‘Stimulus plan not adequate,’ says Nobel Prize Winner Paul Krugman

Paul Krugman, winner of the 2008 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, delivered the spring Atkinson Lecture Friday, Jan. 30, at Willamette.

Earlier in the day, students asked Krugman what he would say if he had five minutes alone with Barack Obama. “I would make the stimulus plan 50 percent larger,” he replied.

“I’m not sure if the $800 billion stimulus plan is adequate to the problem. We’re facing one hell of a crisis and we’ll need more than a band-aid. The plan will limit the rise in job loss, but we’re still looking at three years of unemployment. My guess is that the administration will be back later this year for a second round.”

“There is a limit to the amount of public debt we can run up,” Krugman said, “and there’s a danger if the stimulus spending goes on too long, but other advanced countries are closer to the edge than we are. There’s a threat, but we’re not there yet.”

As a second measure, Krugman recommends nationalizing some of the more troublesome banks on a temporary basis. “We don’t actually want government managing our banks — government doesn’t run banks well — but it should take on the responsibility of guaranteeing funds, and then sell the banks to a private owner. The goal is not to own the banks, but to deliver the necessary bailout without handing a windfall to stockholders.

“There was probably no way to stop the housing bubble and bust, but it could have been less devastating.” Krugman speculates that housing prices probably won’t rise until 2012. “Housing prices continued to fall for six years after the bubble burst in California,” he said. “We probably have years to go before things turn around.

“There’s a jigsaw puzzle aspect to trying to find the right solution. Right now the policy goal is to construct a bridge to this uncertain future. One thing we do need is more regulation. Anything we have to rescue in a crisis needs to be regulated when there’s not a crisis.

“I sometimes get asked if the press should try to be less negative about the economic situation,” Krugman said. “That’s not our role. Our role is to tell the truth.”

One student asked what advice Krugman had for “us soon-to-be college grads. “I have no idea what to say,” he said with a laugh. “One thing I certainly never had was a carefully planned career.”

But he does have advice for the average citizen. “Live within your means, put aside reserves, and play it safe. And support politicians who are trying to fix things, because it’s up to the policy makers to solve the problem.”

Krugman is an influential Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times and professor of economics and international affairs at Princeton University. He received the Nobel Prize in October for his analysis of trade patterns and location of economic activity. He is well known for his work in international economics, including trade theory, economic geography and international finance, and has a unique ability to explain complex issues with wit and passion.

His books include The Return of Depression Economics and the Crisis of 2008, The Great Unraveling: Losing Our Way in the New Century and The Conscience of a Liberal.

Krugman earned his bachelor’s degree in economics from Yale University and his doctorate from MIT. From 1982–83 he worked at the White House as a staff member of the Council of Economic Advisors. Before joining the Princeton faculty, he taught at Yale, MIT, the London School of Economics, Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley.

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Klamath Tribal Leaders to Discuss Restoration of Native Lands

Klamath tribal leaders and a representative of the Trust for Public Land will speak Monday, Feb. 2, at Willamette University about an option agreement that enables the Klamath Tribes to purchase 90,000 acres of their original reservation near their tribal home of Chiloquin, Ore.

The free public event is at 7 p.m. in Hudson Hall in the Mary Stuart Rogers Center and is part of Willamette’s Indian Country Conversations series.

“Klamath Tribal Homelands: Restoring a Legacy” will feature leaders of the Klamath Tribes, including Joseph Kirk, tribal chairman; Jeff Mitchell, tribal council member; and Perry Chocktoot, tribal council member and director of Culture and Heritage. Charles Sams III, director of the Tribal and Native Lands Program of the Trust for Public Land, will discuss the background to the option agreement, which was negotiated by the trust.

The land in question, the Mazama Tract, is the largest of 32 properties nationwide that the trust is working to restore to American Indians, and is about 8 percent of the 1.2 million acres reserved for the Klamath Tribes in an 1864 treaty. The reservation was liquidated by Congress in 1954 during the now repudiated policies of the Termination Era. While the tribe regained federal recognition in 1986, no land base was restored. The Mazama Tract, located east of Crater Lake, would be purchased from Cascade Timberlands, LLC.

“This is an exciting step in rebuilding a tribal nation that was wrongly terminated,” Sams said.

“It’s the first step toward re-creating a sustainable homeland for the Klamath Tribes,” Kirk said. “Not only will land provide the tribe with financial stability, it’s a significant part of our spiritual and cultural identity. There are culturally sensitive areas to take care of, that hopefully have not been lost to past activities.”

The event is on Willamette’s Founders Day, recognizing the university’s founding by Jason Lee and other Methodist missionaries who came to the Willamette Valley in 1834 to open an Indian mission school. In 1842, Lee and the missionary community established a school for children of settlers called the Oregon Institute; this marked the founding of what is now Willamette University. Two years later, the original Indian Manual Labor School was closed.

On Founders Day 2005, Willamette held a Ceremony of Renewal with regional tribes to acknowledge its Indian mission legacy and begin a new chapter in the mutual history of Oregon’s tribal communities and the university. At the ceremony, President M. Lee Pelton announced the establishment of a lecture series to bring guests from Indian country to the campus and broader Willamette Valley for dialogue, teaching and learning.

The Indian Country Conversations series is sponsored by the President’s Office and the College of Liberal Arts, and is coordinated by anthropology Professor Rebecca Dobkins in consultation with the university’s community-based Native American Advisory Council. “Klamath Tribal Homelands: Restoring a Legacy” is co-sponsored by The Tribal and Native Lands Program of the Trust for Public Land.

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Widman Exhibition Includes Gallery Talks, Teacher Workshop

In conjunction with its exhibition Harry Widman: Image, Myth, and Modernism, the Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University has planned free gallery talks and a workshop for teachers interested in bringing their classes to the exhibition.

The gallery talks are Tuesdays, Feb. 3 through March 24, from 12:30 to 1 p.m. Talks are presented by museum docents or Elizabeth Garrison, the Cameron Paulin Curator of Education.

Garrison will lead the teacher workshop Feb. 4 from 4 to 5:30 p.m. at the museum. The workshop helps teachers prepare students for visiting the museum and touring the exhibition, and proposes ideas that reinforce the gallery experience and broaden curriculum concepts back in the classroom. Admission to the workshop is free, but advance registration is required by calling (503) 370-6855.

Garrison has written a teacher guide on Widman that will be available Feb. 4 online at www.willamette.edu/museum_of_art.

Harry Widman: Image, Myth, and Modernism chronicles the life of this highly regarded Portland painter and teacher who taught for 36 years at the Pacific Northwest College of Art (formerly the Portland Art Museum School). The exhibition runs from Jan. 31 through March 29.

The exhibition is supported in part by grants from the City of Salem Transient Occupancy Tax funds and the Oregon Arts Commission.

The Hallie Ford Museum of Art is located at 700 State St. (corner of State and Cottage streets) in downtown Salem near the campus of Willamette University. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m. The galleries are closed Mondays. Admission is $3 for adults and $2 for seniors and students. Children younger than 12 are admitted free, and Tuesday is an admission-free day. For more information, call (503) 370-6855.

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Museum Features Prominent Portland Painter

An exhibition of paintings and works on paper by Harry Widman, a highly regarded Portland painter and teacher, will be on display Jan. 31 through March 29 at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University.

Organized by Willamette art history Professor Roger Hull, Harry Widman: Image, Myth, and Modernism surveys the career of Widman over the past 60 years, from his college days to his most recent work. Widman taught for 36 years at the Pacific Northwest College of Art (formerly the Portland Art Museum School) and served as interim dean during a critical period in the college’s history.

As a special feature, Hull will deliver a free lecture on Widman’s career Jan. 30 from 5 to 6 p.m. in Cone Chapel, on the second floor of Waller Hall. A preview reception will follow from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art. In addition, a 30-minute film on Widman, produced by Portland Community College, will be shown March 1 at 2:30 p.m. in the Roger Hull Lecture Hall at the museum. The film will be followed by a presentation from producers Mark Andres, Prudence Roberts and Michael Annus about how the project was made and why such documents of Oregon artists are important. Admission is free.

The exhibition will feature 38 paintings and 17 works on paper drawn from public and private collections throughout the region, and will be accompanied by a full-color, 112-page book by Hull that attempts to place Widman and his artwork within the context of his times.

Born in Englewood, N.J., in 1929, Widman received his bachelor of fine arts degree from Syracuse University in 1951, and earned his master of fine arts degree from the University of Oregon in 1956. Responding to the work of artists as diverse as Wassily Kandinsky and Robert Motherwell, Widman forged a mature style that combined an abstract vocabulary and sensibility with social and political commentary.

Harry Widman: Image, Myth, and Modernism is supported in part by grants from the City of Salem’s Transient Occupancy Tax funds and the Oregon Arts Commission.

The Hallie Ford Museum of Art is located at 700 State St. (corner of State and Cottage streets) in downtown Salem near the campus of Willamette University. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m. The galleries are closed Mondays. Admission is $3 for adults and $2 for seniors and students. Children younger than 12 are admitted free, and Tuesday is an admission-free day. For more information, call (503) 370-6855.

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Willamette University celebrates MLK Days

Oral histories honor MLK Day

Willamette University and the Salem community present “I’m Not Getting On, Until Jim Crow Gets Off,” by Awele Makeba, Monday, Jan. 19, at 7 p.m. in Hudson Hall at Willamette. The event is free and the public is invited.

The interactive performance and dialog highlight a watershed moment in United States history — the Montgomery bus boycott. The oral histories about the women in the Montgomery movement are presented through a talking timeline that lets the audience reclaim this “herstory” in collective memory.
A variety of voices and stories weave the historical narrative. By interacting with the audience, Awele deconstructs the complexities of this layered history and links it to contemporary issues.
The audience is given an opportunity to discuss content and to interview characters about their motivations. The program concludes with the creation of a human sculpture by audience volunteers that celebrates the role of women as leaders and foot soldiers in the freedom struggle.

Makeba is an award-winning actor and playwright, storyteller and recording artist.
She is a “truth-teller” for social change, researching and performing African American history that might otherwise be lost. She invites audiences to wrestle with complex and emotionally laden issues that teach us about our common humanity.

Makeba has mesmerized audiences in Russia, Australia, Taiwan, France and Canada, and has performed at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

The event is co-sponsored by Salem’s Human Rights and Relations Advisory Commission, the Salem Chapter of the NAACP, the YWCA Racial Justice and Cultural Diversity Conference, the Salem Multicultural Institute, and One Community Initiative.

Civil rights film shown at Willamette

The Birth of a Nation will be shown Tuesday, Jan. 20, at 7 p.m. in the Montag Den at Willamette University. The event is free and the public is welcome.

The silent film, directed by D. W. Griffith and released in 1915, is one of America’s most influential and controversial motion pictures. The film was based on Thomas Dixon’s novel and play, The Clansman. It has provoked great controversy for its treatment of white supremacy and sympathetic account of the rise of the Ku Klux Klan. A discussion will follow the film.

Hip hop artist to speak about King’s legacy

Willamette University will sponsor hip hop performance lecturer Mark Gonzales, who will speak about “King’s Legacy: A Lyrical Look” Thursday, Jan. 22, at 11:30 a.m. in Cone Chapel at Willamette and again at 7:30 p.m. in Cat Cavern in Putnam University Center. Both events are free and the public is invited.

Gonzales is a poet, Hip Hop Theatre playwright and performance lecturer who combines the spoken word and a turntable, and uses hip hop as a tool of resistance, rebellion and enlightenment. He has appeared on HBO’s Def Poetry, Fox News, and at conferences across the United States. The Alaskan-born Chicano has traversed refugee camps in Palestine, back alley streets in Cuba and youth prisons in Los Angeles.

‘Song Talk’ Celebrates African History and MLK Days

Composer, musician and scholar Bernice Johnson Reagon will present a lecture interspersed with song Friday, Jan. 23, at 7:30 p.m. in Smith Auditorium.

For more than four decades, Bernice Johnson Reagon has been a major cultural voice for freedom and justice. Perhaps no individual better illustrates the transformative power of traditional African American music and cultural history. A singer and composer, Reagon recently retired after 30 years of performing with Sweet Honey in the Rock, the internationally renowned a cappella ensemble she founded in 1973. She produced most of the group’s recordings, including the Grammy-nominated Still The Same Me, a 2001 release for younger audiences. Her work as a scholar and composer is reflected in numerous publications and productions on African American culture and history.

Tickets are $5 and are available beginning at 9 a.m. Jan. 20, on the 2nd floor of Putnam University Center.
Doors open at 7 p.m. Call (503) 370-6265 for information.

Join the Stride Toward Freedom 5K Run/1-Mile Walk

Celebrate the life and spirit of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., at Willamette University’s second annual fundraiser, the Stride Toward Freedom 5K Run/1-Mile Walk. The race will begin at 9 a.m. Saturday, Jan. 24, at Brown Field at Willamette University. Runners and walkers of all ages are welcome.

The entry fee includes post-race snacks, and a T-shirt for the first 100 entrants. Pre-register online for $15 at www.Active.com (type in “Willamette University”) or at Putnam University Center at Willamette, or register for $20 beginning at 8 a.m. the day of the race.

Proceeds will benefit the Salem Multicultural Institute for a performance and lecture series. The institute also sponsors the World Beat Festival, held each June at Salem Riverfront Park.

For more information contact Reyna Meyers at (503) 370-6046 or rmeyers@willamette.edu.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT MLK EVENTS, CONTACT GORDY TOYAMA AT (503) 370-6265.

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Alumnus Named One of Top 100 Lawyers in America

Albert A. Menashe JD’76, managing shareholder of Gevurtz Menashe in Portland, was named one of the “Top 100 Lawyers in America” by Worth magazine in December. Menashe was one of only two Oregon attorneys and the only family law attorney on the list, which the magazine compiles annually by polling its readers and professionals.

Menashe, president of the Oregon State Bar in 2007, has been listed among the Best Lawyers in America since 1991 and was featured in Oregon Super Lawyers in 2006, 2007 and 2008 as a top-10 attorney and the highest ranking family law attorney in the state. His firm handles divorce, custody and parenting issues, adoptions and name changes, grandparents’ rights, juvenile law, paternity matters, cohabitation, prenuptial and postnuptial agreements.

Read more about Menashe in the Willamette Lawyer. Learn more about the Willamette University College of Law here.

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Photography Exhibition Portrays Northwest Artists

A small exhibition of portraits by Mary Randlett, a Washington photographer who has documented some of the most prominent artists, writers, poets and thinkers in the Pacific Northwest, will be on display Jan. 10 through March 8 at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University.

Organized by Museum Director John Olbrantz, Mary Randlett: Artist Portraits will feature Oregon artists who were active in the early 1970s and were photographed by Randlett in 1971–72. Included in the exhibition are portraits of Carl and Hilda Morris, Louie Bunce, Michele Russo, Sally Haley, Mel Katz, Frank Okada and a host of other legendary painters and sculptors who have enriched the Oregon art scene.

Mary Randlett: Artist Portraits is supported by grants from the city of Salem’s Transient Occupancy Tax funds and the Oregon Arts Commission.

The Hallie Ford Museum of Art is located at 700 State St. (corner of State and Cottage streets) in downtown Salem near the campus of Willamette University. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m. The galleries are closed Mondays. Admission is $3 for adults and $2 for seniors and students. Children younger than 12 are admitted free, and Tuesday is an admission-free day. For more information, call (503) 370-6855.

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Museum Seeks Volunteer Docents

The Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University is recruiting volunteers for a new, mid-year docent class beginning Jan. 26. Using inquiry-based discussion and dialogue, docents guide visitors of all ages and backgrounds in an active exploration of artwork from a variety of periods and cultures.

“While a background in art or art history is not required, we are looking for people who are able to speak in public, have a strong desire to learn, are flexible and dependable, have a commitment to the program, and can be accurate yet creative in the presentation of information,” said Education Curator Elizabeth Garrison.

Training for new and active docents is ongoing on Mondays from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., September through mid-May. Docents must attend weekly classes, complete occasional reading assignments and develop and present tours. In addition to becoming a member of the museum at the individual level or above, docents are asked to pay yearly dues of $15 per person.

Information packets and application forms may be picked up at the museum Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., or Sunday from 1 to 5 p.m. The museum is closed Dec. 24 through Jan. 5. To receive an information packet and application form by mail, call the museum at (503) 370-6855.

The Hallie Ford Museum of Art was founded in 1998 to serve as an artistic, cultural and intellectual resource for Willamette University, the city of Salem, the mid-Willamette Valley and beyond. It includes four permanent galleries focusing on European, Asian and American art, Native American baskets, historic and contemporary regional art, and European and American works on paper, as well as two temporary exhibition spaces featuring historical and contemporary art.

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