Lessons from Beijing

This summer's Beijing Olympics were oddly different from the ones I remember as a child in the seventies and early eighties.  As a kid, the Olympics were a time for the America to demonstrate its dominance. Athletic supremacy, along with world economic and political primacy, appeared to be an American birthright. "Made in America" was everywhere - on our automobiles, clothes and toys - as was my national pride.     Today all of that has changed.  Americans no longer value American products as Cadillac and other seminal American-made brands are no longer the status symbols they once were.  The Joneses are replacing their Caddys with Lexuses, Beemers.   The Beijing games harbinger a challenge to America's global hegemony.  Prior to the 1984 Olympic Games China had never won an Olympic medal.  That is the world I grew up in.  That is my frame of reference.  At the Beijiing Games China won more golds than any other country, including the USA, and came in second in overall medals.  During the Olympics, another ascendant power, India, won its first ever gold medal.   America is not in decline; the rest of the world is rising.  America is the greatest nation the world has ever and will ever know. Our nation's greatness stems from its unique combination of national, political and individual freedom which generates creative genius in its people and coalesces a myriad of ideas to generate breakthroughs and promote achievement. You can succeed in a global world or a new and different real estate market. You just need to train harder, better and smarter. Just ask Michael Phelps. Mark Schnurman is the director of human resources at GFI Capital Resources Group, New York, N.Y.