Daily Archives: September 7, 2004

The Core and The Gap

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Thomas P. M. Barnett, author of the Pentagon’s New Map makes sense of our Iraq strategy:

The only way America can truly achieve strategic security in the age of globalization is by destroying disconnectedness. We fight fire with fire. Al Qaeda, whose true grievances lie wholly within the Persian Gulf, tried to destroy the Core?s connectedness on 9/11 by triggering what I call a system perturbation that would throw our rules into flux. Its hope was to shock America and the West into abandoning the Gulf region first militarily, then politically, and finally economically. Al Qaeda hoped to detoxify the region?s societies through disconnectedness.
But the president decided correctly to fight back by trying to destroy disconnectedness in the Gulf region. We seek to do unto al Qaeda as it did unto us: trigger a system perturbation that will send all the region?s rule sets into flux. Saddam Hussein?s outlaw regime was dangerously disconnected from the globalizing world?from our rule sets, our norms, and all the ties that bind the Core together in mutually assured dependence.

Immelt’s Dartmouth Commencement Speech

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GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt gave this useful commencement speech at Dartmouth this past spring. Immelt formerly ran Waukesha based GE Medical, prior to replacing Jack Welch.

This is the second graduation I have attended at Dartmouth, and here is what I remember from the commencement speaker at my graduation. Hmm, hmm, see, so I know my role today is to be brief and I promise to pay more attention this time…
[T]o be honest I’m a little intimidated [giving this speech]. You know The Dartmouth quoted students calling me an uninspiring and uninteresting choice for commencement speaker. You would have preferred Bono or Jon Stewart or Colin Powell and you have every right to expect that the fortune your parents paid for your education should get you a world leader. But do you really believe that an aging rock star would speak to the class that created Keggy, a human beer keg, to be the new college mascot?

Via Powerline.

Buffalo: Three “New” Frank Lloyd Wright Buildings!

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Fred Bernstein on Buffalo’s plans to add three new Wright “inspired” buildings, in hopes of capturing more architectural tourists. (Monona Terrace is mentioned – along with comments on “executing” the designs of the long dead Wright:

Mr. Puttnam, 70, is best known for “executing” another Wright-designed building, a convention center in Madison, Wis., called Monona Terrace, which opened in 1997. Theodore Marks, the president of a nonprofit organization that hired Mr. Puttnam for one of the Buffalo projects – a boathouse on the Niagara River – described Monona Terrace as stunning.
Stunning perhaps, but not wholly accurate. “We used Wright’s exterior religiously,” Mr. Puttnam said, “except we made a six-inch mistake in height. There were hand-done drawings, and we thought we saw a zero. Years later we blew up the drawing for an exhibition, and we said, ‘Whoops, it’s not a zero, it’s a six.’ ”
Robert Twombly, a Wright biographer, has accused the architect’s former apprentices of muddying his legacy with mediocre “Wright” buildings.