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How to Make Peace: Pope Francis and Rabbi Abraham Skorka
By Shlomo Maital
Pope Francis with Rabbi Abraham Skorka
I am writing this blog while watching on TV the arrival of Pope Francis in Jerusalem, brought by a Jordanian helicopter, greeted by our Prime Minister and President. While watching the Pope, dressed in simple white robes, I am reading On Heaven and Earth, the 2010 book recording the dialogue between Pope Francis (then Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio) and Rabbi Abraham Skorka, an Argentinean Conservative Rabbi and long-time friend of Bergoglio. Skorka has come to Jerusalem to join the papal visit.
The book contains 29 dialogues on wide-ranging topics, including the Arab-Israeli conflict, money, poverty, same-sex marriage, divorce, euthanasia, divorce, abortion, the holocaust, and the future of religion.
Almost the very first passage I read, is one by the Pope about dialogue. Here is what he writes: Dialogue is born from a respectful attitude toward the other person, from a conviction that the other person has something good to say.
How sad that neither Israelis nor Palestinians can say truthfully, that they believe the other side is worthy of respect and has something good to say. We cannot make peace unless we respect each other. Will both sides listen to this good man, as a first step toward making peace?
(Dialogue) supposes that we can make room in our heart for their point of view, their opinion and their proposals.
Do Israelis and Palestinians truly understand the other side’s position? Can Israelis state the Palestinian position clearly, with understanding and empathy? Can the Palestinians? I doubt it. Will we listen to the Pope and try to do so?
Dialogue entails a warm reception and not a preemptive condemnation. To dialogue, one must know how to lower the defenses, to open the doors of one’s home and to offer warmth.
Rabbi Skorka and I have been able to dialogue and it has done us good. With Rabbi Skorka I never had to compromise my Catholic identity, just like he never had to with his Jewish identity, and this was not only out of the respect we have for each other, but also because of how we understand interreligious dialogue.
I have a radical idea. American Secretary of State John Kerry is just one of a long line of well-meaning Americans who have failed to bring Israelis and Palestinians together.
Why not let the Pope have a shot at it? Why not let the Pope teach Israelis and Palestinians how to dialogue? He certainly can’t do any worse than Obama. He might do a whole lot better. The Pope is clearly an expert at dialogue. Dialogue is how you make peace. We have had no such dialogue for years – only monologues. Let’s begin by practicing true dialogue. Let’s talk about, say, football and movies. When we learn to truly dialogue, then, we can tackle the tough issues.
We welcome the Pope to our country, and hope all our leaders will all listen to and learn from this humble and visionary good man.
Singapore’s Prime Minister Looks Ahead Two Decades
By Shlomo Maital
After many visits to Singapore, I’ve come to appreciate the highly intelligent, competent political leadership, and capable civil service, this small nation enjoys. (And, by the way — good-looking!)….
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, son of founding leader Lee Kwan Yew, is a Harvard graduate and highly articulate. Recently, he delivered an address, “Scenarios for Asia in the next 20 years”; here is a summary.
“Since the end of the Cold War, Asia’s strategic weight in international affairs has grown. It is home to more than half of the world’s population, and its share of global GDP has risen from one fifth to one third. This morning I will talk about both the clear trends and the critical uncertainties in Asia over the next 20 years. The key players will still be the US, China and Japan.
“Let me begin with the US. Today it is the dominant global power. In the Asia-Pacific, US power and influence have underpinned regional security and stability since the Second World War, and enabled all countries to prosper. The US has been a benign and constructive power, which explains why it is still welcomed by countries in the region. The Obama administration’s “rebalancing” towards Asia reflects the American strategic view, that the US has been and always will be a Pacific power. Unfortunately, the strains of being the global policeman have taken their toll on the US. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have cost the US more than 50,000 soldiers killed or wounded . The American people are naturally war weary. They are reluctant to engage in new fights or take on fresh burdens, whether in Syria, Ukraine or Asia. Its adversaries sense this, and harbor hopes that the US has lost the will to advance its interests and defend its “red lines”.
“I believe that in 20 years’ time, the US will remain the world’s pre-eminent superpower. China’s GDP will probably exceed America’s in absolute terms, but not in per capita terms. The US will still be the world’s most advanced economy, leading the way in innovation, technology and talent. I expect the Fortune 500 global list to include many new American companies which do not yet exist today, just as neither Google nor Facebook existed 20 years ago. Shale gas will enhance the competitiveness of US industries, and could also be an additional tool of American diplomacy. The US armed forces will still be the most formidable and technologically-advanced in the world.”
“There are two key uncertainties … The first is how soon Americans get over the current mood of angst and withdrawal, and regain the confidence and will to advance American interests around the world. The second is when the US can get its politics to work. Politicians on both sides need to come together to overcome the present gridlock and forge a consensus on the way forward, rather than be mired in partisanship and fundamental disagreement.”
Lee’s key point: The U.S. must continue its role as the world’s superpower/babysitter/democracy advocate. If it turns insular and fails in this role, the world will be a mess. To succeed in this role, America must regain its self-confidence, and fix its gridlocked political system.
Keep in mind – Singapore is tightly linked to America, economically and politically, and has enormous interests in America continuing to play a key role in Asia. So part of PM Lee’s speech is wishful thinking, and part is analysis. Let’s hope his optimism is based on analysis, not just hope.
Today is Memorial Day in America. In a memorial ceremony, the names of some 50,000 American casualties since 9/11 are being read. Years ago, the names of the 58,000 U.S. soldiers killed in Vietnam were read; it took three whole days non-stop. If America is tired of policing the world, one can understand. It matters for all of us, and our children and grandchildren, whether America will have the energy and spirit to continue to act for the world’s interests, not just America’s – and whether America will have the wisdom to intervene wisely, much more wisely than its interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan.
A New Miracle Drug called “Give Thanks”
By Shlomo Maital
Mercedes Sosa
This morning, I awoke at an early hour and as I often do, I listened to one of the least popular Israeli radio stations, despite (or because) of it being the most informative.
The person interviewed was a family doctor named Dvorah. She had practiced for many years, loved what she did, but was overweight and slightly discontent. On a trip to Barcelona, to the Picasso Museum, she saw a painting of a doctor and a patient, titled something like ‘compassion’. It led her to rethink her life, and reinvent it, because she felt there were pharmacies in medicine, and ten-minute consults, but no true compassion.
The result was a book, and a method, to help people become healthy and remain healthy, in what today is known as Positive Psychology. This new discipline is built in part on two very long medical terms. One is “neuroplasticity” – the incredible ability of the brain to change itself, for the good. The second is the daunting word, “psychoneuroendocrinology”, which simply means that our thinking stimulates hormones that affect our bodies and our health.
Dvorah’s message, simplified into 15 minutes for listeners, was this: Give thanks. Each day, give thanks for your blessings. Believe it or not, it is proven medically and clinically that doing so can lower blood pressure, stress and even LDL (bad cholesterol). And we have many blessings to give thanks for, especially the ones we take for granted (like, life itself, having all our limbs, our sight, hearing, etc.).
[Do you love, as I do, the Mercedes Sosa song, Gracias a la Vida? Thank you for Life! Now, we know that it is therapeutic!]
Dvorah recommends that families have dinner together each evening, and do a small ritual. Let each person thank someone else in the family for some small kindness done during the day. The result strengthens family bonds, and family bonds simply make us all healthier and happier.
It’s that simple.
Here are the words (in English) to the last verses of Gracias a la Vida….it sounds far better in Spanish…
THANKS TO THE LIFE THAT HAS GIVEN ME SO MUCH IT HAS GIVEN STRENGTH TO MY TIRED FEET WITH THEM I WALKED CITIES AND PUDDLES BEACHES AND DESSERTS, MOUNTAINS AND PLANES AND YOUR HOUSE, YOUR STREET AND YOUR COURTYARD
THANKS TO THE LIFE THAT HAS GIVEN ME SO MUCH I GAVE MY BEATING HEART WHEN I LOOK AT THE FRUIT OF THE HUMAN BRAIN WHEN I LOOK AT THE GOOD SO FAR FROM THE BAD WHEN I LOOK INSIDE YOUR CLEAR EYES
THANKS TO THE LIFE THAT HAS GIVEN ME SO MUCH IT GAVE THE LAUGHTER AND THE CRIYING SO I CAN DISTINGUISH HAPPINESS FROM SADNESS BOTH MATERIALS THAT FORM MY SONG AND YOUR SONG THAT IS MINE TOO AND THE SONG OF ALL WHICH IS MY OWN SONG THANKS TO THE LIFE THAT HAS GIVEN ME SO MUCH
Piketty Is Alive & Well – in London:
Why the Billionaires Worry Me
By Shlomo Maital
Alisher Usmanov
Chances are, you’ve never heard of a man named Alisher Usmanov. He is an Uzbekistan-born Russian billionaire who lives in London. His fortune is estimated at $18.6 b. He built it through metal and mining operations and investments. He owns, among other things, two football clubs, Arsenal and Dynamo Moscow. Usmanov is Muslim, and is married to Irina, who is Jewish. And despite his wealth, he is only London’s second richest billionaire (the richest are the Hinduja brothers, Sri and Gopa, who have interests in oil, banking, cars, property and media).
Why London? Because London is home to more sterling (pound) billionaires than any other city in the world – 72 of them, in fact, ahead of Moscow, which has ‘only’ 48. Why? Because British tax laws are highly favorable to the super-rich, and because London, in many ways the world’s financial capital (huge forex trading volumes, for instance), attracts money like a magnet. Prime Minister Cameron fails to loudly, clearly condemn Putin’s Crimea grab? Two guesses why – Russian billionaires with piles of cash in London.
Thomas Piketty’s book (see my recent blog) has drawn attention to the enormous and growing gap between rich and poor. London, and Britain, are an extreme case. According to the London think-tank NIESR Britain’s per capita GDP is still well below its 2008 peak and won’t return to it before 2017. Yet Britain’s 104 sterling billionaires now have a total wealth of ₤ 301 billion (US $500 billion); last year there were only 88 British billionaires, and their combined wealth was ₤55 b. less. The billionaires grow richer; the poor get poorer. Piketty explained why. Billionaires double their money every decade. The poor fall behind every decade.
A British food bank network reports that nearly a million people approached it for emergency food aid in the year ending in March, more than double last year’s tally.
Why don’t the poor (whom, as the saying, God loves very much, because he made so many of them) rise up and take back their country politically, democratically, from the billionaires?
Here is why. A new study by scholars Martin Gilens (Princeton) and Benjamin Page (Northwestern) shows: *
“…. rich people and organizations representing business interests have a powerful grip on U.S. government policy. After examining differences in public opinion across income groups on a wide variety of issues [1,779 cases, from 1982 through 2001] , the political scientists Gilens and Page found that the preferences of rich people had a much bigger impact on subsequent policy decisions than the views of middle-income and poor Americans. Indeed, the opinions of lower-income groups, and the interest groups that represent them, appear to have little or no independent impact on policy.”
LITTLE OR NO INDEPENDENT IMPACT ON POLICY! In America. And doubtless, in Britain, too, and anywhere that billionaires park their yachts.
The rich are growing richer. And they are using their wealth to tilt policies in their favor, including tax breaks.
That is why the billionaires worry me. Because they are taking control of our democratic system. Perhaps it is too late – perhaps we no longer have true democracy anywhere.
Never has Edmund Burke’s dictum, “for evil to triumph, it is enough for good people to do nothing” been more poignant. We ordinary people have to take action.
But how?
Readers — ideas! Action! This is intolerable.
* See John Cassidy’s excellent New Yorker post, “Is America an Oligarchy?”, April 18, 2014
Yes, I Can! Why We Should Act, Not Gripe!
By Shlomo Maital
Christophe & wife
In our new book Cracking the Creativity Code (forthcoming, SAGE India, late Fall), we offer 10 ‘exercises’ for stimulating the brain’s creative thinking. The very first, perhaps the most important, is “Act – don’t just Gripe!”. Once in a while, when there is a problem that angers or saddens us, we have to take action, and not just wring our hands and complain. Find a creative solution to a problem, then…do it! Adapt Obama’s slogan (which he stole from an African-American woman, who used it to empower black women) and transform it to first person SINGULAR: Yes I can! At least once in a while. A post on Facebook drew my attention to this: France’s parliament has passed a law allowing workers to give some of their days off to a colleague with a seriously ill child. The idea came from the case of a man whose colleagues donated 170 days while his son was battling cancer. The man is Christophe Germain. He works at the Badoit water plant, in France. When his son fell ill with cancer, his fellow workers ‘donated’ 170 work days to him, so he could be home with his dying son. Now, the Member of the General Assembly for Christophe’s district has sponsored a law in Parliament, to enable any worker to donate work days for a fellow worker who needs compassion leave. And the law passed! Congratulations to the French General Assembly! Congratulations to the Member of Parliament (from a right wing party, by the way!). And congratulations to France, a nation that has a heart and is unafraid to let it guide its legislation. Act, don’t just gripe. A handful of good people did, in France, and have changed their country, and perhaps the world. Yes, I can! Try it. The little boy died in 2011. Christophe attended the Assembly debate on the proposed law. The Socialists opposed it. Shame on them. If socialists oppose a law just because a right-wing party proposed it, they deserve our scorn.
Is Money the New Morality?
It is – And That’s Good!
By Shlomo Maital
Really bad things are happening in the world today – and good people seem powerless to do anything about it. Syria’s Assad bombs civilians. Russia’s Putin grabs Crimea. Unspeakable crimes occur in Central African Republic. And that’s just a start. The United Nations? Deadlocked. Obama? Words, no deeds. European Union? Russia’s gas and Russian oligarchs’ money parked in London dominate.
But guess what. Where good people fail, money succeeds. Here is how. When countries like Russia do bad things, money flees. When money flees, the currency declines, inflation rises and economic growth plummets. This is happening to Russia, according to the World Bank. Putin is paying the price — not because of Obama sanctions, but because of market economics. Here are the figures:
“… the (World) bank said Russia’s gross domestic product (GDP) might shrink by 1.8 percent in 2014. …. The Economy Ministry estimates net capital outflow (out of Russia) at up to $70 billion in the first quarter alone, compared with $63 billion in the whole of last year. … the World Bank envisages capital outflow at $150 billion this year and $80 billion in 2015. This year’s forecast exceeds the $120 billion in capital flight that Russia saw in 2008 during the global financial crisis. … The outflow of money will put further pressure on the rouble, which despite its recent firming is still 7 percent down against the dollar this year. The weakening of the currency is likely to put upward pressure on inflation, which the World Bank sees at 5.5 percent in 2014, higher than the upper end of the central bank’s targeted range of 4.0-5.0 percent.”
So, it’s very simple. When countries’ leaders do bad things, money flees. Flight of capital trashes the economy. People suffer. They protest. And eventually, the bad leader leaves, is removed, flees, or is forced to adopt repressive measures, which ultimately fail. Russia cannot afford to lose $150 b.
This is the new morality. Money and capital keep leaders in line, not ethics, values or Obama. It’s the new ethics of globalization.
Is it so bad? The message is: Run your country properly, treat your people well, or, the money will leave and go elsewhere, where leaders are smarter and more ethical. And every country needs to keep its capital at home, rather than flee abroad.
The morality of the new global system is money. Let’s watch Russia closely to see if it really works.
Piketty: The Super-Rich Will Own Us
By Shlomo Maital
Thomas Piketty’s new book Capital in the 21st C. (Harvard/Belknap) should get him the Nobel Prize. It won’t because it is basically just carefully-built data. But the data are shocking. And it took a French economist to do it; except for Paul Krugman it seems that the collective brains of the American economic establishment have shut down for good.
Piketty’s book is 700 pages long. Few will actually read it. But the fierce and growing inequality he documents has already drawn huge media attention, and even the IMF is in on the act, with Christiane Lagarde (IMF Director-General) announcing that the IMF believes inequality is bad for growth, and pro-equality policies can actually stimulate economic growth.
I will save my readers the time and effort of reading this huge book, by summarizing it. Piketty says, there is “an oligarchic type of divergence, in which the rich countries would come to be owned by their own billionaires…or in which ALL countries would come to be owned by the planet’s multi-millionaires and billionaires…. All the ingredients are in place for the top centile and thousandth of the global wealth distribution to pull farther and farther ahead of the rest.”
This has already happened, to a large degree. Oligarchs run Russia. They own the media in my country, Israel. They are powerful in America. They are powerful in China.
Why is this happening? Simple. If you have great wealth, you can earn on average 6.8 per cent annual return (above inflation). This doubles your wealth every decade, without your having to really do anything. And you can keep the profits, because the wealthy easily find tax havens. If you have little wealth, you earn maybe 1 per cent, and then you get taxed. When the wealthy double their wealth every decade, in 30 years it is 8 times what it was at the start. Great wealth confers huge political power. You can buy the media, you can buy lobbyists, and you can, yes, you can buy politicians.
Karl Marx got one thing right, and one thing wrong. He said that wealth would become more and more concentrated, under capitalism. Right. He said that the people (the government) should confiscate national assets and run them. Wrong. Governments can’t run businesses.
Piketty’s solution is very French – perfect, optimal and utterly impractical. Impose a global wealth tax. What are the chances this will happen, when the oligarchs already wield immense political power? If one country does it, the money will flee to another, happy to welcome it by offering tax havens.
Either there will be enormous social upheaval, to bring the oligarchic wealth back to where it belongs, and decades of suffering and instability, or we the people will find some clever way to deal with this ‘doom loop’, which is leading us to destruction. The current situation cannot continue. And Occupy Wall Street was largely ineffective, like the Arab Spring, because it brought passionate protest, it brought attention to a critical problem – but offered no creative solutions.
The solution? To be presented in a future blog.
Hug a Stranger?
By Shlomo Maital
I’ve blogged before about the book by UBC social psychologist Elizabeth Dunn and Harvard Business School marketing expert Michael Norton, “Happy Money: The Science of Smarter Spending.” In their New York Times Op-Ed, the two scholars report on an interesting experiment done by one of their students, Gillian M. Sandstrom. The idea was to test the hypothesis that what matters most to us is our closest ties (with spouses and close relatives), not interactions with minor random strangers. It’s an extension of their work that shows how badly we spend our money, and how it often fails to bring us happiness.
She had her subjects carry clickers, one red, one black, all day. They clicked the red one when they interacted with someone close to them. They clicked the black one when they interacted with someone they didn’t know.
Her finding? Introverts and extroverts alike felt happier on days when they had more social interactions. Not surprising. But she also found that “interactions with [strangers] correlated at least as highly with happiness as interactions with strong ties [ our loved ones].”
“Even the bit players in our lives may influence our well-being,” they note.
So – you may not quite be up to hugging a stranger, and the results may not be great if you do, but, why not chat with a stranger? In an age when people are increasingly alienated, alone, isolated, even with Facebook and Twitter (or perhaps because of them), a face-to-face conversation with a stranger can sometimes provide great comfort.
In the end, human beings are highly social animals. Technology seems bent on making us over into go-it-alone individuals. Time to fight back.
What’s In a Name? Holy Crap! Almost Everything
By Shlomo Maital
In teaching innovation, and in guiding my students’ wet/dry simulations of launching new startups, I always stress the crucial importance of names – what you call your new product or service. A strong catchy name can mean the difference between success and failure. Shakespeare’s rhetorical, “what’s in a name? A rose is a rose by any other name” is just wrong. Rainbow rose (see my blog, April 9, 2012), for instance, is far better than “multi-colored rose”.
John Grossman confirms this view in his New York Times article (April 25), “Risqué, funny …and flying off shelves”. He tells a wonderful story about Corin and Brian Mullins, whose debut product was a non-allergenic high-fiber breakfast cereal. They called it Hapi Food. Really bad name. But an ecstatic client called up to praise the product’s effectiveness. “Holy crap!” the client said, on the phone.
The Mullins laughed…and cooked up a new batch. Brian had worked in marketing communications. He knew he needed a new name for his product.
Why not call it Holy Crap?
Sales grew to $5.5 m. in the first four years, partly because of the name.
More and more products are choosing sassy, risqué, even pornographic names. You can buy wines called Sassy Bitch and Fat Bastard. You can buy a Kickass Cupcake. You can have breakfast at an LA restaurant called Eggslut. According to Eli Altman, author of “Don’t Call It That”, “it’s significantly more risky to have a boring name than to have a risqué one”.
Carey Smith began making industrial fans. He called his firm HVLS Fan Co., for High Volume Low Speed. Dull. His clients began asking about his oversize Big Ass fans. Eventually he changed the name of the company to Big Ass Fans. But the City Council in Lexington KY., a bible belt city, thought about forcing Smith to remove its name from the side of its building. The resulting PR was worth a fortune. True, Big Ass Fans got blocked by anti-spam…but lately, anti-spam is based more on reputation-filters and less on offensive words.
So – innovator! Choose a memorable, cheeky name! You may have a fantastic product. But how will people know about it? To get your product talked about, a risqué name can help. Like, the name of a Tampa Fla. Shop called Master Bait & Tackle. Get it? Or the Toronto construction company, newly named Mammoth Erection, which came with a picture of a woolly mammoth. The phones rang off the hook.
Man Against Fly – So Far, It’s Tsetse 2, Mankind 0
By Shlomo Maital
It has just been announced that the genome of the tsetse fly (prounced: Te-tzee) has been decoded, by an international team of scientists. Like some international fashion model, the ugly fly has made the cover of Science magazine.
The tsetse fly is the scourge of Africa. It lives on human blood, and unlike the mosquito (only the female drinks human blood), both male and female tsetse flies imbibe human and animal blood. The tsetse fly spreads human encephalitis (sleeping sickness) and a disease that afflicts cattle. The suffering and economic losses are huge.
Evolution has created some amazing innovations in the tsetse fly. For one, unlike other flies and insects, the tsetse fly gives birth to live offspring, only about 8 of them. The female tsetse fly deposits eggs in its ovaries, and then secretes a milk-like substance to feed them. When the tiny flies are ready, they are born, full-fledged.
So far, efforts to combat this scourge in Africa have been unsuccessful. But now that the tsetse genome has been decoded, scientists can look for a weak point, perhaps genetically altering a gene to hamper reproduction.
So far, however, it is tsetse fly 2, mankind zero. In this battle, mankind against the wisdom of evolution, mankind is definitely the underdog.
TIMnovate 