Making picks about a game doesn't ruin people's lives. Making stock picks that turn out to be 100% wrong DOES ruin people's lives. It's called context. You can make that anaology if you want but the context of your analogy makes it an apple/orange scenario.
Lol. Uhhh, if a person bet's his life savings on one stock pick or several picks, they might as well bet their life savings on a game or several games. They are doing the exact same thing. Nobody saw the entire market going down like this. Nobody.
If people are willing to put money where Cramer sees best, and not do their own research and fact finding, they are liable to whatever happens. You should not be in the stock market if all you want to do is watch analysts pick different stocks and blindly put your money into them. Cramer's stock picks and buy/sell recommendations are opinions.
Have you heard of Enron? People DID bet their life savings on one pick. It's happened before and it will happen again. Did you watch the interview? John asks a valid question about why didn't ANYBODY see it coming when people leveraged their money so heavily. Cramer HIMSELF acknowledged on his own show that stocks were WAY over valued but it didn't matter because they were still going up. If Cramer knew that stocks were overvalued, is it responsible for him to tell people to keep buying? He said, yea they are overvalued but buy them anyway. Insiders DID know the market was being artificially inflated. But they don't care because they can make $ if it goes up or down.
If you put your entire retirement or your life savings into one stock, you are gambling, period. There are always other options available that are much, much safer due to diversity. The people who lost everything are the people who were stupid, greedy, or both, and I have no sympathy for them.
This is where Cramer failed being interviewed. On his show he's mentioned repeatedly how hedge funds come in at the end of the day and manipulated the market towards the end of days during this recent downturn. He's talked about people shorting stocks down and slamming people out of their stops and then piling back in. This is one reason why he told people to get out of the market and that at the time it was a no-win situation for the average guy. I don't know why Cramer didn't defend himself.
Cramer also is very weird on other people's show. I have seen him on Conan twice and he acted super depressed and weird. He even showed his medication. I think outside of his studio he is very uncomfortable
Yup. He's supreme confidence when he's talking to the camera, but when he talks to another human, he stumbles and bumbles. It is weird. I've noticed this and always wondered why he was like this. The article that aghast posted (thanks to whoever recommended it) only prove there's something odd about him.
Quite possible. It's definitely not out of the realm of possibility that "performers" like Cramer can be depressed and crazy just like the rest of society off-air. I think that's why you see a fair portion of actors/actresses/performers, etc in rehab is because they get tired of playing a personality that they're not. Or when the attention isn't on them 24/7 they get depressed/lonely/anxious whatever.
I don't disagree with you that people are stupid but this isn't about law ...this is about morality. Is it "moral" to knowingly give crappy stock tips to people notwithstanding their IQ level? There is no "moral" question about giving crappy game tips to people. But stock tips is another league (pardon the double meaning. ) If you want to use crappy analogies, it would be like telling a 5 year old there is a pot of candy at the end of the street just so you can watch them run down there. Was the kid stupid for beleiving you? Yes. Were you an a-hole for telling the kid that? Yes.
What you've stated is just a "fact of life" today. Is it moral that a car salesman tries to take advantage of you and make you pay way more than you should? Is it moral to put people in a mortgage that they can't maintain? Is it moral that gaming companies release software before it's time for monetary reasons? Is it moral that other software companies release software knowing there are serious bugs without telling customers? Is it moral that hospitals/doctors lie in bed with drug merchants at times? Where does it end? I recently told a company to go to hell because I would not sign off on the release of software that would a) not install correctly and b) had terrible bugs in it that would cost customers money due to calculational errors. This was stock/options/forex trading software. I had gotten sick of the attitude the customer didn't matter and all we had to do was "get the software out and we'd fix bugs later" or just ship it because our shipping date was hit. At a conference, I had a woman ask me about the software and say she was looking for a way to augment her income because her husband was terminally ill. She knew nothing about trading equities. I told her to not buy the software. At some point, your moral compass may take over - at other points you may realize you have no compass and you're just part of the game. Sadly, at yet other points, you never realize you're just part of the game. I've sat back and thought if this is just what capitalism is about. Does it just get to a point where the dollar is the bottom line and all that is cared about is who can you get money off of next? Or is this just human nature? The leveraging in the markets, the ponzi schemes, etc. aren't new - they were just got large enough to fall apart and were exposed. My guess is we'll still see them happening in the future maybe with a different face.
It's funny how texxx and TJ are always the first to turn this into a conservative/liberal thing. "OMG obama sux, you obamabot drone koolaid drinkers, libpigs don't get it, bush rules, blah blah blah...." It's getting tiresome. Just debate the actual issue for once. (texxxy u actually started out with a damn good point and then it all went down hill, try harder)
Agreed. There are lots of idiots and lots of a-holes. Which one is right or wrong? The answer is neither ...it is what it is. Jim Cramer has just moved further into the a-hole category for me. I'm sure he could care less ...unless there are enough other people out there like me that threatens the viability of his show. If it does, that's just another example of capitalism at work, right? btw, Jim Cramer was already in my a-hole category because his show is made for 3 y/o's. But now he's a liar making him an even bigger a-hole.
CNBC has been nothing but a bunch of cheerleaders masquerading as a news organization. Stewart is right. Bloomberg News is a similar channel for grownups.
No. Sorry, I don't buy this. I appreciate your thinking here, but at some level it sounds like a rationalization. There are times where we all choose to skirt the lines of morality... but at least in my experiences, it's because I made the choice to do so, not because I had no compass or was unaware of what was going on. I think it is very much human nature and will inevitably happen again. That said, we can't just wring our hands and wait for it. There are things, like solid regulation, that can be put in place to make it much more difficult. There are lessons to be learned from History so that we don't fall into the hubristic trap of thinking our time is somehow special and the old rules no longer apply.
So everyone at Enron is at fault for what was going on at Enron because everyone working there knew how it was making money? And they threw their life-savings into it knowing they were doing wrong? Everyone at Stanford Financial knew what was going on? Everyone working for Lehman knew what was going on? There are people working in departments of those companies that just know their company is doing well, but don't expect Susie in the arts department or Jim in the HR department to necessarily know how the numbers are being cooked (as an example).
exactly, right or wrong, i do get the impression that he really wants to help the average person out. maybe he has the wrong format to make it work (as No Worries mentioned), but i don't think he wakes up each morning wondering how he can make Jon Stewart's mom lose her 401k. he has the Wall of Shame (is he supposed to call them liar's before being on the show?), he talks about shorters and leveraged ETF's and others (not sure i agree with him on these things), and he tells people to get out and mentions things he did as a hedge fund manager to let people know how it is out there. he just completely didn't articulate his position at all. i think i could do an interview with PETA and you could have me on video slaughtering a litter of the cutest puppies you've ever seen with my right hand and clubbing baby seals with my left hand and i would do a better job of defending myself. given all the things said now about his social problems, i can't believe they let him on this show. it was a battle he couldn't win.
