Alan Simpson Interview (page: 9 / 9) Statesman and Advocate	Print Interview

How would you define the American Dream?

Alan Simpson: Well, the young people, and the old people, and the middle-aged people who are here with the Academy of Achievement. Colin Powell, a CCNY grad, ROTC, that's kind of the American Dream -- speaking all over the United States -- superb man, and Alma, a superb woman. George Tenet, who went to public school and his old man came over from Greece, and his mother -- he worked as a cook and the mother was the baker. And George Tenet's head of the CIA. Guys who didn't have a pot or a window to throw it out, these guys who never went to school. Michael Dell took one year of college and now it's Dell Computer. These are the stories that these young people are listening to, that's the American Dream. It isn't just about money, although they all made money, but they're all giving it away. They all have a foundation, they're trying to give it back. The American Dream? This is the only country where you can do that, and make a wad, which may be crude to some people, but if you make a pile, you don't have to go down the street with 15 bodyguards. In any other country, when you make a wad, you better take some boys and girls with you when you're walking around, because there's envy and jealousy, and a lot of feeling about people that do that in the rest of the world, unless you live in a kingdom. I suppose the American Dream shouldn't be about capitalism, but it is. And yet, you have artists there and creative people, and musicians, and poets, and this is what these young people are seeing -- poets and dreamers and people who follow a muse that comes to them. Pretty good stuff. That's the American Dream. For a kid from Cody, Wyoming who now is the Director of the Institute of Politics at Harvard, at the Kennedy School of Government and teaching a class to 92 graduate students... Come on! That's it. And even speaking around the country for money. Ann and I are very blessed.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. The American Dream is still there, and don't let them equate it with greed. Because if you stop to think about it, I always say, "Don't forget what makes American great." They say, "What?" I say, "Greed." Now stop a minute and think what happened in the toughest times. Robber barons, child labor. Carnegies, Mellons, Rockefellers, but what did they do? When they got it, they realized, "Wait a minute. There is a social obligation here." Carnegie put a library in every country in America, a Carnegie library. Mellon took his money and put it into America, and the Rockefellers put their money into America. But in the early generations it was guilt about their accumulation that made them do that. Now you've got the new guys, and Gates is feeling the heat. Like, "What are you going to do with all that money? Why don't you get off your fanny?" So Turner set the tone for that. Turner's put up a billion bucks. For what? The U.N. or something. This is great. This is the new guys who have scored it up and now they're getting heat. These kids ask these guys, "Well, now you all made a ton of money, what are you doing with it?" "We're plowing it back in the business." I know, and what's that for? "That's for jobs." They hear that, but they want to see them do a little something charitably and socially, and they are. So the wheel goes around, and it's still the American Dream, and it's still about capitalism and freedom, and doing crazy things, and building goofy things and whatever. But you've got to be about half goofy, and it's fun to do that.

[ Key to Success ] The American Dream

Is there any place in the world you haven't been that you'd like to go? Antarctica?

Alan Simpson: Hell, I'd go anywhere, but they always accuse me when I take my trips of taking too much with me. On the pack trips during the years, they'd say, "Why are you carrying this extra thing for this horse? It's too big and we're only going for a week." And then I'd unpack my little kit, and I'd have a little dry ice with some butter in there, and then I'd fry my fish that I'd just caught in fresh butter. All the rest of them were using some kind of plastic stuff. And they'd say, "What is he doing?" And I always had my toothbrush and so on. So I will go to Antarctica, if it's not slogging through the last 20 miles with my crane-like legs. I've flown in the F-15 fighter plane, I will go under the water, above the water. I haven't jumped from an aircraft, my daughter has. You name it, as long as I can move my stems, I'll go. I love the world. There's places I want to go back to: Florence, Paris. I love Paris. India! I've never been to India. I want to go there. I want to go back to some places, want to see some new places. And I'm gonna do that. Antarctica? Line them up in the alley, I'd try that. Kids should never forget the experience of joy. Joy is faith. The greatest thing you can do in life is live the moment you're in. Joy is a good way to do that. It won't always be there, but faith is simply living in the present, not way out there, not wanting to be 50. Not waiting for the train to stop, trying to see what's going on through the windows of the train while it's going to wherever its destination is. That's what kids hopefully will be looking at. The train trip is not boring, and nobody knows what the last stop looks like.

If you could pick one book for kids to read, what would it be?

Alan Simpson: One book? Good grief! Well, political? It wouldn't be a kid's book. When I was 30, I read Advise and Consent by Allen Drury. I loved it because it was about what I was in as a young legislator. One book for a kid to read? Well, you ought to be a real kid, but you can read it to your grandkids: The Wind in the Willows. It's about friendly little people who care about each other and take care of each other, even though they have to fight off all those evil stoats and weasels. But read it to your children with sound effects, and when Mr. Toad sees the yellow motor car you want to speak it in English and say, "Oh, there 'tis." It's about an erratic, crazy rascal, Mr. Toad, who they cared for, and they were going to help Toady. He was always messing up, and totally spoiled, but they gathered together out of love and friendship. It's a wonderful little story. But that's for kids. Charlotte's Web, you can go do that one one more time. But hopefully they read that and Dr. Seuss and all those things that are still very valid.

When they get into it a little more, get into Robert Service and "The Ballad of the Black Fox Skin" and "The Cremation of Sam Magee" and "The Shooting of Dan McGrew," "The Ballad of Blasphemous Bill," and essays, and Kipling and Longfellow poetry, it's all there. James Fenimore Cooper, still classics. But Shakespeare above all.

"Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleeve of care,
The death of each day's life, sore labor's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course..."

That stuff, it's fantastic. It's in your head, and it doesn't ever go out of your head. But you've got to get it in your head first! Anyway, I'm off, to see the glassblower, Dale Chihuly, who does remarkable things.

Thank you for your time, Senator.

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