Commentator of Note: Christopher Ketcham
Authors & EditorsAfghanistan Wartime Architecture/Infrastructure Photo Galleries 2001-2010
09 Terrorism, 10 Security, 11 Society, Civil Society, Commerce, Military, Photography
EVENT REPORT: State of the Planet 2010, Columbia Univ, New York City
01 Poverty, 03 Environmental Degradation, 03 India, microfinancing, Mobile, Threats, United Nations-affiliated 
Panels and keynotes program schedule I was told via email from someone involved in the event that a video will be posted online.I will be posting this over a the Earth Institute blog (especially since it has zero comments for the March 25 event) as a challenge to improve the overall framework of the “State of the Planet 2012”.
State of the Planet 2010 Event Report:
Intro
I attended this bi-annual event in 2008. At that time there was not a global webcast that included panelists located in other countries. At the 2010 event, there was a V.I.P. section closer to the ‘stage' that I was not notified about. The V.I.P. section had about 3 times more people than the non V.I.P. section which was odd. Despite it being a V.I.P. section, there was never enough time given to them to ask all the questions via microphone. This is a Jeffrey Sachs event, it's his show. He's the main advisor to Ban Ki-Moon, and friends with the president of Mexico (who keynoted this event), so it seems to be more from his perspective and his friends. Therefore, it was a very narrow-visioned event that should not be entitled “State of the Planet”. People involved with the publication “State of the Future” for over a decade (www.stateofthefuture.org) were never mentioned, invited, or asked to contribute. Yet, these people have worked with the United Nations for over a decade. Collective intelligence has been written and software is being developed by those involved in the “State of the Future” (Millennium Project), yet Jeffrey Sachs was attributed to the idea of “worldwide brainstorming” for “collective invention”. And unfortunately, there was an obsession at this event on ‘climate change' and carbon. “Industrialization footprint” involves a broader range of hazards and toxins that needs more air time. More ‘fluid' thinking was lacking while an excess of a kind of cloned groupthink was prevalent (or ‘carbon copying' if you will, pun intended). The forum has great potential but as of 2008 & 2010, is too insulated and will not be respected as highly intelligent and strategically effective by a broad range of people (outside of Ivy League Columbia) concerned about serious global issues. On an interesting note, Zbigniew Brzezinski was once a Columbia professor (see Obama video on his Brezinski recognition).
Continue reading “EVENT REPORT: State of the Planet 2010, Columbia Univ, New York City”
Review: Endless War–Middle-Eastern Islam vs. Western Civilization
6 Star Top 10%, America (Founders, Current Situation), Asymmetric, Cyber, Hacking, Odd War, Complexity & Catastrophe, Congress (Failure, Reform), Corruption, Country/Regional, Culture, Research, Empire, Sorrows, Hubris, Blowback, Executive (Partisan Failure, Reform), Future, Geography & Mapping, History, Insurgency & Revolution, Intelligence (Government/Secret), Iraq, Military & Pentagon Power, Misinformation & Propaganda, Philosophy, Politics, Power (Pathologies & Utilization), Public Administration, Religion & Politics of Religion, Security (Including Immigration), Strategy, Survival & Sustainment, Terrorism & Jihad, Threats (Emerging & Perennial), Values, Ethics, Sustainable Evolution, War & Face of Battle27 March 2010: Full spread sheet and optimal links added below Amazon review.GOT TO RUN, Links later today.
Beyond Five Stars…Gifted Mix of Intelligence, Integrity, Insight Deeply Rooted in History and Firmly Focused on Today's Reality
March 21, 2010
Ralph Peters
I do not always agree with Ralph Peters, but along with Steve Metz and Max Manwaring, both at the Strategic Studies Institute (SSI) of the U.S. Army, I consider him one of America's most gifted strategists whose integrity is absolute. He simplifies sometimes (e.g. Iraqis turned against Al Qaeda because of the demand for marriage that was refused followed by the bloodbath execution of the family by Al Qaeda, not because of anything the US did) but that aside, Ralph is the ONLY person that reminds me of both Winston Churchill–poetry and gifted turns of phrase on every page–and Will Durant, historian extraordinaire. Ralph has a better grasp of history, terrain, and the military than Robert Kaplan, and deeper insights into our failed military leadership (no longer leaders, just politically-correct administrators out of touch with reality) than my favorite journalist-adventurer, Robert Young Pelton.
I have read and reviewed most of Ralph's books, and am proud to consider him a colleague and a fellow Virginian. Ralph is the only author whose books jump to the top of my “to read” pile, and I absorbed this masterpiece over the course of moving my own flag from Virginia to Latin America. US national and military intelligence have completely given up their integrity, and it resonated with me that the key word that Ralph uses throughout this book–a word I myself adopt in my latest book in carrying on the tradition of Buckminster Fuller on the one hand, and most respected mentor-critic Chuck Spinney on the other–is that very word: INTEGRITY.
Continue reading “Review: Endless War–Middle-Eastern Islam vs. Western Civilization”
Search: what are some the atrocities of genocide
SearchesGenocide and Other Atrocities have been isolated from one another because of the enormous gravity of the two different high-level threats to humanity, threats #6 and #7 respectively, as validated and priorities in the UN High-Level Panel Report, A More Secure World–Our Shared Responsibility–Report of the Secretary-General’s High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change.
Genocide focuses on the extermination of an entire group. There is no finer site for the study of genocide than that created by Dr. Greg Stanton, Genocide Watch.
Other Atrocities focus on categories of crimes against humanity that include trade in women and children, trade in body parts (for which people can be involuntarily kidnapped or if in prison, operated on against their will, or the lesser but still atrocious harvesting of organs without permission, e.g. by the Israeli's in Haiti and my multiple groups offering financial incentives without full information or post-operative guarantees). This is not to be confused with medical tourism. Sweat shops are not quite in Other Atrocities (in our view) but slavery is, see for example Review: Nobodies–Modern American Slave Labor and the Dark Side of the New Global Economy. Lynching, extrajudicial killings, and comprehensive repressive racism is an Other Atrocity until it turns into a sustained campaign of violence against a specific group, e.g. Israel against the Palestinians.
Democide or “death by government” is a term that seeks to distinguish between genocide (killing them all) and the other atrocity of killing enough of them so that they all leave, a form of ethnic cleansing that leaves open the door for forced massed migration, itself an Other Atrocity. A most interesting aspect of Democide is its “routine” nature; opinion varies on whether the death of roughly 80 million people from failed or mis-guided government policies including those of the U.S. Government that have both increased poverty in America–as well as assorted injustices–and destroyed hope world-wide with unjustified support to Israel and 41 of the 44 dictators, many of whom have come to power with US complicity in the overthrow of legitimate indigenous regimes more committed to the public interest and their indigenous public. See among many other references Killing Hope–U.S. Military and C.I.A. Interventions Since World War II-Updated Through 2003 and Breaking the Real Axis of Evil–How to Oust the World’s Last Dictators by 2025.
Journal: Legality of US Drones as Killing Machines . . .
08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, Government, Military
U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs Subcommittee Hearing:
“Rise of the Drones:
Unmanned Systems and the Future of War”
Tuesday, March 23, 2010, 2:00 pm 2154 Rayburn House Office Building Written Testimony Submitted By Kenneth Anderson March 18, 2010
Journal: Afghanistan-Pakistan Rabbit Hole
Uncategorized
This is IMPORTANT. Chuck
Down the AfPak Rabbit Hole
The village of Marjah is a meaningless strategic backwater. So why are the Pentagon and the press telling us the battle there was a huge victory?
BY THOMAS H. JOHNSON, M. CHRIS MASON, Foreign Policy.com, MARCH 1, 2010
The release of Tim Burton's new blockbuster movie, Alice in Wonderland, is days away. The timing could not be more appropriate. Lewis Carroll's ironically opium-inspired tale of a rational person caught up inside a mad world with its own bizarre but consistent internal (il)logic has now surpassed Vietnam as the best paradigm to understand the war in Afghanistan.
Continue reading “Journal: Afghanistan-Pakistan Rabbit Hole”
