Former Soviet Leader Tours the 9th Ward

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John Pope, Staff writer
Times Picayune

Mikhail Gorbachev drew loud cheers in New Orleans Friday when he promised to lead a local revolution if the Army Corps of Engineers doesn't keep its promise to improve levees by 2011.

"We will be coming back," the Soviet Union's last leader said, through an interpreter, during a ceremony in the Lower Garden District. "If this pledge is not fulfilled, we will start a new revolution in New Orleans."

After the applause died down, Gorbachev said that action should be a last resort, even though, he added, most Americans apparently have forgotten that their country is the result of a revolution.

"We shouldn't want another revolution," he said. "We should do our best in every (other) way."

Gorbachev, who is in New Orleans as the board chairman of a worldwide organization that promotes environmentally friendly construction, spoke at the International School of Louisiana after a quick tour of the Katrina-ravaged Lower 9th Ward.

"A few brief hours are not enough to see everything," he said, "but it is enough to appreciate the scale of the disaster that the city had to go through."

As a result of that trip, "my impression was that New Orleans is beginning to come back," Gorbachev said, "but, still, there is a lot that remains to be done. ...

"We saw many traces of the devastation, but we also saw the signs of the city coming back."

In a meeting with City Council President Arnie Fielkow earlier Friday, Gorbachev said he had been told of the work that businesses and citizens' groups have done to help restore the city.

Such action is commendable, reflecting the citizens' courage, he said. But, he added in an interview, it is not enough.

"The government of the state and the federal government should express to the world .¤.¤. the intent to rebuild this city, because I think that this great country will be a loser if it is not able to assure this.

"If such a great country cannot rebuild this city, then what about all the other small countries?"

Gorbachev, who won the 1990 Nobel Peace Prize, indirectly criticized President Bush and the Iraq war, in which the United States has been involved longer than it was in World War II.

"Unfortunately, money is easily found for war," he said. "It takes just a few days. I have to say that that's not the first time that money is easily found for wars but not for this kind of trauma, not for this kind of tragedy."

When asked whether he would deliver this message to Bush, Gorbachev replied, "If there is an occasion, I certainly will volunteer my opinion."

Different kind of chairman

Gorbachev, 76, is the board chairman of Green Cross International, which is made up of about 30 organizations, including the U.S. affiliate, Global Green USA. That is the organization working with actor Brad Pitt to build environmentally friendly, energy-conserving homes in the Holy Cross neighborhood and, perhaps, the rest of the Lower 9th Ward.

Green Cross' board chose New Orleans for its first meeting in the United States to express solidarity with New Orleanians and their struggle to rebuild, Gorbachev said.

The board meeting, which is not open to the public, will be held today at the Hotel InterContinental. Gorbachev will speak tonight at a dinner at the Foundry. Tickets for the fundraiser, which benefits Green Cross, range from $250 to $25,000.

Gorbachev, who wore a suit but no tie, and his retinue were at the International School because Global Green USA has chosen the school to be made more energy-efficient and improve indoor air quality, Global Green spokesman Ruben Aronin said.

The changes will include daylight sensors that will turn off lights when use is low, solar panels and solar-powered water heaters, said Matt Petersen, Global Green's president and chief executive officer.

The school on Coliseum Square, which goes from kindergarten through the seventh grade, is the second in New Orleans to be designated a Green Seeds School. The first was A.P. Tureaud Elementary School; five more will be named, Aronin said.

The changes to these schools, which are underwritten by a $2 million grant from the Bush-Clinton Katrina Foundation, cost between $75,000 and $100,000 per school, Aronin said.

Warm welcome

For the Friday visitors, the students strung welcoming signs, in Russian, on brightly colored sheets of construction paper -- one Cyrillic letter per sheet -- across a hall. Pupils serenaded them with "This Earth Is Your Earth," a retooled version of the Woody Guthrie folk song "This Land Is Your Land," that ended with this line: "Keep this Earth green for you and me."

The welcome extended to the former head of what used to be the biggest Communist country was just one example of the changes that have occurred since the Soviet Union fell apart 16 years ago.

Other changes were evident Friday. In a sharp contrast to the overheated rhetoric from the Cold War, Gorbachev called for international dialogue, and the former leader of a country that was officially atheist credited God for the fact that more people were not killed by Katrina and the ensuing flooding.

"I think that the world is changing so rapidly that I feel that even I am not keeping pace," he said in the interview.

"In this situation," Gorbachev continued, "it is very important .¤.¤. to lay the foundation for the building of our future so that we don't have to say one day, 'We're so sorry that we didn't take the opportunity at the beginning of the 21st century to promote whatever is positive and eliminate whatever is negative.'¤"

A capitalist idea

Gorbachev has changed, too. The man who grew up under communism has worked in advertising campaigns for Pizza Hut and Louis Vuitton, the upscale luggage manufacturer.

In one ad, Gorbachev is sitting in a car with a $900 Louis Vuitton duffel bag, driving past a remnant of the Berlin Wall.

He said his reason for joining the ad campaigns was simple: He needed the money for his family and for the Gorbachev Foundation, which promotes diplomatic values and moral principles, according to its Web site.

"The money was very timely for a good cause when we were in great difficulty," Gorbachev said.

His compensation didn't include a set of Louis Vuitton luggage. "More like a briefcase," he said.