Manhattan ? Media mogul Ted Turner said Monday that Iraq is “no better off” following the U.S.-led invasion that ousted dictator Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Delivering the 141st Landon Lecture at Kansas State University, Turner said the world is at a “critical juncture,” comparing it to a baseball team down two runs in the seventh inning.

The philanthropist and founder of CNN gave the lecture to a less-than-full auditorium.

Earlier this fall, former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev delivered a similar message of peace to a packed room as he marked 20 years of the reforms he championed.

Turner said the situation in Iraq was serious but not hopeless. He raised concerns about global overpopulation, poverty and hunger.

He also called for nuclear disarmament. He said the U.S. and Russia still have thousands of nuclear weapons pointed at each other. He said if he were in charge – making it clear he wasn’t and never would be – “we’d be rid of them.”

He said he was afraid someone in power could make the mistake to launch a nuclear war, including President Bush, based on his previous decisions.

Turner said war was an outdated form of diplomacy that had stopped working.

“You would think that we would have learned that in Vietnam,” he said.

Turner also said the authority of superpowers of tomorrow would be derived from education, health care, and science and technology.