Friday, March 13, 2009

Week In Review: Jim Cramer versus Jon Stewart Edition!







The little blue guy represents you.

High-speed rail finally coming to the US. Of course, California leads the way.

Sure unemployment is soaring but the Treasury Department needs lots of help and fast. Send resumes.

People still like the dollar... Funny. I remember back in the fall, people on "the Fly's" site were saying we'd be on the Amero by now.

The problem, according to this humble blogger, is that poverty is just too much fun!

Wow, Washington makes a promise and then reneges... first time ever!

The Reformed Broker, a man who knows all about anal rape, gives Bernie Madoff some advice about which prison gang to join.

Look, if you ever get pulled over for drinking and driving, don't use the old "It's cool, I'm a country" excuse.

Remember that dude from Overstock.com who was always talking about naked short selling? He seemed way into conspiracies and stuff? Here's what he founded to expose the financial media... Deep Capture. Obviously, he didn't think about the unfortunate double-entendre possibilites of that name.

There is a bottom to the market. You can find it at foreclosure auctions all across the country.

Brian from Alphatrends imagines what a possible bottom might look like... the part that is ensquared (is that a word?) in yellow is fictional, but I like it.

How can you not link a site called Gloomberg News?

Finally! The Condo Fucks have a new album out. It's called Fuckbook. Okay, actually it's one of my favorite bands, Yo La Tengo in disguise. Best fake band name ever?

20 comments:

Dinosaur Trader said...

I think Jon Stewart asks the best question... "Who is CNBC responsible to?" You can ask the same question about the media in general.

The Daily Show is by its nature a comedy show, but Jon Stewart is one of the most high-profile media critics we have and no matter your political stance, understand that a stronger media helps all of us.

Great interview.

-DT

Anonymous said...

Agreed.

I just want to make two points:

1. I kept waiting for Jim Cramer to defend himself and he never did. It was like he knew he had been caught and was just taking his lumps for it...especially on those old clips. No explanation, no excuses, no clarifications, no bitching about context. I was surprised.

2. The media point Stewart was trying to make was that they are beholden to access to the powerful, and often that means accepting their BS without question. I think that is true to some extent, but these industries thrive on advertising, and I don't think that should be overlooked either.

They are a 24 hour station with thirty bajillion minutes of advertising slots to fill every single day. I can't help but wonder if the rise of 24 hour news and the decrease in investigative journalism are somehow related. Back when I was a kid, you had the news on at 5, 6 and 10. It was part of the broadcast division and they did investigative journalism, to an extent. Nowadays, everything is watered down and the news organizations are expected to be profitable rather than be good at their job.

Dinosaur Trader said...

Completely. News has become entertainment to the detriment of our country!

Whatever happened to the fourth estate? These "journalists" are very important to the running of our "democracy." Without them doing their jobs, we get into bad wars and those in power get further entrenched.

And that's just about the stuff they SHOULD be reporting on. There is a whole fuckload of stuff (the Octuplet mom, etc) that shouldn't be included in respectable news broadcasts. The distractions from the important stuff...

-DT

Anonymous said...

stewart is still a dick- and cramer folded like a wet towel.

stewart is a hypocrite - he is blaming cnbc for wall street actions cause they didnt call out exactly what would happen years ago- that's like blaming stewarts 'news program' for not calling out dafur before it happened and stopping it. seems like he cant distinguish between 'wall st.' and cnbc. plus his allegations that cnbc was in the know/almost implying they were on the take from wall st. is a f'n joke. anyone who has to watch cnbc w/ jackass maria b or other other ditzs knows they don't know shit. so what they cheerlead. thats like calling espn commentators on the carpet for a-rod's steroid use and blaming them.

stewart- dont invest in us equities if you think it's all rigged and run by dbags.

Trader-X said...

I love the anonymous comments.

Stewart is great, and I hope he continues to call out Cramer and CNBC because they will not change.

Dinosaur Trader said...

You make his point... Maria and CNBC cheerlead when instead they should be reporting.

Stewart is a fucking comedian he has no responsibility other than to make people laugh. The fact that he has taken his opportunity to try and point out the inadequacy of the American media should make you happy, not anger you.

And the A-Rod analogy doesn't really matter to me... sports are entertainment, I couldn't give a shit about them. But when people lose real money because of the sorry state of financial reporting in this country, that's a problem.

-DT

Anonymous said...

yeah, 'trader-x' so non-anonymous

Dinosaur Trader said...

Ha! There are definitely degrees of anonymity on the internets.

But look, at least you anons should be consistent and sign a name to your comments. Otherwise it just feels like I'm constantly arguing with an angry mob of drunk haters all the time.

-DT

Anonymous said...

well dt - define 'reporting'.

they need ratings. they've decided to go w/ the personalities they have and their styles- i hate them all. but so what- i dont watch when i dont have to.

there is bloomberg tv, fbn, paul kangas on nightly biz report, wall street week on pbs, - all cnbc is a commentator. pick your poison. why is everyone holding them to some gold standard. dont watch. dont expect any break through journalism after stewarts rant.

stewart can hide behind - 'hey im just a comedian' shtick - but he has touched the zeitgeist - he's aware of the stats on his viewers esp the younger generations who accept his show as their news source. he's just an upper west side dbag 'intellectual' whining and bitching(go columbia!).

bottom line- bear market- witch hunt. where was stewarts show on cramer at 14,000. hypocrite

Anonymous said...

p.s. i like your blog.

Dinosaur Trader said...

Hey, WTF? I went to Columbia! Now we have a serious problem...

That's the thing, I understand Stewart watching his ratings because his show is there for entertainment... it's on a network called Comedy Central for chrissakes...

Fuck CNBC and their ratings. I'll have to do some research, but I'm pretty sure that up until the 80s sometime, respectable news programs didn't give a fuck about ratings. Their job was to report the news and to investigate shit without regard to advertising dollars or ratings.

If they're going to advertise that they are there to help the little guy get through this financial mess, then they should be held accountable...

However I'll accept your point about only highlighting CNBC now that the shit has hit the fan. However, when the Dow was at 14k, he was busy pointing out the hypocrisies of the Bush Administration.

Thanks for reading.

-DT

Anonymous said...

@ DT

Well, that is where the blogs come into play, right? The news orgs are now getting it on both ends (from those they cover and from those they watch), and the blogs are now, at least in some part, driving the narrative toward something more substantive. That way at least SOME substantive reporting gets through and, more importantly, gets linked to relentlessly by partisans so it doesn't get buried.

The only time I turn on news is when something breaking is happening.

And one more thing;

At least the anon comments in this thread aren't recommending any shit eating yet.

Dinosaur Trader said...

Scrub,

Well blogs can only do so much. Most have no budgets and aren't great as far as objectivity goes.

But it does seem that the MSM picks up on buzz from the blogs, so that if something is talked about enough, it moves into the MSM, which is good. However, it's hard to know if the tail is wagging the dog still.

As for the anon comments, yes, in this thread they have been above average. Soon someone will tell me to eat a pile of dog shit though, I'm sure of it.

-DT

Anonymous said...

@DT

I really don't think anything approaching objectivity can ever enter reporting, because you are still looking at selection bias, access to the powerful, story editing, the need for commentary, etc.

Now, with that said, I do agree that your average blog is going to be much more in your face with bias rather than, say, anything you get on Kos or Redstate, but then it really comes down to which bias is more sinister.

I tend to think that subtle bias is more dangerous to creating a narrative and shaping reality, because with subtlety comes the appearance of authority. That is where the MSM excels, with CNBC being the most recent example of note.

And the example I had in mind when I made my comment about blogs driving narrative was the US attorney fiasco. TPM hammered that story relentlessly even while more "respectable" outlets ignored it first and buried it second.

Granted, this may be an extreme example, but I truly hope it becomes the rule rather than the exception.

Anonymous said...

im one in the same that told you to eat it as the one that i shitting on stewart.

p.s. i like stewart's show alot - just this time i feel he jumped the shark on his charter as s comedy central show

p.p.s. im a hot yoga instructor w/ glistening legs

Anonymous said...

http://www.thebigmoney.com/articles/news/2009/03/13/play-jim-cramers-crashteroids-game

jsp9999 said...

the white house media secretary - jon stewart

Dinosaur Trader said...

Yeah, wrong.

While that has become the new favorite talking point of the right, the whole "Now that Bush isn't President Jon Stewart has nothing to talk about" thing, it's just wrong. He's been skewering Barack since day 1.

And look, if Barack starts doing criminal shit and shooting people in the face, I'm sure we'll hear about it from The Daily Show.

In fact, if we don't I'll change the name of this blog to "I Love Dick Cheney."

-DT

Anonymous said...

just dont make it pink

Anonymous said...

speaking of pink, happy bday you communist