Ray McGovern Arrested for Attempting to Attend Speech with Former CIA Director

October 31, 2014by tobi in General

A high-level guest speaker from the previous 30th Anniversary Schiller Institute Conference, Ray McGovern, was arrested in New York on October 31, 2014. The 75-year-old former CIA Agent and current peace activist was detained before the start of a talk between former CIA director David Petraeus, retired US Army Lt. Col. John Nagl, and author Max Boot on American Foreign Policy. Witnesses claimed that during the arrest he was declaring “I have a ticket!” but the police continued to very aggressively arrest the 75 year old man. Ray McGovern’s presentation at this latest Schiller Institute Conference is a living testament of what is needed to address to current political situation. His speech went through the double-talk of American Political leaders and the shameless submission by Europe’s leader, but what he stressed the most was the importance of organizing as opposed to simply giving speeches or spreading information.

He said:

“When I was beaten up for simply standing with my back to Hillary Clinton, who was then the Secretary of State, standing up quietly, not saying anything, not having anything, signs or anything, I was beaten up pretty badly…

He continued,

…And guess what? I don’t know how it is here in Europe, but in America, people don’t like to see old people get beat up. How do I know that? Hillary Clinton received thousands and thousands of telephone calls and telegrams and emails saying “What are you beating up an old man for?

…if you have some gray in your hair, put your body into it. People don’t like old people to get beat up.

Now, you young people! You got really good models here. You got Sophie Scholl, 21, 22; you’ve got Bradley, now Chelsea, Manning, who was 22 when he did his deed, you have Edward Snowden who was 29—there is great hope.”

In light of these events we’ve attached McGovern’s speech to highlight the importance of courage and the necessity for those viewing to become involved.

China’s High-Speed Rail Investment Would Cover the U.S.A.

October 2, 2014by Jason Ross in General, World Land-Bridge updates

Brookings’ Africa in Focus online magazine published an article Sept. 25 on “The Expansion of Chinese Railways in Africa,” which made clear that Chinese President Xi Jinping’s expressed wish to “link all the capitals in Africa with high-speed rail” is well underway.

China has projects in progress all over the continent, the magazine reports, totaling tens of billions of dollars in investments, and providing the African continent with the connectivity of a standard (Chinese) gauge in replacement of the half-dozen gauges of the old railroad fragments built under well-forgotten colonial empires. One of the most important, the rail corridor across Kenya which will then connect north to the Mediterranean coast, is scheduled to start construction in October, financed by the China Export-Import Bank and the Kenyan government.

But the article’s observation that China’s rail building abroad is expanding rapidly while it slows at home, is not true. The nation’s investment through China Railways in high-speed rail within the country, has increased by 20% in the past year and is running at nearly $100 billion a year (430 billion yuan, or $65 billion, through August in 2014, as reported in Xinhua).

This is a very large investment; it would build a nationwide network of high-speed electrified corridors in the United States in less than five years, according to a thorough EIR study of requirements published in 2002, although U.S. landmass is greater than China’s. Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR), when he publicly slammed Obama in 2011 for deliberately failing on economic infrastructure, had introduced legislation for $300 billion in high-speed rail funding over six years — a very serious level but only half that of China now.

A Reuters article Sept. 29 quotes Xinhua that so far the increase has been accomplished solely with state banks — Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd., Agricultural Bank of China, China Construction Bank Corp., and Industrial Bank Co. — all contracting with China Railways Corporation. The government’s targeted investment level is even higher than this $100 billion annual rate, intending to bring private banks and funds into the investments through China Railways.

Bolivia Asks China for $3 Billion for Major Infrastructure

September 25, 2014by Jason Ross in BRICS updates, General

Bolivian President Evo Morales met with Chinese Vice Prime Minister Zhang Gaoli on Sept. 22 in New York City, where both are attending the UN General Assembly. According to Bolivian Development Planning Minister Viviana Caro, Chinese President Xi Jinping had offered $10 billion in financing for Ibero-American development projects at the BRICS summit in Brazil, “and we are going to take up China’s offer” with a request for a $3 billion credit for four projects.

Among the projects Morales presented to Zhang are the industrialization of the giant iron ore deposits in Mutun, in eastern Bolivia — meaning using them to produce steel, as opposed to simply exporting them as raw materials. He also requested Chinese help in building the Puerto Busch-Motacusito railroad, which would also run past the Mutun mine. Mutun is one of the largest iron ore deposits in the world, with an estimated 40 billion tons of iron ore and 10 billion tons of manganese. This is a geographically critical area, and series of projects, for all of South America.

Natural Ore deposits in Bolivia. By utilizing this credit investment from China, Bolivia would be able to advance its own industrial productive capabalities for long term economic development.

The Bolivian government is already building a major inland port at Puerto Busch, which is on the Paraguay River, which will give landlocked Bolivia access to the Atlantic Ocean via Paraguay and Argentina. Just north of Puerto Busch is Puerto Suarez, another Bolivian river port which is only 10 km from the Brazilian border, and is situated by Laguna Caceres, which is connected to the important Paraguay and Parana river waterways by the Tamengo Canal. This is also close to Corumba, Brazil, one of the locations where the great Amazon River system and the Paraguay/Parana/Rio de la Plata river system meet, and could be interconnected with a navigable canal, as has been proposed as far back as Alexander von Humboldt in the 19th century.

The interconnection of South America’s three major river basins — the Orinoco, the Amazon, and the Rio de la Plata — along with high-speed rail corridors traversing South America from the Atlantic to the Pacific, connected into the World Land-Bridge via the Darien Gap, were proposed in detail in the 1988 Schiller Institute book, Ibero-American Integration.

Webcast: Could Man’s Future in Space Be the Key to Defeat the Deadly Pessimism of Empire?

July 13, 2019by David Dobrodt in General, Helga Webcast, Space updates, World war danger updates tagged Helga Zepp-LaRouche

Helga Zepp LaRouche opened today’s webcast by discussing “bright spots” in the strategic situation, coming from the diplomacy at the G20 summit and the Trump-Kim DMZ meeting. Yet the potential which is emerging to break from the unipolar world of geopolitics is threatened by the enemy of mankind, the British Empire, which is engaged in military provocations, against Iran and China, but more significantly, through its role in spreading pessimism about the future, through the imposition of anti-human Green ideology.

As the West is destroying itself, Asia is rising, and a key feature of Asia’s emergence is the emphasis on space exploration. China and India are both engaged in lunar projects, and Trump’s intent for the U.S. to be back on the Moon by 2024, defines a potential for broad scientific cooperation. This is the antidote to the pessimism of “limits to growth”, etc., around which the Green movement was launched—human creativity can always open new horizons, she emphasized, as Krafft Ehricke emphasized, with his visionary idea of the “extraterrestrial imperative”, and Lyndon LaRouche demonstrated in his writings.

We can use the 50th anniversary of the Moon landing to bring renewed optimism to people, something which is greatly feared by the neo-liberal imperial networks centered in London.

President Xi Calls for a ‘Dialogue of Cultures’ at Confucius Celebration

September 25, 2014by Jason Ross in Cultural renaissance updates, General

In a key-note speech at the International Conference Commemorating the 2565th Anniversary of the birth of Confucius and the fifth Congress of the International Confucian Association, President Xi Jinping called for a dialogue among cultures. “Culture is the soul of a nation,” President Xi said.

“If a country or a nation does not cherish its own thinking and culture, if they lose their soul, no matter which country or which nation, it will not be able to stand..Countries must value and maintain their own thinking and culture, while recognizing and respecting others,..

Individual modes of thought are special in their different ways and there is no culture or thinking that is superior to others..And irrespective of their size and strength, all countries’ thinking and cultures deserve to be recognized and respected.’

All countries and nations should learn and draw on the strength and quintessence of others’ ideology and culture. This is an important condition to encourage dignity, confidence and strength of native ideology and culture.”

he said, while stressing that every nation should value and maintain its own ideology and culture.

“Any kind of civilization, no matter which country or nation it originated from, is fluid and open,”

Xi said, noting that such a flow is an important rule for the spread and development of civilizations.

“Chinese civilization has become more rich and colorful through exchanges with others and in return made great contributions to human civilization in history,”

Xi said, citing the opening of the ancient Silk Road and the foreign diplomats sent to China in the Tang Dynasty (618-907), among other developments.

“Confucianism originated from China and it has long been part of human civilization.”‘

Conference: APOLLO +50

July 9, 2019by Jason Ross in General, New financial order updates, New York City SI activity, Our conferences

MANKIND’S FUTURE MUST DETERMINE OUR PRESENT:

A Dialogue of Cultures on How to Develop the Population and the Productive Workforce for Earth’s Next Fifty Years

Saturday, July 20, 2019, 1 PM – 5 PM

New York City

Full Conference

Keynote: Helga Zepp-LaRouche

Andrea Jones, Goddard Space Flight Center, LIVE from Washington, DC

Dr. Xing Jijun, Counsellor, Head of Science and Technology Section, Consulate General of the People’s Republic of China

Ben Deniston — Solar System’s Next 50 Years

Thermonuclear fusion, applied as a commercial power source, not only supersedes any other available power source, and is non-polluting—it would supply the only efficient power source for travel throughout the solar system. Humanity—not merely China, or the United States, or Russia, but all humanity—has always looked up to the stars, because we have an extra-terrestrial imperative, to know the secrets of the universe. Eliminating war through the joint investigation of the solar system and galaxy—the local neighborhood in which we reside—is our first next step toward the adulthood of the human race.

On this 50th anniversary of mankind’s greatest scientific achievement, let us take a page from the same President John F. Kennedy, who had proposed the Apollo Project to an inspired America, and who, together with America’s “mortal enemy,” the Soviet Union pulled the world away from the brink of extinction in October 1962. In September of 1963, Kennedy told the United Nations:

Finally, in a field where the United States and the Soviet Union have a special capacity-in the field of space—there is room for new cooperation, for further joint efforts in the regulation and exploration of space. I include among these possibilities a joint expedition to the moon. Space offers no problems of sovereignty; …Surely we should explore whether the scientists and astronauts of our two countries—indeed of all the world—cannot work together in the conquest of space, sending some day in this decade to the moon not the representatives of a single nation, but the representatives of all of our countries.

Now, many other nations—India, China, Brazil, several European nations—possess capabilities far more advanced than those of the 1960s Soviet Union or United States. If a mere fraction of the wealth now wasted on war, or foolishly misspent on global warming, were pooled and deployed in a joint space effort, we could in fifteen years create an entirely new economic platform for all of humanity—a worldwide cultural “paradigm shift” as has been proposed by Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche—that propels the human race forward, in the spirit of what has been called by China “win-win cooperation,” in the form of its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI.) Lyndon LaRouche in his 1984 “Draft Memorandum of Agreement Between the US and USSR” provided a model for a durable survival solution to potentially lethal conflicts among nations, by elevating the discussion to the higher self-interest of humanity, thereby dissolving the basis for conflict.

President Donald Trump has recently met with Presidents Xi of China, Putin of Russia, and Chairman Kim of North Korea, as well as others, to avert war. President Trump has also proposed a return of the United States to the Moon in five years, by 2024. Might the United States take the occasion of the July 20 commemoration to propose a joint Moon-Mars mission, involving Russia, China, India, the European Space Agency, and nations in the continents of Africa and South America, both essential launch sites for the continuous and permanent missions required?

Why permanent? Because mankind will now permanently move to the first level of human civilization, which is expressed in the ability to navigate the solar system as a whole. The higher, galactic level (the second stage), and the yet higher intergalactic level, are what we are now only able to observe, in part. For these, we yet “see as through a glass, darkly.” But we know that it takes humanity as a whole, in the tens and hundreds of billions, to develop the scientific competence to investigate and explore the more than two trillion galaxies we now know to exist. We need the creative potential of every single person on the planet to accomplish this.

To prepare for this, the new space program must be part of a broader commitment to simultaneously revolutionize the labor process on Earth as well as in space, through new stages of technologies, and through ending poverty on the planet in the next years through the cooperative arrangements and economic development made possible through the World Land Bridge. Both tasks require mastery of the concept of increasing the energy flux-density of power systems. Lyndon LaRouche’s book, Earth’s Next Fifty Years, outlines how more than one billion jobs in mining, manufacturing and agriculture, of the highest skill levels, must be created now, to fulfill mankind’s “extraterrestrial imperative” to investigate the solar system, the galaxy, and beyond.

It is the power of this vision, the potential of what the astronauts saw when they watched the Earth rise from the Moon, which we of the Schiller Institute must seek to invoke in our fellow citizens, the nation, and the world, this July 20. Join us in this mission, for which “failure is not an option.”

China Expands Its Plans To Move Away from The Dollar Currency

September 24, 2014by Jason Ross in Economic development updates, General

On Sept. 15, coinciding with a visit to Paris by Chinese Vice Premier Ma Kai, the Bank of China (BOC) was appointed as a yuan clearing service in Paris, and two French groups, BNP Paribas Investment Partners (the asset management arm of BNP Paribas) and Carmignac, were awarded licenses enabling them to invest in China’s mainland securities, in moves to expand yuan markets. In another move by Beijing to expand the offshore yuan market, a BOC spokesman told Xinhua the mechanism of renbinmi (RMB) clearing business in Paris will help Chinese and French companies and financial institutions use the yuan for cross-border transactions and facilitate free trade and investment between the two countries.

The BRICS Post said today that Beijing is keen on substituting the U.S. dollar with the yuan in all of China’s trade with other countries. The Chinese currency now trades directly with the Japanese yen, the Australian dollar, the Brazilian real, the euro, the New Zealand dollar, and many other currencies. The BOC became the renminbi clearing bank in Frankfurt in June, and China Construction Bank got authorization to be the renminbi clearing bank in London. China stepped up its plans to boost international use of its currency in October 2013 by signing an agreement between the European Central Bank and the People’s Bank of China (the central bank) to swap euros with yuan. The BRICS Post also noted that competition is fierce among Europe’s major financial centers, Frankfurt, London, and Luxembourg, to trade in China’s currency.

In a major highlight of an investment meeting earlier this month, Moscow and Beijing have entered into a pact to boost use of the ruble and yuan for trade transactions.

“We’re going to encourage companies from the two countries to settle more in local currencies, to avoid using a currency from a third country,”

Igor Shuvalov

Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov said, referring to the U.S. dollar. Meanwhile, the United Kingdom will become the first Western country to issue an offshore bond in the Chinese renbinmi. This was announced after discussions between Vice Premier Ma Kai and U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne earlier last week.

Schiller Institute participates in Symposium with Egyptian Consulate in Houston

July 5, 2019by Jason Ross in General, Houston SI activity, New financial order updates, New Silk Road / BRI updates, Our cultural events

On Thursday evening, June 27, 2019, the Egyptian Consulate of Houston sponsored a symposium at the Arab American Cultural & Community Center in Houston, Texas. The Egyptian Consulate requested that the Schiller Institute co-sponsor the event with them. The theme of the Symposium was “Egypt after the Revolution.” The guests in attendance for the event included Consulates from several countries, including Mexico, Greece, and Russia. There were several friends and guest of the Schiller Institute, and representatives from the World Affairs Council, the Arab community in Houston, the Caribbean American Chamber, and a number of people representing the Houston’s energy sector.

Kesha Rogers, Egyptian Consul General Khaled Rizk, and Brian Lantz of the Schiller Institute.

Joining Houston Consul General of Egypt, the Honorable Khaled Rizk, was Brian Lantz, speaking for the Schiller Institute. Brian and the Schiller Institute’s bold perspective uplifted both the audience and the conference organizers.

Following an introduction, Consul General Rizk spoke and gave prepared remarks which reviewed the efforts of Egypt’s government, led by President El-Sisi to stabilize and rapidly grow Egypt’s economy after the “second revolution.” Consul General Rizk reviewed the ensuing rapid pace of developments since 2013, including future projects now underway, which include the new administrative capital, the industrial zones along the Suez. He also highlighted the new offshore natural gas discoveries and prospects for natural gas exports.

Brian Lantz took up the role of Egypt as a key leader in the development of the New Silk Road into West Asia and Africa—the emerging new center of world economic development. The Schiller Institute’s reports were featured. In the spirit of Egypt’s earlier role in Bandung Conference and the creation of the Non-Aligned Movement, Egypt is once again playing a leading role in south-south relations and world affairs, Lantz said. Lantz also pointed out the importance of Egypt’s diplomatic efforts, working among all the countries in West Asia and North Africa in particular, for peace and economic development. Lantz cited some of Egypt’s initiatives in Africa, and El-Sisi’s role as the new chairman of the African Union. The African Union is deeply involved in cooperation with the Belt and Road and promoting African integration. Now getting the economics right was stressed by Brian, with an outline of Lyndon LaRouche’s principles of physical economy. Africa’s emerging renaissance was thereby highlighted, with its population potential and such mega projects as Grand Inga and Transaqua.

Prior to the presentations there was a reception where people were given the opportunity to talk informally. Likewise, there was a great deal of lively discussion following the presentations. There was recognition and great respect for Lyn expressed by a number of people. A leader of the Arabic community told Brian he had been reading LaRouche’s material for years, exclaiming, “He is a genius. ” Another person, an Indian-American engineer, was very happy to hear of our work in support of the BRI and also volunteered his respect for LaRouche over the years. An Hispanic business women who saw our Silk Road report was so excited: she participated in an art contest as a student, and won first prize for a drawing of the original photograph of the Silk Road and camels, pictured on our original report.

The Schiller Institute participation in the event was very important and timely given the rapid pace of developments around the BRI and the growing recognition of Lyndon and Helga’s role in bringing about this beautiful new paradigm, as we have seen also with the recent events in San Francisco. The Schiller Institute was also an invited speaker at a Chinese consular event in Houston last week, for an audience high school students, with teachers, some media, and consular officials attending.

Helga Zepp-LaRouche: China, Contrary to the West, Is Not Operating on the Basis of Geopolitics

September 24, 2014by tobi in General, World Land-Bridge updates tagged Helga Zepp-LaRouche, silk road

Helga Zepp-LaRouche, in her Sept. 11 webcast on the BüSo website was, asked about the alternative to Western policy that is developing around the BRICS. In her reply, she also went into her impressions of her visit to China in late August-early September.

Not only does China continue to make spectacular progress in building infrastructure throughout the country — at a pace unheard of today in Europe, she stressed, but the government is simultaneously striving to make sure that the population remains conscious of its long and rich cultural heritage, such as the Great Wall and the Silk Road. She, herself, got a sense of that during the “fact-finding tour” of the Old Silk Road that she and others took in the West of China.

Her two-week visit was packed with meetings and conferences, but she wanted to summarize the sum of her experiences.

“This is of great importance: We have to make sure that the German population and others in Europe and America acquire a correct understanding of what is going on in China with the Silk Road and its space policy.”

What one generally hears from think-tanks in the West, Zepp-LaRouche said, is that China just wants to extend its influence, and further its imperial expansion. “Nothing could be more wrong,” she commented. But these Westerners judge China’s economic and space policies by projecting onto China what they themselves do when they pursue geostrategic interests, just as the EU is pursuing, and want to expand the EU ever further. Both former EU foreign policy representative Solana and EU Commission President Barroso have said there is no limit to EU expansion.

“The EU is a neo-imperialist entity which pursues geopolitical interests and considers them to be in blatant contradiction with the alleged geopolitical interests of others countries, such as the U.S., Russia, China, the BRICS group. And that is what is wrong.”

But what is motivating Chinese policy and what has become the guiding light for the BRICS and for a growing number of countries around them, Zepp-LaRouche went on,”is not geopolitics. People in the West cannot even imagine that there are countries which are not operating on the basis of neo-liberalism, monetarism, positivism, and geopolitics, and whose axiomatics are perhaps not identical with, but are very similar to, the thinking and principles that Gottfried Leibniz put forward at the end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th centuries — that is, a true development perspective for the universal history of mankind which is completely comparable to the policy of the American Revolution or of John Quincy Adams, one of the earliest Presidents who said:

“That is emphatically what China is doing today.”

Many people may not understand that, or believe it, Zepp-LaRouche said. But she can assure them that China is operating for the moment on the basis of 5,000 years of Chinese history, more than that of any other country. That is manifest, for example, in the role that Confucianism still plays today in China’s identity, and also in other “nice things” such as Chinese cuisine, which is famous worldwide.

China “is a cultural nation which is not imperialist, and whose interest is to further develop mankind,” which is the concept of the New Silk Road.”Since the reforms of Deng Xiaoping at the latest, by applying the correct scientific principles, China has realized the greatest economic transformation of any country on this planet. And they are now at the point where they are saying: We will transform the other, still-undeveloped regions of China, and raise the population’s living standards, and above all we will make this model of development available to all, in the form of the New Silk Road being in the tradition of the old Silk Road. This is an open concept. Everybody is invited to join in and contribute. It is explicitly inclusive and not directed against the alleged geostrategic interests of other nations or groups of nations.

“That is a very important difference. It is not geopolitics, but a dynamic concept of the upward development of the human species. And I would ask all our viewers’ who do not believe me to send me their questions. I am more than willing to engage in a dialogue with you, because it is crucially important for Germany that we understand this.”

Amidst US/China Tensions, Schiller Institute Holds “Win-Win” Forum on BRI in Los Angeles

July 3, 2019by Jason Ross in General, Helga statement, article, transcript, Los Angeles SI activity, New Silk Road / BRI updates, Our cultural events, Our economic development events, World Land-Bridge updates

In the midst of a flare-up of tensions between the US and China, sparked by the Anglo-American establishment’s fierce commitment to drive a wedge between the two nations, the Schiller Institute held a forum on June 15 in the Los Angeles area to promote the idea of cooperation on the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

The session was opened by a movement from a composition for unaccompanied violin by J.S. Bach, performed by a student from the Los Angeles County High School of the Arts. This was followed by a five minute video of Schiller Institute founder and chairperson Helga Zepp-LaRouche, who greeted the attendees and provided a strategic context for the meeting. She deplored the recent nasty provocations being directed at China by some notorious political factions in the US, and presented a vision of an alternative path, where the US and China lead the world into the future based on the highest cultural and scientific principles, and the most ambitious infrastructure scheme in human history, the BRI.

Zepp-LaRouche was followed by Shi Yuanqiang, deputy consul general for the People’s Republic of China in Los Angeles. Shi provided a very thorough explication of the goals and structure of the BRI, stressing that there is extensive consultation between China and the other nations participating in the project, that all parties participate as equals and share in the benefits. He provided examples of the projects that are being built with Chinese collaboration in Africa and Central Asia, and elaborated on President Xi Jinping’s vision of a “Community of Common Destiny”, a mutually beneficial, “Win-Win” relationship among nations. Shi emphasized that there was a place at the table for the United States.

Following Shi’s presentation, there were remarks by Richard Chen, a board member of the US-China Forum who had acted as an interpreter for Chairman Deng Xiaoping during his historic visit to the US in 1979. Chen said that the two great accomplishments of the US after the end of World War II were the establishment of the United Nations, and the Marshall Plan. He compared China’s current role with respect to the developing nations, to the Marshall Plan.

The concluding presentation was by Schiller Institute representative Daniel Platt. He opened with an image that juxtaposed two historic paintings, showing Americans and Chinese fighting their respective battles against British colonialism during the American Revolution and the Opium Wars. Platt asserted that the methodology of the Empire, typified by the “Zero-Sum Game” approach of geopolitics, is an “article of faith” for today’s neoconservative movement. To this he contrasted President Xi’s concept of “Win-Win”, or Helga Zepp-LaRouche’s vision of humanity entering adulthood. He discussed the historical parallels between the US and China with Dr. Sun Yat-Sen’s embrace of the economic conceptions of Abraham Lincoln, and their shared approach to infrastructure development. He then reviewed the history of the proposals made by Lyndon LaRouche in the years following the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact, culminating in the World Landbridge.

Among the eminent personalities who took part in the forum were the consul generals of Kenya and Belgium, as well as consular officials from Armenia and Malaysia, and a large delegation from the PRC consulate.

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