Jim Cramer responds to WH, Stewart and Rich.

[Ignignokt]

If it is true of what he said, it only confirms the su ion of the WH team of being too thin skinned, and of the sorry political hackery (if such a word) that is Jon Stewart, who passes out propaganda under the guise of his show being a comedy gag.

http://www.mainstreet.com/article/mo...stewart?page=4

Posted March 09, 2009 Cramer Takes on the White House, Frank Rich and Jon Stewart
By Jim Cramer
Suddenly, bloggers, opinion people, columnists and, yes, pundits who haven't paid attention to anything I have been saying or writing for the past 18 months are all over me. Suddenly, I find myself in the center of a firestorm over Obama's economic policies, taking enfilading fire from the "liberal" media (from serious columnist Frank Rich to entertainer Jon Stewart) while being defended by Rush Limbaugh, the standard-bearer for the Republicans.

I'm uncomfortable being in the crosshairs of columnists and comedians I enjoy, and I find the embrace of Rush Limbaugh most certainly strange if not an hetical to many of my viewpoints.


So, why after toiling in the cable wilderness for four years with Mad Money am I the target of the wrath of the Obama clan, and the darling, albeit surely momentary, of the Obama-critics? After all, my criticism of Obama's handling of the economic crisis is a lot less pointed than my withering August 2007 "They Know Nothing" meltdown against the previous regime's handling of the economic crisis. Then, I advocated a swift slashing of interest rates by the Federal Reserve and a concomitant policy for potential widespread banking failures that were sure to come because of the Republican administration's pernicious laissez-faire at ude toward Wall Street.

The answer lies in the way the two adminis

When Paulson and Geithner wrongly euthanized Lehman Brothers, the consequences pretty much spelled the end of finance as we know it. Saving Lehman was well within their capacity, even though they refuse to admit it or say it was even a mistake. The markets have never recovered.

Their hands-off policies ended after Lehman. Two days later, when worries about moral hazard went out the window, they did a total about-face and began what is now an endless bailout of AIG (Stock Quote: AIG).


Nevertheless, they never questioned their beliefs and therefore never answered to anyone -- Congress, the press or the pundits -- so sure were they that everything was fine and things would work out well in the end.

President Obama's team, unlike Bush's team, demonstrates a thinness of skin that shocks me. When I somewhat obviously and empirically judged that the populist Obama administration is exacerbating the crisis with its budget and policies, as evidenced by the incredible decline in the averages since his inauguration, I was met immediately with condescension and ridicule rather than constructive debate or even just benign dismissal. I said to myself, "What the heck? Are they really that blind to the Great Wealth Destruction they are causing with their decisions to demonize the bankers, raise taxes for the wealthy, advocate draconian cap-and-trade policies and upend the health care system? Do they really believe that only the rich own stocks? What do they think we have our retirement accounts in, CDs? Where did they think that the money saved for college went, our mattresses? Do they think the great middle class banks at the First National Bank of Sealy and only the wealthiest traffic in the Standard & Poor's 500?"

They exacerbated their insensitivity when President Obama proclaimed that he wasn't worried about the averages, dismissing them as traffic polls that go up and down in the short term. Ah, if only they went up occasionally and not down endlessly then I would believe the President's logic.

Don't get me wrong, Obama was dealt a terrible hand by the previous croupier. But this administration's handling of the banking crisis, something that has brought Citigroup (Stock Quote: C), Bank of America (Stock Quote: BAC), Wells Fargo (Stock Quote: WFC) and even JPMorgan Chase (Stock Quote: JPM) to their knees, has been devastating. The indecision of Geithner, who has floated to the media every single idea in his head, only to announce none orally, has created a vacuum that has allowed short-sellers to dictate policy.


As someone who just wants to help people preserve capital and help it appreciate when the time comes when it is not too risky to do so, I am appalled at the attack and badly want to engage in the issues and tone down the rhetoric. What's the point? The country's in crisis. We need to stop the lurching nationalization of banks, something that's come about because the Treasury and the Federal Reserve have not been able to regain control of the banking system from the short-sellers who seek to wipe out the common equity and "win" by placing all banks in receivership.

The pundits won't engage in the merits of, say, favoring Tier 1 capital for the banks vs. common equity, or forbearing on the banks to work the situation out over time because the banks can be profitable if we have some patience. They just attack me.

[Ignignokt]

Take Frank Rich and Jon Stewart. Both seize on the urban legend that I recommended Bear Stearns the week before it collapsed, even though I was saying that I thought it could be worthless as soon as the following week. I did tell an emailer that his deposit in his account at Bear Stearns was safe, but through a clever sound bite, Stewart, and subsequently Rich -- neither of whom have bothered to listen to the context of the pulled quote -- pass off the notion of account safety as an out-and-out buy recommendation. The absurdity astounds me. If you called Mad Money and asked me about Citigroup, I would tell you that the common stock might be worthless, but I would never tell you to pull your money out of the bank because I was worried about its solvency. Your money is safe in Citi as I said it was in Bear. The fact that I was right rankles me even more. I never said the same thing about Lehman, where your accounts weren't safe. I expect a skewering from the comedian Stewart. I was shocked, however, that the rigorous Rich wouldn't investigate further and relied on the show's truncation of the truth. After all, how many times were the pull quotes from reviews by Rich used against him when he may have been panning a play in his former role as entertainment critic?


Rich also chastises me for endorsing Wachovia's stock after then-CEO Bob Steel came on Mad Money and spoke positively about the bank. Was I taken in? Yes, and I made a mistake. I apologized both on Mad Money and on the Today Show for believing in Steel. But others say I have been too hard on myself given that the Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating Steel's appearance on my show for truthfulness. I chalk it up to something different: Sometimes you just get had.

After the White House briefing, Rush Limbaugh defended me as a wayward leftist who has seen the light. I am always glad to have any allies and defenders, but I do favor almost all of Obama's agenda, right down to having the rich pay more of their freight in this great country. It's just not the right time. We need to declare a war on unemployment and solve it before we let it get out of hand. We need to stop house-price depreciation. Neither the pork-laden stimulus plan nor the confusing mortgage proposal put forward by Obama will defeat either enemy. When Obama trounces both unemployment and house-price depreciation, he will have the power to enact anything he wants. But all the initiatives he wants to rush, like tax hikes, changes in health care, tinkering with the mortgage deduction -- good grief, right now in the midst of the worst housing downturn ever -- and the tough cap-and-trade rules, will derail any chance we have of turning this economy around. Instead, they put the Second Great Depression smack on the nation's table. The markets thought he could stop it; hence the giant relief rally when he was elected. But in fewer than 50 days of his ascendancy, the markets' hopes were totally dashed and the averages are now forecasting the worst decline since the Great Depression. As someone who listens to what the averages are screaming, I think they are accurately predicting the future.


I welcome any serious exchange with the administration on the issues that are not beyond my ken: fixing house price depreciation, stopping the destruction of wealth as demonstrated by the stock market's plunge, and solving the banking crisis before we nationalize every bank

(Oh, and memo to Bill Maher: Stop insulting my faux great-great-uncle Vlad Lenin. I am using him to dramatize the point of a failed nationalization and confiscation of the banks at the hands of the people. It is funny how the right is certainly very civil as my old friends and new allies as of last week, Fred Barnes and Sean Hannity, don't hold my left wing social view against me when they talk about my criticism of the president! I always love anyone from Fox on the team because they are fierce in their defense with much less gratuitous slamming.)


It's time to get serious. It's time to take the issue from the pundits and from the left and right, and put it where it belongs: serious non-ideological debate to put out the real firestorm, the collapse of the economy from Wall Street to Main Street and the ensuing Great Wealth Destruction for all.

But if it stays ad hominem, we will all be betrayed and the train wreck will become inevitable.

[MiamiHeat]

i forgot how to read 1/3 of the way in.

[Ignignokt]

i forgot how to read 1/3 of the way in.

That's ok, take a break. Dip your head in some ice bowl and let it cool down. and read the bolded part on my second post.

[Bartleby]

[ChumpDumper]

He is, of course, not as wrong as others say he is and not as right as he says he is.

I don't know why he built a strawman about banks in the Soviet Union at the end there, and there is no reason to stop the depreciation of housing in most areas - it was overvalued in the first place.

[RandomGuy]

Of course Stewart replied last night and admitted he was wrong about the exact timing of Cramer's buy recommendation.

He then pulled out an interview clip from about 7 weeks prior to the collapse in which Cramer very clearly and very clearly in context recommended the out of the stock.

Oops.

[RandomGuy]

http://www.businessinsider.com/jon-s...r-again-2009-3



Stewart doesn't seem to harbor much love for CNBC.

Let the smack-a-thon continue. This is entertaining.

[Ignignokt]

Of course Stewart replied last night and admitted he was wrong about the exact timing of Cramer's buy recommendation.

He then pulled out an interview clip from about 7 weeks prior to the collapse in which Cramer very clearly and very clearly in context recommended the out of the stock.

Oops.

So again, another cheap shot, we don't know the situation the weeks that's two months in advance, things went down pretty quick.

All stewart did was issue a false apology, damn the truth or the situation, SCOREBOARD!

[Winehole23]

So again, another cheap shot, we don't know the situation the weeks that's two months in advance, things went down pretty quick.

Orly?

Bear Stearns: Timeline to disaster

Peter Stiff




June 14, 2007 – Bear Stearns reports second quarter profits down 10 per cent to $486 million.



June 22, 2007 - Bear Stearns pledges up to $3.2 billion in loans to bail out two hedge funds hit by subprime losses and investor redemptions.



July 19, 2007 – Bear Stearns writes to clients informing them that two of its hedge funds now contain “very little” or “effectively no value” for investors.



August 1, 2007 – Two Bear Stearns hedge funds file for bankruptcy and another has its assets frozen following mortgage-related losses.



September 20, 2007 – Bear Stearns reports third quarter profit down 61 per cent to $171 million



October 4, 2007 – James Cayne, chief executive at Bear Stearns, said: “Most of our businesses are beginning to rebound."



Alan Schwartz, president at Bear Stearns said: "The market is in the “very early stages” of a recovery."



October 22, 2007 - Bear Stearns secures an agreement with CITIC, the state-owned Chinese lender, under which both will invest $1 billion in each other. The Wall Street bank agrees to buy $1 billion of debt in CITIC.
In turn, CITIC will gain a 6 per cent stake in Bear Stearns for the Chinese group's $1 billion investment with an option to buy a further 3.9 per cent share of the US investment bank.



November 28, 2007 – Bear Stearns announces it will cut 650 jobs, or 4 per cent of its global work force.



December 20, 2007 – Bear Stearns posts fourth quarter loss of $854 million after mortgage related writedowns of $1.9 billion. It is the first quarterly loss in its 85-year history.



December 20, 2007 - Barclays sues Bear Stearns for allegedly misleading the UK bank over the performance of two collapsed hedge funds that were used as collateral for a $400 million loan.



December 28, 2007 – Mr Cayne sells $15.4 million of the bank’s stock over the month.



January 9, 2008 – Mr Cayne resigns as chief executive of the company, but stays as chairman, and Mr Schwartz takes over.



March 10, 2008 – Bear Stearns stated that there is absolutely no truth to the rumours of liquidity problems that circulated today in the market.
Mr Schwartz said: "Bear Stearns' balance sheet, liquidity and capital remain strong."



March 12, 2008 – Mr Schwartz said: “We don’t see any pressure on our liquidity, let alone a liquidity crisis.



"We are in constant dialogue with all the major dealers, and I have not been made aware of anybody not taking our credit. None of that speculation is true.”



March 14, 2008 - Bear Stearns confirms it has secured a funding agreement JP Morgan Chase and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

[Winehole23]

Reconsider, Iggy?

[Ignignokt]

Reconsider, Iggy?

yeah, totally wrong. agree.

Now to random guy's post.

Cramer's first qoute taken out of context was about telling the guy that his funds in his accounts were safe.

So stewart had the timing and the context incorrect.

I guess the lesson is Cramer is a bad prognosticator, and Stewart is still a hack.

second.

In Defense Of Jim Cramer
By Hamilton Nolan, 10:15 AM on Mon Mar 17 2008, 12,864 views
"Bear Stearns is not in trouble!" Jim Cramer, CNBC's bug-eyed "Mad Money" host who is to finance what Carrot Top is to comedy, shouted last Tuesday. "Don't move your money from Bear! That's just being silly." The immediate reaction to seeing his advice in the wake of Bear's collapse is: what an idiot. But really, his advice was not bad! Cramer—a famously bad prognosticator—noted that Bear would, at worst, be taken over, meaning those who had money with the firm would have their investments guaranteed by a more deep-pocketed buyer. Which is exactly what happened when JPMorgan bought Bear over the weekend. Note that he was not speaking about Bear's stock price [last Tuesday: over $60. Now: toilet paper]. What have we learned? Only Wild Jim Cramer can stop the collapse of the American economy. Click to watch the crazy savant's ill-fated harangue. [via WJNO]

Read More: Mad Money, Bear Stearns, Cnbc, Doom, INvestors, Jim Cramer, Recession, Top, Wall Street

http://gawker.com/368610/investors-i...r-consequences

[RandomGuy]

So again, another cheap shot, we don't know the situation the weeks that's two months in advance, things went down pretty quick.

All stewart did was issue a false apology, damn the truth or the situation, SCOREBOARD!

You didn't actually watch the daily show clip did you?

Stewart played almost a full minute of the interview in which Cramer recommended the out of the stock itself.

That was fully in context.

The collapse itself did happen fairly quickly, but as the timeline pointed out rather clearly, it should not have been entirely unexpected, given the data from the previous year or two.

There is a reason that financial stocks have taken a massive hit, and the warning signs were there.

Don't get me wrong, no one should expect any expert to be right 100% of the time.

Was it a bit of cheap shot? I tend to think so. It was a bit unfair.

But Stewart does have a point about the cheerleaders like Cramer who should have known better.

Populist, perhaps. Cheap, probably. Inaccurate satire? Not at all.

[RandomGuy]

yeah, totally wrong. agree.

Now to random guy's post.

Cramer's first qoute taken out of context was about telling the guy that his funds in his accounts were safe.

So stewart had the timing and the context incorrect.

I guess the lesson is Cramer is a bad prognosticator, and Stewart is still a hack.

second.




http://gawker.com/368610/investors-i...r-consequences

Stewart admitted he initially got the bit wrong. That is definitely NOT hack behavior is it?

The distinction was between saying that you shouldn't gank your cash out of bear stearns accounts, as they were insured and probably would end up getting some backing from whoever bought out stearns and the recommendation of the stock itself.

I would have agreed that ganking your money out was not really necessary, but no ing way would I have said to invest in any ins ution holding mortgage backed securities to any large extent.

[ploto]

Cramer is making Stewart's job so easy by getting all offended by him.

[ploto]

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/in...sonality-clash

[balli]

Jon Stewart, who passes out propaganda under the guise of his show being a comedy gag.

I don't watch or like his show, but what Jon Stewart does isn't propagandize. He ing eviscerates people with their own hypocrisy. I'm not going to say that he isn't out to shape or influence people's political beliefs, but he never lies when he's doing it. And usually the thing he's railing against is so obviously egregious, that truly context doesn't matter. Though the Cramer intervoew was contextual.

In any event, neverminding that Stewart's been dead on about him, WTF would you go out of your way to defend Jim ing Cramer's honor? He's a hack cnbc stock analyst who spends his days screaming and banging buttons on a soundboard? You couldn't spend your energy on anything better than defending a guy like that.

[Destro]

Jon Stewart is on a network called COMEDY CENTRAL, why are "news" people caring so much about it. He has a parody newscast

[Nbadan]

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/in...sonality-clash

Comedy gold!

[Bartleby]

Jon Stewart is the proverbial tar baby. The more you try to hit him the worse you make it for yourself.

[DarrinS]

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/in...sonality-clash

I gotta admit, that was ing hilarious.

[boutons_]

Busted: CNBC Sleaze Jim Cramer Blabs on How He Shorted Stocks and Manipulated Markets



By Julie Satow , Huffington Post
Posted on March 12, 2009, Printed on March 12, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/htt...t.com//131334/

In light of the current economic crisis, and with the hullabaloo ignited recently by Jon Stewart over the accuracy of CNBC's reporting, we thought it might be useful to revisit this shocking 2006 interview Jim Cramer gave to TheStreet.com's Aaron Task.

In it, the host of Mad Money says he regularly manipulated the market when he ran his hedge fund. He calls it "a fun game, and it's a lucrative game." He suggests all hedge fund managers do the same. "No one else in the world would ever admit that, but I could care. I am not going to say it on TV," he quips in the video.

He also calls Wall Street Journal reporters "bozos" and says behaving illegally is okay because the SEC doesn't understand it anyway.

Here are some gems:

-On manipulating the market: "A lot of times when I was short at my hedge fund, and I was positioned short, meaning I needed it down, I would create a level of activity before hand that could drive the futures,"

-On falsely creating the impression a stock is down (what he calls "fomenting"): "You can't foment. That's a violation... But you do it anyway because the SEC doesn't understand it." He adds, "When you have six days and your company may be in doubt because you are down, I think it is really important to foment."

-On the truth: "What's important when you are in that hedge fund mode is to not be doing anything that is remotely truthful, because the truth is so against your view - it is important to create a new truth to develop a fiction," Cramer advises. "You can't take any chances."
Watch it:

( follow the link below to see video)

Editor's Update: Former Virginia Representative Tom Davis apparently wants Cramer "looked at" for market manipulation:

"I think he's become a poster child for why hedge funds need more regulation and transparency," former Virginia Representative Tom Davis told CNN on Thursday.

Davis's remarks were sparked by a video from 2006, which has now gone viral, in which Mad Money host Cramer explained on his own website how he could influence stock prices as a hedge fund manager.

"You take a bunch of stocks and make sure that they're higher," Cramer suggests in the video. "Maybe commit five billion in capital to it. ... No one else in the world would ever admit that, but I don't care."

When asked, "Is any of this illegal?" Davis replied, "It wasn't, but it should be."

"He may well have crossed the line," Davis continued. "I think that's something somebody ought to be looking at. I think the tragedy is, over the last few years, nobody's been looking at this at all"

Davis, a moderate Republican, served as chairman of the House Government Reform Committee from 2003 to 2007, when it was known for exercising almost no oversight of the Bush administration.

CNBC declined to comment on Davis's remarks, but CNN obtained a statement from Cramer saying, "No one knows and respects the securities laws more than I do. ... When I was a hedge fund trader in the 1990's, I played fair and I did nothing that violated those laws."

© 2009 Huffington Post All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/htt...t.com//131334/

[MannyIsGod]

I'm watching him on the Daily Show right now and its absolutely pathetic. Say what you will about Jon Stewart, but if the ing regular news channels would be doing this job he woudln't have to. This is really ing sad. Cramer should be the poster child of how these ers are too short sighted to operate without regulation.

[MannyIsGod]

[ChumpDumper]

Man, that was brutal. Cramer lost the second he appeared with his sleeves rolled up to his shoulders.