A bracing session with a man who has his own strong opinions but who is capable of looking even at them with some perspective: "If you recommend policies that are so sensitive that they have to be put in place exactly as you recommend them ... for all practical purposes you are recommending policies that can't work, for the political process is never going to take one idea and put it in place precisely as Art Laffer or Les Thurow thinks it ought to be put in place." And a salutary reminder: "If you take the real-world scientists--geologists, meteorologists, people who study earthquakes--their prediction records and their ability to control is no better than economists'."