Reflecting on the November 2008 Global Financial Crisis made me research the origins of the US monetary and financial system and the uncovered facts, were to state the least: utmost illuminating!
The US Dollar, a.k.a. "Greenback" were IOUs (I Owe yoU) empowered by the Constitution to the Government of the day by the people, to issue payments for goods and services rendered.
There is not a need to borrow money with or without usury and then pay for goods and services rendered to the people through the Government, because the Government is precisely the people and it does not make sense to pay usury to private bankers when the Government is empowered by Law (the Constitution) to print legal tender money.
When Abraham Lincoln is President, he paid for goods and services rendered to the Government by printed Greenbacks and the Greenbacks were then used by the people who received them to buy other goods and services for other people and through this, money is circulated into the economy and the economy expanded.
These were "fiat" money, that is money issued in faith, without the backing of any gold, precious metal or even borrowings.
While the primary fear of fiat money is its continuous store of value and public acceptability, its integrity is not so much its intrinsic but confidence value.
In times past, tokens ranging from stones to corrie shells and even common table salt (that is where the term 'salary' originated) were used as money.
Usury burdens the borrower and it makes no sense that the Government, who is the collective "people" should indebt the people through borrowed money to finance projects that are needed by the people, when the Government is empowered by Law to manufacture as much money as they need to govern the people.
Borrowing from private bankers to finance Government projects for the benefit of the people will only enrich the private bankers at the expense of the people, burdening them with higher taxes to pay off the usury charged by the private banking entrepreneurs.
Printing money to pay for goods and services rendered to the people under the Government auspices, per se, will not drive up inflation, provided there are idling resources waiting for capital to stimulate their sustainable exploitation.
What drives inflation is when too much money is chasing after too few goods and services.
If the economy is undergoing recession because there is not enough money around, either because people do not have the money and/or or too cautious to spend, it is time for the Government to prime the pump by printing money and spending on projects that will benefit the people.
Only Governments have the right to print money and this power can be used for good or evil.
If deployed for good, the printing of money, unbacked by gold or even borrowings is not only benign; but necessary and beneficial.
The last thing the people want is an economy with not enough money when money could merely be printed by the Government with the backing of gold or the Government indebt the people with borrowings from private bankers to spend for the benefit of the people.
I say, plagiarizing Oliver Cromwell, "Melt down all the misconceptions and circulate all the needed printed dollars into the Economy"!
Friday, December 25, 2009
Friday, December 18, 2009
Contemplations On the Mandatory Death Sentence
"An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind", Mahatma Gandhi famously said.
Perhaps, it is because we are spiritually blind that we endorse the reciprocity of sin disguised as deterrent punishment.
Is it logical to chop off the hand of a convicted thief who stole because he needs food to survive and condemn him to seek no other avenues of making a living but to risk his other remaining hand in order to put food into his mouth?
As Mencius puts it, all human beings endeavor to do good, but distractions are a plenty and the onus is on the strong to bear the weak.
Alas, there are few keepers around today, especially brother's keepers.
Let us work towards a more compassionate cultured society.
Progress in civilization had actually digress humanity towards monstrosity.
Let there be Love, Peace and Hope among us, especially at these trying times when almost every known systems seem to be broken!
May 2010 be a better year.
Perhaps, it is because we are spiritually blind that we endorse the reciprocity of sin disguised as deterrent punishment.
Is it logical to chop off the hand of a convicted thief who stole because he needs food to survive and condemn him to seek no other avenues of making a living but to risk his other remaining hand in order to put food into his mouth?
As Mencius puts it, all human beings endeavor to do good, but distractions are a plenty and the onus is on the strong to bear the weak.
Alas, there are few keepers around today, especially brother's keepers.
Let us work towards a more compassionate cultured society.
Progress in civilization had actually digress humanity towards monstrosity.
Let there be Love, Peace and Hope among us, especially at these trying times when almost every known systems seem to be broken!
May 2010 be a better year.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
The Moral Capitalist: Oxymoron?
This is a conversation between a "classically trained capitalist marketer" and a "reformed capitalist turned environmentalist":
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Thu at 11:15am · · Like / Unlike
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Venture Platform Pte Ltd "Quality in a product or service is not what the supplier puts in. It is what the customer gets out and is willing to pay for. A product is not quality because it is hard to make and costs a lot of money, as manufacturers typically believe. This is incompetence. Customers pay only for what is of use to them and gives them value. Nothing else constitutes quality" Peter Drucker
Friday, November 13, 2009
Repent, Rethink, Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
Mega scale solar thermal projects to generate “green electricity” is never going to be feasible because the constraints, limits and ethos are all stacked against it.
The maximum potential amount of solar energy falling on a square meter of land in the wilderness of Australia is 7 or even 8kWh per day.
Assuming a unrealistic 100% energy conversion efficiency rate and stack them against the amortized capital cost (assuming running input cost is zero, what will the cost-performance (returns) be?
Solar energy is not unlimited; it is constrained limits and this is one of the fundamental first principles that we should be aware of, always.
The ethos of converting solar energy into electricity so that we can continue to live our wanton energy guzzling lives and not making inconvenient adjustments to cut down our energy footprint will only get us back to square one.
Indeed, the Earth can supply all of our needs; never our greed.
If we, however, live within the Cycle of Sustainability and Renew-ability, even fossil fuel is a sustainable resource.
Alas, we are all caught up in the hurry to “progress” and “grow” our economies to the detriment of our larger meaning of quality living.
Fellow earthlings, Repent, Rethink, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle before we reach the tipping point of no return!
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
A Response to Pure Capitalism
This is my response to:
http://www.myfreedompost.com/2009/11/video-of-jon-voights-speech-in.html
...an extract is stated below:=============================
Source: www.myfreedompost.com
1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity.2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.4...
==============================
True. Both extremes of Socialism and Capitalism, in fact any "ism" are bound to fail because they are idealistic whereas human economic problems need pragmatic and real solutions. Unless we have more benevolent capitalist like Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Colgate, Carnegie and the like, the only face of Capitalism that the People will see will just ... Read Morebe the Ugly. Throughout history, a hungry person is still a dangerous people who will risk the uncertainty of change in the hope of a better tomorrow. When Hope is all that is left, let's hope the change is the right.
==============================
True. Both extremes of Socialism and Capitalism, in fact any "ism" are bound to fail because they are idealistic whereas human economic problems need pragmatic and real solutions. Unless we have more benevolent capitalist like Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Colgate, Carnegie and the like, the only face of Capitalism that the People will see will just ... Read Morebe the Ugly. Throughout history, a hungry person is still a dangerous people who will risk the uncertainty of change in the hope of a better tomorrow. When Hope is all that is left, let's hope the change is the right.
Saturday, November 7, 2009
What are the Possible Causes of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis?
The root cause of the Financial Crisis of 2008 is the unfettered creation of credit and money fueled by human greed for “economic and business growth” at any price and at any cost.
Before the creation of credit, one has to save enough money to buy or consume a commodity or a service or to barter if no money is to be transacted.
To boost sales, credit was invented and suddenly, when people are able to consume something with future money, GDP and the wealth of nations increase by leaps and bounces.
When new and more creative money and credit devices are created e.g. the stock market, derivatives, futures etc, further balloon wealth is created and without the real physical assets to support the created mirage of wealth, it is a matter of time the balloon burst.
Money can be created by printing, but real wealth is built upon sweat, blood and tears of enterprise, diligence and ingenuity.
If more money can solve all of the world’s problems, the printing of more paper money will solve all the world’s problems, but we know that is not the case.
The way out of this global financial crisis is for us all to return to the fundamental issue of what is the purpose of the human life and to add value while we are here on Earth.
While we need money to live; living just for money make life a baloney.
For us who lost much money through this crisis, be thankful, we could have lost our lives and sanity as well, so let us return to sanity.
For us who has not lost anything because we had nothing to start with, let us be also thankful that the Lord Who feeds the sparrows and clothe the lilies is the same and identical Almighty that sustains us and to who all humanity destined to when our term finally expires on Earth.
Let us through this crisis, return to sanity and appreciate the real meaning of living and begins to appreciate the serenity of Joy, Peace and Love, not necessarily with money and wealth.
Goodbye 2008, Happy 2009!
At this crisis time, no amount of blame apportioning finger-pointing will be helpful, neither any panic knee jerk reactive actions or inaction.
USA and generally the rest of the linked globalized world is facing what Dr. Peter Senge in his book “The Fifth Discipline” described as “paradigm paralysis” warranting a “shift in paradigm” and a change in “mindset”.
In the past 100years, history records for us the failure of the planned economy a.k.a. soviet styled central command planned economy, culminating in the implosion of the Soviet Union.
Now it seems the alternative to Soviet economic system at the opposite of the economic model continuum, the laissez-faire or free economy seems to be failing to the brink of a similar implosion.
Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis propound Hegel and Fichte is the dialectic thinking outside our boxed paradigm and dogmatic mindset way out of the similar global economic-financial hammering at the very remaining foundations of the capitalist system since the other alternative had failed more than 2 decades ago.
Age old and universal dialectic is the way to go, but can 21st Century homo sapiens put aside personal and even national interest for the sake of the larger and paramount global interest?
Alas, I am pessimistic.
The human race is far too parochial and divided to see beyond his own navel to see ourselves as citizens of island Earth in the whole wide Universe.
There is no other place we can call home, save Planet Earth and it is only when we see ourselves facing the same identical fate that we shall either swim or sink together as one humanity.
There is still hope, if we remain united as one, united by common purpose and meaning because we are humans sharing a common Earth, then only can we see the meaning and purpose of enriching our neighbors because it will ensure our own survival too.
Like it or hate it, the person who taught us to love our neighbor as ourselves some 2000years ago still rings true today, but will the words of Jesus Christ, a Jew from the tribe of Judah still have a place in our heart let alone in our ears alone?
May the Good Lord forgive our sins as we repent and do what is right before Him, comprehensive and holistically from as diverse a matter as the environment to personal finance.
Ted, if you grasp the spirit and not just the letter of Peter Senge’s Fifth Discipline, we will less likely to be gridlocked into chronic paradigm paralysis by endless finger pointing rhetoric but join in the light of the New Hope led by the President of Change: Barack Hussein Obama.
The name Barack Hussein Obama is in itself, an antithesis to the legacy thesis of USA and unless we confront the failing thesis with another alternative antithesis to arrive at synthesis, we remained captives of our own paradigm, that’s my point.
Partisan politics has its role in its safeguard against tyranny through a comprehensive system of checks and balances including the separation of powers, alternative competing philosophies and a free press, but not when America and the rest of the world who follows American leadership in ideals, values and economic system are in trouble and seeking ways towards a new paradigm and even adopting a new mindset.
Change, we must and Change we ought to, for where there is No Change, there is No Chance!
I am beginning to like you and that is not a joke, seriously. I like your candidness and if you are as serious as I am, even naive, it is fine with me, we are all entitled to our own views and as long as we don’t seek and use violence to promote or instill our beliefs, it is entirely fine with me.
I just have one question.
If you know the problem(s) what is/are your solutions?
If you are the President of the USA, what would you do save blaming people, parties and systems?
And to Faisal, your Islamic system as the new paradigm is interesting, can you share a little details how the Islamic system is the better vis-a-vis Marxism and Capitalism, save the God system part, because the US Dollar has the famous “In God We Trust” and yet her economy is in shambles! And please don’t tell me they are different gods here, to me it is irrelevant and irreverent.
Tell me why and how “Islamic Economics” is different and better than the two other systems in the dichotomy or continuum.
interesting ideas no doubt, but neither new nor fresh I am afraid.
It seems to me another Utopian Dream Economics ala Marxist or Egalitarian with the element of “God” skew.
I am also personally against Usury but see Capital as one of the two other economic resources: Land and Labor.
For the reward for the use of Labor is the payment of Wages, Land: Rent and Capital: Interest, Dividend, Profits etc.
Money is a form of Capital and the risk of parting of one’s money (cold cash, gold, liquid convertible assets) surely had to be the reward or incentive of interest as returns.
For the past 1400 years or so, we have yet to experience a viable “Islamic Economic System”.
Perhaps out of the ashes of Marxist and Capitalism Collapse, could we see the emergence of the Synthesis, with Islamic as a potential candidate?
Well, I am no prophet so I cannot foretell.
But certainly, with the Islamic Economic System as painted by you, I would rather be the hammer than the nail i.e. the Borrow, rather than the Lender 
No malice meant here but I am always tickled pink by a Notice I saw hanging out from a shop in Los Angeles, California, USA.
It says in Bold:
“In GOD we Trust TRUST, others pay CASH”
To me that is the succinct meaning of the printed slogan on the reverse side of the US Dollar Bill or was that the cheeky hint that In God we Trust and not others because all man are liars, politicians, bankers, lawyers, priests, imans, monks, soldiers, homemakers etc etc.
Well, you make your own conclusion(s).
By the way, I am not a youth anymore, but I am still a student nevertheless, because for as long as I live, I continue to learn new things and often by first unlearning the wrong or outdated, obsolete things first.
But one truth remains:
Let God be true and all Men: Liars! (Romans 3:4, Psalms 11:16)
It does not matter whether one believes in God or not, all humans need air, water, food, shelter etc to survive and in the modern day, money usually buys all these necessities and that is what money is for: a mean to an end.
No billionaire will want to give the 1/40? You mean billionaires who claim themselves Muslims or “infidels” billionaires like Warren Buffet and Bill Gates?
Go check your facts before you speak, please.
Usually the worst people are the religious hypocrites and that transcends religion type.
You may ask, how can we build and maintain billion dollars cathedrals, temples and religious buildings when so many of our neighbors die from the lack of basic potable water, nutrition, clothing and shelter?
When we rather spend our scarce resources on so called “defense” killing one another rather than helping one another because I see my Father’s creation in my brothers and sisters face although they bear a different color and have a different religion from me?
Why did God create such a mess with so much diversity when He could have just created one homogeneous commodity of humanity with identical color skin?
My take is even if we are homogeneous in color, homo sapiens will still fight one another because like it or not, there is an inherent class struggle defect in the human species!
The conclusion is not whether I or you believe in God, but are we prepared to love one another as brothers and sisters because we share a common ancestry, a common Earth and a common Destiny when we are gone from planet Earth, now or in the distant future when all things must come to an end, even the Solar System exploding into oblivion?
If we know how significant we are, we will become more generous with others.
Islam is no different from all other religions I supposed, they all espouse good works but alas their followers hardly follows.
2.5% per year is ambitious. if it is just 1% and from all the combined wealth of Middle East Oil revenues itself, I suppose Muslim countries like Pakistan, Indonesia, Palestine etc will be very well today, but alas the classic failing rings true cross culture and religion: Good Religion; Bad Followers.
Yes, it is still the big “IF” and I guess we all can always dream and hope, but the reality still is, I assert:
“Let God alone be true and all men (and women), Liars (me included).”
The 2008 Global Economic Crisis is rooted in easy unbridled, unregulated and undisciplined credit.
But ironic it may seem, the availability of easy credit is what that grew the global economy in an unprecedented pace in the last 10 years.
The invention of credit was also what that spearheaded the accelerated growth of business, trade, commerce, manufacturing, mining, banking and every aspect of the economy.
In the subsistence economy of old where each family grew their own food and are self sufficient substantially, there is little trade and the economy did not grow much on an aggregate basis.
It was the creation of credit, where one can consume now with future wages, profits and income that made the sale of house, automobiles and other big ticket items take off in a mass market scenario.
China tried to manufacture its way out of poverty by selling its products to USA at the expense of paying a high environment cost for it, an now, she is paying a disproportionate level of cost, financially, economically and even politically and socially.
China in fact lend USA the money she made from the selling of goods and services to USA, so that she can continue to buy Chinese goods.
China, like Japan holds much US bonds and hopefully the Chinese will remain sane and not dump US bonds for US cash, causing the collapse of the US economy internationally.
China and Japan, together with the rest of the world outside USA, especially Europe are now like multiple commonly joined “twins” and we have no choice but to float or sink together as one big globalized nation.
Neither gold nor silver nor any form of currency is “real wealth” as you perceive.
The only real wealth that exists on earth are the lives you impacted upon while you are alive on earth, and that is not even in the pie-in-the-sky “Heaven” or Paradise with flowing rivers of wine and multitudes of virgins to service you.
If we had returned and remained in the gold or silver standard domain of the old, we would have turned the clock back to the Middle Ages.
Whilst I do not condone the wanton creation of false wealth by the printing of money or credit, curtailing economic growth to the pace of how fast gold and silver could be mined and minted into currencies is no solution either.
If USA has to print the Amero, so be it, if it solves the global economic problem; but things are not so simple. However, it is a much more progressive idea that regressing to medieval solutions.
By the way, it is easy to blame others for problems we ourselves also contributed to in whole and it parts, so please, minorities are always easy to a target at, as we, as a so called humanity had ill-treated for a more than 2000 years.
Faisal, FYI, paper money was first invented by the Chinese, that is factual history; “paper zionist currency”, I am not certain.
I do foresee a day where paper money will disappear, not because it is outlawed, but because there are better ways to transact as in mobile money in Africa via mobile phone money transfers.
History also shows us for what the Muslims collectively persecuted the Jews: it is pale compared to what the Christians collectively persecuted the Jews, culminating in Nazi Germany’s mass extermination of the Jews in the Second World War (of course this historical verifiable fact is still being disputed by certain people and certain parties, then and even now).
Gold, silver, platinum, titanium and all minerals need to be mined, refined and minted, and in order for them to have any intrinsic monetary exchange value, they must be sufficiently rare.
To bridle any economy on the account of the pace on how fast gold and silver in the ground or in the sea could be processed and turn into money would be foolhardy in the context of a 21st Century globalized economy.
Gold and silver was the the currency of China, and the currency of international trade with Europe during the 1800’s, but as you are aware, when silver flowed out of England into China and tea leaves flowed vice-versa, the tide was only reversed when British opium, grown in occupied India flowed into China and silver flowed back into England that started the Opium Wars that ended the Ching Dynasty that started the Modern China period.
No, much as gold and silver I like to own, nothing is like melting down the Silver Saints and circulate them into the economy, plagiarizing Oliver Cromwell.
At the end of the day, it is the people that matters and we all wonder how can the rich live off the sufferings of the poor and that applies to all seats of powers: political, religious, organizational etc.
What is the meaning of Saint Peters Cathedral in Rome, Saint Pauls in London, Kaaba in Mecca, Taipei 101, Petronas Twin Towers, Shanghai Tower etc when billions in the world are without even the most basic drinking water, sanitation, nutrition, clothing, warmth and shelter?
The world is not without its riches and there is enough wealth to spread around, rather it is the unequal and inequitable distribution of wealth where it ought to have been distributed willingly by the haves to the have nots that is the root of the problem.
Throughout history, thinkers and philosophers had tried to think and seek out a solution, from the Buddha right up to Karl Marx, various solutions from personal enlightenment to social re-engineering had been propounded, but none seems to work.
Faisal, your Muslim Solution is one of the many propounded solutions, I am afraid.
There are challenging times ahead of us and as we create solutions to an old economic problem, let us remain optimistic and open minded and not be boxed up by our limited parochial interest and perspective and blinkered by our prejudice and mantras.
Peace to you, my friend.
Faisal, I am a keen reader of history and if my memory serves me right, the last Ottoman Sultan was bankrupted and had to be done away with with the lost of the Axis to the Alliance in the Second World War.
I am not certain if the Ottoman system is Islamic for you, if it is, your theory about the flawlessness of the Islamic system you claimed as revealed in the Koran and elsewhere remains, at best, a pipe dream (pun unintended).
If not, there probably will never be a viable “Islamic Financial-Economic System”, empirically.
Name me please, your working model example: Taliban Afghanistan, Wahabi Saudi Arabia, Secular Islamic Indonesia, Islamic-Islamic Pakistan. Islamic-Malay Brunei?
You are probably referring to the system to come in the future, just as Christians look to the Millennium Rule of Christ or the Buddhist for the coming of the Maitreya Buddha of Prosperity.
If so, I rest my argument because Utopia will always be a dream like Heaven or Paradise may seem to be for all us lost souls yearning for a better place and a better in eternity. This is what many deemed as “Hope beyond Hope”?
Mind my cynicism.
We only have one life, we only have one Earth and we only have one chance on Earth, so let us make the best of it and not blow it up or screw it up because we are going to Heaven and Earth can go to Hell for all we care. Is that the right attitude we should take? Ought we? To me, an emphatic NO!
If we cannot realize a little semblance of Heaven on Earth for our kindred, we are not fit to be stewards of God’s Earth by just promising Paradise as the opium to sedate our daily struggle for survival!
Niang, I am heartened that you are matured in your concern for a mere 17 year old; I was still partying in my hippie days when I was your age!
Well, times have changed but the needs of homo sapiens for clean drinking water, nutritious food, clothing, shelter, transport, energy, heating etc remains unchanged throughout human history.
Do not be alarmed about what is going on around you, in Chinese Tao philosophy, the Ying Yang has to come to an equilibrium, so the world economy is finding its own natural equilibrium before it become stable again, and that has to happen by aggregate natural processes: the so called “Wu Wei” or “Sans Actions” or “The Invisible Hands” of the free economy.
Don’t rely on the government to do anything, they are no gods and sometimes, the more they intervene, the worst the situation becomes.
Governments are faceless and whether they are put in place through the ballot or the bullet, they face one common problem, they have no money. They merely tax and spend on behalf of the people. When they don’t have enough they literally beg, borrow or steal and that includes the printing and creating of more new money.
I am assuming you are from an agrarian based nation like China, if so, you will still have your land to provide you and your family your basic survival needs, you will be OK. Woe is you if you have only the desert and oil or buildings and worthless bills: you can’t eat sand, concrete and paper money or drink oil.
Yes, the New World Order is coming and it has to come, engineered or otherwise but blessed is the man or the woman who keep faith in the goodness of God and goodness of man in loving and bettering his or here neighbor!
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Which is Worse, "There is Only 1 Choice" or "You have No Choice"?
Me think the former because when you have to actively "choose" to have the only one choice left rather than just passively let things be on "default mode", it is like adding injury to insult.
In life and even in death, if it is possible, we must retain the dignity to exercise our freedom of choice.
Even God in His Omnipotence did not contradict Himself in His attribute, he left us the choice to choose Him or to reject Him.
Of course the consequences of our choice is for us to bear, just as he bore our iniquities if we choose to cast them unto Him should we choose not to carry them.
Yet still, we still have our own cross to bear, nonetheless.
In life and even in death, if it is possible, we must retain the dignity to exercise our freedom of choice.
Even God in His Omnipotence did not contradict Himself in His attribute, he left us the choice to choose Him or to reject Him.
Of course the consequences of our choice is for us to bear, just as he bore our iniquities if we choose to cast them unto Him should we choose not to carry them.
Yet still, we still have our own cross to bear, nonetheless.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Economic Cycles or Deception Cycles, Really ?
I remember reading about the inevitability Economic Cycles of Boom and Bust in a Laissez Faire Capitalistic System, as if these cycles are inherent weaknesses of the System and must be accepted as a necessary evil or imperfections as it is with Democracy as a System.
In my adult life, I have personally experienced at least 3 downturns: the early 1980s just as I was freshly graduated from Business School, the Great Asian Currency Crisis of the late 1990s and now, the Global Economic Crisis of 2008.
The classical theory behind economic cycles is the inherent mismatch of production to match consumption demand to the point of overproduction, not unlike the situation of cash crops demand and supply feedback phenomenon. When the supply of a certain cash crop cannot meet the existing demand due say to bad weather or diseases, many farmers jump into the bandwagon and start planting the same crop at the same time, and inevitably ripens, harvested and put on sale in the market at the same time, a glut in the market drives down prices, less planting, less supply and the next upward price spiral repeats the cycle.
The other modern theory is that if hot money is not put into the real economy, but merely into the financial market like stocks and shares, derivatives, real estate speculation, this drives the financial market bubble causing it to inevitable explode one fine day when the frantic music stops in a game of musical chairs.
Having gone through 3 cycles, I am beginning to doubt if there is going to be a 4th and subsequent cycles as the politicians, economists and all vested interested people have wanted us to believe and put our faith in Economic Cycles.
The seduction to have us believe that Economic Cycles are natural and inevitable reinforces our acceptance of assurance that whatever goes up must come down and in defiance of gravity, whatever that goes down, will rise up too.
My take of the situation is the creation of money and credit to stimulate aggregate consumption and drive economic growth is not sustainable for the simple reason that unless the real resources is there to support the man made monetarily and financially created wealth, any additional virtual wealth is only going to drive up prices as too much money chases after too few goods and services.
Another real threat to the survivability of homo sapiens lies in the ability to feed, clothe and heat ourselves given the past half decade of potential global famine in the later part of the 2oth Century was only avoid thanks to cheap fossil fuel.
The so called "Green Revolution" in food production was only sustainable not due exclusively to superior high yielding crops but also the application of petroleum based plants fertilizers.
As oil peaks, pollution sickens and climate change threatens the status quo, a new point of balance or homeostasis in world population versus sustainable resources would present itself.
Like mice in an overcrowded cage, Malthusian attrition is the inevitable prognosis, I am afraid.
Globally, we have reached the tipping point in population explosion.
The picture are happy healthy goldfishes swimming about in an overpopulated fishbowl and when the blackout cuts off the electricity that powers the aeration pump, we see fishes bellying up.
We are kept alive in all intend and purpose by past cheap oil and the time has come when no amount of money buy any commodities any more, because we have eaten our last fish and drank our last glass of fresh water.
In my adult life, I have personally experienced at least 3 downturns: the early 1980s just as I was freshly graduated from Business School, the Great Asian Currency Crisis of the late 1990s and now, the Global Economic Crisis of 2008.
The classical theory behind economic cycles is the inherent mismatch of production to match consumption demand to the point of overproduction, not unlike the situation of cash crops demand and supply feedback phenomenon. When the supply of a certain cash crop cannot meet the existing demand due say to bad weather or diseases, many farmers jump into the bandwagon and start planting the same crop at the same time, and inevitably ripens, harvested and put on sale in the market at the same time, a glut in the market drives down prices, less planting, less supply and the next upward price spiral repeats the cycle.
The other modern theory is that if hot money is not put into the real economy, but merely into the financial market like stocks and shares, derivatives, real estate speculation, this drives the financial market bubble causing it to inevitable explode one fine day when the frantic music stops in a game of musical chairs.
Having gone through 3 cycles, I am beginning to doubt if there is going to be a 4th and subsequent cycles as the politicians, economists and all vested interested people have wanted us to believe and put our faith in Economic Cycles.
The seduction to have us believe that Economic Cycles are natural and inevitable reinforces our acceptance of assurance that whatever goes up must come down and in defiance of gravity, whatever that goes down, will rise up too.
My take of the situation is the creation of money and credit to stimulate aggregate consumption and drive economic growth is not sustainable for the simple reason that unless the real resources is there to support the man made monetarily and financially created wealth, any additional virtual wealth is only going to drive up prices as too much money chases after too few goods and services.
Another real threat to the survivability of homo sapiens lies in the ability to feed, clothe and heat ourselves given the past half decade of potential global famine in the later part of the 2oth Century was only avoid thanks to cheap fossil fuel.
The so called "Green Revolution" in food production was only sustainable not due exclusively to superior high yielding crops but also the application of petroleum based plants fertilizers.
As oil peaks, pollution sickens and climate change threatens the status quo, a new point of balance or homeostasis in world population versus sustainable resources would present itself.
Like mice in an overcrowded cage, Malthusian attrition is the inevitable prognosis, I am afraid.
Globally, we have reached the tipping point in population explosion.
The picture are happy healthy goldfishes swimming about in an overpopulated fishbowl and when the blackout cuts off the electricity that powers the aeration pump, we see fishes bellying up.
We are kept alive in all intend and purpose by past cheap oil and the time has come when no amount of money buy any commodities any more, because we have eaten our last fish and drank our last glass of fresh water.
Monday, October 5, 2009
A New World Order Starts With A New World Currency?
Preamble
With the global economic crisis triggered off by the US financial and banking crisis in September, 2008, the world is still teetering in fear of a potential failure in the US Dollar, a store of value for many a nation's reserve of wealth.
There is now an urgent call in unison by a diverse mix of nations ranging from China, Russia and even Brazil for an alternative global trading currency to replace the US Dollar.
A journalist from the STAR Newspaper had even wrote a long article about the wisdom of replacing the US Dollar in this Sunday's (04October, 2009) newspaper.
He has argued for an Asian centric currency to replace the US Dollar to facilitate trading transactions between Asian countries, probably one that is underwriting by the world's second and third biggest economies: China and Japan.
The basic justification is cost (the avoidance of forex related works) and risk management (avoid potential erosion of stored wealth kept in US Dollars).
Rise of the Asian Mammon?
Whilst the idea of an Asian based regional currency seems very seductive to Asians, I would caution it on the side of wisdom.
In understanding the roles and functions of exchange rates in their "invisible hands" self regulating and self adjusting mechanism of international trade, settlement of accounts and store of reserves, there are merits and justifications for the retention of individual nation's local currency amidst a commonly international currency rather than the abandonment of all local currencies in adopting just one common global currency.
Whilst the primary merit of adopting one global currency to replace all individual nations' currencies lies in the avoidance of exchange losses, the lost of national sovereignty and local government fine tuning flexibility through local micro management often offsets whatever gains that may be obtained by abandoning the status quo of having a local currency in the midst of another international trading currency or currencies.
The free floating exchange rate mechanism in the context of a free international market setting is supposed to self adjust itself to equilibrium.
For example, in the event where a country buys more than it sells with another country, the demand for the surplus country's currency will rise and cause the import price of goods to go up and therefore , hopefully the demand to go down and self adjust without the need for any government intervention.
Moreover,the reason why the US Dollar became the global de-factor trading currency is not something that had been forced upon us by USA, but something that the world outside USA had come to adopt as a matter of expediency.
In avoiding the lost in currency exchanges, we thus as countries like oil exporting Saudi Arabia, selling oil internationally denominated not in Saudi Riyal, but in US Dollars and importing goods and services also denominated in US Dollars.
The factory of the world, China likewise buys raw materials internationally denominated in US Dollars and sells her manufactured goods international, denominated not in Renminbi (RMB) but but in US Dollars as well, because China need to import raw materials like oil, iron ore etc and there are obvious advantages to buy and sell in one common currency to avoid exchange losses as currencies are converted from RMB to USD, USD back to RMB or any other local currencies where raw materials are bought from or manufactured goods sold to.
If based on pure economic dynamics, given that USA had over the decades, been importing more than she exports, the demand for USD should have dropped in value as demand for USD lag behind the supply of USD.
The only reason why the value USD remained high is a distortion in demand where the demand for USD is not purely for the purpose of settling accounts, but other reasons including the store of reserves, speculations and others.
For example, Saudi Arabia could have insisted that her oil be paid in Saudi Riyal, but the reason USD is adopted as the currency of quotation and settlement is because Saudi Arabia has to import virtually everything aside from oil.
The US Dollar is therefore internationalized out of expediency and prior to the advent of the European Union Euro in 2000 AD, the US Dollar is peerless and is the sole international currency available for international trade, settlement of payments and store of value.
However, with the advent of the Euro juxtaposition to the USD, not only does the USD now has a competitor; it now has a benchmark of value as people can now alternate between the two alternative international currencies.
I can still remember the cautious skeptical reception to the Euro's debut into the international scene in 2000, when it was valued slightly below the USD.
Today, in October 2009, 1Euro is exchanged for USD1.472 and whilst any crystal balling the future exchange rate is as good as a random walk, the gut feeling is that the Euro will remain stronger vis-a-vis the USD simply on the basis of aggregate confidence that fuels aggregate demand and the market supply of the respective currencies.
Why has the Euro strengthens against the USD or why had the USD weakened against the Euro since the advent of the Euro in 2000AD?
Before one can even attempt to answer this simple question, a tour of history and grounding of the mechanics behind the intricate linkages of currencies, exchange rate to trade, debts, settlement of accounts, currency trading & speculation and economics is essential.
Back to Basics: Back to Barter
Prior to the invention of money, trade and exchanges of goods and services between individuals are based on the premise of free and fair value transactions and assuming that it is in the context of a free market, exchanges occur only when agreements are met. In other words, it is only when the both parties in the single transaction agrees to the terms and conditions supporting the transaction, then only can the transaction be completed and settled.
For example, if I have a few extra live chickens that I would like to exchange for say, some vegetables which I do not grow myself, I will approach my neighbor farmer if he would like to exchange his vegetables for chickens. If the answer is affirmative, the question that follows is at what parity? That is how much vegetables can I expect to get in exchange for a live chicken.
We may haggle or we may just agree on the spot and he gets my chicken and I get his vegetables at a mutually agreed exchange rate and totally without the use of money. This is known as "barter trade" and commonly done before the advent of money and still carried out today, locally as well as between individuals from two different countries.
Trading with money vis-a-vis barter trade will obviously manifest itself, the convenience and advantageous of the monetary system.
Money, a token of common accepted media of exchange can be anything, real or virtual, what matters is both buyer and seller mutually accepts the tokens for the exchange of goods and services.
Money therefore can be in the form of a signature as in the backing of a valid Credit Card a.k.a. "plastics", cowrie shells, gold, silver and even electronic credits as in phone and internet credits.
In the days of old, it is not uncommon for individual domains to trade internally with paper money, but beyond its own borders, the sovereign paper money is not worth even the cost of the paper that was printed on.
Opium
A classic case in point is the famous "Opium Wars" or Anglo-Chinese Wars between England and China in the mid 19th Century (First Opium War from 1839 to 1842 and the Second Opium War from 1856 to 1860).
To cut a long story short, the problem was the imbalance of trade and payments between two sovereign countries: England and China.
The English, addicted to tea, a commodity only available in China, discovered that silver, the only form of money China wants in exchange for tea, is fast flying out from England to China as tea flows into England.
Realizing that England is in dire straits, England tried to convince China to buy English cotton goods and other products in exchange for tea. The Chinese refused on grounds that the Chinese has no lack of or desire to have English products.
Convincing the Chinese to accept British Pounds in paper money was also a non mover because only gold and silver is the only accepted form of payment for international trade back then.
The problem escalated into the English addicting the Chinese with British Indian grown opium and in a matter of decades, the reverse flow of silver from China to England as opium poured into China forced the Chinese to take drastic actions to ban the consumption of opium.
This trade war culminated in two Opium Wars resulting in an unmodernized China being carved out by the European colonizers and even her neighbor, modernizing Japan.
The American Dream; The World's Nightmare
In the days of old, paper currencies are backed by gold and silver, so no governments, no matter how corrupt could irresponsibly print money without any backing.
However, at the turn of the 2oth Century and with the passing of two world wars and the Great USA Depression and the world in turmoil, a solution has to be found and the backing of printed money by gold was reckoned to be unsustainable, illogical and stifling.
The Americans decoupled the USD from any backing of precious metals like gold and adopted the "a fait" system: i.e. based on trust or "faith".
With the decoupling and easing of the monetary supply by the "a fait" printing of money, stimulus spending etc, USD was brought out of the great depression of the 1930's.
Since then many other countries had followed the example do the USA and taken their currencies off the backing of any precious metal and issue them ala "a fait".
With the meteorite rise of the US economy and international trade post Second War World, the adoption of the USD as the de-factor global currency became an entrenched phenomenon until the advent of the Euro alternative in 2000AD.
The easing and therefore the availability of easy money and credit did accelerated the growth of the US as well as the global economy vis-a-vis had it have to be tandem with the rate of the discover and refinery of precious metals.
Without the stifling of the economy by the physical production of precious metal, the 2oth century saw the unprecedented and simultaneous growth the economies in diverse places like post WWII Germany and Japan aside from the USA.
But the system of the a fait money is by no means without its inherent problems.
Faith requires honesty and honesty is indeed a rare commodity, be it personal or in an organization called the "government".
When government starts to fiddle with the monetary system and overprint money so that they can spend frivolously, the lost of value of printed money or inflation is the inevitably consequence as we can see in the Zimbabwe economy of late under President Robert Mugabe.
Faith money prerequisites honest governments and if the leader (USA) is far from honest herself, one wonders how can other developing world's leader can be expected to follow otherwise.
As I write today, 7th October, 2009, jitters around the world over the imminent fall in exchange value of the USD starting with the dumping of USD by oil exporting nations like Saudi Arabia, has caused the USD to drop and gold commodity price (again denominated in USD) to rise.
Why has the love for the USD turned so sour lately?
Confidence or rather the lack of it.
The consensus nowadays is that the USD is unsustainable because it is issued based on nothing but 100% faith in the USA and her economy, and with the US economy now in shambles, it does not take a fool to dump the USD for anything else including gold, Euros, commodities etc.
For nations who keep their savings, surpluses and reserves in USD, the erosion of wealth via the weakening of the USD is utmost unnerving.
At the same time, it is a catch 22 situation.
The unison ditching of the USD by all will only cause the USD to fall further but on the other hand, the fear of being the last person holding the unwanted hot potato is an unwelcome nightmare of default by inaction.
Amongst the biggest losers of a weakening USD are countries that had invested heavily in US bonds having gained from exchanging goods and service with USA for a fait USD.
Normally, no fool will be dumb enough to exchange goods and services for mere pieces of printed papers and for so long are there are people out there willing to accept USD as money, the crisis of confidence does not exist and the USD remains bankable.
What if indeed the USD does not command any more confidence?
Well, unless world trade ceases in concert with the USD, there will still be need of a global currency or currencies to facilitate trade and avoid the loss in currency exchange.
Between the Devil & the Deep Blue Sea
Would the Euro be the replacement to the USD?
It could very well be, but there is no guarantee that the Euro would not go down the same road as the USD.
These symptoms are manifestations of a larger and more insidious global economic problem festered by dishonestly, greed and corruption.
The biliions and billions of dollars that are presumably "lost" in the global economic crisis is still too baffling.
Where have all the money gone to?
Surely not into the thin air.
If its mere "paper losses" due to valuation bubble, it can be accepted, but with actualized gains that are "lost" attributable to the payment of vulgar bonuses and compensations, it is sinfully wrong.
With the lessons learned from the 2008 Global Economic Crisis, I would hope that the world leaders would have come to realize that the old economic model is broken and unsustainable.
While the world gropes in the dark from the global economic brown out, hopefully, world leaders will begin to take a long term view and start rebuilding the global economy based not on a "business as usual" paradigm; but a sustainable system of real and honest economics.
While we hope, we pray the world leaders would have the moral courage to do what is right and good for the people in the long run.
May God help us all, we need it.
With the global economic crisis triggered off by the US financial and banking crisis in September, 2008, the world is still teetering in fear of a potential failure in the US Dollar, a store of value for many a nation's reserve of wealth.
There is now an urgent call in unison by a diverse mix of nations ranging from China, Russia and even Brazil for an alternative global trading currency to replace the US Dollar.
A journalist from the STAR Newspaper had even wrote a long article about the wisdom of replacing the US Dollar in this Sunday's (04October, 2009) newspaper.
He has argued for an Asian centric currency to replace the US Dollar to facilitate trading transactions between Asian countries, probably one that is underwriting by the world's second and third biggest economies: China and Japan.
The basic justification is cost (the avoidance of forex related works) and risk management (avoid potential erosion of stored wealth kept in US Dollars).
Rise of the Asian Mammon?
Whilst the idea of an Asian based regional currency seems very seductive to Asians, I would caution it on the side of wisdom.
In understanding the roles and functions of exchange rates in their "invisible hands" self regulating and self adjusting mechanism of international trade, settlement of accounts and store of reserves, there are merits and justifications for the retention of individual nation's local currency amidst a commonly international currency rather than the abandonment of all local currencies in adopting just one common global currency.
Whilst the primary merit of adopting one global currency to replace all individual nations' currencies lies in the avoidance of exchange losses, the lost of national sovereignty and local government fine tuning flexibility through local micro management often offsets whatever gains that may be obtained by abandoning the status quo of having a local currency in the midst of another international trading currency or currencies.
The free floating exchange rate mechanism in the context of a free international market setting is supposed to self adjust itself to equilibrium.
For example, in the event where a country buys more than it sells with another country, the demand for the surplus country's currency will rise and cause the import price of goods to go up and therefore , hopefully the demand to go down and self adjust without the need for any government intervention.
Moreover,the reason why the US Dollar became the global de-factor trading currency is not something that had been forced upon us by USA, but something that the world outside USA had come to adopt as a matter of expediency.
In avoiding the lost in currency exchanges, we thus as countries like oil exporting Saudi Arabia, selling oil internationally denominated not in Saudi Riyal, but in US Dollars and importing goods and services also denominated in US Dollars.
The factory of the world, China likewise buys raw materials internationally denominated in US Dollars and sells her manufactured goods international, denominated not in Renminbi (RMB) but but in US Dollars as well, because China need to import raw materials like oil, iron ore etc and there are obvious advantages to buy and sell in one common currency to avoid exchange losses as currencies are converted from RMB to USD, USD back to RMB or any other local currencies where raw materials are bought from or manufactured goods sold to.
If based on pure economic dynamics, given that USA had over the decades, been importing more than she exports, the demand for USD should have dropped in value as demand for USD lag behind the supply of USD.
The only reason why the value USD remained high is a distortion in demand where the demand for USD is not purely for the purpose of settling accounts, but other reasons including the store of reserves, speculations and others.
For example, Saudi Arabia could have insisted that her oil be paid in Saudi Riyal, but the reason USD is adopted as the currency of quotation and settlement is because Saudi Arabia has to import virtually everything aside from oil.
The US Dollar is therefore internationalized out of expediency and prior to the advent of the European Union Euro in 2000 AD, the US Dollar is peerless and is the sole international currency available for international trade, settlement of payments and store of value.
However, with the advent of the Euro juxtaposition to the USD, not only does the USD now has a competitor; it now has a benchmark of value as people can now alternate between the two alternative international currencies.
I can still remember the cautious skeptical reception to the Euro's debut into the international scene in 2000, when it was valued slightly below the USD.
Today, in October 2009, 1Euro is exchanged for USD1.472 and whilst any crystal balling the future exchange rate is as good as a random walk, the gut feeling is that the Euro will remain stronger vis-a-vis the USD simply on the basis of aggregate confidence that fuels aggregate demand and the market supply of the respective currencies.
Why has the Euro strengthens against the USD or why had the USD weakened against the Euro since the advent of the Euro in 2000AD?
Before one can even attempt to answer this simple question, a tour of history and grounding of the mechanics behind the intricate linkages of currencies, exchange rate to trade, debts, settlement of accounts, currency trading & speculation and economics is essential.
Back to Basics: Back to Barter
Prior to the invention of money, trade and exchanges of goods and services between individuals are based on the premise of free and fair value transactions and assuming that it is in the context of a free market, exchanges occur only when agreements are met. In other words, it is only when the both parties in the single transaction agrees to the terms and conditions supporting the transaction, then only can the transaction be completed and settled.
For example, if I have a few extra live chickens that I would like to exchange for say, some vegetables which I do not grow myself, I will approach my neighbor farmer if he would like to exchange his vegetables for chickens. If the answer is affirmative, the question that follows is at what parity? That is how much vegetables can I expect to get in exchange for a live chicken.
We may haggle or we may just agree on the spot and he gets my chicken and I get his vegetables at a mutually agreed exchange rate and totally without the use of money. This is known as "barter trade" and commonly done before the advent of money and still carried out today, locally as well as between individuals from two different countries.
Trading with money vis-a-vis barter trade will obviously manifest itself, the convenience and advantageous of the monetary system.
Money, a token of common accepted media of exchange can be anything, real or virtual, what matters is both buyer and seller mutually accepts the tokens for the exchange of goods and services.
Money therefore can be in the form of a signature as in the backing of a valid Credit Card a.k.a. "plastics", cowrie shells, gold, silver and even electronic credits as in phone and internet credits.
In the days of old, it is not uncommon for individual domains to trade internally with paper money, but beyond its own borders, the sovereign paper money is not worth even the cost of the paper that was printed on.
Opium
A classic case in point is the famous "Opium Wars" or Anglo-Chinese Wars between England and China in the mid 19th Century (First Opium War from 1839 to 1842 and the Second Opium War from 1856 to 1860).
To cut a long story short, the problem was the imbalance of trade and payments between two sovereign countries: England and China.
The English, addicted to tea, a commodity only available in China, discovered that silver, the only form of money China wants in exchange for tea, is fast flying out from England to China as tea flows into England.
Realizing that England is in dire straits, England tried to convince China to buy English cotton goods and other products in exchange for tea. The Chinese refused on grounds that the Chinese has no lack of or desire to have English products.
Convincing the Chinese to accept British Pounds in paper money was also a non mover because only gold and silver is the only accepted form of payment for international trade back then.
The problem escalated into the English addicting the Chinese with British Indian grown opium and in a matter of decades, the reverse flow of silver from China to England as opium poured into China forced the Chinese to take drastic actions to ban the consumption of opium.
This trade war culminated in two Opium Wars resulting in an unmodernized China being carved out by the European colonizers and even her neighbor, modernizing Japan.
The American Dream; The World's Nightmare
In the days of old, paper currencies are backed by gold and silver, so no governments, no matter how corrupt could irresponsibly print money without any backing.
However, at the turn of the 2oth Century and with the passing of two world wars and the Great USA Depression and the world in turmoil, a solution has to be found and the backing of printed money by gold was reckoned to be unsustainable, illogical and stifling.
The Americans decoupled the USD from any backing of precious metals like gold and adopted the "a fait" system: i.e. based on trust or "faith".
With the decoupling and easing of the monetary supply by the "a fait" printing of money, stimulus spending etc, USD was brought out of the great depression of the 1930's.
Since then many other countries had followed the example do the USA and taken their currencies off the backing of any precious metal and issue them ala "a fait".
With the meteorite rise of the US economy and international trade post Second War World, the adoption of the USD as the de-factor global currency became an entrenched phenomenon until the advent of the Euro alternative in 2000AD.
The easing and therefore the availability of easy money and credit did accelerated the growth of the US as well as the global economy vis-a-vis had it have to be tandem with the rate of the discover and refinery of precious metals.
Without the stifling of the economy by the physical production of precious metal, the 2oth century saw the unprecedented and simultaneous growth the economies in diverse places like post WWII Germany and Japan aside from the USA.
But the system of the a fait money is by no means without its inherent problems.
Faith requires honesty and honesty is indeed a rare commodity, be it personal or in an organization called the "government".
When government starts to fiddle with the monetary system and overprint money so that they can spend frivolously, the lost of value of printed money or inflation is the inevitably consequence as we can see in the Zimbabwe economy of late under President Robert Mugabe.
Faith money prerequisites honest governments and if the leader (USA) is far from honest herself, one wonders how can other developing world's leader can be expected to follow otherwise.
As I write today, 7th October, 2009, jitters around the world over the imminent fall in exchange value of the USD starting with the dumping of USD by oil exporting nations like Saudi Arabia, has caused the USD to drop and gold commodity price (again denominated in USD) to rise.
Why has the love for the USD turned so sour lately?
Confidence or rather the lack of it.
The consensus nowadays is that the USD is unsustainable because it is issued based on nothing but 100% faith in the USA and her economy, and with the US economy now in shambles, it does not take a fool to dump the USD for anything else including gold, Euros, commodities etc.
For nations who keep their savings, surpluses and reserves in USD, the erosion of wealth via the weakening of the USD is utmost unnerving.
At the same time, it is a catch 22 situation.
The unison ditching of the USD by all will only cause the USD to fall further but on the other hand, the fear of being the last person holding the unwanted hot potato is an unwelcome nightmare of default by inaction.
Amongst the biggest losers of a weakening USD are countries that had invested heavily in US bonds having gained from exchanging goods and service with USA for a fait USD.
Normally, no fool will be dumb enough to exchange goods and services for mere pieces of printed papers and for so long are there are people out there willing to accept USD as money, the crisis of confidence does not exist and the USD remains bankable.
What if indeed the USD does not command any more confidence?
Well, unless world trade ceases in concert with the USD, there will still be need of a global currency or currencies to facilitate trade and avoid the loss in currency exchange.
Between the Devil & the Deep Blue Sea
Would the Euro be the replacement to the USD?
It could very well be, but there is no guarantee that the Euro would not go down the same road as the USD.
These symptoms are manifestations of a larger and more insidious global economic problem festered by dishonestly, greed and corruption.
The biliions and billions of dollars that are presumably "lost" in the global economic crisis is still too baffling.
Where have all the money gone to?
Surely not into the thin air.
If its mere "paper losses" due to valuation bubble, it can be accepted, but with actualized gains that are "lost" attributable to the payment of vulgar bonuses and compensations, it is sinfully wrong.
With the lessons learned from the 2008 Global Economic Crisis, I would hope that the world leaders would have come to realize that the old economic model is broken and unsustainable.
While the world gropes in the dark from the global economic brown out, hopefully, world leaders will begin to take a long term view and start rebuilding the global economy based not on a "business as usual" paradigm; but a sustainable system of real and honest economics.
While we hope, we pray the world leaders would have the moral courage to do what is right and good for the people in the long run.
May God help us all, we need it.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Two Deaths Won't One Life Resurrect
Another of PH's thots on the sentencing of the two policemen accused of shooting and blasting the Mongolian Model, Altantuya Shararibu:
================================================================
Two Deaths Won't One Life Resurrect
written by Penumpang Halal, April 09, 2009
I am personally against the death sentence because it serves no other purpose, save an economic one: since it is cheaper to exterminate than to incarcerate and further more, dead people tell no tales.
These two poor souls may be the "kaki-tangans" that executed the killing and the disposal of evidence, but who is the "kepala" who ordered the execution?
There can be no justice without truth and where justice is not done or seen to be done, it engenders fertile grounds for alternative forms of justice contrary to what we have constitutionally bind ourselves to abide.
The slide down the slippery slope of perceived institutionalized injustice is steep and insidious, it seeks to corrode the very ties that binds society together through shared common values in law and order.
Oh, may sanity and rationality prevails in our midst, still.
================================================================
================================================================
Two Deaths Won't One Life Resurrect
written by Penumpang Halal, April 09, 2009
I am personally against the death sentence because it serves no other purpose, save an economic one: since it is cheaper to exterminate than to incarcerate and further more, dead people tell no tales.
These two poor souls may be the "kaki-tangans" that executed the killing and the disposal of evidence, but who is the "kepala" who ordered the execution?
There can be no justice without truth and where justice is not done or seen to be done, it engenders fertile grounds for alternative forms of justice contrary to what we have constitutionally bind ourselves to abide.
The slide down the slippery slope of perceived institutionalized injustice is steep and insidious, it seeks to corrode the very ties that binds society together through shared common values in law and order.
Oh, may sanity and rationality prevails in our midst, still.
================================================================
Thursday, March 26, 2009
BNM's Zeti, "Zeti: Economy strong enough to take downturn"
As reported in the Press:
KUALA LUMPUR, March 26 — Bank Negara Malaysia yesterday acknowledged that the country would experience the full impact of the global downturn this year, but painted a picture of an economy sufficiently resilient to withstand the external shocks should conditions worsen. (snipped)
==========
Penumpang Halal's Counterpoint:
============
Strength is Relative, Prophetess!
written by Penumpang Halal, March 26, 2009
The Prophetess may have just prophesied that, "The Malaysian Economy is Strong Enough to Take Downtown".
That statement begs for 2 more nervous questions:
1. How Strong (or Weak) is the Malaysian Economy
2. How Strong (or Weak) is the Anticipated Downturn and How Long Will the Downturn Be?
In 2007-2008, buoyant market priced Malaysian Oil financed more than 40% of the Malaysian Budgeted Expenditure.
With Oil having lost more than half of its market price vis-a-vis its peak, how much more oil must Malaysia sell to raise the same amount of revenue to finance the identical amount of budget expenditure?
But then again, Malaysia is no Switzerland whose currency is still backed by gold and like USA, Malaysia can gear up the printing press to print more money, because unbacked money is like what it says on the US Note: "In God We Trust".
Great, but other than "God", should we trust anyone else?
Well, unfortunately, it is dead silent on that!
===============
KUALA LUMPUR, March 26 — Bank Negara Malaysia yesterday acknowledged that the country would experience the full impact of the global downturn this year, but painted a picture of an economy sufficiently resilient to withstand the external shocks should conditions worsen. (snipped)
==========
Penumpang Halal's Counterpoint:
============
Strength is Relative, Prophetess!
written by Penumpang Halal, March 26, 2009
The Prophetess may have just prophesied that, "The Malaysian Economy is Strong Enough to Take Downtown".
That statement begs for 2 more nervous questions:
1. How Strong (or Weak) is the Malaysian Economy
2. How Strong (or Weak) is the Anticipated Downturn and How Long Will the Downturn Be?
In 2007-2008, buoyant market priced Malaysian Oil financed more than 40% of the Malaysian Budgeted Expenditure.
With Oil having lost more than half of its market price vis-a-vis its peak, how much more oil must Malaysia sell to raise the same amount of revenue to finance the identical amount of budget expenditure?
But then again, Malaysia is no Switzerland whose currency is still backed by gold and like USA, Malaysia can gear up the printing press to print more money, because unbacked money is like what it says on the US Note: "In God We Trust".
Great, but other than "God", should we trust anyone else?
Well, unfortunately, it is dead silent on that!
===============
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Proverbial Boiled Frogs
One of the most valuable lessons in life I learn and applied from school books is the experiment on frogs (or toads rather).
Toads and Frogs are cold blooded amphibians and unlike mammals like humans; amphibians cannot regulate their body temperature, but rely on external sources of heat like sunlight and ambient temperature to regulate their body temperature for survival purposes.
Therefore, if you throw a frog or a toad into a basin of warm water (approximately 36degreesC), they will immediately jump out through reflex instincts.
However, if you place them in a basin of room temperature water, they will just remain in it, even when you start to heat up the water on a stove.
They will just continue to enjoy the cozy jacuzzi of warm water until they are literally boiled to death.
Humans are largely creatives of habits and more often than not, for want of diligence, we end up as proverbial boiled frogs in the comforts of our cozy habits.
Amidst the negative ambiance against "hopping" or "lompat" in the current political scenario of Malaysia, there are indeed merits for hopping out of our insidious comfort zones or die a nice slow boiled death.
So, politicians and people out there, it is OK to jump, hop or "lompat', if survival necessitates it!
Toads and Frogs are cold blooded amphibians and unlike mammals like humans; amphibians cannot regulate their body temperature, but rely on external sources of heat like sunlight and ambient temperature to regulate their body temperature for survival purposes.
Therefore, if you throw a frog or a toad into a basin of warm water (approximately 36degreesC), they will immediately jump out through reflex instincts.
However, if you place them in a basin of room temperature water, they will just remain in it, even when you start to heat up the water on a stove.
They will just continue to enjoy the cozy jacuzzi of warm water until they are literally boiled to death.
Humans are largely creatives of habits and more often than not, for want of diligence, we end up as proverbial boiled frogs in the comforts of our cozy habits.
Amidst the negative ambiance against "hopping" or "lompat" in the current political scenario of Malaysia, there are indeed merits for hopping out of our insidious comfort zones or die a nice slow boiled death.
So, politicians and people out there, it is OK to jump, hop or "lompat', if survival necessitates it!
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Dr. Wee KS & Chinese Education
Another interesting post from Penumpang Halal, this time about Dr. Wee's veiled treat on withdrawing $$$$$ support for a Chinese primary school should they invite the state government representatives to their school function:
===========
Datuk Wee, Please Don't Wee On Yourself
written by Penumpang Halal, February 24, 2009
===========
Datuk Wee, Please Don't Wee On Yourself
written by Penumpang Halal, February 24, 2009
Bravo, MCA SS2 lead by its Chairman Mr. Lee Chong Beng.
Well said.
If MCA cannot represent the very interest the party is supposed to champion, the grassroot will switch over to other parties who can a better job.
Datuk Wee must not wee on the people who supports him or the people will wee on him and the party he represents.
The time of "There is Only One Choice" is gone, swap away by the tsunami of March2008, so for people like Datuk Wee, let the people free and let the people wee!
=====================
Well said.
If MCA cannot represent the very interest the party is supposed to champion, the grassroot will switch over to other parties who can a better job.
Datuk Wee must not wee on the people who supports him or the people will wee on him and the party he represents.
The time of "There is Only One Choice" is gone, swap away by the tsunami of March2008, so for people like Datuk Wee, let the people free and let the people wee!
=====================
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
No Justice Without Equality
Look what I found on http://www.malaysiainsider.com.
So good that I must replicate here:
=============
No Justice Without Equality
written by Penumpang Halal, February 18, 2009
Granted all of us are unique (no two humans has identical thumb print!) and there are obvious differences in the Gender, that does not make us unequal when rights are concerned.
All persons are equal before the law and whether you want to believe that some laws are "God given" and some "Man made", all laws are humans implemented.
Herbert Spenser, the English sage said, ""Laws whether written or unwritten, formulate the rule of the dead over the living. In addition to that power which past generations exercise over present generations, by transmitting their natures,--bodily and mental,--and in addition to the power they exercise over them by bequeathed habits and modes of life, there is the power they exercise through their regulations for public conduct, handed down orally, or in writing. . . . I emphasize these truths,"--he adds,--"for the purpose of showing that they imply a tacit ancestor-worship."
Alas, what the women is fighting for is actually futile, because the "rights of men" are enshrined above that of women in the holy books.
What is needed is a shift in paradigm and a change in mindset and that include even to the drastic step of not having the religion that one, who had chose not to belong to by one's freewill e.g. "by birth".
Simple solution, in a democracy, people have personal freedom and that includes rights to personal choice and privacy: Just Leave and be Free to or not to associate.
This is the 21st Century which no obsolete paradigms, methods, systems and mindsets can help solve modern days problems: modern day problems need modern day solutions, that is why Homo-sapiens are have better brains and are supposed to be the fitter survivals in the Cycle of Life where it is a game of the Survival of the Fittest (another of Herbert Spenser's coined terms).
Want to know how liberal and pragmatic some other people from other parts of the world have shifted their paradigms and changed their mindsets?
Well, feast your eyes and change your mindset:
http://www.asiaone.com/Travel/News/Story/A1Story20080331-57109.html
========================================================
So good that I must replicate here:
=============
No Justice Without Equality
written by Penumpang Halal, February 18, 2009
Granted all of us are unique (no two humans has identical thumb print!) and there are obvious differences in the Gender, that does not make us unequal when rights are concerned.
All persons are equal before the law and whether you want to believe that some laws are "God given" and some "Man made", all laws are humans implemented.
Herbert Spenser, the English sage said, ""Laws whether written or unwritten, formulate the rule of the dead over the living. In addition to that power which past generations exercise over present generations, by transmitting their natures,--bodily and mental,--and in addition to the power they exercise over them by bequeathed habits and modes of life, there is the power they exercise through their regulations for public conduct, handed down orally, or in writing. . . . I emphasize these truths,"--he adds,--"for the purpose of showing that they imply a tacit ancestor-worship."
Alas, what the women is fighting for is actually futile, because the "rights of men" are enshrined above that of women in the holy books.
What is needed is a shift in paradigm and a change in mindset and that include even to the drastic step of not having the religion that one, who had chose not to belong to by one's freewill e.g. "by birth".
Simple solution, in a democracy, people have personal freedom and that includes rights to personal choice and privacy: Just Leave and be Free to or not to associate.
This is the 21st Century which no obsolete paradigms, methods, systems and mindsets can help solve modern days problems: modern day problems need modern day solutions, that is why Homo-sapiens are have better brains and are supposed to be the fitter survivals in the Cycle of Life where it is a game of the Survival of the Fittest (another of Herbert Spenser's coined terms).
Want to know how liberal and pragmatic some other people from other parts of the world have shifted their paradigms and changed their mindsets?
Well, feast your eyes and change your mindset:
http://www.asiaone.com/Travel/News/Story/A1Story20080331-57109.html
========================================================
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Creation or Evolution?
Some kind soul sent me the below article and I responded in reciprocation.
Enjoy!
Question:
============
We are often asked whether we believe the Creation account in the first chapter of Genesis should be understood as a literal six-day creation. Some Christians believe that if a person doesn’t believe that God created everything in six literal days, then they are denying both God and the Bible.
But it is important to remember that some parts of the Bible are intended to be understood literally and some parts are intended to be understood figuratively. In fact, some 40 percent of the Bible consists of poetry and metaphors, and these are intended to be taken figuratively, not literally. And the figurative parts are every bit as true as the literal parts.
For example, God is not a literal hen, rock, tower, or shepherd, even though the Bible describes God in such terms.
We have to remember that the writer of Genesis 1 lived at a time when common oral (and eventually written) traditions included mythic creation epics that presented the stars, the planets, the sun, moon, land, sea and animals as gods. Some of these creation epics began with a pre-existent mound out of which the first god springs, who then in one way or another produces the other gods. Another variation has the sea as the first god. Such epics were the standard approach to explaining the original of the known universe.
Contrast that with the Creation story in Genesis 1. The Genesis account uses the standard style of creation epics of the ancient world. But it makes the radical declaration that the God of Israel, completely unlike all the gods of the nations, did not emerge from anything, nor was he ever part of the universe.
Quite the contrary, Genesis declares that this God created everything out of nothing simply by the power of his word. Each of the things thought of by the nations as being gods is systematically presented in Genesis as having been created by this God, and then being declared “good” by this God, demonstrating his utter power over them.
In other words, Genesis 1 is about the Who of Creation, not the how. Genesis 1 is making a profound theological statement to us about who God is as Creator in contrast to the gods of the nations. We should not try to interpret it as providing us some kind of literal scientific record of how and when God did it.
The biblical revelation tells us that the God who revealed himself to Israel and who has revealed himself to humanity in Jesus Christ is the Creator of all that exists. This means that nothing factual that science can say about the universe needs to be in conflict with the biblical revelation – as long as the scientific interpretation doesn’t conclude that God is not the Creator of all that exists.
Scientists, using whatever evidence is available, seek to better understand the wonders of the amazing universe God has brought into being. Since God is the creator of all that is, whatever science finds to be true about the universe or about life itself, is simply a discovery about some aspect of what God has done.
As Christians, we have no need to be afraid of or skeptical of what science discovers, because all truth is God’s truth, and all true science is God’s science.
==================Answer:
| Hi .... |
What is critical now is the future which can be influenced by what we do or do not do in the present.
Present the Creation Story as part of the whole Gospel of salvation by and through Jesus Christ alone as the solution to an impending problem of Sin through the Fall.
If people, after hearing the Gospel, accept, believe and repent, Praise be unto God, if they reject, that is there God given right and if they choose to believe in "scientific evolution", let them find salvation in the scientific theory, that is their right and also their destiny.
Let us not be like some modern Pharisee who insist that man are not mammals because we are not animals.
Man are mammals because we share the common attributes of scientifically coined criteria, but man can fail to be humans if we behave like animals as seen lately how politics have become in Malaysia.
Regards,
...
=======================
Friday, January 23, 2009
A Wonderful Speech is It?
I received an email from a long time friend and in it contained the former PM of Australia, John Howard's speech to the UN.
My friend claimed it to be wonderful; I beg to differ and would classify it as unhelpful.
The reason is one immigrant cannot ask another immigrant to leave; but to understand why people are as they are and so long as they seek no violence in there struggles, we should live side by side amidst diversity.
My reply to my friend is below the posting:
==========================================
IT'S A WONDERFUL SPEECH………
Hi ,
The views of Patriotic Australian Prime Minister....
THE UNITED NATION Needs A Leader Like This !
Prime Minister John Howard - Australia
Muslims who want to live under Islamic Sharia law were told on Wednesday to get out of Australia , as the government targeted radicals in a bid to head off potential terror attacks.
Separately, Howard angered some Australian Muslims on Wednesday by saying he supported spy agencies monitoring the nation's mosques. Quote: 'IMMIGRANTS, NOT AUSTRALIANS, MUST ADAPT. Take It Or Leave It. I am tired of this nation worrying about whether we are offending some individual or their culture. Since the terrorist attacks on Bali , we have experienced a surge in patriotism by the majority of Australians.'
'This culture has been developed over two centuries of struggles, trials and victories by millions of men and women who have sought freedom'
'We speak mainly ENGLISH, not Spanish, Lebanese, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, or any other language. Therefore, if you wish to become part of our society . Learn the language!'
'Most Australians believe in God. This is not some Christian, right wing, political push, but a fact, because Christian men and women, on Christian principles, founded this nation, and this is clearly documented. It is certainly appropriate to display it on the walls of our schools. If God offends you, then I suggest you consider another part of the world as your new home, because God is part of our culture.'
'We will accept your beliefs, and will not question why. All we ask is that you accept ours, and live in harmony and peaceful enjoyment with us.'
'This is OUR COUNTRY, OUR LAND, and OUR LIFESTYLE, and we will allow you every opportunity to enjoy all this. But once you are done complaining, whining, and griping about Our Flag, Our Pledge, Our Christian beliefs, or Our Way of Life, I highly encourage you take advantage of one other great Australian freedom, 'THE RIGHT TO LEAVE'.'
'If you aren't happy here then LEAVE. We didn't force you to come here. You asked to be here. So accept the country YOU accepted.'
Maybe if we circulate this TO THE WHOLE WORLD- IT MAY GIVE the backbone to start speaking and voicing the same truths FOR THE PEACE & LOVE OF MANKIND
IN THE WHOLE UNIVERSE.
GREAT EXPECTATION MAY GOD BLESS ALL OF US.
Now go to this website to know more"Why Israel's offensive on gaza?"
www.jcpa.org
John Howard
========================================
Dear Bro. (zapped to protect confidentiality),
John Howard's right to free speech must be respected and I support his right, even though I may not entirely agree with what he said, hopefully he verbalizes what he thinks.
The fundamental issue is still Human's basic right to choice.
For people who wants to be under Sharia, let them vote with their hands and legs and for people who vote for Civil Law, let it be so.
But for John Howard, to demand people to get out when he himself like so many others to Australia are immigrants, is a little way above the top.
A viable democracy is one that embraces and the acid test is how the rights of the minorities are protected for the comfort consumption of the minorities alone, without discriminating the majority by even an iota.
Similarly, transport this back to our beloved home country, Malaysia.
What if one day, the majority demands Sharia and Hudud and tell us, the minority that if we don't like it, we can get out of the country?
Yes, any weapon of aggression can backfire, so, let us be more retrospect in everything we think, say and do, undo or don't do.
Shalom,
Alex Kee
My friend claimed it to be wonderful; I beg to differ and would classify it as unhelpful.
The reason is one immigrant cannot ask another immigrant to leave; but to understand why people are as they are and so long as they seek no violence in there struggles, we should live side by side amidst diversity.
My reply to my friend is below the posting:
==========================================
IT'S A WONDERFUL SPEECH………
Hi ,
The views of Patriotic Australian Prime Minister....
THE UNITED NATION Needs A Leader Like This !
Prime Minister John Howard - Australia
Muslims who want to live under Islamic Sharia law were told on Wednesday to get out of Australia , as the government targeted radicals in a bid to head off potential terror attacks.
Separately, Howard angered some Australian Muslims on Wednesday by saying he supported spy agencies monitoring the nation's mosques. Quote: 'IMMIGRANTS, NOT AUSTRALIANS, MUST ADAPT. Take It Or Leave It. I am tired of this nation worrying about whether we are offending some individual or their culture. Since the terrorist attacks on Bali , we have experienced a surge in patriotism by the majority of Australians.'
'This culture has been developed over two centuries of struggles, trials and victories by millions of men and women who have sought freedom'
'We speak mainly ENGLISH, not Spanish, Lebanese, Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Russian, or any other language. Therefore, if you wish to become part of our society . Learn the language!'
'Most Australians believe in God. This is not some Christian, right wing, political push, but a fact, because Christian men and women, on Christian principles, founded this nation, and this is clearly documented. It is certainly appropriate to display it on the walls of our schools. If God offends you, then I suggest you consider another part of the world as your new home, because God is part of our culture.'
'We will accept your beliefs, and will not question why. All we ask is that you accept ours, and live in harmony and peaceful enjoyment with us.'
'This is OUR COUNTRY, OUR LAND, and OUR LIFESTYLE, and we will allow you every opportunity to enjoy all this. But once you are done complaining, whining, and griping about Our Flag, Our Pledge, Our Christian beliefs, or Our Way of Life, I highly encourage you take advantage of one other great Australian freedom, 'THE RIGHT TO LEAVE'.'
'If you aren't happy here then LEAVE. We didn't force you to come here. You asked to be here. So accept the country YOU accepted.'
Maybe if we circulate this TO THE WHOLE WORLD- IT MAY GIVE the backbone to start speaking and voicing the same truths FOR THE PEACE & LOVE OF MANKIND
IN THE WHOLE UNIVERSE.
GREAT EXPECTATION MAY GOD BLESS ALL OF US.
Now go to this website to know more"Why Israel's offensive on gaza?"
www.jcpa.org
John Howard
========================================
Dear Bro. (zapped to protect confidentiality),
John Howard's right to free speech must be respected and I support his right, even though I may not entirely agree with what he said, hopefully he verbalizes what he thinks.
The fundamental issue is still Human's basic right to choice.
For people who wants to be under Sharia, let them vote with their hands and legs and for people who vote for Civil Law, let it be so.
But for John Howard, to demand people to get out when he himself like so many others to Australia are immigrants, is a little way above the top.
A viable democracy is one that embraces and the acid test is how the rights of the minorities are protected for the comfort consumption of the minorities alone, without discriminating the majority by even an iota.
Similarly, transport this back to our beloved home country, Malaysia.
What if one day, the majority demands Sharia and Hudud and tell us, the minority that if we don't like it, we can get out of the country?
Yes, any weapon of aggression can backfire, so, let us be more retrospect in everything we think, say and do, undo or don't do.
Shalom,
Alex Kee
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Sustainability = Living Within the Renewable Cycle
We often use the term "Sustainable & Renewable" without much thought and thinking aloud lately, I wondered what it meant philosophically.
As we are all aware, nothing on Earth is new; everything that existed now had existed in its absolute content quantum, its form may have changed and its content remained conserved just as energy and matter are.
The Law of the Conversation of Matter and Energy states that Energy and Matter cannot be destroyed; they can only be transformed as succinctly expressed by Albert Einstein's E=mc2.
This being the case, we ought not to run out of resources, but the empirical evidence is that we do, and always too.
Take the case of drinking water.
The next time you take a drink, think for a while, it may have been someone's urine and after you have drank it, it may come back as clean recycled fresh water in someone else glass.
How? You may ask.
Well, thanks to the Hydrological Cycle (one of the many major cycles that recycle Earth's resources: the Nitrogen Cycle, the Carbon Cycle etc).
Scientist believe that the quantum of water on Earth has been fixed during the Jurassic Period and there are no new water; just fresh recycled water, compliments from the Sun.
Used water evaporated under the power of the Sun to form clouds that fall as precipitation: rain, snow, hail etc that fills up rivers and get treated to become potable water for us.
Conceptually, we ought not to run out of fossil fuel too, but the reality is because unlike water, the recycling gestation period of oil is not in a matter of weeks, months, years, decades or centuries but eons!
Therefore, when we run out of clean potable water, let us realize that this ought not be the case because the Recycling Cycle is within Renewability; it is our abuse and/or overuse that pushes it beyond its sustainability.
As Gandhi puts it, "The world has enough resources to satisfy our needs; never our greed".
So, use resources wisely and judiciously, always within its renewability cycle so as to remain sustainable, for our sake, our children' sake and our children' children' sake.
As we are all aware, nothing on Earth is new; everything that existed now had existed in its absolute content quantum, its form may have changed and its content remained conserved just as energy and matter are.
The Law of the Conversation of Matter and Energy states that Energy and Matter cannot be destroyed; they can only be transformed as succinctly expressed by Albert Einstein's E=mc2.
This being the case, we ought not to run out of resources, but the empirical evidence is that we do, and always too.
Take the case of drinking water.
The next time you take a drink, think for a while, it may have been someone's urine and after you have drank it, it may come back as clean recycled fresh water in someone else glass.
How? You may ask.
Well, thanks to the Hydrological Cycle (one of the many major cycles that recycle Earth's resources: the Nitrogen Cycle, the Carbon Cycle etc).
Scientist believe that the quantum of water on Earth has been fixed during the Jurassic Period and there are no new water; just fresh recycled water, compliments from the Sun.
Used water evaporated under the power of the Sun to form clouds that fall as precipitation: rain, snow, hail etc that fills up rivers and get treated to become potable water for us.
Conceptually, we ought not to run out of fossil fuel too, but the reality is because unlike water, the recycling gestation period of oil is not in a matter of weeks, months, years, decades or centuries but eons!
Therefore, when we run out of clean potable water, let us realize that this ought not be the case because the Recycling Cycle is within Renewability; it is our abuse and/or overuse that pushes it beyond its sustainability.
As Gandhi puts it, "The world has enough resources to satisfy our needs; never our greed".
So, use resources wisely and judiciously, always within its renewability cycle so as to remain sustainable, for our sake, our children' sake and our children' children' sake.
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Why do you think companies which encompass responsible manufacturing and end of life disposal issues, are able to sell their services at a higher price?
Corporate and social responsibilities are capitalistic concerns as well.
So do not blame capitalists for doing whatever you deem is harmful to environment.
Are consumers going to pay for it, the market is the final arbiter of it. Capitalists can only follow what the market needs. Contrary to what you may think, they do not dictate what the market needs.