I have often written about self delusion and here I am doing it again about the stock market. Most people know very little about the stock market so they feel they can get the direction they need from professionals. They talk to brokers who only have their own best interest as their number one issue. If they can talk you into something it will make money for them even if you do not. In many cases the brokers know far less than the client they just project an aura of knowledge and tell the client they know better. Then they procede to sell that client on some established in house package sold several times prior to selling it you. The rub here is that as a seeker of knowledge there is much to be gained by doing your own research. Because we are all pressed for time we rationalize that it is professional help we need. We hear a broker say the proper words and he tells us all will be well and we need to believe him. What hurts us is when we realize the support is only in words and when the market takes a hit you are not protected and your great gains become steep losses. At that point the self delusion is broken at least until the next time.

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Dubai has taken a big hit and this may be the other shoe the world economy has been waiting and fearing to hear drop. I will not go into what is happening now other than to say that if there are to be solutions for Dubai's problems it will probably take about six months for us to find out what the answers and corrections will be. Most of the business that has been done there has been with a handshake and a nod of the head. There are no documents for most of the leveraging to cover what would happen if someone defaults. It seems that was true for the government also. On March 10th of this year I did a piece on Dubai called the Crumbling Fortunes In Dubai. If you go back and read it you will see how close to the mark I was at that time. As for now, as I learn things I will let you all know.

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We are just 31 days from the official first day of winter. With the holidays upon us there is little time to spare for our winter head planning. I have always found head planning to be the best way to deal with the dark and cold months of winter. If you want to brighten the days and nights of winter start to plan the parties you will give or attend in January and February. Prepare a schedule for the better days of the weekends that will allow for activities outside. Plan short trips and even start to plan the activities for starting the spring garden. In reality you do not have to follow the plan as you may have prepared it. The idea is that there are thoughts and concepts already on paper and working in your head which will make decisions on what to do when the days are dreary.

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I am tired of all the bull coming from every direction because I have to hear it. There seems to be an endless stream of lies and half truths on the lips of just about everyone who makes a speech in public. Even worse are the political spin doctors who blatantly lie about past events and then try to blame their misguided past efforts as the problem someone else caused. I am past the point of making my case because now all I want to know is how to shut these people down. I do not wish to stop them from speaking but I do wish there was a way to make them tell the truth or shut up. Opinion is fine but using outright untruths and misleading statements should be stopped. As yet I have not found the answer but I will keep trying and if and when I do find a way to shut them down I will pass the information immediately on to those who read The Red Dragon Letter.

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Home is where the hearth is has a nice ring to it and I used to think I knew what the saying meant. My recent experience with the sale and closing down of a house started me thinking about the saying. As I thought about it I realized the statement begs the question "where is home?" in the first place. Is home the place where you presently live or is it the place where you once lived and felt the most comfortable. Either of those thoughts would be applicable to me. Thus the question transforms itself to ask if we are speaking in the here and now or the then of the past. Most people refer to home as the place where they currently reside. Hearth or not, in general, our current home is where most of us find comfort at the end of a long day or trip. I guess that leaves me with the answer that home and hearth represent where your comfort zone is at the end of each day. I would imagine that for me the home and hearth are mobile allowing for warmth and comfort where ever one finds it.

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When a person steps up to vote for anything it is almost always an emotional issue. The simple act of casting a ballot is an emotional issue. Because we all know the importance and insignificance of each vote we cast. The importance is that what ever the final count the issue or individual with the most votes wins. The insignificance of the vote is that we sort of believe inside ourselves that our single vote is meaningless in a way. The thing is, if we really believed in the insignificance of the vote we would not go to the polls. In reality we do go to the polls for the more important or main issue and the stronger the issue the more who show up. What really gets the polls full is when there is a Mom and Apple pie scenario on the table. Americans feel that not showing up to vote on a Mom and Apple Pie issue would be very Un-American. That is why the traditional approach from the government over a heavily disputed issue is usually wrapped in a Mom and Apple Pie blanket. Americans want to stand by their country because they believe what America stands for is good. They do not want to examine an issue and find out that what the government says we are doing and what we are really doing, as a country, betrays what we as Americans believed we voted for. It is time for Americans to rethink that old saying "My Country Right or Wrong" because what is right is right and what is wrong is wrong. Once we look at things as right or wrong and question if the issue stands up to that test we will feel more comfortable about a vote wrapped in Mom and Apple Pie.

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Here is just a little something to think about as we head for 2010. As of right now New York City is the financial capitol of the world. It is the capitol of the world for a number of reasons but the fact that most of the world counts on it to be the center of the financial universe is the most important reason. That is also why Wall Street must work to rebuild their credibility and capacity for doing business otherwise the world wide power it presently has will quickly evaporate. As more and more power shifts to Asia and India the controlling power the U.S. and Wall Street has over the world wide financial community will diminish to a considerable degree. We cannot change the direction the power shift is taking but we can start to slow the process down. The slowing process will require two things to become present in the U.S. market very soon. The first is to deeply penetrate the European and Asian markets with companies that are Wall Street clones, of the businesses presently in place, and allow them to function and trade around the clock for five days of the each week requiring the New York Stock Exchange to be open over the same time. That will extend the Wall Street reach and make the venue of Wall Street proper carry its power around the important parts of the globe. The second thing to do is to re-establish the credibility of the U.S. financial structure by decreasing the need for imported energy and external money required to fund our internal debt and also remove our nation from very costly and distracting wars. Part of keeping Wall Street as the Wall Street we know is to change the credibility of the U.S. by negotiation and soft words which are quietly backed up by our military power for defense purposes only. If we do not make these changes Wall Street will start to loose its power and credibility by 2015.

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A very long time ago I married a woman who was my age. That age was twenty years old and we were the bright spots any where we went. She was very intelligent, quiet, olite, athletic, an equestrian, an accomplished seamstress, quite good looking, and well mannered. We decided we would get married and work at jobs as well as finish our education over the next several years. She came from a family where even her mother had a college degree but stayed at home to raise the kids and cook the meals. Her mother was a great cook. After moving into our appartment I ecame aware that she had never learned to cook. That scared me because my mother cooked for me up to that part of my life and she never learned to cook. That is why I quite often ate out from the time I was ten years old. My wife's mother cooked well so I never asked the cooking question. I could cook so we made out for a few months until one night she arrived at the appartment early. She decided she would make me a meal as a surprise. When I got home the meal was waiting for me and it did smell enticing. With great fanfare I sat down and started on the meal. I was delighted right up to the first choke and gag. I could not look at her but was determined to get through the meal even if it killed me. As I went for my second mouth full she grabbed my hand and said I cannot eat another bite of this and you should not either. Thank God I said "I do not think the dishes or the silverware could take any more". So we got up from the table and went to a local deli and ordered sandwiches and a box of chocolate covered donuts to go. As we walked back to the appartment my wife said I think it is time for me to get some cooking lessons from my mother.

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As we approach Veterans Day I felt it was time to say something about that special day and what it means for many people. For those who served their country the day represents sacrifice and perhaps glory to the memory of their deeds and that of their comrades in arms. I can remember people I knew when I was very young who had served in WWI and those who had served in WWII. The WWI guys were old but the WWII fellows were in the same age range as my father. They were young then. As I look around today most of them are gone. They did not talk about the war but they did convey the spirit of the men and women they served with. As time has moved on I have lost more than half of the friends I had that served in the Korean Police Action. They only received a memorial in Washington several years back nearly fifty years after the conflict ended. Most of my Viet Nam era friends are still around and they are the same age as me so time has not caught up with most of them yet. The young ones from the Gulf War are starting to make the middle age turn but they still look young to me. The glory they received upon their return is still fresh in their minds. They can still taste the victory. As for the young men and women who have been and are still serving in Iraq and Afghanistan they greatly deserve praise and support. What they actually receive is support that is almost tentative with a lesser degree of certainty than there should be. They are remembered better by the ghosts and comrades in arms of former wars than by the current public. Regardless of how much they have given of them selves their sacrifice and glory fade not only in their minds but in the minds of the public. Over time both sacrifice and glory fade out and become caricatures of what once was.

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The flu season is upon us and the dreaded H1N1 version is starting to come out of the woodwork. It is a natural event and it will make many people sick and will kill some. Our hopes will be that the number of fatalities will be small. One of the problems relative to limiting the death toll is the inaccurate information that has been passed on to the public over the last several months. The population over sixty five was supposed to have a built in immunity from contact with some previous flu many years ago. Recent studies have proven that information to be less than accurate. The early error prone information has now put a large part of the population, those over sixty five, at greater risk. The bad information has caused the demographics of delivering first to the most vulnerable to eliminate most of the over sixty five population. With the new studies coming on line the elimination of the elderly population may be a severe and deadly mistake. With the current supply of vaccine in short supply the best thing for the elderly to do is to contact their doctor and arrange to get the H1N1 shot as soon as can be arranged.

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Yesterday was a strange day for both sides of the isle. Races were closer than expected and there were upsets. The Spin-doctors have set upon these events to try to persuade the electorate that their side came out ahead because of what ever. There are a few things to understand before we start to listen to the tales of the Spin-doctors. The first thing is that the voter turnout was quite small in almost every venue. Under those circumstances it is the voters with specific issues or grudges that come out in droves. This was a quiet year election period so the turnout should be expected to be small. Secondly, the specific elections that were cited as bell weather statements about the public's feeling relative to the performance of the President was linked with the individuals up for election. In both cases the Republican side of the isle is trying to tie the elections to the failures of local issues. What many forget is the current president inherited the huge financial mess from the former administration and now has been given ten months to show he has cleaned the mess up or he must take the blame for it. Thirdly, Congress is the body that is to blame for most of the problems we are rebelling against at this point. This year they were not in the sights of the electorate but next year they will be. The Obama administration now has a year to get the Congress to pass legislation the people want and to find the way to assist the country with its stumbling growth. If Congress fails to make this happen the Obama administration will be cut off at the knees the day after the mid term elections of 2010. At this point in time for the administration it is either fish or cut bait.

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There is not a person I know who would not want a job where they could occasionally perform in the shoddiest manner possible and still get to come back to work day after day. I never even thought there was such a job but there is. It is in our face every day and the performance is so continuously and blatantly bad that our minds almost refuse to believe what is happening. That is why I want to be a weatherman in my next life. To start with I would make good money at a non pressure job. Then I would be able to predict the weather in any fashion I would wish. What ever I would predict if it went wrong could be defended simply by saying the fault was due to a change in the weather. I could be wrong every day and I could still come back to work. There is no other job where you can do that and still be commended for doing a good job.

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Every once in a while we all get a moment when something is obvious to everyone else but we just cannot see it. As that moment lingers on our actions fall into two categories, which are both defensive moves to assist us in covering for our momentary mental shallowness. The first action is to openly state that we do not see what others tell us is there. With an exclamation of "I do not see it but if you say it is there I will have to go along with all of you until I do see it or I can prove you wrong". That statement acknowledges the failure to recognize the obvious and provides cover for your momentary short coming by suggesting that you will see the light eventually or you will be able to show all present where they went wrong. The second action is to dismiss the failure to yourself as a moment of trivial consequent and move on to another subject with out mention of any failing on your part to the surrounding group. The second action tends to come about more often as we get older. Without imperial data to support my theory I believe older individuals take the second action as a cover for their fear that they may indeed be coming up short because of withering mental powers. No one likes to feel that they have lost a step but for the older folks there is always the fear that they may be witnessing the beginning of some form of mental disease. The mind seems to be the last tool left in the box and the great fear is that it to may be slipping away. It is a fear that does not go away until we are no more.

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