We know that there was a lack of US leadership in the last 8 years concerning global issues the like of - ENERGY AND CLIMATE CHANGE. We also know that an Administration that inherited a National economy with huge surplus ended up in deficit within a mere first term, and will leave a now behind a bankrupt economy begging for foreign aid - this as its inheritance to the next inhabitant of the Washington White House. Should it easily be renamed a Red House in need of becoming a Green House?

But, was it all avoidable without radical change? Just think of the writings of Dmitry Orlov whom we started to cover on this website. See the parallel impact on the G-7 - Russia is not part of this group and China and India were not yet included in this group - does the OECD as configured at this time - still have relevance for the future of global leadership? Ask those that visited China this week-end.

China remembers its own local Schindler.

By JEFF KINGSTON, Special to The Japan Times, Sunday, Aug. 10, 2008.

John Rabe (1882-1950), known as the Oscar Schindler of China, was an employee of Siemens and a Nazi party member when he helped establish the International Safety Zone (ISZ) toward the end of 1937 to provide a refuge for Nanjing’s noncombatants.

The good Nazi: John Rabe in his air raid shelter behind his house JEFF KINGSTON

As a result, he is credited with helping save the lives of some 250,000 Chinese from the marauding Japanese troops. As a Nazi, Rabe got more respect from the Japanese than his other Western colleagues running the ISZ and on a few occasions by showing his swastika armband he managed to stop Japanese soldiers in the midst of raping Chinese women. In general, however, the good intentions of the ISZ were ignored by soldiers allowed to run amok for six gruesome weeks.

Were it not for the timely intervention of the German President Johannes Rau in 2003, Rabe’s house in Nanjing would have been bulldozed for a road-widening project. On a visit to the city, Rau prevailed on local authorities to move their roadwork elsewhere, and in 2004, Siemens agreed to provide funding to help restore the dilapidated house.

It opened as the John Rabe Research and Exchange Center for Peace and Reconciliation in October 2006. Its mission is to “refresh memories and learn lessons paid with blood from this agonizing period.” According to the director, Dao Luan Tang, the message of the Rabe house is a hopeful one, offering a contrast to the unremitting inhumanity on display at the Massacre Memorial.

Rabe emerged from the dustbin of history due to the research of author Iris Chang. She managed to unearth his unpublished diaries and included excerpts in her controversial book, “The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of WWII” (1997). Subsequently the diaries were published as “The Good Man of Nanking: The Diaries of John Rabe” (1998).

Rabe, precisely because he was a Nazi, is an especially inconvenient eyewitness for the revisionist Japanese historians who try to deny, minimize, shift or otherwise evade responsibility for the Imperial Japanese Army’s savage rampage in Nanjing.

In February 1938, Siemens recalled Rabe to Germany, where he gave lectures about the outrages in Nanjing and showed a film shot by the American missionary John Magee depicting the brutal consequences of Japan’s reign of terror. He also made the mistake of writing to Adolf Hitler, detailing the atrocities, leading to his arrest by the Gestapo, apparently for activities inconvenient to bilateral diplomacy. He was released due to the intervention of Siemens, but forbidden to lecture, write, show films or converse on the phone concerning what had happened in Nanjing.

After the war, Rabe got caught up in a de-Nazification program that left him unemployed and destitute. When news filtered back to Nanjing, where he was lionized for his good deeds, the grateful citizens raised $2,000 for him, a grand sum at the time, and every month sent food parcels. The statue of Rabe that now stands in front of his house in Nanjing was built with money raised by overseas Chinese students in Hamburg, Germany, where he was raised.

Nestled at the edges of the leafy Nanjing University campus across the street from the Angel beauty salon, the Rabe house gets relatively few visitors — It has, in total, only seen about 10,000 since it opened.

Currently the exhibits, which consist mostly of documents and photographs, have Chinese and English explanations, but I was told a draft Japanese translation is being checked for accuracy and should be ready in 2009.

The Rabe house is an intimate space that helps one imagine Nanjing at the time, and the staff is friendly and helpful. On request, they will show versions of the video displays with English captions for non-Chinese speakers.

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Coincidentally, I started to read yesterday morning a new book by Dmitry Orlov titled - “Reinventing Collapse.” The book was released by New Society Publishers www.newsociety.com and was sent to me by Perseus Distribution of Jackson Tennessee.

Dmitry Orlov was born and grew up in Leningrad, and came first to the US in 1985 and after 10 years started going back and forth so he says - hehasbecome a witness to the changes in Russia.

Orlow is an engineer who worked in high-energy Physics and in Internet Security. He came under our cross-hairs when it turned out that he is also a leading Peak Oil theorist. But this is not why I am mentioning him today. The reason is much deeper then that.

Dmitry Orlov writes that when he came back to the US in 1996, after a longer stay in Russia where he just got married, but also said that at the time he started to understand the reasons why the Soviet Union collapsed - and horror - he started to see that the US had already at that time all the symptoms of the same disease that did in the Soviet Union. He writes that he came back with his wife to make for themselves a new life in the US, but he also started to write about his insights that made him see that the second shoe will drop eventually - that is the US after the Soviet Union - two very different States - but nevertheless two States with similar destinies because they suffer from very similar malaise.

His description of the ingredients of a super-power collapse are as follows: (a) A severe and chronic shortfall in the production of crude oil; (b) A severe and worsening trade deficit, (c) A runaway military budget and (d) Ballooning foreign debt. When such a soup starts boiling, then “the heat and agitation” are provided by (e) a fear of a humiliating military defeat, and (f) wide spread fear of a looming catastrophe.

He looks then at all of those ingredients that existed in the Soviet collapse - that was an internal collapse - an implosion I would say. He laughs at the thought that it was caused by outside influences, stemming from the actions of the US, except for the fact that the Soviets fell for the arms race of the “star-wars” competition that caused them further exhaustion. On the other hand, he sees all these ingredients in the present state of the US, and he watched these aspects grow during the last decade.

Orlov looks at Chernobyl as the backdrop of catastrophe that sent off the Soviet Union, and sees the need of oil in order to grow food in the US - at the tune of ten calories of fossil fuels to produce one calorie of food - this, and runaway foreign foreign debt, leading to the decrease in credibility of US monetary instruments - killer hurricanes and global climate upheaval - become the US fear of catastrophe. The eventual reason for the drop of the second shoe.

I only mention here these morning thoughts - I will be getting back to this book later and write a book review. Now I intend to touch on another incomplete activity I found myself involved in yesterday.

***

This was a “Pre-Concert Discussion” of the “Mostly Mozart” Lincoln Center Festival presentation of “REQUIEM.” Yesterday was the US premiere, but I will be seeing the show only tonight. All what I did was to sit in at the discussion between the Festival’s Director Peter Sellars, and Lemi Ponifasio, a Samoan living in Auckland, New Zealand, who is the Director/Choreographer/Designer of this Requiem.

Again, this writing of mine is a half backed attempt, and not yet a finished review of the show. This will come later. But now what I want to say here is that all such words as “Director,” “Choreographer,” “Designer,” “Show,”"Review,” were actually knocked out of my head last evening, because I realized that we really are totally incapable of understanding the mind of those that do not think like us. Interesting, Peter Sellars, remarked in a even larger context - “in our age - the commentator on the Op-Ed page presumes to understand everything - we will see that it is not as simple as that.”

My mention of Orlov’s look at history showed me how trite it is to think that the US led to the collapse of the Soviet Union, and that the US is safe because it thinks of itself as a democracy. Now, Lemi, and the movement of MAU in Samoa, and his troupe, that adopted the MAU name for their collective, are really no actors at all, according to how they see themselves. In effect they will be involved in CEREMONIES that come to them naturally - something that is not just a CELEBRATION - and this requiem is not a memorial for the dead - this because they are not dead at all - they are here with them - so it is as if there were a communal living with these unseen members of the community present. We will look in a future review at this as a “Requiem to Requiem” where the idea of a Requiem, in the second time it is mentioned in this comment, becomes sort of a synonim to culture, life, an island, an environment. Then the first mention of Requiem in the remark is the more accepted meaning. MAU is the name of the Samoan independence movement that took on the Germans, French, Dutch, and British. The meaning is Vision or Revolution. The activities of the MAU troupe serve “to energize dialogue and revive local oriented histories, arts, thought, languages, and narratives that have been silenced or excluded.”

In those Pacific Islands a house is not a home where you close in your belongings like in a storage - their concept is that this is a space for life and all are invited. There is always a standing pole in their culture - this pole gives you sort of a vertical feel of space and you and all your ancestors reside there. We will see that eventually this home without walls becomes the whole island and its sufferings.

To be true to our www.SustainabiliTank.info website, I will add that Lemi and Peter also touched on the problems of global warming that threaten the demise of cultures like Kiribas (Kiribati). So, will we someday have to try our own hand at this kind of Requiem when remembering the independent indigenous cultures of these Small Islands Independent States of today - the SIDS of the Pacific?

This is the extent of how far I am ready to go here.

***

Now, with the above two snippets, in my head, let me say that I sat down before my TV set to watch the NBC, Channel 4, reporting from Beijing, that was handled by NBC as if it was just an excuse to sell us ExxonMobil trying to sell us that they take on “the largest energy challenges of the World.” I was amazed when after that an NBC journalist actually added “while you watched the advertisements China advanced several hundred years in its history.” I hope they will not fire him for this remark.

GE spoke of biogas technology and that was fine, but Chevy Silver was trying to impress us with their miserable 20 mpg technology. Oh! Yes - we also saw John McCain bashing Obama in the campaign well paid advertisement - and we thought that at least this night we can forget about the US Presidential non-debate.

This Chinese Coming-Out event was all about HARMONY. We watched the Tai-Chi performers and were told of Harmony between Man & Nature as the only chance for Sustainable Development for China and the rest of the World for next generation - and we said AMEN. When this is resolved there will be prosperity and environmentalism.

You do not have to be naive and embrace China’s government, or take for granted the smiles on the faces of all the participating dancers and musicians. It was too uniform and large to be taken at face value - but there was enough there to say that it was an honest attempt to say - look - we suffered in our history from what others did to us - but we are a sleeping giant that is now showing - yes - we can and we will.

China showed us that they are much closer to the MAU mentality now then they are to their previous MAO mentality. Yes, the legions of dancers and musicians were militarily trained. Their performance perfect, thus in some way threatening, but the content of their show was so we appreciate what they have given to the world - ink and paper for those believing in the needs of the press, and the compass for those in search of direction. Navigation is the means of communication with the great world, and they had their own naval chiefs of the caliber of a Christopher Columbus.

These performers did not hate us - they CELEBRATED their return to the world stage, and this was their CEREMONY. After this show, China and us will never be the same. Just think of the fact that they reminded us that there were days China had the highest GNP in the world. We saw some of their ghosts, and we saw some of our ghosts. We saw Confucius, and yes, we remembered how it was members of the Atlantic community that committed them to opium enslavement. It was not said - but I knew it was somewhere there in that huge mat, center stage, on the floor of the stadium.

Money is no problem, they bought the best architectural minds to work with their own best, and created the greatest venue for a global event. Pity that parts of the show were missed by us because of the commercialism of US TV world.

We saw how some foreign leaders, like Putin, that did not smile, President Bush looked at his watch, we wondered why President Peres of Israel, who is secular, had to make the gesture of going on foot back to his hotel because of the Sabbath, but then these were not China’s problems that day.

OK, now, I finished the Friday events. On Saturday morning I rushed to pickup the papers.

The opening of the Olympics was really not the main set of news. That debatable honor went to Russia’s attack inside Georgia, and to the John Edwards attack on the US political system by having endangered the Democratic Party’s chances for meaningful change in Washington.

I really have little to say about Edward’s male infidelity - that should have been left to be solved between him and his wife, but we know that this is not US reality. Such events can sink the US, as it happened in the Bill Clinton days. Clinton’s Presidency was decreased in potency, to the detriment of the American Nation, by some self appointed ethical judges who, as we know by now, some of them had much worse transgressions in their closets. What the US does not have is that vertical space the man from Samoa was talking about. There is no ceremonial thinking in our system - only raw hunt after the culprit who may have sinned much less then we did. And when the US is in decline, while China is on the rise - now we have things to think about - not so? And don’t forget - China holds the strings to the US treasury and Orlov made his unforgivable observations.

As for the second news of the day - Putin moving on Georgia - that is tough for the Georgians but again, Putin is back in the oil-saddle and is flush with money too. In effect, we believe that he came to Beijing not as a teacher, but now he comes to Beijing as a student. He has learned from the Chinese that if you put your economy in better shape, outsiders and your own people as well, will criticize you less on human rights and other transgressions. He did not smile on TV, and he knows what his intent is now.

So, what does Dmitry Orlov think of the opening of the Olympics and the near certainty that China will take over the Super-power manttle after the drop of what he described as the second shoe?

Then, to remind us that change may not be as smooth as some may hope for, two American Olympic tourists were just stabbed while visiting the Drum Tower in the center of Beijing - reasons yet unknown.

***

The Marathon After the Olympics
In this week’s At Issue, Executive Director Dr. Jackson Janes discusses the politicized opening to the Olympic Games in Beijing and how the transatlantic partners can positively deal with China’s growing influence in global politics and economics.

To read this essay, please click here.

Issue Brief #22: A European Realignment: German-American Responses
In AICGS Issue Brief 22, Research Program Associate Kirsten Verclas describes the current German and U.S. positions on Russia, energy security, NATO, and the role of the EU, and examines the U.S. presidential candidates’ views in these areas, discussing what these positions will mean for the transatlantic relationship and German-American relations in 2009.

To access this Issue Brief, please click here (PDF).

German Vulnerabilities in a Globalizing World
What are Germany’s vulnerabilities in today’s globalized world? A recent joint AICGS/Institute for German Studies at the University of Birmingham conference sought to explore the collection and nature of challenges that Germany faces as a state, as well as Germany’s responses to these challenges. Conference participants Katrin Auel, Roland Czada, Christian Hacke, and Dan Hough all provide their thoughts on some of the domestic issues that Germany must face.

To read Katrin Auel’s essay. please click here (PDF).

To read Roland Czada’s essay, please click here (PDF).

To read Christian Hacke’s essay, please click here (PDF).

To read Dan Hough’s essay, please click here (PDF).

Issue Brief #21: Security and Stability: German and American Cooperation in Times of Transition
In AICGS Issue Brief #21, AICGS Research Program Associate Kirsten Verclas analyzes German and American perceptions
of and policies on current security issues including terrorism, the conflicts in the Middle East, and questions of nuclear nonproliferation. Issue Brief #21 also explores the possibilities for cooperation and for conflict between Germany and the United States in solving these issues with an outlook on the changes to be expected after the U.S. presidential election.

To access this Issue Brief, please click here.

‘The Europeans Are Chasing Illusions’
Former AICGS Fellow Henryk Broder and Martin Doerry interview Dutch author Leon de Winter about the threats mounting against Israel and the assimilation of Muslims in Europe, with Mr. de Winter arguing that modern Islam is in a state of significant change. This article originally appeared in the July 25, 2008, edition of Der Spiegel International.

To read this article, please click here.

Russland ist schwächer, als Europa
wahrhaben will
Dr. Jörg Himmelreich, Senior Transatlantic Fellow at The German Marshall Fund of the United States and a contributor to AICGS projects on Russia, analyzes the foreign policy of new Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and argues that Europe has the upper hand in creating a new cooperative agenda. This article originally appeared in the July 27, 2008, edition of Die Welt am Sonntag and is available in German only.

To read this article, please click here.

The Atlantic Community Online
www.atlantic-community.org - the first online foreign policy think tank - is an open platform for dialogue, cooperation, and the establishment of transatlantic networks. Issues range from climate change and energy security to non-proliferation and the question how to peacefully integrate China and Russia into the international security system. In addition to a daily round-up of top press commentary, the website features up-to-date summaries of think tank analyses, as well as regular opinion articles from members and guest contributors. Register for free, and join the debate by clicking here.

Yesterday, an extremely interesting TV program introduced the concept of “Global Dimming.”

We all are familiar by now, and swear by it, that we are in the midst of a  “Global Warming” phenomenon. We know that this is caused by fossil CO2, and some other gases, that accumulate in the atmosphere. These gases impact global climate in an unseen way. They are not smog causing as such. Their direct effect is not seen to the naked eye.

But there is a second effect - this one has to do with carbon particulates and as well some other - more active - gases - that originate also from the burning of these fossil fuels. these gases are the sulphur and nitrogen compounds.
So, these other particles and gases do two things - they can nucleate small droplets of water and these droplets, together with the carbon particles, create a second effect - they block the sun rays that try to reach us. So, we end up having two effects - the heat that did reach us has a much harder time getting to us, but some of the sun rays that would have reached us - do not reach us. The sum total effect is that we have Global Warming, but also a “Global Dimming” effect. THE BEIJING OLYMPICS SHOW US BOTH EFFECTS - FOR US ALL TO SEE!

The TV program told us of an Israeli scientist, Jerry Stanhill who back in the 1950s mapped out the insolation in Israel for the purpose of planning the water distribution for Israel’s agriculture. Others measured water evaporation.

For some reason, in the 1990s, the same Jerry Stanhill, 40 years older, repeated his study and found out that there was an average  drop in 22% in the amount of solar radiation hitting Israel. Reading of his study, a lady scientist in the German Alps, looked at the sun reaching her area, and got similar results. Others found that there was a parallel DECREASE in evaporation. The evaporation studies, done all over the world were then reviewed in Australia and in the Maldives Islands, and confirmed. Of special interest were the studies by a scientist called Ramanathan, who looked at two islands in the Maldives - at the extreme ends of this chain of islands - and found that the more polluted island in the north end had much less sun and less evaporation then the southern-end island that gets cleaner Antarctic air and has more sunlight.

So, we do not want to rain on China’s parade. But, as environmentalists, we do not see only the glitter.

Seven years in the making, billions of dollars spent, great buildings, real terrific architecture, millions of happy people - and we are happy for China’s progress. China has indeed lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty - but in this Year of the Rat - we also see the Dragon of Smog. Is this pollution a must that comes with progress? Can, and will, the Chinese, and ourselves learn from these SMOG HIGHLIGHTS of an otherwise happy event? With Bush, Sarkozy, Putin, Fukuda and some other Heads of State in town to watch the opening - will their eyes also see what there is for all to see - THE SMOG? Will they pull together and say - let us do something about this so that there will be light from the sun, and no global warming as well? Can they get themselves to praise those aspects of the games and of the architecture for the games, that stressed green energy? Will they speak up and say - if we want these solar panels, and the rest of solar technology to be effective - we must also think of what the enhanced fossil fuels born smog does by sabotaging these efforts.

 http://www.republicanherald.com/articles/2008/08/08/news/local_news/pr_republican.20080808.a.pg3.pr08solarplant_s1.1865133_loc.txt

Solar plant slated for Carbon County in Pennsylvania’s Coal Region.
BY MIA LIGHT, STAFF WRITER  of The Republican Herald

 mialight at standardspeaker.com  <... href=”http://www.republicanherald.com” title=”http://www.republicanherald. ” target=”_blank”>www.republicanherald.com
Published: Friday, August 8, 2008

NESQUEHONING — The largest solar energy farm east of Nevada is slated for construction in the Carbon County community of Nesquehoning.

The facility will be the largest solar energy plant in Pennsylvania and one of the largest in the nation.

Dubbed “Pennsylvania Solar Park,” the solar farm will generate enough electricity to power 1,450 homes and eliminate more than 320,000 tons of greenhouse gas emissions, the equivalent of planting more than 25,000 acres of trees, within 30 years of operation.

“Carbon County has always been at the center of America’s energy generation. What we did for the Industrial Revolution with anthracite coal is unsurpassed. Now, we are going to be on the cutting edge of alternative energy,” McCall said.

Plans for the facility include installation of more than 900 solar trackers with 48 solar panels on each tracker. Unlike stationary solar panels, the tracking panels will pivot from east to west, following the track of the sun across the sky.

The $65 million project is being financed through a combination of private investors, federal and state incentives and tax credits.

According to Curtis, the majority of the project’s financing comes from private investors, whom he declined to identify due to ongoing negotiations.

Kovatch Enterprises, which will retain ownership of the 100-acre parcel, has entered into a 30-year lease with two 10-year renewal options — for a potential total duration of 50 years — with Green Energy Capital Partners.

Kovatch said the parcel is open space with no history of past use.

“Just weeds and trees, which are green, but this energy project will be green, too,” Kovatch said of the land and the project. “Once it’s up and running, the solar farm will be 100 percent pollution-free and help to reduce our country’s appetite for foreign oil.”

Although precise plans for distribution of electricity generated by the facility have yet to be finalized, Pennsylvania Act 213 requires local electric utility providers to purchase a percentage of the facility’s solar-generated electricity.

Act 213, which was signed into law by Gov. Ed Rendell in November 2004, requires that electric distribution companies and electric generation suppliers include a specific percentage of electricity from alternative resources in the generation that they sell to Pennsylvania customers. While Act 213 does not mandate exactly which resources must be utilized and in what quantities, certain minimum thresholds must be met for the use of solar photo voltaic resources.

Developers hope to break ground for construction by March 2009 and have the facility fully operational approximately four months after ground-breaking.

“No one loses in this type of project. Everyone wins,” Curtis said.

According to McCall, the county that was a leader in coal energy will now be a leader in alternative energy.

“I will do everything I can in Harrisburg to support projects like the solar farm to make sure we all have a cleaner, greener, more affordable energy future,” McCall said.