a paper, get a report read in time for meetings. >> sure. sure. so i was asking you before about politics and you know, in reading the book, i said this to you before, reading the book, i would see that you were in government, something would happen, and i don't want to say too much because i want to give afternoon a chance to read the book. but, when you do read the book you will understand, what i'm talking about, but, there were certain instances where you had a difficult time in liberia. and you would just get away and leave, just sometimes just barely getting away. and the next line, a couple pages, would say, and then i decided to go back to liberia. i would have to put the book down and say, why! tell me, what was it that was in

you that i'm sure your family was fearful for you. even if you sort of pushed your fears aside and almost like i would think in the book, it was just something in you, you knew you had to do. but, i -- please, tell us, what was that in you that kept bringing you back? >> well, there was always another step to climb and every time, when i ran into difficulty and had to run away, you know, it's like, no, you can't run away, you have to go back and face it and i've always believed, like so many others i'm not the only one, many in this room, who have gone through the same thing and made the same kinds of sacrifices, but there is always, our belief that our country had a potential, that it deserved more and that if we went back and we were able, enough of us, to take a stand

and to do the right thing and to move it, that we could reach the potential, we hatch reached it yet but i just hope that with enough good people who are there now, that maybe we'll make it what it ought to be. [applause]. >> so, let's go to these last elections, that brought you to where you are. today. what made you decide to run? >> i had do. [laughter] [applause]. >> and why did you have to? >> i mean, you know, it already -- i paid the price, earned the stripes, you know. so it was a natural thing to do. we had to go back, competition is part of life, is in my soul, and so, you know, i had tried once, didn't make it.

try again, and this time, more determination and, you know, each stumbling block, became a stepping stone. [applause]. >> did you ever feel intimidated when you were running against this... did you ever once think maybe not. >> no, no, no. i was never intimidated. i always knew the competition was fierce and i knew that, you know, once had to really find the right strategy to be able to win. but no, i have never been intimidated and always had great confidence in myself. >> all right. now. [applause]. >> you said during the run off that you released your secret weapon. no one saw coming, what was that secret weapon? >> women. [cheers and applause].

>> and just what did that secret -- those women do? >> everything. i mean,... they did everything. like i say, women from all walks of life, rural women, urban women, illiterate women, professional women, poor women, rich women, they all decided our time has come! [applause]. >> amen! >> amen, amen. i also noticed a lot of similarities in watching the documentary with, you know, a little event we had happen this year, november 4th, where the odds seemed against a particular person, but -- and when i say a lot of the similarities, i notice that you talked a lot about change, in your speech, in your speeches,

that you would give. and then, the similarities where that it was with a day of jubilation for you the day you won and then the real work begun. do you see, look at president obama now, what do you think when you look at president obama now, being where you are, and coming through what you have come through for the past... what do you think, when you watch his presidency now? >> i think he's on the right course. i also think the difficulties will come. it comes for all of us and it was not going to be as easy, no matter how good the strategy is willing. that one will face it and -- but i do believe that his strong commitment and his strong belief in change, that he, too, will sur mountain those odds. it will not be easy.

it never is, reality will hit home, you know, when you try one policy or try one prosecutor and you run into obstacles. but, i do believe that he brings to it, you know, that courage, that commitment, and that dedication and that belief in change and so, that is enough to see him through. i hope -- i am quite sure he'll make it. >> right. right. right. [applause] so what is next for you? what is next on your agenda? and i don't necessarily mean politics. i mean, what -- once politics is over -- or will politics ever be over? >> let me ask this -- >> no, no, no. there comes a time when you know, it ends for all of us. and i just wanted to sit in the hammock under a coconut tree...

[laughter] [applause]. >> you know, and sip coconut water, and read a book. without any telephone calls, or any crisis that i... >> are you still working 14-plus hour days? >> yeah. that i have to do. but so many others along with me. >> all right. all right. you do have a lot of -- a strong team around you. i was very impressed when i saw the documentary, extremely impressed and i have -- a few stars i'm seeing in the documentary are here. and that staff around you, they seem like and even matthai, she wanted to be here and she's in chicago and conveyed to everyone that we must support and must

uphold you and you must succeed. she wanted to give you that message. [applause]. >> wangari is a strong supporter and is a good friend and great lady, very courageous, has done a the lot of things in kenya, around the world and the green belt movement and we're still trying to plan those million trees that she decided was to be planted around the world and she's just wonderful. >> all right. all right. so my last question to you is this: and this is what i meant by the girl chat, because i'm sure there are a lot of young women here, who really look up to you and admire where you have come from and where you have been and your determination and where you have gone and where you are still going and we want to know, from you, tradition, we go to the elders, we want to know from you, is it possible to have it all and in the sense, have

family, have a career, and be able to balance all of that and achieve your goals? >> one must strive for that. because a family life is as important as professional life and for those who are age to hold the two together -- and many are -- that's the most idealistic situation. there are times when conflicts do occur and one has to make a choice, between one or the other. that choice has to be made depending upon the circumstances and experience and conditions of one's life and, you know, you will never know what the choice will be until you face it. but i think it is possible to have a good, solid family life and also, to pursue one's professional goals and to succeed at both. and many have been able to do that, and we must applaud, you know, applaud that and hope that

everybody can move that in direction. >> wonderful. wonderful. well, thank you, we thank you for writing this book, we thank you for being who you are, we thank you for being a role model, and we thank you that you never gave up. >> and i want to thank so many people in this room, i see so many of them that have been on this long road with us. have made some great, great contributions, to our safety, to our survival, to our success, i see some right here, i see some across the room, some over there, who today, you know,... all of them in here and all of the liberians who have come together as one people, those who helped with election, i see some of them are sitting there and all of those i wanted to say that, my success is your success. because i would not have had it were it not for you. [applause].

>> so i just want to say a big thank you is -- it's not over yet, i keep saying that, greatness comes not from me, it truly comes in we can change our country and make our country great. that is where the greatness really lies and that will be the measure of my success and the measure of my greatness is if we can put liberia on an irreversible course toward reconciliation, and development, thank you all for being a part of that. >> ladies and gentlemen, her excellency, madame ellen johnson sirleaf. [applause]. >> we have a small presentation for you. we would like to thank you, for joining us, this is divine kim -- the president of the oracle group and worked diligently to host you here today and we are

so happy to have you here, and everyone here welcomes you, we thank you, and we look forward to many more years of your greatness! >> thank you. [applause] >> ellen-on son sirleaf who payment bt president of liberia, was an executive with citibank and was awarded the presidential medal of freedom by george w. bush. the oracle group organized the discussion for their weakly interview program, in the cafe with mocha. for more information visit theoraclegroup.net and click on the "show" tab.

>> deborah gordon in 2009, how many cars or on the road in the worlded . >> there are just over a billion cars on the world's roads, the not just cars, motor vehicles, cars, trucks, buses, lots of scooters and two wheel,in asia, and on the road today. >> how many in the u.s. >> in the u.s., about 300,000. >> 300,000 or 300 million. >> i mean 300 million. >> that is too many. >> is it too many? this is the issue, the issue is if we want -- if what we have, the mobility we have, which is wonderful, if we want to replicate that for the world, we can't do it the way -- the world can't do it the way we have done it. in terms of oil, internal combustion, there is not going to be enough air, enough in terms of climate change, enough oil, to do what we have done for -- growth towards 2 billion cars. >> has the world tried to emulate the u.s.? >> it's at a crossroads, china,

india and, brazil, russia, most of asia, are all following us. affluence has made more me build which is wonderful and the way it has been sold to them has been, you know, gm going to china, and saying, buy cars. so, we are at that crossroads where it could be conventional or really could be different. and that is a lot of what the book is about. >> you say there is about 1 billion motor vehicles on the world's roads today. >> right. >> the titled of your new book, coauthored by daniel spurling says "two billion cars." >> over the last 100 years we have invented the car, and fueled it with oil and we have risen now to a billion. in the next 15 years, we expect to double that to two billion. and that is the road we're on and it issen creditably fast. >> why? >> for the sake of affluence, and mobility and right now, the only technology we have for mobility is a motor vehicle.

>> where is the growth, though. >> the growth is in china, number one, india, number 2, brazil and russia, also, indonesia, really, throughout asia. largely throughout asia, and in americasings we have over 1 car per person and we're going to be replacing our cars and that is a big question, what are we going to replace our cars with, with the 20 mile per gallon suv that we already own or something really novel? >> is this american dream and the american car dream gone in your view. >> i think that the dinosaur vehicles that we drive should be gone. i think mobility is not gone, we're going to want to be as mobile as ever. but, we will have to think of far more creative ways to be mobile, in cars that get 80 or 100 miles per gallon and using our blackberries to hook us up with automatic car share services, and using peratransit to pick us up where we have to

go and started telecommuting and not always traveling and when i wrote the book with dan spurling, i think the -- we got together in five years of the writing it three times and had a virtual experience writing the book so there wasn't a lot of miles or oil or car trips or airplane trips in the book and i think that is the type of productivity we'll have to think more about. >> what about when it comes to transport and actually moving people? what is this solution. >> the solution is probably choice. right now, we have no choice. if you want to go somewhere you came here and you drove, presumably and if you want to go somewhere, 95% of the time you are driving. and, 98% of the energy moving you in that car is oil so we have no choice in vehicles and no choicen fuels. and that is the biggest problem, we have to really start thinking about different types of cars that are more fuel efficient using different types of fuels like electricity and cellulosic biofuels and then, having different types of mobility

options so it's not always a car you have to pick. if you are old or young, or disabled, or injured or poor you don't have a car. cars aren't an option and that is a big part of the population here and everywhere in the world. so we need to have much more creative inventive, you know, differ rent shatdz ways of moving ourselves around. >> in your book you talk about some alternative fuels, the former administration of president bush put a big investment into hydrogen. is that sustainable. >> hydrogen is a really interesting case, always has been 25 years out, and when i started working in the field 20 years ago, it was 25 years out and today it is still 25 years out and the thing about hydrogen is, it is in everything and so finding it and getting it and it is very small, the smallest molecule containing and storing it is challenging and many of us think it could ultimately be the carrier, but in the meantime, we'll have to have electric

motors an electric vehicles and seeing plug in hybrids now and hybrid electric vehicles on the road and more and more work is going into liquid biofuels and not corn ethanol, that is what we have seen and not going to food, and in the bringing it back to fuel, but, grass and algae and garbage, and that will be useful for truck, for liquid fuels in trucks. >> is that still 25 years out. >> no, i think that is much closer in. and the big part has been the last 25 years of cheap oil and we have had t 5 years of stand still. and we haven't done much research and the oil industry, and the auto industry, the government, haven't done that much, the economy, was such that oil was where we were at. and we had the bump last summer and people realized it might not be -- many have been saying for a long time, that oil could be any price. it is a global market and a confused market and an irrational market, and, you know, caught up in wars and

skirmishes and so the price could be anything looking ahead and that is what this -- gives the impetus for change. >> some of the energy crises that we faced in this country, this 1970s, '08, have they improved our efficiency, has the marketplace responded? >> it's interesting see at the moment of crisis in 1973, 1974 a1978, 1979 and last summer how quickly people respond to price and that is heartening, actually to say there are price points where people will actually change their behavior, companies will actually change their products, and, the government will stand up and say, this is actually a good thing but what happens in between, has been the valley of death. so, in between these crises, we've had mrumentsz and for the last 25 years a very long floor on oil at $40 a barrel, $50 a barrel, and now a dollar -- 1.85 at the pump where there is no

motivation to do anything. >> do we rely on the marketplace or should the u.s. governments step in, should it be a global effort. >> i don't think we can rely on the marketplace. i think this market won't do it alone. it is too cyclical and very much caught up in the global market like i said, which is dysfunctional. so, it will take government and will take federal policies, that are going to have more efficiency built in, alternative fuels, basic research, incentives for consumers, you know, again, consumers are reacting to the prices they see and so, when the price rose to $4 a gallon, last summer, everyone stepped away from suvs and trucks and now, in december, suvs and trucks sales are back up. because the price is low and we'll need government to stabilize, whether a price war on oil and fuel economy standards, it will take regulation incentives to change the behavior of consumers and

corporations. >> how did you become a transportation analyst. >> i started out actually, very interestingly in alternative fuels during the second oil crisis in college as a chemical engineer, and when i graduated from college, telling my age here, whine graduated from college was 1982 and the price of oil plummeted and every job, every exciting future oriented job i was interested in dried up overnight. and i ended up doing transportation -- the energy side of transportation policy. and as 0 posed to alternative fuels because there was no market. and there has been no market, now one big transformation could be energy companies instead of oil companies, and it's interesting we have heard little from exxon in this time when gm is, you know, in crisis. xn is not really speaking up. and i find that, you know, curious, because they are the other side of the coin, the car and the oil, both sides now, the transportation. so i'd like to see true energy

companies that are thinking beyond oil. >> you have work with china, there is a national policy on transportation in china that you think the u.s. could draw from. >> china adopted more stringent fuel economy standards than america's and that tells you something and we have ours from the first oil crisis and they sat at a very low level at 27.5 miles per gallon for cars and 20 miles per gallon for trucks for 25 years and have been raised with a lot of -- you know, after the price of oil spiked. so already, china is jumping in, i think with the feet first and the reason, interestingly, that china and i think india will both jump in ahead of america on this, is they don't have oil indigenous oil, either. like us they have a lot of coal and not oil and here you have the u.s., china, and india, the three largest transportation oil consumer, us, and the two

growing oil consumers, china and india and they have some oil but don't they have oil that is going to really fuel the fleets they are imagining they'll have and will create either tremendous political turmoil on the downside, or on the upside, tremendous innovation and them hope is america will be this innovator and will sell the world cars but, that will be left to be seen and might be china and india tell sell us their cars. >> everybody watching this is wondering, do you have a car. >> i do have a car. and i have a car that i am breathing life into. it is 11 years old, it is hobbling along and i desperately wanted a very fuel efficient hybrid station wagon gone and they don't make one. >> you lived in southern california, lived in northern california and now live in charlottesville, virginia. are you able to get around on public transportation. >> i am able -- not to get around here, this is a very rural county and i was able to

get around in public transportation in san francisco and oakland and also in l.a., i walked a lot. where i lived. here, it is very rural, i mean, really is not, you know, it is gorgeous but not to my mind the look of the most sustainable development patterns with large lots, we have a beautiful large lot with trees but it is far away and i try to combine my trips and i try -- do telecommute. i don't deputy my job and spend a lot of my time in front of my computer at my desk which saves my daily commute but i would like to be more on foot and be closer invent chilly. >> do you know where the picture on the front of the book is taken. >> i believe -- i need to check, i think that is the border crossing to mexico. >> and who is your coauthor, daniel sperling. >> i have known him for 25 years, you see -- at u.s.-davis and i spent so much time at berkeley and with the union of concerned scientists, i know him very well and we met and decided

we wanted to write a book like this and we did, and, like i say, got together very few times and actually wrote it all virtually, basically on, you know, the computer, back and forth, back and forth, and he now is on the california resources board, poised to be able to really help, you know, regulate these policies in california which we both argued, there is a chapter on california in the book, is ahead of the game in terms of pushing innovation and certainly, california is ahead of the u.s., in terms of thinking ahead. the u.s. has been much slower, as a nation, compared to definitely, all of the western european nations and much slower to innovate and slower than california. >> and a forward by governor schwarzenegger. >> yes. >> what does he say. >> he has been, it has been nice to get it to be a bipartisan message, for many years we talked about having the environment and the economy not be em battling and don't -- not pitted against each other and it is a good thing for the environment and the economy when

the environment is clean and the economy is working and in california that has been a big issue, climate change is a huge issue and oil imports are a huge economic issue for california and so he's saying, listen, you know, take heart, in these messages, because we need to think ahead and california hopefully will be the exporter of these technologies. >> dib bra gordon, coauthor of "two billion cars, driving towards sustainability". >> here's a look at up coming book fairs and festivals over the next few months: :

the louse founding father because it really was one of the last on and fathers of our nation. >> why another bio on james monroe? >> it is more complete, or information found the three older records and archives and we're finding there is still a lot of patriotic interest out there so i want to continue to see that market. >> white house? >> a wonderful biography of

america earhart and there is something of a movie tie-ins goods, a movie with hilary swank and richard gere coming out this fall and will be bringing out to coincide with that can track how old is the bookracks. >> at least a decade but we're giving a new cover and rolling it back out. >> who is to dominate? >> she is a very well-known author who has a history of direct times bestsellers and he is still a window in the night about south africa that covers the whole apartheid and the turmoil that country went to become the nation it is today. >> what books to look for? >> affectionate is published primarily, fiction is where we're going to find successful readers and a lot of military history for us, general history and a little politics entering events and pop culture to mix it up, music history. >> speaking of pop culture,ha