All things come down to your personal relationships.

When you're serving at the local level, you have to build strong personal relationships to get things done.

Remember, NO ONE has the right to control your emotions, thoughts, and actions, unless you let them.

Energy independence and energy security are really two different things.

If only you could really use a fail-proof system to know who was worth keeping and who needed to be thrown away. It would make it so much easier to move through the world, picking and choosing what connections to make, or whether to make any at all.

In Asia, personal relationships are important, but you cannot personalise diplomacy.