"An American Perspective"
A Lecture by Senator Richard Bryan, Former United States Senator

(Washington D.C., June 24th, 2014)

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Biography

Richard Bryan began his legal career in 1964 as the Deputy District Attorney in Clark County (Las Vegas), Nevada. He served as prosecutor for two years until appointed as Clark County’s first Public Defender and the youngest public defender in the nation in 1966. Two years later he would be elected to the Nevada State Assembly from District 4 in Clark County where he was successfully re-elected in 1970. His hard work and legal background proved worthwhile for voters where then in 1972 he was elected to the State Senate and re-elected four years later, serving as chair of the Taxation Committee and the Education Committee.

Following the State Senate, Senator Bryan would win his first statewide election as Nevada’s Attorney General. One of his successful accomplishments as Nevada’s Attorney General was defending Nevada's gaming regulatory structure in the Federal Courts. 1982 marked an important year for the former Senator when he was elected to the first of two terms as Governor of the State of Nevada. His legacy comprises of many accomplishments, one of them being his role in pushing economic diversification and the attraction of new businesses to Nevada. He resigned as governor in 1989 after being elected to the first of two terms in the U.S. Senate. Senator Bryan was active as a Senate member where he served in tandem on several U.S. Senate Committees: Finance, Commerce, Science and Transportation; and Banks, Housing and Urban Affairs.

Senator Bryan received his B.A. at the Univeristy of Nevada at Reno and would later serve in the U.S. Army and Army Reserve. He earned his law degree from the Univeristy of California, Hasting College of Law where he was active in both the Order of the Coif and the Hastings Law Review.

He currently practices law with Lionel Sawyer & Collins as a shareholder and member of the Firm’s Executive Committee. His area of concentration focuses on government relations at the federal, state and local levels.

Senator Bryan has remained active as a community and business leader for his state. Using his past experiences in the public sector, he has been able to encourage businesses to relocate to Nevada through serving on the Board of Trustees of the Las Vegas Global Economic Alliance. Senator Bryan is also on the Board of Trustees of the Las Vegas Metro Chamber of Commerce and serves on the Board of Directors of The Smith Center for the Performing Arts.

Senator Bryan has been mentioned in Best Lawyers in America and in Mountain States Super Lawyers for Government Relations Law. 

“An American Perspective”

A Lecture by Senator Richard Bryan, Former United States Senator

 

Thank you so much for your hospitality. Let me associate myself with so much of what you had to say, I thought it was very insightful. I should in making a full disclosure tell you that I have neither the erudition nor experience or background that the Ambassador has. When I was asked by Mark to come here and to speak to this group I must tell you that I had not heard the term Cultural Diplomacy, I was not really quite sure what that was, and so you must be saying why, in heaven's sake, would this old fellow be invited to share anything with you with that lack kind of lack of knowledge and background.

Let me suggest without being immodest or presumptuous, I am probably the kind of guy that needs to be engaged because I have travelled fairly widely, I have been to more than 40 countries, I have been to Bulgaria and spent some time in Sofia, I have been to the Crimea and I have been to many many countries in the world. I have a great interest in history and passion for it and I love things internationally and so perhaps the kind of an American that I am needs to be included here.

Let me suggest that because one is widely travelled does not necessarily mean one is knowledgeable about the cultural issues in a country. Let me give you an example: a couple of years ago I went to Waterloo, many of you know that that was where Wellington defeated Napoleon in a climactic battle of the war that had engulfed Europe for many decades, and I can tell you, where the imperial guard fell and how Blücher came back and the nick of time to prevent, in effect, Napoleon from braking Wellington's lines. But until I spent an hour that afternoon during my visit there with a citizen of Belgium I had no idea that there were cultural divisions in that country that were, in effect, presenting what I call “centrifugal forces” that may, hopefully not, break up the country.

So although I am not as knowledgeable certainly as the Ambassador, let me, as American lawyers say, stipulate that I agree about the importance of establishing cultural bridges, the importance for my country in terms of our national security and our economy and I find myself in agreement with the insightful observations that the Ambassador has made.

I think in terms of understanding the American perspective, but not necessarily agreeing with it, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. was one of the most distinguish justices ever to grace the United States Supreme Court and nearly a hundred years ago he made the observation, that a page of history is sometimes more instructive than a volume of logic, so let me share a little bit of our history in terms of how we historically relate and some of the attitudes. America fought its war of independence and our iconic national hero, the founder of our country, George Washington, who frequently had to make a decision between Alexander Hamilton, our First Secretary of Treasury and Jefferson. Jefferson urged just to get involved with the French revolution, Washington declined to do so and in his farewell addressed to the nation, he said “beware of foreign entangling alliances”. In effect, problems of Europe ought not to be our problems and for most of the 19th century, America focused on its internal development, spreading to the West and developing the West, and creating an economy which ultimately became the largest economy in the world.

In the latter part of the 19th century or the early 20th century we began to be more assertive globally – the Spanish-American war, the acquisition of the Philippines, for short time Cuba. But that really wasn’t based upon any cultural understanding – the Filipinos thought we had come to liberate their country from Spain, in point of fact we did not exactly liberate the country, we fought an insurrection by Aguinaldo, one of the great Philippine heroes and then when the century moved into the new century, we were very reluctant to get involved in the WWI. but ultimately we did so, as you know. Then after the war, there was kind of a period of disillusionment. This was the war – to use the American terminology of our president Woodrow Wilson – the war to end all wars and yet the United States refused to ratify the treaty which established the League of Nations. That is in effect a kind of retreat from this experience in Europe and well into the period before WWII there was a strong isolationist feeling. Franklin Roosevelt did an extraordinary job of ultimately moving us into a position where we were able to participate with the allies to defeat the forces of aggression.

Although Americans are very diverse, we love to say that we are the melting pot, perhaps more appropriately, the quilt in which there are many different cultures, we've not always embraced those cultures, at least initially. When the Irish came to America after the Irish famine in the little part of the 19th century, there was a tremendous hostility and prejudice to the Irish. In fact, some of the terminology is still part of the American lexicon: a “paddy wagon” - that's where the drunken Irish were taken to the police station, and we still use the term “paddy wagon” not today with reference to the Irish, we talk about a donnybrook and that's a fight, that's a reference to the Irish, the stereotype that they were drunken, fighting folks all the time. The Chinese faced a tremendous hostility, Chinese exclusion laws along with other cultures. And so, that is a part of our history and it still, as history of every country, influences attitudes.

I think America is often times misperceived, I mean, the social media, the way in which we are depicted in films, I mean, often times I think presents one of the least attractive sides of our country, that is that we are a country of enormous wealth, we are a country that tells the rest of the world we know what is best. You know, if you really want to correct the problems that you have at home, just follow us, do what we have done, we've got the answer. In the 1950's, long before many of you were even born, it was kind of the “ugly American”, you know, we went to countries around the world and kind of asserted ourselves in a very clumsy and awkward way, and some of that maybe to give America at least some benefit, or in colloquial terms, cutting us some slack as we say, is that our country is so large that you can travel 2500 miles across the country and essentially it is an English speaking community whereas particularly in Europe if you travelled, you would go through many many different countries, many languages, many different cultures.

In fact, even in the recent times, one of the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee prided himself: “I've never had a passport”. This is a chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee! That is part of our background; our educational system really does not do justice to cultural diplomacy as I have come to understand that term. Those of us who are fortunate enough to have had the benefit of a university education and perhaps a little bit more above that, can tell you a lot about the history of various countries from the perspective of the great alliances, the struggles, the incredible architectural legacy from some of the ancient cultures up to the present day, but we really know very little about the culture.

As one who knows a little bit about the country I know a little bit about the battle of Tours, 732. That's when the Islamic advance that threaten to engulf all of Northern Europe was stopped by Frankish king Charles Martel and it took, from European perspective, 700 years before finally the Muslims, you know in 1492, the year as we say in America, America was discovered, for that to occur. Yet I must tell you until the recent times I had no idea that there was such a division and antagonism and a historical enmity Shi'a to Sunni – never heard that and I'm again, not a scholar, but I know a fair bit about the history and had absolutely no idea. When the breakup of Yugoslavia occurred, I had no idea that these historical, cultural groups had such an intense animosity – the Serb, the Croat, the Muslims... I thought it was a vestige of something that occurred hundreds of years ago. So that's something that came and obviously the tribalism in Africa that we're experiencing today.

The great cultural divide with respect to religion is challenging for us. We have a constitutional provision in America, the freedom of speech, the freedom of religion, in which people can say terrible things about the Catholic Church or I'm an Episcopalian, or we have many Mormons in our part of the world. The idea that somehow blasphemy would be considered a crime and punishable is just unethical, we don't understand that and that's troublesome too. So when the fatwa was directed against Salman Rushdie and the word was out, you must, to be a good Muslim, kill this individual, whether we agree with what he said or not, I have never read any of these “Satanic Verses” so I don't know exactly but what he said must have been pretty bad, that becomes very much of a cultural divide. Religion is sensitive in America and in polite circles when you're talking socially, you restrain you very seldom bring up religion, it's considered personal. Part of that is my own background, I'm an Episcopalian, we do a lousy job of proselytizing, there are today more Muslims in America than Episcopalians. So I'm not particularly comfortable, I mean, if you're religious, that's wonderful, frankly I go to church on a regular basis, that certainly does not make me any better person than anyone who does not, but I do have a strong belief.

Now the United States is facing this budget crisis and I think the observation that the Ambassador  made is a correct one. There's kind of a tendency at this point to say, wait a minute all of these foreign policy engagements and the billions of dollars we've spent for this and that, presumably to provide aid, to more recently Afghanistan and Iraq is incomplete and perhaps in many ways, not the correct approach. This has kind of left us with the sense of: wait a minute, maybe this really isn't worth it. Again, I'm not suggesting that our efforts were perfect, but at least I think the intention was to provide stability to the world. So in America if you ask about the budget, where should we cut? It’s always, ah, I've got the answer! Foreign aid! I must tell you that that probably represents one tenth of 1% of the Federal Budget, but yet that's a category that an American would say – I think the Ambassador probably has heard that – that's where we can balance the budget. That's not true even if we eliminated all foreign aid.

Then there is, what I think is one of our more unpleasant features, and that is having been to the various parts of the world, there are many things that other parts of the world do, that's better. Oh, that is very sensitive politically. I don't know how any fair-minded person could not go to Europe and admire the extraordinary rail system that exists in Europe, far better. But if you pursue that line frequently their response will be and largely from people who are not unsophisticated perhaps – “well, if it's so great there, why don't you go there and live?” As if somehow wait a minute, your identity as an American, your patriotism is challenged because you find something in another country to be admired. Our own president trying to reengage Europe early in his term, was accused politically of making an apology for America. I never saw it that way. I thought what he's attempted to do was to be more inclusive, to try to say: look, we want to work with you, we want to embrace your own country as we try to deal with these issues which the ambassador has pointed out, not terribly well. So we're not perceived as we see ourselves, you know the Scottish poet Bobby Burns once said: “would the God give us the will to see ourselves as others see us.” That's not only true in countries, that's true of each other how we are perceived as individuals and countries, sometimes we fail to see that. So that's enough of our history.

Where do we go from here and what attributes do we bring to the table in terms of building those cultural bridges? Well, right after WWII back in 1946, the Fulbright programs to help Americans, that's a wonderful program. When I was in high school, the American Field Service had a program, where each summer a couple of high school students would be sent to Europe to live with European families, much as a son or a daughter. And we had a reciprocal, we had in my time, I can tell you the name of our students, we had Paul Guntherzeller from Germany, in my graduating class Guy Wittoff from Belgium and Horsch Schmidt from Germany. Now, that should have made me a more enlightened and sensitive person. I never ever had a conversation with any of these three about the culture of their community. In other words, they were there, they kind of absorbed our culture, the good, the not so good, and that which they might not have agreed with it at all. And I was not some recluse that went to school and left, I was engaged actually.

We have a number of wonderful study programs today, in fact many students in America – some of you may be part of this – have in effect studied abroad for a semester where you are not just a tourist. I'm highly supportive of tourism but, having been to a lot of these countries, I know far less about their culture, I can sure tell you a little bit about their history, I have admired that magnificent statue of the Tsar Liberator in Sofia and I know a little bit about that, just a tad, don't think I began to know enough to talk intelligently about your country, but my point being we've got the Peace Corp and there are people that have spent time, not necessarily in glamour capitals of the world, but some of the most impoverished destitute parts of the world, they have spent a couple of years of their life ther. That is a very positive thing and that kind of brings out, what I'd like to think, is about the best of America.

We have a lot of, what I would call, NGOs, there may be a better term for it, that is organizations who to go to help countries that are experiencing floods or other types of natural disasters. I must say having travelled, when I was a vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, to many parts of the world with our embassiy staff in what we call, the country club, where you get to meet young people who are part of our foreign service, I don't know a more dedicated, idealistic group of young people in the world. I was so impressed and we went to a lot of areas, we are not talking about the Ambassador to the Court of Saint James' in England or the Ambassador to France or Germany or Italy. We are talking areas in the world in which there are young families where there are no physicians available within maybe 50 or a 100 miles.

The increasing diversity of our country I think is an asset, we are becoming much more diverse in our society, the mean by which we communicate, the internet, we are much more connected. There is a paradox that I see in America that is somewhat troubling. Never before in the history of civilization have we had more information available in this little cellphone that I have. Never before! The computer that guided the Apollo mission 45 years ago to the landing on the Moon was probably half of the size of this room. Yet today in a time when more information is available to us, I'm not sure we are better educated and better knowledgable, that's a real paradox that I see.

I think there is a growing awareness which I think is positive and that is, there is a recognition in a business community from their own self interest and I don't suggest to you that that is unique in America, obviously every country has its own self interest, that's certainly a part of advocating on behalf of your country, just as the Ambassador does so effectively here in Washington. The business community recognizes that the real growth potential in the world are foreign markets. Sometimes we stumble badly because of our cultural insensitivity, sometimes the translations with which we market American products are unbelievably insensitive. Not because we designed it that way, no business person in his or her right mind would do that, but because we don't understand some of the cultural nuances and we have stumbled badly. I am talking about some of the major corporations in America.

So I do not want to conclude this on a negative note, there is  great opportunity and again to reaffirm my personal sense that most Americans probably share the view that we need to work together in a global community, to try to achieve peace, the right of individual societies to make decisions for themselves, to encourage tolerance whether it's religious or cultural or political or economic differences. Yet we face, as the Ambassador pointed out, many challenges, very very troubling challenges certainly from my perspective, such as Putin's aggression in the Crimea, which is very discouraging although maybe more understandable with what we've seen in Iraq.

I did not favor us going into Iraq. But we've spent more than a trillion dollars, thousands of lives lost, tens of thousands of Americans suffer from injuries as a result of that just to see this kind of implode before our eyes. We probably did not see all of this as clearly as we should have and in my view, al-Malaki is simply not doing what the Ambassador has suggested and what I think: inclusion. I mean, obviously in effect what he did was to only include people that share his perspective and dealt very harshly with the population that allies itself with Iran. So that's kind of how I see things. But we need to educate people, I think that's the first thing and we're not necessarily real good at that, and we need to be more tolerant.

One of the things that is troubling about the American society is, there's this polarization that exists, today on the left – if you're a democrat - people on the far left, and right - people to the far right. Because those groups tend to be so organized, they have a disproportional impact on the political party structure. Recently for example the majority leader in the United States Senate, Eric Cantor, was defeated, I mean, a shock to the political world. Allegedly, he was defeated because he had spoken about the need for inclusion perhaps paths citizenship. Let me tell you, in a metaphor of the old West, I don't think that the Republican party leadership will touch the immigration issue, which I think needs to be addressed because the message is there, and it is a new word in the American political lexicon, primaried, that is if you get too close to the center, you are perceived by a small, but very very active and effective minority in a party you could lose the primary and that is the lesson that many are drawing from Eric Cantor's defeat, because he had all of the establishment with him and he probably had twenty times as much money to spend, this is not everything.

Having said that I believe most people in America really have a more moderate view. When you take a poll of people in the United States, most people believe we need to address immigration problems with comprehensive reform. But when you take various political constituencies, congressional districts as they are called in America, they have been so gerrymandered - is an American political term – where in congressional district one, two or three they are so overwhelmingly democrat or republican, they tend to take the more extreme rather than the moderate view, whereas if you take the overall view of American it's much more moderate. Just as I suspect that in the world of Islam there are more moderates, I like to believe that, I think that's true. My own personal physician is a Muslim, I know him and many people who have come from countries such as Pakistan, and I know him to be a muslim but that's not the face that we see all too often. In Islam we usually see radicalization which makes American very fearful and frightened.

So, I don't have any answers, I'll refer you back to the Ambassador's 9-10-11 checkpoint she gave us, and say that I associate with those. I'd be happy to open those up for any questions. Thank you so much for including me here, it’s been delightful to be here, to meet the Ambassador, to hear her and to hopefully respond to some of your questions.

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