Wolraich: Obama at the Gates of... Gates
Dr. C: In Praise of Writing Binges
Maiello: Gatsby Doesn't Grate
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Wolraich: Obama at the Gates of... Gates Dr. C: In Praise of Writing Binges Maiello: Gatsby Doesn't Grate |
Blowing |
Whoo-boy. Another fun day on Wall Street. I just got done watching another episode of Jim Cramer's Mad Money and I gotta vent a little bit here.
I like Cramer. A lot of people think he's a buffoon, but I think he's incredibly smart, and he entertains and informs like few others in the business. And there is no denying his stellar record as a hedge fund manager in his former career (though I would venture that a lot of the practices he now rails against as a voice for the common man- like naked short selling - helped contribute to a lot of that performance).
But Cramer's really beginning to annoy me. This year, i feel like he's called the bottom at least a half-dozen times. Even from a short-term trading perspective, he's been wrong on a lot of those calls, and obviously, from a longer-term perspective, he's been painfully pollyannish.
Back in February, I wrote Cramer a long email saying he was being too cavalier and stating my concerns about the market. Among other things, I wrote:
Not surprisingly, Cramer never responded to me. One of the best things about Cramer used to be his ability to admit he was wrong (When he first created Thestreet.com financial website, his column was in fact even called Wrong!). He understood that Mister Market was a humbling beast, that one day you'd think you got it all down, and the next it'd have you whimpering in the corner like a scolded puppy.
But you don't hear mea culpas much from Cramer anymore. Because he's on every day, Cramer can and does change his mind about the market so often that he can claim he's 'right' no matter what happens.
I don't really want to castigate Cramer. He's been right a lot in his career and obviously made a lot of money in his lifetime, while I'm a nobody who can't even begin to count all the times I've been wrong in my short career. All I'm asking for is a little more humility and a recognition that maybe his show is better served as a vehicle for entertainment and education rather than making money.
By Judith Durbin via vocativ.com 5/20
Syrian rebels under siege in a strategic city on the Lebanese border are increasingly turning to social media to wage psychological warfare, according to Vocativ analysts monitoring the region.
The town of Al Qusayr has become ground zero in the war between rebel fighters on the one side and the joint forces of President Bashar Al Assad and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah on the other. Some of the most intense fighting has taken place there over the last few days. The New York Times reports both sides consider this battle a turning point in the larger civil war that has been raging for more than two years.
With so...
A collection of links and comments dealing with government spying and intimidation of journalists
By Juan Nagel, Transitions blog @ ForeignPolicy.com, May 16, 2013
[....] The consensus is that Venezuela needs high oil prices just to stay afloat. But if the fracking oil boom results in low oil prices, what does the future hold for the South American country?
Sadly, Venezuelans have nothing else to fall back on. Its private industry is a shambles, and the country is even importing toilet paper. Years of populism have left the state crippled and heavily in debt. The public deficit...
By Aidan Foster-Carter, ForeignPolicy.com Op-Ed, May 20, 2013
[....] Pyongyang's faux rage at Security Council Resolutions 2087 of Jan. 22, and 2095 of March 7, which condemned its rocket launch and nuclear test respectively, recycled similar ludicrous canards it hurled at similar resolutions in 2006 and 2009, calling the Security Council, a "marionette of the U.S." A U.S. plot, and puppet? Hardly: Every resolution has been unanimous. China and Russia water down the wording, but they're on board. It's North Korea versus the world.
And that's just the way they like it. Some believe that all their banging and shouting is just a...