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.

Kashmir glaciers face the heat

"Owing to global warming, most of the small glaciers in Indian administered Kashmir have totally melted down while the big glaciers in most of the areas have decreased in size.
According to a report released by international humanitarian group, Actionaid International, many of the areas in Kashmir have seen a complete disappearance of small glaciers.

The head of ActionAid's Kashmir chapter, Arjimand Talib, said, "The global warming has affected the Kashmir glaciers too and due to the increase in the temperature, the small glaciers in many parts of Kashmir have disappeared while the bigger ones have been reduced in size".

He said that the testimonies of people living in various parts of Kashmir substantiate to the fact that the glaciers in Kashmir are either disappearing or decreasing in size." |Read more|

EPA Asked to Regulate Ship Emissions

"Environmental groups and California Attorney General Jerry Brown asked the federal government Wednesday to require oceangoing ships to limit emissions of heat-trapping gases blamed for global warming.

Brown and the groups separately asked the Environmental Protection Agency to adopt standards for carbon dioxide output from the thousands of cargo ships, cruise liners and other large vessels that dock at American ports each year.

Marine vessels are responsible for nearly 3 percent of the world's greenhouse gases — equal to the amount generated by all cars in the U.S. — and ship emissions are projected to grow by more than 70 percent by 2020 as global trade expands, according to the petitions.

"If the U.S. is to do its part in reducing the threat of global climate disruption, then EPA must limit the global warming emissions from ships that enter the ports of the United States," Brown said.

The environmentalists' petition was filed by Oakland-based Earthjustice on behalf of the Center for Biological Diversity, Friends of the Earth and Oceana." |Read more|

Let's Hope We Weed Out Public Corruption In New Orleans

The FBI and the US attorney's office are continuing their investigations into publiccorruption in New Orleans. If you have any information that can aid them with their investigations, please speak up. Do not allow public corruption to harm our cities.

The vast majority of public officials in Louisiana are law-abiding public servants, said James Bernazzani, the FBI's special agent in charge in New Orleans, but a handful are involved in a corruption culture that has deep roots in the region.

The FBI office here has launched a public awareness campaign that includes radio announcements and town hall meetings to coax more whistle-blowers and warn public officials not to break the law, Bernazzani said. Investigators receive five to 25 tips a week.

The most publicized bust has been the arrest in August of Oliver Thomas, a popular city councilman. Thomas pleaded guilty to accepting nearly $20,000 in bribes from a city hall vendor.

Bernazzani promised more to follow. "We have some ongoing investigations, as we speak," he said. "Once they come up, they'll rock the city again."

Island Nations Warn of Warming Threat

"Island countries from around the world warned Tuesday that despite debate over global warming and the potential for a significant increase in sea levels, there has been little concrete action to stem the climate changes that threatens their existence.

"The international community has convened numerous conferences and summits at which it has agreed on wide-ranging plans and programs of action," Foreign Minister of the Maldives Abdalla Shahid, told the U.N. General Assembly. "However ... all too often the reality of implementation has failed to match the ambitious rhetoric."

He was speaking just days after the world body convened its first-ever climate summit which sought to put new urgency into global talks to reduce global-warming emissions.

The dangerous emissions, or greenhouse gases, come primarily from the burning of fossil fuels like coal-burning power plants. Scientists and environmentalists say carbon dioxide in particular is to blame for warmer temperatures, melting glaciers and rising sea levels." |Read more|

Australia's Temperature to Rise With Gas Emmissions

"Australia's average temperatures may rise by about 1 degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2030 and by 3.4 degrees Celsius by 2070 unless greenhouse gas emissions are cut, the nation's weather bureau and science agency said.

Temperatures will be more extreme with ``substantially'' more days over 35 degrees Celsius (95 Fahrenheit), the Bureau of Meteorology and the CSIRO said today in a joint report. Rainfall will decrease and droughts and high fire-danger weather become more frequent under the ``high-emissions'' scenario, it said.

A United Nations panel of scientists last month said the world is ``very unlikely'' to avoid a warming of 2 degrees Celsius that may lead to droughts and floods and put millions of people at risk.

``The message is that global warming is real, humans are very likely to be causing it, and that it is very likely that there will be changes in the global climate system in the centuries to come, larger than those seen in the recent past,'' the report said." |Read more|

Climate change top issue, CEOs declare

"Canada's top chief executive officers have reached an “unprecedented consensus” on the need to combat global warming and their obligation to do more to help.

Monday morning, the Canadian Council of Chief Executives is releasing a declaration calling climate change “the most pressing and daunting issue” today, and acknowledging the need for “aggressive” action including “absolute” emission cuts. It's the clearest signal ever sent by a broad coalition of Canadian businesses that they embrace the fight against climate change and accept the need for emission cut targets." |Read more|

Actor Brad Pitt Supports New Orleans' Residents With Environmentally Sound Building

"In keeping with one of Pitt's driving principles, architects explained elements of "green" construction to residents who lost decades-old homes that, while rich in family history, were riddled with cracks that let cool air and heat escape, driving up power bills. Many structures in the Lower 9th Ward also were caked with dangerous lead-based paint.

Homes built through the Make It Right program, the architects said, would have energy-efficient appliances, south-facing roofs laden with solar panels, outdoor space for composting and interior finishes made from products that are not harmful to residents' health or the environment.

At each weekly session, residents and architects shared their ideas for the revival of an area that Mayor Ray Nagin described for months after the storm as a place residents should beware of rebuilding." |Read more|