Grievances as they try to ratify the constitution is also implied or enumerated. And then to show up in the bill of rights. That is very well put it if you want to make up a list of grievances ben noticed the fact it contains a constitutional theory then you get complaints and then the executive power and a long list dustup from jefferson that are his pet peeves that at the end complaints of violations of the of lot. That structure and list of grievances, as from adams. That quebec acted as jeffersons pet peeves you conceded to mind than the two hands working together. With that enumeration which means of course, that it was about equality and the constitution about liberty and those are Different Things. They have the same constitutional theory. Thank you a kiss so much. I appreciate it. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [applause] [applause] [applause] good evening. Thanks for joining us this evening please stand back cover of the men and women that served our freedom to do the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flight of the United States of america. And to the republic for which it stands. One nation, under god, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Now we will have a change conversation Maria Shrivers work is driven by the belief of the architect of change. Then to step out of the comfort zone to give what it takes to create a solution. Not many people know this better than san ann romney. Marriage, children and a storybook life but then in 1988 diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and told there was no treatment and life as she knew it was over. Should refuse to except that was a very first active first idea of massachusetts a grandmother of 23 and eight Award Winning equestrian and found time to found the center for neurologic diseases and now is the global embassador. The Ann Romney Center is a Major Research center to find cures and treatments for alzheimers, multiple sclerosis and other devastating neurological diseases including lou gehrigs and parkinsons. And works to fuel wife giving for future generations. It is surely the epitome of an architect of change. For those that created the series period shriver was an architect of change. With entreprenuership creating programs in issuing reports with the singular goal to a finance women professionally also the leading advocate for families struggling with alzheimers that is why it is important to her as well. Please join me to welcome Maria Shriver and ann romney [applause] let banalities people that came to hear you. Thank you. Thank you for braving the traffic they have chosen to come to listen to you or hillary clinton. [laughter] [cheers and applause] it is wonderful you cannot come to hear a better woman. And she truly is an architect of change i also like to say full disclosure be our friends and have known each other a long time and i am a big admirer of her as a woman, wife, mother, grandmo ther and certainly now as an advocate for people with ms in all neurological diseases but today we will talk about that and have you beryl through some she will take my questions then we will open to questions from the audience. I hope this is lively and fun and inspiring because i do believe every Single Person watching this on cspan is a change in the world. Everybody here has of voice and the mission and lets begin. Is that you and mitt or all of us . Guest good question. I will start with my diagnosis 1998 in the Doctors Office i knew there is something seriously wrong. There was a pamphlet and there were three choices. Als or ms or parkinsons. I knew right away i could narrow it down to als or ms i just narrow reading the berkshires i had one of those two. Mitt and i went into the doctor together he looked at my mri and told me that i had an immense and gracefully left the room. So we cried and mitt had to me he said its not terminal , we will be okay. We are in this together. That is the title of the book. That now that i have lived through this experience and have spent on the campaign trail to see hundreds of thousands of people coming up to me during that time to know they were suffering they were there for me. I kept telling them i will be there for you. I now know we have a box kerry nobody can see that bag of rocks that is over our shoulder if we live long enough youll have a problem were up to our knees. With a loss of a loved ones a glitzy, a failed marriage there is a crisis and there wrote the book now for those that are suffering with ms are going through a crisis in life where they need help and support. So yes we are in this together but were all in this together we travel the earth together. We need to be more compassionate and caring to recognize everybody has a bag of rocks. Host you talk about everybody having a bag of brock said before your diagnosis you said you had a storybook life you felt perfect how about today . Guest ms has been my cruelest teacher and the lessons i have learned to be in the depth of sorrow and despair that it had no value that time was worth nothing anymore. We could hardly take care of myself to have come through that now i can say that a mass i am very grateful to have that because i never would have imagined i could do what i am doing now. I wouldnt have i gone through the would not start to the center, written the book, i doing the things that came from that. Sometimes you the key word delts a bad hand and did you say it was rough but i got through it. To go through the steps of depression that was no use to do anybody. You rightabout losing your identity because she read the center of the family and you did everything he felt like you did not know who you were. I am sure people who have had that experience. If something happens the identity that you have built this appears before your very eyes. Talk about how you build that up with a different identity. It is it context and to run everything then all the sudden you can hardly get out of bed and then to even think what is inside the envelope. But that huge shift brings about the changes that we all have labels and my doctor, lawyer, a journalist , whatever it is what says to the world this is my identity if that was it then basically with the covers over her head. When that happens it is pretty traumatic and i really felt one of the hardest pieces of the book for me to write because i wanted to get right because how tough it is going through situations like this. It made me feel worthless and of no use to never have another day of joy in my life. It was important that i communicate that to let people know others will go to the same identity crisis. To know how upset i was and how down i was he said something pretty wonderful wonderful, i dont love you because you make good dinners because i did. [laughter] ill let you for who you are. That was is a relief that allowed me to be sick and start to heal because i could lead it go. Of who i had built myself into was gone. But now i had to decide what was left inside and what mitt saw and i had to get to the depth of despair to this point and my faith also helped me. Host a lot of people in this room dont have a mitt. [laughter] talk to us about how you had to begin to see what he saw. You must have met people along the way so how educe see yourself . That is where you turn to fade to recognize you are valuable and the loved and cherished by guide and you are important and i have to say with my perspective, it is in gods army, at i am wounded and until they you really dont understand this and the end of but the four others that you are truly loved and cherished by god. I feel i am one of the wounded i like to say it broke my heart but in doing so it opened my heart for a greater ability to have compassion for others. You said people suggested perhaps you had gotten an answer because you could do something with it and you said you dont subscribe to that. Guest no. Host but you have. To be an architect of change because you have stepped up to say this is what it looks like maybe not for everybody but you can continue. Guest again it is not something you would welcome or do i think guide it had been since you. Life is indiscriminate and life happens and bad things happen we cannot escape it. And with some things with the publishers telling me they want to publish the book and they kept saying i dont want it to be about me so many people have suffered so much more and they said we want to hear your story. Despite that i had to include other stories from people who really have had bad the news had been. But despite that they went through this same thing to just want to die and all of that but then the resilience of the human spirit is so extraordinary, and this strength that people have so i had to write about some of those people in the book proposal i wish i had the opportunity to meet with Nelson Mandela because if you look someone who has such a huge impact on the world, he went into prison an angry black revolutionary and can mount the most livent loving and forgiving extraordinary human being. I wanted to figure out what happened or what happens to the human spirit to change from that into that. That is what is wonderful about life we all have that with cydnus to have that impact and change. None of us will have the impact of Nelson Mandela he changed south africa and the world he was an example that will live on. But each one of us can have an influence or the impact for good on the circle that we lived in. That is something we cannot forget. Sometimes we feel theres so much suffering in the world and heartache and poverty and when we have such abundance, how you deal with that frustration you cannot do either of . I love how mitt describes it to my children and said if you think about it as a football field everybody has 10 yards. That is relived. Where you live. You will not cure world hunger but those 10 yards you could have a huge impact you dont have to have a life shattering life to impact the entire world only a few people have done that. But with their your 10 yards you can. If someone comes into my life that i know, that is the person i will help. Host talk about Nelson Mandela how he went in and cave now describe yourself of the way in and on the way out. On the way in self content, the selfish, not a great world view come on the way out broken heart, an urgency and a sense of wanting to let people know that i understand and i want to help to do something and make a difference i mean the neck 50 million lives that are impacted by neurological disease but also the caregiver and the loved ones that have to live with the consequence. Host what do you want to inspire people to do because of your journey . Guest it isnt like i have grey and hopes. [laughter] host id yes you do for you want to find a cure. Guest i keep saying did you find a cure yet . [laughter] we know it takes a long time but i want to be able to have people that are suffering say this is what happens when you are in despair and i know where she went and came out the other end of what to give people hope. I want to give people hope. Host do you understand how it progresses, i get concerned about the diseases to raise billions of dollars to find a cure . Guest we all saw what the ice bucket challenge did many people participated irrigates 100 or 1,000 which is alzheimers i mean als. Host we are in it together. [laughter] guest with fact one pebble it went across the world of my grandchildren did it i think they raised 140 million. They made that one any event such a Ripple Effect i would hope to have just a fraction but to raise awareness to let people know for right now is somebody has that diagnosis there is nothing a dr. Kiev do except ibm so sari and you will die within five years of very slowly and horrible death. With alzheimers you get the diagnosis and they send you home and tell the of family were sorry this is nothing we can do. I feel were on the threshold to a great discoverer one year to do talk about this as well. About Alzheimers Research to literally have the kind of impact than the change of the millions of people. Host this is a good example that parties mean nothing because as a republican nor a democrat or the independent were both committed to the diseases that she talks about and my dad died of alzheimers. In day disproportionately affect women so a woman in her early sixties is twice as likely to get alzheimers as Breast Cancer 70 million americans are caregiving their unpaid family members. So to get these president ial candidates to talk about his care giving and Brain Research and what we can do is a United Nations and United States to focus to find cures for these diseases because i ayrshire if you have a steady for parkinsons and alzheimers or a cure for rms or als but with the and Romney Center you say look at all of these together because they affect so many family members and care givers and children that is why i am so excited to work with you. We try to say there is hope for people to get diagnosed early there are Clinical Trials but there is still a lot of the year. The one to come back and say when you went to the Doctors Office you knew something was wrong. So many people know but they are afraid. You talk about those not wanting to go because you were afraid. So why would you advocate if they feel like something is wrong or a parent, why should they go . Because there is exciting things going on whether at the Ann Romney Center in terms of research. Guest as example of why i got so excited at our last board meeting, id the neck your nephew . My cousin once removed. [laughter] it is a kennedy. [laughter] your husband rand against miami uncle so here we are. [laughter] [applause] they became great friends and they Work Together and really did it was extraordinary. And we were so sad when your uncle died of the incurable brain tumor. But i do want to say we have an Extraordinary Group of doctors and researchers at a steadying that find very out of the box approaches were these diseases and are compounding right now available for human trials in 2017 and nasal vaccine for alzheimers. [applause] these things are happening. Then we have to get people focused were working on wipeout alzheimers because womens brains in particular why is this happening not just because people are living longer than they say it happens to old people. Not so. Als happens to people in their prime and you were 50 years old. See a good thing something is wrong but you dont want to go to the doctor. So what plus you out of the freer why would you say that is a good thing . I am fortunate i have a brother is us a doctor i would describe to him and he was so kind during that time and finally said you have got to go. After two or three months arabia even in a year i knew something was wrong. I would trip, my lady would go numb my leg like it was asleep. But the real problem was the fatigue people do not appreciate the fatigue that they have. It is unrelenting and unforgiving it is horrible and rules your life. It is different in you even have either what theyre really bad flu and cannot get out of bed . Is backed that completely takes a hold of your wife and i knew i had to figure out there was something really wrong and what it was. In a strange way i was relieved to get the diagnosis because then there was a label why i was feeling this way in to say no i cannot do that. Host mother alzheimers or in early diagnosis it does make available for certain trials the earlier you get in the more they can help you you talk about hitting yet early and headed a hard so if you do suspect something is wrong or a loved one to get an early and had a hard hit it hard. You talk about the debilitating disease and then running for president. [laughter] that is usually debilitating [laughter] the prescription is dont over fatigues yourself with a normal schedule. [laughter] eat healthy and exercise in a president ial campaign a remember once getting dinner out of the vending machine. Only once . [laughter] you are hungry of lot and eat anything. Routine for you are exhausted, traveling all the time the possibility of leaving getting on an airplane i could not do it. No way those first three or four years. The fact that they did that is miraculously that i could have the strength and stamina to do that. I still fatigue were quickly and i had to watch it but i have learned how to manage myself at that point and i am so grateful i am one of the very few that have spent a Great Mission for a very long time and i am so grateful for that. [applause] host it is important to explain she said she does not look sick. She is beautiful. Talk about that. There are two different types i know others who are incapacitated and end up in a wheelchair so how can you be in remission . A lot of blood is done and mri people want to know why i do so well. The codirector of Ann Romney Center i am in decline study of 2500 patients we are following very carefully like the nurses study for hearts with the same idea. As you can imagine those 2500 that are being tracked are varying degrees of disability. I am one of the few that is doing as well that you can see. I dont know why. You talk about force is and reflexology and of the alternative. And others may not do as well there is a lot of mystery. There is a great drug for a mass some works for some and not others but then you have progressive or relapsing in the past very few drugs have impact then they get weaker than they are in the wheelchair then downhill. If you have relapsing you go down did you recover but if you go down enough overtime been there with a walker they have been having a prolonged period of time but now with drugs were finding we want to reduce the frequency of the attack and the duration. That is working but also the genome project that made the biggest difference progress we find out we cant take someones blood to say this drug will work and that will not to find pickier is much further away but that is why i am hopeful about alzheimers. To be so sophisticated of the mri imaging. And then to figure out amyloid plaque develops of the brain of alzheimers patients 20 years before symptoms. Take it one step at a time. Doesnt make a difference . It does. So some of these the drug czar breaking up that plaque there is said to a wideopen field with so much potential the reason it will become more hopeful is because of the diagnostic tools. So encourage there really to go into neuroscience. [laughter] to make it a field that is attractive and has all the bright young minds if we put the best and the brightest to focus i always said we command a man on the moon but we need a woman to figure it out. [laughter] tried to figure out a nasal problem they discovered though talks people trip over terrors the more People Better in the field so it is great to encourage them to go into neuroscience because there are some of the disease is of the brain if we make today priory we will find a cure. There is a political debate going on as we sit here. And you came to Hillary Clintons defense says you talk about that she is not likable or trustworthy and you said you know, what it is like to be in that situation in the neck was not fair. I also think sometimes when get tougher scrutiny. Their hair and their close certainly it is more challenging of what is evident with his feminine leadership look like . That is is a lady like they should not do that or a basketball player said a woman should not be president she is too emotional. We have a republican and democratic woman riding. Running. I thought there was so much unfair and cruel politics is improving while it should be to read peoples lives better. If thats why we are motivated why do we have to be everybody up . Deerfield that have been to you . I knew it would happen if you took that as part of what you had to go through. I never got that upset which is amazing. I knew it would happen but the political system now is where the agenda is that we cannot ag cannot let that happen. But there has to be some point we have to believe in something. [applause]. I think along with Many Americans i feel the same disenfranchisement from politicians that do not respond to the best will of the people. That special interest are ruling, mondays ruling whatever it is, corporations are having the biggest impact in washington but not the citizens. I think frustration is spilling out into the political arena right now in whats going on. Do you sit there and watch the republican debates . Are you one of the 24 million tuning in . I watch them and i will watch this one as well. Are you watching the republican debates . Having her dissipated into president ial election cycles and participated where i was at the debates i think mitt had 20 debates. Republican debates, not elections i think im kind of amazed at whats going on. Can you elaborate and tell me more . You are kind of amazed that what . I will say the fact that more people are watching is a good thing. The fact that people are disparaging women or ethnic groups is not a good thing so for me you know its like again its important to me to have stability because civility brings conversation. Civility brings the ability to respect one another and you cannot work with somebody if you do not respect them and you are not civil with them. If we expect our leaders to be good leaders [applause] how can we have someone calling people a bad name being the leader of the free word free world. Which you find yourself challenged if a certain person was calling people names . [laughter] say the republican nominee would you find yourself challenged voting for that person . It would give me posit. [laughter] so is that undecided . [laughter] what is fat . That as this is a long election process and i trust the American People that the end of the day we will get to a person and whatever that is whether in the democratic or the republican side there will be people that we believe will be able to be that of the free world that will be able than to be a true leader which in true leadership you have to be able to communicate and be respectful and have dialogue that will lead to some conclusion that will be positive. We cant get there any other way. Thats the political answer. [applause] you said you have been through two president ial campaigns. Give people a sense of whats the families of those candidates are going through right now. If any of you had the opportunity to see this mitt movie you will know it really is behindthescenes. You never see strategy meetings because by the way they would never let me in. Greg whitely did this film and it really is behindthescenes. Maria no, maria knows you know how hard it is on the family. We love our families and we see them being criticized and maligned and its hard. They become defensive and im unlike the she line when it comes to my husband. In some ways i think it was harder for me than it honestly was for mitt to be going through because i always wanted to be defending him and being his advocate in every way. He is always mine so you know, but on the other hand i have to say what an amazing experience. You having been involved in know what its like preticket to meet people, you get to see whats going on in the country. You were there with the pulse of whats happening and when you are in iowa and of a small town iowa and about a smalltown sunni go to New Hampshire and all the small towns talking to people all the time and you go to South Carolina and ugoda california and michigan and that they go to ohio you are talking to people all the time. It is very energizing on that level where you really come away with an appreciation for our liberties, our freedoms, our extraordinary citizens that really love this country and love democracy and freedom and you come away energized from it. Its an extraordinary experience so i would say theres the good and the bad as there is in everything in life to a Political Campaign is so strenuous and so difficult and it stresses you to the limit really every day it stresses you to the limit. Anything thats hard in life you learn from and you go from and hopefully thats where i feel as though in the end it was. I think every young person should be required to work in a Political Campaign because its where you actually see the country. Its where you see and meet people from different parties and different beliefs because we become so segregated. We watch the channel you want to watch where youre put all opinions can be important in a neighborhood where maybe people think the same issue but when you get out there and you start campaigning and you have to meet people of different political persuasions it really does give you a different understanding of the country. Knowing that im watching this campaign, no we should be in there. [applause] especially when you see the discourse and you see whats happening. It is tempting. We made that decision in january. We thought about it for 20 seconds. Why did you say no . Is so interesting, we had no idea was coming. Obviously no one did what was going to calm tumultuous but it was just like my dad and mitts god, it didnt feel right. It just didnt have that feeling that we should do it. And you had that feeling the other two times. We definitely have that feeling the other two times and you have to have that otherwise you will never be able to sustain the difficulty that you have to go through every single day. I was just interviewing a young woman last week who started the company which is an blood diagnostic company. Many that people were saying the young people going into business they that is the way to change the world. Politics no longer is the place to create change, to create impacts. I was saying when i was growing up if you wanted to change the world he went into politics and now people say forget it, you cant get anything accomplished with politics. You have to go into business. Would he think of that . I would say right now i kind of agree with that because what is happening in washington is such stagnation there are anice got to be frustrating to those that are serving. I know everyone is very frustrated because they are trying to get rings done and they can be there. I think for me again i feel so content right now and so happy to know that mitt and i are going to making an impact in ways that are going to be meaningful and really significant that arent necessarily going to be in the political arena. So we might look to politics to fund a lot of this research and thats why think you are going around the country. The proceeds of this book are actually going to the Ann Romney Center going around trying to raise a lot of money so many of the trials which cost a fortune, doctors can be funded to create these trials. Thats a big part of what you are trying to do. Not only to talk about them but also to raise money so doctors have the funds to do the trials. Maybe a lot of you are to understand this but a lot of the Research Done in this country is done by the nih and nih dollars have been shrinking along with all other dollars in this country, but if you want to do for instance in our center could want to do something experimental that is a little bit outside the box, for instance an als drug trial we are doing for a nasal vaccine. The nra just not going to fund that until its up and running and sees that its working. If you want to see the really brilliant breakthroughs its going to have to come from philanthropic dollars. That is something that i think is really important to people under for people to understand. The real breakthroughs are going to come from citizens getting behind in helping support some of this research. The tone for they have become more and more important because of that. The nih dollars are shrinking and because anything thats new will come through for land purpy. And what it cost to run for office, a billion dollars. What we did could do with a billion dollars. Melissa have some questions that people were down for ann romney. I would like to make a comment about that. I would say its much easier to read raise political dollars than it has been to raise research dollars. This is something we can begin to change right now. You are inspiring us that we are going to start raising some research dollars. [applause] ann and i were talking and i said bush and clinton would have embraced all this money in a bipartisan way for disaster of eight. You and i are going to have to crisscross the world to raise money for Brain Research and philanthropic dollars so we can fight these diseases. [applause] okay so heres a question. We have time for few questions and im going to start with one for both of you. As a woman of the 21st century what they believe is the most important attribute our generation of women can leave america . A cure for alzheimers. I think feminine leadership is incredibly important. I think one of the things i learned from my mother and my grandmother and something we wrote about on our web site is that raising a child takes your energy, emotion and time and perhaps its one of the greatest gifts we can leave this country. I think one of the dash. [applause] ancop wrote an incredible piece for morey Maria Shriver. Com on her role as mom being as important as the worker husband was doing outside of the home and it created i should say in 2015 quite a discussion about that. Im hoping that women who step forward as architects of change that we can just put that discussion to rest that women no longer need to be debating that amongst each other. We need to be valued and everybodys role and everybodys choices. And we become sympathetic to peoples choices. What we hope for is to leave welladjusted children. I have 23 grandchildren. I have none. I have a lot of work to do and i feel like my work, i feel like it was a good mother and that my boys are wonderful adults so i feel. I think its so important that we talk about male and female that we are all better off if women have something that we can give and that is the ability to bear children. By having that experience of loving a child, there is something that is quite feminine about that love and i think we cant lose sight of the fact that we have, because of that gift we have we have the unique ability to loving care. I think we have as women can have a huge impact on the world through that godgiven quality of truly loving children and its really a special thing. You know we lose track of people saying the feminist Movie Movement and saying you had been a business. I dont agree with that. We cant forget that i believe are basic nature is loving and kind and if we want to have a huge impact on the world we have to develop that. I agree with that and the pope was talking about beginning a culture of care. It can institute a culture of care, and are businesses and care about employees who are taking care parents and care about employees who are taking care of inlaws. But if we just begin to talk about the culture of care are being conscious about the world we live in thats an extension of what the pope was talking about and what you were talking about as well. Someone asked ankara how have you managed 23 grandchildren . Not very well. We are all under one roof and you figure out five sons, five daughters on line 23 grandchildren that means breakfast lunch and dinner and there are a lot of babies and a lot of chaos but we really make an effort mitt id do to think about that and think about things that we want to teach them and principles that they want them to have. So we structured things in such a way that we will have discussions or Family Councils are Different Things in the children and even my grandchildren no whats important to mitt a night. Obviously their parents as well but we find its a wonderful opportunity when theyre all together to emphasize the fact that we want to be servants, that we want to help one another and we want to produce a page in helping those that are less privileged. That becomes something that is important to us and we want our children and grandchildren to understand. Thats a value that we have as a family. Mitts father George Romney was friends with sarge shriver, your dad. They were very good friends and both of those men i believe have had a Ripple Effect on the generation. They were extraordinary human beings but stepped outside of themselves. George romney was president of american motors and the governor of mission and michigan and then he ran for president. Volunteer america, and so we saw that. That was a powerful thing in my life, and im sure your dad was a powerful impact in your life. We saw service firsthand, and people that we knew and loved stepping outside of themselves and doing things. And there is not a prayer that mitt would have even considered politics if he hadnt seen his father george do it. And his mother, right . Lenore too. She ran for senate. So i think theres legacy that is important, so thank you for that question, because i think our legacy is, i want it to be that our grandchildren know that we serve others and help others. But i also think on your Facebook Page i saw the annual family talent show, so a lot of fun there too. We have fun too. F so i think this is going to be the last question. A sorry, theres a lot here, but were running out of time. O my niece was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis at 6 years old. Today at 18, shes a freshman in college. Is there anything she might be able to take away from your living with ms that mightpi inspire her when shes in the hospital . That is so 6 years old. I have another really good friend who has a child with the same. And, you know, thats really, really hard when you see small children. And i think for her to know that in her lifetime there will beli more and better and more progressive and aggressive treatments where is it a girl . Will live in a place where not only will she have fewer attacks, but we are were on the threshold of this nerve regeneration where people that, you know, have spinal cord injuries and all there are things happening that are so exciting. I wish you could all be in the meetings that im in. And im sure, maria, you too where you see whats coming and these brilliant engineers and scientists that are working to make and improve peoples lives so that even if she does lose some function, that theres hope again with regeneration of cells and treating not only just the symptoms, but getting to the point where your function is going to be better. And thats the future. You still feel like youre carrying a bag of rocks . I feel as though my bag of rocks has been made so much lighter by all the people that i know who came up to me all the time and said im praying for you, im with you, we love you. It was so extraordinary to have that experience of going across the country and having that kind of response. Has this given you a sense of purpose that perhaps you didnt have . You