Here are more comments from Alan Greenspan, who engaged in a lively conversation with Cambridge Energy Research Associates founder and chairman Daniel Yergin at the annual CERAWeek in Houston recently. Approximately 1,200 energy-industry professionals, academics and heads of state attended the dinner. (For headliner Greenspan comments, see Valentine's Dinner With Alan Greenspan: Nuclear! Plus, Iraq And 'Are We In A Recession?') -- Referring to his autobiography that was released last year, he said he never imagined a multi-week NYT best-seller would contain chapters on LNG and SOX. -- It was difficult for him to write in the first person. "When you write in the first person, you feel a greater ability to assert...when the evidence is somewhat less than what you would require (otherwise)." (Yergin said, "It's called the free hand.") -- He sees numbers in terms of their relative meaning. "To this day, when I see a number, I visualize what it means in the real world...It's quite extraordinary; the importance, people don't realize." According to one Greenspan biography (Bob Woodward or Justin Martin), one of his personal-favorite early indicators of economic direction was orders for corrugated paper (cardboard), as this reflected orders for boxing goods to fulfill orders. -- Gerald Ford, whom Greenspan praises often in his autobiography, "was as close to psychologically normal a president I've ever known" and he worked with or for eight presidents. To become president, you have to be a bit off to endure the route to the job and endure the job itself, he said. Gerald Ford never would have made it through--because of his normalcy--"and never would have tried." -- All the presidents he has worked with or for have had this in common: "a fierceness." There are innumerable, seemingly unsolvable problems that face the president, and a fierceness is needed in the job. -- The two most technically knowledgeable presidents he worked for: Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton. "Both exhibited remarkable intellectual capability." Many people don't know this, but the teleprompter was disabled for the first 10 minutes of one of Clinton's "State of the Union" addresses, he said. Clinton ad libbed through those 10 minutes without anyone noticing. -- Greenspan pursued a career as a musician in his early days. He said he thought he knew all the curse words from those days, until he met Nixon behind the campaign. Richard Nixon "really was two people." -- What is a "Greenspan Republican?" His answer: "I don't want to know." --Nissa Darbonne, Executive Editor, Oil and Gas Investor, A&D Watch, Oil and Gas Investor This Week, ndarbonne@hartenergy.com
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