Blog Entries tagged 'china'
Madame Chiang Kai Shek and Eleanor Roosevelt
The Times says the book is awful, but isn't the photo sublime. The turn of the ankle, the rich blue velvet and inscrutable face. The way the eye is drawn to Madame Chiang Kai, how she gives nothing but takes everything. Then Eleanor's distinct blend of American naivete, grit, and optimism.
Addendum: From the review in today's NYT:
Christopher Isherwood, traveling in China with W. H. Auden, met Madame Chiang in the late 1930s. He caught her aura exactly: “She could be terrible, she could be gracious, she could be businesslike, she could be ruthless. . . . Strangely enough, I have never heard anybody comment on her perfume. It is the most delicious either of us has ever smelt.”
Dr. Realist interview, from Newsweek
Excerpt from a nice, concise interview in Newsweek on the economy with the man who predicted the current state of affairs, Nouriel Roubinin:
What is going to fuel the next growth cycle?
That
is a difficult question. The periods of high growth in the United
States in the last 25 years have been characterized by an asset and
credit bubble. Whatever the future growth is going to be, this time
around it needs to be sustainable and not bubble-prone because we are
running out of bubbles to create. We had the real-estate [bubble], tech
bubble, housing bubble, hedge-fund bubble, private-equity bubble,
commodities bubble, even the art bubble—and they are all bursting.
What makes you different from the other economists?
We
think usually that crowds—on average—can be wiser than individuals. In
this case, most people got it wrong because whenever we are in an
irrational, exuberant bubble, people fail to think correctly.
As we reach newer lows, we may be closer to a level of the market that is fundamentally right. A year ago we were not as close to a true bottom. Today we are closer to it. As we become closer to the bottom of the economy, the stock market looks ahead and sees the light at the end of the tunnel and rallies. In spite of these caveats, I would argue that even the latest market rally is a bear-market rally.
Do you worry about China getting tired of holding our bonds?
In
the short run, China has no option but to accumulate more reserves and
dollar reserves. Why? Because if they stop doing that, their currency
would appreciate sharply while their exports are plunging. So in the
short run, they are going to keep on accumulating. But I have seen a
huge number of new initiatives in the last month that suggest [the
Chinese] are pushing for the yuan to become an international currency
and a reserve currency. They are doing bilateral deals with countries
like Argentina and half a dozen others in yuan, not in dollars.
They are moving away from the dollar?
Yes,
slowly they will. First they have to establish their own currency as an
international currency. That will take years, but already in a month
they have done more than in the last 10 years.
From Newsweek: The Global Elite
Interesting piece in Newsweek on the history of power and the new global elite.
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