Stanley Scism

Samir of Orissa is under persecution and threat to his life for introducing people to Jesus Christ.  Orissa is the same state where an Australian missionary and his two sons were burned alive in their car a few years ago.  Samir is asking for prayer.

In this same state, very many pastor are coming to know about, and accept and follow, Jesus name baptism.

So we see again:  God has placed before us an open door that no man can shut, and there are many who oppose us.

Stand behind Samir.  We plan to have a crusade there within one year.

PSALMS

YOU WILL SHOW ME THE PATH OF LIFE;
IN YOUR PRESENCE IS FULLNESS OF JOY;
AT YOUR RIGHT HAND ARE PLEASURES
FOREVERMORE.
PSALM 16:11, NKJV

SATISFY US IN THE MORNING WITH YOUR
UNFAILING LOVE,
SO WE MAY SING FOR JOY TO THE END
OF OUR LIVES.
PSALM 90:14, NLT

I WILL BE GLAD, YES, FILLED WITH JOY
BECAUSE OF YOU. I WILL SING YOUR PRAISES,
O LORD GOD ABOVE ALL gODS.
PSALM 9:2, TLB

THE INSTRUCTIONS OF THE LORD ARE CORRECT.
THEY MAKE THE HEART REJOICE.
THE COMMAND OF THE LORD IS RADIANT.
IT MAKES THE EYES SHINE.
PSALM 19:8, GOD’S WORD

SEE IF THERE IS ANY BAD THING IN ME.
LEAD ME ON THE ROAD TO EVERLASTING LIFE.
PSALM 139:24, NCV

TEACH ME HOW TO LIVE, O LORD.
LEAD ME ALONG THE PATH OF HONESTY,
FOR MY ENEMIES ARE WAITING FOR ME TO FALL.
PSALM 27:11, NLT

PUT OTHERS BEFORE
YOURSELF, AND YOU
CAN BECOME A
LEADER AMONG MEN.
IT SHALL NOT BE SO AMONG YOU: BUT WHOSOEVER
WILL BE GREAT AMONG YOU, LET HIM BE YOUR
MINISTER; AND WHOSOEVER WILL BE CHIEF AMONG
YOU, LET HIM BE YOUR SERVANT.
MATTHEW 20:26-27, KJV

WE ARE NOT OF THOSE WHO SHRINK BACK
TO DESTRUCTION, BUT OF THOSE WHO HAVE
FAITH TO THE PRESEVERING OF THE SOUL.
HEBREWS 10:39, NASB

Ludwig van Beethoven’s Greatest Hits

These are: movements from Symphonies 3, 5, 7 and 9 and from a violin concerto; Turkish March; ‘Moonlight’ Sonata; Fur Elise. How do you reduce Beethoven to one CD?

Harry Belafonte’s Calypso Hits

I like ‘Island in the Sun’, ‘Banana Boat Song’, ‘Man Smart (Woman Smarter’, ‘Mama Look a Boo-Boo’, ‘Jamaica Farewell.’ Fun songs—calypso has a light, playful beat and many of these songs have words to match. Originally recorded 1956-1967, this compilation 2006.

Ray Conniff Singers’ Sixteen Most Requested Songs

Not my most requested. I do like ‘I’d Like To Teach the World to Sing’, ‘Way We Were’, ‘Just the Way You Are’ and ‘Emotion/How Deep Is Your Love’, but not their sound-effect-without-words-songs or their versions of ‘We’ve Only Just Begun’ (Carpenters are better), ‘I Write the Songs’ (Toni Tennille is better), or ‘You Light Up My Life’ (Debby Boone is better).

Anne-Sophie Mutter’s Mendelssohn/Brahms Violin Concertos

Outstanding violin concertos of the 19^th century German repertoire are four: Ludwig van Beethoven’s (1806), Felix Mendelssohn’s (1844), Max Bruch’s (1866) and Johanns Brahms’ (1878). This CD has two of the four. Bruch’s and Mendelssohn’s are easier to play.

After studying for a while, Mendelssohn wrote his concerto for Leipzig virtuoso Ferdinand David. The work is very original—for instance, instead of the traditional orchestra opening the themes, the soloist does it.

In Portschach, an Austrian village, Brahms in 1877 completed his lyric Second Symphony. That same year, he also arranged Bach’s Chaconne from the D minor Partita for the piano left hand.

In 1878 summer, Brahms evolved from Bach, Viotti and Beethoven’s styles a violin concerto in E minor. He’d written a piano concerto twenty years before, and was again combining virtuoso instrumental writing and symphonic utterance. Again, brilliant violinist Joseph Joachim was present to advise (as W.H. Reed would Elgar, and as Jascha Heifetz would Walton). Result: a work of fierce technical challenge—difficult leaps and challenging double-stops—used strictly for musical purpose. The orchestral parts respond richly. The Beethoven Concerto requires the conductor to care for rhythm and tuning, while the Brahms Concert is ‘soft clay to be molded in performance’, says Yehudi Menuhin. First comes the oboe, then the violas, violins, bassoon, with a happy ending.

In 1879, Brahms wrote another violin concerto, in G major, there.

Played with Berliner Philharmoniker conducted by Herbert von Karajan, born in 1908 in Salzburg. He started studying at the Mozartium when still a boy. At age 21, he became principal conductor to the Stadttheater in Ulm. In 1934-1941 he worked in Achen as general music director. He was appointed to succeed Wilhelm Furtwangler as principal conductor to the Berlin Philharmonic. For many years he also served as artistic director for the Vienna State Opera and Salzburg Festival. He recorded his first album in 1939. In 1967, he founded the Easter Festival at Salzburg. In 1973, he started the Whitsun Concerts. He founded the Herbert von Karajan foundation and the Orchestral Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic. He pioneered stereo sound, music on video. He was a perfectionist. He died in 1989.

Anne was born in Rheinfelden, Baden. She asked for piano lessons for her fifth birthday present, then switched to violin a few lessons later. After her first teacher, Erna Honigberger, died, Anne switched to the Winterthurr Conservatory, attending master classes taught by Aida Stucki, pupil of Carl Flesch. Her success, especially at Lucerne Festival. At age 13, she was invited by Karajan to play for him. In 1977, her solo career began. She also works in chamber music combos. Made in 1981.

David Abram, et al’s, India

Of the Rough Guide series. For sheer information, the best travel guide. My only quibble is that they refer to Theravada Buddhism by the term its detractors use, which they probably would not do for other religions. Outstandingly helpful guidebook, though.

Eyewitness Travel Guides: India

The best travel guides for illustrating sights and scenes, even various foods of India. Printed on photographic paper, therefore heavy, therefore not the best for backpackers. Details on lodging and eateries not as complete as in Rough Guides—the Eyewitness clientele probably stay in upper-bracket hotels and use travel guides more than would budget travelers.

Three nontravel notes: 1. At Matho Monastery, Ladakh, ‘oracles traverse the topmost parapet…blindfolded, despite the 98-foot drop onto the rocks below. The Oracles answer questions put to them about public and private affairs, and great faith is reposed in their predictions’ (p140). In the Bible, oracles are God’s Word through prophets (see, e.g, Isaiah).

2. At Mandu, Madhya Pradesh, ‘a seven-story victory tower acclaimed in contemporary accounts as Mandu’s finest structure. It was built by Sultan Mahmud in 1443 to mark his battle with the maharana of Mewar. Interestingly, the latter also built a victory tower at Chittorgarh after the same battle’ (p247)—each side claimed victory, as we see happening now politically.

3. Beypore, Kerala, ‘is believed to be the fabled Ophir, referred to in ancient Greek and Roman texts’ (p653).

However, the book’s editors don’t seem to understand the basic three broad groups of India—North, South, and Northeast, with the consequence that they divide crazily, and end up putting Orissa (but not Bihar) with NE India, UP and Uttaranchal in Central India, Rajasthan and Gujarat (but not Maharastra) in Western India, Maharastra with Goa and Karnataka in SW India, and ndia itself including Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra and Andaman. So don’t take geography lessons from them, but their photography and history are great.

Jostein Gaarder’s Sophie’s World: The Greek Philosophers

The author hails from Norway, formerly taught philosophy, passionarly believes in philosophy’s importance for everyone, and won an award for the novel Sophie’s World. The present volume excerpts two chapters and wittily introduces to the reader the Greek world’s most famous philosophers, explaining Socrates’, Plato’s and Aristotle’s ideas. My notes:

Two ideas to distinguish: logos means universal, as contrasted with and at times opposed to, individual reason (p7); nous means mind or intelligence (p12).

The oracle at Delphi started thus: a Greek goatherd searching for a missing goat found it on a hillside acting strange, investigated, and found a fissure in the ground emitting gasses. Their society, not knowing the natural source, attributed this directly to gods and eventually built to Apollo, god of wisdom, a temple, with a hole over the fissure, and a three-legged stool (called a tripod) over the hole. A priestess, titled Pythia, would sit on the tripod, become entranced by the fumes, start babbling, and the result was taken to be divinely inspired (in Greek, breath, wind and spirit all come from the same word, pneuma). Delphi was located near Corinth, and one can see from this scenario the overemphasis that rose in Corinth on speaking in tongues.

Since a babbling provides no clear message to anyone from the god, a priest was assigned the task of ‘interpreting’ the ‘message’, and would do so in hexameters (prophecy in poetic form was common—indeed, much Old Testament prophecy is poetic, as is readily seen in a modern English translation). This enabled the priests to say what they chose. Since opposing forces often both came to Delphi for wisdom, the priests became circumspect and cryptic in responses, the most famous example being when the king of Lydia asked whether he should fight Persia, and the priests responding that if he did so, he would ‘destroy a great army.’ He did—his own.

Hippocrates founded Greek medicine, believed in moderation and a healthy lifestyle, ‘a sound mind in a sound body’ and started medical ethics by requiring his students to take the Hippocratic Oath: ‘I will follow that system of regimen which, according to my ability and judgment, I consider to be for the benefit of my patiens, and abstain from whatever is deleterious and mischievous. I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked nor suggest any such counsel, and in like manner I will not give to a women the means to produce an abortion. Whenever I go into a house, I will go for the benefit of the sick and will abstain from every voluntary act of mischief and corruption, and further, from the seduction of females or males, whether freemen or slaves. Whatever, in connection with my professional practice, I see or hear which ought not to be spoke abroad, I will keep secret. So long as I continue to carry out this oath unviolated, may it be granted to me to enjoy life and the practice of of the art, respected by all men in all times, but should I violate this oath, may the reverse be my lot’ (p19-20).

Socrates, says Gaarder, ‘believed that this foundation [of human knowledge] lay in man’s reason. With his unshakable faith in human reason…’ (p31). Yes, rationalism is a faith.

Plato’s concept of the forms, or ideal reality, came because he ‘believed that the soul existed before it inhabited the body….But as soon as the soul wakes up in a human body, it has forgotten all the perfect ideas. Then….as the human being discovers the various forms in the natural world, a vague recollection stirs his soul. He sees a horse—but an imperfect horse….The sight of it is sufficient to awaken in the soul a faint recollection of the perfect ‘horse’, which the soul once saw in the world of ideas, and this stirs the soul with a yearning to return to its true realm. Plato calls this yearning eros—which means, love’ (p40). So when you see a pretty girl and think she’s ‘divine’, you’re on the right track, according to Plato.

Incredible India: Adventure Sports

Incredible India: Dance and Music

The first volume covers rock climbing, rapelling, mountaineering, trekking, biking, mountain biking, hang-gliding, paragliding, ballooning, river running (rafting, canoeing, kayaking), cruising, scuba diving, snorkeling, sailing, windsurfing and other water sports, skiing, angling, nature walks, riding, and safaris by camel, yak, elephant, horse and jeep.

The second volume covers Carnatic, Hindustani, Ghazal, Qawwali, folk vocal music. Also the dholak, ektara, flute, jaltarang, ghatam, mridangam, nadaswaram, pakhwaj, santoor, sarod, shehnai, tabla banya, sitar, veena, violn, edakka, kombu, chenda instruments. Also the Kathak, Bharatnatyam, Kuchipudi, Kathakali, Mohinlattam, Odissi, Manipuri, Chhau and folk dances (Dumhal, Rouf, Lama, Pangi, Losar Shona Chuksam, Bhangra, Raas, Gidda, Dhamyal, Duph, Lahoor, Dhurang, Mali, Tera Tali, Naga, Hazagiri, Cheraw, Nongkrem, Bihu, Thang-ta, Karma Munda, Ponung, Brita, Hurka Baul, Kali Nach, Ghanta Patna, Paik, Dalkhai, Gendi Silt, Bhagoriya, Jawar, Garba, Dandya, Kala, Dindi, Mando, Dollu Kunitha,Dandaria, Karagam, Kummi, Kuttiyattam, Padayani, Kolam, Lava and Nicobarese (not that you can see this last).

Frank Kusy’s and Rupert Isaacson’s South India

Frank Kusy was born in England to Polish-Hungarian immigrants, attended Cardiff University, left to start a career in journalism, worked with the Financial Times, and ‘India is his first love, the only country he knows which improves on repeated viewings.’ Maybe he should have completed university—he might know more. I could suggest several countries that can grow on a person. He spends three months of every year in India. I spend five, and know better than to put up with his ‘hell-wait’ for India buses to start: ‘To secure a seat, you have to get on half an hour before the bus is due to leave, and for that time, wth the temperature hitting 40 degrees C, you must grit it out, the sweat running inside your shirt and from your hair into your eyes. Children selling fruit climb onto the bus and thrust their wares at you. Beggars proffer their sores and stumps, but you cannot speak or even think beyond the next breath.’ Improves on repetition? I don’t think so. He says the bus driver doesn’t hit the people. Headlines suggest otherwise. It’s true that, when you get out of the heat and into the hills, the natural beauty and coolness can make you feel better about life. He’s also right about the Hyderabad’s Golconda fort and about the ‘seething, stinking town of Madurai’, although residents might rightly call it a city. He says, ‘In India, the calmer you are, the smoother things will go.’ They just seem calmer. The chaos remains. The book is inferior to Rough Guide or Doring Kindersley’s guides.

Darwin Porter’s and Danforth Prince’s Frommer’s Portable London

Really useless guidebook unless your main idea of tourism is to spend LOTS of money to eat and sleep in historic surroundings. If instead you are active, prefer to save money on accommodation and food, eating healthy and spending time seeing things, then forget this book and go to one with budget accommodation and practical information on the sights.

P.G. Wodehouse’s Big Money

Lessons learned, with useful quotes: ‘stolid affection, like a cow inspecting a turnip’ (p38).

‘Feeling now as Elijah would have felt in the wilderness if the ravens had suddenly developed cut-throat business methods’ (p43).

A father ‘visited his son and heir, but in some mysterious way….the extraordinary idea [he] might possibly have a little cash in hand, and be willing to part ith somne of it to the author of his being’ (p43).

‘Opportunity pressed down and running over’ (p44).

‘Father’s natural bewilderment’ (p45)

Glancing nervously back, ‘as if expecting to see the Recording Angel standing there with pen and notebook’ (p57).

‘Like an enthusiastic but ill-advised sportsman in the jungles of India who has caught a tiger by the tail’ (p66).

‘Look at Othello and Desdemona. Othello hadn’t dreamed of saying all that stuff about moving accidents by flood and field, of hair-breadth ‘scapes I’ the imminent deadly breach, until that girl dragged it out of him with her questions. Othello knew perfectly well that when he talked of the cannibals that each other eat and the men whose grow beneath their shoulders he as piling it on’ (p68).

‘Wished to be elsewhere, and that right speedily’ (p72).

‘Grim and desolate spots where the foot of white man had not trod nor the Gospel been preached’ (p77).

‘Said something sharply in one of the lesser-known dialects of the Hindu Khoosh’ (p101).

‘In a slow, thoughtful sort of way like a man hunting for a lost collar stud’ (p102).

‘Groaned slightly and winced, like Prometheus watching his vulture dropping in for lunch’ (p102).

‘A drove of dotards who talk across you about the time they ere given a half-holiday because of the Battle of Crecy’ (p104).

Hit on the ear by a hard dinner roll, he ‘leaped convulsively and for an instant forgot all about the girl. In similar circumstances, Dante would have forgotten Beatrice’ (p106).

‘A frame of mind which would have qualified him to walk straight into a Chekhov play and no questions asked’ (p108).

‘Suppressed elation as of one ho on honeymoon has fed and drunk the milk of Paradise’ (p119).

‘Lawyer tightened his lips another fraction of an inch, as if to say that something of this kind as only to be expected in a world in which all flesh was as grass…find himself legally debarred from being a feofee of any fee, fiduciary or in fee-simple’ (p126).

Do simple daily things ‘reverently, as one feeling that there is a home beyond the skies’ (p131).

‘Sudden apparition of a totally unwanted’ anyone affects one as ‘the ghost of Banquo on a memorable occasion affected Macbeth’ (p141).

Helping a visitor, a ‘stranger in a strange land’ (p141).

‘Hart that pants for cooling streams when heated in the chase’ (p143).

Breaking off a mistaken engagement and getting engaged to someone else is ‘a consummation devoutly to be wished’ (p161).

‘Should say no that God was in His Heaven and all pretty well right with the world’ (p163).

One man, called a Jonah, corrected ‘Judas’ because ‘he liked to get these things straight’ (p181).

One man puzzles over ‘the sort of thing Marcus Aurelius used to worry about’ (p211).

Another man paraphrases Longfellow (p212).

One man recommends another by saying, ‘His life was gentle, and the elements so mixed in him that Nature might stand up and say to all the world, “This was a man!”’ (p224).

Sages of the Ages: Wise Words On Christianity and Jesus

‘Jesus picked up twelve men from the bottom ranks of business and forged them into an organization that conquered the world.’ Bruce Barton

‘I like your Christ, but I do not like your Christians because they are too unlike your Christ.’

Mohandas Gandhi

‘My own commitment is neither to liberalism nor to Marxism, but to a curious idea put about by a carpenter turned dissident in Palestine that the test of our humanity is to be found in how we treat our enemies.’

Paul Oestreicher

‘Preach the Gospel to every creature. Use words if necessary.’ Francis of Assisi

‘How could twelve uneducated men, who lived on lakes and rivers and deserts, conceive of such a great enterprise? Their preaching was clearly divinely inspired.’

John Chrysostom

‘Jesus promised his disciples three things: that they would be entirely fearless, absurdly happy and that they would get into trouble.’ Russell Maltby

‘God never built a Christian stron g enough to carry today’s duties and tomorrow’s anxieties piled on top of them.’

Theodore Cuyler

‘Jesus Christ was a man who was completely innocent, offered himself as a sacrifice for the good of others, including his enemies, and became the ransom of the world. It was a perfect act.’ Mohandas Gandhi

UK: Novelist Charles Cumming is writing The 21 Steps, a web version of John Buchan’s World War I spy novel The 39 Steps, told through Google Maps. People read text, click pointer bubbles marking each scene, and follow the hero’s race from London’s St Pancras train station to Heathrow airport to Edinburgh, so see real-world places in context. Penguin Books collaborates with media company Six to Start to tell stories on web. Instead of reading novels adapted to online use, they want to create stories designed for the Internet.

In 2006, online magazine Slate serialized Walter Kirn’s novel to hyperlink and merge media. Cell-phone novels were Japan’s top three best-sellers last year.

In 2007, Penguin’s Ettinghausen tried a wikinovel—a book-length story written by everyone, with predictably atrocious results. Cumming says, ‘ can’t imagine War and Peace told in the style of a Google mash-up.’ Barrett Sheridan in Newsweek (‘New Ways of Telling Tales’, p10, 2008/5/12), says that to Ettinghausen, ‘that might sound less like a statement of fact and more like a challenge.’ Apparently, neither Cumming nor Sheridan ‘get it’—Ettinghausen doesn’t want to rewrite either 39 Steps or War and Peace, but create something new.

Q: What do you think of John Hagee’s views on Israel?

A: God’s promises to Abraham do not apply to the modern nation-state of Israel because:

First, Abraham’s sons were more than Isaac. For that matter, Semitic people are more than just Abraham’s family, so anti-Semiticism would apply as much to criticism of Arabs as it would to criticism of Israel.

Second, Israel’s people intermarried with many other people, so they are not pure-bred sons of Abraham, or even of Jacob. Joseph married an Egyptian, Moses a Midianite, Salmon a Canaanite, Boaz a Moabite, and eventually most of the population moved away captive except the poorest, who married the people the Assyrians moved in. Many people of ten tribes were lost, intermarried with local populations.

Third, the promises were based on faith—most Jews in Israel are atheists. Abraham’s real children are of his faith, so the promises apply to believers in One God, not to mere physical descendants, which in any case are hard to trace over millennia.

PRAY THAT:

God will protect Christians in India from attacks by fanatics, will help new believers in Rajasthan, Orissa, etc, come to Jesus’ name baptism, will help churches in India/Nepal/Bhutan grow in numbers and Spirit.

PRAISE THAT: Over 200 received Holy Spirit in NE India’s general conference, over 20 in S India’s, 10 in the Head & Heart Ministers’ Meeting in Pokhara, and 6 in the Head & Heart Ministers’ Meeting in Hyderabad.

Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign was hurt by its ‘sleazy nature’ says Karen Johnson of Aurora, Colorado, and Helen Javennes of Kristiansand, Norway, says, ‘Clintons would do anything and say anything to win the White House. They’ve lost their sense of value and are not really concerned about serving people or helping the less fortunate’ (both on p12, ‘Letters’, Newsweek 2008/5/12.

Clinton didn’t give up until Obama had the delegates to clinch. And Obama’s candidacy is now racial—90% of blacks in recent contests vote for him, so he does well where blacks are a large portion of the Democratic Party, but that won’t help him as much in the general election because blacks vote for the Democratic Party anyway—having them on board doesn’t represent an increase unless they vote in larger numbers than before.

Indian Fareed Zakaria wrote in ‘The Rise of the Rest’ (Newsweek, 2008/5/12, p16-23), ‘The world’s tallest building is in Taipei, and will soon be in Dubai. Its largest publicly traded company is in Beijing. Its biggest refinery is being constructed in India. The largest investment fund on the planet is in Abu Dhabi; the biggest movie industry is in Bollywood….largest Ferris wheel is in Singapore. The largest casino is in Macao….most recent rankings, only two of the world’s ten richest people are American….In 2006 and 2007, 124 countries grew their economies at over 4 percent a year. That includes more than 30 countries in Africa. Over the last two decades, lands outside the industrialized West have been growing at rates that were once unthinkable….overall trend has been unambiguously upward….25 companies most likely to be the world’s nex great multinationals….four companies each from Brazl, Mexico, South Korea and Taiwan, three from India, two from China and one each from Argentina, Chle, Malaysia and South Africa.’ True, but then he misrepresents the past by saying America was the most powerful nation in the world from the late 1800s. Wrong. America came to dominance on the ashes of World War II, was quickly caught up with by the Soviet Union, regained ascendancy in the late 1980s due to the Ronald Reagan military buildup, and is still today called the world’s only hyperpower, although the Bush administration has helped weaken America by making it impossible for America to respond to military challenges other than in Iraq and Afghanistan—for instance, the carnage in Sudan and Congo continues because we can’t stop it.

He says Muslim nations during the last five years have stopped favoring violence. Why won’t he notice that this is the same time America has been making violence not pay in Iraq and Afghanistan?

He says ‘the share of people living on $1 a day has plummeted from 40 percent in 1981 to 18 percent in 2004 and is estimated to drop to 12 percent by 2015. Of course. That’s 34 years. He doesn’t point out, though, that $1 doesn’t buy what it did a third of a century ago. A better comparison would have been to use terms adjusted for inflation. And this guy wanted to advise presidents? He calls the United States the ‘biggest of the bunch’ of small nations that have dominated the industrial world, then says ‘the real giants—China, India, Brazil…’ When did Brazil become a nation of larger population than the USA? When did it rank with India and China? India has more people than South America and Europe combined. Brazil might have 160 million—India has one state with that many people.

He’s got some good points: ‘Russians have long chafed over the manner in which Western countries remember World War II. The American narrative is one in which the United States and Britain heroically defeat the forces of fascism. The Normandy landings are the climactic high point of the war—the beginning of the end. The Russians point out, however, that in fact the entire Western front was a sideshow. Three quarters of all German forces were engaged on the Eastern front fighting Russian troops, and Germany suffered 70 percent of its casualities there. The Eastern front involved more land combat than all other theatres of World War II put together.’

He seems to feel that national media outlets newly provide alternatives to CNN and BBC, and uses NDTV as an example, but India had Doordarshan (the government media) giving alternative views decades ago, so that’s no argument for American non-dominance. As Zakaria admits, ‘The United States is currently ranked as the globe’s most competitive economy by the World Economic Forum. It remains dominant in many industries of the future like nanotechnology, biotechnology, and dozens of smaller high-tech fields. Its universities are the finest in the world, making up 8 of the top ten and 37 of the top 50, according to a prominent ranking produced by Shanghai Jiao Tong University. A few years ago the National Science Foundation put out a scary and much-discussed statistic. In 2004, the group said, 950,000 engineers graduated from China and India, while only 70,000 graduated from the United States. But those numbers are wildly off the mark. If you exclude the car mechanics and repairmen—who are all counted as engineers in Chinese and Indian statistics—the numbers look quite different. Per capita, it turns out, the United States trains more engineers than either of the Asian giants. But America’s hidden secret is that most of these engineers are immigrants. Foreign students and immigrants account for almost 50 percent of all science researchers in the country. In 2006 they received 40 percent of all PhDs. By 2010, 75 percent of all science PhDs’ in America ‘wll be awarded to foreign students. When these graduates settle in the country, they create economic opportunity. Half of all Silicon Valley start-ups have one founder who is an immigrant or first generation American….If these people are allowed and encouraged to stay, then innovation will happen here. If they leave, they’ll take it with them. More broadly, this is America’s great—and potentially insurmountable—strength. It remains the most open, flexible society in the world, able to absorb other people, cultures, ideas, goods and services. The country thrives on the hunger and energy of poor immigrants.’ He’s right to ask if the US government is in step with no longer having everyone coming to it. London is ‘now the world’s leading financial center—less because of things that the United States did badly than those London did well….the US health care system, which has become a huge liability for American companies. US carmakers now employ more people in Ontario, Canada, than Michigan because in Canada their health care costs are lower. Twenty years ago, the United States had the lowest corporate taxes n the world. Today they are the second-highest’ because other nations’ came down. If America wants to lead the system, it must be part of the system. ‘It is the global rule-maker but doesn’t always play by the rules. And forget about standards created by others. Only three countries in the worlddon’t use the metric system—Liberia, Myanmar and the United States.’

Japan’s economy has declined from 2^nd (15 years ago) to 18^th in per capita GDP, yet they restrict foreign direct investment. An attitude of ‘we are very good; we don’t need you at all. If you want to come to Japan, work on our terms…

just sort of encourages foreign investors to look elsewhere, where investment rules are more transparent,’ says EU trade delegation head to Japan, Peter van den Heuvel. Japanese governments say they must grow robustly, then plan for 5%, which is unlikely, but even if achieved, is low for East Asia. Japanese companies fear ‘a new investor wll come and force them to change doing business the way they have for years. They have the same level of resistance to domestic agents of change’, says Tony Miller of investment fund Ramius Capital. If Japan doesn’t watch it, the world will pass it by.

First China called the Dalai Lama a ‘devil’ with a human face and beastly heart. Nice of them. Now they want to talk to him. Strange. No wonder Tibet’s government in exile, in Dharamsala, doubts the clean and tender hearts of the Chinese government. While criticism threatens to spoil their Olympic event, they’ll offer talks. When demonstrations die down, Chinese officials will stall. And they insist the Dalai Lama be ‘sincere’? Tibetans demand no more clampdowns in Tibet, withdrawal of security forces from lamasaries, no more ‘patriotic education’ demanding monks to denounce the Dalai Lama, release of political detainees, fair trials for those accused of rioting. Good luck; they’ll need it. China’s state press still slams the Dalai Lama, soldiers still occupy lamasaries, foreign journalists and tourists can’t come, and secret trials sentenced people to terms from three years to life for rioting.

The Dalai Lama, meanwhile, says Taiwan’s future must be decided by its own people, that Tibetan culture and environment be protected. China thinks he still wants to redraw Tibet’s borders to include all ethnic Tibetan areas near it—a quarter of China’s land.