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Strategies & Market Trends : Galapagos Islands -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Techplayer who wrote (28410)	2/23/2003 12:10:47 PM
From: Jorj X Mckie	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 57110

I agree TP. The U.S. lost a bit of trust, but Chinese industry has yet to earn it.

To: Techplayer who wrote (28410)	2/23/2003 1:43:45 PM
From: X Y Zebra	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 57110

Good morning tp, I do not disagree with you. But let's see... 1. I am looking at this primarily from the investment side. i.e. how can I benefit personally from this? I am fully aware that to "trust" Chinese companies, (or any other foreign company for that matter), I will have to rely on local experts. --People like Mr. Faber, who at least I have known of for a long time. 2. It is evident that we are talking about a major change. I mean factories are not built overnight. They take a lot of planning and a lot of vision from those who back them, so this "shift" will last for a while. 3. The Chinese may be deceiving, greedy, corrupt and all those other things that any garden-variety human is. (I wonder if the ENRON honchos have any Chinese background in their families or... Does Ernie Ebbers sounds Chinese to you? (Maybe Chinese-Canadian eh? -gg) Chinese may be anything you want, but stupid they are not. For now... they need foreign capital to be able to build the capacity they want. At some point, (if not already) they are opening up more... and they know that in order to trade with other countries they will have to allow certain exchanges that will have to be mutually beneficial. 4. A question we need to ask ourselves is... has US corporations (the large ones) and US government have acted in accordance to not only international laws, but more importantly in an ethical way? Remember... who put Saddam Hussein in power (and people like him around the world). And in Saddam's case allowed him to stay 12 years ago. I know they told me that they slapped him on the hand and they "made a deal with the UN" and so long he would not do a. or b, or c... they would let him stay... ----->bullshit I mean, we are asking every country in the world to "act responsible” this has a price, "acting responsible" carries a cost that needs to be better defined and identified... but that is a slightly different subject, (but needs to be covered). However, with the same mouth we do as we wish? Ok... are we willing to live with that? If yes, then we must accept the risks. BUT if all of a sudden, China rises as a potential serious challenger to be the world's bully... we can't go crying for mommy. The choices are... either we continue to think as if the world has not changed since the 50's and 60’s and continue to issue threats of carpet bombing to whomever does not bend to out whims and desires (and end up like the sequel to the Palestinia ~ vs ~ Israel bout --more and more this "war against terrorism" is sounding like that...) Or... We start genuinely attempting to bridge the differences and bring the rest of the world to truly embrace Capitalism.... But that means a lot of things that here in the US people does not have the slightest bit of interest to do... like... be really interested in other cultures.... For starters, learn the damned languages... Problem is... we have lost the element of "the peace dividend” we wasted it, the world has lost TRUST in the US Dollar, Russia is controlled by the Mafia... so now we have an uphill battle.... not only that.... but in the eyes of the world, we are about to fulfill the "image" that our enemies want to create about the US.... Again... I am not an apologist or ready to accept that Saddam stays in power... nothing like that... all I am saying (again) is that we really need to think how we approach these problems... because they exist for real... we just need to consider what solutions we take... Perhaps... given the rhetoric and the course of events so far... we have no choice but go into Iraq... and finish the job from 12 years ago... the real problem starts AFTER Saddam is gone... and the current leadership (except for Mr. Powell), do not inspire me confidence... Another alternative we have is to compete against a very cheap Chinese and rest of the third world labor are we willing to do that? Probably not, do we have a choice? Unfortunately, (thank you politicians), the US has painted itself into a corner. That is ... I do not think we have much choices here... So what's next? I mean, how are we all as investors going to make money... I do not think going long the US market is the route... going short yes, probably, but be aware of those flesh eating bear market rallies... because they will come and if you are not ready to jump ship they will eat in one or two bites the profits built on the short side... I am looking for an alternative... a diversified alternative that will create me wealth over time... The combination of the current status of the US market PLUS (more importantly) the outlook for the US Dollar forces me to look outside ... but where... that is the question that needs to be answered... I could go on forever... but I think you get the point.... One last point... The stress factor here in the US is going to start going off the charts… perhaps is time to slowly seek an alternative, after all, there are countries like Thailand, or Ecuador and so on.... that who knows.... maybe living the beach bum life is not that bad.... you know... quantity of money ~vs~ quality of life... and ... at what cost ? hell at least for 6 months of the year… in this fashion “retirement won’t be that expensive” AND life will become more interesting… no ? just rambling and rattling the brain... -ggg