Project Save the World Podcast / Talk Show Episode Number: 172
Panelists: Jonathan Granoff
Host: Metta Spencer

Date Aired: 27 January 2021
Date Transcribed: 12 March 2021
Transcription: Otter.ai
Transcription Review and Edits: David Millar

Metta Spencer

Well, hello, I’m Metta Spencer. And today I get to get back in touch with a fellow I’ve known a little bit for a number of years, but not very well. So I get to know him a little better today. This is Jonathan Granoff, who is president or the head honcho anyway, at the Global Security Institute, which is someplace outside of… Kenwood… Pennsylvania, is that where you are… No, not for a long time. Last time I knew you were… Where are you nowadays?

Jonathan Granoff

Our offices are two blocks from the United Nations [New York City].

Metta Spencer

Oh, okay. Well, that puts you in the big league, doesn’t it? … not the sticks… or an elegant suburb of Philadelphia as I recall. Anyway, it’s good to see you, Jonathan. And, and we are going to get caught up a little bit, because first time I met you,… we were both in the backseat of a car in Pugwash, Nova Scotia… and you were on your cell phone. And you were calling US senators, as I recall, just casually… as if you just wanted to check in with these folks see how they were doing… first name basis… my jaw dropped. I thought this is this is a peacenik with power. Anyway, I think we’ve met on a few other occasions, and I don’t know that you are on the phone with senators every day of the week. But at any rate, it’s, it’s good to know that I have a friend in high places. How are you?

Jonathan Granoff

I’m fine. Thank you… privileged and living in the suburbs of New York City… my wife and I are enjoying it. We go for hikes in the woods every day. And, you know, we do these zooms. So we’re intimate with people all over the world. We live in a fairly large, large home. It’s not it’s not environmentally perfect by any stretch… But I think… how difficult the present situation must be for people living in apartment houses.

Metta Spencer

I have an apartment house and I’m perfectly happy. Well, yeah, I never go out.

Jonathan Granoff

You don’t go out… imagine if you had three children, oh, that would be hard. And then imagine if one of the people in the house had to go out and work. And when they came back, you either had to quarantine them, or you were concerned that they could spread the virus. And then imagine that you have several generations, that you have elderly people who if they get the virus, they’re terribly compromised. And then imagine you’re in… public housing, where you have elevators that are relatively slow, dysfunctional, overcrowded. And then imagine… you’re in a part of the country, a large part of the country, where people have been told by the… former president of the United States, not to wear masks, and you have to interact with them. Just to go to the grocery or get gas for your car, or anything, and and you’re afraid if you tell them, “Put a mask on,” that they might shoot you —

Metta Spencer

I can’t think —

Jonathan Granoff

I think of this every day. how privileged I am. Under these circumstances.

Metta Spencer

Well, I feel the way very privileged too and I’m very comfortable. And I’ve got… arthritis, so I’m not comfortable. But otherwise, I’ve got a young girl who does errands for me and I have food delivered. And.. have I have a rich social life because I do this every day, I talk to somebody… on the zoom about four hours a day, which is better than I used to be, you know, in terms of being in touch with people. So I feel… I’m not missing a thing. Anyway, so we have a lot to get caught up with because you are kind of a mover and shaker in the global peace movement. And I’ve run into you at other international type meetings. And I liked the fact that you titled the institute, the “Global Security Institute,” which is, you know, pretty inclusive. So, why don’t we talk about what your organization is up to and the policy options? Where are we in the start of 2021 with a new administration in the US and the possibility of renewing the START agreement… Where do we stand and what what’s our assignment for the year or the decade? How about that first quarter? Yeah. You can break off any chunk of it you want.

Jonathan Granoff

Well, first I wanted to… highlight where we met in Pugwash, Nova Scotia. We were at Cyrus Eaton’s estate, which served as a bridge-building center for scientists of the then- Soviet Union and the United States during the Cold War. And the Pugwash Conference Center has a legacy that most Canadians don’t know about. But if they do know about it, it’s a matter of appropriate pride. So, it’s this beautiful estate, you know, looking out on… the Atlantic Ocean. And during the height of the Cold War, scientists from the Soviet Union and the United States met there… in 1995, the Nobel Committee bestowed on those conferences a Nobel Peace Prize. And along with that, they gave a particular prize to one of the founders of the Pugwash conferences, a man named Dr. Joseph Rotblat. And the reason was that Dr. Rotblat. was on the Manhattan Project. And… when he found out that the heavy water facility in Norway, had been blown up by the Norwegian resistance and the British Secret Service operators, that the Nazis could not build an atomic bomb — and the whole premise of the Manhattan Project was to be a deterrent against the Nazis — he went to the leaders of the Manhattan Project and said, we should stop, because the raison d’etre of this project is no longer there. And their response was not explicit, but it was essentially, billions of dollars have been spent, we can’t just walk off. He said, “You build it, you’ll use it, and you build it, others will build them, and you’ll have will have a horrible arms race. And as a moral principle, you walk off,” —

Metta Spencer

You know, there’s a different angle on that story. And your, your part of it is not one I heard. I interviewed Joe Rotblat once. And the story he told me… had to do with Japan, that… General Groves told him… “This is not really for winning the war against Japan. This is for what we’re going to use it for next, which will be Russia. Because as soon as this war with Japan is over, pretty soon we’re going to be z war with Russia. And that’s what… this bomb is for.” And that’s when he decided to quit.

Jonathan Granoff

Well… they’re not contradictory. There was a slew of a slew of reasons that Grove articulated to justify continuing the project. And there’s more, there’s affirmations that were made to the US military establishment, and particularly to those who had to allocate these huge sums of money. But yes… the reason that we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was as a message to Stalin who was about to invade Japan. But… let me go back to Pugwash, Canada. And so — you’re absolutely correct, that was one of the arguments… but it goes back to the reason for the project of the Manhattan Project, it begins with a letter from Albert Einstein to President Roosevelt that said the Nazis are going to get the bomb. And that… reason falls away. They start looking for other reasons. So, this was a weapon, looking for a rationale. And he considered the weapon immoral, irrational and extremely dangerous and founded the Pugwash movement named after the venue in Canada, and we were there because of another, a great Canadian leader, Senator Douglas Roche. Who… started the middle powers initiative… looked at where the world is or and was, which was between — 1. the maximalist demand of nuclear abolition now today by the majority of countries in the world which don’t have nuclear weapons — and 2. the intransigence of the nuclear weapon states, despite their legal obligation under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to negotiate elimination… that middle-power countries, countries that rely on the rule of law that have that have fairly good records on human rights Canada, an excellent record, but we were pretty flexible, because our issue was not human rights. Our issue was nuclear weapons, countries with legitimate… governments that rely on the rule of law, could and should be a bridge between the maximalist demands and the intransigents, and to come up with practical steps that the world could take to walk down the nuclear ladder, and lead toward fulfilling the legal obligation that the International Court of Justice has articulated, the legal obligation to negotiate the elimination of nuclear weapons, and the legal obligation contained in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. And our retreat there was essentially focused on that agenda, building that agenda, to build that bridge —

Metta Spencer

And that’s really what the whole focus was almost the whole time, then we branched out a little bit here or there. But this big focus… has always been nuclear weapons. Yeah, by the way, Doug Roche had an article just yesterday in the Globe and Mail newspaper about the new nonproliferation (TPNW), not the Treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons (NPT)… because Canada has, of course, not endorsed it… there’s a big effort here now to get Canada to, to not only sign it, but ratify it… which is of course, problematic, from many points of view, because people want to say, “Well, we’re a member of NATO… it’s not possible for a NATO member to join the TPNW”. But there’s a very strong argument that yes, it is possible. So that’s what he was arguing for yesterday. And we have a new minister, Foreign Minister, Marc Garneau, who was an astronaut… in Global Affairs. And he is he had previously stated his support for nuclear disarmament… before he took a very significant part in the government. But at any rate, now, the question is, does he still think that way? And does he have enough clout to make it happen?

Jonathan Granoff

Canada also has an excellent ambassador to the United Nations,

Metta Spencer

Bob Rae, I’m trying to get an appointment with him, one of these days on this show…

Jonathan Granoff

A very open, thoughtful, reflective, insightful, inspiring human being, and one would expect great things from him. When the UN gets back in motion. Under the Biden administration, it’ll be a lot easier. But you know, Canada has been, you know, missing in action the last few years, it has walked away from its traditional role as a leader in global cooperation as a bridge -building nation. And, in fact, deep the Department of Foreign Affairs hosted several endeavors with the middle powers initiative. And Senator Roche and I had… no less than four meetings with Jean Chretien. Really… I brought the former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara to a meeting with him… Michael Douglas, the actor… the most impressive was a meeting with the…former Prime Minister Kim Campbell. And how cordial and how professional and how… mature as people they were… I was just thinking of like their character, both of them. Chretien and Campbell, compared to most politicians… they were real people of character and… thoughtfulness. And the current prime minister, to my surprise, given his background, his lineage… his father was a great world leader. And this youth has not taken the mantle of global leadership that the world so desperately needs. And… I would reach out to him and say, you know, there is a constituency in Canada: the business community that operates at a global law-governed level, the financial community operates at a global level, the human rights community of Canada, both domestically and internationally, has a legacy and positions for which it can take pride. It still is a leader in that… globally, on the issue of science and climate. Canada has a global perspective on the issue of the pandemic — Canada’s position in approaching it as a global public vaccine, and addressing it as a global public good. Canada has a strong position to be proud of… on the issue of on international security, on the melting of the Arctic, Canada has a position to be proud of. And it has leaders such as the… Order of Canada, which has unanimously come out in favor of the abolition of nuclear weapons, national heroes like Romeo Dallaire, a strong nuclear abolitionist — and there’s a very small minority in Canada dragging their feet on this issue… on the issue of nuclear abolition, Canada is a laggard, and it has fallen behind. And I don’t believe it’s consistent with the will of the people of Canada to be a global leader in peace and security. And what it can do in NATO… is cause an ongoing review of the process. And that review must include civil society. Thus far, the NATO review process has really been a very closed process. And that would involve having hearings in the Canadian Parliament. I’ve testified before the Canadian Parliament, and I was amazed at how sophisticated the parliamentarians were, how they were prepared, and they asked demanding questions. So, there could be hearings, and organizations like the ones that you’re a part of, Metta, should be part of that process… Canada could also be convening middle-power countries in a process to build that bridge between the maximalist demands and the intransigence of the nuclear weapon states. There are many things that Canada could do right now… Another thing that Senator Roche was a leader in… Parliamentarians for Global Action. They started an initiative called the Six Nation Initiative. And at that time, you had six heads of state. Papandreou from Greece, Nyerere from Tanzania, Gandhi from India, Olaf Palme from Sweden, and the respective heads of state of Argentina and Mexico. I’m glad you can remember all those, I wouldn’t have been able to do that. And they went to Moscow and Washington and made the case that they were all subject to the hazard of the nuclear sword being over their heads. And thus, they could only fulfill their first duty as the head of their states, which is to protect their populations, if the Soviet Union and the United States started talking to each other about the issue. And I know from President Gorbachev directly telling me, this had a very, very positive effect. Well, Prime Minister Trudeau could start a similar initiative of like-minded heads of state that want to be seized of the issue and bring it to the forefront at the General Assembly debates. Every head of state should be saying, we have yet to fulfill the first resolution of the United Nations to ban weapons of mass destruction, atomic bombs. That’s the first resolution —

Metta Spencer

— everything that you said. And I my own interpretation… is that Trudeau, the present Trudeau, Prime Minister, is very concerned about staying on the good side of the US. That’s always been the main motivation… the main constraint on politicians doing things a little bolder than they’ve done. And so he was being very careful and cautious about his dealings with Trump. Now, the question is, how much more latitude will exist in the Biden years, as Biden is by no means a pacifist, he’s very much a military-minded person, I don’t know how strong he is in favor of nuclear weapons, or whether the plans for the US expansion and modernization of the nuclear arsenal will continue on the present course. But if there is to be any kind of wavering on that, it might give a little bit more room for those… and there is a very strong initiative going on here in Canada, to press the Canadian government to take a stronger position against nuclear weapons. And either to get out of NATO or… I think the opinion is sort of divided whether Canada should leave NATO, or use the power that we have within NATO to instigate some changes there. So that’s, you know, in a way, I’m gonna throw it back in your lap since I’m on this side of the border, and you’re on that the southern side of this border. And if Biden is going to be a little bit more open to changes of a nuclear policy, how are we going to find that out? When? Do you have any feelers out?

Jonathan Granoff

No need for feelers, just need to look at the policy statements that he ran on, that he’s committed to move toward a nuclear-weapons-free world —

Metta Spencer

but everybody says that it just means, you know, like, 100 years from now, maybe —

Jonathan Granoff

No, I’m sorry. That’s not what it means. No. Okay. No… and I don’t think we should frame it… we should stop framing it as we’re against nuclear weapons. I think we should frame it as we are for… fulfilling promises that have been made under solidly negotiated treaties. So we are for Law and Order in the international arena. We are for fulfilling the legal obligation to negotiate the elimination of nuclear weapons, unanimously held by the International Court of Justice, and the positive law of the nuclear nonproliferation treaty [NPT}, that Canada is a party to and the United States is, and there are practical steps that have been committed to under the nuclear non proliferation treaty that remain outstanding. and Canada can push very hard on those because they’ll have support from the Biden administration, if it’s framed as fulfilling the rule of law —

Metta Spencer

And that’s really interesting. Because I, I have to, I don’t want to disagree with you, Jonathan. But, you know, even the Green New Deal people, and Ed Markey, who’s always a most fervent anti-nuclear weapons guy for the last 50 years or whatever. He’s part he’s one of the leaders of Green New Deal, and there’s nothing in there about militarism. There’s certainly nothing there about nuclear abolition.

Jonathan Granoff

No, but he has other legislation… he has other legislation on that, he has no-first-use legislation. He has a budget… He’s been putting forward legislation to change the budget and reduce military spending all of these so you know, no, I mean, certainly Markey has been consistent.

Metta Spencer

I am sorry, I shouldn’t I shouldn’t attribute the failings of the Green New Deal just to Markey. But I’m not criticizing him. I’m creating, criticizing, if anything, the limitations of the Green New Deal, which in every other way is just terrific. But it doesn’t really talk about militarism.

Jonathan Granoff

It shouldn’t… The goal is to get it done it you know, you don’t throw in other, may be politically naive to throw in other issues. You don’t want to… throw in the right to abortion in it. Also, you don’t want to throw in a human rights issue. Although you know, … we support these issues. Okay. So it makes no sense to do that, but the same people who are conscious of the need to get off the addiction to fossil fuel, are the same parliamentarians globally who want to move to the security of a nuclear-weapons-free world. And I know this because one of the programs of the Global Security Institute is Parliamentarians for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament. And Ed Markey is one of the co-presidents of that organization. Okay. And so we I interact with parliamentarians all around the world. And these are parliamentarians who get elected on local, mostly parochial issues, you know, that are of local concern, which are taxes and lifestyles and things, things that are not existential, frankly. But who realized that the world is one? The climate is one, there’s no passports for the climate, there’s no passports for pandemics. There’s no passports anymore for capital, for the movement of capital, there’s no passports for art, communication, transportation — although we have passports — you can fly almost anywhere, almost everywhere in the world now. not

Metta Spencer

And not easily under the pandemic.

Jonathan Granoff

No, but I’m talking about the psychology of … understanding the world, and parliamentarians who understand climate often are the same ones who understand about nukes because –.

Metta Spencer

That’s what my reason, I take your point, I think you’re probably politically correct. And saying, don’t hook these things together? Maybe. But, you know, I’m always one looking for the connections between things. And the connection between global warming, and militarism, and especially nuclear weapons. I think, you know, there is, there’s a lot to be said about showing that these two issues are interrelated. And I think in, you know, when I talk to the public, general public, that’s one of the points I try to make. So I guess I was a little disappointed that the Green New Deal doesn’t make that connection.

Jonathan Granoff

But the connection… and this is something that the Global Security Institute is partnering with the United Nations and the World Academy of Arts and Sciences, which Joseph Rotblat was one of the founders, with Einstein and Russell, I’m a fellow in that — and one of the projects that we did, it is as pretentious as it sounds, the World Academy of Arts and Sciences, I think there’s about 650 of us — and one of the projects that we have, is to change the paradigm of how security is defined from the disproportionate reliance on militarism, and the concept of national security in derogation of or minimalizing global security — precisely Metta, because of the insight that you have, that we need to see security holistically. It’s very much the way medicine 50 years ago was very atomized. If you… said, Doctor, I have a terrible upset stomach all the time, he would likely give you a pill of some kind to address the symptom of the upset stomach. But today, any good doctor will say, What are you eating? How’s your… sleeping? Are you getting exercise, etc. Because we now know that the body is a whole. Similarly, the security of the human family cannot be obtained. relying only on nationalism. So the climate requires global cooperation —

Metta Spencer

— the thing that I am engaged with this complex Project Save the World. And we have six global threats. They’re not all equally ominous, but they’re they can all… wipe out a billion people at a whack. And that is not only militarism, and global warming, which are the two biggies, but famine, pandemics, radioactive contamination, and cyber risks. And if you look at them, they’re all interconnected, you can’t do you can’t solve any one of them without doing something about one or more of the others. So it’s,

Jonathan Granoff

And that’s why we need to, we need a new intellectual paradigm called human security, where we’re focused on human security so very much in the same way as in the 17th century, when when… Christians were slaughtering each other, as to whose definition of Jesus love was was better. And a third of Central Europe was… destroyed in Protestants and Catholics slaughtering each other and they, and… since they were killing each other, in the interest of immortality of the soul, they weren’t going to stop. And there were some, you know, walks, who got together in Westphalia in 1648 —

Metta Spencer

Wonks —

Jonathan Granoff

wonks,

Metta Spencer

I hear you’re just a little surprised that they were called walks. But they weren’t called that then —

Jonathan Granoff

We now know what they were they were: policy wonks… and visionaries. And they got together and created the Treaty of Westphalia which created the modern state. But the purpose of the modern state was to stop this religious madness, not to create a new madness of nationalism. And the UN is an institution that responded to the the destruction of much of the world in the 20th century, because of… the tribalism of nationalism … we need to… be pushing for a new paradigm of security. And we need to have a global discussion about balancing science, the use of science, the two pillars of this are science, as a tool to understand the natural world — but that alone is not sufficient, we also have to affirm the universal values of our humanity. We cannot just have efficiency and science as a value, we have to have the primacy of the individual … freedom of conscience, freedom of assembly, etc. So those are the two prongs and they have to be balanced. And I think this … you asked what I’m involved in, and I that this is where my thinking is now… And I think this is… the kind of thinking that has to be compelling enough to bring the best minds of our time together to come up with a balance between the efficiency that quantum computing… and biotech is going to give us: the efficiencies of manipulating populations and the fundamental freedoms that need to be protected. So —

Metta Spencer

How are you working on that? Because I think our goals are 100% compatible, if not identical in nature. But I think that the question of strategy of how to best move these move, the world… in that direction, is still open for discussion. You move to being near the UN, presumably because you think the UN is a good place to work on these issues. Is that right? Why didn’t you move to Washington DC instead?

Jonathan Granoff

Well, we did. We had an office… with retired diplomats across the street from the Senate right next to the Supreme Court, and called the Bipartisan Security Group. But in the recent years, there’s no bipartisanism, there’s been no bipartisan discussion. And we couldn’t raise any money for it anymore. So, we had to close the office. But… it would be very irresponsible to neglect the indispensable country… in the process. But… we’re, the way in which you infuse an idea into the public debate is by conferences and writing papers. So, I just published an article in Cadmus, which is the journal of the World Academy of Arts and Sciences and chaired the opening session in a two-day conference with the United Nations on “global leadership for the 21st century”. And it was very high level… it was opened by the director general of the UN… so that’s what we’re doing, right? You convene, you discuss, you identify allies, and you build… a movement for it, but… this isn’t new. This isn’t new, but what’s new is —

Metta Spencer

I think it’s not only not new, but it’s what we are in now is kind of a throwback or recession period, toward nationalism. I mean, all of this populist thinking, it has made it worse, not only, you know, the Trump period, but all these other things. Dictators who wannabe dictators around the world are certainly nationalists in their orientation… or they’re anti-globalist is what they think they are. But so I, I hope that we’re going to come out on the other side of that now, that we will be, except that the whole pandemic has created more, you know, the borders between countries are in trouble now, and much more local thinking. So, I don’t know that I’m very optimistic that we are really passing out of this period of nationalistic chauvinism into a more global way of thinking. I’d like to think that as soon as the pandemic is over, we’ll automatically see the value in interacting as a whole global community. But are you optimistic at this point in time?

Jonathan Granoff

I don’t. I don’t look at, I don’t think that way,

Metta Spencer

don’t you? Okay? No, I

Jonathan Granoff

I think like, what’s actually going on? Where can I make a difference? And I don’t look at it like… what’s the likelihood of success or anything? For me, for me, these are issues of … moral compulsion. And so I don’t use that metric. But I do… try and look and see which way the wind is blowing to figure out whether the wind’s behind us or the wind’s in front of us. When the winds in front of you, you can tack you know, you can still move the boat forward. But so the first thing that Joe Biden did is he rejoined the World Health Organization. That’s pretty clear right? Now, we’re going to rejoin the START treaty —

Metta Spencer

and the Paris Agreement

Jonathan Granoff

and the Paris Agreement. So I mean, we’re fighting for the soul, not just of America, but the soul of modernity. And modernity… has created an international cosmopolitan class that understands exactly what you and I take for granted. The reality of the picture, the icon from outer space, that the world is one mysterious, graceful sphere in infinity, where love is possible. There may… other other places, maybe there is maybe there isn’t. But we know that the highest value of love is possible here. And people understand that icon. It’s not just a marble. It’s an icon. It’s a symbol of our human unity and mystery and wonder. And the other icon of the modern age is the quest for security through the affirmation of absolute power and destruction, which is the mushroom cloud. And my grandfather would see a mushroom cloud and he would think of mushroom soup. But I see a mushroom cloud, and I think of Nagasaki, the last time these weapons were used, and the pathway of nationalism well, leads to war. That’s where it leads to. And to quote Martin Luther King on the subject: “If modern man continues to flirt unhesitatingly with war –“, he’s talking in the context of nuclear weapons, and his Nobel acceptance speech, ” — he will transform his earthly habitat into an inferno, such that even the mind of Dante could not imagine.” And that’s what’s before us. And we need to make it very clear to our political leaders, that this is how we see it, that this is not just an issue of partisanship, that this is not just an issue… of normal political discourse. But this is an issue of fundamental… sense of the blasphemy of degrading the gift of Creation itself in derogation of God’s blessing, in favor of something we’ve created… Human beings create states; we didn’t create the planet Earth, we didn’t create the climate, we didn’t create life. We created states… Why? We created them to stop our madness of religious bigotry. So we need to start redefining things based on the truth. You know, and this, this whole misidentification with… the things that separate us, rather than the reality of our common humanity is what’s at stake.

Metta Spencer

I want to let you know how much I appreciate your… idealism and the inspiration of what of the way you speak about these matters and I think we we have not only the the ideals that everybody and everybody shares and even these thugs, you know, patriots who, who are really doing so much damage, some part of them recognizes all of the things that you’ve just said. But and and so we all, at some part of our soul we share these values. And but of course, the reality is also they’re very practical, pragmatic, realistic. This worldly reasons for abolishing nuclear weapons.

Jonathan Granoff

Well, we’re… the realists… we need to we need to claim the realist debate. Because because it is not realistic to continue to be addicted to fossil fuel and think there’s a sustainable future. It’s not realistic. It’s not realistic to think you can have a vaccine- apartheid world, with… with walled states, with walled communities, with walled hearts and leaders who are that way. It’s not realistic. It’s not realistic. You know, it’s interesting that it was Ronald Reagan who pushed the Montreal Protocols to protect the ozone.

Metta Spencer

I’d forgotten. Right. And it was… Ronald Reagan, called George Schultz into his office (a right wing conservative American president, but he wasn’t, he wasn’t a fascist, he wasn’t crazy) and he said, Look, the scientists are giving me alarmist information that we could be destroying the ozone, causing massive cancers and agricultural disruption. Maybe they’re wrong, maybe they’re right, but we should have an insurance policy. And we can lead in America to get this done. Because who brought him into office was the right wing. So… America was wind in the sails of the Montreal Protocols, which Canada should be proud of. And when people say, Oh, you can’t get the cooperation, we can’t get the world to be realistic. Not true. Canada led with American support in getting the getting the protection of the ozone and reversing the destruction of the ozone layer from… hydrofluorocarbon molecules. This is the time in which, that opportunity has arisen now… Canada can push America toward a new realism in human security and global cooperation. And you have the intellectual heft… in Canada, you know, and you have the parliamentarians in Canada who understand this, and the Neanderthals who are still talking about unrealistic myths, myths, like strategic stability — that NATO … how can you have strategic stability when you’re also pursuing military advantage? It’s, you know, it’s totally schizophrenic. So, we have to say, We don’t believe you’re being honest, you’re being unrealistic. Do you want strategic stability, that means lowering the salience of the weapons? If you want military advantage, we’re going to have an arms race that will bankrupt us, and make the use of weapons more likely. Neither of these are realistic. What is realistic, is working together on those existential threats that you laid out: the climate, cyber, pandemics, poverty, you call it hunger I call it poverty, nuclear weapons, and on the horizon, nanotechnology, quantum computing, biotech and all of these new capacities that we have. This is what’s before us, either … we’re going to be in pieces, or we’re going to be in peace. And a country like Canada, … has a legacy and… the moral authority. By the way, you domestically have a country that’s truly multicultural, and a true sense of freedom. And when I hear… the scandals that you guys have, and that it upsets the Canadian people, and Ithink of what we are living through in the United States. I mean, we just had an attempted coup! — What our scandal is that the the prime minister was caught eating a chocolate bar in Parliament. He had to apologize.

Jonathan Granoff

Yes, honestly. Canada, grow up already. You know… you actually exemplify… be the leaders that you have to be… demand of your leaders that they take a global leadership role, because you’ve got the right to do it.

Metta Spencer

Well, Jonathan, you got me all fired up, I can hardly wait to finish my day, we have so many things to do. And you’re doing your part, and I want to do what I can. And thank you for this because I want to share it with my Canadian friends. And they’re going to be all fired up to. So it’s wonderful to have you as our partner, and especially to have you there at the UN where you have access to some people that we don’t necessarily have much contact with. So Bless you.

Jonathan Granoff

Oh, bless you. Thank you, Metta. And thank you for being a thought leader and a heart leader for so many years. You know, this is not something that you’ve just come to in a fashion way, this is something… that was a calling that you responded to.

Metta Spencer

It’s true, for both of us but for me, it’s also fun. I hope you’re having as much fun with it as I am.

Jonathan Granoff

But… I think that we have to get the millennials… to know that you can make a difference. We can claim some victories that — our voices… — because they bring peace. But peace is not as eyeball compelling as conflict. We’re set up to watch out for conflict. But when there’s peace, we just kind of take it for granted. It’s like our health, right? It’s like our health when you’re healthy. You don’t think about it… we should. And … we should be grateful for our health, and we should be grateful for people like you who responded thanklessly to the call for peace.

Metta Spencer

Bless you my friend. And it’s just a delight to be back in touch anytime that, next time we meet it may be in the backseat of a car going someplace in Pugwash, Nova Scotia, or it might be in Geneva I think which is the last time I met it maybe

Jonathan Granoff

Hearings in Ottawa.

Metta Spencer

And maybe hearings anonymous… Indeed, indeed. Thank you and have a great day.