G-8 Summit

President Bush is attending the G-8 economic summit in Japan.

I remember as a little kid growing up in the early part of World War two and reciting hateful rhymes against the Japanese and in particular emperor Hirohito. We were, after all, at war and our fathers and uncles were in harms way. I guess it was our way of dealing with the adult frustration and anger that filtered down to us kids.

The Japs, as we called them then, were the enemy. Today they are the Japanese and we are demonstrable friends and fierce competitors.

Emperor Hirohito was 88 when he died in 1989. He ruled for 62 years from the Chrysanthemum Throne and became the longest reigning monarch of the world's oldest imperial line. He saw his homeland go from a super military power, to crushing defeat, to a world economic power achieving in business what it could not do in war.

Hirohito saw his life go from being considered and treated as a living god, to a position largely ceremonial, as is the case today with his son.

The G-8 summit, in part, is to figure out ways that the world's richest nations can help the world's poorest nations. The Japanese are the evidence that the move from poverty to riches can be done. It takes collective help and a strength of character and a ideological world that is willing to see itself as ONE. The miracle of life is not in the oneness, it is the diversity within the oneness.