarding nuclear transactions between Niger and Iraq, "would you (Rove) or would you not...call Raum Emanuel a traitor?" He also wondered if Rove would have instructed Republican congressman to take the floor and echo such traitorous claims.

"I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if he'd say that's exactly what I'd ask them to do, and I don't know why they didn't," Clinton mused. "I mean this guy is good."

The former president, who was departing Saturday to attend the World Cup final Sunday, also suggested Rove be asked how anyone could question the patriotism of former Georgia Sen. Max Cleland, who Clinton noted had left two legs and part of an arm on the battlefield in the Vietnam War but who was defeated in 2002 after ads for Republican rival Saxby Chambliss associated Cleland with images of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.

Thirdly, Clinton said Rove should be asked why the Bush Administration would offer an estate tax repeal valued at 20 times the cost it would take to strengthen gaps in the security of U.S. ports, but which Republicans had roundly rejected.

Asked about Democrat's electoral prospects in November, Clinton rebutted a questioner who said Democrats did not appear to be able to differentiate themselves from the majority Republican party, while acknowledging his party would has a major disadvantage in communicating its message due to the GOP's control over the executive and Congress, as well as judicial appointments.

"I think the differences are clear," he said, acknowledging Democrats needed to run a national campaign emphasizing what he said was their commitment to open and accountable government rather than his characterization of Republicans' efforts to concentrate power and reward the wealthiest taxpayers. "911 suspended critical thinking for awhile," he said, adding, "they ran that old dog up the chute for a couple of elections."

"Historically, we should win," Clinton said, referring to the trend of second term presidents to lose legislative seats at mid-term elections, and he said it was possible to win a majority on Capital Hill, at least in one of the houses. He questioned whether Republican baiting on issues like flag-burning and gay marriage would start to wear thin: "I don't know how long you can milk that old cow."

In the hour-long interview, Clinton touched on a variety of subjects:

- Alternative Energy. He praised the 25% tax cut for clean energy development as a part of the 2005 Energy Act which he said he'd once proposed, but which had been met with indifference by the Republican Congress. "It elicited a giant yawn," he said. "I told Newt Gingrich I finally found a tax cut he would oppose."

- Climate Change. Clinton praised former Vice President Al Gore's climate change movie, "an Inconvenient Truth," adding he now believes the issue is 'a lot worse' and its potential consequences more widely appreciated than it was when he was in office. "In addition to climate change, we may not have as much oil [reserves in the world] as we think," he said.

- Jobs. Related to climate change, the former president argued America was failing to exploit opportunities for new technologies that were being embraced by other countries, and that we risk falling behind. "This decade's new jobs are in clean energy and we haven't seized them."

- Iraq and Afganistan. Clinton kept consistent with his previous statements that the United States should not set a deadline for pulling out of Iraq, and he also expresed concerns about a resurgance of the Taliban in Afghanistan.

- Hamas and Israel. Clinton said he was split in his opinion of the administration's response to Hamas's electoral victory, supporting Bush and the European Union for withholding nonhumanitarian aid due to Hamas's failure to recognize Israel, to renounce terror and to honor treaties, but he also said it remained important to keep channels of communication open. "You don't have to advertise it. You don't have to put it in the paper.... I'd still talk to them if they wanted to talk. The more you talk the fewer people will die."

UPDATE - James Fallows has posted a wonderful description of how it felt sit next to Clinton in the interviewer's seat, with some of the most telling lines coming towards the end. We indeed found the former president particularly relaxed and eager to linger at the rope line to speak with attendees.

Aspen IdeasFestival: Valuing Ideas

The weeklong Aspen IdeasFestival straddles the Independence Day holiday and is noteworthy among conferences not only that it celebrates the world of ideas, but seeks to give its roughly 1,200 attendees and panelists an array of talks, interviews, panel discussions and socratic colloquia that offer many slants at the interrelationship and evolution of those ideas.

Elliot Gerson, Aspen Institute's executive in charge of seminars and programs, describes IdeasFestival as akin to the first week of classes at a university since attendees shop between a broad variety of subjects ranging from Shakespeare and leadership to the greening of corporations and from terrorism to the challenges of running a university, including Richard Brodhead, the president of scandal-encumbered Duke University and Lawrence Summers, who recently resigned as president of Harvard University.

IdeasFestival might be more aptly described as IdeasFeast. Participants are encouraged to gorge on topics both esoteric and popular and to seek out new, inspiring ideas from the veritable cornucopia of fora lead by intellectuals and practitioners from universities, politics, diplomacy, clerics and the business world.

In that context, the conference harkens back to the open exchange of ideas dating back to philosophers Socrate and Plato, of course, and also to America's Founding Fathers celebrated this week.

Such exchanges these days as throughout our history as a nation can often be noisy and chaotic - several panels were devoted to topics such as "Fake News, Spin and Inaccuracy in Media" and the bias of Left and Right in political discourse - as well as inspiring.

Organizers ensured the proceedings are all on the record, and there is generally ample time for questions and discussion.

Participants and presenters at this second annual event were no less invigorated by the wealth of simultaneous panels than a year ago, and many said it was a unique collection of leaders, creators and inventors.

The spirit reflects the writings of Thomas Jefferson, who wrote in a letter discussed during a Socrates Seminar at Aspen Institute prior to IdeasFestival, the open exchange of new ideas can proliferate among many to inspire a multitude of inventive efforts which can produce huge gains for human progress:

"That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation," Jefferson wrote.

David Bradley, chairman of The Atlantic Monthly, echoed Jefferson as he kicked off the conference by describing how ideas are a singular "great gift" with which humanity is endowed. "Our species is different from all others in the respect that it is capable of being seized by an idea," he said.

Readers of the posts to come from this excellent conference will recognize Conferenza's approach to IdeasFestival is to identify and track trends among several sessions in many cases, rather than individual efforts, and to reflect issues as they are addressed from multiple angles in successive sessions.

For those looking for further coverage: correspondents of The Atlantic, which is co-producing the conference with Aspen Institute, are keeping their own running blogs reflecting inspiring moments which strike their fancy.

Aspen IdeasFestival Eyes World-Changing Ideas

Following close on the heels of Fortune's Brainstorm, Aspen Institute's second annual IdeasFestival kicks off tonight with a plenary session entitled "Ideas that Change the World," an echo of the theme of February's TED2006 in Monterey, California.

Although occupying many of the same Aspen Institute venues as last week's Brainstorm, and sharing marquee speakers like former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, IdeasFestival takes a broader and a more political and cultural tilt, with former President Clinton, George W. Bush adviser Karl Rove as well as the likes of film director Sydney Pollack and TV producer Norman Lear taking the stage.

The seven-day event, which earned our 2005 Rookie of the Year Conference award last year, was preceded (like many previous days here) by heavy downpours and earthshaking bolts of lightening, as if the Olympic gods were heralding the arrival of myriad luminaries at Aspen Meadows.

The kickoff included a performance by Anna Deavere Smith, who has been a MacArthur Fellow and was recently named the first Aspen Institute Harman-Eisner Artist in Residence, as well as Architects for Humanity founder Cameron Sinclair and Jacqueline Novogratz, founder and CEO of the global nonprofit venture fund Acumen. All three have bean presenters at TED.

Lawrence Krauss, the Case Western Reserve University professor of physics and astronomy, also wowed the sold-out crowd with a quick romp through the vaguaries of string theory and the properties of 'empty space' in outer space, as he had done at greater length at the PUSH conference in Minneapolis last month.

TED 3 Themes - Doing Good and Doing Well to TED's Drumbeat!

Al Gore's coming back!

The man whose presentations served ostensibly as bookends for his first TED conference used the bully pulpit of the stage as TED2006's final speaker to announce he was coming back - no, not to politics, but to TED. Next year.

And that, coming from a man who likes to quip it's not been long since "I used to be the next President of the United States", says a lot about the transformation not only of the former vice president to the causes of averting global climate change and warning of media complacency, but also of TED.

TED2006 will likely go down as a remarkable year of consistent rhythm - a seamless alignment of the conference's original concentration on "Technology Entertainment Design" with TEDsteward Chris Anderson's vision of a world meeting social causes, often through inspired efforts of individuals commited to making a difference.

Not that Anderson will slow in his ambitious efforts to keep evolving the TEDconference and trying new ways to increase the velocity of productive communication between members of the TEDcommunity - whether through electronic introductions, the new TEDuniversity or various lunches, galas, beach parties and the two-years-running nighttime beachfront drumming session, this time sans Mickey Hart.

The three trends

0. Climate Change. Al Gore has been on a crusade for planetary preservation, warning influential audiences from Los Angeles to New York of the devastating potential impact of global warming. Allowed to break from TED's rigid 18-minute limit on talks, Gore was allocated a full one-hour Bonus Session on the opening day. With the disarming power of a sharp wit many had not expected and an up-to-date fact-filled slide show he made a compelling case global warming is fact, while doubt about is fiction. Afterwards, many who had doubted global warming were instead suggesting he needed a strong name for it - like global crisis or catastrophe. It's thus smart that Gore's releasing a film this spring, with "Pulp Fiction" producer Lawrence Bender who also attended TED, along with teams of surrogates to take the talk out to the country. Gore's was a sharp contrast to the presentation at TED2005 by Bjørn Lomborg, of skeptical environmentalist fame, which ranked climate degredation towards the bottom of priorites dubbed "bad projects" as decided by an assembly of experts.

0. Youth, Innovation and 'Upgrade Paradox". A variety of speakers addressed the issue of innovation, creativity, educating youth and our future. Sir Ken Robinson argued creativity is as important as literacy, and said we train it out of our youth. Zany astronomer Clifford Stoll suggested those who want to know the future 20 years out should ask kindergarten teachers, not technologists or futurists. Neil Gershenfeld of MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms described how his $20,000 mobile fab labs are used by young children, who are often bedazzled and spend hours learning to build complex technical systems. Finally, NYTimes tech columnist David Pogue described the "upgrade paradox" by which well-meaning, consenting (presumably) adults work to "improve" a piece of software so many times "you finally ruin it."

0. One Person Can. Over and over, speakers came to the stage demonstrating what a difference one person can make, whether it's the pioneering aviation of Burt Rutan, the video game worlds of David Perry, the natural animal-human interactions photographed by Gregory Colbert, or the aggregation of many individual testaments to violence of the Witness project as presented by musician Peter Gabriel.

The three themes - Ways to Get There

0. Doing Good and Doing Well. Green is the new... There was Al Gore, who professed that work to stem global overheating will create new jobs and businesses, and Bronx environmental activist Majora Carter, advocated ecological restoration projects, installing green roofs and improving traffic flows could create jobs ["Green is the new Black," is a phrase she uses to fight bad urban planning in predominantly African American neighborhoods]. Both argued economic incentives are crucial. Venture Capitalist Vinod Khosla cited similar success of economic incentives in Brazil, where adoption of "flex fuel" ethanol consuming cars has surged to 70% from 4%.

0. Ignore Assumptions. Live Forever (Nearly). Sprout New Limbs. In addition to the scorn of conventional education suppressing creativity, presenters argued we are often tied down by our own assumptions. Aubrey De Gray of Cambridge University suggests it is time to do away with ageing, which he says kills 90% of Americans and that extending lives of those destined to die of old age currently costs $200 billion in this country alone. It may seem unusual unless you, like De Gray, expect humans to naturally live to be 1,000. Similarly, regenerative medicine pioneer Dr. Alan Russell asked if a newt can regenerate a lost limb, why can't humans?

0. Look out for Patterns along the Way. Futurist Erik Peterson of the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies spoke of the challenge of population growth, governance, and information flows among the challenges we face over the next 20 years. Soon thereafter, Hans Rosling of Stockholm and Gapminder offers an engaging and graphic demonstration of the importance of drillng down into data and trends, and not overgeneralizing. Finally, Stanford biochemist Paul Berg, who shared the 1980 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, offered a fairly professorial walk through his recombinent DNA work. A couple of minutes from the end he launched into how identical twins' same genetic makeup can interact quite differently depending on the environment - worth a talk in its own right.

The three people

0. Larry Brilliant. Crowned as head of Google's foundation on the eve of TED, Brilliant energetically declared himself "the luckiest guy in the world" not for gaining that post, but for having seen the last case of smallpox in the world when he helped lead the eradication efforts. Furthermore, the maverick public health campaigner and former technology CEO aims to garner support with his $100,000 TEDprize to create a "Early Detect, Rapid Response" system that might stand a chance of halting avian flu before a pandemic spreads. He dubs this INSTEDD - International System for Total Early Disease Detection.

0. Cameron Sinclair & Jehane Noujaim. Yes, this will make it four people, yet Sinclair and Noujaim each deserve not only their individual $100,000 TEDprizes, but commendation for their efforts to raise the profile of innovative, humanitarian grassroots design and of independent, humanitarian films with their own famous TEDprize wishes.

0. Al Gore. Some Republican-leaning attendees spoke vehemently afterwards about how they felt two quips Gore made about the two presidents Bush, respectively, undermined his contention that Climate Change was an ethical, moral and spiritual issue, not a political one. Nonetheless, Gore won over many with a quick humor few saw in his public performances, his earnest climate campgain, and his frank assessment of his own political acumen. Asked by Anderson if he would run for president again, Gore noted that aside from election as vice president, he had run four times nationally and lost. To which one audience member blurted out "you won!" "Yeah, there is that," was Gore's reply.

The TED moment

TED has always been famous for its TED moments of amazing revelation.

This year, one such moment from off stage was recounted by Chris Herot, who found himself sitting on a bench in front of a tank of large fish during the TED gala evening at the Monterey Aquarium where he joined actress Meg Ryan and string theorist Brian Greene as they were deep in conversation around the origins of the universe and the concept of a larger purpose to existence. Also participating was Thomas Stat of the design consulting firm IDEO. "And in a moment that could only have occured at TED, not one but two people brought up what the Dalia Lama had told them about the topic in personal conversations they had had...," he reported.

The one complaint

TED2006 inserted itself smack in the middle of a broad trend of social entrepreneurship which has attracted innovators and philanthropists alike. Some long-time TEDsters still complain, as in recent years, there is 'less' of the T E and D in the TED experience, and that may very well be true.

Nonetheless, there was no lack of Technology at hand than engineer and pilot Burt Rutan or MIT D Lab head Amy Smith, or nor any shortage of intrinsic Entertainment and performance skill in Serena Huang, the 11-year-old violinist who also showed pluck at storytelling, saying she chose the instrument over the piano because with the violin she could hide it if she wanted to get out of practice, nor any shortage of Design sophistication with Joshua Prince-Ramus, architect of the Seattle Central Library.

Anderson's leadership is ambitious - he's announced a further TEDglobal conference in 2007 in Arusha, Tanzania, which some believe may require him to build a highway for participants to get there.

Yet, in a world of rapid change and literally dozens of fresh ideas for innovation and investment, an even greater challenge TED community faces is its impact outside the Monterey Conference Center and a four-day event. One can envision a far greater reach for TED, if it is able to preserve the intimacy of the event itself, while opening its flow of ideas more fully to the world. This could include greater public access outside even the amply-appointed simulcast room - which would also challenge the drumbeat of critics promoting open-source conferences.

Final thought

TED has resided for more than two decades among the pantheon on the top of the premier conferences, and deservedly so. Like any event or institution, conferences face a challenge of reinvention and remaining relevant. As Shel Israel noted in his interview with Tom Abate in last week's San Francisco Chronicle, TED's rhythm is beating to a younger and more hurried drumbeat than it had under design maestro Richard Saul Wurman, who founded and nurtured TED for years.

Under Wurman, TED was described by some early attendees as a form of "show and tell for adults" which involved into a "show and tell with geniuses for adults." Under Anderson, it is self consciously moving from the "Cirque du Soleil for the mind" he envisioned in acquiring TED to a "Cirque du Soleil for the mind, with humanitarian intent," much to the applause of an audience willing to plunk down $4,400 14 months in advance to ensure a spot in the conference's Main Hall.

TED is as strong as ever.

Finally, congratulations to 2005 TEDglobal (Oxford, UK) producer Bruno Giussani for his excellent liveblogging of all sessions, here, and ditto to the copious Ethan Zuckerman, who turned over his entire website to TED for four days of live blogging in which he estimates he wrote more than 19,000 words in 45 postings. Blogger Verite, indeed!

Up next for TED2007? "Icons. Geniuses. Mavericks." What more could you want?

TED - Halftime Report

Since assuming the stewardship of TED - Technology Entertainment Design - Chris Anderson and his Sapling foundation have
accentuated the humanitarian opportunities to leverage design, entertainment and technology to profoundly improve the world and the human condition.

This year's convocation has become the most seemless integration of the four-day, $4,400, 1,000+ participant extravaganza with noble causes which could truly and literally save humanity.

Under the mantle "The Future We Will Create," TED2006 is taking Chris's vision to a new level while deepening the conference's associations with influential long-time TEDsters like the partners of venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins Byers & Caufield and Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and the founders of high tech blockbuster companies like Kleiner-backed Google and Amazon.

The main highlights of the first half of the conference were unquestionably Wednesday evening's 'Bonus Session' with former Vice President Al Gore on the coming global crisis from climate change, and the distribution Thursday evening of the three TEDprizes, whose winners each was allowed to make one 'wish' to be granted by the TED community:

- Cameron Sinclair, founder of Architecture for Humanity to generate radically improved designs for cost-effective shelter, desires a community to embrace open source design for improving living standards for all,

- Jehane Nojaim, the documentary film-maker whose film "Control Room" explored the U.S. war in Iraq and coverage of the conflict by al-Jezeera television network, wishes to bring the world together on one day every year through the power of a simultaneous screening of film and

- Dr. Larry Brilliant, the public health maverick who played a leading role in eradicating Smallpox, wants help building a powerful new early warning system "to protect the world form some of its worst nightmares," including Avian flu.

Brilliant arrived at TED immediately after being named to head Google's charitable foundation, also played a key role recently in helping the venerable venture firm Kleiner Perkins establish a $200 million fund dedicated to preventing pandemics and reducing their potential impact.

Kudos to play-by-play session reports by our friend Bruno Giussani, who produced the more intimate TEDglobal event at Oxford, England, last July.

Session One - History's Arrow - Demographic Directions and glimpses at Future Scenarios [hint: we may want to wake up, strap on seatbelts, and consider avoiding catastrophe].

Session Two - [Don't Hold your] Sharp Intake of Breath - of which the troupe of delighting [HIV/AIDS-orphaned] Ugandan dancers totally rocked TED.

Day One Bonus Session - Al Gore.

Session 3 - Small Miracles.

Session 4 - Links within a Flattened World,

Session 5 on Pastor Rick and Skeptics,

and, of course,

TEDprize Winners.

At the end of Day Two, Anderson also announced TEDglobal 2007 will be held in Tanzania June 3-6 - presuming of course we're not strickent by a global pandemic, a surge in global warming, a conflagration of international strife, etc.

This just in...Evangelist Marries Scientist Guy, Bride On Stage

Actually, we were tipped on Friday afternoon of what we think is a new milestone in the record of premier conference revelatory moments – an apparently impromptu wedding ceremony on the stage of eg – the Entertainment Gathering.

Conference participants reported that Bill Nye the Science Guy and his fiancé were wed on the conference stage with “Purpose-Driven” Pastor Rick Warren presiding and accompanied by wedding music performed by YoYo Ma on Cello (naturally) and Mike Hawley on piano!

The eg nuptial moment followed some urging on from long time conference impresario and host Richard Saul Wurman, who in his years of producing TED became famous for summoning sensational “TED moments” – spontaneous revelatory sparks of understanding instantly felt throughout the audience.

But conference-goers said the wedding scenario had apparently brewed up over a Friday lunchtime conversation between Pastor Rick, Nye and Nye’s fiancé – the couple had only known each other a short while and yet were engaged.

The pastor is known for The Purpose Driven Life, the best-selling book of our age and with more than 20 million copies sold and at a current pace of a million copies a month is rapidly closing in on Dr. Spock and the Bible on the all-time bestsellers list. He is also a skilful preacher with a seductive message.

Now on the conference circuit, Warren recounted at Aspen Institute’s IdeasFestival last July how he’d persuaded a high-ranking Communist Party official to convert to Christianity extremely publicly, almost on the spot. Nonetheless, Warren’s prostheletizing tone makes some listeners extremely uncomfortable.

Apparently the lunchtime conversation resulted in a number of attendees encouraging the couple to tie the knot on the spot. So, at the start of the afternoon session Wurman called Nye to the stage and also goaded him to go through with the ceremony, which Nye agreed to do.

As they had no wedding rings, Nye used her engagement ring, and she gave him a watch. No sooner had Nye kissed the bride than Hawley and YoYo Ma struck up their wedding music.

Nye, a one-time Boeing Co. engineer whose penchant for explaining things scientific led him to a career in television as "Bill Nye the Science Guy", had earlier addressed the gathering, describing how a life-long fascination with sun dials had caused him to convince NASA scientists to back sending one on an expedition to Mars.

Convened at the Skirball Cultural Center north of Los Angeles after a four-year hiatus since selling the TED Conferences to Chris Anderson’s Sapling Foundation. “Nye seemed genuinely stunned by the whole thing,” reported attendee David Hornik of August Capital and Ventureblog, who talked with Nye after the ceremony and said the newlyweds were headed off to Hawaii to celebrate.

Sam