An excerpt from U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s book “A Fighting Chance” describing a car ride she took with then-Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner:
On my first day on the job, Secretary Geithner asked me out to lunch. When I showed up in his office, he said, “I have a present for you.” He held out a cop’s hat. Perfect!
Heading for a restaurant that he said was one of his favorites, we bounced along in the backseat of an SUV driven - very fast - by one of his security guys. I had put on my seat belt before the car pulled out of the Treasury encampment, but as we sped along I noticed that the secretary was unbelted. Like a bossy third-grade teacher I looked at him and said, “Put on your seat belt, Mr. Secretary.”
Like a naughty kid, he looked back and said, “I don’t have to.”
He explained with obvious pride that the car was bulletproof and that the driver and his partner were both highly trained and carried big guns. “We’re safe here,” he said in a tone meant to end the conversation.
“What? Are you kidding?” I said. “What good is that if we get hit and this thing turns over a few times turns and you smash your head against that great bulletproof window?” I think I may have raised my voice a little.
He didn’t put on his seat belt all the way to the restaurant.
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Excerpted from “A Fighting Chance.” Copyright (c) 2014 by Elizabeth Warren. Reprinted with permission of Metropolitan Books, an imprint of Henry Holt and Company, LLC.
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