-
From the Obama Ministry of Truth
May 21, 2013 | 68 comments
-
Alan Abelson, RIP
May 10, 2013 | 20 comments
-
South Carolina on My Mind
April 30, 2013 | 31 comments
-
Dream Sequences
April 26, 2013 | 62 comments
-
Just Like a Woman
April 25, 2013 | 35 comments
Ben Stein's Diary
Taking Stock
A drop to 11,383 in the Dow is still way ahead of March 2009 — though it’ll probably get worse.
(Page 2 of 2)
I drove home to Beverly Hills about midnight. I started listening to a report on the BBC about the increasing religious control of Turkey. Then I realized I will never go to Turkey so I switched my great Sirius XM to love songs of the 1950s. I imagined doing to fox trot with some beauty in my Junior High, maybe blond and stupefyingly beautiful Mary Lou Gurick (or did she even go to my Junior High?), and soon I was home. Wow, I knew her as a classmate about fifty years ago. Wow. I got home, swam very late, under the stars and palms, showered, then watched Asian rap groups on M Net, my new favorite channel, and then to sleep. I dreamt I was sitting in on Mr. Obama’s cabinet meetings and young kids were skateboarding on the ceiling of the Capitol Dome, hanging upside down like bats, held up by a mysterious device with green and blue lights like the lights on the bow of my Cobalt.
Thursday
Chaos. The
stock market is way, way, way down today. People are screaming
bloody murder. The media is, as usual, selling panic and
desperation, exactly opposite the way investors should behave. Calm
and cool makes people rich.
CNN called to ask me to be on. I cheerfully agreed and ran into my old pal, Jeff Bridges. He looked cheerful. He was being interviewed by Piers Morgan right across from where I was being made up. Piers did not look cheerful at all or even look up from his notes.
I was interviewed by a great guy named Tom Foreman.
Here is what I said:
The Dow was about 6500 (very roughly ) in early March 2009. After today’s drop, the Dow is at 11,383, a rise of almost 80 percent from March of 2009. Not much to complain about there. Plus, the Dow after the close is about where it was last winter in November or December. No one was complaining then. So, at least so far, it’s not so bad.
It will probably get worse. The new agreement with Mr. Obama and Congress provides zero new stimulus to the economy. Mind you, the deal had to happen because the national debt is far too high. But where the stimulus comes from now is a bit hard for many to see. I personally view it as coming from the ingenuity of 308 million Americans or maybe a few million fewer than that. But it is going to be a slow ride back up. Patience and adaptive behavior. Those are the keys.
Then the Eurozone is in trouble. But Germany and France are the keys to that and they are doing fine. I never got why they had to do the whole Euro thing anyway. Why did they need it? And why do we care if the Eurozone breaks up? How much do we export to Greece anyway? Or Portugal? And there will still be great companies in the Eurozone we can buy stock in. Still, it depresses me when the market crashes.
I was feeling pretty low about the whole thing until I heard a 1960s song about a man whose wife dies. I cannot recall the name of the song but it’s by someone named Bobby Goldsboro. I think it’s called “Honey, I miss you.” I started to sob as I cruised along Elevado in Beverly Hills.
The song and my reaction to it made me realize that as long as I have my wife, I am the richest man on this planet. Just her smile is worth as much as Berkshire-Hathaway.
I don’t know what the future holds for the Dow. I do know that I am going to treasure Big Wifey for as long as God lets me have her.
About the Author
Ben Stein is a writer, actor, economist, and lawyer living in Beverly Hills and Malibu. He writes “Ben Stein’s Diary” for every issue of The American Spectator.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (86) | Leave a comment
More Articles by Ben Stein
More Articles From Ben Stein's Diary
http://spectator.org/archives/2011/08/05/taking-stock
Follow us:
ADVERTISEMENT
SPONSORED LINKS
FLASHBACK TO: 1995
-
Pope Culture
A man of faith in a godless age is hitting Americans where it hurts.
-
Why the GOP Does Not, Like, Totally Suck
Mr. and Mrs. American Spectator Reader, let P.J. O’Rourke talk sense to your kids.
-
Dames at Sea
-
In the Absence of Guns
In Britain, defending your property can get you life.
-
The Metaphysical Martini
-
Counting the Costs of Clintonism
The debacle of this president’s administration is both a cause and a symptom of the decline of American values. Unless Congress impeaches him, that decline will go on unchecked. An eminent jurist surveys the damage and assesses the chances for the recovery of our culture.
-
Chuck McHagel
It won’t take long for conservatives to scratch this presidential wannabe off their 2008 scorecard.
-
The Legacy of Old John and Mother Fresh-Roasted
-
It’s the Best Time of the Year
The American Christmas, like the songs that celebrate it, makes room for everybody under the rainbow. Is that why so many people seem to be hostile to it?
-
The Bush Crack-Up
Was the President done in by the economy, or by the politics of the economy?
Clip of the Day
H/T to National Review Online
ADVERTISEMENT
Clint| 8.5.11 @ 7:17AM
During the summer of 1981 the central focus of policy debate was on the Economic Recovery Tax Act (ERTA) of 1981, the Reagan tax cuts.
As a 1982 JEC study pointed out, similar across-the-board tax cuts had been implemented in the 1920s as the Mellon tax cuts, and in the 1960s as the Kennedy tax cuts. In both cases the reduction of high marginal tax rates actually increased tax payments by "the rich," also increasing their share of total individual income taxes paid.
The economic benefits of ERTA were summarized by President Clinton's Council of Economic Advisers in 1994: "It is undeniable that the sharp reduction in taxes in the early 1980s was a strong impetus to economic growth."
Intelligent Design| 8.5.11 @ 7:26AM
There are studies that convincingly show that the only way to increase tax revenues is to grow GDP, which is another way of saying that higher rates by themselves do no lead to higher revenue, and lower rates do not necessarily result in lower revenue. Obama and his comrades in the administration and Congress just don't get it. They learned nothing from the collapse of the Soviet Union. In fact, they are trying to resurrect it. They flunk the IQ test.
massmile | 8.5.11 @ 9:14AM
I lost interest in this column after he got it wrong about Reagan's tax cuts and supply side economics.
I am a 28 years old doctor, mature and beautiful.and now I am seeking a good man who can give me real love , so i got a username sammyshine2002 on--a'ge'l'ov'e'r.c óm--.it is the first and best club for y'ounger women and old'er men, or older women and y'ounger men,to int'eract with each other. Maybe you wanna ch'eck 'it out or tell your friends!
George True| 8.5.11 @ 10:27AM
TAS Editors: Isn't there anything you can do about this annoying spam? It gets old.
Occam's Tool| 8.5.11 @ 1:02PM
Unlike your superb stuff which never grows old.
MacAdams| 8.8.11 @ 2:07PM
massmile ........
Why don't you go advertise somewhere else. You are not wanted here on this site. Get a life. The web adviser should ban you from this site.
Alan Brooks| 8.5.11 @ 12:01PM
"A drop to 11,383 in the Dow is still way ahead of March 2009 -- though it'll probably get worse."
You secretly want the market to drop far lower so it will make Obama look bad. You almost enjoy the suffering of others if it will make it more likely your people will get elected.
Doc| 8.5.11 @ 2:19PM
What is it with you, huh, his comments were anything but pessimistic, on the contrary they were realistic and honest, your such a typical indoctrinated attack dog lib... The sad part is whereas he see's the beauty in life all you see is the toilet and its contents... A glass can be half full or half empty... with you and your prog ilk it will always be half empty... So buzz off to your toilet and feast on the remanents of Obozo the Clown's fecal policies.
Doc: Somali Basin
Seek| 8.5.11 @ 4:34PM
Rush Limbaugh, in fact, has been pretty blunt about his wanting the economy to tank so long as calamity occurs under Obama's watch. He doesn't seem to understand that the name of this country is "America," not "Conservatia."
George True| 8.5.11 @ 4:58PM
The economy will not recover as long as this administration is in power. So if it takes the economy tanking for 15 months longer to get him out, that is better than having the economy in shambles until 2017.
beebop| 8.6.11 @ 5:42AM
Didn't you see his performance on CNN? Castigating the Tea Party for wanting deep cuts? Seems to me that a person with a fortune, supporting large government who takes care of a 23 year old (where was the son's own wife while this was going on?), and seems to believe the Democrats can be reasoned with is even less than a RINO.
God, the man is nearly as self absorbed as the nitwit in the white house.
mzk1| 8.6.11 @ 4:21PM
I am shocked. I tohught you were a half-decent troll, but now you have shown your true colors. You have completely and totally discredited yourself.
If you had said this about anyone else, I would not have said anything. But Here Ben is AGREEING with Obama on economics, and you are claiming that he wants the economy to tank so Obama will look bad?
After what you just said, I will never give any credence to anything you say again. And this will be my comment to all of your future comments.
MacAdams| 8.8.11 @ 2:10PM
Mr. Brooks,
No one, and I mean absolutely no one has to try and make your O'bama look bad. He does the best job of that himself. And... you only help him pour the bucket of syrup over his head.
Intelligent Design| 8.5.11 @ 7:19AM
The main problem we have is too much government with too many burdensome, expensive rules, sucking up too much capital, thereby contracting the free market. As Milton Friedman pointed out so well in his book, Capitalism and Freedom, they go hand-in-hand.
Mr. Friedman was our substitute economics professor one day in the early 1960's. Wow, was that a surprise.
Clint| 8.5.11 @ 7:30AM
The July Jobs Report Numbers Are Coming In This Morning.
Economists Are Expecting A 9.2 Percent U-3.
old white guy| 8.5.11 @ 1:26PM
too bad the numbers are bogus. if the real number is under 22% i would be da-n surprised.
Shamus| 8.5.11 @ 7:58AM
Stein pushes efficient market theory at every opportunity. This means he thinks current stock prices reflect all information available. But what shocking news made the market crash yesterday? This is a mystery.
And there are other mysteries about efficient market theory. For instance, if current prices give exactly the right level for a security, then why does anyone buy or sell stocks?
The answer can only be that markets are not perfectly efficient and that buyers and sellers are at least somewhat influenced by psychological factors. But Stein has the weird notion that the market is a perfect machine that can exactly gauge a security's value at any given second. Ferris Bueller had good grounds for skipping class.
George True| 8.5.11 @ 10:50AM
It's no mystery at all. The market weighed in on what it thinks about the US government refusing to get its fiscal house in order. And make no mistake, the agreement reached to raise the debt ceiling another three or four trillion dollars was a signal, clear as a bell, that the US government intends to continue the runaway spending till the cows come home. Which will cause massive inflation and a catastrophic devaluation of the dollar.
The markets are telling us exactly what they think of that. They are telling anyone who has eyes to see that the price of all equities that are denominated in dollars must necessarily go down in value as the government inflates the dollar. It is an efficient market indeed, and intelligent too.
Stan| 8.5.11 @ 11:44AM
But his point is still well made about the market. It's a lot of hand wringing when all things considered (looking at the market historically) it's doing well.
George True| 8.5.11 @ 12:00PM
I suspect yesterday's precipitous drop was rather more than hand wringing. It was smart money cashing out and fleeing to safety. I would not be surprised to see more of these sell-offs in the months to come. As long as we have the current regime in power, wedded to Keynesianism as they are, the markets have no place to go but down.
Mark in LA| 8.5.11 @ 1:18PM
Haven't you noticed there is always a "reason" why the market goes up or down. Total hogwash. Follow the money, the market moves up and down so that Wall Street can do a more effective job of fleecing its clients. The market is stampeded by the market makers and the reason is thought up and fed to the fawning financial press.
Nomad| 8.5.11 @ 3:29PM
The flaw in your argument is that while the stock market lost over 500 points just yesterday, Treasury bonds did quite well. Yes, any investor (foreign or domestic) worth his salt is keeping an eye on our debt load. But what has investors genuinely jittery is the now-conclusive proof that Congress is irretrievably broken with no likelihood that its warring factions could agree on what kind of pizza to order, much less strategies to support growth in GDP.
C. Vail| 8.5.11 @ 8:07AM
Are prattling columns about personal matters reserved to Ben Stein, or can anybody get into the act?
Anthony| 8.5.11 @ 12:11PM
Most interesting C. I had just about posted a comment a few hours ago warning you that the Stein trolls would soon be attacking you in mass, and decided to hell with it.
I'd been told to stay off this web page by his 15 dedicated trolls if I didn't love and appreciate the twaddle coming from Stein's Hollywood miasma.
So far the trolls are in check. I hope I've awakened them.
Stein the economist, is about as cogent on supply side economics as is Stein the lawyer is on proper defense techniques for his fellow elitist DSK.
Stein the economist trashes Reagan, DSK and the lefty elites trash the poor hotel employee.
I wonder what Stein's shrink tells him about this? Maybe next week Stein will inform us. I can't wait.
Doc| 8.5.11 @ 2:25PM
Let me see, didn't Schumer Dummer one of your illustrious elite make the comment that the 'Canesian Con' was over.
Wake up dumbo its done, Obozo's and performing clowns have screwed it up for you all. Welcome to reality...... You've seen the shows now you get to live them....
mzk1| 8.6.11 @ 4:24PM
I think you have reversed the meaning of troll. A person who just reads a column to attack it is a troll. Please look in the mirror. And read something else, troll.
zarada| 8.5.11 @ 12:18PM
you are jealous!
Anthony| 8.5.11 @ 2:03PM
Ah yes, they've awakened!!!! No zarada, I'm not jealous, after all, my shrink can beat up Stein's shrink anyday, and my masuse can deep massage like Stein's can't.
The only real question that remains is if Stein's dominatrix beats up Stein and his shrink at the same time.
hardcard| 8.5.11 @ 8:21AM
Dear Benny,
Who cares about jeff bridges, peirs morgan, or your stinking plants??? Take a nap, stop writing this crap.
mzk1| 8.6.11 @ 4:25PM
IS someone forcing you to read it? What IS your problem?
Anthony| 8.7.11 @ 11:14AM
No mzk1, nobody is forcing us to read this drivil, nor are we calling for Stein to be removed, like many closet totalitarians on this site, (like you) who tell us to bug off, read something else, and keep our opinions to ourselves.
What I ( I'll only speak for myself, as my ego doesn't presume to allow me to speak for others) find repugnant about Stein's columns are the absolute self absorbed, narcissistic, and just plain mundane crap he sees as gems of wisdom that need to be shared.
You want Stein, you got him. You like cotton candy served on a shrink's couch, go for it. I like a good red wine and steak sitting up at the table. I don't come to TAS for this. I think it's a waste of precious space, it's that simple.
Oh, btw, when I look in the mirror, I see a person who would never dream of making the banality of some of the events in my life fodder for a column, to glorify and make precious those events, as if their import was so much more so, because it was me who was experiencing them, especially when I name drop to boot.
I guess that's why I don't need a shrink, or a column for that matter.
mzk1| 8.9.11 @ 3:27PM
OK, I'll try again, as in spite of your silly insult, you seem to be reasonable. I've been reading TAS since the Clinton days. Ben Stein was always a prominent feature, and many people liked it. TAS is a print magazine, and they need to sell copies. If it sells copies so they can get the rest of the magazine read, this is a good thing.
Regarding space, I doubt it takes up significant space on the server. If we are talking about totalitarians it is people like you and most of the commenters here who cannot stand to have anything present that does not meet their standards of ideological purity.
I do not see why someone will click on, and read, something they do not like, just to attack it. This is what a troll does. That's what you see in the mirror - a troll. There is plenty to read here, more than enough, just click on something else. Make believe this is like "from the Left" in WorldNetDaily.
As for me, I don't like personal attacks; it's that simple.
grant1863| 8.5.11 @ 8:30AM
I lost interest in this column after he got it wrong about Reagan's tax cuts and supply side economics. If Ben likes tax increases so much tell him to send another $100,000 to the Treasury, think they could use it these days.
NOBAMA 2012| 8.5.11 @ 9:12AM
Hey, Stein the recession started in 1980.
Reagan wasn't inaugurated until January 1981.
How could Reagan be held responsible for something that happened before he was even in the Oval Office...Hello?
The problem in the 80's is the same problem today...Liberals think you can spend your way into prosperity & borrow your way out of debt...
We had a spending problem in the 80's just as we have a spending problem today.
Margaret Thatcher said it best, Socialism only works 'til you run out of other people's money.
Ben Stein an "economist?" Give me a break! LMAO
Stick to comedy Stein & leave economics to those of us who actually own businesses & have "met a payroll." Shezzzzzzzzzzz...
WJ| 8.5.11 @ 11:12AM
For Stein to stick to comedy would require him to be funny, intentionally funny that is.
Once again, why is his annoying prattle (thank you C Vail) posted on this site?
Stan| 8.5.11 @ 11:48AM
To be fair to Mr. Stein, he didn't say that Reagan caused the recession. Reagan spent like crazy, because our national defense was an absolute mess.
Now you could argue that Reagan did use Keynsian economics because the defense business soared in the 80's. And a minor tax increase was nothing compared to the slashing he had given them earlier. And Reagan was working with (if memory serves) Democrats in the House and Senate at the time (Tip O'Neal era).
Occam's Tool| 8.5.11 @ 1:02PM
He's a professor at Pepperdine, in Malibu. Didn't The One go there for a while?
RCV| 8.6.11 @ 4:19PM
No. He went to Occidental. Pepperdine is a very conservative college where Ken Starr is law school dean.
Nomad| 8.5.11 @ 3:33PM
Thank you! May I assume you adopt the same attitude toward Obama that you proclaim about Reagan? Neither started the recession they inherited and both made initial mistakes in addressing the problem. Reagan was given a second chance to get it right. Will you support doing the same for Obama?
Occam's Tool| 8.6.11 @ 12:13AM
Nomad:
The correct response of Obama's to the current crisis should have been in 2009 to start cutting spending while lowering taxes, especially on capital gains. If he wanted to stimulate the economy, the best way to do that would have been market driven. Instead, he did the opposite, worsening Bush's errors to an insane degree and destroying our credit rating. Obama is more interested in dogma than results; Reagan was the opposite. No second chance for the clown.
RCV| 8.6.11 @ 4:21PM
Sorry, Occam, but cutting spending in the midst of a recession is never the right choice.
mzk1| 8.6.11 @ 4:27PM
And raising taxes is?
Keynes was proven wrong by stagflation in the 70's.
Jpksilver| 8.6.11 @ 12:12PM
The history is thus: recession 79-80, tax cuts passed '81 but phased in three steps, FICA fix passed raising taxes '81, double dip recession '82, only once third phase of cuts arrive in '83 is there an overall effective cut and Reagen Boom begins.
Bill| 8.5.11 @ 9:34AM
You were listening to old love songs, eh? Did you ask yourself why you weren't listenting to any NEW love songs?
Maybe it's because there AREN'T ANY! Women are no longer the objects of our unrequited hopes and dreams; they're "bitches" and "hos" whose function is to be the receptacle for our bodily fluids.
I believe the lack of love songs reflects just how far this culture has come in the wrong direction.
Nottellin1| 8.5.11 @ 2:30PM
Fuuny, I was just thinkin about this last night and it seems like men used to revere women more in past decades, like prior to 1970.
my question is:
What happened?
Have mens thinking changed because of the times or did men always feel less reverent of women but weren't allowed to express it?
Or was it 'the pill' that gave women more power over their activities?
Occam's Tool| 8.6.11 @ 12:17AM
Men changed because women castrated them and held proper manhood in low esteem. When you allow sex without consequences for men you get the outcome that inevitably sets up. The "pill" did NOT empower women---quite the opposite.
"Feminism" has done tremendous damage to women, as "the War on Poverty" destroyed the Black family. Men's drives, properly sublimated, can be incredibly useful wellsprings for societal maintenance. Derail those drives through lack of understanding of what men are, rather than what you want them to be, and you will destroy society, as we are.
Seek| 8.5.11 @ 4:35PM
Maybe it's because you haven't been paying any attention to the radio.
Bill| 8.8.11 @ 9:06AM
Quite possibly that's true. Will you name a couple of recent love songs for me?
Derek Leaberry| 8.5.11 @ 9:45AM
Mr. Stein's simple-mindedness is mind-boggling. The Reagan tax cuts, a modification of the Kemp-Roth 10-10-10 cut proposal of 1978, were approved only in the summer of 1981 and had been altered to 5-10-10. Not only was the first cut small, the effectof the whole package naturally would take a while. By 1983, with the second cut in progress, the economy began to take off and would be boming in 1984. And as bad as the TEFRA tax increases of 1982 were, they were mostly limited to taking back some of the special tax breaks negotiated in 1981. Rates were not toyed with.
Perhaps Mr. Stein, like his late father, remains a Nixonian liberal Republican at odds with the conservative takeover of the Republican Party.
R Martin| 8.5.11 @ 9:45AM
I suspect Herb Stein was a fine gentleman, and his son, Ben, rightly honors his memory. The senior Mr. Stein was an economist, a Keynesian economist, and if he referred to supply-side economics as “the economics of joy”, it was not meant to be complimentary. Herb Stein chaired president Nixon’s Council of Economic Advisors. He advocated the wage and price controls Nixon imposed and delinking the dollar from gold. The fact is Mr. Stein and like-minded economists who had long been in power were unable to explain why the result of their efforts was persistent stagflation.
Ben Stein is disingenuous when he suggests Regan’s embrace of supply-side economics did not reverse the economic malaise of the past decade. Empirical evidence shows otherwise. Yes, there were unemployment issues in the 1980s, but they were unrelated to Reganomics. Trade Union power in the 1970s resulted in COLA contracts that eviscerated heavy industry in the 1980s, and technology enabled industry to increase productivity with fewer workers. Mr. Stein also ignores a key economic event of the 1980s—the small business revolution. That process has proceeded unabated, and as large employers slashed their workforces, small businesses increased theirs.
We all hope Mr. Stein enjoys a long and healthy life and that he continues to write about the things he loves: his wife, animals, nature, swimming and pretty girls at airports. However, his take on economics is not well suited to this forum.
Westie| 8.5.11 @ 10:00AM
Ben stein has completely revealed his incompetence about economics but hey he's got Hollywood and CNN to pay the freight. I found his views abhorrent years ago when he became a raving fool on Fox Business. Why does the AS bother to publish this fluffy writer?
gearjammer| 8.5.11 @ 10:24AM
It is not 1980. Regulation alone is a monster burden unknown then. What was the price of oil after the embargo compared to today ? And, Ben tour father giving advice to this current mob of reds running the executive branch ? He'd never get within a mile of the white house gates.
JP| 8.5.11 @ 11:06AM
The rise in stock prices circa March 2009- 2011 have more to do with negative interest rates and QE1 and QE2 than anything else. The Treasury Secretary under Hoover, Benjamin Strong, called these injections of liquidity by the goverment "coup de whiskey". In a healthy economy, even a small injection of liquidity can have short term benefits. But in one that is tapped out by debt, falling consumer demand, and investor uncertainty, a coup de whiskey usually leads to market bubbles. In 1929, it lead to one last strong, irrational market rally. In 2009, it lead to a rally in both stocks and commodities. Hedge Funds managers have poured billions into both.
Ben has been part of the investor class for decades. He makes his money by speculating on individual companies. Obviously he is very good at it (check out Realty.com for home prices in Malibu and the Hollywood Hills). But, in his old age he has allowed loyalty to his father's memory get the best of him (his father was an infamous enemy of Supplysiders). The Reagan Tax Cuts didn't pass until 1981, and were not fully implemented until early 1983. The 1981-1983 Recession was the result of the policies of the Fed Chief Paul Volker, who raised interests starting in late 1979. Voker rightly raised interest rates from 4% to 21% in a period of 18 months. The resulting recession was a correction, which eventually led to the collapse in not only consumer prices but also real estate and oil. Ben knows all of this. Blaming the 1981-1983 Recession on tax cuts that didn't kick-in fully until after the recession was over is disingenuous.
Don| 8.5.11 @ 11:07AM
Ronald Reagan, the greatest president of our times, bar none.. regretted raising taxes..
As they say...you can look it up.
I heard a man call in to aradio show last and say this about tax cuts:
The recipients (taxpayers) either spend it (stimulative)
Save it (it's theirs,and they will need it once Social Security gets cut)
or they Invest it (to help the economy grow)
Anything else is confiscatory and generally wasted.
Makes sense to me.
Clint| 8.5.11 @ 11:17AM
The July Jobs Report Numbers Are In.
U-3 Unemployment: 9.1 Percent
U-6 Unemployment: 16.1 Percent.
Obama will be hard pressed to get reelected with these Unemployment Numbers.
Occam's Tool| 8.5.11 @ 1:01PM
And their numbers are going to get worse.
Maddox| 8.5.11 @ 11:28AM
When times are good it is easy to tolerate prattling columns and ignore historic blunders by comedians. Today, not so easy.
John H. Hicks| 8.5.11 @ 11:31AM
Ben,
Please read today's Wall Street Journal editorial on reforming taxes. I think your Dad forgot to carry the 1.
Steve A| 8.5.11 @ 11:32AM
Maybe it's just me, but I recall being 24 years old with 2 small kids. Not only would it never occur to me to call my mommy at 1 am to bring me medicine for the sniffles, but I'm fairly sure that if I did, my old man would have hung up on me.
Notary Sojac| 8.5.11 @ 11:46AM
Me neither Steve, but that may be because we are just icky peons who weren't brought up in Malibu.
Occam's Tool| 8.6.11 @ 12:21AM
I agree, Steve. Also, Beverly Hills and Malibu are NOT that far away. What's the point of having houses in both places? Kind of like maintaining a house in downtown Chicago and Morton Grove. He'd be much better off having a home in Idaho and Beverly Hills. (Mudslides, Ben. Mudslides.)
His kid sounds like a chump.
Notary Sojac| 8.5.11 @ 11:48AM
"Frankly, I am getting old and tired and cannot handle all of the homes I have much longer."
This is heartbreaking, Ben. I am sure that most Americans would tonight cry themselves to sleep about your problem. If only they knew!!
Biff from Ventura Beach| 8.5.11 @ 5:11PM
Hey, wait a minute. I clean Ben's pools and mow his lawn. If Ben sells his houses I will have to join the legions of Obamabots and move back into my mom's basement.
Occam's Tool| 8.6.11 @ 12:23AM
Hey, I gotta idea. Why don't we raise his taxes so he has to sell one? That's the idea he supports, so it shouldn't bother him.
I hope he sells one and LOSES money on the deal. Asswipe.
mzk1| 8.6.11 @ 4:36PM
You lost me on the last word. He sincerely believes in this sort of economics. Otherwise, I doubt he likes Obama much.
David Carr| 8.5.11 @ 12:56PM
Alan,
Regarding your comment that Mr. Stein secretly wants to see the market drop, I have two comments:
1. Short-term pain and sacrifice is worth a long-term improvement. So if we have to see our 401k and IRA plans suffer to get rid of Obama, then I'm willing to accept that sacrifice. That is a corollary of the idea that I'm willing to sacrifice my standard of life and that of my retirement years, so that my children and grandchildren can have better standards of living and live in a free society, not a statist, totalitarian one.
2. Statists like you don't understand that the economy is not going to recover under this president. The best hope we have for improvement in the economy is defeating Obama in 2012 and seeing an upswing in 2013-14. Otherwise we'll have to wait until 2017 at the earliest.
Kilgore Trout| 8.6.11 @ 1:44PM
A. The concept of calling my folks to bring medicine to me from 5 minutes away is SO far from any universe I have ever lived in
AND
MY granchirren (22,20,17,10 & 2) ALREADY live better than I do and EVER have. I only hope they can continue to do so.
simon templar| 8.6.11 @ 6:01PM
Hey, do you still live in Cohoes, NY?
Occam's Tool| 8.5.11 @ 1:00PM
The song by Bobby Goldsboro is "Honey." He was quite famous in his day. He was my wife's first crush when she was 8 years old.
Ben, so long as you favor increased taxes on investors, the economy will head South, idiot. Increased taxes get you less of the behavior you tax. So, large taxes on anus lawyers starrring in commercials will get fewer commercials of that type, for example.
simon templar| 8.6.11 @ 5:58PM
Please send Bn a copy of the IRS's latest report on income and potential tax capability of various income levels relative to debt and spending rates.
When he finds out that it will be necessary to tax him at 100 percent and still not meet our debt obligation and spending levels, he will shut up and slink away.
simon templar| 8.6.11 @ 5:59PM
Sorry for the typos, that is Ben, not Bn.
Stefan Stackhouse| 8.5.11 @ 5:34PM
If you have any money at all to work with, you can be a trader or you can be an investor.
If you are a trader, the fact that the market and its constituent stocks are volatile works in your favor - until it doesn't. My impression is that most traders underestimate the degree of sheer randomness that is in the market, and overestimate their ability to get the better of it. A few manage to beat the odds, and those are the ones you hear about. Pure randomness suggests that there will be a few lucky ones, and they are it. The ones on the opposite tail you never hear about, but I can assure you that they do exist, and there are lots of them. For more insight into all of this, read Taleb's Fooled by Randomness and The Black Swan.
Then there are the investors. They realize that the market moves randomly on a daily basis. They also realize that intelligence and creativity combined with hard work and wise management adds value, and over time that value translates into actual income and capital gain. Investors are thus in it for the long haul, and look at fundamentals, not technical patterns. For more on this, read Ben Graham's The Intelligent Investor or any other good book on value investing.
You can be an investor or a trader. I don't know if it is even possible to really be both. Investors help build the economy and make a better nation and world. I'm not quite sure quite what I can say in behalf of traders, except that I guess they do add liquidity to the market. Thanks, guys.
William McKinley| 8.5.11 @ 8:07PM
Hello Mr. Stein, nothing world serious here...just a love of dogs....particularly the German short haired pointer....She was named Ruby... a glorious beast who let me play with her for 15.995 years....we hunted pheasant and quail in Nebraska for most of those years even though I live in the metro Denver area....there is NO dog like the german shorthair....I had a Lab/doberman that was close....I've been around Labs, vizlas, weimeroners, springers, brittany's all the rest....the shorthair is the king /queen of all dog creatures.....it became so apparent to a friend of mine that he got one because his vizla just wasn't "as" wonderful....though a truly fine dog and companion....it's impossible to explain the magic that a shorthair has to somebody that has ever lived with a shorthair...I can't say owned because I never owned Ruby...she was just a part of me and I of her...just like you and the fair Bridged....my deepest condolences....I did get a puppy from a puppy rescue to replace the hole in my heart until I move to Nebraska and relive a german shorthaired experience...he's a fine beast of poor cattle dog?healer breeding...healthy and SMART as a whip....good boy....I can only wait to introduce him to another shorthair and let him aid me in the introduction of that beast to the world....SPEACIAL...SPEACIAL creatures that they are...sorry for your loss....Do ya think that German shorthaired pointers are capable of taking over the Earth???....it'd be a better world....LOL
Corrine DuRoque| 8.5.11 @ 9:09PM
Bobby G left Honey at home one day, and the angels came and took her with them--but her tree is still growing. Peg Bundy once sang the song to poor Al, and drove him crazy.And for an experience to savor there is on Youtube a recording of Mr. Goldsboro singing Honey in Italian. I am surprised that Ben seems to be poopooing the European financial crisis. I assume he has read somewhere of the big bank in Vienna that crashed in the early 30s and drove the continent into the Depression after we were already into it. Someone fill me in on the details of this.
POST American| 8.5.11 @ 10:41PM
---------------------BOTTOM LINE--------------------
'90's Show' Calm-place-ency OP ---ALERT!---
AS EVER, the core issue remains unbridled,
God mocking, psychopathic, Globalist USURY.
ALLLLL else is DIS-traction.
---------Break the epell!
-------------------END THE CON!
mzk1| 8.6.11 @ 4:33PM
Ben needs to investigate some really good charities, ones with low overhead that help the deserving poor. There are reports on the internet; with his training he should be able to do it. Then he should sell one hours, put half away against a crash, and split the rest between those charities and the USO and other military support organizations. I hope someone close to him talks t ohim about this.
And not a penny for the stupid animals, please.
mzk1| 8.6.11 @ 4:34PM
One house. Sorry, not a typist.
Clinton Lovell| 8.6.11 @ 4:58PM
Dear Diary: today I learned that everything I thought I new about economics and the continued growth of government spending turned out to be so much trash.
Now I will do something about being such a truculent fool for all these years.
simon templar| 8.6.11 @ 5:52PM
There are two things that really bother me about Ben's ramblings of late. The first is this inapproptiate self absorbed 'La La land, is not life grand' exposure to his personal life and diaries. This is not being positive nor optimistic..it is self indulgent..just what value is this. The second is his diatribe about raising taxes as if this is all we just need to do and all will be just fine. He indeed may just see his tax increases if we keep spending at these insane levels. We may just be forced to jump rates by 15 to 35 perecent to just barely stave off total economic collaspe in the future years ahead. What is astounding and unsettling here is the fact that raising rates will not make any significant difference in dealing with this debt crisis. The IRS just issued a report that the 127,000 people in the US making more than 1 million a year in income were taxed at 100 percent we would still come up short 480 billion a year. This guy does not know this? He is a big talking head and considered an intellectual and he can not grasp the fundamentals here and reality?
We are in big trouble, my friend.
Marxfreesociety| 8.6.11 @ 7:06PM
Ben does not give a rip one way or another. Celebrity net worth pegs Ben's net worth @>$20M. That is what you call self actualization on Maslow's hierarchy and life is good there and little affected by the tribulations of the rank and file.
Merlin| 8.6.11 @ 9:54PM
Ben,
Typically trees respond to excessive nitrogen by growing folage, but not blossoms. (apples, pears and cherries) Cut down on the nitrogen, but not on the other nutrients, especially for the 6 months prior to blossoming.
Spectacular blooms on Jacarundas in Addis Ababa, and not a bit of nitrogen added to soil except for an occasional passing sheep.
kate| 8.7.11 @ 12:28PM
i have spent the weekend reflecting. i am currently playing dan fogelberg, emmylou harris and steely dan. (on album) going to "planet of the apes" and to red lobster. the end of the good clean american life is over soon. celebrate while you can...(not barefoot in the rose garden)..but what the hell. drink your big black cow and get outa here..
goodbye america. working hard, being smart and then rejoicing in life will soon be a thing of the past.
we'll all be living in soviet-style "blocks" with the government up our ass.
so sad and disappointed in the americans who have allowed this corruption to thrive. TEA for me.
kate| 8.7.11 @ 1:09PM
God. i'm dreading tomorrow. a lifetime of work wiped away. all in the name of redistribution.
MikeN| 8.8.11 @ 2:53PM
Mr Stein, you leave out the part where Reagan lowered tax rates again, from 50% to 28%.
The high unemployment was probably more due to a big crash in the gold rate as the Fed wasn't paying attention to the money supply. Keep the gold price constant, money stays stable, and let the economy sort itself out. Yet you seem to think the economy crashed because you didn't have to pay 70% tax rate for your wages in saying 'Something doo economics, voodoo economics'
C.K.Amos| 8.8.11 @ 6:28PM
As of today, my primary retirement account has lost nearly 10 percent in the last week.
I'm sending an invoice to my U.S. senators, both who would not even vote on Cut, Cap and Balance; and my representative, who voted against it. No surprise, all three are Democrats.
Harry| 8.20.11 @ 3:56PM
If all Ben needs is "Big Wifey" (and who in their right mind would refer to their wife with that monicker?) why is a pool necessary if they get down to one house in Malibu. And what about those starry nights in Rancho Mirage, and Idaho? What about the Beverly Hills address.
Here is my problem with it all: humility is the easiest human emotion to fake. And Ben, I think your humility is a fake. It is too inconsistent with the bragging about what you own, who you know and your wonderful Cadillac. Choose one or the other, but don't belittle us with your non-sequitor life and observations. The veneer has worn off. Pick pone and stick to it. Stop faking your emotions already.