I feel bad for him a bit, because this seems to be a career-ender. Of course, I feel worse for anyone who listened to his investment advice as regards Bear Stearns. It occurs to me — but I’m an idiot;……

“Now what kind of an attitude is that — these things happen. They only happen because the whole country is just full of people who, when these things happen, they just say, “These things happen.” And that’s why they happen!”

Drive down and dig it up. Dig it all up.

The banking and financial system had stabilized by 1931 when many European nations abandoned the Gold Standard. Instead of letting gold float, the Fed attempted to defend the dollar as gold reserves left the country. The result was a second liquidity crisis that resulted in a nationwide banking collapse. Had the Fed provided liquidity instead of defending the dollar the Great Depression in the United States would have just been a long period of slow growth.

Chairman Bernecke has done his homework and at least for now will not sacrifice liquidity for a higher priced dollar. If he sticks to his guns Europe will end up paying the price for its slow economic growth as a high Euro deinstrialized the continent.

Cramer was just on Erin Burnett’s show and said he wasn’t talking about staying in BSC stock, he was talking about keeping your money in the bank. Yeah right.

The question was about having money in the bank, but the graphic showed stock quotes. I don’t know about this one. I think Cramer is trying to cover his ass, but he might be telling the truth.

I bet he cringes every time he has to rewatch this clip.

Roebuck on March 17, 2008 at 11:42 AM

So does the guy that wrote in and listened to him.

Cramer got royally screwed up the wazoo by the management of Bear Stearns as did every other investor in Bear.

This is why there are disclaimers on “advice” shows.

have you ever seen that disclaimer? it rolls on and on — almost appears as a joke, but very real.

entertainment/advice shows are a joke and should always be avoided (include the oprah and dr. phil in there).

If the Fed hadn’t been involved in the 1998 LTCM crises then we might not have had the internet bubble. A recession at that time which took down a big money center bank would have made everyone a little more wary of funding stupid internet start ups. There is a reason for economic cycles. We need to calm the animal spirits of capitalism every once and a while with a crash. Having put that off for at least since 1987 we now have a lot of debt and leverage which needs to be worked off.

There is no quick and easy solution to this problem. It is probably too big for the Fed to handle. Just like the WW I was known as the Great War, the Great Depression will be known as World Depression I.

HawaiiLwyr on March 17, 2008 at 12:17 PM

Yeah, who can believe any of them. Like the guys telling me a year ago that gold would double or triple in the next few years. What a load of crap that was eh?

Soulsirkus Public Safety Announcement….

Yo Rappers beware, the new worth of those gold teeth in your mouth just may get you iced, straight up dog!

There is no doubt that it was good policy to prevent a run on the banks. Ultimately, the merger of Bear Sterns & JP Morgan is a good thing, because it prevents bankruptcy of Bear Sterns, which would unravel billions of financial transactions and cause a crash to the market. Yes, a crash.

That said, the Fed should beware of its open-door policy towards lending, because it is already creating inflation. Milk is more expensive than ever before. So is corn, meat, eggs, gas & oil, and other basic commodities. Federal policy is exacerbating the problem, by promoting the mis-use of those products (corn is being used for ethonal instead of feed for cows).

The problem is, you have to massage the economy so that the failures fail, without allowing them to crash the entire system. In this environment, it’s almost guaranteed that inflation will occur. You can’t get banks to lend unless cash is cheap, but cheap cash will cause inflation.

Sydney Carton on March 17, 2008 at 11:42 AM

The only good spot in this disaster is that we can pay down debt with inflated dollars. If the high price of goods and services doesn’t suck them up. Catch-22.

When these so-called experts would call me on the phone recommending some investment vehicle that has typically been paying a 7-8% return all I had to ask was, “Will you guarantee that rate of return?”. The conversation would always end at that point.