Hate to jump in here and alter the course of this thread, but had to interject a bit here. Bill Gates is a very generous man with his money. His charity's main goal right now is to eradicate Polio from the world. He spends quite a bit of his time and a big chunk of his money doing it, and has had quite a bit of success so far I understand. He also, according to what I have read, will be leaving a few million dollars for his children when he dies, and the rest will be going to various charities. So until you can say you have contributed that much to the world, you might want to lighten up on Billy a bit.
An "equitable wealth distribution" sounds wonderful, but who decides what's equitable? Judging from all the people from around the world who are flocking to the US, I don't think wealth distribution is a big problem. The neo-socialists like Kevin Phillips who are constantly wringing their hands over this grave problem of wealth distribution omit one factor. The distribution is not static over time. Today's bottom 10% have a better chance of getting in the top 10% here than anywhere else. As for the Chinese, they are on the right track if you happen to be a government official or other elite. Otherwise, hello forced abortion, infanticide, censorship, religious persecution, corruption, forced organ donations and a few dozen other hallmarks of a medieval regime with nukes.
OK guys, since I seem to be the only one you are arguing with and it's not really contributing much (if at all ) to the original intention of the thread, I will not post on this subject here any more (besides, I'm sure you'd all still cling to your initial time-weathered beliefs on this matter regardless of any arguments one way or the other. ). RS7, sorry to have unwittingly pulled the discussion away from trading matters. I hope it was as stimulating for you guys as it was for me. Happy trading tomorrow. V.
OK Vladiator. Everyone gets one free pass. But next time, you will be subjected to something awful. I can't tell you what, because I haven't devised the next form of punishment yet. It, like our Constitution, is an ever evolving thing. The razor room has been done, and the getting locked up with a life insurance agent has too. But some of the possibilities include being forced to read all of Fasterpussycat's posts over and over, and mud wrestling with MrSubs' Mom. So beware! And be careful. Also a weekend in Odessa involving publicly having to wear a sign around your neck proclaiming "Russian Mafia Guys Are Incestuous With Their Mothers" is a possibility. Just a friendly warning. RS7
Well, tomorrow evening my wife returns home. So no more postings from me between dinner time and when she falls asleep (usually around 9:30). Even then, I need to cut down. She keeps asking me why I bother talking to a bunch of idiots. She is unaware that the biggest idiot here is me. So now, as my last hurrah as a semi-bachelor, I get my opportunity to put in my final thoughts about being alone with my kids. IT SUCKS! I mean they expect to be fed and everything. Just simply amazing. My wife has been gone for a week now. It will be 8 days by the time I pick her up tomorrow. My oldest son just got back from visiting his girlfriend in Tampa, and I told him to sleep at a friends. My daughter is also staying with a friend (I don't think she likes being around me....she is a female, so it kinda figures). My 17 year old boy, well he is going to be doing his homework in the cabana bath out by the pool, because the cleaning lady came today, and my only hope of keeping the house looking neat (to wife's specs.), is to lock him out of the house. Hey, theres a sink, a toilet and a shower. And he can sleep on a raft or a lounge chair. Better than I had it at his age! No A/C, but it is screened in, so the mosquitos and stuff will be at a minimum. Tomorrow I have to make some money trading. This has been a rough week for me so far. Seems like every trade I do has been wrong. Actually, if I held all day, they would have worked out, but that ain't my style. Was long a lot of MSFT today in the morning, and of course it closed at it's high. When I got out of MSFT long (for a pretty big loss), I naturally got short the brokerages for a quick loss. The only trends that worked today was if you trended to do the opposite of me. Which is what the market did. Having said this, I still am confident in having a great month. This is for several reasons. First off, I am an optimist. Secondly, I am delusional. And thirdly, I know that I can't be wrong all the time. Actually I am still up marginally for the month. But it has been a rough one. But what works more times than not is what I stay with. So buying MSFT this morning on a nice dip (for example) was still the right trade as far as I am concerned. And taking the loss was the right thing too. As I said, hoping and praying to get bailed out is gambling and not trading. (even though it would have worked beautifully a few times lately). I know a lot of traders that build positions like I do were probably averaging down in the techs all day today and ended up having a great day. I just don't have the temperament to go through that much pain. I don't think it is a healthy approach to trading. As proof, I just found out that a very good friend of mine who does trade that way (average down, hold and pray) is getting a divorce. Now this is such a sad thing for me to hear. He and his wife seem perfect for each other (true, you never really know). But his temperament is not exactly "even". When he is in a big hole during the day, as he often is, he gets to be another person. Nothing is good, nothing is right. If his wife calls, she gets yelled at. The people he trades with know to stay away, or at least quiet. But she has no way of knowing until it's too late. Now my wife never calls me at work. She knows that sometimes I am not in the right mood to talk, but really she just doesn't see any reason to call unless it is important. And she works too. So she doesn't have the time to waste on calling to tell me how much she adores and worships me. This brings me to my gripe of the day. I said in an earlier post that if you trade in a room with other traders to keep the phone calls to a minimum and a short duration. Today I was FLAT and losing my mind listening to some guys' cell phone ring every 20 seconds. He wasn't around, and I couldn't figure out how to turn the ringer down. Finally someone figured out how to turn it off (I think he took out the battery). And it's one of those phones with a speaker phone. Expect to see me soon on death row if this guy doesn't change his routine. Of course it turned out to be his wife. So now I know why I am looking forward to my wife returning. She doesn't pester me at work! That alone makes me realize how damn lucky I am. So for that reason, the house will be clean until she gets home, dumps her luggage and dirty laundry all over the place, and makes the house much more messy than even I can. But we live by different rules (she makes them). Well good trading to all. I hope days like today remain few and far between. RS7
There is one excellent function the market has that hasn't been mentioned so far. It is removing resources from idiots. Thus contributing to society's financial health in general.