I know I haven't been updating so read this. It's good.

(Click for larger image!).
Courtesy of Reason.com

Pretty interesting draw-up. This gives us quite an insight into the issue of immigration in this year's race. Enjoy!

It's a Saturday but I'm looking forward to next week already!

Television
Monday (22nd)- Heroes Season 3 Premiere!
Thursday (25th)- Grey's Anatomy Season 5 Premiere!
Sunday (28th)- Desperate Housewives Season 5 Premiere!

Politics
Tuesday (23rd)- Start of General debate- UNGA 63rd Session!
Friday (26th)- First 2008 Presidential Debate! (Alarm clock for GOP fanatics)

Birthdays
Monday (22nd)- Yu Changda's Birthday!
Tuesday (23rd)- Shervin Lim's Birthday!
Friday (26th)- Esther Kok's Birthday!
Saturday (27th)- Nigel Keith's Birthday!
Sunday (28th)- Hillary Duff's Birthday!

Stuff
Tuesday (23rd)- Shervin/Changda's Birthday Thing!
Tuesday (23rd)- Hillary's New Album!

and...

Monday (22nd)- Mugging! (23 days to Os!)
Tuesday (23rd)- Mugging! (22 days to Os!)
Wednesday (24th)- Mugging! (21 days to Os!)
Thursday (25th)- Mugging! (20 days to Os!)
Friday (26th)- Mugging! (19 days to Os!)
Saturday (27th)- Mugging! (18 days to Os!)
Sunday (28th)- Mugging! (17 days to Os!)

With all the big hoo-hah on short selling now I thought I'd give a little digestible entry on why its such a big deal on Wall Street and what's actually going on. (Read the unfun New York Times entry here or read what's below! Smile!)

In a time when stocks plummet and business sucks, it is only ordinary that individuals find some way to make some cash out of the situation. And here comes the scenario of short selling. Media has told us that in short selling, investors want stock prices to go down, and not up- which is diametrically opposed to traditional investment (when investors want share prices to go up). So how does this really work? And why is the New York Attorney-General trying to ban it?

Let's start with the profiteering stock buyers.

Short sellers will first attempt to borrow stocks from Brokers (someone who buys and sell stuff for couch investors). They are now in a "stock debt" and owe the brokers the stocks they borrowed.

Let's say that now the total cost of the stocks borrowed are valued at $1000 in the open market. The short seller then sells the stock to any investor bidding in the crazy place where everyone is shouting.

The short-seller now has $1000 and an existing stock debt. He cannot clear his debt with the thousand dollars because his work would have come to naught.


For some reason the stock price drastically drops! (Earthquake/SARS/terrorist attacks/whatever)


The short seller now quickly buys up these cheap stocks and then returning them to the Broker he borrowed them from. He now makes a profit!

Note to all: I have never studied Economics in my life (although I hope to next year) and have almost zero foundational knowledge in this subject. In any case should you wish to correct anything you view wrong in the above entry, please feel free to do so in the comments section.

In my opinion this is a rather nifty way of earning some bucks and takes some real risk, adrenaline and brains to actually execute it. But the current legal dispute about it now is that short sellers, in order to ensure maximum profit, are spreading rumors about the market in order to ensure stock prices fall. This is creating an extremely distrustful, investor unconfident market sending Wall Street into further turmoil.

What do you think?

Following the disastrous reports of the Wall Street nightmare on CNN came the glamorous shots of Obama and McCain campaigning through the cities. The first words that came out of my mother's mouth was "Shouldn't they be helping out in this crisis and work together instead of the continuous debating and fighting?"

I immediately dismissed that as shallow thought, only seven weeks exist before "America Votes 2008" and Obama would need all the campaigning and debating he can get to gain and edge over the Palin-McCain combo. (Or, if you're Republican, for Palin to convince America that McCain's their man) But then I reconsidered, amidst the turmoil that Wall Street is facing, with touting of a second Great Depression, is it still legitimate for campaigning to be carried out in such a festive matter?

Of course we could argue that it is only through the debates etc. can we gain more insight into these densely economic issues and search for viable solutions. At the other end, regular television watchers can only jump into the conclusion that leaders are merely fighting and not coming to a conclusion. This Wall Street shakeup has its tremors felt all over the world, Singapore no less.

I think this is such a powerful message; and should be the story for all Malaysians, Singaporeans and humans.


On a side note, today is the day Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim is suppose to enlist enough MPs to topple the ruling coalition of Malaysia. He has previously repeatedly emphasized a stance on multiracial rule in Malaysia (a controversial, sensitive issue to all Malaysians), which I believe brush aside the hidden agendas, is a correct decision. Because race shouldn't even be a word.

So on such a momentous date, let's hope that people around the world continue to break prejudices against other people, no matter how difficult. Because we're all human.

I'm quite tickled by how Starhub/MDA/SINGAPORE censored the Madonna/Britney/Christina kiss at the VMA Awards. At first I thought it was just some hype cum effect they were trying to create but I realized the Michael Jackson one was not censored. OH WELL POOR GLBT SINGAPOREANS! Even the famous kiss is not allowed for your innocent eyes!