Celebrating 90 Years - Foreign Policy Association

Off-the-Record (OTR)
Lecture Series
Off-the-Record Lecture Series had exciting and
stimulating 68th and 69th seasons. The 2006-
2007 season was a delicate balance of journalists,
including Tony Blankley, Mary Anastasia O’Grady,
and Michael Barone, and of former and present ambassadors
and nongovernmental organization leaders,
including Sir Emyr Jones Parry, Dennis Ross, and Gareth
Evans. The season culminated in an eerily prescient
closing lecture by Richard Haass, president of the
Council on Foreign Relations, who dubbed Pakistan the
nation to watch in 2008. For the 2007 Elizabeth French
Hitchcock Lecture, R. James Woolsey, former director
of intelligence for the CIA, spoke on “Energy, Security,
and the Long War of the 21st Century.”
The 2007-2008 season was one of OTR’s best to date.
Nicholas Kristof and George Packer related stories of
people they had met amid the conflicts in Darfur and
Iraq. Walter Russell Mead, Frank Wisner, and Niall
Ferguson emphasized the importance of history in
current international issues. L. Paul Bremer and Ambassador
Zalmay Khalilzad gave government insights
on events in Iraq and Afghanistan. Richard Holbrooke
and Humphrey Taylor forecasted implications of the
upcoming presidential election. The 2008 Elizabeth
French Hitchcock Lecture, delivered by former Secretary
of the Treasury Lawrence H. Summers in the Titus
One Auditorium at the Museum of Modern Art, was
entitled “America and the New Global Economy.”
Off-the-Record continued to hold patron events and
etails. The latter are events convened at the last
minute, by email only, at private clubs for our patron
members. In 2006-2007, OTR held an etail with
Edward Rollins, pollster and political consultant, and
collaborated with the Overseas Press Club to host an
event featuring three Iraqi journalists. Former Chilean
Minister of Government Jose Pinera also gave a
stimulating talk at a patron event on providing assets
to the poor. In 2007-2008, Robert Amsterdam gave
an insider’s view of Putin’s Russia; Sandra Hamid
discussed conditions in Aceh, Indonesia; and Calvin
Sims and Michael Orr of The New York Times screened
and discussed their film, “Rearming Japan.” Patron
events in 2007-2008 included Vali Nasr on the Shi’a
revival and Cheryl Benard of the Rand Corporation
on moderate Muslims. Cheryl Benard spoke at the
home of Ambassador Gerhard Pfanzelter, permanent
representative of Austria to the United Nations, and
Mrs. Pfanzelter.
Membership has continued to grow steadily. OTR
now has 720 members, including almost 250 patron
members, and a significant waiting list for membership.
With its large membership, OTR has launched a
new Website providing online registration and membership
renewal capabilities.
We look forward to celebrating OTR’s 70th Anniversary
with presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin.
The 68th and 69th seasons were a strong way to leave
my five-year tenure as chairman of the Off-the-Record
Board of Governors, and I commend the Board of Governors
for all its efforts and wish the Board success in
the 70th season and beyond.
Ann L. Charters
Chairman,
Off-the-Record Lecture Series
FOREIGN POLICY ASSOCIATION | 115
MEETINGS: OFF-THE -RECORDLECTURE SERIES