Financial Talk Show Circuit

The recent weird action in gold, namely that its price has not risen despite every reason to rise, has people angrily writing to me and saying, “Dear Worthless Mogambo Moron (WMM), You are always telling us that we are stupid unless we own a lot of gold, silver and oil; so I bought some, just like you said to do, but they are not going straight up in a zooming price rise like I want, and so what else do you recommend so that I can make some real money, real fast, besides this gold-silver-oil loser idea of yours that ain’t doing me much good and now I am wondering who the stupid one really is? (signed) Disgruntled in Canada.”

Firstly, I would recommend that Mr./Ms. Disgruntled stop reading my Stupid Mogambo Crapo (SMC) immediately, firstly because it indicates a woeful lack of sophistication in choice of reading material, because if they think that I can, or could, come up with something new that nobody else in the last 4,500 years has thought of, instead of just gold, silver and energy, I sure as hell would!

And I’d tell everyone else how to do it, too! I’d get a Nobel Prize for sure! And then I’d be famous as we all became rich, rich, rich on my new, wonderful investment idea!

And I would be on TV, making the rounds of the talk shows and hobnobbing with Oprah, or Ellen, or Dave, Jay, or Regis, or maybe even Kelly Ripa, especially Kelly Ripa, who would be there with those high heels and a short skirt, all beautiful smiles and legs, and she would ask me a question about how insane levels of government deficit-spending and insane levels of money-creation by the Federal Reserve will produce horrendous price inflation that will destroy us, perhaps something along the lines of, “What do you see in the future, oh Grand And Wonderful Mogambo (GAWM)? And do not hesitate to tell me the truth just because you sense danger to your male ego because you are so near me like this, and you are overwhelmed by my throbbing, consuming sexuality that would dwarf and overpower anything you could muster, even on your best day!”

I would, of course, reply, “Kelly, I say this not as a guy who is perpetually ‘hot’ for you and actually has secret fantasies about you wherein you do bad, naughty things that I want you to do, and you end up wanting to do them, too, and then asking to do them, then panting to do them, then demanding to do them and, in the end, down on your hands and knees begging to do them, but, instead, I will answer you as a professional economist of international renown whose expertise and brilliance has never been questioned – never! – without a response from me (e.g. ‘You’re an idiot, Mogambo!’ and I reply ‘Yeah? Well, screw you!’). So it is with that kind of towering authority that I tell you to buy gold, silver and oil stocks, Kelly, because the truth is that there is no way to make debt disappear except to pay it or default on it!”

Whether or not you can tell from looking at me, I am kind of disgruntled myself, in that I would love to be able to find a way to make debt disappear without paying or defaulting, and then everyone would love me, and I would love to be idolized by an adoring public, but that ain’t going to happen, either, and in fact the only thing I have going for me is that I have gold, silver and oil, because whereas everybody hates me and things seem to be so hard because hateful people sabotage my every move while stabbing me in the back like the treacherous vipers I always knew they were, “Whee! This investing stuff is easy!”

The Mogambo Guru
for The Daily Reckoning

The Daily Reckoning