The Summer NPQ ( New Perspectives Quarterly ) has arrived, with an emphasis on the dissension gripping the Islamic world. Articles include "The Essence of Islamist Resistance: A Different View Of Iran, Hezbollah, and Hamas", "Iran's Crisis of Legitimacy" and "A Global Convergence Against Globalization?" The usual stable of stars serve as contributors on a number of topics, including legendary M16 agent Alistair Crooke, Iranian lawyer and 2003 Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi, former Kabul CIA station chief Graham Fuller, current CIA Director Leon Panetta, former U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad, Nobel laureates Joseph Stiglitz, Myron Scholes, Gary Becker and Roger Myerson, commentator Arianna Huffington, Tiananmen uprising leader Wang Dan, 2008 Nobel laureate Jean-Marie Gustav le Clezio, and others. Scope it out on the current Jackson periodical stacks.
Coming to a town hall near you: angry citizens opposed to the Waxman-Markey bill. The bill creates a cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gas emissions. An article in the Irish Times claims that the American Petroleum Institute (API), representing the US oil industry, wrote to member companies asking them to "move aggressively" and stage up to 22 public meetings similar to recent protests against President Obama's healthcare plans. Success breeds success, and the success of the healthcare protests at town hall meetings has allegedly motivated the API to stage its own -- with an appropriate number of protesters -- against imminent climate change legislation.
With a new administration in Washington, government regulation is back. In the United States., industries and sectors representing more than a third of the nation's economy -- including financial services, automobiles, health care, and telecom -- are being reshaped. Many are asking how regulations will impact those businesses. Former Labor Secretary Robert Reich offers his perspective in the July / August issue of the Harvard Business Review on how the government will manage and regulate business in the foreseeable future.
In Learning To Live With Radical Islam, Fareed Zakaria believes we should take a step back from heated rhetoric and try to understand the phenomenon of Islamic radicalism. Not all radicals are terrorists, and Zakaria proposes we pick our battles. He makes a powerful argument for recognizing the reality of radical Islam, though this is entirely different from accepting any extremist ideas. We must defend our own values and views and pursue policies that will make others accept the shared aim of reducing cruelty and corruption. If we walk the walk, others will follow.
"You are there!" So said the old radio broadcasts. But with Photosynth you are there, at the Obama inauguration, in the midst of the crowd. The technology on the CNN site allows you to look up and down, turn around. Photosynth takes pictures from individual volunteers and blends them into a continuous image or landscape. Learn more from a snazzy demo on Photosynth given at a TED (Technology Entertainment Design) conference.
Over the last few days NPR has been presenting a series on Russia’s natural gas giant Gazprom. Most of central Europe depends on Russia for most of its natural gas, which has put Russia in a very powerful political position since most houses are heated with natural gas. Listen to report entitled Gazprom And Russia's Foreign Policy.
The New Perspectives Quarterly Fall 2008 issue, now on the rack, addresses itself to globalization and power shifts. Shall the West remain dominant, or is a new paradigm at hand? As usual, a clutch of world thought leaders ponder 'big picture' topics such as China's rise to dominance after centuries of eclipse, the new "crisis of faith" facing Western secularism, challenges to globalization, and more. Contributors include German sociologist Jurgen Habermas, Chinese intellectual Wang Hui, former Prime Minister Tony Blair, author Naomi Klein (The Shock Doctrine), former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, political philosopher Francis Fukuyama, economist Joseph Stiglitz, former Cal Tech President David Baltimore and others. Check it all out on the Jackson Current Periodicals rack.
Is it 'curtains' for California? The American magazine (November / December) opines that our state is in eclipse, its economic and political dominance a thing of the past. Filled with discouraging statistics, cover story 'Sundown for California' notes growing out-migration from the state, a declining job growth rate, unaffordable housing in urban centers, statewide budget troubles and the 15th highest poverty rate in the nation. The cause? Well ... take a look at the issue, on the Current Periodicals Rack in Jackson Library.
Looking for a little comic relief after the tensions of the past political campaign? Check out the October 30 New Yorker article Bound For Glory by Jill Lepore. The author highlights some of the more hilarious aspects of American presidential campaigns of the past two centuries. For example, allegations of alcoholism against Franklin Pierce, whose horse supposedly fell on him during the Mexican War, prompted the Whig party to mock him as the "hero of many a bottle". The Whigs got as good as they gave, when in turn a critic of their 1848 candidate, Zachary Taylor, declared Taylor's only qualification for office "sleeping forty years in the woods and cultivating moss on the calves of his legs". Lepore observes how, after President Andrew Jackson's 'Everyman' image took root, it became almost obligatory for each presidential candidate to show his rustic roots in a log cabin, literally plowing his way up from backwoods fields to the White House. The model endured, in some form, even into the Twentieth century. Adlai Stevenson was probably doomed when he noted, in 1952, "I wasn't born in a log cabin, I didn't work my way through school nor did I rise from rags to riches, and there's no use trying to pretend I did." An amusing romp from the early Republic to the latest campaign shenanigans.
Neel Kashkari was hand picked by Henry Paulson to oversee the U.S. Treasury’s economic rescue plan, now called TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program). Kashkari was brought to Washington and the Treasury as assistant secretary for international economics by Paulson, after both worked at Goldman Sachs. Kashkari began his career as an engineer for a NASA subcontractor. The Bailout Czar, as he is often called, spoke about what TARPs goals and objectives are for the foreseeable future. The speech can be viewed here. Money published an article entitled List Of Cos Planning To Participate In U.S. Govt's TARP. Companies must notify the federal government by November 14 if they plan on participating in the bailout plan.
Can Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest private employer, influence a presidential election? According to a Wall Street Journal story, Wal-Mart store managers, department heads and supervisors around the country have been summoned to mandatory meetings to warn that if Democrats win power in November they'll likely change federal law to make it easier for workers to unionize companies -- including Wal-Mart. Company executives argue that voting for Democratic hopeful Barack Obama will be tantamount to inviting unions in, according to employees who attended gatherings in Maryland, Missouri and elsewhere. The message was clear to all who attended the meetings : a vote for Senator Obama will negatively impact Wal-Mart -- and their jobs.
GSB Alum and bestselling author Tom Peters draws attention on his blog to a recent reflection on Dwight D. Eisenhower. Peters remarks that the website Armchair General points out that Eisenhower's innate ability to make friends easily and gain confidence was crucial to his success as Supreme Allied Commander during World War II. Even as a West Point cadet he was known for his convivial persona. Ike's use of confidence and trust to later hold together the massive anti-Fascist alliance of oversized egos and strong personalities during the greatest war in history was no mean feat. A time to pause and reflect on the power of interpersonal relations -- and how they made a critical difference with one man at one time in history.
"That a 57-year-old divorced Greek immigrant would become the reigning queen of online political chat might come as a surprise to the legions of teens and twentysomethings who frequent forums on the web known as blogs. But that's exactly what Arianna Huffington did." So begins 'The Blogger', the cover story for Worth magazine December 2007. Two years ago Huffington launched a blog for political wonks; it is now one of the hottest sites on the Internet. Her Huffington Post, founded in 2005, attracts 3.5 million visitors daily. Read this fascinating interview with Huffington, at the Jackson Library periodicals display.
Japan has launched a program called “Innovation 25” with the goal to innovate Japan with an extensive long term plan extending to 2025 and beyond. In the September 17 issue of Red Herring dedicated to Japan, an article entitled Country Makeover take a look at the many initiatives the country is taking to make this work from dramatically increasing the number of foreign students at Japanese Universities to increasing investment in science and technology. The goal is to create a second wave of opening up Japan to the world.
Tomorrow evening (Thursday December 6) 4:15-5:30pm Kiyoshi Kurokawa, Science Advisor to the Cabinet of Japan will be at Stanford, as part of the Center for East Asian Studies, to speak on the topic Innovate Japan! among the topics discussed will be “Innovation 25”.
Chairman of the House Appropriations committee David Obey explains why he’s not going to approve the President's request for an additional $46 billion for the war in Iraq. Obey plans to slow down the supplemental funding until the country gets a better idea of what the future spending for the war is going to look like. Listen to this interview on NPR
The CNN -YouTube Democratic Presidential Debate on July 24 offered a new political twist – real people asking real questions. Fancy that! Except maybe the talking snowman -- but he did make a good point. The candidates were often able to hide behind their scripted answers, but you did get to see them squirm.
The debate covered the usual topics by the usual suspects. There was the occasional humor, as when two purported hillbilly-types from Tennessee came on screen. But when serious questions are asked by ordinary people, you see the passion and pain in their faces. A father who lost a son in Iraq wondered if he would lose another. Two women asked “ Would you allow us to be married …to each other?” Two brothers submitted a video of themselves feeding a parent with Alzheimer’s. This debate was different -- and I hope the difference is that some of those faces will haunt those candidates enough to make a change.
|
