The Education of an Idealist

by Samantha Power

  At the top of our meeting, President Obama pinpointed the challenge: “There is the epidemiology of this, and then there is the sociology of it.” As Cass had pointed out to me, more Americans had married Kim Kardashian than had died of Ebola. But the national panic was real, and it risked crippling our response.

  American politicians seemed to relish the opportunity to declare that they would not allow hermetically sealed hospital waste from Ebola patients even to transit their states on the way to a landfill. Amid such uproar for only four cases diagnosed in the United States,* the challenge before us was securing funding despite the fact that some of the very people who were fueling the frenzy controlled the purse.

  As the highest-level US official to have visited the region, I was thrilled to be able to affirm from the plane that our interventions were working. I told President Obama and the rest of the national security team that I had seen US troops operating around the world in places like Bosnia, Kosovo, Kuwait, and Iraq, but that I had never witnessed such creativity and rapid returns. I described the impact of US lab technology, the increase in safe burials, and the flood of new recruits to training programs, as well as the gratitude expressed by leaders and ordinary citizens.

  Knowing the President’s frustration about “free-riding” in the international system, I also laid out in detail what China, the UK, France, and even small countries like Cuba were contributing. I confidently stated that we were going to end the Ebola epidemic. However, knowing the pressure he was under to announce new travel restrictions, I finished with a plea: “Mr. President, my appeal to you is to wait before making any move.” Our embassies in the region had explained that they had already dramatically slowed the processing of visa requests, and I relayed the message that they could easily, quietly, dial back the flow even further.

  “But,” I said, “we lead the world no matter what we do. If we announce a new policy of visa restrictions, every European country will follow our lead, and it will have a devastating effect on morale at just the time it is finally rising.”

  I also argued that, no matter what we announced, Congress would inevitably demand more concessions from us down the line.

  “If we can wait, even just a few weeks,” I said, “we will have evidence to show that our way is working.”

  The President was in full agreement. His public comments had been clear. “America is not defined by fear,” he had said. “America is defined by possibility. When we see a problem and we see a challenge, then we fix it.” Congress would not be back in session until November 12th. Obama told us we had until that date to turn anecdotes and impressions into hard facts.

  Our next stop was Brussels, where I would be lobbying the deep-pocketed European Union to expand its contribution. In my thick binder of preparatory reading materials, I came across an essay that MSF had posted on its blog the previous week from a Liberian worker named Alexander James who had been traveling around the country educating communities on Ebola. “Sunday, the twenty-first of September, is a day I will never forget in my life,” James wrote:

  At that time, Ebola had come to Liberia so I tried to talk to my family about the virus and to educate them, but my wife did not believe in it. I called my wife begging her to leave Monrovia and bring the children north so we could be together here. She did not listen. She denied Ebola.

  Later that night, my brother called me. “Your wife has died.” I said, “What?” He said, “Bendu is dead.” I dropped the phone. I threw it away and it broke apart. We were together for 23 years. She understood me. She was the only one who understood me very well. I felt like I’d lost my whole memory. My eyes were open, but I didn’t know what I was looking at. I had no vision.

  James went on to describe how his two daughters and his brother had then died of Ebola as they tried to care for each other. Only his son, Kollie, also staying in the house in Monrovia, was still alive. James met up with his son in the northern part of the country, where Kollie too was diagnosed with Ebola. James continued:

  When the test came back positive, it was a night of agony for me. I didn’t even shut my eyes for one second. I spent the whole night just crying and thinking about what would happen now to my son . . .

  I was able to see Kollie in the care center from across the fence, so I called out to him, “Son, you’re the only hope I got. You have to take courage. Any medicine they give to you, you have to take it.” He told me, “Papa, I understand. I will do it. Stop crying Papa, I will not die, I will survive Ebola. My sisters are gone, but I am going to survive and I will make you proud . . . ”

  When finally I saw him come out, I felt so very, very happy. I looked at him and he said to me, “Pa, I am well.” I hugged him. Lots of people came to see him when he came outside. Everybody was so happy to see him outside . . . Since then, he and I do everything together. We sleep together, we eat together and we have been conversing a lot. I asked him, “What’s your ambition after you graduate from high school?” He’s a tenth-grade student. He told me that he wants to study biology and become a medical doctor. That’s what he told me!

  . . . He is 16 now, so I will make him my friend. Not just my son, but my friend, because he’s the only one I have to talk to. I cannot replace my wife, but I can make a new life with our son.

  A family of six, reduced to two, and almost to one. As I read this story, all the pent-up emotion I had been carrying during the trip came pouring out.

  IN THE END, the surge of resources, from money and health workers to buckets and SIM cards, meant West Africans got what they needed to conquer Ebola.

  Although the affected African countries would suffer several small flare-ups thereafter, Liberia was declared Ebola-free for the first time on May 9th, 2015. Sierra Leone rid itself of the disease on November 7th, 2015. And Guinea got a clean bill of health on December 29th, 2015.* Some 28,000 people were infected with Ebola, and more than 11,000 people ultimately died, but the curve depicted on The Slide never came to pass.

  The most deadly and dangerous Ebola outbreak in history was beaten above all because of the heroic efforts of the people and governments of Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone. Their national health responders were on the front lines battling the virus from the very beginning, providing care, staffing treatment units, and educating affected communities. Their citizens took it upon themselves to change the way they interacted with one another, avoiding hugs and even handshakes. The people of the region labored to track down every single contact that an Ebola-infected neighbor may have had. And, if a loved one died, they developed the discipline to avoid the burial rituals they had long cherished.

  America’s involvement was also crucial. President Obama ordered a mission that played an essential role supporting Africans fighting the disease. Obama’s leadership also gave despairing people a reason to believe that Ebola could be beaten. By refusing to impose the travel ban that even prominent figures in his own party were calling for, he maintained leverage to rally other world leaders to resist as well.

  In the wake of this effort, an unusual wave of confidence washed over the UN. The combination of ending the Ebola epidemic and concluding the Iran nuclear deal in 2015 made diplomats believe for the first time in a while that diplomacy and collective action could, in fact, make the world better and safer.

  Despite this success, the polarization that was increasingly defining American politics and society meant that those who had objected to Obama’s efforts never acknowledged how effectively he had managed the crisis. Our health workers and soldiers never got the bipartisan embrace they deserved for their bravery and sacrifice. Mostly, the United States and the world just moved on.

  I continued proudly to describe what President Obama and American doctors, nurses, health workers, aid workers, diplomats, and soldiers had accomplished together. I used Ebola as an example of why the world needed the United Nations, because no one country—even one as powerful as the United States—could have slayed the epidemic on its own.

  Only
months later did I learn about an incident that had happened while I was in West Africa. A group of agitated parents at Declan’s school had urged that he be kept home under self-quarantine for twenty-one days following my return. Fortunately, the school’s administrators had declined.

  — 35 —

  Lean On

  Whenever I worked at home at night and during the weekend, Declan seemed to delight in making his presence felt. “Mommy,” he said during one of my calls with the secretary-general, “Can I ask you something?”

  I shook my head and whispered, “I’m on the phone.”

  “Mommy, it’s important.”

  “This is important too,” I said, cupping my hand over the receiver. “I’ll be off in a minute.”

  “Mommy,” he persisted, “what’s the score of the Nationals game?”

  Another time, after failing to get my attention as I participated in a White House conference call on Russia sanctions, Declan stomped away, muttering, “Putin, Putin, Putin . . . When is it going to be Declan, Declan, Declan?”

  Rían, who has an unusually generous heart, tended to forgive my distractedness.

  On days when I took her to the YMCA for a swim, or stayed off my phone during her weekend soccer practice, she had a habit of graciously awarding me extra credit.

  “That was incredible,” she would say. “You watched me play the whole time!”

  María regularly packed a snack and a change of clothes in Rían’s backpack for these outings. But when she was away, I was prone to leaving home empty-handed.

  Rían would shake her head knowingly and ask, “Did you forget again?”

  “Unfortunately, yes,” I would admit. “But, remember I—”

  And then, in a kind of game that developed between us, before I could finish, she would say: “I know what you are going to say, Mommy: You have other qualities!”

  NOT LONG BEFORE I BECAME UN AMBASSADOR, Facebook executive Sheryl Sandberg published Lean In, her influential book about the significant obstacles that women confront on their paths to professional and personal achievement. Sandberg, who had worked in the US government before moving to the private sector, argued that women needed to raise their voices in meetings, put themselves forward for advancement, and demand more equal contributions from their partners at home.

  Because I was juggling my job in the Obama administration with raising two young children, I was often asked by journalists where I came down on Sandberg’s argument. In responding, I sometimes said that the weight of my balancing act often made “fall down” a more apt description of my life than “lean in.” But usually I invoked Hillary Clinton, who I once heard say, “It’s not so much lean in as lean on.”

  With Cass teaching in Cambridge during the week, I myself leaned most heavily on María, Mum, and Eddie. But I also depended on friends like Laura, who after working a long day at Human Rights Watch faithfully dropped by the Waldorf every Wednesday night to play with the kids. Hillary, John, my law school classmate Elliot, and a legion of other friends carved out time to act as an extended family. Without this support network, I don’t know how Declan and Rían would have transitioned so smoothly to our radically different life in New York City.

  My friends and family helped me adapt the ornate Waldorf apartment for the kids. We taught Rían to use a scooter by jogging alongside her as she trundled across the hardwood and carpeted floors. And we took turns pitching Wiffle balls to Declan in the spacious “great room” where I generally held receptions with foreign ambassadors and dignitaries.

  “Pure power!” Declan would exclaim after whacking a Ping-Pong or squash ball the length of the room, as John attempted to make a diving stop before the ball clattered against the grand piano. Fearing a fire hazard, every few weeks Mum, María, or I would recover balls from the chandelier. Once, as I stood on top of a dining room chair and used Declan’s bat to dislodge a ball that had gotten wedged among the glass pendants, I said to Cass, “I just can’t see Adlai Stevenson or Jeane Kirkpatrick doing this.”

  Early mornings were precious because, thanks to María, I could focus on the kids themselves, rather than the frantic last-minute preparations for school. At around 6:30 a.m., before Washington or UN meetings began, Declan and Rían would pile into Cass’s and my bed as María packed their lunches, and we would take turns ranking the highlights of the previous day. When Cass was in town, he would play Steve Earle’s “Galway Girl” from his laptop, in honor of his dark-haired, blue-eyed daughter, and show Declan YouTube highlights of the baseball greats. Both kids would watch endless videos of dogs—German shepherds, Rhodesian ridgebacks, and yellow Labs—preparing for the choice Cass promised they would have when we moved as a family back to Massachusetts. Rían developed an all-consuming interest in ChapStick and lip gloss, slotting the different flavors into a neon pink plastic briefcase as methodically as I had once stored my baseball cards. As I got ready for work, and as María turned to getting Declan dressed, Rían would recruit me to test out her latest exotic acquisition.

  After breakfast, María would walk Rían by stroller to her daycare a few blocks from the Waldorf, while I would accompany Declan to his more distant school in my armored car. On these morning trips, thanks to the fact that an agent on my security detail did the driving, I was able to sit beside Declan in the back and help him learn to read. With the agents often complimenting him when he sounded out a hard word, this regular “read-time” allowed Declan to master the Batman phonics books, graduate to chapter books, and eventually devour the whole Harry Potter series. Whenever he managed to read five pages aloud during our trip, I would buy him a donut in his school cafeteria. On days he managed even more, I threw in a bonus side of bacon.

  Because so many of the agents who provided security were parents themselves, they were wonderfully sensitive to the awkwardness of people in dark suits staking out a school pickup or hovering as I pushed Rían on the swings at the playground. They did their best to be unobtrusive.

  Sometimes, I was overwhelmed by the agents’ thoughtfulness. From the time she was a baby, Rían had been plagued by frequent ear infections, and when she was three years old, began to show signs of hearing loss. Her doctor told us that he could fix the problem by removing her tonsils and adenoids and inserting tiny tubes in her ears. On the day of her operation, Cass and I helped her into the back of the armored vehicle just after dawn as we prepared to head to New York-Presbyterian Hospital. She squealed with delight when she spotted what was sitting strapped into her car seat: a stuffed white bunny adorned with a pink bow.

  “This is the best surgery ever,” she proclaimed. With all that was going on, I hadn’t remembered to get her a good-luck gift—but the agents delivered.

  The other UN ambassadors were similarly generous toward my family. Halfway through my tenure, Boubacar Boureima, Niger’s Ambassador to the UN, told me that the African ambassadors were “all talking” about how much they enjoyed getting to know Mum and Eddie and seeing Declan and Rían race around the apartment. The inclusion of three generations of my family in large gatherings, he said, “was creating a different impression of the United States,” one with which they could identify. “Family matters so much to Africans,” he explained. “The big power seems much more open to us.”

  I had not been trying to make a statement by including Mum, Eddie, and the kids when I held events at the Waldorf apartment. With a job that didn’t allow much free time, I was simply hoping to maximize every moment with them.

  Animal-obsessed, Declan and Rían quickly realized they could talk to my colleagues from around the world about their home countries’ wildlife. The normally reserved Namibian ambassador, Wilfried Emvula, became an effusive storyteller when he had the chance to talk about his country’s cheetahs. At one reception, Declan and Rían convinced Egyptian ambassador Amr Aboulatta to leave the main gathering and visit their bedroom, where they showed off their diverse stuffed animal collection. Amr eyed the array, and then shook his head in mock outrage, affec
ting injury. “How can you have a pink flamingo and not have a camel?”

  “I am so sorry,” Declan said with great seriousness. “I will ask Santa for a camel.”

  Declan’s favorite animals were elephants, leading him to fixate on Zimbabwe—the country that his National Geographic map depicted with the highest elephant concentration. When other ambassadors invited him to visit their countries, he would apologetically say that he was planning to visit Zimbabwe first. After hearing a version of this exchange several times, I decided to describe Robert Mugabe’s repressive rule to Declan in accessible terms.

  I told him that the leader of Zimbabwe was not terribly nice to the people who lived there. He locked up those who criticized him and gave the country’s riches to his friends.

  “Why don’t they get somebody else?” Declan asked, leading me to explain that Mugabe would not allow the Zimbabwean people to choose a new leader. As a result, I said, we were not likely to visit anytime soon.

  Declan considered this new information and, solutions-oriented, asked, “How old is Mugabe?”

  When I answered “ninety-one,” he broke into a large smile. “Great,” he said, “so we will be able to see the elephants pretty soon.”

  I didn’t bring up the topic again, but every few months he would ask for an update on Mugabe’s health. In 2017, when the Zimbabwean president was forced out of office, I showed Declan video footage of the street celebrations. But by then he was canny enough to ask, “Is the new guy better?”

  At times, I wasn’t sure if I was wise to translate aspects of my work life into language the kids could understand. Declan’s favorite books at the time were the British Mr. Men series. The characters each bore the names of their personalities: Mr. Mean, Mr. Chatterbox, Mr. Greedy, Mr. Lazy, Mr. Strong, and so on. I would sometimes spin the globe around, point to a country, and then describe that country’s ambassador, giving him a Mr. Men nickname. In light of the many events held at the residence, though, it was inevitable that Declan would personally encounter one of these “characters” from our game. Luckily, even at a young age, he had the sense not to cause a diplomatic incident, and would only whisper to me excitedly when he realized that an ambassador he had just met was the Mr. Impossible we had been discussing a few weeks earlier.