More from Guy Geldworth, Market Bull

Life is jittery in the office these days. Just trying to take care of our clients' portfolios. We emphasize uncorrelated measures as we try to moor assets in safe harbors, yet it appears there's nowhere to hide. I have to say it, the deregulated market seems to have been the tipping point of the end of a thirty year growth market dominated by the bulls. No more, it appears. (These words are ineffable in the office, of course. It took forever just to admit we were in a recession.) Are we heading for a "deep recession" or a depression? A depression!? That's what some bold technicians are saying as they see strong parallels in the charts comparing the 1929 market and today's.

But what really prompts this posting (Thank you Jack Sands, for the space) is the ignoble way some in the media are already undermining an authority not yet manifest in going after president-elect Obama. "Obama recession," they're saying. Huh?! Obama is just now putting his cabinet in place, is just barely ascending the "bully pulpit," and Wall Street is already discounting equities, and projecting blame on the newly elected. Oh well, as they say in Britain: (President) Bush is forgotten but not gone."

I understand the wealthy (many of our clients) want a flat tax rate, nothing progressive for them, a 17% flat tax rate would do. That saves them a bundle, but what about the middle class? The poor? I understand the fear they have of a "leftest" increase in the capital gains tax rates. All personal perspectives, mind you. Very personal. To heck with the rest of the culture "out there." "We have to protect our own." The phrase my fellow Americans takes on a whole new meaning.

But to the point of this posting. Below, I list quotations issued from a few bright minds concerning unrestrained capitalism and the unwholesome mixing of private capital with government. Notably, in their recent campaigns for presidency, Barack Obama and John Mccain spent nearly $1 billion. Who'd they get these sums from? What may these contributors want and get from the future president? Worse yet, consider the use of public funds to heal the wounds of private capital--the current use of public money as a "back stop" to bail out corrupt investment bankers. Most importantly, see Thomas Jefferson's concern over the dangers of a politically uninformed body politic.*

I am in accord with all expressions below, particularly those emphasizing the responsibility of citizens to inform themselves, then to act.

I might have my CFA, but I'm also, it turns out, a believer in a democratic republic, one who, nevertheless, will try to keep his rich clients rich, hopeful that they share my values, even as I remain dubious of that possibility in the near future. I'm perhaps like many of you, still a few feet away from becoming a Public Citizen.

In 1816 Thomas Jefferson warned of "a single and splendid government of an aristocracy founded on banking institutions and moneyed incorporations" which would mean "the end of democracy and freedom".

A few decades later in 1864, Abraham Lincoln warned: "I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. . . . corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed." Thirteen years later, the Gilded Age commenced, a period of growth and vast corruption.

Albert Einstein: "... under existing conditions, private capitalists inevitably control, directly or indirectly, the main sources of information (press, radio, education). It is thus extremely difficult, and indeed in most cases quite impossible, for the individual citizen to come to objective conclusions and to make intelligent use of his political rights. "

Noam Chomsky: "The press is owned by wealthy people who only want certain things to reach the public."

Jefferson again: "Ignorance and sound self-government could not exist together: the one destroys the other. A despotic government could restrain its citizens and deprive the people of their liberties only while they were ignorant."

*Jefferson could never completely separate education from government. With the fullest faith in the ability of man to govern himself, Jefferson nonetheless realized that self-government could be assumed successfully only by an enlightened people.