Posted May 24, 2010 at 1:36 pm
by Dan Denning:
“You know,” a friend said to us the other night over a drink, “sometimes you come off like a know-it-all smart arse. It’s one thing for you to tell the Chinese they’re doing it all wrong and predict a crash. But you’re bagging out our Prime Minister and you’re not even an Australian. To be honest it’s kind of aggravating and offensive.”
“Good,” we replied.
“How can you say that? Aren’t you worried you’re going to upset your readers? They won’t become customers if they’re angry with you.”
“That’s true. But you probably misunderstand what our business is. I don’t want a customer who’s easily offended by ideas. It’s my job to provoke thought. And you do that by presenting ideas, challenging conventional wisdom, and just thinking harder about things.”
Warming up to our task, and perhaps inspired by a sip of Maker’s Mark, we continued, “When I see someone say something idiotic – or, if you prefer – something I think is totally wrong, I feel compelled to point it out. You have to challenge that stuff when you see it, or else people start to believe it. And once they start to believe it without really thinking about it, the game is up. You become a servile, passive, brain-dead whip dogged to be kicked around and cuffed about the ears by the Welfare State. You’ll be lucky to get a bone.”
The discussion came up because of this quote by the Prime Minister earlier in the week on the radio. He said:
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted May 20, 2010 at 11:17 am
by Sherwood Ross:
ANDOVER, MA—The mass media is not telling the entire truth about the Bernie Madoff scandal and that is contributing to the suffering of the victims of the largest investment scandal in history. Massachusetts School of Law Dean Lawrence Velvel ought to know; he’s one of them.
“Let me tell you the things you don’t know,” said Velvel, who has written extensively on the complex subject in books and blogs and hosted several television programs dealing with the Madoff affair.
“The media isn’t telling the whole story because they generally focus only on the very wealthy people who were taken in. But the vast majority of the victims are ordinary people, like you and me, and they are the ones who are now left twisting in the wind. It looks to us like the wealthy are being helped now while the average bloke who put in $500,000 or $750,000 and who needed to use the income in order to live is being hurt.”
Velvel is actively involved in the appeal of a recent federal decision that denied recoveries to thousands of small investors.
“Now every investor is at risk because you don’t know until the whistle is blown that you’ve been investing in a Ponzi scheme. You think you’ve got some protection, but you don’t. That’s because they won’t use your final statement (to determine a settlement). And your final statement is all you have these days now that you don’t get securities anymore.”
Velvel brought up the example of the Federal Depositors Insurance Corporation (FDIC), which is designed to protect bank deposits up to a six-figure amount and insure that people’s hard-earned money and life savings don’t go up in smoke.
“Imagine if you get a statement from your bank every month,” he said. “It’s got on it what you think you’ve got in your account, but then one day someone sends you a letter that says ‘Sorry; the whole thing is worthless. It was a fraud!’”.
That is what happened to those taken in by Madoff. As far back as 2000, Gretchen Morgenson, who writes the Market Watch column in the Sunday New York Times Money and Business section, published an article about the Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC), which was created to be the first line of defense in the event a brokerage firm fails while owing investors cash and assets. Yet nobody did anything about the Madoff fraud despite the rumors all over Wall Street that Madoff’s way of doing business just wasn’t “kosher.” Nobody that is, except for Harry Markopolos, who has subsequently written an expose. There was at least one other financial professional who believed the investors were at risk.
“There was a fellow whom the SEC Inspector General said was a respected hedge fund manager, but his name was kept secret,” said Velvel. “He sent materials to the SEC in 2003, but he was ignored. Lots of other people on Wall Street knew that Madoff wasn’t kosher, including Goldman Sachs. But ordinary people, small investors, knew nothing of this.”
In Velvel’s opinion, some of the biggest financial concerns on Wall Street are also to blame.
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted April 19, 2010 at 12:12 am
with permission from msnbc.com
( patience. Video may take 30 second or so to load )
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted April 14, 2010 at 12:38 pm
via BusinessInsider.com
Here’s why government spending is really out of control.
First of all, half of Americans don’t even pay income taxes, but it gets worse. If we look at total federal taxes, 20% of Americans pay 70% of taxes, as shown below. 40% of Americans pay 95% 85% of federal taxes.
Yet when it comes to deciding how these tax dollars are distributed, those that pay 85% of the taxes are outnumbered by the 60% who pay just 5% 15%. Thus, when it comes to the politics of government spending, most Americans are arguing about how to use other people’s money. No wonder nobody wants to see real spending cuts.
(According to the 2006 data from the Congressional Budget Office’s latest tax burden release.)
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted March 16, 2010 at 11:23 pm
by Barry Goss:
Michael Lewis, of Liar’s Poker fame (a compelling, hide-nothing expose of working at an investment banking firm in the 80s) has another book out:
The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine
In it, he writes about a handful of Wall Street outsiders who realized the subprime mortgage business was a house of cards and found a way to bet against it.
Here’s Steve Kroft, of 60 Minutes, interviewing him:
To watch Part 2 of this interview, click here
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted February 27, 2010 at 12:48 pm
Via the Fisher Investments Editorial Staff
When markets take a tumble as they’ve done recently, some investors reach for one of the investing world’s “safety blankets”—gold. Gold fans see the shiny stuff almost as a cure all—an inflation hedge, a stock market correction hedge, and even a weak economy hedge.
But does gold deserve the security blanket mantle? Maybe not. In reality, gold is prone to short-term volatility just like stocks and boasts miserable returns over the long term—practically flat over the last 30 years, even including last year’s big gain.
Gold began trading truly freely in 1973, after post-Bretton Woods controls were removed. Since then, gold’s returned a cumulative 983% (annualized 6.8%), while global stocks returned 2,229% (9.1% annualized) and US stocks 3,552% (10.5% annualized).* Gold’s 2009 run was much hyped in the media, but even then it lagged stocks, returning 24.8% versus 30.0% for the year.
Besides lost opportunity costs, what’s even more dangerous for investors? Gold historically has been a short-term timing game. Much of gold’s long-term gains have come from very short boom periods. Since 1973, there have only been six major gold booms, each lasting from 4 to 22 months—or just 15% of the total time. Meaning gold’s done less than stellar the other 85% of the time.
Gold’s assumed stability and safety is largely a function of sentiment. Remember, gold is a commodity, and thus, its price is driven by supply and demand pressures. Sure, gold may do well during times when there is a high degree of market and economic uncertainty—when fear is high
[ Details / Source: Above is our hand-picked KEY excerpt(s) from this full article: "Gold’s Safety Blanket Myth" ]
* For more insights on gold, from the Fisher Investments staff, read “An Overview of Gold.”
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted January 7, 2010 at 9:23 am
By Randy Gage:
Of all the challenges we face today, there may be none more pressing than people losing their ability for critical thinking. We have an entire education system from kindergarten to graduate school designed to tell people what to think and how to memorize data.
Teaching HOW to think has fallen by the wayside.
Yes you really do have to teach people how to think. Or at least you do when the rest of the education system is designed to stifle independent thought. As usual, the worst examples come from the government, and this week, from the TSA here in the U.S.
Of course by now you’ve heard about the attempt to blow up the Delta jet flying from Amsterdam to Detroit over the holiday. But the TSA reaction to the event is the perfect example of what happens when you give dim-witted government bureaucrats control over our lives.
The measures they have taken since the incident are ridiculous, and do absolutely nothing to make air travel safer. In fact, you can easily argue that they will make it more dangerous, because they create complacency; with people believing the agency has actually strengthened security.
And the mainstream media will perpetuate this travesty with more vacuous coverage, interviewing people standing in security lines quoting another moron saying something to the effect of, “Well it’s an inconvenience, but as long as it keeps us safe is the main thing.”
Sorry, but no rational, thinking person could believe such a thing…
Read Full Article…
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted January 4, 2010 at 8:30 am
From LewRockwell.com:
For any non-scientist interested in the climate debate, there is nothing better than a ready primer to guide you through the complexities of atmospheric physics – the “hardest” science of climatology. Here we outline the essential points made by Dr. Gerhard Gerlich, a respected German physicist, that counter the bogus theory of Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW).
Before going further, it’s worth bearing in mind that no climatologist ever completed any university course in climatology–that’s how new this branch of science really is. Like any new science the fall-back position of a cornered AGW proponent is…
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted December 23, 2009 at 10:19 am
By Greg Roy:
Today’s video is the most shocking presentation of a story that I have ever seen on mainstream media.
Dylan Ratigan has been at the forefront of pointing out the deception that our financial and political leaders are engaging in.
In today’s video, his guest is Congresswoman Wassersman-Schulz of Florida. She is there to do what just about all politicians do: tell us what great work they are doing on our behalf.
She tries to get in her story using feel-good buzzwords that the health care bill is a big win for consumers.
I don’t view it that way.
My background was in construction. How would you feel if the federal government passed a law that mandated you to purchase a quarterly home inspection from my former construction firm. Your chimney, your drywall, your structure, your heating, cooling, and electrical systems would all be checked and you’d be alerted to any problems.
The fee for this inspection would be $7,500 per year. You have to buy the home inspection. If you don’t, you will be fined substantially. If you refuse to pay the fine, you will go to jail.
Now, you might not want to pay $7,500 per year for a home inspection. Too bad, the law says that you have to buy it or else.
That’s what the health care bill does. It requires you to buy health insurance.
How is a law that requires me to buy something that I have no interest in buying a win for me?
It’s not a win for me. It’s not a win for consumers.
Who is it a win for? The insurance companies, as the law requires you to buy their over-priced product.
That is why their stocks have risen in the past month or two. Dylan is trying to make the connection between the rising stock price and the fact that this health care bill is a gift to the big insurance companies.
If it was really tough on the health insurance companies, and thus better for consumers, you would have seen their stock prices fall, not rise.
But in reality, the health care bill truly is a tremendous gift to the health insurance companies.
The Congresswoman refuses to make the connection. She just wants to keep blathering on using all the warm and cozy buzzwords that make it sound like this health care bill is a big win for consumers.
That is a pure lie, plain and simple. After this bill becomes law it is going to cost us all even more for health care than it currently does, and the level of service will go down, while the profits at health insurance companies go up.
I don’t call that a win for consumers.
Dylan simply refuses to let her spew her talking points.
What ensues is rarely seen in the mainstream media. I wish we’d see more of it, and we probably will. We cannot just let these people lie to us while handing over more and more of our money to their deep-pocket political donors.
Contrary to what the President is claiming, this path we’re on is going to lead to national bankruptcy.
Dylan ends up later issuing an apology for being “rude,” but I don’t think he should be apologizing. I think that instead, the members of Congress who are deceiving the public should be the ones apologizing for their actions.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Posted December 7, 2009 at 11:11 am
From The 5-Minute Forecast:
For the foreseeable future, you are free to die in America without penalty… so long as you aren’t rich.
The U.S. House of Representatives voted to extend the estate tax late last week – indefinitely.
In a time when everyone could use an extra dollar — and, in fact, hundreds of billions of dollars are being handed out while trillions more are being printed — the state opted to extend the “death tax,” which was set for a one-year repeal in 2010. Instead of a year of tax leniency, for every dollar beyond $3.5 million that you bestow upon your departure, the government will take 45 cents (should this bill become law).
Filed Under: High Jinks
Category Feed:
To get an emailed digest of all posts, join our free Wealth Wire News Feed
Stay connected to the pulse of Renegade Investing & Wealth Generation
Subscribe to our email wire and receive hand- picked DAILY-updated financial, investing, and economic news that is usable, unique, and timely.
Find Out More
or sign up below
Loading ...
Add Your Comment | 0 Comments