Good Reading

To follow up on a point that I made recently, you never know where a good investing idea will come from. The website Stratfor focuses on geopolitical topics. Recently, they added Robert Kaplan to the roster of regular correspondents. He comes out with a weekly piece, one of which was the inspiration for my thinking about investing in real estate along the Gulf Coast. Last week, he delved into Myanmar, also a country of great interest to me. His current article is about the situation in Mali, but speaks more broadly about the issues of governance in Africa and why the borders that exist are really a fiction -- central authority does not often extend much beyond the capital cities. And, perhaps, in thinking about real estate and frontier market investing, that is why the capital city is often the best location to place your bet. In any event, Stratfor is a paid service but it is worth the price of admission in my opinion.