A Close-up View of Public Diplomacy

QUESTION: Welcome to Think on KERA. I'm Krys Boyd.

Justified or not, there are numerous reasons why America's reputation around the world is less than stellar. The primary responsibility for polishing that reputation now falls to a single person, Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Karen Hughes.

Since part of that job has included a major initiative to fight breast cancer in the Middle East, Hughes is in town this weekend to address the Susan G. Komen Foundation's 25th anniversary conference. We're very pleased that she's made time for us as well. Ambassador Hughes, welcome to Think.

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Thanks so much. It's great to be here. It's great to be back in Dallas. I started my career here in television in Dallas-Fort Worth.

QUESTION: You were at Channel 5; is that right?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: I was. I was.

QUESTION: Are there things that you make time to do every time you're here in Dallas?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, I see my mom who lives here still and I don't unfortunately get to spend much more time than that. So usually, I'm spending time with family. Of course, I love the many restaurants here in Dallas that I miss and still have many friends; in fact, saw several of them here at KERA this morning.

QUESTION: Well, that's great. Now working with women around the world as you go and travel and meet with groups about breast cancer initiatives, is it different? Is the response you get different from a more mixed group of people?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, it is different, you know, for -- on a couple of levels. First of all, working on breast cancer detection and awareness and prevention is very fulfilling because you know you're saving lives. And I was actually a reporter here in Dallas when Nancy Brinker started the Susan Komen Foundation and at that time, the newspaper here would not print the words, "breast cancer." Nobody talked about it and therefore, it went undiagnosed in many cases for far too long.

That's still the case in many other parts of the world. We talk about it today in America and that means we now have a 95% cure rate because women -- for women who find it at the very early stages of the disease. But in many places, there's still a shame associated with it, a fear associated with it, a sense that it's a death sentence or that it's a private family matter and it's not something you can talk about.

And so actually, a group of women in the Middle East approached us because they were alarmed about the incident -- the high incidence and the high death rate from breast cancer in their countries. And so Nancy and I traveled to the Middle East and started a new partnership along with Johns Hopkins University and others. And I really believe this is the best kind of public diplomacy because it's what I call the diplomacy of deeds. It's doing something in concrete ways that make a difference in people's lives. And so how powerful would it be for women or families in the Middle East to know that a group of American women who are volunteers with the Susan Komen Foundation made a difference that maybe saved the lives of their mother or their wife or their grandmother?

QUESTION: Now there's the power of deeds and then there is the power of images. And I'm wondering if it's frustrating for you that as much as you can control the message that you put out there, you can't control American popular culture or media or things that also really color the way the rest of the world sees us.

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, there's a lot you can't control and that's exactly right. In fact, I was watching the Super Bowl with my husband and I've just written an opinion-editorial about this. And I couldn't help but think if a farmer in Morocco or a mother in Malaysia saw these ads, what would they think? You know, that Americans go around slapping each other and that we fondle our cars and that we're so desperate for beer that we'd let an axe murderer in the car?

QUESTION: Well, it's hard to watch those and think they're moral.

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, you know, we have a sense of humor.

QUESTION: Right.

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: We know that -- we know the context. We know that the ads are edgy and we've grown up with Saturday Night Live and we know to laugh at ourselves and we know that it's exaggerated. But I couldn't help but think, what do people around the world think? And of course, they don't always see the commercials, the commercials are different in different places, but they do still on the internet and it is -- the -- I say the picture of America, it's a very -- imagine a very complex tapestry on which a lot of different artists come and paint. And some of those, I may have some influence over and a lot of them, I have no influence over.

In fact, I was -- it's interesting, I was in Saudi Arabia and the women there kept -- they were very agitated about something that had happened in America and they kept saying, "Your media portrays us in the wrong way. Your media does this." And you have to think, their context is that the government controls the media, so they were thinking that I, as a government official, was controlling what the media was saying. And it turned out the media they were talking about was actually an Oprah Winfrey show on domestic violence in Saudi Arabia that they thought had portrayed their country in a bad light.

And so you're right; the image of America is -- you know, a lot of different factors contribute to it and it could be even something so simple as the experience you had at an American company, whether you were treated with courtesy or not. A man in China recently said to me -- he said he had come to America and he was very surprised by how family-oriented Americans were, how freely and how -- the variety of churches and synagogues and religious institutions in America. And I asked him -- I said, "Why is that surprising?" I mean, if you ask any American, we know that. And he said America is not the way it looks on television. And so I think we need to think some about how the world sees us on television, because more and more of the world has access to television today.

QUESTION: How responsive do you think Americans are to understanding the rest of the world? And is that where some of the disconnect happens?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: It is where some of the disconnect happens. I mean, we have -- I can't remember the numbers, but the vast majority of Americans, for example, don't have a passport. We -- the rest of the world thinks that we are not interested in the rest of the world. And clearly, one of my missions, one of the things I try to do is to encourage our young people to study the world, to show respect for the rich culture and history and tradition of other parts of the world, to learn the languages of the world.

We have -- President Bush has launched a new National Security Strategic Language Initiative encouraging our young people to study languages like Chinese and Arabic, languages that are going to be so important in an increasingly globalized world. Now a lot of people around the world are learning English because it's becoming the language of international business, but we also need to be able to communicate with other people in their native languages.

And so part of my job, I believe, is also to encourage my fellow Americans to care more about the news of the world. I remember traveling and people telling me -- and I always feel a little humble myself. I mean, I speak a little Spanish from my experience in Texas, but I don't speak any other languages and I regret that. I wish that -- you know, I'm encouraging young people to learn other languages and I'm always very humbled in Europe when I'm at a table and I notice people near me speaking four or five languages.

QUESTION: Is it difficult for you to communicate with people who are sort of on the street level? Being where you are and doing what you do, having to work through a translator, how do you sort of make sure that you're grounded in the real world when you go somewhere and you're working on diplomacy at an upper level and also with regular people?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, you put your finger on a hard -- a very interesting question. I always tell our embassies I don't want the cook's tour. I don't want to go to the place -- if I go to someplace and they say, "Oh, we had Secretary Powell here eight -- five years ago," or "Secretary Albright visited here," I say maybe I'm going to the wrong place, because I think I should be going to places where Americans have never been before. And so there's --

QUESTION: The two-star spots?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Exactly, there -- well, there's a -- you know, there's a mix. I mean, obviously, because of my long association with President Bush, I'm able to meet with a lot of leaders and I think that's important because they're pretty open and honest with me. I can listen to their concerns and I can bring those back and relay them to Secretary Rice and to the President.

At the same time, I want to meet with people that Americans maybe have not met with before. I remember going to Indonesia and I had read an article in The New York Times about a young musician there who's very popular in Indonesia. His name is Dhani and he is a Muslim and he sings about Islam being a religion of peace and tolerance and respect. And it's exactly the message we want to convey, that we understand that those who are engaged in acts of terror are essentially a death cult and do not represent the mainstream teachings of Islam.

And so I told the embassy I want to meet with Dhani and the first thing they said was, "Who? Who's that?" (Laughter.) And the second thing they said was, as we got out of the car to the event, a person there said, "Remember this was her idea." In other words, that's a little -- this is a little dangerous, this is a little edgy. But you should have seen, we went to a low-income housing project and the young people there all knew -- some of them knew the name of their president, some of them knew America and President Bush; all of them knew Dhani. And so I believe it's my job to reach out and to foster those sort of new ties and friendships.

QUESTION: You are, by all accounts, one of the closest advisors the President has had throughout his political career. Have you seen him change as a person since he's taken office as President?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, you know, all of us, given all that we've been through -- I was thinking the other day about all that we've been through since I went to work for him back when he was still just George, before he was even Governor of Texas. All of us change and grow. I mean, I think of the experiences I've had. Obviously, September 11th was such a dramatic, life-changing, horrible event for all of us.

But you know, what I see is, at his core, the same person, a person who loves his family, who is there to try to serve the country, who has the same friends over to the White House that he used to have at his house here in Dallas when he and Mrs. Bush lived here over in Preston Hollow and the same people come to Camp David. The same people come to the White House. And so I think at his core, he's still a person whose faith and family are very important in what guides him.

But obviously, we all learn and grow from our experiences and, of course, he's had -- we've just had historic challenges during the course of his presidency and he's had to make some extremely difficult decisions that I know must be very difficult, although he's a very strong person and I admire the way he is able to not seem to let it -- not seem to let it deter him from doing what he thinks is right.

QUESTION: You call him President Bush even in private now; is --

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Yes.

QUESTION: -- that correct? Was that an odd transition to go from calling him George to then Governor and then Mr. President?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, you know, I don't think so for me so much. I'm a daughter of a career Army officer and so I grew up --

QUESTION: Titles were okay?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: "Yes, ma'am, Yes, sir." Titles are expected and so I just thought it conveyed the respect for the office. And so I used to call them George and Laura, and then when he was elected Governor, I immediately began calling him Governor and then Mrs. Bush, because I think it shows -- conveys a respect for their office.

QUESTION: When you go to bed at night or whenever you do your thinking about what's gone on, are you more likely to be looking back at what happened or looking ahead to what you have the next day?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: I think looking ahead. This is a very challenging assignment, probably the most challenging assignment I've ever had.

QUESTION: Really?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: I think it's really important. Well, it's -- you know, it's -- every country is so different and unique and every -- people everywhere have different issues. And so I've been to -- I've been at the State Department now for 18 months and I've been to, I think, about three dozen countries, you know, more than 150,000 international miles or 170, I think, at the last count. I haven't even added up the last few trips.

And so I just came back, for example, from China and the Philippines. I'm going next week to Mexico and then to Israel and the Palestinian territories and Algeria and I'll be going on to Jordan. And so I'll meet with businesswomen in Jordan and they'll have a set of issues that they're concerned about. In Algeria, there will be unique issues that people there are concerned about. And so part of my job is to listen and try to understand those issues; part of my job is also to appear on television and represent our country.

And so I'm asked about a whole host of issues happening around the world, so it's a very, very challenging job and I think it's very important. I think, you know, it's -- for the future -- the reason I took this job, my son was instrumental, he said, "Mom, you have to." And I was kind of surprised because --

QUESTION: He was famously the one who --

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, and he is going to college, which is what sort of freed me to be able to feel that I fulfilled my responsibility to having him graduate from high school and the place where I thought he would best thrive. And so he had gone off to college and he -- but it meant that I wouldn't be around as much in the summer or on weekends. And I said, "Why?" And he said, "Well, because you really care about it. You talk about it all the time," which I do, because in the aftermath of September 11th, I realized that we really had to work very hard. It was a real recognition of how much hate and misunderstanding there is around the world.

And the second thing is he said, "It's really important for my generation." And I really believe that's true. I mean, I feel like it's really important for the next generation, not only of American children, but also children around the world, that we try to build better bonds of friendship and respect because, you know, we're never going to win this ideological struggle in the long run if children are growing up either being taught or learning to hate America. We've got to represent the truth about our country and the positive values of our country around the world.

QUESTION: When you left the White House initially and moved back to Texas, was it hard not to -- you were always engaged, but was it hard not to be fully in control of everything that you had been before and to let go of that?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: You know, it was actually the best decision I ever made. It was very hard to make the decision. I mean, I remember agonizing over the decision for a month, a month or two. I mean, I would -- at home at night, I would be convinced, okay, we've got to go back to Texas. And then at work, in a day, I would think, there's no way I can go back, look at all the challenges we're facing around the world, I've got to stay here.

So it was a very hard decision to make. Once I made it, I really don't -- because I was able to reconnect with my family. That was one of the things that I was very concerned about was that I felt like I wasn't able to be the wife and the mother that I wanted to be when I was in Washington for those 18 -- those first 18 months. And so I was -- I mean, my son was learning to drive at the time after we moved back and I was -- he had come home from school and we'd spend an hour -- he'd say, "Let's go driving, Mom," and we'd spend an hour in the car. And I had realized if I were in Washington, I would never -- I would be forever -- I would have forever missed this part of his life. And so it was actually a very gratifying time.

You know, I always enjoyed when I -- I think I really -- it was -- I enjoyed when I went back to Washington and I missed the people. I mean, the people -- Condi Rice and President Bush and -- they had become really good friends and we'd been through, as I said, so much together that they're really my friends and we enjoy having dinners together. And so I -- you miss, you know, that dynamic of seeing the friends and colleagues that you've worked with. But I think I was absolutely right to come home and I also enjoyed being able to go to my son's baseball games and help teach him to drive.

QUESTION: When a man steps down from a position or changes careers and says he's going to spend more time with his family, it's like a euphemism for, has been --

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Pushed out. (Laughter.)

QUESTION: -- kicked to the curb. And it seems like no one doubted it on your end for a moment. I don't know if that's perhaps because you're a woman. Did that help that everyone seemed to believe that there was an actual valid family reason and is it fair that we don't assume that about men?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, it's probably not fair, and that's right. I mean -- I think Maureen Dowd wrote in one of her columns that leaving for family reasons was sort of the next -- the step before you were indicted. (Laughter.) You know, and so -- and then she wrote a very nice column about -- you know, I think the reason was -- you know, my son had traveled with me on the presidential campaign for -- we had homeschooled him that fall. I thought it was just a wonderful experience.

QUESTION: He had actually --

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Well, he had actually suggested it. It was the best experience of my professional life, I think, having him with me to see me work and to experience all that and to see our country and to watch the -- and, you know, the wonderful volunteers who come out and the great history that is a presidential campaign. It was also grueling and exhausting.

But we had taken him out of school under the Texas Homeschool Law, believing that traveling on the campaign was a very educational experience and he was able to enroll in a correspondence course for algebra because I couldn't teach that. But I tried to -- we did some other -- we tried to do some other schoolwork on the way, but -- so he had been very much a part of the whole experience and the reporters had seen that and so I think they knew. And though any -- certainly, any of them that knew me and had worked around me for a period of time knew that my family was really important to me and many of them had children in the same school where my son was. And so, you know, at the sidelines at sporting events, I had been talking about how difficult it was for me to balance my career and my family in Washington.

QUESTION: Does he worry about you?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: You know, I don't know; probably. They probably worry a little. I think they're -- you know, it's -- security around the world is -- it's a -- you know, there's terror alerts and all kinds of things like that. But I don't -- I think he's mostly proud of what I'm doing.

QUESTION: Certainly as a journalist, you had a reputation before you went to work for now-President Bush, but so much of your -- the highest pinnacle of your career has been associated with President Bush. Does it worry you that when he's no longer in office, the nature of your work will necessarily change?

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: You know, I don't even really think about that. I've never been one to sort of plot my whole career out. It's funny, I -- when I was growing up, I never dreamed I would one day work at the White House. And my dad was a career Army officer, believed in serving your country, believed in service. But I was -- when I started off, I -- when I went to college, I was very curious. I asked questions. I liked to argue. My mother thought for sure I was going to law school and that's kind of what I thought, "Well, okay, I'll probably go to law school."

And I -- along the way in college, I fell in love with journalism, took a great journalism course from a wonderful professor named Bob Mann and then took a radio/TV news writing class from a man who was the news director at the time at KXAS here in (inaudible). And I just fell in love with the art of marrying pictures and words and I just found a great outlet for my curiosity in journalism, and so I started my career as a reporter, spent seven and a half wonderful years doing that, realized as I covered the political process, how much difference it made in people's lives and decided I wanted to be a part of all that, and so that's what drew me to the political process.

But I've never plotted out my career and said, "Here's what I'm going to do next." I've always just tried to do what I was passionate about at the time in keeping with my priorities in life, which are my family, my faith and my friends. And so that's how I've always tried to approach it. So I don't know what will happen next or what I'll do. I will try to live in the same city with my husband, so I think -- (laughter) -- going back to Austin, Texas. I miss my husband. I miss my beautiful golden retriever dog and I'd like to be closer to my family.

QUESTION: Well, have a great weekend in Austin. Take care.

UNDER SECRETARY HUGHES: Thank you so much.

QUESTION: Karen Hughes is Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. It's been great to have you with us.

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