2008 was a rough year, and all indications are that the first two quarters at the very least will be tough too. There is stimulus package being bandied about that should help consumer spending but until the housing prices see their bottom and begin to rebound a little, I am skeptical about a quick turnaround. It is likely to be a slow U shaped recovery than a V. But looking back on 2008, here are my top 10 events in no order of importance.
One- The 700bn bailout: Undoubtedly, that encapsulated the extent of the crisis that everyone knew was around but was shy to admit. It brought economics back on the national agenda from the War, it brought Statesmen together like nothing else ever did (with 20 of them flying to DC at a moments notice!), it signified the end of an era on Wall Street, and it galvanized public opinion around good regulation that is badly needed to keep greed in check. Hopefully, the lessons learnt will not be forgotten soon.
Two- Falling oil prices: Not everything has been bad news for the Consumer. Oil prices have fallen sharply and gas at the pump is cheap- cheaper than I have ever known it to be. The only potential downside to this is that the need for fuel efficiency might again take a backseat given people are not feeling the pinch at the gas station and that could be disastrous in the long run.
Three- The Big 3 in DC: Talking about bailouts and oil prices, we have got to talk about GM, Chrysler and Ford, the CEOs of whom travelled in their own Private jets to DC to ask for money saying they were bankrupt! The hearing in Washington, granted a lot of it was grandstanding, brought it very clear to mind that the problems of the auto makers in Detroit had started a long time back and were inextricably linked with poor quality manufacturing and ineffient labor rates determined by the Unions. While it was sad spectacle for American manufacturing, it also brought to the fore the fundamental tenets of good manufacturing where the Americans still lag behind the Japanese.
Four- The Obama election: While it was all doom and gloom with the economy, the promise of change from a humble man with a good head on his shoulders brought people together, and people from all walks of life got together to vote for Obama. It signified a change and hope that things will undoubtedly get better in DC.
Five: The Mumbai attacks: Just as everyone thought terrorism was on the backburner, it sprung back with some vengeance. It has led to a diplomatic stand-off between India and Pakistan, and given that both nations are powered with nuclear weopons, the threat of instability in South Asia must not be underestimated.
Six- OJ imprisonment: Just as people were losing faith in the system, the judiciary stepped up to do what it should have done more than a decade back- sent OJ to jail! Finally, justice was being served the right way.
Seven: Sarah Palin effect: Nothing was a bigger surprise than McCain's choice of a running mate, little known governor from Alaska, Sarah Palin. Her glasses became an instant hit, her lack of comprehension of bigger issues of the day made for fantastic viewing on Saturday Night live and it made Tina Fey a much bigger celebrity than she ever imagined. Palin added color to the campaign and even after it ended, made it quite clear to everyone that her political ambitions have not ended. I like her, as long as she is not making the biggest decisions for the world!
Eight- The Britney comeback: She has had a rough time- a teenage celebrity, a broken marriage, two kids and she is barely 25- lets give her a break! She fought back and I hope her head shaving and hitting the car are all things of the past. I only hope the papparazzi get off her back now. She is on the mend and lets have it that way.
Nine- The Beijing Olympics: What a show that was- and it cemented China's entry on the world stage for good. The Opening ceremony was breathtaking, all events ran on schedule and given Phelp's phenomenal achievement, ensured that the Olympics had the highest television ratings ever!
Ten- India and South African wins over Australia in cricket: The end of Australian dominance in cricket is something that cricket lovers around the world have looked forward to for at least a couple of years now. The convincing manner in which the team was beaten first by India and then South Africa meant that a new world order was emerging in cricket and Australia could not take its No. 1 spot for granted anymore. Great joy for any cricket lover!
So there it is, my top 10! Look forward to 2009.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Obama and the burden of expectations
We are living in tough times- the mortgage crisis seems to have spiraled out of control, the economy is in shambles and terrorists are again striking in different parts of the world. It is natural in these times to hang to any reasons for hope for the future and the incoming President has provided that hope to the Americans in particular and the world at large. An articulate intelligent man with humble beginnings but a track record of achievement and a self deprecating style have endeared him to a lot.
But lets get realistic and lets not expect too much of the man who is taking over from the worst Presidency ever. Reading the Time magazine write up on Obama made me concerned- "Obama's genome is global, his mind is innovative, his world is networked, and his spirit is democratic"- wow- that is some compliment to live upto and symptomatic of the media hyperbole that creates unrealistic expectations. We can be hopeful but not THAT hopeful. He himself points out it will take him at least two years to make a tangible impact and given the media's short attention span, two years can be a long time. Heck- two years back, Obama had a distant shot at getting the democratic nomination let alone be President.
There is reason to hope with Obama. The man has a philosophy of leadership that I find liberating. He says- "I've got a pretty good nose for talent, so I hire really good people. And I've got a pretty healthy ego, so I'm not scared of hiring the smartest people, even when they're smarter than me. And I have low tolerance of nonsense and turf battles and game playing, and I send that message very clearly. And so, over time, people start trusting each other and they stay focused on the mission, as opposed to personal ambition or grievance. If you've got really smart people who are all focused on the same mission, then usually ou can get some things done."
Bingo. Simple and clear.
While there is reason to hope and be optimistic, I just want to caution that there is no magic wand to erase years of bad or no regulation, years of greed on Wall Street and years of callous spending habits that the average American has gotten very used to. Obama will do his best and his best will come to naught if everyone is just waiting for him to wave his wand!!
Heres to a hopeful 2009 and beyond!
But lets get realistic and lets not expect too much of the man who is taking over from the worst Presidency ever. Reading the Time magazine write up on Obama made me concerned- "Obama's genome is global, his mind is innovative, his world is networked, and his spirit is democratic"- wow- that is some compliment to live upto and symptomatic of the media hyperbole that creates unrealistic expectations. We can be hopeful but not THAT hopeful. He himself points out it will take him at least two years to make a tangible impact and given the media's short attention span, two years can be a long time. Heck- two years back, Obama had a distant shot at getting the democratic nomination let alone be President.
There is reason to hope with Obama. The man has a philosophy of leadership that I find liberating. He says- "I've got a pretty good nose for talent, so I hire really good people. And I've got a pretty healthy ego, so I'm not scared of hiring the smartest people, even when they're smarter than me. And I have low tolerance of nonsense and turf battles and game playing, and I send that message very clearly. And so, over time, people start trusting each other and they stay focused on the mission, as opposed to personal ambition or grievance. If you've got really smart people who are all focused on the same mission, then usually ou can get some things done."
Bingo. Simple and clear.
While there is reason to hope and be optimistic, I just want to caution that there is no magic wand to erase years of bad or no regulation, years of greed on Wall Street and years of callous spending habits that the average American has gotten very used to. Obama will do his best and his best will come to naught if everyone is just waiting for him to wave his wand!!
Heres to a hopeful 2009 and beyond!
The end of an era...
For followers of cricket around the world, this week has been momentous. South Africa beat Australia comprehensively 2-0 to hand the Aussies their first home series defeat since 1992. Never in the last decade have the Australians looked so vulnerable and so out of sorts as they did in Melbourne last week. Never has a side seem so determined as South Africa to take the top spot in the world from a team that has dominated cricket for over a decade, and may I need, never have cricket fans around the world met this Australian demise with as much glee as they have done, including myself.
There are several reasons for this end of an era to hailed. One- it evens out test cricket around the world. It is no fun watching one team dominate every other team forever. Second- there is a certain arrogance about this Australian side that has rubbed all cricket fans around the world the wrong way and so, there is widespread celebration that they have been given the humble pie they truly deserve. Third- India and South Africa have edged ever so close to the Aussies in the last couple of years only to be edged out by some poor umpiring and questionable tactics. So, this victory seems divine justice in more ways than one.
Make no mistake. I have liked what the Australians have brought to the world stage in the last decade. First- very aggressive batting in tests with scoring rates consistently topping three and a half an over, sometimes over four make for compelling viewing. Second- very disciplined fielding both close in and in the outfield. Third- a brand of bowling led by the likes of McGrath and Warne that combined accuracy with subtle variations that left batsmen flummoxed around the world. And last but not the least, some very god captaincy from the likes of Taylor and then Steve Waugh.
When Hashim Amla scored the winning runs in Melbourne, I am sure South Africa celebrated but so did the rest of the cricketing world as those couple of runs signified a shift of balance that everyone has been desperate to see but has not been able to. I am glad the time has come...Graeme Smith and the Proteas- take a bow for beating the world champions so convincingly!
There are several reasons for this end of an era to hailed. One- it evens out test cricket around the world. It is no fun watching one team dominate every other team forever. Second- there is a certain arrogance about this Australian side that has rubbed all cricket fans around the world the wrong way and so, there is widespread celebration that they have been given the humble pie they truly deserve. Third- India and South Africa have edged ever so close to the Aussies in the last couple of years only to be edged out by some poor umpiring and questionable tactics. So, this victory seems divine justice in more ways than one.
Make no mistake. I have liked what the Australians have brought to the world stage in the last decade. First- very aggressive batting in tests with scoring rates consistently topping three and a half an over, sometimes over four make for compelling viewing. Second- very disciplined fielding both close in and in the outfield. Third- a brand of bowling led by the likes of McGrath and Warne that combined accuracy with subtle variations that left batsmen flummoxed around the world. And last but not the least, some very god captaincy from the likes of Taylor and then Steve Waugh.
When Hashim Amla scored the winning runs in Melbourne, I am sure South Africa celebrated but so did the rest of the cricketing world as those couple of runs signified a shift of balance that everyone has been desperate to see but has not been able to. I am glad the time has come...Graeme Smith and the Proteas- take a bow for beating the world champions so convincingly!
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Reboot America- From Friedman's latest column in NYT
I love Thomas Friedman's writing style. he is insightful, incisive and very direct.
I am reproducing here a piece from his latest column as it correctly portrays America's plight at the moment. Read on...
It actually started well, on Kau Sai Chau, an island off Hong Kong, where I stood on a rocky hilltop overlooking the South China Sea and talked to my wife back in Maryland, static-free, using a friend’s Chinese cellphone. A few hours later, I took off from Hong Kong’s ultramodern airport after riding out there from downtown on a sleek high-speed train — with wireless connectivity that was so good I was able to surf the Web the whole way on my laptop.
Landing at Kennedy Airport from Hong Kong was, as I’ve argued before, like going from the Jetsons to the Flintstones. The ugly, low-ceilinged arrival hall was cramped, and using a luggage cart cost $3. (Couldn’t we at least supply foreign visitors with a free luggage cart, like other major airports in the world?) As I looked around at this dingy room, it reminded of somewhere I had been before. Then I remembered: It was the luggage hall in the old Hong Kong Kai Tak Airport. It closed in 1998.
The next day I went to Penn Station, where the escalators down to the tracks are so narrow that they seem to have been designed before suitcases were invented. The disgusting track-side platforms apparently have not been cleaned since World War II. I took the Acela, America’s sorry excuse for a bullet train, from New York to Washington. Along the way, I tried to use my cellphone to conduct an interview and my conversation was interrupted by three dropped calls within one 15-minute span.
All I could think to myself was: If we’re so smart, why are other people living so much better than us? What has become of our infrastructure, which is so crucial to productivity? Back home, I was greeted by the news that General Motors was being bailed out — that’s the G.M. that Fortune magazine just noted “lost more than $72 billion in the past four years, and yet you can count on one hand the number of executives who have been reassigned or lost their job.”
My fellow Americans, we can’t continue in this mode of “Dumb as we wanna be.” We’ve indulged ourselves for too long with tax cuts that we can’t afford, bailouts of auto companies that have become giant wealth-destruction machines, energy prices that do not encourage investment in 21st-century renewable power systems or efficient cars, public schools with no national standards to prevent illiterates from graduating and immigration policies that have our colleges educating the world’s best scientists and engineers and then, when these foreigners graduate, instead of stapling green cards to their diplomas, we order them to go home and start companies to compete against ours.
To top it off, we’ve fallen into a trend of diverting and rewarding the best of our collective I.Q. to people doing financial engineering rather than real engineering. These rocket scientists and engineers were designing complex financial instruments to make money out of money — rather than designing cars, phones, computers, teaching tools, Internet programs and medical equipment that could improve the lives and productivity of millions.
For all these reasons, our present crisis is not just a financial meltdown crying out for a cash injection. We are in much deeper trouble. In fact, we as a country have become General Motors — as a result of our national drift. Look in the mirror: G.M. is us.
That’s why we don’t just need a bailout. We need a reboot. We need a build out. We need a buildup. We need a national makeover. That is why the next few months are among the most important in U.S. history. Because of the financial crisis, Barack Obama has the bipartisan support to spend $1 trillion in stimulus. But we must make certain that every bailout dollar, which we’re borrowing from our kids’ future, is spent wisely.
It has to go into training teachers, educating scientists and engineers, paying for research and building the most productivity-enhancing infrastructure — without building white elephants. Generally, I’d like to see fewer government dollars shoveled out and more creative tax incentives to stimulate the private sector to catalyze new industries and new markets. If we allow this money to be spent on pork, it will be the end of us.
America still has the right stuff to thrive. We still have the most creative, diverse, innovative culture and open society — in a world where the ability to imagine and generate new ideas with speed and to implement them through global collaboration is the most important competitive advantage. China may have great airports, but last week it went back to censoring The New York Times and other Western news sites. Censorship restricts your people’s imaginations. That’s really, really dumb. And that’s why for all our missteps, the 21st century is still up for grabs.
John Kennedy led us on a journey to discover the moon. Obama needs to lead us on a journey to rediscover, rebuild and reinvent our own backyard.
I am reproducing here a piece from his latest column as it correctly portrays America's plight at the moment. Read on...
It actually started well, on Kau Sai Chau, an island off Hong Kong, where I stood on a rocky hilltop overlooking the South China Sea and talked to my wife back in Maryland, static-free, using a friend’s Chinese cellphone. A few hours later, I took off from Hong Kong’s ultramodern airport after riding out there from downtown on a sleek high-speed train — with wireless connectivity that was so good I was able to surf the Web the whole way on my laptop.
Landing at Kennedy Airport from Hong Kong was, as I’ve argued before, like going from the Jetsons to the Flintstones. The ugly, low-ceilinged arrival hall was cramped, and using a luggage cart cost $3. (Couldn’t we at least supply foreign visitors with a free luggage cart, like other major airports in the world?) As I looked around at this dingy room, it reminded of somewhere I had been before. Then I remembered: It was the luggage hall in the old Hong Kong Kai Tak Airport. It closed in 1998.
The next day I went to Penn Station, where the escalators down to the tracks are so narrow that they seem to have been designed before suitcases were invented. The disgusting track-side platforms apparently have not been cleaned since World War II. I took the Acela, America’s sorry excuse for a bullet train, from New York to Washington. Along the way, I tried to use my cellphone to conduct an interview and my conversation was interrupted by three dropped calls within one 15-minute span.
All I could think to myself was: If we’re so smart, why are other people living so much better than us? What has become of our infrastructure, which is so crucial to productivity? Back home, I was greeted by the news that General Motors was being bailed out — that’s the G.M. that Fortune magazine just noted “lost more than $72 billion in the past four years, and yet you can count on one hand the number of executives who have been reassigned or lost their job.”
My fellow Americans, we can’t continue in this mode of “Dumb as we wanna be.” We’ve indulged ourselves for too long with tax cuts that we can’t afford, bailouts of auto companies that have become giant wealth-destruction machines, energy prices that do not encourage investment in 21st-century renewable power systems or efficient cars, public schools with no national standards to prevent illiterates from graduating and immigration policies that have our colleges educating the world’s best scientists and engineers and then, when these foreigners graduate, instead of stapling green cards to their diplomas, we order them to go home and start companies to compete against ours.
To top it off, we’ve fallen into a trend of diverting and rewarding the best of our collective I.Q. to people doing financial engineering rather than real engineering. These rocket scientists and engineers were designing complex financial instruments to make money out of money — rather than designing cars, phones, computers, teaching tools, Internet programs and medical equipment that could improve the lives and productivity of millions.
For all these reasons, our present crisis is not just a financial meltdown crying out for a cash injection. We are in much deeper trouble. In fact, we as a country have become General Motors — as a result of our national drift. Look in the mirror: G.M. is us.
That’s why we don’t just need a bailout. We need a reboot. We need a build out. We need a buildup. We need a national makeover. That is why the next few months are among the most important in U.S. history. Because of the financial crisis, Barack Obama has the bipartisan support to spend $1 trillion in stimulus. But we must make certain that every bailout dollar, which we’re borrowing from our kids’ future, is spent wisely.
It has to go into training teachers, educating scientists and engineers, paying for research and building the most productivity-enhancing infrastructure — without building white elephants. Generally, I’d like to see fewer government dollars shoveled out and more creative tax incentives to stimulate the private sector to catalyze new industries and new markets. If we allow this money to be spent on pork, it will be the end of us.
America still has the right stuff to thrive. We still have the most creative, diverse, innovative culture and open society — in a world where the ability to imagine and generate new ideas with speed and to implement them through global collaboration is the most important competitive advantage. China may have great airports, but last week it went back to censoring The New York Times and other Western news sites. Censorship restricts your people’s imaginations. That’s really, really dumb. And that’s why for all our missteps, the 21st century is still up for grabs.
John Kennedy led us on a journey to discover the moon. Obama needs to lead us on a journey to rediscover, rebuild and reinvent our own backyard.
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