Two Bullets in Defense of Reason

• The Choice

Every four years I fall in love with a candidate. However, I try to love my candidate with equanimity. I know no man is perfect. That’s why every four years I look forward to viewing the Frontline episode The Choice. It presents bios of the main candidates for president, warts and all, and by the end of the episode you hate both of them.

For example, Al Gore? Looooved Al Gore. He was smart, especially compared to G. W. B., C student that he was. Then Frontline told me that Al spent an entire year in college stoned silly with a bag on his chest. “Pothead” was the word his friends used to describe him.

So I looked forward to watching the comparison of Barack “Butter” Obama and John “Guns” McCain. I thought I might hear about Obama’s cocaine use, or a little more about McCain’s philandering. And temper. Oh, and drinking. But instead of dealing the dirt even-handedly, the premise this year was essentially “Who can fake it best?” Because they’re both fakes. And I say, Obama can fake it best. That’s my cold heartless choice. “Emotions pull the carriage, but reason holds the reins.”

• The Dead Cat Bounce – my new favorite term

A dead cat bounce is a term used by traders in the finance industry to describe a pattern wherein a spectacular decline in the price of a stock is immediately followed by a moderate and temporary rise before resuming its downward movement … derived from the notion that “even a dead cat will bounce if it falls from a great height.”

This stock market is tiring. I am exhausted from talking Gary down from the ledge. I called to see what he wanted from Starbucks and he said, “alcohol. ” He has run around in circles flapping his arms insisting we stock up on cat food.

This went into overdrive this weekend when the S______s all congregated in a circular flight. I was told I was entirely too reasonable about the stock market. As opposed to pulling out every penny, which was the family line.

Oh, wait. Sorry. The family line was “Financial advisers, they don’t know nothin’.” I believe this was in response to my saying, “My financial adviser has this little saying: ‘Buy low, sell high.’”

Why the panic? None of the S______s are retiring any time soon, and of course the one retiree has everything out of the stock market already. However, Monday I did put money market where my mouth was and put half my old 401k back in the End of Year 30% Off Sale we call the current stock market. Then I patted my heavy furry balls for a while. Or perhaps just my one ball, given that I only invested half.

I think that each time I have heard a Republican president or de-facto leader say, “The American economy is strong” it is followed by a great tankage in the market. Maybe it’s code.

We’ll see if this reason thing does me some good for once.