Hugh Shelton is a towering figure!

Seriously, even with a bum knee, the guy looks down on me like few people I meet.

Flew through Charlotte (free wifi there, as all airports should offer) yesterday afternoon, after penning piece for World Politics Review online quick post-election "issue" that will post next Monday. Production continues on my my next-issue pieces in both Good and Esquire.

Somebody out there has to remind me of some German pub that wants a small piece from me sometime in early Nov. I remember it vaguely ...

Anyway, fly USAIR through Charlotte, missing the connection, so show up late for dinner of Hugh Shelton Leadership Center's board of directors at Sheraton in downtown Raleigh, where my speech the next day is sponsored by Oak Ridge National Lab and old comrade of Shelton's, Frank Akers (my original boss at ORNL in my consulting gig and still minister-mentor of sorts there). Nice to see Frank again, and honor to meet General Shelton and his wife and sort of share the meal (I was starving, showed up late, got served, and then ceremonies launched at podium right behind me so I had to sit and stare at my food for about 45 minutes, which for me, is like putting down a dog bowl and then asking Fido to "sit!," but it reinforced my pre-tour diet a bit [down five pounds already], so that helped, I guess).

After dinner I worked out and listened to my iPod (son's old one that I'm loving and stocking with all my favorite albums) and then prepped for next day and crashed, watching some "Family Guy" (an addiction I picked up in RI--quite aptly).

Up at 0700 and down for breakfast at hotel, then taken by MC of day's forum to local convention center, along with Shelton and his missus. Set up and get the AV down right. Then show begins 0815 with opening comments, intro of Shelton (Chairman, Joints Chiefs of Staff second Clinton admin and a bit into Bush), and then he intros me and takes a seat on stage. I operate off the floor, covering about 60 or so yards of cumulative territory (I love going way up aisles, cause it really catches people) and give a truly kick-ass performance. I have no idea why. Allergies have abated quite a bit, but I just felt on in a big way. Of course, a crowd of somewhere in the vicinity of a thousand is a good reason. Bigger the crowd, bigger the pump.

Go almost exactly one hour and then do about 20 Q&A with Shelton making first question. I'm even hotter in the Q&A, which is really odd for me, because usually the delivery breaks down quite a bit then. But again, for some reason, I was OOOOOON!

Anyway, Shelton and Akers and loads of audience seem very happy, so the customer happy.

Nice personal, UNC-Shelton Leadership Center coin from the general.

I gotta tell Steve that Enterra needs its own coin.

As always, lots of young people coming up afterwards asking how they can join Enterra, once they've heard the Development-in-a-Box™ pitch. This I like a lot.

Two flights home and down to the movie theater with the kids. Break earned.

Comments

[Darren Dasburg]

I was in audience and Tom is right on here. The presentation was very powerful and led me to order the most recent published book as soon as I got home. Of curiosity is something I often ponder after higher order thinking sessions like this. many people came up to me afterward and said wow, how does someone keep all that in his head. I too was impressed but as I digested it it all made so much sense. The scary part is if it makes all that much sense then why can't Washington explain it well to the American people. There is a huge explanation on why we are still in Iraq that America doesn't understand. It provided a marvelous picture of the future (of course longer than political terms) that we need to get in bed with and understand we've got to be patient. We as Americans have to educate fellow citizens with a more robust set of perspectives like Tom offered.

Additionally I had a question that the timeframe didn't allow for and hope Tom will address in blog. Given the circle of troubled areas that Tom illustrated, is it a mistake for America to get focused on not sending $700B to people who don't like us very much to quote a recent candidate? It seems that these investments are our way to further accelerate the shrinking of the boundary of pain you illustrated. Pull back and create jobs and investment in America and it seems like we prolong the change in places like Afghanistan.

Are we being short sighted?

[Tom Barnett]

We should look to achieve as much energy source diversity as possible, creating good jobs en route.

The $700 b figure isn't probably operative anymore now with the drop in oil prices.

[crittenden]

"... UNC-Shelton Leadership Center... I gotta tell Steve that Enterra needs its own coin."

Test the waters first, perhaps? From the conference and unconference experience, I can imagine a hybrid learning experience, combining what we know works best from each.

Hmmm... What worked at PopTech, TED, New Map Game, BloggerCon, PodCamp, BarCamp? How might those lessons learned by applied to a ResilienceCamp...

We have the techology...