Burt Reynolds and What is Success ?

In the news, also posted by a friend in Facebook, Burt Reynolds, the famous movie star of the 70s, is apparently broke and is selling off his stuff. 

I feel sad to hear about this. He was a big star. However, he is not alone. Many people succeeded in beating poverty, but failed to manage wealth. As comedian Bill Hicks said, "It's just a ride." 

This is what I think: a successful person is not necessarily rich and famous. A successful person is one who is able to live happily under any conditions in life, whether rich or poor, famous or unknown, married or single, powerful or common, and is able to do what he or she loves to do. Enjoy your ride !!!

Israel and Palestine

The conflict between Israel and Palestine is the most difficult problem to solve today. Whoever can stop all the violence and killings and bring real peace truly deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. "Uncivilized" humans still keep killing one another, very bad and sad !!!

Something Beautiful

Be open-minded. If you heard some music, or saw something strange and foreign, put it aside for a while. Return, hear or look at it again. You would discover something beautiful which you were not aware of before. Nothing is strange and foreign, if you open your heart and mind to feel and understand it. Cheers !!!

Obama Chewed Gum at APEC

I do agree that Obama looked bad, in being one of the world leaders and walked around chewing gum in such formal APEC summit. Some people said Obama was rude. I am not against chewing gum (Singapore is), but Obama did look like trying to be cool only with the opposite effect. Xi Jin Ping and Putin looked more like statesmen than Obama.

The American Dollar

The American Dollar is no longer as mighty as it was. The Almighty Dollar doesn't sound Almighty any more.On the latest trip of Stephen Harper to Beijing, Canada signed a currency deal with China. Business between the two countries can now be conducted in their own currencies of Canadian Dollar and Chinese Yuan.

Canada is not the first country which has signed such a currency deal with China. Many countries have already done so. This enables business between countries to be conducted directly in their own currencies, without having to take the extra step of converting them  to U.S. money.  

As many know, the American Dollar was backed by gold in the past. In 1971, president Nixon untied the American Dollar from gold. It then became the Petro Dollar. International trading of oil and other commodities was then conducted in U.S. currency. At the present, the American Dollar is just fiat money backed by nothing, except you may say that it is backed by bullets and bombs. In other words, Uncle Sam would get mad and force you to use the American Dollar, and if you refused to comply, he would make your life difficult, by using political pressure, economic sanction, and even military action.   

The game of creating American money from thin air will be over. It may not be completely replaced by another new game, but it will not be the only game, or the primary game.

Some economists, investors, financial people, or even conspiracy theorists predict that the American Dollar will collapse soon. I don't agree with them entirely. I don't think that it will be a sudden and quick collapse. I believe it will gradually lose its status as the international trading and reserved currency. It is already happening. All said, I could be wrong, so please don't point finger at me, if the American Dollar suddenly collapsed. I pray that it won't, because if it happens this way, the American people will suffer greatly beyond words.     

Uncle Sam is in heavy debt, owing trillions of dollars to China and other countries. It is a losing game, to keep borrowing and printing money, in order to maintain a false or exaggerated economy, and to finance the very expensive military adventures everywhere.

Will the Almighty Dollar, the American Greenback, give way to the Chinese Yuan (Dollar) or Reminbi (people's money) ? Just wait and see !!!       

Elephants

This is so horrific: according to the Wildlife Conservation Society, 96 elephants are kill every day in Africa. That's 35,000 elephants killed in a year.

A friend Mariah said that if you believe BBC, the majority of the tusks went to China.

I said yes, Chinese gangs and criminals made deals with poor African poachers, to illegally smuggle the elephant tusks to China, Vietnam, Taiwan, etc. to make ivory artifacts. It is not only elephants. Humans should be ashamed of themselves, to keep destroying the environment and abusing the natural resources and wildlife on planet earth. Unfortunately, money and the economy often speak louder than ethics and morals, and people would even break the laws for greed of money, power and self interests.

I said yes,