12.16.07

Good Riddance Smart Money Magazine - A Smart Money Review

Posted in Book Reviews, Investing, Rants at 11:19 pm

Dear Smart Money Magazine Editors,

For three years, I’ve been a loyal subscriber and reader of Smart Money Magazine. It was always a well-written magazine with solid advice. The articles and stock picks were often winners, and the writers always gave compelling arguments and entertaining insight.

However, over these years, I’ve come to watch your magazine turn into a pile of non-technical financial fluff with egregious amounts of cardboard inserts, advertisement-fueled centerfolds, and consumer-driven spending spree recommendations.

I could handle the tripling of cardboard inserts and ads over the past year. My first mission upon opening a newly arrived Smart Money was to tear out all cardboard and throw it away. Seriously though, if I’m a subscriber to your magazine, how many damned business reply mail cards do I need to re-subscribe to the mag? Isn’t one enough?

I could also handle the annoying centerfold-style articles that span four pages so that Smart Money can sell monstrous ads to Genworth Financial and T. Rowe Price. But as much as I love looking like a complete jackass while gawking over an enormous centerfold on a crowded airplane, I prefer to keep my centerfolds in magazines that do NOT sport pictures of Ben Bernanke.

However, the tipping point for my frustration with your publication came in the December 2007, with the cover article Best of Everything — 9 New Splurges You Deserve.

Let me tell you Smart Money hypocrites something - if I am subscribed to something titled Smart Money Magazine, chances are that I don’t want to read your recommendations for a 3,450 dollar fucking watch. How dare you insult me with your half-assed third of a page to recommend plasma TVs! And I certainly don’t need you telling me where to get a road bike or silk scarves of all things. You call this SMART money?

If I want to find the best television, guess where the last place I’m going to look for advice is: that’s right, a financial magazine. If I needed a buying guide, I would go get Consumer Fucking Reports, not your joke of a monthly publication.

So essentially, the money I’ve paid you this past year to give me financial advice has gone towards receiving advertisements and learning how to piss away my money on your recommended product-placement-driven luxary goods?

Well guess what Smart Money - I’m done with you. My subscription ended with that December edition and you will not be receiving any more money from me. Good luck with your spa bathrobe recommendations to your moron customers who sit in debt while I read how to actually properly SAVE money from your competition.

Sincerely,
Mike Roberto
Hermosa Beach, CA

So I’m now on a mission to find a REAL financial magazine, something with real technical analysis, a worldview, written and edited by people who aren’t complete sell-outs. I’m currently thinking of getting The Economist, which is an England-based weekly news magazine. Despite being less financial-based, having four times the content will more than make up for Smart Money’s monthly blundering babble.

Any recommendations would be appreciated.

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11.06.06

Book Review: The Broker, by John Grisham

Posted in Book Reviews at 11:31 pm

Prior to this story, Joel Backman was a high rolling lawyer until he tried to broker a deal to sell software to the world’s most powerful satellite surveillance system. He got caught and put in prison and the software was hidden. However, the U.S. government wants his death or that information. After six years in solitary, the CIA director gets the lame duck President to pardon Backman, making him available with a nice target on his chest.

So this book is written by Grisham. This means that it’s a good story, well-told, and will keep your attention (for the most part). However, I can’t believe that this is one of Grisham’s better writings.

First, the plot is a bit too far-fetched. But it’s passable because it’s about a smart, sleazy lawyer who can figure anything out and the US government who is capable of anything.

Second, the book is predictable. I’m sure the Grisham fans knew every single twist and turn, because I could guess the majority of them and this is only my second book of his.

Third, a weak love subplot was awkwardly inserted into the story, as if Grisham was forced into doing it. Expect no details from it.

And fourth, the ending leaves much to be desired, a bit too open-ended, and generally flat.

However, it’s still a good story, so if you are ridiculously bored and have nothing better to read on an airplane, go grab this one. Not every book can be ridiculous like A Confederacy of Dunces, and it’s a decent, easy read.

I’d like to thank Coleman for this book. When I got home from my trip to Columbus, I promptly ordered him A Confederacy of Dunces off of half.com

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10.28.06

Book Review - A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole

Posted in Book Reviews at 1:50 am

Every now and then, a book comes by, rocks your world, and completely shakes your foundations by changing the way you think.

A Confederacy of Dunces is not one of those books – but it’s close.

John Kennedy Toole simply fascinated me with this book. The dialogue, vocabulary, humor, and character development are simply unequaled. You have to read it to believe it.

However, just because it’s such an amazing read doesn’t mean that you’ll get a whole lot out of it, other than entertainment. Go ahead and read the reviews on Amazon.com – you will quickly realize that everybody loves this book, but nobody knows what in the hell it’s about.

My best way to describe A Confederacy of Dunces is that it’s a story about a man who is unfit (in all senses of the word) for society who gets thrust straight into our cultural beast – and loads of ridiculousness and shenanigans ensue.

Ignatius J. Reilly, our protagonist, is an obese man with a world-view that is simply out of this world. While this filthy thirty-year-old man who lives with his mother isn’t stirring trouble at his newly-found occupations, he’s busy writing his memoirs and obsessing over his pyloric valve.

The dialogue is simply ridiculous. Here are a few chosen passages:

“She appears to have been knocked a bit in her life already. Up rather than down. If she ever nears me, however, the direction will be reversed.”

And from the end of the famous opening paragraph:

In the shadow under the green visor of the cap Ignatius J. Reilly’s supercilious blue and yellow eyes looked down upon the other people waiting under the clock at the D.H. Holmes department store, studying the crowd of people for signs of bad taste in dress. Several of the outfits, Ignatius noticed, were new enough and expensive enough to be properly considered offenses against taste and decency. Possession of anything new or expensive only reflected a person’s lack of theology and geometry; it could even cast doubts upon one’s soul.

The subplots weave together in such a manner that it makes Seinfeld look like a woman’s social.

The most unfortunate part of this book is that John Kennedy Toole committed suicide before he could get it published. Toole fell into depression after the manuscript was rejected due to it “not being about anything” (which it’s really not). It was only noticed after Toole’s mother found it under his bed and pressed for a Professor Walker Percy at Tulane to get it published. It is a shame that we do not have more of Toole’s writings out there.

If you’re a serious person (and I assume you’re not since you’re reading my blog), then don’t read this book. Go read 7 Habits or some offensive tripe like that.

But if you’re looking for a good read that is completely out of left field, and perhaps lacks a bit of taste and decency, then I implore you to read A Confederacy of Dunces.

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09.15.06

My First Book Review: Freakonomics, by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner

Posted in Book Reviews at 1:08 am

I’ll be first to admit that I have no clue how to write a book review, and this contains “spoilers”, if there is such a thing in a non-fiction book. You’ve been warned.

Freakonomics claims to have no unifying theme, but I actually have found the unifying theme, and I’ll get to that at the end.

But first, let’s get started with the content:

Content Review (spoilers)

“A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything” you say? Wow, everything?! How does he do that in a 207 page book?

I was unaware that “everything” only meant cheating, the KKK, real-estate, drug-dealing, abortion, and parenting!

1. Introduction

   The introduction of this book starts out strong and grabbed my attention. The Steves began to discuss how abortion and crime rates are related. Now this is something new – and politically incorrect, might I add. My style.

   For the record, I will call the authors “The Steves”, since they are named Steven and the more offensively-spelled Stephen.

2. Chapter 1

   So at this point, we’re excited, and chapter 1 drops this bomb on us: people cheat! You don’t say, Steves?! Tell us more!
   

   Oh, they go on to clarify: underpaid teachers whose pay increases depend on their students’ standardized test scores are the ones who cheat! Well no shit guys, I never thought of that!
   

   And sumo wrestlers who have nothing to lose cheat to help a friend out? Dear God I’m so glad you spent an entire chapter dedicated to this garbage.

   The one good thing is that this chapter helps call out the ridiculousness of standardized testing, which is always a good thing. Disappointed but still eager, let’s head over to chapter 2.

3. Chapter 2

   Let me sum up this chapter in three big words for you so that you don’t have to waste your life reading it: INFORMATION IS POWER.

   Really?! Thanks Steves – Let’s just hope you didn’t melt your computers running Minitab figuring that one out.

   Now, this is the point where our most intelligent readers are done with this book and try to find some other use for it. For people like you, I’ll help fill you in on the rest of the story because have a general taste for misery.

4. Chapter 3

   Chapter 3 explains to us white folk that drug dealers still live with their mom because they don’t make any money. We white folk are, after all, the audience of this book.

   This is actually the only well-written chapter, and contains a good element of suspense. I was truly interested in reading the story about Vankatesh, a student at the University of Chicago who went to live with gangsters. I wonder if Vankatesh has written a full text about this because it would be pretty cool. As long as he’s not as boring of a writer as Dubner.

   Everything that’s interesting here has almost nothing to do with economics. But that’s beside the point – when you’re writing a shitty book that’s centered around one idea, you need to write something interesting to get your readers to your main argument.

5. Chapter 4

   Ahhh, here it is! “Where Have All the Criminals Gone?”

   This chapter is based off of Levitt’s ground-breaking study that linked the Roe vs. Wade decision with a sharp decline in US crime rates a couple decades later. This study was written by Levitt in 2001, which you can credit for making his career. It can be found here:
   
   http://pricetheory.uchicago.edu/levitt/Papers/DonohueLevittTheImpactOfLegalized2001.pdf

   I have to credit Levitt for two things – first, discovering this when nobody else did. Pure genius. And second, for having the balls to publish it. We all know that it’s not fun to get in between the pro-choice vs. pro-life argument. Steve, you not only got in between it, you dropped a nuclear bomb on it. Cheers to you for this!

6. Chapter 5

   The next chapter, “What Makes the Perfect Parent”, spins its wheels and goes nowhere for basically the whole time. Not that I’m surprised at this point.

   What this points out is that GENERALLY, smart parents create smart children. For someone who studies genetics in my spare time, I am not surprised. For those of you living in Kansas, sorry to break it to you.

   However, this chapter points out some studies stating that a child’s peers actually have a greater effect on school performance than the parents behavior. Then they completely drop the idea. Way to go, fellas.

   Listen up, my friends. There have been thousands of books, papers, debates, and so on that are about the nature vs. nurture battle. Do you think that these two guys can solve it in 29 double-spaced pages? Give me a break.

7. Chapter 6

   And finally, the last chapter. Get this jaw-dropper – African Americans like to name their children differently than whitey!

   Now, I know this book was written for unenlightened gringos from the suburbs who have nothing better to read at the airport during their corporate business trips, but I’m pretty sure we had a handle on that whole idea.

   But in come the Steves, who need to tell us about the “Blackness” of certain names (yes, they do actually use the term “blackness”, I shit you not).

So that’s your Freakonomics in a nutshell.

As an engineer whose taken my share of statistical courses, this book is completely disappointing. Sure, they show some percentages, but I want DATA. Prove your claims! Show easy-to-read graphs! Is it that hard to use Minitab or Excel? Come on

As for the book, it has no flow, is far too dry for me, and most information in it just made me think “so what?”

No Unifying Theme?

I disagree that there is no unifying theme to this book. In fact, there is definitely a unifying theme to this book. And that theme is this:

People who are unwilling to raise a child, or are just plain stupid, should stop reproducing.

After all, all the data suggests it. They just don’t come out and say it. What makes a perfect parent is a smart parent who wants to be a parent. Those who knew they were unfit parents, or just wanted to keep spreading their legs around the block, no longer need to infect our gene pool any more than they’ve already infected it with their own being.

And parents in California who name their kid Shithead (yes, this is cited in the book) will yield children who don’t likely stand a chance. No offense to all of you Shitheads out there, I’m just generalizing as always.

So that’s your unifying theme. Because statistically speaking, if you are in the criteria above, your child’s life will suck. But of course, those are just generalizations.

But I do agree with it.

Conclusion

So why in the hell is this book such a best-seller? Here’s what I think:

• 10% of readers who are actually intelligent will think this book is a total joke, and most likely not finish it.
  
• 60% of readers will go bonkers reading this book, thinking that they have become enlightened to the ways of “everything” in the world. They will think that they can now teach a class on statistics, and will recommend it to every other idiot they run into at the airport because it’s changed the way they perceive life or some other nonsense.
  
• 20% of reading this book will be so disgusted because they can’t handle the fact that it’s actually a legit pro-choice argument, or that their kid is going to turn out to be an idiot no matter how hard they try.
  
• 10% of readers will just have no fucking clue what’s going on and give up after “regression analysis” is first mentioned.
  

The 60% group will obviously cause lots of people to buy this book, and the 20% will bitch so much that it will get more people to buy it as well (no publicity is bad publicity). Hence, you can see the mob of morons putting this one on the NYT best seller list.

If you can’t figure out what group I’m in, then I haven’t done my job.

As for the authors, we can only conclude that THEIR children will most likely be extremely smart, but terrible writers who are out to rip Americans off.

3.5/10

Comments and hate mail welcome

-berto

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