I am not swooping in for bargains in the short term. Equities were buttressed by corporate bond fueled buy backs and dividends, and that is going to happen far less now. China has yet to face the music, and the Fed will continue to raise rates. These are not the makings of a bull market, and thus, I sense no urgency to get back in when the getting is good. Could the Dow rally 23% this year? Sure, but it could also fall 23% and I would be a little bit less surprised.
I just finished "Other People's Money" and understand the markets in a whole new light. I swear it feels like everyone has forgotten how the fundamentals of an economy work and the whole 'buy low, sell high' mantra is left for the freaks on the sidelines.I have three pieces of advice to all the Nervous Nellies out there: Turn off the TV, focus on the big picture, and review your asset mix so as to use this corrective phase and radical repricing of relative asset prices as an opportunity to rebalance the portfolio.
I read The Selfish Gene first, then The Ancestor's Tale, then The God Delusion. There's no doubt that TSG is worth reading, but I find the premise ridiculous because it doesn't intentionally illustrate how silly it is to pick a preferred frame of reference for the purpose of understanding evolution. Genes offer no better thread for the tale of evolutionary adaptation. Evolution is in the eye of the beholder. TAT was good. Not as good as Stephen Jay Gould, but very good. TGD was crap. Pretty much a rant, and I think it better explains TSG. Dawkins is a religious guy that happens not to believe in God.
That is the one. I coulda sworn you pointed that one out to me. I think I finally get the 2007-2008 cluster fuck. Dawkins is... interesting as an author. I don't like him as a philosopher, but love his style as a science writer. The God Delusion is fine, but if you can get your hands on Climbing Mount Improbable I'd start there. Then go into The Selfish Gene and from there decide if you want to read more of his stuff. He has a very British writing style. http://amzn.com/0393316823 http://amzn.com/0199291152 Also liked this one as well.