Tim: Black, White and 9

I have the feeling that United States are going through what Japan had gone through in the 1990's, only with much worse international effects... But what's hopeful is that, the world will definitely not let United States fail! Especially for China, which owns around US$900 billion of bonds - much lesser if not for possible political leverage.

At the back of my mind, I can tell you the most competitive person in NBA history: the guy who lost 2 NBA Finals called LeBron Raymone James. I knew he is competitive, even without even Tweeting to him or reading his book, because he appears to do the 'right' things that keeps him in position in winning the rest of his world. I saw a picture of James wearing a Yankee hat. James is born and raised in Ohio, so I thought, out of local pride, he should support a Ohio-based baseball team, like the Cleveland Indians and Cincinnati Reds. No - he supports the New York Yankees with their 27 world titles, and their huge success in the late 1990's, when he first encountered sports. He only desires victories, nothing else. It's also noted in Wikipedia that he supports the Chicago Bulls and Dallas Cowboys - the most successful teams in the same period. James appeared on Vogue, hosted a Saturday Night Live show, owns part of Liverpool F.C. and most importantly, earned the m...

I think that Wal-Mart was (in the past 30 years), and still is, the greatest retail company on Earth. They are the only hypermarket, or 'supercenter', that defines all-in-one-stop retail. It stemmed from a visit to Wuhan, China not too long ago, when I met the friendliest 'associates' and the cheapest goods, in a nondescript setting in a central city, even more so than the friendliest in Singapore. Never mess with Wal-Mart! They have a strong central management system, they invest a lot in both human capital and investment. They got the Walton International Scholars Program.  They also have the  IBM 370/135  computer system, leased. The result? T hey serve to increase the economies of scale Wal-Mart can use to have savings to pass on to consumers - $700 million currently. For now, Wal-Mart just seemed to have a PR problem in sexual equality, which, in my opinion, seems to be overblown. Wal-Mart was embroiled in a lawsuit against former employees, for cha...

Very few people see the Greek crisis not as a 'debt crisis', but as a crisis where different brothers of a family fight for the same stuff that feeds them in the great financial famine, like I do. Do you know that France, Germany and Britain hold together hold 62% of the total Greek external bank loans? And they make up 100 billion dollars. Is this the debt crisis we are hearing? Greece owing some country large sums of money? But who are the countries that Greece owed to? Greece is owing money to its very own European nations - and not to some foreign countries like China, India or United States. Only then, will the world be really stuck in a systemic crisis. I do not have material evidence, but I think Portugal, Italy and Spain have similar issues as Greece. Added with Greece's woes in governance, I do not think the situation in Greece will improve.