Plenary Session Transcripts

Governors Attending:

Guests:

Discussion Subjects:

• Economic Development and Commerce (EDC) – initiatives to improve citizens' access to the Internet; and broadband Internet access
• Human Resources (HR) – Next Steps for SCHIP: Building on State Success
• Natural Resources (NR) – roundtable discussion on Invasive Plants and Animals: Globalization's Impact on America's Economy, Health, and Environment; and Rehabilitating Small Watershed Dams: Making Aging Facilities Safe
• Other Governors' Sessions – Task Force on Information Technology
• Plenary Session Discussion Subjects - The new economy and the technology revolution; postsecondary education; and regional primaries

Points of Interest:

Governor Mike Leavitt, chairman of the association, opened by remarking that it was the first Governors' meeting of the new Millennium. He went on to point out how far technology had brought us in the past 100 years, noting that when his grandfather traveled to Europe as a young man, it took three months for a letter from his family in Utah to reach him by horse, then wagon, then train, and finally boat. Yet Governor Leavitt's son could now email him instantly wherever he was in the world to give him news from home.

Governor Leavitt also noted that NGA had just released a report titled "State Strategies for the New Economy," to be followed by additional reports on the challenges that globalization brought to the states, and that Governors would be gathering with all U.S. Senate members after the Winter Meeting ended to talk about how states could be strengthened in a new global economy.

Thomas Friedman then spoke about his book Lexus and the Olive Tree, the theme of which was that the statute of limitations on the cliché "the Cold War" had expired. Instead, Friedman argued, we were in a new international system that—like the Cold War—had its own set of characteristics and rules.. He noted that while the Cold War had been characterized by division and symbolized by the Berlin Wall, Globalization was characterized by integration and symbolized by the Worldwide Web. And while the Cold War was built around weight—the weight of two rivals, Globalization was built around the speed of potentially countless rivals. Finally, he argued that while the Cold War entailed a balance between two nations, Globalization entailed not only national balance but also balance among: (1) states; (2) supermarkets in the form of the largest global stock, bond, and currency markets in the world; and (3) super empowered people.

Friedman then noted that finance, information, and technology had become democratized, which together had been instrumental in exploding the walls of the Cold War, in turn permitting rapid commoditization

Memorable Quotes:

NGA Chairman, Governor Mike Leavitt of Utah, said: "One day about 100 years ago, I was recently reading in my great grandfather's journal, he had left his home in Utah and had traveled to Europe…had left his family in Utah. He was waiting on the dock of a port in Europe for a ship, as he made this journal entry, hoping that the ship would contain a letter that his wife and four children had written to him. When the ship arrived, it in fact did have the letter. It had taken over three months to travel first by horse, and then by wagon, and then by train, and then a long trip by boat. Now you fast forward about a century. Like many of you, I travel the globe as my great grandfather did, on trade missions. I was in Europe on a trade mission. Middle of the night. I can't sleep. I think to myself, if I get up right now I can get on the Internet and find out what happened in the Utah Jazz [professional basketball] playoff game…So I'm in the corner of the hotel room, kind of lifting the blanket over my head so as not to wake [my wife] up. The Internet boots up, and I hear a familiar voice. 'You've got mail!' Well, I click on that little red flag and up comes an e-mail just arrived from my then-8-year-old son Weston. It was a very direct message: 'Dear Dad, I just stapled my thumb. Love, Weston.' Now I could picture Weston home in my study. My guess is he had just finished drawing some pictures that he likes to staple together in a book, and some incident had occurred that caused him some injury. I immediately e-mailed back to him my condolences and something about Neosporin and a bandaid, but that's the world we live in. Here's a world where an 8-year-old can reach across the globe in seeking a father to give him some nurturing and some comfort at a time that he needed it and expect that he will receive a reply. The message that my grandfather waited for on that dock took three months to arrive. A similar message [now takes] seconds. That's the world we live in. It is a world that is no longer defined by distance. No longer defined necessarily by time or by place. It's a world of connectivity. It's a world of bandwidth, of knowledge, of convergence, of computing. It eclipses any technology that we have seen…in the past."

Selected Policy Positions Adopted:
(1) Opposing a national sales or value added tax; (2) supporting reauthorization of the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program; (3) suggesting that states be allowed to pass through to families a greater share of child support collections; (4) urging the federal government to respect states' strong interests in independently operating their institutions with regard to enforcement of the Civil Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act, and urging that legislation regarding religious freedom should exclude prison and jail inmates in deference to circumstances; (5) urging close federal consultation with states to prevent state loss of funding under the Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment block grant program in accordance with the Synar statute requiring states to pass and enforce laws regarding the sale of tobacco products to minors; (6) expressing the view that Congress not shift the cost or responsibility to the states for any federally-expanded prescription drug coverage to seniors; and (7) suggesting options for Food Stamp program reform, including increased waiver authority for states, less complex paperwork requirements for applicants, streamlined quality control, and greater flexibility in the use of funding for the food stamp employment and training program.