I'm a night-owl. OT:On China, to answer jeeptrader's questions, I studied Mandarin Chinese (a lot harder than Spanish!).
China seems 99% capitalist and highly materialistic. It's moving fast with little sentiment for its own cultural past or for anything other than making money, though Chinese people get emotional about national issues rapidly. There's little opposition to the government because "you don't quarrel with success" so the Communist Party now still has "the mandate of Heaven". Fairness and property rights take a back seat to the interests of big developers. Insiders and the well-connected seem to rule. You may think you own your home or farm, only to find it bulldozed one morning by a developer coming in. (Justice Kennedy and the Supreme Court just legalized basically the same practice in the USA.)
For investments, it seems that you can't assume that any property or "rights" in China cannot later be trumped by someone with better political connections. So a really good gold mine might get taken away someday. It's just a political risk.
Both China and Taiwan intend to be able to win an all-out war in 2010, I believe. Millions could die.
Compared with West Africa, I think China will continue to develop fast, because of the attitude of the people more than any political factor. West Africans now don't have this same widespread drive to work hard and succeed. China is graduating millions of competent engineers. Every day in school and later life the Chinese are urged to work hard and save. I found Ghanaians universally friendly and welcoming whereas the Chinese are not. Ghana is in many ways more pleasant, while slower to develop.
FL
