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The Lao People's Democratic Republic is a communist country, like China to the North and Vietnam with which it shares its Eastern border.
And like the bordering communist countries, the government has embraced limited private ownership and free market capitalism, in theory. But there remain powerful vested interests, and residual pockets of political power, particularly in the agricultural sector, and corruption is a significant issue.
During the past decade tourism has become an important source of income and is now generating around a third of the Nation's domestic product. Tourism is centred on Luang Prabang and to a lesser extent the Plane of Jars and the capital, Vientiane.
1963 was a pivotal year for me. It was the year I completed High School and matriculated to University; the year Bob Dylan became big in my life; and Beatlemania began; the year JFK was assassinated.
The year had started with a mystery the Bogle-Chandler deaths in Lane Cove National Park in Sydney that confounded Australia. Then came Buddhist immolations and a CIA supported coup and regime change in South Vietnam that was both the beginning and the begining of the end for the US effort there.
Suddenly the Great Train Robbery in Britain was headline news there and in Australia. One of the ringleaders, Ronnie Biggs was subsequently found in Australia but stayed one step of the authorities for many years.
The 'Space Race' was well underway with the USSR still holding their lead by putting Cosmonaut, Valentina Tereshkova into orbit for almost three days and returning her safely. The US was riven with inter-racial hostility and rioting. But the first nuclear test ban treaties were signed and Vatican 2 made early progress, the reforming Pope John 23 unfortunately dying midyear.
Towards year's end, on the 22nd of November, came the Kennedy assassination, the same day the terminally ill Aldous Huxley elected to put an end to it.
But for sex and scandal that year the Profumo Affair was unrivalled.
Carbon Sequestration Source: Wikimedia Commons
Whenever the prospect of increased carbon consumption is debated someone is sure to hold out the imminent availability of Clean Coal Technology; always just a few years away.
I have discussed this at length in the article Carbon Sequestration (Carbon Capture and Storage) on this website.
In that detailed analysis I dismissed CCS as a realistic solution to reducing carbon dioxide emissions for the following reasons:
