Sunday, October 30, 2011

Walter Isaacson

Mr. Isaacson originally refused to write Steve Job's biography.  Eventually he accepted.  However, he probably never thought that this was going to be, by far, his biggest bestseller.  Previously he had published biographies of Einstein, Kissinger and Benjamin Franklin but none of them ever came close to matching Steve Jobs who is a worldwide phenomenon. For many years, Alfred P. Sloan and Thomas J. Watson Jr. have been my models in business.  I always hesitated to learn about Jobs because he was a GENIUS.  If we are not one, what can we learn from him?   Well...  I'm already immersed in Steve's biography.

Occupy Wall Street

This seems to be one of the most absurd movements in the history of movements.  What are they trying to achieve?  Things are going to get worse before they... well, before they get even worse.  For many years, the Earth has been subsidizing us and thus the middle classes all over the world have lived quite well.  Actually, we have lived exceedingly well.  But the capacity of the planet to continue subsidizing us is reaching its limits.  Consequently we will never again see the "standard of living" we have been accustomed to.  The unemployment is going to increase even more, to levels we don't think possible.  Thus, we should feel grateful of the relative abundance in which we have lived so far, but 2007 will never come back.  Never.  Consequently we all have to adapt to a life of diminished expectations.  Sure, the "one percent" will always be wealthy, but the rest of us should find happiness in other things and not anymore in wealth or the promise of future wealth.

From Bad to Worse

The world, more than the Lybians have been celebrating the death of Gadaffi and the new era of "freedom" that Lybia will now experience.  Well, not so fast.  It seems that the "rebels" are worse than the regime they have brought down (with a little help from Europe and the USA).  "Freedom" is now equivalent to cruelty, death and even more poverty in Lybia.  Is there hope in the future?  Very little.  I bet you that in less than a year people will long for the stability, control and order of the Gadaffi era.  Let's see.

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