Wednesday August 6th, MSPAC hosted Hillary at the Microsoft Redmond Campus

The Introduction was given by Jeff Rakes via a Tablet PC. Jeff set the tone for one of the hottest topics in numerous industries today, the values of intellectual property and digital rights management.

Robert Scobel misbehaved and ran up get Hillary's signature on a picture of Jeff Rakes, here is the official photographer catching him in the action.

Below is the gist of her introduction speech...

• 21 Billion was raised for cleanup and recovery efforts for Ground 0
• Hillary went to Wellesley college and Yale Law School ( Funny shouting from Alumni of Wellesley in the crowd )
• She encourages religious tolerance and is an Advocate for Women's and girls
• 1 million copies in the first month of pub for her latest book
• Hillary came to the MS campus to support Senator Pat Murray.
• "I can't think of any other place in American that is more future oriented".  Microsoft is representative of the employees that think about the future not just in the corporation, but philanthropic opportunities as well.
• If you are not at the table when it comes to political decisions you are conceding decision making to people that may have values that miles away from yours
• The real philosophical driver for the American experience is future preference. Sacrifice today and make the hard decision for what you believe will create a better society for you your society and your children
• In the middle of the civil war, Lincoln was signing and petitioning land rights for colleges in the the US. The battle of Gettysburg was important, but so was the planning of a potentially unsure future -- the countries education of our future children
• Today we are not paying as much attention to our social future.
• The current administrations economic policies are wrong because they violate what will make us richer in the future. e.g. fully funding no child left behind
• If you look at the political horizon, (difficult with all the short term info and decision making) we are at risk of having the first generation of leadership leaving the country worse off than they found it.
• If i could come up with one overriding critique of what is happening today... position of shorting the future.
• Reversal of the policies and programs that we took for granted over the last decade.
  So much of what was constructed. Medicare, SS, Unemployment, Environmental regulations for cleaner water and air.
• This leads to a suggestion. As you evaluate political action, take a hard look at the decisions that are being made... what does this mean
  to my future, children, society.
• Use your influences and your resources.
   

Question and Answer session
Q. First question by a guy who proves he knows a girl, a great feat for many a microsoftie ;)-. He apparently dated a girl at Wellesley when he was at MIT. Didn't catch the actual question during the laughter I shared with a colleague, Tony East...
A.

• There is no substitute for appropriately investing in things that individuals can not do on there on.
• It really does make a difference if you have a vision for where you are heading
• There needs to be a commitment to do something about the thorny issues.
• Federal government should have involvement in making the streets safer
  e.g. prior to the Clinton administration there was disproportionate # of police offices to individuals. Clinton worked to reconcile this and
  as a result, the crime rate was driven down. It should not be about being a debater and scoring points, it is about acting.
• Don't just be frustrated by problems
• There is no substitute in American politics for hope and optimism
• bring people together on a common ground and sow the seed for people to begin to solve there own problems.

Q. Ken Williams - Medical liability crisis. Medical malpractice reform bill and insurance reform.
A.

• Did not feel there was a simple answer to this
• Multi-pronged approach required
• create conditions to limit medical errors and provide better quality information
• MS can lead on this!
• There are a lot of reported and unreported medical errors attributed to misinformation
• In addition to quality, provide incentives to discipline the small # of practitioners that are being reported and are driving the insurance
  costs up encourage the Ins. companies not treat every doctor as part of the same pool
• There should be some preliminary review before a mal-practice case can go for e.g. peer review group or independent group given the resp. to Determine if a lawsuit is appropriate or not.
• Combination of many different factors
• Bring people together and tackle the problem and not score political points on the debate

Q. Elective war in IRAQ - If you were president - would there have been an IRAQ crisis post 9-11
A.

• I voted for the IRAQ resolution
• From the first gulf war all the way through the Clinton to Bush Admin, intelligence about Saddam Hussein has been consistent. Thinking has been consistent from the analysts
• When the Gulf war ended, the inspectors found much more stuff than they had expected.
• In 1998 there was debriefing, clean up, etc. Anthrax, Botchulism, equip crop duster, to deliver CW and VW etc. Saddam threw out the UN inspectors in 1998 at which team, no one had the appetite for coercive return of inspectors.  As a result, Clinton bombed all of the places that we were going to inspect based on the assumption there must be something there if Saddam did not want those places to be inspected
• From 1999 until recently - a lot was destroyed; however, new vigorous attempt to get this back
• Thanked MSPAC for contributions for Sept 11
• There is absolutely no evidence that Al Qaeda was linked to Saddam. Post 9/11 there was a lot of Qs of where he would go for refuge.
• Northern Kurdish territory where there where terrorist fighting the Kurds. It was legit to ask the questions of, "where is Saddam?"
• My decision was based on the views of people that I had worked with in the prior administrations, not the NSC, CIA, state dept.
• Everyone believed that he did have 6 months -7 years nuclear capacity. As a senator of New York, I did not feel comfortable betting on 7 years.
• This was not a vote for pre-emption for the president rather a vehicle to strengthen relationships with the UN
• UN unanimous security counsel resolution that said we will send in inspectors
• Where the administration went wrong was Refused to internationalize what should have been a world concern
• After military action - where are the weapons... I do not know, I am perplexed
• There were such people that felt things would be found not just in the current administration
• When they crossed the Niger into the Euphrates river. Our troops expected to be attacked with biological weapons. They were not
• What happened?
  1. He never had the weapons and could not stand to admit it and would rather lose his post. Every bit of intelligence was wrong and he couldn't bear to say he didn't have them. Very delusional personality at best.
  2. So concealed it that we haven't found it
  3. destroyed everything; however, from the execution of the war, it would not appear that he was sufficiently organized enough to do this
  4. handed off to another state or terrorist network
• The reality is, this is a far more complicated topic than what people talk about
• Was our intelligence wrong all of those years? With satellite, intercept, etc. Was there some truth and totally blown out of proportion that could have been avoided with inspections
• Security counsel resolution - series of mistakes, miscalculations, and overreaching preparation for post period conflict is inexcusable - hold them accountable for this. Not giving us information that us and I as senator Clinton have a right to have e.g. what is your planning post conflict, what is your assessment for funds.
• Favorite response is from - Rumsfeld - Secretary of state's - "unknowable" - "we know what we know - we know what we don't know - but we don't know what we don't know"
• How many troops will we need? Gross mis-reading of history. Need a more realistic assessment of what is happening in the world. Need a more realistic view of what is going on in the world.
• Senator Burg, a person that resembles and old testament prophet, asked Rumsfeld, "How much is it costing us?" Rumsfeld responded, "I don't know."  Senator burg, "You had better find out."
• The conflict is costing approximately 6 billion a week for Iraq.
• There was a recent Defense appropriations bill 360 billion, this was off budget not associated with Iraq

Q. I believe that you are a powerful force in the Dem party. What is the plan for economy and stimulating jobs?

A.

• 5 1/2 million jobs lost in this current economy
• We need to move back to a Fiscally responsible federal budget
• Interest rates are ticking up - anyone who is not an ideal log\
• Huge deficits = interest rate response - squeezing private capital - gov. is in the market of squeezing up the money for this deficit.
• $300 billion deficit. Clinton understood.  Clinton school of economics - paying as you go. revenues coming in as bills going out. don't do this and you will strangle the economy
• There may be some spikes because of undermining recovery of a real economic recovery, lowering cost, outsourcing overseas, ?
• Need to do a better job of protecting IP - It is one of greatest exports.
• Need to extend the R&D tax credit
• "I can't pay for a mile of road, some of you could"
• Middle class tax cuts
• investments that will make us richer
• Washington seems like an evidence free zone today.

Q. Carl Fuss - What are the benefits of citizenship in the US? Don't need citizenship to get healthcare, vote, driver's license. The only thing it gives you access to is the draft and be able to become president.

A.

• Future investments - the internet was a federal research investment
• We need a renewed sense of citizenship (not just the flag waving patriotism)
• Need to stop the attitude of "do I really owe anybody anything for that". It does not stop at laying your lives on the line for our country.
• Creating a business that employs thousands of people is also good citizenship.

Q. The recent defense departments ruling breaks up our company, and forces us to included competitor products in our platform, give away our source code and IP. Does this go far enough to protect the american consumer?

A.

• Agrees with the settlement and judicial decree
• encourage competition and provide MS the continuing motivation to be competitive
• MS must recognize the significance of keeping a very competitive environmentI want to see even more tech. adv. do we have an environment to do this
• Let's make sure that everyone is as incentivised, creative, and competitive not just for the consumer, but for the American economy.