As far as fall guys go, Jim Cramer makes a great one, and he took a major crash down the basement steps last night on The Daily Show. Clearly, he has said some questionable things and has questionable motivations, and Jon Stewart did not let him escape the truth that financial reporting should be objective and perhaps even investigative. He claimed that people lied to him and certainly they lied to everyone, but with a bit of thought it would have been obvious what was really going on. Of course, everyone wants the money no matter where it’s coming from, so nobody asks the questions and winks their way into the profits. It’s all a game and unfortunately, people get hurt. Cramer is just a tiny pawn in the fraud and he knows it; he took everything John threw at him with grace and a sad-puppy-who’s-just-been-scolded-for peeing-on-the-carpet face. It’s a sham and he understands the sham as well as anyone, hence he should be explaining it to the people, but instead he is an entertainer and he wins when you win. But when you lose…
Anyway, it’s all fine. We will survive. We will realize what is true about money and will reshape our financial culture based on reality. Money is man’s greatest invention and it is not going away, but we will need to take a hard look at ourselves to find the truth. I think that in doing so, we will come to understand that everyone’s well-being is dependent on complete transperancy and public information. Don’t buy low or sell high — be real.