Just a sign of life from Germany, where Marco Versace and I just visited Lindenberg Salem yesterday for an all-day lecture on neurofeedback. Salem is the worldwide service organization that Thom Hartmann was associated with years ago. At his instigation, they are now doing neurofeedback.

This beautiful spot in Northern Bavaria is something of an unknown. It is near the border with the former East Germany and with the Czech Republic, and as such has had development pass it by. Surprisingly, even tourists have stayed away from this idyllic place. As a result, the region has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country, nearly 20%.

The area is known for the highest density of breweries in the world. In the nearby town of some 3800, there are five breweries. They possess the most imposing buildings in town. You cannot look in any direction from the railway station without seeing a brewery.

Unsurprisingly, Germans have among the highest per capita beer consumptions in the world. In addition, smoking is still commonplace. And Germans are accustomed to lathering lard onto their Broetchen, and dining on chicken broth at lunch. One wonders about the impact of all this on health. Life expectancy is advancing here as elsewhere, but a price is obviously being paid. More than half of all female deaths are now attributed to cardiovascular problems. Men have already been there.

There is something that needs explaining here. The French set records with respect to per capita wine consumption; the Greeks drench their food in oil; and the Italians are obviously enjoying their prosperity through excesses in food consumption. Yet life expectancies are on the increase everywhere.

Our talk drew a local neurologist. He is already doing neurofeedback. It was my challenge to keep him nodding. Perhaps unsurprisingly, he has a handicapped daughter at home who was probably a key inspiration in his entering the field. (It was very satisfying to hear that he was originally inspired to enter the field by Maximilian Teicher of Zurich, who in turn was attracted by Wolfgang Keeser, who had attended the first Key West Conference in 1993 and was the first person in Europe to purchase a NeuroCybernetics system. He also hosted two of our training courses in Europe, and attended others.) I say “our talk” because Marco translated my mixture of English and German for the assembled. That was a tough assignment. We had in the audience some people who could not speak English, and some who could not speak German. A couple of people had flown over from England and Scotland for the presentation.

Incidentally, we took the fast train through Germany from Hamburg, so covered the distance in five hours. Imagine calmly booking a 9-minute connection at 3.5 hours into the trip, to meet the last train of the day to take us to our final destination in the hinterlands. Here trains serve even very small towns. They are not only the arteries but the capillaries of the public transportation system.

The second half of our training course is coming up this weekend, with Sue in charge. The course is full of energy. I believe that Europe as a whole will now latch onto neurofeedback enthusiastically, much like they did in the Czech Republic years ago. (The Czech development was largely attributable to the efforts of one man, Jiri Tyl.) The difference is that the field is being “discovered” here at a stage of greater maturity. In the U.S. we suffered from the fact that over the years we inadvertently cultivated the “immune reaction” against neurofeedback by the mainstream.

Here the field also appeals to the technology bent of the locals. In the land where homeopathy is mainstream, how could we fail? A few people have been energetically spreading the word. This includes Doerte Klein, a child psychologist from Hannover, Uwe Gerlach, as well as John Styffe and Werner Schlaefli in Switzerland. Pete van Deusen has been over here to teach. Doerte Klein has also been offering training seminars. There is also the new ISNR group in Europe to organize around. There is already a significant group of practitioners emerging in Switzerland, a country that is surprisingly open to innovation. Another group is building in Norway (where we did two trainings over the years). This development is largely attributable to the efforts of one man, Oystein Larsen.

This visit to Germany after many years is meaningful to me in many ways. First of all, we are seeing here the obvious contrast to contemporary American society in that this is still an economy with a safety net. Despite an unemployment rate hovering around 10%, one sees very little poverty. People falling into unemployment get state support for up to 18 months, in order to allow them to get back on their feet. There are generous health benefits and generous retirement benefits. The whole country is more or less middle class. Nobody sleeps on the streets.

It is also becoming clear that this is not entirely sustainable. Globalization inevitably levels the playing field according to the script of the leading player, the United States. There is probably no country as dependent on international trade as is Germany, and it cannot ultimately remain insulated from America’s cut-throat, shoot-the-wounded economic model. It is also apparent that by maintaining a certain level of comfort for everyone, entrepreneurial adventures are less likely here. True innovation is more favored in the culture of the US. Germany under these circumstances will be more like Japan, quick to adopt the emerging technologies, but not in the lead with respect to innovation. Hamburg introduced electricity into its harbor operations in 1888, which can’t have been long after Edison demonstrated it in New York.

It seems as if there is just a much bigger flywheel attached to the German economy. On the good side, this means that the old buildings in town are modernized rather than razed. It means that villages around the country retain their character. They are continually revitalized, as opposed to rich folks mansionizing the hillsides and abandoning the towns to inevitable decay. The cancerous growth of a Los Angeles would be out of the question here because literally everything bearing on public welfare is regulated. On the down-side, getting a few BrainMaster units through customs can mean several trips to the airport customs office, filling out lengthy forms, and dealing with perfectly polite but relentlessly fastidious customs officers. Filling out the form required reference to two thick volumes of instructions, all written in German that was as opaque as legally correct language can be. At the airport you can hire attorneys on the spot who can help you with the forms. Yikes. This world is much more geared to large shipping companies than to small enterprises trying to gain a foothold. When all was said and done, however, the customs officer was impressed that we had managed the process. Few survive unaided.

In walking through downtown Hamburg yesterday, we came upon the carcass of a church that has been preserved as a memorial from World War II much like the bombed-out church in Berlin. Bells had been added to the unreconstructed tower at the fiftieth anniversary commemoration. At that event, Gorbachov had been present, as well as the mayor of Jerusalem at the time (probably Ted Kolleck). A special relationship had developed with the cathedral at Coventry, bombed by the Germans in 1940. Coventry donated a “cross of nails” (nails which had been used in its own original construction) to the ceremony. This cross of nails has now launched a world-wide peace initiative.

One wag recently sighed that it is a strange world in which the most famous golfer is an African-American, the most famous rapper is a white guy, France accuses the US of arrogance, and Germany refuses to go to war. It is perhaps difficult for outsiders to see how much Germany has changed. This country was, after all, able to stand by and do nothing during the carnage in the Balkans, which are much closer to home. Is it any surprise that it would choose to stand down when it came to Iraq?

During the Nuremberg trials, German defendants were told that no argument could be raised in defense of the war itself because no arguments in favor of initiating warfare could be considered defensible. Categorically. The war itself had therefore been a war crime. This principle had become bedrock in the post-War world as a result of our own efforts.

At the memorial church there was also a display relating to the end of the war here in Hamburg. This is particularly relevant given what we are currently facing in Iraq. The surrender of Hamburg to the allies was negotiated by military officers who themselves were not authorized by Hitler to do this. Hence they were immediately under threat of death, which any person loyal to Hitler would have been empowered to carry out. Similarly, as long as Saddam Hussein and his loyalists are still hiding out somewhere, vengeance is still possible against any “collaborators.”

The retrospective also recalled Hitler’s “Nero” decree on March 15, 1945, in which he ordered what remained of German society to be destroyed. Since the German people were losing the war, they were obviously unworthy of him. This decree clarifies a distinction between what Hitler regarded as his loyal following and the nation at large. It may seem a quibble, but whereas the SS was his, i.e. a Nazi creation, the German army had remained the German army. It was never the Nazi army. The decree to destroy Germany may have emanated out of Hitler’s progressive paranoia, but there existed a cadre of adherents who were willing to carry out the order, even against their own countrymen. Germany was simply the vehicle he had selected for his mission, and now it was time to correct his error.

If one has lived through fearful times, it is difficult to shed the fear thereafter. That having been said, allow me to voice some cautions. It seems that even in the United States it is possible for an interest group to recruit the country in the name of patriotism, but to have interests that are not identical with those of the country as a whole. For lack of a better term, let us call that interest group the ruling class. Such a ruling class would be expected to adjust the laws of the country so that in time its interests are better served. A voluntary army would mean first of all that the sons of the well-to-do would no longer be at risk. (In England during WWII the officer class died at a higher rate than the grunts.) Of course that has to be accomplished before sabers are once again rattled.

Tax law would be adjusted so that once wealth is gained, it may be preserved from generation to generation. Capital would be increasingly favored over labor through taxation. Off-shore tax havens would receive official sanction, so that the truly rich do not have to pay the bills that are coming due for an aging U.S. labor force and a huge contingent of immigrants seeking social services. It was during Reagan’s presidency that his Budget Director was moved to say in disbelief and disgust, “the hogs are really feeding.” In retrospect, they had just started in on the appetizers. We had not seen anything yet.

The ruling class would also have to move the opposition party into dependency on its largesse, thus assuring a docile and servile opposition in the political sphere. Finally, an information network has to be put in place so that the elect can keep tabs on all those who at one point or another may be inclined to rock the boat and threaten the interests of those who really matter in this world. And perhaps an election or two may have to be tilted to assure the right outcome.

After the war, Germans were asked why they did not object.
It is getting harder to ask that question.
When, for example, should one start?
Is it when certain people are treated as non-persons?
We are there.
Is it when people are held by government incommunicado?
We are there.
Is it when we start talking about the use of torture to extract information?
We are there.
Is it when criticism of the government is considered unpatriotic?
We are there.

At the war memorial, it was recalled that Hitler had nearly half a million Germans killed for their opposition to the regime.
That’s more than one percent of all German adults at the time.
It is indeed getting harder to ask the question.

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