Super Tuesday What’s so special about this Tuesday? I mean that in the most holistic sense, knowing full well that we all recognize that Super Tuesday is the big early primary sweepstakes of the presidential primary season. There are fifteen states in play in both the Republican and Democratic Party races (for the Republicans: AK, AL, AR, CA, CO, MA, ME, MN, NC, OK, TN, TX, UT, VA, and VT, and for the Democrats: AL,…
Paying the Piper WRITTEN BEFORE OUR SE ASIA TRIP Donald Trump is on the campaign trail and is pushing hard to win in South Carolina (Which we now know he did win). On Saturday a week ago, he said he would encourage Russia to attack NATO countries that don’t pay their fair share of the NATO budget. Trump, free-forming his stump speech to the emotions of the crowd (as usual), invoked a scenario in which…
Repricing the Universe FIRST TRIP FILLER STORY IN CASE I DON’T KEEP UP About 20 years ago a guy came on the scene in New York City, and he became a bit of a phenomenon. His name was Jimmy McMillan and he coined the expression the “The Rent is Too Damn High!”. He formed a political party with the same name and ran for the Mayor of New York City in 2005 and 2009 and…
Reaping the Whirlwind Today we are heading towards Siem Reap, Cambodia, the city where Angkor Wat is located in the place where over 1 million people once lived 1,000 years ago. When moving from Vietnam to Cambodia, it’s hard not to think back to the history of these lands back when I was moving from school to Wall Street in the 70s. When I think of Cambodia, I think of three things, I think of…
Good & Plenty Today was a big day for me on this trip. We had booked a full day tour out to the far western region of Thailand, some 3-4 hours drive from our hotel in Bangkok. That is only 115 miles, and the roads were decent, but Bangkok traffic is always an issue. We had a young lady named Angela (her Anglicized name for our convenience) who was our tour guide today. Her partner…
2% Off Chimps On a grand tour of SE Asia like we are currently on, there is always more down time than one expects. Sometimes it has to do with sleeplessness due to lingering jet lag, and sometimes its just the group dynamics of letting everyone have their space to carry on with their daily needs. In addition, travel delays in places that are unfamiliar are also to be expected. Yesterday we arrived in Bangkok…
Bangkok Bound Tomorrow we fly from Kuala Lumpur to Bangkok. That means we are going from a Muslim state to a Buddhist state (Thailand is 94% Buddhist). Our stay at the Mandarin Oriental here has been very pleasant. The facilities are very nice and the service is excellent. These people know who they serve and as I look up at the ceiling of our room I see another sign of that. There is a small…
So, So Tired I am not so-so tired, I am so, so very tired. Just as I finished my deposition yesterday and wrapped up a three month expert witness blitz that had me putting in over 180 hours, a reasonably brisk pace for a semi-retired guy, I have not been able to just take a deep breath and relax in anticipation of my upcoming travels to Asia. What has stolen away my well-deserved “School’s Out…
Super Duper We just watched Super Bowl LVIII. That means the first Super Bowl was in 1967 and it was between the Green Bay Packers and the Kansas City Chiefs. It was a rout in favor of the powerful Packers of the NFL, whereas the Chiefs were from the expansion team AFL. It’s all about the NFL these days and there are five teams (Patriots, Steelers, Cowboys, Broncos, and 49ers) with more than the six…
Tax-Us or Texas The World Economic Forum at Davos started fifty-three years ago but has really gained momentum and notoriety among globalists in the last decade. I have never attended (when I was in my corporate prime and realistically a candidate, Davos was not yet a must-do) and now I doubt I ever will go (now that I am a mere bystander and observer of the world and decidedly not a mover and shaker), but…