PROGRAMS FOR 2006 – 2007

1. Tuesday, Sept. 26--Prof. Fred Starr, spoke on: "Some Good News from Afghanistan and Central Asia!”

Dr. Starr is the Director of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University in Washington, D.C. He is the former President of Oberlin College and of Tulane University. A Soviet area studies expert, he founded the Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington. He is the author of many publications, and is also a first-class jazz musician (clarinetist and saxophonist) who has written “Red and Hot--an account of jazz and dissent in the former USSR.”

2. Tuesday, Oct. 24--Chris Flavin, spoke on: "America's Energy: Can We Break Our Addiction to Oil?"

Chris Flavin is the President of Worldwatch Institute, one of the nation's best-known environmental organizations, founded by Lester Brown. Mr. Flavin has been actively engaged in energy policy discussions for many years. He participated in the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992; the Climate Change Conference in Kyoto, Japan in 1997; and the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in 2002. He is a founding member of the Board of Directors of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy and is a member of the National Academy of Science’s Board on Energy and Environmental Systems Flavin is the author of many publications; speaks frequently before business, university and policy audiences; and appears often on radio and TV--including CNN, NPR, BBC, Voice of America and PBS.

3. Thursday, Nov. 30--Eileen Heaphy, spoke on: "What the Mexican Elections Mean for the United States."

Eileen Heaphy is the Executive Director of the World Affairs Forum of Stamford, CT. Prior to joining that Forum in 2000, she had a 26-year career in the U.S. Foreign Service where she divided her assignments and responsibilities between Western Europe and Latin America, serving in Spain, Denmark, Costa Rica and Mexico. She was the U.S. Consul General in Monterrey, Mexico, the country's key business and industrial center, where she was named Honorary Vice President of the American Chamber of Commerce of Mexico for her extraordinary service to the American business community. At the State Department, Ms. Heaphy headed major bilateral affairs offices for Northern Europe, Western Europe and Mexico. At the time of her retirement, she was the State Department's top ranking expert on US-Mexican relations, a subject on which she writes periodically for various publications.

4. Tuesday, February 20, 2007--Dr. Mel Goodman, will speak on "Russia and the Russian Challenge to American National Security." 

Dr. Goodman is Professor of International Studies at the National War College, Ft. McNair, Washington, DC. He is the author of many books and articles on Russia, and was a senior analyst in Soviet and Russian affairs at the CIA. Complete information about this program will be posted after the first of the New Year.