By Paolo von Schirach February 22, 2012 WASHINGTON – Whatever happens with the Republican nomination process, the winner is unlikely to truly inspire America. For different reasons, Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum are all very weak candidates. (I shall not even try to assess Ron Paul, who lives all by himself in a [...]
By Paolo von Schirach Related story: http://schirachreport.com/index.php/2012/02/19/america-hit-by-2009-recession-as-wages-were-stagnant-due-to-global-competition-citigroup-peter-orszag-argues-that-us-should-invest-smartly-in-education-as-a-way-to-regain-strength/ February 21, 2012 WASHINGTON – Just a few days I reported (see link above) that Peter Orszag, formerly Obama’s Budget Director and now with Citigroup in a recent Chicago speech strongly advocated more organic links between corporations, especially manufacturers, and Community Colleges, so that these vital education institutions will be able [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 20, 2012 WASHINGTON – According to a piece in Caixin, a Chinese publication, by Mark Clifford, Executive Director of the Hong Kong-based Asia Business Council, Shi Zhengrong, CEO of China’s Suntech Power and the world largest producer of solar panels stated during the latest Davos gathering that soon enough (by 2015) solar power [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 19, 2012 WASHINGTON – America is short of breath because we have to deal with the impact of two major issues. The first one is stagnant or declining wages, a global “tectonic shift“ affecting most developed economies that started several years ago. The second one is the gigantic financial crisis that we are very slowly trying [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 15, 2012 WASHINGTON – Thanks to C-SPAN TV I have watched many times Congressman Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland give several “special orders” speeches, (speeches on whatever topic delivered at the end of the day for a duration of up to 60 minutes), on “peak oil”. Bartlett is a pleasant old gentleman who speaks [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 14, 2012 WASHINGTON – General Electric is hosting a major event in Washington, DC, titled American Competitiveness: What Works. Given GE’s convening power, lots of interesting people from industry, government, the media and think tanks are attending and speaking. And mostly the panelists and speakers talk about the right things. [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 11, 2012 WASHINGTON – You can promote innovation in America via complex government financial aid programs that may be poorly designed, or you can push it forward by fostering good education for budding scientists, while creating incentives for them through competitions and prizes awarded to real, marketable applications.
By Paolo von Schirach February 9, 2012 WASHINGTON – The confused and fractious Republicans appear terminally incapable of getting their act together, as the latest contests in Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri won by comfortable margins by conservative Rick Santorum show. By now it is pretty obvious: a large chunk of the rank and file GOP activists really do not [...]
By Paolo von Schirach February 6, 2012 WASHINGTON – Remember Yale historian Paul Kennedy and his 1987 tome “The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers“? At that time there was a lot of interest in, and indeed concern about his fairly comprehensive narrative focusing on how all major Western Powers, primarily because of the huge [...]
By Paolo von Schirach January 31, 2012 WASHINGTON – Wolfgang Ischinger, former German Deputy Foreign Minister, Igor Ivanov, former Russian Foreign Minister, and San Nunn, former US Senator, and once Chairman of the powerful Senate Armed Services Committee, in their current role as co-chairmen of the Euro-Atlantic Security Initiative voice their concern about the future [...]