National Press Club
NATIONAL PRESS CLUB TAKING BACK OUR FISCAL FUTURE INTRODUCTION: ISABEL SAWHILL, SENIOR FELLOW, THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION STUART BUTLER, VICE PRESIDENT, DOMESTIC AND ECONOMIC AND POLICY STUDIES, THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION OVERVIEW OF THE PROPOSAL: ALICE RIVLIN, SENIOR FELLOW, THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: ROBERT REISCHAUER, PRESIDENT, THE URBAN INSTITUTE RUDOLPH PENNER, SENIOR FELLOW, THE URBAN INSTITUTE MONDAY, MARCH 31, 2008 THE NATIONAL PRESS CLUB WASHINGTON, D.C. ISABEL SAWHILL: Good morning. I’m Belle (sp) Sawhill from Brookings and we – I want to welcome you on behalf not only of myself, but of the terrific team of people who put together the paper that we’re releasing today. We’re here to talk to you about our fiscal future and what we think needs to be done to get it under better control. And although the nominal sponsors of this event are Brookings and Heritage, I want to emphasize that a much broader group of institutions and people have been involved in this effort. And it may be that one of the more significant things about this paper is not just what it says, but who is saying it and what a diversity of people is saying it. This paper, believe it or not, has 16 authors. You may ask, how in the world could 16 people co-author a paper? And let me tell you, it is difficult. But, of course, the true answer is that several people took the lead, particularly Alice Rivlin. Nevertheless, this was very much a group effort. These are not nominal co-signers to this document; this is a group of people that has been meeting for more than two years, every month, and talking about these issues and wondering what we might be able to do as a group to address the fiscal challenges facing the country.
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