Scott Tyler's Blog

...is laissez faire.  I believe in freedom of speech.  Complete freedom.  So say whatever you want- be it racist, sexist, homophobic, sacreligious, whatever.  You're just showing what a doofus you are, when you do.  But I won't censor it.

(Unless it's spam.  I hate spam.)

Racism is a choice, folks.  If you want to be a racist, that's your choice.  But you have to live with yourself.  All that bitterness and hate is unhealthy, and it won't make you happy.  Have you ever seen a happy skinhead?  A happy Muslim extremist?  I doubt it.   Don't be a hater.   Haters, really, just hate themselves.

So why not censor it, you ask?  Why allow ignorant and hateful comments?  Because when you suppress such speech, and drive it underground, it only fuels the paranoia and self-pity of the commenters.  They say, "See?  Nobody will let me say the 'truth'!"   Also, sometimes, the people who are politically incorrect in their views have a point, and aren't just raving redneck lunatics.  Sometimes.  But not often.

That's why I have a "no-censorship" policy on this blog.  So (sigh) do your worst.

Last month, I returned two sets of keys: one for a church I helped to lead, and another for a business I part-owned.  Both failed.  The business failed financially, and had to close down.  The church, while still open, has failed spiritually, and is dying a slower death.  I feel disappointed by both failures.  I knew the business would fail, after just the first few months, as we were under-capitalized and my partners were mismanaging it.  I myself share some of the blame, as I neglected the business and left it entirely in their hands, once I saw that it was unprofitable-- basically a money pit.

But the church is a bigger disappointment.  I invested a lot of time and energy (and, yes, money) in the church.  I "delivered the message" there, about 12 times.  I lead a weekly Bible study for over a year, I attended weekly leadership meetings, helped set up charity projects, and so on.  More than that, I felt like part of a community of believers-- friends-- who were working together to build our church.

Then we decided to pay our pastor, who had been unpaid up until that point.  Somebody said, "If  we are going to pay the pastor we should do it right, and make a contract."  I said, "Fine", and wrote a business-like contract, which made the pastor responsible to the church elders.  He refused to sign it.  And that's when we began to see how our pastor truly felt about our church.  That it wasn't 'our' church at all... it was 'his'.   At every meeting, his ego grew.  Or perhaps just became more apparent.   As his pride and stubbornness grew, so did divisions within the church, and one-by-one members left.  A few of the church leaders remain, and they have decided to make one last effort to reason with the pastor.   But I'm not hopeful.

Did I invest three years in that church for nothing?  Should I have fought harder to save it?  The pastor seemed to believe that I was trying to lead a mutiny, to take over leadership of 'his' church.   That was never my intention.   In fact, I left to avoid such a power struggle.  But as I remove these keys from my key ring, I wonder: what did I do wrong?

I am fortunate to have a job that gives me 14 weeks of vacation/year.  I get 6 weeks of vacation in the winter, 6 weeks in the summer, 1 week in the spring and 1 week in the fall.   My job also pays well enough that I can save for trips at those times.  So, over the next 2.5 years, these are my travel plans (subject to change without notice).

My goal over the next 2.5 years is to visit most countries in eastern and southern Asia, plus Australia (I have already visited China, North and South Korea, Malaysia and Singapore).  I am also planning to visit Egypt and Greece next year.

Not that I don't want to.  Don't take it personally.  But in case you haven't heard, Facebook is BLOCKED in China.  Yes, I still get email notifications when someone wants to 'friend' me, or writes on my wall, or throws a 'grenade' at me.  But I can't do anything about it.  

Actually, since Facebook has been blocked, my productivity has increased about 50%.  So, maybe it's not such a bad thing.

American economists often complain that the Chinese government is keeping the yuan artificially low.  Right now, the Chinese are keeping their currency pegged to the U.S. dollar (it floats freely against other currencies) at what some feel is a too-low exchange rate.  But those economists should be careful what they wish for.  The U.S. currency has lost ground against other currencies, of late, and a rising Chinese yuan would mean a descending U.S. dollar.  I believe that the reason the U.S. currency hasn't descended even further than it has is because it has been pegged to the yuan, demand for which has increased in the last decade, as China's economy has been booming.   If the yuan floated freely, the 'greenback' wouldn't be worth the paper it's printed on.

My prediction, with a freely floating yuan, after 6 months:

1 U.S. dollar = 5.5 Chinese yuan (or less) (6.8 yuan today)

1 US$ = .90 Canadian dollars (meaning the Canadian dollar is worth US$1.10)

1 US$ = 1 Australian dollar

1 Euro or UK pound = 2 US$ (or more)

(etc.)

On the other hand, historically speaking, every new currency (or newly floating currency) has always LOST value within the first year of its introduction/free exchange.  So the Chinese yuan might actually decline in value after an initial bump, if it is allowed to float freely.