Passionate Plea From Asia

by Larry Edelson

Martin’s off this week. So I’m writing you today from Asia with a passionate plea to our country — to its citizens and especially to our leaders in Washington.

We are now the laughing stock of Asia. Our dollars are no longer respected; our ambitions, no longer mimicked.

Our way of life, often based on consuming far beyond our means, is being flat-out rejected.

I can’t even exchange a $100 bill on the street here anymore: Most of the street money changers will take euros, Singapore dollars, even Chinese yuan. But fearful of losing their shirt with sinking exchange rates, they don’t want U.S. dollars.

Not long ago, I never traveled without my American Express card. Now, it sits in my office safe. Many in Asia no longer accept the card anymore. MasterCard and Visa are still OK, but they’re also losing market share to locally grown cards like Aeon.

The running joke in Singapore, Hong Kong, Bangkok, and Kuala Lumpur is that the U.S. is the place where even your pet could get a credit card or a home mortgage.

So to Asians, the crisis we’re going through is our own fault. And although it was also caused by blunders in Western Europe and other regions, truth be told, they are mostly right.

The message is clear: We need to immediately stop living beyond our means. But can we?

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