Continue reading Toast: The Bush legacy

Toast: The Bush legacy originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 03 Nov 2008 18:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

This concept does not seem to have resonated in Washington and, along with his advisers, our president is either ignorant or avoiding the issue altogether because he does not want to discuss the remedy: everyone tightening their belt financially and taking some economic pain.

Warren Buffett has sounded the alarm many times about this subject, and I will, too. When the dollar falls in value, say 30% (each currency varies), that gives foreign investors 30% more buying power here. Yes, it is true they buy more when our goods and services are "on sale" (and we buy less of theirs). However, what if instead of buying perishables, they buy income-producing property and companies. As long as this trend continues, they would be wise to buy more and more.

A simple example: They buy a company that makes widgets in the United States. They are able to sell (export) more widgets along with their American counterparts because of the devalued dollar. Who makes a higher return on invested capital? The foreign investor, of course, because they paid 30% less for the widget company!

Continue reading Is Bush giving the country away without knowing it?

Is Bush giving the country away without knowing it? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 26 Oct 2007 12:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

It's April 1st, Fools Day, no spoofs here - The truth is funny enough!

When I read on Thursday morning that Berkshire Hathaway Inc (NYSE: BRK.A) was upgraded to In-Line from Under-perform at Fox-Pitt, Kelton I could not help but be amused. It seems at least a little bit silly for someone to be putting out recommendations about a company that has never lost money nor shareholder value over any meaningful length of time. As a shareholder I can attest to the fact that I was holding dead money at times. But more often I wish I had bought more shares and earlier than I did. We own 'B' shares not 'A' shares. Berkshire, with the best management period, the highest level of integrity, super cash flow, mountains of cash reserves, little long term debt, diversification of assets, a low P/S of 1.69, a low P/B 1.54, a below average P/E of 15.26 is the ultimate safe haven.

Also Thursday morning Kyle Sampson, former chief of staff to U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales disputed his ex-boss's version of the facts regarding the political nature of the firing of federal attorneys. Earlier this week included in my post Cramer, Cramer, Cramer -- You screwed up buddy! I mention the AG in this context:

• There is an old expression I keep learning anew: It's the first law of holes -- if you're in one stop digging. I must have used this before in one of my posts somewhere but it is worth repeating. And if Attorney General Alberto Gonzales does not see this post I hope one of his friends points it out to him. He too seems to be digging deeper when it comes to his forthrightness relative to his role in the politically motivated firing of federal attorneys.

As the days go by we see nothing but stone-walling from the White House. Can you hear them digging deeper? Obviously none of my readers passed the message along.

Responding to one of the many posts on American Idol and Sanjaya's staying power, a guy named Phil made the following comment:

• "And I should also note that as previous posters have said, there is no vote count. The producers make sure to add this disclaimer: "VOTES ARE TALLIED AT THE PRODUCERS DISCRETION." This means that when producers get the votes, they can count them, decide they don't like the vote, then just decide for themselves who gets kicked off the show. Or, what happens the majority of the time is that the producers don't even count the votes. They just decide who gets booted. Sanjaya is keeping ratings up. Why get rid of him. Also remember this for all you idiots that send in text-message votes. YOU'RE PAYING FOR THOSE TEXTS. AMERICAN IDOL GETS A CUT OF ALL THOSE TEXT MESSAGE PAYMENTS. God, you people are just plain stupid. "

So Phil brings out another economic angle to the AI saga, it is a waste of time and money to vote on AI.......so obvious...but sometimes the obvious is not so...right Dubya? right Alberto? right Fox-Pitt, Kelton?

Many of you did not have the chance to read D.C.'s deadlock - fine by me, so take a gander, because nothing is more ironic than us citizens paying our Washingtonian officials to do something and discovering we might be better off when they do nothing!

Enjoy the day!

Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the vice president for design and research at an architecture & planning firm. Check out his other posts for BloggingStocks here.

Sunday Funnies: Berkshire upgraded - Gonzales down originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sun, 01 Apr 2007 15:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Reports of a mild winter have been lost on me. I watched reports of snow in Malibu, California last week with amazement. I do not remember the last time that happened. Everyone in my household had to see it to believe it.

The Governor is declaring the fruit-killing, grower-crushing, brutal cold a state disaster. He will be seeking Federal assistance on the matter. Commentators are forecasting a loss of billions to the state, affecting growers, workers and truck drivers, not to mention consumers.

What really frosts me are all the reports I'm reading on the mild winter -- widely cited as one reason oil has been dropping. Mild compared to what, the South Pole? The Himalayas? The chill between the Donald and the View? Actually it has been cold but not very wet around Southern California, yet. But oil prices have been coming down. My prediction? Temperatures will rise again...and so will the price of oil.

Commodity prices have been softening for many months while the frost has been turning California strawberries to mush. We can all look forward to that commodity rising in price, as well as oranges, for the next few quarters.

Perhaps the surfers in Malibu who are also snowboard enthusiasts will find a path from the snow passages in the hills to the chilly beaches with winter wave action, in the first ever sleet and surf event. I'm sure Governor Schwarzenegger will be among the crowd. He might even participate depending on how fast he recovers from his recent skiing accident. Get well soon, Arnold!

Check out my other posts for BloggingStocks here. Be sure and read You don't have to be 007 to find the best picks for 2007!

Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the vice president for design and research at an architecture & planning firm.

Snow in Malibu, CA is a mild winter? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 22 Jan 2007 15:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Since the Democrats took control of Congress, a battle is going on within the Bush administration on the direction of its Mideast policy. You can see this with the resignation of Donald Rumsfeld and the subsequent appointment of Robert Gates as Secretary of Defense. We also got additional evidence with the resignation of John Bolton as American Ambassador to the United Nations. This is literally a battle of the Bushes.

On one side we have the "neoconservatives" or Bush 2 people who were the architects of American foreign and defense policy during President Bush's first term. They are internationalist in scope and want to remake the Mideast and, to a lesser extent, the rest of the world in a new Western, democratic mold, beginning with Iraq. They want to accomplish this with or without help from the rest of the world.

On the other side are the "realists" or Bush 1 people who served during President George H.W. Bush's term of office. These individuals value stability and American control of the situation with much less regard for ideology and are very wary of trying to change the existing world order. Some have said that they don't mind a dictator as long as he is our dictator.

Why should we care?

Continue reading The Battle of the Bushes: Why is No One Paying Attention?

The Battle of the Bushes: Why is No One Paying Attention? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 06 Dec 2006 14:08:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Bush uses 'The Google' to pull up maps of 'The Ranch' originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 27 Oct 2006 13:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.