The Atlantic - Latest Comments in The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Jim — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 13:00:07 -0000

Thank you TNC; it's encouraging to see that i understood tyour point.

One last thing. I can understand the exposed nerve endings when it comes to asshats trying to pin all this on black people. Scape-goating has consequences for the scape-goats. Tactically it may make sense to respond and refute, but strategically it's a bad move. In the long run the best answer is to roll your eyes and leave the busllshit lie on the side of the road to die. It's the equivalent of not feeding the trolls. In this case the scape-goating is not really playing very well out in broader society anyway; the people who are peddling this have basically lost all their credibility already by being so wrong on so many other issues.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

BD — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 10:39:12 -0000

I work at a financial services firm where we have CNBC playing on a flat-screen tv all day - so I basically have been watching CNBC 5 days a week for years. I can tell you that while I thought the Stewart takedown was hilarious, his clips were of course heavily edited. In fact, Cramer's last big blow-up was when he said that everyone with a 401k who was close to retirement should completely get out of the market because it was going to collapse (which it did - dropped like 400pts the next day - everyone blamed him).

Like most fields, finance is full of arcane but important knowledge that affects how information (say, from CNBC) is processed. What a hedge fund trader takes from CNBC is much different from what a retiree watching at home takes from it. It's like when I read your blog, I totally get your posts about race and football, but with the WoW stuff, I am clueless - the nuance is lost, the conclusions that are clear to you are undiscernable to me because I have never played an RPG (is that even what they are called?). My point being, I would say that 99.999% of finance industry folks "know" to ignore Mad Money because it is "obvious" that the show is meaningless filler - who would put real dollars at risk based on this hyperactive dude jumping around pressing buttons and throwing stuffed animals? If you have been trained to build models, analyze comp sets, evaluate management, and generally take dozens of steps to make a single investment, it is clear that Jim Cramer is just a financial Howard Stern, or maybe Oprah for white guys. But it seems that CNBC has been successful selling to the non-finance world this idea that Jim Cramer is an "expert" on the market. Or maybe, the non-finance world just needed a straw man to tear down, and Jim Cramer was it.

We in the finance world fucked things up pretty bad, but Jim Cramer had pretty much nothing to do with it.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

tricstmr — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 07:40:08 -0000

Basic problem.. (with us) is that too many people have come to believe in faith-based-financials--just believe us and it will all work out..

Faith may be appropriate in many places (believe in yourself and those you know and trust personally) but when you are faced with large, complex, hard decisions that are life-altering--too many people have run away and fled the problem of reducing uncertainty through work and thought and instead just placed their faith in people who they didn't actually know at all.

The biggest part of Stewart's critique for me is that CNBC has positioned itself as experts to fit into this category--but its expertise was more about bluster than analysis.. Yes, many ordinary folks have neglected to question this expertise.. and they thus should suffer part of the blame.. but before you start blaming the followers, I think those who have led you in a wrong direction should be outted as frauds.. if only as a lesson for people to question those who appear as authorities, but who actually have no basis for that authority other than their ability to be on the Tee-Vee.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Byrk — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 20:23:03 -0000

The financial networks exist to promote their advertisers financial and investment products. Who would expect them to warn about the credit bubble or coming Washington national debt collapse which will destroy much of the remaining private wealth in America today or what this will do to the dollar, the stock market, bonds, gold or the real estate market?

Because they are given special protections under the law to do this. If they aren't going to do it, then the special privileges they enjoy as journalists should be stripped and they should be treated as entertainers in the eyes of the law.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

bread & roses — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 23:06:08 -0000

T-N, I took Jon Stewart's point to be different. Jim Cramer is a journalist, and not only does journalism carry responsibility, but it holds a promise to actually provide good information to people. Having a position at CNBC or the Atlantic gets you things that normal people don't get- you literally get a press pass. And the obligation you have in return for that privilege, that advantage, that special view of the interior of institutions and opportunity to interview CEOs, is that you need to use your power well, and use it to further the agenda of good information, not the agenda of the people you're covering. That's why what Judith Miller did was wrong- she stopped serving the interest of information, and started passing off one person's propaganda as "news"- which we poor un-accessed citizens expect to be fact-checked. If you got something factual wrong in one of your long-form articles, would "sorry, my source lied to me" be an acceptible excuse? No. You're supposed to check up on your sources. So is Jim Cramer- but he didn't.

I heard Stewart saying that CNBC could be a great watchdog, and being pissed that they aren't even interested in that. It could help keep both the financial industry and the regulators honest, the ultimate job of journalism. But CNBC doesn't even TRY. Stewart has a different platform, but his job is to keep people honest, too, by making fun of them. With Cramer he crossed over into serious journalism territory, because Cramer and CNBC have just let that field lie fallow.

When I read in a newspaper, or magazine, or see on TV that, say, beer sales are higher than they've ever been (I just made that up), believing it doesn't make me a dunce. It makes me a person who doesn't have access to special information and has to rely on other people to tell me about it. And when those people lie to me day after day, it really pisses me off. I have a choice between believing that what I see on TV- from presidential press conferences to car-chase footage- has some truth to it, or only believing what I can verify with my own personal eyes and people I personally know and trust. We can't function in the modern world with only the information we can personally verify. I mean, how can you sign a contract on that basis? Buy a house? Well, the seller says there's insulation in the walls, but how do we REALLY know?

So yeah, some media outlets have a lot more credibility than others. But even the National Enquirer is held to truth standards. CNBC shouldn't be an exception. I think this story was about the deep, painful, and vividly real consequences in other people's lives of lazy journalism.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

david morris — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 19:58:28 -0000

But I couldn't stop wondering the sort of nation takes its most crucial advice from a guy who throws cows through his legs?

Are you implying that anyone who throws cows through his legs shouldn't be taken seriously? What does a superficial thing like that have to do with whether you should choose to take crucial advice from somebody?

What makes Cramer a charlatan--and his followers rubes--isn't the fact that he throws things between his legs. It's the fact that substantively, his show is a bunch of BS.

Honing in on Cramer's morning DJ schtick as a means of belittling him or the people who followed his advice reminds me of Republicans who attack Obama for not always wearing a suit jacket in the Oval Office. All that stuff doesn't matter one way or another.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Ron — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 16:28:36 -0000

While I enjoy watching Cramer every night, one must remember the show is primarily entertainment. The financial networks exist to promote their advertisers financial and investment products. Who would expect them to warn about the credit bubble or coming Washington national debt collapse which will destroy much of the remaining private wealth in America today or what this will do to the dollar, the stock market, bonds, gold or the real estate market?

China is now worried about their dangerous over investment in US Treasury obligations. Washington ’s long-term choice is either repudiation or monetization. For monetization to be effective, the depreciation in the dollar would have to be substantial and this in turn would dramatically raise prices of imports for American consumers which would mean a tremendous drop in foreign imports. Debt monetization would cause more disruption to exporting nations than selective repudiation of Treasury debt.

The Campaign to Cancel the Washington National Debt By 12/22/2013 Constitutional Amendment is starting now in the U.S. See: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=67594690498&ref=ts

Thanks,

Ron with 30 plus years in the investment business and banking industry.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Big Word — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 14:35:37 -0000

Honestly I've always looked at those shows on CNBC as like Entertainment Tonight for Wall Street. They're just a propaganda tool. The problem is (as Stewart correctly pointed out) they don't present themselves as such.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

KM, Texas — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 11:42:54 -0000

Dustin, way above, makes a good point about enabling. And if you don't grow your own food, but trust growers and grocers, you have no right to cvomplain about pesticides and poisons in what you eat. Exploitative child labor in factories? C'mon people, raise sheep on the roof and knit your own. Trust is overrated, anyway. Me? I'm armed to the teeth. Or at least I would be if I accepted Dustin's argument about the right basis of society for a second.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

maria — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 11:16:02 -0000

contrary to what you wrote, CNBC's ratings have gone down since stewart's attacks, not up.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/03/13/jim-cramer-cnbc-ratings-d_n_174873.html

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Bruce — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 05:32:09 -0000

I think the anonymous fellow above me nailed it. And that was the main point of Stewarts comments.

And the "douche-borough" zinger in the end was HI-larious! He Nailed It!

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

anonymous — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 20:21:40 -0000

Maybe the most important thing that Stewart said was that people have to remember that it's work that creates wealth, even for capitalists.

At US News, James Pethokoukis attacked Stewart for this, finding the right wing pony in all the mess: Americans have become an investor class, you see, which is "Why Jon Stewart Really Attacked Jim Cramer."

LOL -- somebody needs to watch more TV.

But there is an important argument to be had there: there are people who work for their money; there are people whose money works for them; and there are people who get OTHER people's money to make them rich -- without any risk, and once in awhile, without any actual work, either.

In the end, what makes 30:1 leverage a scam isn't that compound interest is evil. It's not. Capitalism is one of the great engines of human freedom and happiness, because wealth can make work more valuable. (If you doubt that, try using a hand tool to do a power tool's job.)

What makes 30:1 leverage a scam, and what made Stewart's takedown of Cramer so ... TRUE, is that Stewart realizes that when "wealth" is so far ahead of what work PRODUCES, somebody is full of it.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

wtf — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 19:08:21 -0000

why?

greed ignorance fear doubt

people want to be rich and they want to believe that the man on the teevee is telling them the secrets of how

people want to believe in the man in the sky who hears their prayers, too

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

russd — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 18:01:50 -0000

I think DanS has confused faith for an incorrect conclusion based on observation. People don't trust Jim Cramer of something they can't see, he's on CNBC ostensibly because he's made a lot of money in the stock market and because he gives good video. People trusted his advice because of his reputation. Faith, on the other hand, requires something a little more, as it is the belief in something when there is nothing to point at -- which is what is in play whether you believe in intelligent design or a purely naturalist school of thought.

I notice many posters here harbor deep seated resentments towards those of us who do believe in God. It gives one pause to wonder what kind of people demand tolerance and respect for their beliefs while simultaneously trashing the belief systems of others just because they are different.

While we're asking questions about how we got to the place we're at, I think part of the explanation will come from our adoption of a "right here, right now" morality. In other words, my definition of what is good is based on what's good for me "right here, right now".

But hey, what do I know? According to a lot of people who post here, boomers like me are the cause for everything from 9/11 to global warming, to feminine itching.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

DaveinHackensack — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 17:57:06 -0000

Ta-Nehisi,

"I don't know much about the financial world. I come to this equipped solely with the weaponry I was deeded by the streets"

That's a key point, about the benefit of hands-on, real-world experience. I made a related point recently elsewhere, that some of our current economic troubles are due to too few of our elites having that sort of hands-on experience ("Lessons from Brooklyn's New Economy"). For example, your father owns his own business, right? If he's like most small businessmen, I'm guessing he's wary about taking on too much debt. If more Wall Street chiefs came from that sort of background, more of them might have thought twice about levering up their companies 30-to-1.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Ta-Nehisi Coates — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 17:27:48 -0000

Thanks Jim. You basically said what would have said. If you want to read what I think of blaming poor people for the meltdown, my record is pretty clear:

http://ta-nehisicoates.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/09/debunking_the_blame_the_negroes_conspiricy_theory.php

http://ta-nehisicoates.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/10/matt_taibbi_sons_byron_york.php

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Jim — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 17:12:10 -0000

"......when you try to break it down to "nobody gets a house for free" and that you're buying into the right-wing baloney that has tried to blame this financial meltdown on poor people ....."

I may be misreading him, but I didn't get that sense from him.

It's bad enough that there is a financial meltdown, but what is at least as bad for the people who got sucked into this because it looked like it might work out is that now they are stuck with a huge wound on their credit. That may even be the seven-year wound of a bankruptcy. Getting the blame for the collapse of the world is small potatoes for them compared with that. And his point holds on that - don't buy a watch of the arm of some guy on the corner, and if you do, it's on you.

That all may be valid, but it's really not good enough for me. The question now is what to with/for/about a bunch of people who have taken this kind of a hit. How is it good for us to have this going on? I am willing to bail out people who made stupid or hopeful or greedy or however you want to characterize these house purchase decisions in order to save the property values in this country - at least my part of it. And the same holds for the people - I don't want a population of financial broken people.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Patrick — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:53:38 -0000

This is all very selective. Numerous CEO's of popular companies went on CNBC touting the same bullshit but because you liked their products, you sent the links to your friends. A prime example would be the asinine assertion made by Steve Jobs that the new IPhone was 5 years ahead of the market. The "tech" expert on CNBC sat there going;This is some scoop...

Nobody with a cursory knowledge of telecommunications would believe that.

Without wanting to go on a rant about ridiculously overpriced "designer" tech goods contributing to peoples inability to meet other more pressing costs, it's still necessary to acknowledge that banks have been failing for over a year now.

It is also necessary to state the convenient timeline of this populist/counter populist drivel. A couple of weeks after Santelli went off on his asinine tirade comes the patronising Jon"Im a comedian gais" Stewart with his latest MURROW moment.

Did Santelli bring it on CNBC? Were people unaware pre-rant that CNBC had been wrong for years?

And what on earth is wrong with Americans thinking that they could actually make money in other ways? Curious ramble from Jon towards the end.

CNBC also has a tiny audience. There is a reason for this(see above)I have never taken Cramer seriously. His picks always pop up for a few hours-2days and die a death.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Laura Clawson — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:33:31 -0000

TPM makes a key point:

CNBC's business model is not reporting news for average folks or even average investors. While the channel makes good money, it ratings are actually pretty low. The whole model is based on who the audience is -- brokers, financial professionals and folks with big money on Wall Street. So of course it's heavily biased toward that viewership.

Not that there's anything wrong with that. Big dollar investors deserve their own cable channel too. But as more of the 'news' moves into CNBC's 'space', it's worth considering how deeply skewed their reporting is.

So it's about "us" in the sense that we're all complicit in the organization of the economy, but in really important ways, CNBC is exactly an outlet of and for the wealthy. It has wider influence in the creation of experts and celebrities and in feeding the aspirations of people who are never going to have this kind of money, but we have to consider really broadly who it's for and what place it fills in the media ecosystem.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

DougEMI — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:31:48 -0000

Canada (where I am from and invest), does not have a mortgage deductible. Instead the sale of a principle residence doesn't face capital gains tax. It makes a structural difference.

Not only the tax preferences but other government incentives to get people to own their own homes. I know some disagree, but I think owning a home is a good thing, so there is a balancing act. If owning housing is something considered good and the government wants to encourage it, the risk is that too much encouragement results in a housing boom which creates a bubble.

The tax code also provides incentive to obtain housing debt rather than other kinds of debt. So there is an advantage to buying a car with a second mortage rather than through an ordinary car loan. So people piled up mortgage debt to replace debts in which interest can't be deducted.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Liza — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:15:22 -0000

Jordan,

The consolidated US mainstream media isn't likely to find it's collective balls any time soon. Anyway, where will those journalists come from? Outside of independent media, who in the US is doing any significant journalism anymore?

The truth about Iraq will be told. It just won't be told by Americans using American sources.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

texascowgirl — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 16:12:59 -0000

"What madness has led us to hand off our shields and put our future in the hands of shaman and faith-healers?"

Haven't we always done this? Doesn't every "faith" tradition and religion depend on it?

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Jordan — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:51:59 -0000

I think a lot of the media issues coming out right now have to do with the double-edged sword of access. Over and over you hear Cramer talking about how he interviewed all these bigshot CEOs and that he was just reporting what they said. Getting people with power and money to talk is not often an easy thing to do. If a program wants to continue to have that kind of access, there is always a tension between flat out reporting what people say and checking the background. This is why shows like 60 Minutes have become justifiably famous because they have simultaneously managed to maintain access to amazing sources while oftentimes calling those same sources on their shit. When a program doesn't have that kind of talent, it's all too easy to fall into the trap of access. They get a scoop, interview someone important and feel really good about themselves. Maybe they don't push too hard and later they get another scoop. It's a downward spiral from there.

With all that said, it doesn't let news organizations off the hook. Becoming a mouthpiece for the powerful is lazy journalism because you don't have to do any real work, just let people come on and say their bit. I'm hoping that after the debacles of the Iraq War and the current financial crisis, the media finds its collective balls, but I'm not going to hold my breath. It's going to take an awful lot of soul searching.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

Watson — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:44:09 -0000

Almost everyone can share in the blame, but a relative few bear a much larger share than the others.

Re: The Strength Of Street Knowledge

metis — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 15:40:18 -0000

I feel bad for the guy.

Maybe I'm just too softhearted, but I think he believed his own line - that he was doing something helpful, funny and entertaining by letting his viewers peek behind the curtain and see what the traders were thinking day to day, about stocks, and about the market.

And then one day this guy comes out and says really loudly, in public that you are hurting people, hurting your viewers, making things worse. and maybe, at least a litte, to blame for the collapse of the global financial system.

And at least partly, you think he's right. but you still have to get up in the morning and go back to your job - jumping up and down, making funny noises and telling people about who's up and who's down that day.

I think I'd skip the monring talk shows too.