serving as governor and i faced an issue that related to life, i came out on the side of life and wrote an op-ed at that point on my opposition. it hasn't changed at that time and i think people understand where i stand. >> host: on the economy so many people see you as a capable businessman and i might add this is your second the. your first book was about your experience running the salt lake olympic committee and your success there. and the question then becomes how do you view the fact that so many americans at this point in our history are anxious about the economy and see the economy as a big problem, and the question would be did president bush and has president obama pursued policies that you feel would help to revive this american economy because you see that as one of the pillars of america's global strength? ..

he shares responsibility as well. for the economic distress which has occurred. i think in this president,

president obama has not been as effective as he could have been helping us about of the distress. he frankly scared the heck out of the private-sector. when you say you're going to raise taxes next year that scares investors. when you say we are going to have cap-and-trade that is going to cause to pull back. when you take away the right to vote for speaker about for a union that scares away not only workers and employers and a trillion dollar deficits obviously frightens the financial sector and anyone who needs money to grow and thrive so it's been a policy which hasn't been as effective as it could have been but longer term the foundations of the economic vitality freely to the entrepreneurialism of america, the educational base of the country, the family formation in investments parents make in children, energy independence, they come together to form the basis of economic vitality, and those foundations are very much

in distress right now so not only do we have near-term problems and we will come out of the near term slump. it's worse than this one come severe recession. we will come out but long term we will not be as strong unless we address the more fundamental problems. >> host: you think we are on the way out of the recession or there's the possibility of a double-dip? >> guest: waiting we are on the way out. it may double dip. it's hard to predict whether there will be another downturn, but we will come out. there is nothing permanent about recessions. we've come out of the others we have endured. i think the president could have helped us get out faster and keep us from having to an% unemployment. that number will hang like an albatross around his neck. he spent $87 billion saying he did hold unemployment 8% and if we didn't go that would spend to 8%. we spent all that money so it was not as effective as it needed to be but we will come out of the recession.

will america continued to lead the world in productivity per person and gdp per capita or if you will income per capita? only if we have the foundation and fundamental strength of a leading highly productive economy and that is something which our energy, education, health care, tax, entitlement problems call into question. >> host: it's interesting to go into the specifics for a moment. in the book you praise secretary paulson and the bush administration for helping to bail out the banks, the t.a.r.p. money and the bank but you are highly critical of tim geithner for continuing what looks to me like the same policies. explain. >> guest: there is no question in my mind but at the time secretary paulson and president bush said look, we are in real distress and we could have a financial calamity. that was essentials to do something to provide confidence

to the people around the world that a miracle was not going to have all of its banks go under and there was a very real risk we would have a cascade of bank failures first with the big ones than through the country and we could ultimately have virtually every bank in the nation go out of business and peoples savings bond, the dollar worth less. we could have had a true financial system calamity, and t.a.r.p. kept that from happening but it wasn't implemented terribly well and i don't mean to say secretary paulson did it terribly with, i'm sure they both did mistakes and did things well but undersecretary geithner who's been the champion or if you will the master of this for a long period of time but over a year the process has been relatively opaque as to which banks got money and why they got money and who got and what the provisions would be providing the funds.

i think for instance if you're going to put money in a bank that saves it that the shareholders should have been virtually wiped out. if the government has to step in to bail them out why did they get to keep the majority ownership in the bank's? they should have paid very dearly for the government having to come in and rescue and enterprise and when the government can and the taxpayers should have gotten a healthy state is not a majority of the stake that was saved. so i have a number of criticisms on how the plan was implemented. what was it needed to keep our financial system from collapsing? yes. and those people who today go back and see it's terrible. you bail out wall street. i didn't hear a lot of those voices at the time we felt we were going over the cliff. benefit of hindsight now that we've come back from the cliff they are saying we don't need it but at that point there are a lot of people who had white knuckles and were concerned about where we were headed and did what plus politically unattractive to make sure we didn't have the kind of a calamity that would have

devastated not just wall street but every street in america and as the son of a car guy you think that it was smart to bail out the big car companies? >> guest: i think when the wall street -- excuse me, when the detroit ceo showed up in washington saying give us money to write the answer was to say no, you need to pursue a managed bankruptcy process shedding yourself of exceptional costs and debt so that you can re-emerge as a stronger entity. that was the right course ultimately the was the course the was taken and detroit is a much stronger footing than it was prior to those managed bankruptcy is being carried out but washington spend a lot of money gave them tens of billions of dollars that was on necessary and wasted and instead of the company's management teams and boards guiding of the bankruptcy process ultimately the government got in the bankruptcy process so we got the right

solution manager bankruptcy gup but only after we wasted a lot of money. >> host: i am wondering if you think that somehow the tea party movement and people on the right in this country who look up the bailout of not only the car companies that the banks and say washington is too big and too intrusive. this notion of too big to fail is just lining the pockets of big executives who take these huge bonuses at the end of the year without any concern for the little man from the main street in america. >> guest: juan, but this idea of to get to feel that should not be part of the election. if a major institution has -- is on the brink of disaster either let him go bankrupt as we ultimately did with the gm having them go through the bankruptcy process that is the right thing that should happen. bankruptcy doesn't mean close the doors of r. dee gets fired. it means that shareholders get wiped out or nearly wiped out. if under the shareholders the

enterprise has failed in the shareholders shouldn't be billed out and the executives shouldn't be billed about and ford has done a right. but with the exception i think the other companies might have gone to was up. >> guest: i don't think they would have gone toes up. they shed their excess of costs. now they are emerging. that is the right course. >> host: with a tremendous help from the u.s. government. >> guest: post bankruptcy they can help the enterprise keep going and thrive. the money that went in, the tens of billions of dollars that went in could have been better spent. go ahead. >> host: what about the reaction that is at the base of so much of the tea party movement which is this money should not be helping out car companies, should not be helping feeling financial institutions on wall street. >> guest: well, there's no question that perspective of those in this country that thinks government is too intrusive and too big that is absolutely right. there's no question the government is grown to be a

massive player much larger than the founders would have imagined and i think people like myself thinks makes sense. right now the portion of the gdp made up by the government is roughly 33%, federal state and local government. that is excessive and it should be less than that but then we can go through item by item and say there are certain things government needs to do to defend the country. integrity aires worth of that great need to manage the judicial system, agree with that. certain safety net features the government can provide that we can agree on and then globally piece by piece singing was the government but during an action or another and we are not going to agree on all of those but i can tell you with regard to the car companies they were wrong to bail them out to read the right course was to move to managed bankruptcy of front. the ultimately got there and with regard to t.a.r.p., that is something the should be ended. there's no reason for the government to continue using that money. we backed away from the cliff.

the financial institutions did not collapse but at the time it was put in place it was essentially to keep the entire system from collapsing. >> host: let's talk second about unemployment numbers which at the moment seem to be rather stable but stable at a very high percentage near 10%. you were antiprotectionism. you believe in free trade and open trade but isn't that something again that people who would say we need to protect the american people and look after those who are unemployed might find objectionable? >> guest: they may find it objectionable but if they think about what's happened around the globe and a history they will realize protectionism has always been associated with economic peril. the nations to try to put barriers around themselves find themselves falling into deeper and deeper financial woe. there's a number of people who feel princetons the

protectionism put in place of the advent of the great depression was one of the reasons we went into a depression. one of the reasons for that is america sells a lot of stuff to the people and if we put walls up and down does it not only keeps foreign goods out it keeps american goods from being able to go other places and there are a lot of jobs in this country, a lot of good paying jobs and growth in this country in terms of things going elsewhere. so you've got to realize -- the sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. >> host: but in this book to introduce the idea of a worse generation and talk about the idea we don't manage debt, in fact the chinese holds so much of the debt and other countries do have a protectionist practices our competitors. so how does that -- how do you put those ideas together? >> guest: my view of america's worst generation, and i put a question mark after that because if you want to alarm the reader when he gets to the chapter to say what is he saying here.

i want to point out if we don't change course here we will seriously in peril the future of this nation and its ability to defend freedom and protect prosperity and the overspending we are carrying out an over borrowing from china and people like that is very much one of those elements that can peril the future. the inability and unwillingness to deal with entitlements to make them sustainable leaves us with tens of trillions of dollars of obligations for the next generation. the failure to deal with failing schools, our energy dependence, these likewise are elements that are frightening and disconcerting to those who want to make sure the future is bright. now i don't think for a minute the way to deal with these challenges is to point and say that it's someone else's fault. it's china and brazil's fault. its trade. let's be honest about our problems and deal with them directly. it's not easy. it's hard work.

but scapegoating has never created a great nation are strong economy and there are nations by the way that try to protect themselves and cheat and there's no question if it were magically to keep other people's goods in but allow our goods to go out everybody before that and some nations try to pull it off when they did try to pull it off we have to make sure they can't get away with it. one thing is for short people watch america too closely to think we can keep foreign goods out and at the same time sell our goods to the world. >> host: do you think it is fair when you hear from the tea party that the president, president obama is a socialist? is that a fair description of this president? >> guest: i don't choose at this point to use that term to apply to the president of people i disagree with. it's obviously an incendiary terms in a lot of respects. i do think there are those in his party, and i can't speak for the president himself, who would like to see a health care system

like the socialized medicine systems that existed in europe, the president may as well for all i know that in my view would be very detrimental way for health care system to move. i'm not going to step away from the fact i think there's a great effort to try to socialize the medicare in this country and i do think fit with a very serious implications for our economic future and well-being from the health standpoint. >> host: you talk about a new commitment to citizenship on on the americans and to suggest that we find common cause and do less of the special-interest politics. you talk about optimism that you believe is part of the american character, hard work, deep religious faith and the like but you must be aware when people are asked about political posters do think that the countries on the right track or the wrong track? it is up six becomes the become 80% of americans who say we are headed in the wrong direction. >> guest: they are absolutely

right. we ought to get it to 100%. this is what the book is saying, washington politicians have put us on a road to to decline. they are taking america in the wrong direction. this massive growth of government, inability to deal with government, failure of schools kafeel leer of the immigration system to welcome the best and brightest of innovators to the country and open borders to those helping america's strength all of these elements together or in periling the future. my optimism flows in the fact the american people when confronted with the truth to the right thing. i think that you are seeing that happen to be the reason the tea party of this gathering and expressing their views as they say that they've been the silent majority too long. it's time to speak up and that is a movement which gives me some encouragement. the people are paying attention and recognize the consequences of continuing down this washington driven past, those consequences are not good for

the country. >> host: do you fear the tea party movement passion might lead them away from someone who's a businessman who had the kind of massachusetts background governor of a liberal state all that, that you are pushing them or the direction of sarah palin were other populists? >> guest: why can't tell you where it is going to lead. i can tell you i welcome the energy and passion that seems to be part of the american political scene right now. that is a good thing. whether i and part of the scene or not time will only tell. but we have great leaders in the republican party who i think will be able to capture the imagination of the majority of the american people and i think the president's course unless it is dramatically changed the next few years that his course will be in did short with only one term and that we will elect a president to bring us back to a center-right coalition of republicans and democrats who are willing to take the action

that is necessary to preserve america's greatness. >> host: mitt romney's new book, second book is called quote polk no apology the case for american greatness." for joining us on "after words." >> guest: thank you. good to be with you.

next, author rebecca skloot on her book, "the immortal life of henrietta lacks." is "the immortal life of henrietta lacks" his been on the board of directors of the national book critics circle and spoke recently at the virginia festival of the book in charlottesville. this is a half-hour.

>> rebecca skloot, who is henrietta lacks? >> a porth african american tobacco farmer who was raised in southern virginia and eventually moved up to baltimore where she was diagnosed with cervical cancer at 30 and without her knowledge her doctor to a small piece of her tumor and put it in a petrie dish and her cells became the first in mortal human cell line grown in culture scientists have been trying to grow cells for decades and it never worked and no one knows why but hers just never died. so hurt cells or alive growing in laboratories around the world though she died in 1951 and they became one of the most important thing is that happened in medicine and they were used to develop a polio vaccine and first space missions to see what happened to the human cells and human gravity. there were the first cloud, her jeans for the first map. the site at the plant marks go on and on. >> and they are still used today?

>> yeah. one of the most widely used lines. >> and what is a cell line? >> they are cells that live in a laboratory and will keep growing and multiplying and living outside the body as long as you keep them fit and cleaned and the right temperature and everything so they will just live on forever. >> why did the doctor ticker cells? >> guest: this was a point scientists were trying to grow any cells they could get their hands on succeed in taking samples from anyone who came into the hospital, lots of different hospitals, some scientists to give hundreds of samples from people and they all died, their samples have died. spec with their knowledge or without their knowledge? >> pretty standard to do it without their knowledge. so repudiate could you people do this was happening. sprick this was in the 40's? >> 50's, 1951 is when the cells were taken. it was standard practice of the time and in some ways still is today. a lot of people have their

tissue used in research now and don't really realize it. >> why from a tumor? >> there was a specific study going on at hopkins looking at cervical cancer. this was -- the pop singer had been developed not long before this and so doctors could take the cells from the cervix and look under a microscope to diagnose cancer but they didn't know what they were looking for some there was widespread misdiagnoses so they were taking cervical cancer cells specifically so they could establish what they were looking for with the papsmear, so that's why cervical cancer cells specifically but more generally they were trying to prove any cancer cells they could because at this point they didn't know anything about cancer. they didn't even know what dna was. they had no idea how the cancer cells beau differently than normal cells and how they spread so fast so part of it is they wanted to grow cancer cells savitt figure out what cancer really was. >> what is the medicinal value

of cancer cells? >> i often get this question accounted cancer cells help the polio vaccine. it seems like a complete disconnect so there's a lot of different ways. one of them is that they do have a lot of things about them that are normal. the have abnormal dna. but they still metabolize and produce protein, energy and a half cell membranes that function like a normal cells see you can study what is normal but the cancer cell and applied to any cell, but they also work as little factories. so if you in fact the cells with a virus like polio, the cells grow and grow and the fibers -- virus will reproduce and so you can mass produce five verses and extract them from the cells so they work as little factories but just more generally, they are just really widely studied so they are a sort of baseline for any research. scientists know how the honor flights and they know what to expect from this.

so is the expose them to a drug or something else and thus the seventh react, they know what they're starting from city to see what changes so there's different ways. >> what are the fees for the reasons that per cells servile? >> they're really are not any. we know she had hpv which is the virus that causes cervical cancer and it inserts itself into your dna and changes it and that is what causes cancer so there was something about the hpv and have interacted with her cells that caused the cancer itself to be very. she was 30-years-old and had a nickel size tumor when they found it. >> is that big? >> it's not huge, but the more amazing thing is it went from that nicole size within six months every organ in her body was taken over bye cancer so we'd grow very fast, more than her doctor had ever seen before so this something jerry special about her tumor.

we know there is an enzyme in the cells three builds the chromosomes so they don't age. they just stay young and never die. but why hurt cells do that and others don't is a little bit of a mystery still. >> tell us about her family. tell us about her background. you said she is a tobacco farmer in southern virginia but a little bit more information. >> she came from -- she worked the same farm land her ancestors farmed as slaves. they were a very impoverished family for generations. and she moved up to baltimore in the 40's because they had tobacco firms that dried up and her husband found work in baltimore so that is how she ended up. and she had five kids by the time she died at 30, and she was just this caretaker. she wanted more children. she was very devoted to her kids. she was also a person if he were in baltimore and didn't have money and needed a place to stay

use lead on her floor and if you're hungry there was a pot of food on the stove and she would feed you, if she needed a girlfriend and she would find you one. she was like a super bomb to everyone. so for her family the fact that her cells are taken care of by so many people and have helped so many people makes sense in terms of her personality and what she would have done. her family sees five cells as henrietta, they believe that her soul is very much alive in the cells and she was brought back as an angel to take care of people. and the family has a very conflicted feelings about the cells. >> all five kids still living? >> no, there's three kids alive today and her family didn't know that the cells had been taken until the 70's. so the scientists after the cells had grown the scientists hadn't seen other cells like them and to learn more about the specifics of scientists decided to track down her kids and do research on them to understand

the cells. so her husband who had a third grade education, he didn't know what a cell was got a phone call one day and the way he understood was we've got your wife she is a lie of alive and a laboratory. we've been doing research on her the last 25 years and now we have to test your kids to see if they have cancer, none of which the scientists said but he thought they had her in a cell. that was his understanding of the word cell. so her family got sucked into this world of research they didn't understand and the scientists didn't realize the family didn't understand and it had a pretty dramatic effects on the family and they've been struggling with anderson's for a lot of different reasons. some of them just a very emotional. her daughter, deborah dirty much believes her mother is alive in those cells and would ask the scientists questions like if you are sending her cells up into space can she rest in peace and when you inject them in technical skills that somehow

hurt her. and henrietta's sons found out fairly early on that her cells were the first commercialized so they were bought and sold, multibillion-dollar industries grew out of selling these cells and her family can't afford health insurance and they are quite poor and they often say of our mother was so important to medicine why can't we go to the doctor? so they've never gotten an answer to that question. >> has there ever been any litigation? >> no, not from the family. there have been other -- some of it is access to the legal counsel. they didn't ever have that. but also, there's been other cases in the past where people have sued over ownership of the cells. ayman who found out his doctor patented his cells without his knowledge and they were worth billions of dollars. it's very rare that happens. most cells are worth nothing. and the courts always will against the people of the cells come from so the way the case stands is that you don't have