perspectives

Dear President Obama: Considering MORE War

Dear President Obama,

It is the eve before your Afghanistan Policy Speech. Like millions of other Americans that supported your election and have put faith in your leadership judgment, I remain hopeful. However, I am saddened about what is to become a new phase of US aggression, if press reports are correct. We didn't elect you to be a new "war president," and I agree with many others that you will wear this mantle, if you proceed as it appears you are planning to do with an expansion of the war, risking more lives of America's men and women --- forever changing the lives of their families. President Eisenhower made it clear, "...War never solved anything."

I also know we are not the only ones bracing ourselves for the delivery of your policy message. The whole world is watching. Many of them, who have believed in your leadership and continue to look to you to deliver on your promise of change are waiting. I can't help imagining the Afghan people --- mothers and fathers --- children old enough to understand whatever rumors are meeting them --- worried and scared at reality that the US once again is staging to show its military might, destroying more of their homeland and killing more of their innocent men, women and children. Collateral damage we have rarely even acknowledged in this war.

Why? There must be a better solution than more WAR.

Last night, I read a passage from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. I wish you could read before you deliver your message from the podium at West Point about expansion of the War:

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 
(A Time to Break Silence, April 1967)

"A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: 'This way of settling differences in not just.' This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in this revolution of values. There is nothing, except a tragic death wish, to prevent us from reordering our priorities, so that the pursuit of peace will take precedence over the pursuit of war. There is nothing to keep us from molding a recalcitrant status quo with bruised hands until we have fashioned it into a brotherhood.

This kind of positive revolution of values is our best defense... War is not the answer..." 

I remain grateful for not personally knowing the experience of WAR in my lifetime... However, I admit I'm also haunted by a message left by someone with a credible opinion, Brigadier General Smedley D. Butler, well-known as America's MOST decorated soldier. He told us...

"WAR is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in life."

With great hope we await your message. Bring our troops home, save lives, save money we don't have, and STOP THE MADNESS of WAR. These are my greatest hopes. Please do the hard, more courageous act of doing what is RIGHT for our country, our troops, and for the world.

Respectfully,

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
founder, president, and CEO
Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies
author, Putting Our Differences to Work:
The Fastest Way to Innovation, Leadership, and High Performance

PHOTO CREDITS: An Afghan man looks on as he stands at a bus stop in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Nov. 29, 2009. (AP Photo/Mustafa Quraishi)

Personal Responsibility: Changing the World

Reflective Audio Program:
PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY:
It's Role in Creating a Better World
...a virtual online dialogue with nine Berrett-Koehler Authors

News Flashes...
St. Valentine's Day 02/14/09
Afghanistan: DoD Identifies Army Casualty
Staff Sgt. Marc J. Small, 29, of Collegeville, Pa., died Feb. 12 at Faramuz, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when insurgents attacked his unit using a rocket-propelled grenade launcher and small arms fire. He was assigned to the 1st Battalion...

Iraq: U.S. Confirmed Deaths
Reported Deaths: 4243  |  Confirmed Deaths: 4242   |   Pending Confirmation: 1
DoD Identifies Army Casualties (4 of 4) --- Pfc. Jonathan R. Roberge, 22, of Leominster, Mass...died Feb. 9 in Mosul, Iraq, of wounds suffered when an improvised explosive device detonated near their vehicle.

Source: http://icasualties.org/ Thank you!

The news today in Afghanistan and Iraq and places around the world paralyzes the mind with disbelief.

Oh, I want so much to be a part of changing this world, don't you?

Leaving just a little imprint on creating a world that works for everyone.
If we just thought more about each other;
About people we don't know or can't see.
If we just became a little more conscious and aware
About what is happening around us every day;
Across the world and in neighborhoods we can't even imagine.
If we listened more; objected more; paid attention more;
Spent more time thinking through the implications of our actions
and behavior day to day, choosing what's most right for a better world.
If we took time to be informed and to teach others.
If we were committed to loving our neighbors...

What difference could these small changes make?

It overwhelms me sometimes---I feel helpless and worried.
The small acts of one person seem so insignificant when
you look on at the mess we are in --- a mess we all collectively
shared in creating...


Then I recall this story...

The Starfish Story
by Loren Eiseley

"I awoke early, as I often did, just before sunrise to walk by the ocean's edge and greet the new day. As I moved through the misty dawn, I focused on a faint, far away motion. I saw a youth, bending and reaching and flailing arms, dancing on the beach, no doubt in celebration of the perfect day soon to begin.

As I approached, I sadly realized that the youth was not dancing to the bay, but rather bending to sift through the debris left by the night's tide, stopping now and then to pick up a starfish and then standing, to heave it back into the sea. I asked the youth the purpose of the effort. "The tide has washed the starfish onto the beach and they cannot return to the sea by themselves," the youth replied. "When the sun rises, they will die, unless I throw them back to the sea."

As the youth explained, I surveyed the vast expanse of beach, stretching in both directions beyond my sight. Starfish littered the shore in numbers beyond calculation. The hopelessness of the youth's plan became clear to me and I countered, "But there are more starfish on this beach than you can ever save before the sun is up. Surely you cannot expect to make a difference."

The youth paused briefly to consider my words, bent to pick up a starfish and threw it as far as possible. Turning to me he simply said, "I made a difference to that one."

I left the boy and went home, deep in thought of what the boy had said. I returned to the beach and spent the rest of the day helping the boy throw starfish in to the sea."

What small difference will you make today? tomorrow?

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
founder, Global Dialogue Center
author, Putting Our Differences to Work:
The Fastest Way to Innovation, Leadership, and High Performance

Learning from Gandhi

In several places in my home, I have small framed signs with one of Gandhi's messages strategically placed to catch my eye during the day, "My life is my message." It is interesting how those five words have shaped so many days --- so many actions --- so many decisions. They place the question of rightness to every action and decision. It is humbling on many days to realize that my humanness has kept me from living up to this proclamation in the way I wished I had.

GANDHI's Message
The story goes like this:
Gandhi remained silent one day a week. He was traveling on a train on the one day a week when he did not speak. A journalist came up to his window, screaming out to him, "Do you have a message for me to take back to my people." Gandhi scrawled a few words on a piece of paper and put them up in the window... "My life is my message."

Over the years as I've thought alot about the commitment this message takes, I realize that if each of measured our behavior by it every day with a new kind of consciousness about all we do, we could change the world in short order, don't you think? How many things would be different throughout the world? Think of it.

In my book, Putting Our Differences to Work, recount Gandhi's warning to us about the personal traits that are the most perilous to humanity. Imagine how we could change the realities today by changing and measuring our behavior and actions. I also introduce Five Distinctive Qualities of Leadership and propose each of us add them to our portfolio. The one that seems to embrace all the others is "make mutualism the final arbiter" for all actions and decisions (e.g., behavior, products, services, profit-making) measured by just six powerful words:

Everyone benefits; no one is harmed.

With this conscious shift in our thinking and actions, we could reverse those personal traits that caused Gandhi worry. Think of it...

• Wealth with Work
• Pleasure with Conscience
• Science with Humanity
• Knowledge with Character
• Politics with Principle
• Commerce with Morality
• Worship with Sacrifice

How does your life stack up and contribute to these virtues?
I leave you as I ponder this question myself.

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
founder, Global Dialogue Center
author, Putting Our Differences to Work

new book!
Putting Our Differences to Work
The Fastest Way to Innovation, Leadership and High Performance
by Debbe Kennedy ▪ Berrett-Koehler ▪ 2008 – Hardcover
ORDER a copy at AMAZON.COM

Putting Our Differences to Work was selected as as among
"the very top business books" for review in August, 2008.
Read it!

Also available in DIGITAL DOWNLOAD at Berrett-Koehler

First Presidential Debate: Obama

With our country screaming for our attention on every front and the world looking to us for leadership, the long awaited First Presidential Debate between Barack Obama and John McCain was a top priority for this Friday night at my house. Seeing them side by side affirmed for me that we need fresh new thinking and a whole new style of problem-solving and approach to the presidency.

Even Pat Buchanan described McCain's style as mean, contemptuous, angry and a tough character. Other descriptors of McCain's body language were hunched, "look 'em in the eye," snarly --- yet, he never found the "big leadership" moment to give Barack Obama the courtesy of looking at him. McCain came across as rude and disrespectful --- Enough! We can't afford another "rough around the edges" president not at this time in history with so much at stake and so many relationships to repair around the world.

In contrast, Obama brought a whole new approach and leadership command of issues --- a fresh, visionary leadership strength that we've not seen in a long time in this country. He is emerging to a new height as the Change We Need to lead our country!

So tonight I celebrate Barack Obama debuting a beautiful new original oil painting (24x30) by Sally K. Green, Bay Area Artist. Learn more at www.sallykgreen.com.

Reflections the day after the night before...

• Grading the First Debate - Time
• Canadian Perspective - Toronto Star
• The First Debate: A Win for Obama - New York Times
• Sharp Jabs Mark Debate - Kansas City Star
• European Perspective - BBC

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
author and founder, President and CEO
Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies

New Book! Putting Our Differences to Work (June 2008)
Learn more: www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com 
Berrett-Koehler - BK Business

GOP POLITICS: A Dissenting View Palin's Introduction

I think it started with former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani's speech last night at the GOP convention. I found his vicious words and blood-thirsty mockery more disturbing than at other times. I wanted to yell, "ENOUGH!"

Watching and listening to the display that followed said a great deal about him, McCain, Palin --- and all we've all become as a nation living under the "Karl Rove Playbook" of hate and fear and intentional culture wars and mean-spirited attacks on others for political gain. Even seeing Sarah Palin come on stage, looking sweet and beautiful, then transforming into a "smiling snake" with venom spewing out at key moments in her introduction to the nation with thousands cheering the distortions, the put-downs and the sarcasm of personal attack---another "wolf in sheep's clothing" in a female form.

Based on the morning headlines, hailing the "success" of GOP convention program last night, I am in the minority in my view. Of Palin, the headlines read, "She hit the ball out of the ballpark..."

What I know for sure is ...

• we can't heal a nation with these techniques.
• we can't lead in the world modeling this kind of leadership behavior.
• we can't be a beacon of peace with leaders stooping to this level of rhetoric.
• we can't teach our children by setting the example we witnessed last night.
• we can't repair our standing the world with this kind of thinking and behavior.

Funny, as I watched, I remembered a young friend, age 8, a purple belt with green stripe in Karate, who mentored me by teaching me his daily mantra:

Watch your thoughts, for they become your words.
Watch your words, for they become your actions.
Watch your actions, for they become your habits.
Watch your habits, they become your character.
Watch your character, it becomes your destiny.

I have personally worked to advance and support women and think of myself as a pioneering women executive. This morning women have been saying, "She's just like me!" She's just like us!"  Isn't this what we swallowed when we chose George W. Bush --- a real regular guy and look at the devastation we are left with as he exits.

Somehow, in my vision for who would breakthrough the glass ceiling, my hope was for a women of substance, one mastered in the human dimensions of change; someone with knowledge and know-how about all the issues and pressing  problems we face. A woman willing to respect and protect women's rights that so many worked and sacrificed to achieve. A leader who's behavior is above reproach; a beacon of strength, integrity, and goodness.

Sarah Palin doesn't fit this bill and I recognize she is not just like me.

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
author and founder, President and CEO
Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies

New Book! Putting Our Differences to Work (June 2008)
Learn more: www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com
Berrett-Koehler - BK Business

POLITICS: Putting Our Faith in Lies?

I think I am writing out of sense of helplessness as a citizen of the United States. It is a long way until November, but I don't think there has been an election that was more critical and the process more scary. We are so beyond party politics. There is much at stake and the United States must get itself heading in a new direction with engaged citizens and a leader with a vision and imagination to mobilize our people to solve our pressing problems.

This morning's headline proclaims "McCain takes the lead over Obama: poll".

Do you ever wonder who they poll? Have you ever been called? What is most disturbing is also reading the article to discover what has resulted in this lead. It is not McCain's leadership or policies. "There is no doubt the campaign to discredit Obama is paying off for McCain right now," pollster John Zogby said. "This is a significant ebb for Obama."

Wow! What is wrong with the American people? Are we so addicted to negative spin and unethical people and campaign tactics that we are willing to be snookered again and sacrifice our future and the stability of the world for more of the last eight years?  Are we so risk averse and change resistant that we can't trust ourselves enough to follow a leader with a greater vision?

I used to think that McCain was truly an American Hero, but a hero that lies, tells-half truths, surrounds himself with the likes of "Karl Rove handlers" and works to dismantle his opponent one-lie-and-character assassination-at-a-time is not the American Hero we need for the leader of the free world and our country. He has already broken his promise to run a clean campaign with weeks of negative, proved untruthful propaganda and innuendo, as well as spewing out appeasing "buzz words," empty promises by the barrel full, and distortions of his own record and accomplishments. So what is a vote McCain mean?

With all due respect to his military service, I can't understand why no one has the courage to call him on his missteps and lying and pandering.

TWO QUESTIONS:
There is a two fundamental questions that I would like to ask Senator McCain:

1. LEADERSHIP EFFECTIVENESS: If you are so experienced and influential in getting things done as you say you've been and are --- and handling our economy and "winning the war" as you claim, then why is our country in such a mess? Where have you been?  What results can you point to that demonstrates NOT YOUR EFFORTS, but your effectiveness as a leader in the last eight years?

2. CHARACTER and INTEGRITY: If you are so honorable and hold character and integrity as core values, why has your ambition to be president allowed you to slip into the slime of Karl Rove politics toward Obama? Why are you lying and distorting with such a constant drumbeat? With you holding the responsibility of an elder, it is shameful to watch you work to tear down the next generation of leadership we so badly need at this time in history.

My mother taught me to beware of people who proclaim their honesty and integrity too loudly. "What you do speaks so loud, I cannot hear what you say."  --- Ralph Waldo Emerson

I'm ready for a leader with character and change we can believe in and engage in.

How about you? (my private poll question for you)

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
author and founder, President and CEO
Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies

New Book! Putting Our Differences to Work (June 2008)
Learn more: www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com 
Berrett-Koehler - BK Business

If I were PRESIDENT...

If I were President of the United States, one of my priorities would be re-evaluate our policies, laws and practices for removing presidential incompetence in a timely manner. Our Founding Fathers obviously couldn't have imagined that we would have allowed our country to be disgraced by poor performance, greed, and disregard for the Constitution and the people of the United States in the way we have all experienced. In a company or corporation, the Bush Administration would have long ago been fired.

Today, I read an Editor's Letter in Vanity Fair by Graydon Carter. He summed up the issues at hand this way:

GRAYDON CARTER - Editor's Letter, Vanity Fair
"It can fairly y be said that politics brings out the worst in people. And at times simply the world people. ...In less than a year, the Bush administration will strut out of office, leaving the country in roughly the same condition a toddler leaves a diaper. The report card on this White House will be a series of F's.

• An optional war that has cost the country dearly
  in lives and resources? --- F
• Our reputation, military, and economy in tatters? --- F
• Wall Street an unregulated disaster? --- F
• Banks in crisis and airlines in bankruptcy? --- F
• A national debt that is through the roof? --- F
• Oil at more than $113 a barrel? --- F
• A tax system that favors the rich over the poor?
• A generation of environmental protections shot? --- F
• Five-year record low in consumer confidence and new lows in "Are we headed in the right direction? polls? --- F
• The loss of a great American city? --- F"

I would have to add to the list an --- F for the heartbreak of watching the disgrace of the Office of the Presidency in ways one could not foresee. The whole thing makes me sad. I would love to blame it solely on BUSH. This would be easy, but each of us seems to bear the responsibility in part for standing by paralyzed, helpless to change anything with a system unprepared for this kind of leadership failure.

If I were President, it would be a TOP priority to make sure this never happened again.

What would you do to change our policies, laws and practices?

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
author and founder, President and CEO
Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies

New Book! Putting Our Differences to Work (June 2008)
Learn more: www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com
Berrett-Koehler - BK Business

BEGINNER'S MIND: We need a new approach!

In every direction, it is clear we need a new approach in how we think and behave and interact with each other, our country, our world, and the planet. Some days I ache, don't you? The more you take-in and ponder, the more you see the mess we've created for ourselves by our biases, our inaction, our indifference, our busyness, our closed-minds to anything new and different.

When I watch the highest leaders in the land tearing down each other with violent tongues, lashing out, making fun, doing anything to divide and conquer to win vs. reaching for a new approach. I admit Hillary has been deeply disappointing to me. Not because I would love to see a woman in the White House some day, but because of her approach, her divisive rhetoric that violates all I thought she so whole-heartedly believed in at one time, has taken me by surprise. This is more of the same. More of what we don't need. Imagine what our children are taking in when they watch adult leaders have at it this way --- and we wonder why some are disrespectful, violent, and mean. They are watching us.

My hope is going with Obama. Not just the man and the message, but I'm hooked on gathering of people demonstrating their desire for change, to be part, to take back, to reach for more --- I am willing to work for it, are you? It seems to start here.

I learned one time that Shoshin in Japanese means "beginners mind."
It doesn't mean a closed mind.
But an empty and ready mind.
If one's mind is empty, it is always ready for anything.
It is open to new thinking, new questions, new points of view, new people.
In a beginners mind there are many possibilities.
In the expert's mind there are few.

May this be a day of renewal
A clearing out...an opening up
Each of us in our own right
Unique and different
Beginner's minds.
Hearts beating.
For a moment
All in One.

Hold that thought.

What will renewal mean to you today?
What will it mean to all of us in the months ahead?

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
author and founder, President and CEO
Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies

New Book! Putting Our Differences to Work (June 2008)
Learn more: www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com
Berrett-Koehler - BK Business

Dr. MARTIN LUTHER KING's Wisdom for TIME OF WAR

IN COMMEMORATION of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Legacy
Young Martin
Original Oil Painting by Bay Area artist, Sally K. Green
www.sallykgreen.com, see leaders with a lasting impression

At this moment in our history, we have experienced a week where the realities of an escalating war are suddenly confronting our consciousness. Its truth is coming at us directly from governmental actions, in what appears an abuse of power, most likely covert plans and rumors of a deeper level of war, killing and destruction. It is as if Dr. Martin Luther King is speaking to us across time. He seems to be tapping us on the shoulder to remember for reasons that may be more important now than ever before in our lifetime.

Take in his wisdom...challenge yourself to step up to be part of creating that tipping point where all of us change our misdirected course, demanding that our country live up to its values. Peace doesn't come from war. War begets war. Hatred and violence multiplies hatred and violence. We must ask...
How can MORE KILLING hold the answers we seek?

CONSIDER DR. KING's WISDOM...

OUR ROLE IN PEACE
"When evil men plot, good men must plan. When evil men burn and bomb, good men must build and bind. When evil men shout ugly words of hatred, good men must commit themselves to the glories of love. Where evil men would seek to perpetuate an unjust status quo, good men must seek to bring into being a real order of justice."

LESSONS FROM WAR
"...The only change came from America, as we increased our troops commitments in support of governments which were singularly corrupt, inept, and without popular support. All the while, the people read our leaflets and received regular promises of peace and democracy and land reform.  Now they languish under our bombs and consider us...not the real enemy. They move sadly and apathetically as we herd them off the land of their fathers into concentration camps where minimal social needs are rarely met. They know that they must move or be destroyed by our bombs, and they go, primarily women and children and the aged. They watch as we poison their water, as we kill a million acres of their crops, and they wander into the hospitals with at least twenty casualties from American fire power to one ["enemy-inflicted"] injury. They wander into the towns and see thousands of children homeless, without clothes, running in packs on the streets like animals. They see the children selling their sisters to our soldiers, soliciting for their mothers."

ISN'T WINNING MORE ABOUT RULE OF LOVE not War?
"The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows. One day we must come to see that peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal. We must pursue peaceful ends through peaceful means. How much longer must we play at deadly war games before we need the plaintive pleas of the unnumbered dead and maimed of past wars?''

"Our freedom was not won a century ago, it is not won today; but some small part of it is in our hands... If we assume that life is worth living and that man has a right to survival, then we must find an alternative to war. In a day when vehicles hurtle through outer space and guided ballistic missiles carve highways of death through the stratosphere, no nation can claim victory in war."

BOOK REFERENCES and ARCHIVAL VIDEO of Dr. King's Wisdom
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
The Words of Martin Luther King Jr. and The Trumpet of Conscience
Selected by Coretta Scott King

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Visit to Grace Cathedral in 1965
Story and video of his message

What difference will you make to move us to the rule of love?
How will history record our response?

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
author and founder, President and CEO
Global Dialogue Center and Leadership Solutions Companies

New Book! Putting Our Differences to Work (June 2008)
Learn more: www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com

ECONOMY: Examining Our Wants and Needs

Yesterday on a newscast, I heard an economist suggest that the way to stop our economic troubles was for us to SPEND. My first question was who would benefit from this kind of spending? I admit I flashed back to few years ago when early indicators showed that we had economic troubles brewing, security in question, and an ill-conceived war raging out of control. President Bush invited us to "go shopping" as I recall. Since that time, much has happened in the world to demonstrate the lack of wisdom in such short-term fixes. The wake-up call was one I badly needed and I recognize that what I've seen has been just a tiny glimpse of the far-reaching reality of what we've created for ourselves and our human family across the world.

I've been reading in a book, The Lessons from St. Francis: How to Bring Simplicity and Spirituality into Your Daily Life. It seems much of our lives are driven by wants. BIG wants, not needs. I think many of us don't even realize how our wants have turned into greed and self-interest unknowingly --- and that our choices are having negative impacts our future, the environment, and the lives and future of others whose lives are filled with needs unfulfilled.
Have you given this any thought?

Author, John Michael Talbot offers this simple formula to help us distinguish between our wants and needs:

• Food is a need. But a medium-rare T-bone steak smothered in onions is a want.
• Clothing is a need. But a designer suit with matching shoes is a want.
• Housing is a need. But a split-level ranch house with a semiattached garage, walk-in closets, and three bathrooms is a want.

Not all wants are bad, he reminds us, but moving through life with a higher consciousness about them and their implications on others is where change begins.

"Live Simply so that others may simply live." ---Gandhi

St. Francis left us with his call to action. Bay Area artist, Sally K. Green, shares three of her original paintings in oil with St. Francis messages to us all:

• Brother Sun
• Saint Francis of Assisi
• Saint Francis of Assisi 2 with Jane Goodall

I leave you pondering my needs vs. wants.

Debbe

Debbe Kennedy
founder, Global Dialogue Center
author, Putting Our Differences to Work:
The Fastest Way to Innovation, Leadership, and High Performance
Learn more... www.puttingourdifferencestowork.com
Blog... www.globaldialoguecenter.blogs.com/differences