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What could possibly go wrong?

Trump won’t accept the election results — unless he wins. He thinks the election will be rigged — unless he wins.

Short-term this means an ugly gray (grey?) pall over the stockmarket short-term.

Long-term, no worries.

noworries

Earnings season is on us.

You can’t predict surprises. Like the Microsoft and McDonalds beats.

I’m sitting tight, gritting my teeth. Maybe some of my favorites will drop in price and I’ll pick up some on “sale.” I have some limit buys in place.

The classic cockroach stock

Now Wells Fargo is being investigated on suspicion of identity theft.

Want more? Google “Wells Fargo stole my house.” The stories are heart-rending.

All those cockroaches are not affecting the stock — yet.

wfccockroack

I remember selling Lehman Bros short back in 2008. I’ve wanted to sell both WFC and DB short. But today is different. Here’s DB over the last three months. Weird.

dboverthreemonths

 Justice David Souter’s dire warning

On September 12, 2012 — more than four years ago — Justice David Souter (who used to be on the Supreme Court) did a Q&A with New Hampshire students.

davidsouter

New Hampshire kids asked questions ranging from the Second Amendment to what Souter worries about at night.

In answer to that one, he spoke of pervasive civic ignorance and the structure of government.

Two -thirds of Americans don’t know we have three branches of government.

What I worry about is a remark that Benjamin Franklin that an ignorant people can never remain a free people. Democracy cannot survive too much ignorance.

Benjamin Franklin was asked on the streets of Philadelphia, “What kind of government will the constitution give us?”

Franklin’s famous answer was “a republic if you can keep it.”

Souter said, I don’t worry about losing republican government in the United States because I’m afraid of a foreign invasion. I don’t worry about it because I think there is going to be coup by the military, as has happened in some other places.

What I’m worried about is that when problems are not addressed, people will not know who is responsible.

When the problems get bad enough as they might do, for example, with another serious terrorist attack … As they might do with another financial meltdown, some one person will come forward and say “Give me total power and I will solve this problem.”

That is how the Roman Republic fell.

Augustus became emperor not because he arrested the Roman Senate. He became emperor because he promised he would solve problems that were not being solved.

If we know who is responsible, said Souter, I have enough faith in the American people to demand performance from those responsible.

If we don’t know, we will stay away from the polls,we will not demand it and the day will come when somebody will come forward and we and the government will in effect say “Take the ball and run with it. Do what you have to do.”

That is the way democracy dies.

If something is not done to improve the level of civics knowledge that is what you should worry about at night, concluded Souter.

To watch the full video which ranges broadly and also includes a discussion the Second Amendment, click here.

Things learned:

+ Don’t ever allow them to force you into “paper-only.” Citigroup forced me to go paperless. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. Yesterday I tried online to get details of my latest Citi MasterCard. Here’s their enlightened response.

citibankmessge

I called them. On-hold. Wait. More wait. Finally, a live human being. Can you send me details? I asked. Yes. But only by mail in 7 to 10 days. You can’t do email, I asked? No we can’t do email. Can you do faxing, I asked? No we can’t do faxing. Can you do overnight delivery. No…. You get the message.

Citigroup gives bad customer service a whole new meaning.

The moral of the story: Never go paperless — no matter how much they beg you.

+ The New York Times did a piece on “Three Excellent Books About Long-term Investing.” The books are:

andrewtobias commonsenseinvesting  charlesschwab

I’d start with the Tobias book. Click here. You can read the New York Times article here.

+ If you ever need to get to the on-line version of a piece you’ve just read in a newspaper or magazine, search Google thus: NYTimes.com:Three Excellent Books about Long-Term Investing. 

Google does a better job searching than the publisher’s own web site. This advice applies to Bloomberg, the Economist, the Wall Street Journal, etc.

+ Go through that pile of credit cards you have in your wallet. You’re paying $85 a year for the privilege of cluttering your wallet with many of them. Cancel them — if you can. You gotta call and wait interminably. Don’t sign for new credit cards. You don’t need them. You need one Visa or MasterCard and one debit card. That’s it. No more.

+ Save your work every few minutes. Or change your auto-save (if you have that feature) to one minute. Google Gmail is the best for auto-saving. It does it fast.

TV Academy offers Trump Emmy if he will quit race

emmy

LOS ANGELES (The Borowitz Report)-After learning that Donald J. Trump was still stinging from having lost an Emmy for “The Celebrity Apprentice,” the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences offered to give the former reality-show host a belated Emmy if he will drop out of the 2016 race.

“We never imagined that if we had simply given you an Emmy back in the day our current national nightmare might have been avoided,” a Television Academy spokesman said in an online video.

Displaying an Emmy statuette, the spokesman said, “Here’s your Emmy, Mr. Trump, all gold and shiny, just the way you like things to be.”

Reached by reporters, the spokesman said that the Academy decided to give Trump the belated Emmy because the organization felt “terrible” about the unwitting role it had played in bringing the United States to the brink of destruction.

“Historically, television has been blamed for a lot,” the spokesman said. “We wanted to show that when the very existence of the entire world is at stake, television does the right thing.”

HarryNewton
Harry Newton, who went to his investment club meeting this week and learned (once again) the virtues of diversification. Meantime, it’s raining in New York. So much for outdoor tennis.

 

8 Comments

  1. Barry Merchant says:

    I agree with Justice Sauter regarding the pervasive ignorance of today’s students in the areas of civics and government. There has been a dumbing down of the population as a result of a deficient educational system where winning and losing is sacrificed to the preservation of the student’s self esteem, and focus on matters of import has been supplanted by Pokemon Go and incessant tweeting. But Sauter’s bogus assertion that the fall of Rome was due to a dictator in the person of Emperor Augustus would only be believed by that same dumbed down population he referenced. And the implication that this applies to our current election is equally ludicrous.

    There are, however, many similarities between the fall of the Roman Empire and the situation in the United States today. They are as follows:

    Over-expansion and military overspending
    At its height, the Roman Empire stretched from the Atlantic Ocean all the way to the Euphrates River in the Middle East. With such a vast territory to govern, the empire faced an administrative and logistical nightmare. There were constant wars and military spending was bankrupting the empire.

    Failing Economy with Unemployment of the Working Classes
    Even as Rome was under attack from outside forces, it was also crumbling from within thanks to a severe financial crisis. Constant wars and overspending had significantly lightened imperial coffers, and oppressive taxation and inflation had widened the gap between rich and poor.

    Barbarian Invasion
    Barbarians were reluctantly allowed into the empire and eventually led to its overthrow from within.

    Government corruption and political instability
    Rome’s sheer size made it difficult to govern but ineffective leadership and corruption magnified the problem. The Praetorian Guard—the emperor’s personal bodyguards—assassinated and installed new sovereigns at will, and on occasion even auctioned the spot off to the highest bidder.

    Decline in Ethics and Values
    Life became cheap – bloodshed led to more bloodshed and extreme cruelty. The values, the ideals, customs, traditions and institutions, of the Romans declined. Debauchery was in evidence everywhere.

    I think the similarities that led to the fall of the Roman Empire and our situation in the U.S. today are clearly evident. Over-expansion into the affairs of other countries around the world; flagrant use of military might in perpetual wars and actions; a failing economy with high unemployment and unsustainable debt; a policy of open borders with an influx of illegal aliens having different cultures and values; government corruption at all levels; and a decline in ethics and values.

    What we need more than anything else is the change promised by Barack Hussein Obama that was never delivered. I’m not worried about a dictator……I know we have 3 branches of government and a system of checks and balances. If we continue on our current path we will soon join the Romans as one more failed empire. What we need is a leader with a new vision and a different approach. The leadership of someone outside the current corrupt, failed establishment. It’s not a guarantee, it’s a chance. Which candidate will give us that chance?

  2. TomFromVa says:

    Harry – I thought you were an indoors-only player. I havent seen that many outdoor courts in NYC.

    Tom In Ca – here in Va we actually have a good balloting system. We mark paper ballots then put them into a machine that reads them and stores them. So electronic tallies with a paper trail.

  3. Toby Bugfoot says:

    Why should Donald J. Trump accept the fixed election results? He won’t, and neither will his followers. THe day after the election is when it all starts getting good. That is when the real fight begins. Do we care if the stock market gets crushed, boy? No way. Let the revolution begin.

  4. Gary S says:

    I always use the paperless option for all billing, statements, credit cards – basically anything that I can stop being mailed. Each month for items I like to retain I just go to the website and download the statement to a pdf file, into a folder on my local drive. Makes it easy when I need access to documents, no paper files plus some websites don’t have access for statements after a year or so. I also download credit card transactions monthly and append into an Excel file.

    You can use technology without being reliant on website storage (ie Cloud) and not have to revert to old paper filing. I use Cloud systems for redundant backups and/or syncing – not for primary backup or the only copy of files.

    • Harry Newton says:

      Gary, Yes, that’s the theory. But after wasting an hour with Citigroup on their web site and on the phone, I went back to paper statements. I can also download the monthly statements and then chuck the paper…. But if their web site doesn’t work — I still have the paper.