Clinton Foundation Strategy Briefing
I am attending the Clinton Foundation Strategy Briefing to trustees. I have been a trustee of the Clinton Foundation since its inception and I made a committment to donate $1 million to the foundation over 10 years.
Since 2001 I have been to quite a few of these meetings and they have been getting better and better. I am very impressed at the quality of the team that President Clinton (in America Presidents are called Presidents even when out of office) has put together.
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Posted at Foundation, info el 2006, December 15 | # Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (2)
Holocaust Deniers and Creationists
Here´s a Wikipedia definition of Holocaust deniers and here´s a Wikipedia definition of Creationism. What do these two have in common? That they are both movements of people who try to fight facts with ideology.
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Posted at info el 2006, December 13 | # Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (2)
What Happens When a Country Gives Up Religion: as Spain Shows, Nothing Much
During Franco´s dictatorship Spain was a very Catholic country. After 3 decades of democracy, Spain is not really a Catholic country anymore. First, loss of religion became apparent with the legalization of divorce and contraceptives and the promotion of sex ed, followed by the decriminalization of abortion, the acceptance of drug possession for personal consumption (drug users are not criminals in Spain, but treated instead as medical patients) and a general acceptance of premarital sex. Also gambling in public places became commonplace, prostitution was legalized and regulated, and recently gay marriage became legal. So other than euthanasia, I can´t think of anything that the Church used to opposed that is not legal now in Spain.
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Posted at info el 2006, October 29 | # Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (6)
15 Million Americans Moving to Mexico
There´s a boom in the retirement industry in Mexico. Presently, there are around half a million Americans retiring in Mexico. They do this because they get great weather, nice people, and with the same income they can live much better lives.
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Posted at info el 2006, October 25 | # Permalink
Clinton Conference
Follow the conference live by clicking here. I am presently attending this conference and there will be more posts related to it coming out soon.
And also in my blog.
Posted at Foundation, info el 2006, September 20 | # Permalink
Jews for Lebanon, it´s Live
At the Safe Democracy Foundation we went ahead with the initiative Jews for Lebanon.
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Posted at Foundation, Safe Democracy, info el 2006, September 18 | # Permalink
My Ranking of Countries From Best to Worst Governed
I was thinking about the countries in the world that are the best and the worst governed and I elaborated this very personal list. I did it quickly, as a kind of a game, and I may have forgotten certain countries, but the idea was to make a personal ranking that reflected my vision of the world.
I could spend a lot of time explaining why I put certain countries in certain places. I could also change my opinion. This is the same kind of thing as when you meet someone and ask them about their favorite movies, music, books, and places. All of this information only helps you to know a person better.
So here is my ranking, from best to worst
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Posted at info el 2006, September 14 | # Permalink
Israel Lost
Israel is managed by a generation of leaders who grew up wondering how could six million Jews walk to their death without putting up a fight. Maybe this explains why these leaders are so ready to over react when Israel is attacked and why Israel consistently loses the war that matters most, the war of global public opinion, even against the most unlikely candidates: Syria and Iran.
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Posted at Politics, info el 2006, August 21 | # Permalink
Bill Gates and The Authoritarian Elements of Philanthropy
You could either say that Bill Gates is the most generous man in the world (now even more so that he gets others to donate through him), or you could say that he is a man who made his money as a monopolist who now gives his money away as an authoritarian. Personally, I think the truth is somewhere in between.
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Posted at info el 2006, July 8 | # Permalink
Catholic Church: Creationism is Paganism
Being a non religious person myself I find many of the views of the Catholic Church difficult to deal with. Opposing the use of condoms for example is to me extremely irresponsible. But surfing the net this morning through Microsiervos I got to this comment made by a Vatican astronomer who I found summarized what I thought about creationism, mainly that creationism is a superstition. I was surprise to find myself in total agreement with the Catholic Church. I wonder though what the rest of the Catholic Church thinks about creationism.
Posted at Politics, info el 2006, May 9 | # Permalink
Observations on China
I recently read that David Sedaris moved to Paris and started writing on France only to be sorry a few months later he had so quickly written about Paris and ended up sounding like the typical American in Paris. Nevertheless because I belong to a more rare group, that of an Argentine in China I will dare to make a series of comments on China with the caveat that I am no China expert and have only been four times to China since 1988. My last visit ended yesterday.
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Posted at info el 2006, April 17 | # Permalink
Dinner with President Clinton
President Clinton is the person I admire the most in the world, it´s that simple. Readers of my blog and those close to me are well aware that I am rarely a fan of anyone in the true sense of the word, but when it comes to Clinton I cannot help but make the exception. Whilst in NY I was invited to attend a dinner in his honor. As usual I found the President´s views fascinating (a not to non American readers in America people call ex presidents...Presidents).
Now before I share the Presidents views with you I would like to remind you that I am not a journalist and that I did not take notes during dinner so some of my recollections maybe wrong. Still I believe that they are worth a try as they are original and challenging.
The dinner was held at the home of New York financier Marc Lasry who I thank for his kind invitation. The whole event consisted of two parts. The dinner itself during which approximately seven of us asked an array of questions to the President on current affairs; and an after dinner conversation in which I personally followed up on a number of issues. Here are my recollections, a brief summary of the three hour conversation.
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Posted at Foundation, info el 2006, March 15 | # Permalink
Contact us
Correspondence other than grant proposals may also be sent to:
The Varsavsky Foundation
c/o Jazzya Investments
Avenida Bruselas 7, Planta 3
28100 Alcobendas
Madrid, Spain
Fax: +34 91 291 7688
e-mail: Matias Bergmann
Posted at info el 2005, February 7 | # Permalink
Mission
The Varsavsky Foundation was established by Martín Varsavsky in May 2000.
Using the same entrepreneurial spirit he used to build 5 companies over the past 20 years, Martín Varsavsky has approached the social, political and economic issues of his day with the same creativity.
The first large project started by the Varsavsky Foundation in the year 2000 was www.educ.ar and www.educarchile.cl. These two are the largest educational web sites in Argentina and Chile and the two largest in the Spanish speaking world.
The Educar program however is not just the web site. After donating over $11 million for these projects Martin Varsavsky was able to bring in government, private and corporate donors to connect educational institutions to the internet with a total investment in these projects now exceeding $50 million dollars. In 2004 alone the Argentine Government invested $30 million in the Educar "alfabetización digital" objectives.
The latest project of the Varsavsky Foundation is Safe Democracy.
Safe Democracy came out of an original idea by Martin Varsavsky which consists in getting together some of the most powerful figures in global politics with academics, media experts and business leaders to study over three days around March 11th in Madrid how democracies can effectively fight terrorism without losing their spirit.
Other than promoting original ideas of Martin Varsavsky the Varsavsky Foundation gives grants to NGOs around the world. A list of the Varsavsky's foundation donations appears in this web site.
The Varsavksy Foundation is a private, independent grant making organization dedicated to using the full pedagogical potential of the Internet to engage societies' most prevelant inadequacies.
Posted at info el 2005, February 7 | # Permalink
