Next Week's Program (Aug. 3)
Jim Carriere, Shelter-in-a-Box
Pledge: John DeRussy
Thought of the Day: Bob Binn on making a difference
Song: “I Shot the Sheriff”, which was not led by Susan Manheimer but by Kristin Jensen.
Newscast: Angel Riley did a great job on multiple subjects, some of which involved the “translation” of work emails’ true meaning.
Sunshine Report: Bo Whitehill had nothing to report
Rotarians with Guests: Mike Peterson introduced Jarrod Hegretty. Dick Bennett introduced Dave Ayala and Charles Gresk. Apologies on any spelling butchery, verbal delivery.
Women in Rotary: Rosemary Azem reported that this 30 year accomplishment will be celebrated Aug 27
th from 11-130pm. You can sign up at
www.rotary5150.org
Dick Nelson updated us on the kids at Bayside, Rotary Scholarship benefits in general, and how appreciative the kids are that we just show up.
Stanfurd Football Game Tickets: Brian Sullivan is working on this, email him if you are interested.
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SPEAKER LARRY DIAMOND
Walt McCullough introduced Larry Diamond, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution; Senior Fellow, Center on Democracy, Development & the Rule of Law; Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies; Bass University Fellow in Undergraduate Education
Larry began by mentioning a WSJ article from 7/26/17 titled “West Loses Allure for young Chinese”. The article highlights that the West is on the wane, and that China is ascending. China’s GDP will certainly eventually become larger than the US GDP. The US has been spoiled over the last 100 years in the “American Century”. The world has been better for it, and now through some self-inflicted wounds, the world is becoming more chaotic and more war-prone with security issues beyond what we have traditionally faced. How do we retake our place in the world? How do we show American leadership?
Larry covered a lot of ground with us, specifically as it relates to China, Russia, North Korea.
China points:
- China’s economic expansion, military modernization, ability to project power
- US’ “unquestioned” military supremacy is declining
- Investing in cyberattack capabilities, which raises the cost to US
- As China projects power, American response is uncertain
- Thinks withdrawal from the TPP was a huge mistake, as it was a geo-economic leadership vehicle. Now China is free to formulate its own.
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Russia points:
- Putin is trying to cobble the former Soviet Union back together
- Example: Ukraine, Crimean peninsula, threatening Baltic states, Central Asian states defer to him
- Putin has no formal plan to “make Russia great again”, he just appears aggressively opportunistic
- Russia is building out huge cyber warfare capabilities
- Russia could cripple the US power grid if they wanted
- Russia is projecting soft power, such as the RT (Russia Today) channel which is all propaganda
- The US needs to win the “info wars” and the US “marketing” battle
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North Korea points:
- Last totalitarian regime in the world, they control every dimension of life
- Intrinsic military danger, young immature leader with a really bad haircut and delusions of grandeur
- Estimated to have 25 nukes, threat to US, S Korea, Japan, China, Russia
- N Korea working to build an ICBM. Intelligence sources estimate that weaponization of a warhead could occur within 12 months
- Only two options:
- Solve Diplomatically (preferable)
- Solve Militarily
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Thank you Larry Diamond for a great talk!
Spinnings Editor,
Chuck Cattano
Thanks to the Photo Editor of the week Dick Bennett
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