Disappearing into the Secret City

Dateline: Jameson Inn, Oak Ridge TN, 28 June 2005

I surface.

Sunday I had taken Amtrak to NYC, meeting my brother Jerry for a great meal at a French steak house there. We close the place at midnight.

Monday morning I have breakfast with literary agent Jennifer Gates, talking over the long-range plan. We meet at the restaurant where I'm staying just south of Central Park at Le Parker Meridian.

After that breakfast I meet up with Steve DeAngelis of Enterra, our strategic partner, and we talk over some next steps, as that relationship progresses nicely.

Then I head up to the third-floor conference rooms for the reason why I actually came to NYC: a briefing to senior execs from Royal Dutch/Shell. A very global crowd, with responses varying according to continent.

Then I hang in the lobby, reading and editing through page 52 of BFA's unbound galley (I had started some on Saturday night, then more on the train down). Some of our last fixes to the text are not in here, but frankly, this is why I call the bound galley basically the butt-ugly version-like watching the film before post-production was complete or previewing a play before all the kinks are worked out. You have to remember, I write this manuscript in January-February and now it's almost July, so yeah, thinking does evolve and you have to hedge certain sentences for the long haul on items where the outcome remains unclear.

Mark Warren, my Exec Editor at Esquire and the editor of both PNM and BFA then calls and we meet, as planned, at our favorite spot: the Greek restaurant Molyvos on 7th Ave. We synch up on all our stories, big personal plans, joint project plans, etc. Nice drinks, great food. Mark then has to head out to a dinner for a new editor at the mag, while I jump in a cab to LGA for flight to Knoxville.

Get to TN after midnight and grab my rental for 40-minute drive to the former secret city now known as Oak Ridge, where the U. of Tennessee and Battelle jointly run the Oak Ridge National Laboratory for the Department of Energy. Oak Ridge was a secret city made out of thin air (after the locals were tossed off) in 1942 when the U.S. Government started the Manhattan Project for real (Los Alamos being the other great secret city for the scientists and Hanford in WA being the sister secret city where they cranked out the plutonium). Oak Ridge was the place where the uranium was processed.

The city was about 80,000 people hidden behind wire and guard towers for most of the decade, emerging into the real world at the end of the decade. An amazing story.

Today I spend whole day at Oak Ridge, joined about halfway by business manager and New Rule Sets Project partner Steff Hedenkemp in the afternoon.

Gave the brief in the morning to basically all the top managers, in what was described to me as a rare event (i.e., having them all show up for the same talk), then tours of amazing facilities, lunch with director and most senior managers, then many more tours and some time with scientists showing off most recent inventions (unspeakably cool-quite literally in some cases). Day ends with visit to local museum, and we head out to dinner with host, a senior player here. Possibilities to discuss.

I am way down on sleep, so tonight I need to catch up.

Fascinating trip so far. One of those trips where I really need to remember how lucky I am to have a career like this. It is very fun to be me.

Admin notice: No Signposts or Newsletter 4th of July

I'm taking a vacation next weekend, July 4, 2005.

The next newsletter is scheduled for July 11, 2005.

Thanks.

Rogue Aliens: Let them eat baklava

Dateline: Molyvos, 871 Seventh Avenue, Manhattan

*** Breaking News ***

Presumably with trusted escort -- most likely, though unconfirmed, Mark Warren -- assuring his timely return to editing, Tom has been given a moment for food and refreshments.

Having parked their four BeamVehicles directly on the restaurant's frontage, I would assume a stiff drink will be in order to get Tom back to the hotel.

More later.. . . . ..

The Newsletter for June 27, 2005 now posted

Introducing: "Ask the Audience"

Download The Newsletter from Thomas P.M. Barnett - 27 June 2005 at:

PDF format

Word document

Rogue Alien identified: XESSE ESUOH

Dateline: Manhattan, June 27, 2005

***** Breaking News *****

One of the Rogue Aliens -- Rogue Alien 1 -- alledged to be holding Tom Barnett captive in Manhattan has now identified itself as XESSE ESUOH. Rogue Alien 2, the one with the crayon ears, has not yet introduced itself.

More to come.. . . . ..

Browsing used bookshop in Turkey

Photo passed to me from an old colleague/mentor. It was taken at a used bookshop in Antalya on the southern coast of Turkey. The book on the left is Metal Firtina, a current best seller about a 2007 war between the US and Turkey stemming from problems in Iraqi Kurdistan and ending with the nuking of DC. Books about Hitler are also popular here, more for Turkish interest in what he managed to do with nationalistic pride than for antisemitism.

Crazy Talk Central on China

Dateline: Manhattan, not too far from Times Square, 26 June 2005

Geertz is a little Charles Foster Kane all by himself: "Get me some pictures! I'll supply the war!"

Chinese dragon awakens

By Bill Gertz

THE WASHINGTON TIMES

Published June 26, 2005

China is building its military forces faster than U.S. intelligence and military analysts expected, prompting fears that Beijing will attack Taiwan in the next two years, according to Pentagon officials.

U.S. defense and intelligence officials say all the signs point in one troubling direction: Beijing then will be forced to go to war with the United States, which has vowed to defend Taiwan against a Chinese attack.

China's military buildup includes an array of new high-technology weapons, such as warships, submarines, missiles and a maneuverable warhead designed to defeat U.S. missile defenses. Recent intelligence reports also show that China has stepped up military exercises involving amphibious assaults, viewed as another sign that it is preparing for an attack on Taiwan. . .

The combination of a vibrant centralized economy, growing military and increasingly fervent nationalism has transformed China into what many defense officials view as a fascist state.

"We may be seeing in China the first true fascist society on the model of Nazi Germany, where you have this incredible resource base in a commercial economy with strong nationalism, which the military was able to reach into and ramp up incredible production," a senior defense official said.

I had a China handler in the Office of Secretary of Defense's public afffairs office email me last week that I shouldn't believe any of the war talk about China supposedly emanating from the Pentagon, as portrayed in the press.

Check out the whole piece: (http://www.washtimes.com/functions/print.php?StoryID=20050626-122138-1088r.

No, no, nothing to worry about when senior Pentagon people start comparing your state to Nazi Germany. So many similarities, where to begin?

The crazy talk will only get worse as the money gets put on the table in the Quadrennial Defense Review: $1.4 trillion spread over several dozen programs.

Do you think the defense-industrial complex is going to take it lying down? Just giving it all up to the Army and Marines to fight puny wars the Gap over?

No way, Jose. Lotsa money on the line. Need a big demon real bad. Just keep calling them fascist as if the word has meaning in the free-wheeling and incredibly rapacious capitalism that is China.

Geertz has to be the dumbest guy writing on the Pentagon today. He should go back to the National Inquirer or wherever he learned his "craft."

Barnett Captured by Rogue Aliens!!!

Dateline: not above the garage in Portsmouth, Sunday, June 26, 2005

***** Breaking News *****

I've just received a report, though unconfirmed, that rogue aliens, visiting Earth to determine the current condition of human connectivity, are holding Dr. Thomas P.M. Barnett until he can convincingly illustrate for them the A-to-Z- rule set.

Barnett, because of his extraordinary visionary powers, has been temporarily outfitted with a bionic arm designed specifically for high performance speed editing. The apparatus includes WileyX2025 future vision goggles, allowing Dr. Barnett to include real-time thought process images into his documents.

Though the translation of text has been exasperating at times, the imaging seems to be working fine.

Barnett expects to be home before the 4th of July.

See also: "Rogue Alien Indentified: XESSE ESUOH" and Run, Tom! Run

Win a Pentagon's New Map Poster!

Captured by Tom using his cellphone. Of course, I don't have a clue where he is tonight. So. . . the first person who correctly identifies the city and the building he's taking the picture from gets a free map poster.

Signposts - Sunday, June 26, 2005

June 19 2005 - June 25, 2005

from the blog of Thomas P.M. Barnett

www.thomaspmbarnett.com/weblog

Discussion at www.bloggingthefuture.com/discuss

To receive html format Signposts, send an email to get.signposts@thomaspmbarnett.com. Auto-response delivers the current issue to your Inbox.

NRSP Update members automatically receive Signposts via email. If you would like to receive Signposts, publishing alerts for The Newsletter from Thomas P.M. Barnett, and Ask the Audience (coming soon!), please send an email to subscribe@newrulesets.com.

Thanks.

Enterprise resilience for the financial sector

Tom and Steve will be talking about the nature of resilient enterprises at the Association for Enterprise Integration's (AEFI) "Enterprise Resilience for the Financial Sector" on September 19th. It's being held at The St. Regis Hotel in New York.

Give us a heads up if you're coming.

Thanks.

The 2000th posting

Claiming this one for myself before bed (actually, watching "Enemy of the State" with spouse).

This is the 2000th posting since we began the blog back in March of 2004, in my Dad's final days.

The blog has been a lot of fun, and a key reason why PNM has done well. As always, I thank my webmaster for pushing me in this direction. I think it's made writing Vol. II a whole lot easier, because writing and analysis has become a very hands-on, every-day thing for me now.

At least, that's what I'm hoping as I head into the editing process.

Esquire named "Top 50" magazine by Chicago Tribune

Dateline: above the sold garage in Portsmouth RI, 25 June 2005

Packing all day today, breaking only for run to garbage transfer station and quick stops at Honda dealership and B&N. Got a mountain of boxes done. Both attics emptied. Far enough in now so I can concentrate on BFA until deadline now.

Got this one from reader Ben Limbaugh.

Trib picks its annual Top 50 magazines and natch, Esquire makes it.

Here's the online edition first:

50 best magazines



By the Tempo staff

Published June 17, 2004



What makes a magazine great? The writing. The ideas. The photography. The design. Sure. But more importantly, a magazine's worth depends on how it catches readers' glances, and then their hearts. Here, Tempo presents its second annual 50 Best Magazines list. Our selections reflect the periodicals that we pay good money to buy, that we pile on our nightstands, that we devour on trains, that we consider to be the best at what they set out to do. There are more than 17,500 magazines published in this country, so choosing the 50 best was daunting. We argued, we concurred, we scoffed. And we welcome you to continue the debate . . .

5. Esquire. We suspect we're not as good-looking as we think we are. We know we're not clever enough. Esquire is the antidote to our human frailty. Snazzy, gorgeous, well-dressed, smart and that's just the magazine itself. The writing within is consistently great and sometimes beautiful, offering heaping portions of journalism, fiction, essays and helpful advice columns. Even if we doubt we'll ever wrestle with the great trouser-cuffs-and-suspenders debate, we love it that Esquire does.

That's the online entry for Esquire. Here's what appeared in print in the Thursday edition of the paper, typed in personally for me by Ben:

5. Esquire: It's a magazine full of beautiful contradictions, the kind that can drool over Scarlett Johansson's lips in one spread and then, a mere 20 pages later, sincerely prod President Bush with sound advice for creating "a future worth living."

Both Scarlett and I deserve more money, dontcha think?

I'm calling Mark Warren . . . or maybe Scarlett!

Love that wireless!

Dateline: Sacucci Honda, Middletown RI, 25 June 2005

Spending day packing boxes. Will start on BFA manuscript tonight, but have to help my spouse out by getting house more in order before I leave again. Not worried on manuscript timeline, because Mark and I have through the 5th, according to Neil. Putnam's production people want it back by the 29th, but Neil got us the extra time (production people are always incredibly unreasonable!).

Larger reason for dawdling: too much time will push me to start dicking around with the text too much, and I don't want to. Shoving in a lot of recent news stuff is not what I want to do, because I write for the ages, not the fall of 2005. I want to read the text mostly to identify arguments I really want in there but have neglected to include up to now.

Damn Saccuci did my oil change so fast, I barely had time to pen these posts!

■ The next step in the Sino-American economic relationship

■ Iran: connecting and disconnecting at the same time

■ Brazil: the downside of the AIDS drugs threat

The next step in the Sino-American economic relationship

■"Meet China Inc.: Topping Japan Inc. of 1980s: Corporate China Shows Muscle As Host of Global Bids Emerge, Marking Only Start of Deal Flow," by Henry Sender, Wall Street Journal, 24 June 2005, p. C1.

■"Buying Sprees By China Firms Is a Bet on Value Of U.S. Brands," by Geoffrey A. Fowler, Wall Street Journal, 24 June 2005, p. B1.

■"Unocal Sale Could Signal New Directions: Purchase of U.S. Company by Chinese Firm Is Seen as Shift in Investment Approach," by Greg Ip, Wall Street Journal, 24 June 2005, p. A10.

■"Oil Battle Sets Showdown Over China: CNOOC's Offer For Unocal Raises Stakes in Conflict Over Sino-U.S. Ties; Threat, Rival or Vast Market?" by Neil King, Jr., Greg Hitt and Jeffrey Ball, Wall Street Journal, 24 June 2005, p. A1.

WSJ with a slew of articles Friday that really dissect the larger meaning of CNOOC's bid for UNOCAL. The bid is not as weird as it might seem, because most of UNOCAL's assets are in Asia or Asian focused in service. Plus, it ain't exactly a nasty battle between Chevron (other suitor) and CNOOC (China National Offshore Oil Corp), because they partner on other deals in China and Asia.

Larger reality is that China will naturally move into oil industry in big way, both uptream (exploration and production) and downstream (refining and distribution), because of its skyrocketing demand for oil. Even larger reality is that the huge trade surplus creates large dollar reserves, and after you buy as many US T-bills as possible, and pour so much into the secondary mortgage here that it may be fueling the real estate bubble just a bit too much, the next logical step in deeper connectivity with the trading partner is too use those funds to buy companies. This is exactly what Japan did way back when, freaking us then too (they were going to "own" all of America).

But buying American means China intertwines its economic fate with ours even more, by trusting the lasting appeal of U.S. brands that sell--not too surprisingly--mostly to American consumers.

Threat or rival or opportunity? It's simply better for China's rising economy to become more connected to ours. They benefit. We benefit. The world benefits. My man Alan Greenspan is a long-time backer of the notion that China and U.S. must come closer together economically. Watch for him to dampen the typically idiotic response out of Congress to try and stop this bid, which could easily fail on its own because Chevron is already on the inside track to closing this deal.

Iran: connecting and disconnecting at the same time

■"Victory Is Seen For Hard-Liner In Iranian Vote: Reformers Fear Sharp Shift on Freedoms," by Michael Slackman, New York Times, 25 June 2005, p. A1.

■"Iran Pipeline Complicates South Asian Policy: U.S. Tries to Balance Aiding India-Pakistan Rapprochement With Isolating Tehran," by Jay Solomon and Neil King, Jr., Wall Street Journal, 24 June 2005, p. A4.

The news on the Iranian election is depressing. The hard-liner Tehran mayor wins by pulling in the rural poor and enough of the middle class, which apparently is sick of state corruption and felt Rafsanjani wouldn't do enough to tackle that (his presidency in the 1990s was full of corruption). It's a sad expression of how bad things are in Iran that a public hungry for reform will take the hard-liner who promises a cleaner government over one far more likely to open up to the West.

But the vote makes a lot of sense from an internal perspective. What good is better ties with the outside world if the government is that corrupt?

This election portends no movement on the nuke issue with Tehran.

But you know what else won't be going away soon? The U.S.'s uncomfortableness over the gas pipeline from Iran through Pakistan to India. No one will budge on that project, because India and Pakistan see it as a huge confidence-building measure and India simply needs the gas too bad.

Hard-liners will come and go, but the pipeline will stay. We better figure out how to come to grips with Iran given these inescapable realities.

Brazil: the downside of the AIDS drugs threat

■"Brazil Mulls Drug Patent Theft as an AIDS Antidote: Eroding property rights will only result in more misery for the afflicted," op-ed by Mary Anbastasia O'Grady, Wall Street Journal, 24 June 2005, p. A13.

O'Grady, whom I respect, raises several important issues against a stance I generally support, causing me to think harder on the subject.

On the face of it, Brazil's threat to break AIDS drugs' patents for use in their country seems like a logical give on the Old Core's part--here largely American Big Pharma.

But O'Grade lists several downsides worth considering:

1) Brazil wants to become a biotech center in the global economy, and companies won't go there if they fear they'll be ripped off

2) Foreign direct investment will suffer

3) Brazil already gets breaks on the drugs that are under patent, and several of the drugs they currently use have no patent protection

4) This is part of Brazil's larger effort within the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) to push a "development agenda," and such a push may put them at odds with fellow New Cores India and China, which are making big efforts to strengthen property and intellectual rights in their countries in order to keep the FDI flowing.

5) Brazil ain't exactly poor, seeing that it has a space program and big time aircraft industry.

So is Brazil moving closer in the direction of the Irans, Cubas and Venezuelas of the world? Or is this just further evidence that Brazil's preferred role is that of a New Core pillar that argues for Gap rights?

The crunch and the crunched

Dateline: above the garage in Portsmouth RI, 24 June 2005

House is looking scary. Vonne emptied everything to go into #2 POD into piano room and the overflow of stuff spills throughout first floor.

Kids are hiding in their rooms or ours because no furniture to sit on elsewhere and basement no longer a place to play (nothing down there). I fear it's the weird segregated future of the apartment.

Gone all week so so much to do when I get back. Lawn first, and now some pick up and cleaning while wife relaxes. I am so far behind on keeping records etc. Feel like I'll just have to start tomorrow on that before tackling BFA.

It looks pretty cool, except the left upper corners that dog chewed off. But no matter, I will build edit file on Mac, so hard copy is pure artifact anyway.

Quick phonecon with Greg Ip of WSJ today. He's writing on China and economic engagement. Had to help him out because Greg Jaffe helped me out on my piece yesterday. Did it all between call-up for Preboard and cabin door shut on flight 84 from Midway to PVD. I like the time drama of such interviews.

Took the China Esquire piece from just under 5k to 6.5 k on two flights home. Got in all the extras I wanted in. Feel like it's ready for Warren's edit.

Nice long phonecon with Steve DeAngelis of Enterra, partner extraordinaire of NRSP. Exciting things happening with that company. He exhausts me everytime we talk with all the possibilities he raises. Gotta get this move done and then it's pedal to the metal with Enterra.

Nice scotch, some cleaning, quick shower, watch DVD with kids. Tomorrow the text awaits. Glancing over it, my sense is that I will not dick around with it that much. I wrote much closer to the truth of what I wanted to say in this one right off the bat, so the edits got it closer still. My rule is going to be: change what needs to be changed for the reader 25 years from now.

Photos from Sandia

Captured by Tom's cellphone:

Esquire named "Top 50" magazine by Chicago Tribune

Dateline: above the sold garage in Portsmouth RI, 25 June 2005

Packing all day today, breaking only for run to garbage transfer station and quick stops at Honda dealership and B&N. Got a mountain of boxes done. Both attics emptied. Far enough in now so I can concentrate on BFA until deadline now.

Got this one from reader Ben Limbaugh.

Trib picks its annual Top 50 magazines and natch, Esquire makes it.

Here's the online edition first:

50 best magazines



By the Tempo staff

Published June 17, 2004



What makes a magazine great? The writing. The ideas. The photography. The design. Sure. But more importantly, a magazine's worth depends on how it catches readers' glances, and then their hearts. Here, Tempo presents its second annual 50 Best Magazines list. Our selections reflect the periodicals that we pay good money to buy, that we pile on our nightstands, that we devour on trains, that we consider to be the best at what they set out to do. There are more than 17,500 magazines published in this country, so choosing the 50 best was daunting. We argued, we concurred, we scoffed. And we welcome you to continue the debate . . .

5. Esquire. We suspect we're not as good-looking as we think we are. We know we're not clever enough. Esquire is the antidote to our human frailty. Snazzy, gorgeous, well-dressed, smart and that's just the magazine itself. The writing within is consistently great and sometimes beautiful, offering heaping portions of journalism, fiction, essays and helpful advice columns. Even if we doubt we'll ever wrestle with the great trouser-cuffs-and-suspenders debate, we love it that Esquire does.

That's the online entry for Esquire. Here's what appeared in print in the Thursday edition of the paper, typed in personally for me by Ben:

5. Esquire: It's a magazine full of beautiful contradictions, the kind that can drool over Scarlett Johansson's lips in one spread and then, a mere 20 pages later, sincerely prod President Bush with sound advice for creating "a future worth living."

Both Scarlett and I deserve more money, dontcha think?