[NOTE: The following does NOT constitute investment advice of any kind. It is for education or entertainment only]  ‘There are known knowns. There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we now know we don’t know.” Donald Rumsfeld 2002                  That the stock market fell does not surprise me: I have wondered how the rally could continue before the long list of threats to the global economy would reduce share prices. But I was surprised that it happened so abruptly.  I should not be surprised at that, however, because markets generally fall much faster than they rise: investors often “get in” in increments and “get out” in a cataclysm.  And while stocks only

  WHAT HAVE YOU done for me lately? I find tremendous irony in the fact that the US president was the star of a reality show where he was surrounded by less-than-brilliant sycophants and presented as the epitome of  business success in charge of a thriving empire (though it turns out his decision-making often led to bankruptcy). The  climax of each episode was when he got to pronounce to a hapless contestant “You’re fired!”  The irony makes an entrance in that he is now at a point in his tenure where the party that embraced him (only after they realized that he could get them power) may soon make a similar pronouncement to him.   Almost two years ago on this blogsite, I posted that

  Like past comedy talents such as Robin Williams and Jim Carrey, Steve Carell continues along the path toward rebranding himself as a “serious” actor. In the brand-new film Welcome to Marwen, he gets a role and a movie that should garner some Oscar attention. The film has all the ingredients of a Best Picture nomination: it has a socially prominent issue, an innovative format, and strong and diverse female roles. Based on a true story, “Marwen” very artfully follows themes and threads woven between two worlds: the real, small-town world of a disabled man and the handful of people (mostly women) invested in his well being, and the quasi-real, delusional, fortress realm he creates and catalogues through the lens of his disease-and-drug-fueled imagination. Leslie

[Disclaimer: The chart and the following content do not constitute investment advice of any kind. This material  is for educational or entertainment purposes only. ]   (SPX Chart from www.bigcharts.com retrieved Nov.20, 2018)   THE OCTOBER WIND BLEW all the leaves off the Wisconsin trees last month and did it over the course of only a few very windy days. Stock prices drifted ten percent lower, too, in recent weeks and everyone wants to know what chill wind sent them lower. I can explain the “why” because there are only two  reasons stocks fall. The details are harder to derive. I have never been able to talk about the investing environment without providing some background. No forecasters (I do not act as a forecaster here) worth

Hannah Arendt coined the phrase “the banality of evil” in the early ‘sixties when she covered the trial of Adolf Eichmann for The New Yorker.  The phrase was in response to how Eichmann had matter-of-factly claimed to have only been “doing his duty.” The phrase applies  in many countries today, but each in a unique context.  As for the United States, with the 2016 election, our country managed to elect as president an individual who personifies much of our culture–its superficiality and the worship of wealth, power, and privilege. During the first two years of his tenure, the former reality TV star and red-toothed capitalist has shown us ourselves (not all of us, but enough of us) and the result is so lacking in virtue