The Ignorant Investor

Well, the democrats in New Hampshire have spoken, and as I always thought they would, they went with the Clintonian wing of the party. Hillary polled about 45% of the democrats voting in the primary, while Obama won among independents.

Obama still has a chance, but he's going to be swimming upstream. Rationally, I kind of knew he was going to get ground down by circumstance, but I can't resist the pull of the big dreamers. What can I say? I must have a thing for the underdog.

A sizable number of democrats want the Clintons back in power. The desire to recreate the 1990s is palpable. I don't think this will happen, because the Clintons benefited from unique economic forces that drove a very strong economy. We had a huge market runup that fed government coffers with capital gains taxes and income taxes. We didn't have any big security concerns. It was a singular decade, I suspect.

Meanwhile, on the investment front I've had good luck with gold. This kills me, because gold is a just a dead hump of metal. It doesn't make anything or employ anything. It can't be used to finance new enterprises or research innovative new products. To watch as it keeps climbing in value while my stock holding falter is depressing. I'd rather be giving money to a business that can use my money to make more money. With gold, I feel like we're just feeding off the slowly dying patient that is western civilization. It's the carrion of investment vehicles. But with my other investments languishing, I've got to eat something.