California has something which not every place in the world has: It has what I would call a sunny side, and I don't mean just physically, but the sunny side is a future. California's worth saving, to put it bluntly.

Commodity exchanges have a lot of advantages. One, you are helping transparency. Two, they are not political. It's institutional building. It can survive any environment, in theory.

If you have things and if you are a perfectionist, which I am, you have to really tend to them, and it takes energy away from other things.

At the end, the key thing is you've got to live with yourself. That's the real test. Everything else is fleeting.

I don't get that much enjoyment out of saying 'I own it.'

Possessing things is not that interesting. Living in a grand environment to show myself and others that I have wealth has zero appeal.

Most countries in Africa have the capacity to be great agricultural producers, but they do only subsistence production. So a family will produce for themselves and nothing more. Why? Because of the systems: The markets are not there to go beyond.