A single line often inverts meaning once you see what it
answers, so neighbouring messages are always shown.
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Sept. 12, 2003 -- Gave another briefing in the Situation Room of the White House to General John Gordon. Present were Ken Bemard, Carol Kuntz, Robert Card (Deputy Secretary of DoE), Ari Patrinos, Phil Russell, Larry Kerr, Harriet Meiers -- Deputy to Andy Card. Topic was the Craig Venter situation. I presented the facts and pushed for an NIH RAC-like approach and argued again for transparency and cultivating a culture of responsibility. Adjourned with Carol Kuntz to her office and discussed the anthrax threat and the capabilities of Al Quaeda in this regard. Will brief the VP within a couple of weeks on a progress report of biodefense at NIH.
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Sept. 17, 2003 -- Another briefing in the White House Situation Room for Gen Gordon regarding Venter issue. DoE did the briefing (Ari Patrinos) and I presented the proposal rwer back finally. of having the NIH Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee (RAC) serve as a mechanism to provide a "culture of responsibility" among scientists similar to what was done in the mid-1970s. At the briefing was the usual people - Gen Gordon, Ken Bernard, Richard Falkenrath, Carol Kuntz, several DoE people, WH communications people, etc. Decision was to put together a briefing for the Secretaries.
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Sept. 18 -19, 2003 - Went to NYC to give Plenary Lecture at the AIDS Vaccine 2003 meeting. While I was there, Hurricane Isabel hit Washington, D.C. and there was widespread devastation with major power outages (3 million people in DC, VA, and MD without power). Power not expected to be restored for at least 1 week.
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Sept. 24, 2003 - Power back finally.
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2003-09-25 00:00
Anthony S. Fauci
Sept. 25, 2003 - White House meeting with Jay Lefkowitz, Gary Edson, Mark Dybul, Joe O'Neill, Carol Thompson to discuss the controversy regarding $2 Billion versus $3 billion in FY '04 for the President's $15 billion, 5 year plan. Bono and other activists want a full $3 billion in '04. However, if we did that, then we would put less in '05, '06, etc. I recommended to Jay et al to stick with the Plan and leave flexibility to match other funds by 1/3. See below my e-mail to Jay from 9/25/03: Jay/Gary: Just a recap of my suggestion from this afternoon for your consideration. Mark was on the same page on this also. I believe that we must remind people and strongly underscore that the President's Plan is a $15 billion program over 5 years involving 14 countries. Within the context of such a plan (we must emphasize this point), the best way to spend the money and thus to save the most lives is by phasing in with $2 billion in the first year and more than $3 billion per year in subsequent years. We all realize that more money can be spent globally on AIDS and thus more lives can be saved. This is a no-brainer. We never said that the President's Plan of itself would cover all of global AIDS. We should not get into an "absorptive capacity" argument since no matter how clear we are, people will confuse absorptive capacity in the President's Plan of 14 countries and absorptive capacity for the rest of the developing world. I suggest that we take a 2 pronged approach. 1) We stick with the President's Plan as it has been outlined, and; 2) We publicly recognize that more money can indeed be spent on AIDS globally. We are hoping that other countries will follow the President's lead and put more money into programs either bilaterally or through the Global Fund. In fact, we are willing to go the extra mile and to contribute 1/3 of the global effort if other countries rise to the occasion. In '03, the world total was $3.6 billion with $1.4 billion by us (39%). Since we are giving $2 billion in '04, the rest of the world should give $4 billion. If the rest of the world gives more than $4 billion, we will match them by 1/3. Thus, if they want us to give $3 billion in '04, the rest of the world must total $6 billion. If this happens (which it will not), then we will put the additional money into a mix of Global Fund and other countries (beyond the original 14) bilaterally. In this way we show leadership and flexibility. If no one else gives an additional penny, we still are committed to the President's Plan as we have outlined. If other countries meet the above mentioned benchmarks, then we are flexible enough to match them by 1/3. Finally, if the Congress appropriates a couple of hundred million over the $2 billion and the President signs such a Bill, we would give that additional money to the Global Fund and/or additional countries and back up our contention that our funding plan for the 14 countries is indeed sound. I would be happy to discuss this further with you. Thanks, Tony
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Sept. 26, 2003 - White House meeting on Bioshield with the usual suspects - Stewart Simonson, Jorge Tavel, Ken Bernard, Bill Winkenwerder, Larry Kerr, etc. We are getting ready for finalizing the legislation. After the meeting in the EEOB, I went over to the West Wing to see Richard Falkenrath. NIAID will be awarding 2 NBLs (BSL-4 labs) and 9 RBLs (BSL-3 labs) on Sept. 30. I have been getting incredible lobbying pressure from people like Sen. Hillary Clinton and others for their state or district sites. Chicago is in the running for an NBL and the President is going to Chicago on Sept. 30. The WH wants me to delay the announcement until 2:00 PM after the President leaves Chicago since Chicago got an RBL, but not an NBL and the WH wanted to avoid any embarrassment for the President to be there when bad news arrived.
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Oct. 7, 2003 - Briefing in the Situation Room of the White House for Andy Card on the Craig Venter issue of synthesizing microbes. Also at the meeting were: Tommy Thompson, Spencer Abraham (Secr. Of DoE), Dan Bartlett; General Gordon; Ken Bernard, Harriet Miers (Card's Deputy), Bob Card from DoE, Ray Auerbach (DoE), Bruce Alberts (NAS), Gerry Fink giving summary of Fink Report on "Biotechnology Research in an Age of Terrorism", which is an NAS/NRC report; Stewart Simonson; Carol Kuntz; Larry Kerr; I have essentially been adopted by the WH to be the one who explains the science of Venter's work. This, I was the major briefer. Also, I have been spearheading the NIH effort to create a subcommittee of the RAC to provide the "culture of responsibility" for the scientific community on these issue similar to the 1970s with the RAC following the Asilomar Meeting in 1974.
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Oct. 13, 2003 - Went to White House ceremony (President's speech) and reception to commemorate Columbus Day. The President specifically greeted me in his remarks saying how proud he was of how I was the General in the Global War on AIDS. After the ceremony, I ran into Josh Bolten in the hallway of the EEOB. He asked about my opinion of the controversy of $2 billion versus $3 billion in FY '04 for the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. Bono has been giving the WH a hard time saying that the President was reneging on his promise when in fact he promised $15 billion over 5 years staring with $2 billion in '04 (see above). He specifically asked my opinion of how Randy Tobias was doing as the new AIDS head of the program. He indicated that he did not think that there was anything wrong, but that he was getting the vague feeling that things were not moving along as aggressively as he thought that they would be. He asked me to quietly check it out.
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Oct. 16, 2003 - Had breakfast (at his invitation) with Jay Lefkowitz at the White House Mess to say goodbye. He is leaving as Director of Domestic Policy Council to return to his law firm in its NYC branch. He will likely return after 2 years for the President's 2nd term (if this occurs). We had a great conversation in which he mentioned how honored he was to work with me on the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, the MTCT plan and to a lesser extent on the stem cell issue. I sincerely told him that he was second to none in people that I have worked with at the WH over the past 19 years. He asked my help in making sure that the AIDS Plan does not get derailed by the mischief of USAID in trying to lobby the legislation such that power is taken away from Randy Tobias and he would not be given an independent account.