Thursday, June 21, 2007

Met with Nancy Pelosi in her “Speakers Office” at the Capitol to discuss the funding of the University of California at SF Center for AIDS Research (CFAR). They did not get the funding amount that they had hoped for and we finally worked it out to everyone’s satisfaction by getting some extra money from OAR and the NHLBI to give them the additional $771,000.00 that they requested. Nancy was satisfied. I went with Elias Zerhouni and Marc Smolonsky from OLA at NIH. Her main staffer was Scott Brule. Nancy was as usual very warm and cordial to me. We discussed a plan that she had to get extra money to the NIH through a budget supplemental. She felt that if we wrap in the cancer package, all of the Congress would be in favor even though it was understood that it would go way beyond cancer. Elias and I and Marc will world on a strategic plan for the initiative and get back to her. Visited by USA Ambassador to Indonesia (just appointed) Cameron Hume. I know Cameron from time he was Ambassador to South Africa and we (Cliff Lane) established the Phidisa Project with the South African Military to treat HIV infection in the military. Cameron left South Africa and became (briefly) Ambassador to Sudan (during the Darfur crisis). He is on his way to take over in Jakarta and wanted me to brief him on Pandemic Influenza threat and what the USA is doing in this area. Indonesia is a hot spot for recent cases of chicken to human H5N1 Chris and I had dinner tonight at the home of Australian Ambassador to the USA Dennis Richardson and his wife Betty to celebrate the visit of immunologist Ian Frazer (wife Caroline) who is the 2006 Australian of the Year. His research led to the development of the HPV vaccine with Merck (Gardasil). Good food and conversation at the beautiful Ambassador’s residence at 3120 Cleveland Avenue, N.W. Balmy Spring night in DC. June 21 – July 4, 2007 – POTUS commuted 30 month jail sentence for Scooter Libby, but did not pardon him. The conservatives are enraged that the POTUS did not go far enough to pardon Scooter and the liberals are saying that the commutation was a “disgrace”. Went to the Gala Dinner of “The Golden Plate” with Chris. Usual celebrity gala. Met Hillary Swank for the first time. Others at the dinner were Alberto Gonzales, Margaret Spellings, David Rubenstein (Carlyle Group), and many many others. Sitting at Table with Chris and me were: Gen. Ralston (former Chairman of Joint Chiefs) Mac Macarty (former Chief-of-Staff to Pres. Clinton, Ann Venneman (UNICEF Director and former Sec. Dept. of Agriculture. Entertainment by Brooks and Dunn – country singers who were fantastic (winner of many country music awards) Went to a Cocktail Buffet at Jamie Gorelick’s house on June 30 and met with the usual cast of DC notables: Richard Ben-Veniste, Bill Jeffress (Scooter’s lawyer), David Ignatius of the Washington Post, Seth Waxman (lawyer), Judy Woodruff (PBS), Al Hunt (Bloomberg News), Mark Shields (Newshour), etc. Living discussions about Washington Politics, including the fact that I wrote a letter for Scooter. July 5 – 7, 2007 – Went to the Aspen Ideas Festival in Aspen, CO. Presented a session on “Emerging and Re-Emerging Infectious Diseases: The Perpetual Challenge to Global Health”. Beautiful mountain weather – warm, no humidity, clear skies. Met and interacted with many, many notable people: Colin Powell, Bob Hormats (Vice-Chairman of Goldman Sachs), Rahm Emanuel, Tim Wirth, Margaret Spellings, Dan Glickman (former Sec. Agriculture and current CEO of Motion Picture Association of America), Walter Isaacson (CEO of Aspen Institute), Jim Woolsey (Former Director CIA), Jim Lehrer and his wife Kate (Lehrer NewsHour), and many, many more. Very enjoyable experience. Perhaps started a friendship with Corby Kummer, whom I had not met or heard of before. He is senior editor at The Atlantic magazine. He is one of the most respected food journalists and he “narrated” the meal that was served to us at a very elegant dinner on July 6 at Plato’s restaurant hosted by Booz, Allan, Hamilton. They brought in a chef from Denver and provided a meal made only from local ingredients (lamb, vegetables, corn soup, etc.). We had long discussions and we flew back together from Aspen to Denver. He offered Chris and me use of his Boston Apartment when we come to Boston to visit Jenny. July 10-14, 2007 – Went to Genoa for my yearly review of the Gaslini Institute. It was the usual pleasant interactions with Lorenzo Moretta, Alain Fischer, and Sergio Romagnani (Committee members) as well as the people of Gaslini such as Gianni Melioli, Giovanni Rossi, Alessandro Moretta. Since I was not allowed to take the honorarium this year of any more, this might be my last time doing this. July 21 – 25, 2007 – Went to Sydney Australia with Chris, Megan and Alison to present the opening session plenary lecture on the topic of “HIV/AIDS in 2007: Much Accomplished, Much To Do”. We had to turn around quickly and come home and thus cancel our plans for a mini-vacation in Australia together. Reason was that I had to return to DC to receive the National Medal of Science (see below). The trip was nonetheless very enjoyable notwithstanding the length of travel time. My talk went over very well, got much press and turned out to be the defining theme of the meeting that caught on with the press and the other speakers.