Don't Just Blindly Enter the Markets

If there is one thing I talk about all the time wherever I write, it is about the importance of understanding and participating in the stock market. I talk about it as much as I do because I think being in the stock market trumps all other means of income and wealth building, aside from owning your own successful enterprise.

But there is a caveat to this that I often do not have the space to dig into more deeply, but it as important as my advice to understand and participate in the stock market, and that's to make sure that you know what you are doing when you decide to invest your money.

It's not unlike many things we do in life. We can't just blindly step into something and expect to have an instant good outcome. Knowledge is everything when it comes to not only saving your money but also investing your money.

The thing to keep in mind is that, generally speaking, the stock market is not all that complicated a place. Granted, some may find it a bit scary. Some may believe that it's rigged against the little guy. Some people think it's not a place to make money, but to lose it.

You can learn it.

A great book to read, if you have not already, which is often considered the Bible of Investing is The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham, the man who was the mentor for Warren Buffet and a lot of the ideas he has about what to look for in a company—and essentially how to invest.

I will contend that it is not an end all be all guide. But it is a great book to get started to get your feet wet.

In order to ever be in the money, you must first be in the know. You need to know, when you pick a stock, why you are picking it, and keep in mind in so doing that you are not investing in a stock, but rather you are investing in a company.

What that means is that stocks do things day to day. The interest is not in what a stock does day to day, but what the company does and the value of the company over the long term. Many people get overly cautious or skeptical when a stock moves—they either get scared and sell at a loss, or they sell too soon if the stock suddenly jumps and lose out on the real future value the shares may generate.

It's not as simple as putting a bunch of company names on a dartboard, blindfolding, and simply start tossing darts. It is important to read balance sheets and understand how a company makes money, and how it will either potentially keep on making money or make more money.

It's important to know how a company manages its debt, how much money it keeps in cash, what the costs of operating the business are and what external factors may drive margins up or down. It's important to understand terms like price to earnings, debt to income, EBITDA, and it is important to understand how to compare companies against their peers or to evaluate companies that are similar.

For example, I invest in both Walmart and Amazon. But I invest in them for different reasons. For one, I don't view Amazon, really, as a total retail company like Walmart is. Amazon is much more about distribution and tech, and I think that separates Amazon. Both have lasting value, just in different ways.

For the same reason I invest in Ford Motor Company and Rivian for different reasons.

Granted, you could probably be relatively safe investing in iconic brands that have stood the test of time and likely will for the foreseeable future like Coca-Cola, Kraft Heinz, McDonald's, Proctor & Gamble and things like that. But there are myriad other businesses just as good, with just as much future potential to rocket, that are worth investing in.

You just have to make sure to know what you are doing and do your homework. Due diligence is a tenet of sound investing, and it is key to generating profits that can not only provide future income, replace current income, and generate wealth—but even change the entire way you view money and its benefits.

I think it is vitally important to point all of this out, because the fear I always have is that if people simply go blindly into the markets and then lose their money because they didn't know what they were doing, it will stop them from ever exploring more and they will likely never get ahead or reap the benefits of what the stock market truly offers. Most importantly, to ordinary working folks like you and me.

When I advise people to get into the stock market, I want them to actually succeed. And unfortunately, I can't always take the time to fully explain what it all means, what to look for, and how to actually do it. I also don't like to make investment suggestions, although sometimes I will, because I also feel it is more important for individuals to seek out information on their own, and to have their own perspective and ideas about why Company X is a good investment or not.

A lot of people get it wrong, including me. And you will get it wrong too. But at least you have the goods to understand what you missed because you did your own research in the first place.

At the same time, a lot of people want to rely on brokers or other so-called experts. They watch certain business news programs and want to trust that guys like Jim Cramer know what they are talking about all the time.

Never invest in a company because someone told you it is a good investment. Invest in a company because that's what your own research tells you. If you aren't sure, don't invest until you are. I can't stress that enough.

At the end of the day, it's your money and every penny is important. You work hard to make it, and you work hard to save it. Blindly investing what you have worked hard for and worked hard to save is as much of a waste of money as walking into a casino and expecting a big win or buying a lottery ticket and expecting a big jackpot.

Even a blind man doesn't simply walk blindly. He has the tools and the knowledge to get where he wants to safely be before he ever walks out the door.

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Don't Rush to Buy These Boycotted Companies' Stock

Not so fast, folks. As I work my rounds around the Facebook and Twitter spheres about this controversy faced by several companies over backlash against Pride stuff—Anheuser-Busch, Kohl's, Target and others—it seems the naysayers and deniers of the effectiveness of the boycotts are quick to simply say, "Thanks for the opportunity to make a lot of money buying shares of stock of these beaten down companies."

Normally I would agree with them. And maybe ultimately, they are right. Eventually these companies will make a comeback and perhaps come back stronger. It is certainly not outside the realm of possibility, and things like this do eventually tend to pretty much go away once the heat dies down.

I will say that being an avid and long-time stock market guy, I will certainly be keeping my eyes on it. I don't want to miss any opportunities to make money either. But I think the time is not now. Not immediately. Because I also think this backlash has legs left yet.

It would be best to sit this one out and wait until the fire dies down, the smoke clears, and the ashes have all been cleaned up.

Because this is a different feeling backlash. It's still quite hot. And I don't think consumers are near done with it yet and may not be for some time. Especially when it comes to Anheuser-Busch. Even just the other day when I went to Casey's to pick up a craft beer to share with my brother-in-law, all of the AB InBev beers were untouched while competing brands like Coors Light and Miller Lite were almost completely gone.

Nobody is buying Budweiser, Busch, Busch Light, Bud Light or any other AB beer. And that's the same story at Walmart, Schnucks and everywhere else I have been.

It's different because the fact is that consumers are just very tired of the whole LGBTQ+ thing. As I have said many times on this blog, they've simply had enough of the forceful spoon-feeding of the rhetoric. Not only that, but there's another interesting element here that needs to be considered.

It's the left's reaction to it.

Suddenly the word snowflake is being hijacked and used to describe conservatives. Suddenly, after the left succeeded in kicking Aunt Jemimah pancake syrup off the shelves, destroying iconic logos like the Land 'o Lakes indian and seeing name changes from Uncle Ben's rice to simply Ben's Original, forcing the Washington Redskins to change their name to The Commanders, the left is signaling a "wah-wah-wah" stance against conservatives over beer, and over our stance against the Pride movement.

Apparently, unless you are on the left, you are not allowed to have a position, take a stand, voice an opinion, or otherwise be offended by anything.

The left also makes a mistake to assert that we, the ones opposed to cancel culture, are now engaging in cancel culture. I have pointed out in my arguments that what we are opposed to when it comes to the Pride movement is in fact, in direct opposition to cancel culture.

Because ultimately the LGBTQ+ thing is trying to cancel gender.

This movement on our side against Pride and the LGBTQ+ movement is something that runs quite a bit deeper than other positions in the past—from both sides, frankly. It is an assault on family values. It aims to clutter the minds of children and influence them to question their identity. It pits normal lines of thinking against a societal fringe. And it is attempting to create bigotry where none exists.

If you disagree, you simply hate. And no one likes to be called a hateful bigot when that's not the case at all.

I simply think that there was a final straw on this issue that broke the camel's back, and it is going to take a lot longer than usual to heal the wounds. And for that reason, I am not so sure those discounts offered today are really discounts at all. I don't think they will bear fruit. And even if they one day do, it's going to be a long time to wait for them.

If you are a lefty thinking a pot of gold has been left on your doorstep, you may want to take careful hold of your britches and wait this one out. Because I think not only have you lost the LGBTQ+ fight to attempt to change the status quo of common culture, the companies who have fallen in your court have also fallen out of favor, and there's no guarantee a comeback is coming.

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Dave Ramsey in Some Heat

One day it seems to eventually come that certain faces we know and love have a dark side. To be fair, don't we all? I think it could be safely said that nearly everyone has at least one skeleton tucked away in their closet.

To be fair, it may not even be an example of a dark side or a skeleton in a closet, but there does seem to be another side to financial advice radio talk show guru, Dave Ramsey in light of a recent lawsuit seeking $150 million in damages from a time share exit company he has touted on his show for years, Timeshare Exit Team.

The lawsuit alleges that customers of the company Ramsey endorses has robbed them of tens of thousands of dollars and that the company rarely actually gets people out of their timeshares, but simply pushes customers to simply default on what's due.

That's a far cry from what Ramsey advertises about what Timeshare Exit Team actually does. The company also seems to have found itself in legal trouble before—including in May of 2019 when it was deemed by the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida to be unfair and deceptive. The company was also sued by Washington's attorney general stating that every aspect of Timeshare Exit Team's business was deceptive or unfair.

It would seem that Dave Ramsey would be aware of what a business he promotes does, yet he continues to promote the company on air. And over the years it is estimated that for doing so he has received over $30 million in payments from the company.

Perhaps beneath the surface Ramsey is just an opportunist? Which seems a bit counter to how he advertises himself as a "helper of people," and often cites his Christianity on air and off air. Over the years he has gained quite the following and is loved and admired by many. Thus, he has made a fortune doing this.

I actually listen to Ramsey often and find most of his advice, although some of it a bit on the extreme side, to be informative and useful. I think he is mostly a genuine guy with the right ideas at heart behind what he does.

But he is a businessman, of course, and sometimes in business you do things to simply bring home the bacon. I am not sure there is much wrong with that either, but I do take issue with misleading your listeners and find it puzzling that despite mountains of evidence that Timeshare Exit Team is not an above-board company that he continues to promote it.

But Ramsey is not without other issues against him. He's been sued for discrimination in cases where he fired employees who were unmarried and became pregnant. Certainly a result, likely, of his Christian beliefs, but not necessarily an appropriate workplace policy for any company. It also seems, to me, that's a bit mean-spirited.

The bottom line is that for decades Ramsey has always come off a squeaky clean guy with the best of intentions at heart, and in light of some of these new details, it suggests that behind the helpful face behind the microphone, there may be darker things afoot and perhaps Ramsey is not as much the loveable, likable guy he portrays himself as.

He's got a few skeletons in his closet, some of which are being seen, and it makes you wonder what else lies in the deeper, darker corners of his closet?

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On McCarthy: Obligations Now, Spending Later

Everyone is trying to suggest Speaker Kevin McCarthy rolled over on the debt ceiling debate. Maybe he did? Maybe he didn't. The thing is, getting anything agreed upon on any bill is a tough thing to do on its own. It's when we throw in all these add-ons and ultimatums that we get all tangled up, and processes take longer or shut down.

The key issue, in my opinion, regarding the debt ceiling is that it is about money already spent and making sure we honor our debt obligations. We have to pay our bills regardless of the reality of out of control spending. 

You can't go to Discover and say, "Let's hold my payment until we can talk about spending less." That's just not how it works. You spent the money, the bill has come due, and you have to pay it. Even if the spending was irresponsible or out of line.

McCarthy does assert that the dems are onboard with furthering the discussion to include some welfare reforms, cut spending and slash IRS funding. Who knows if they will actually be onboard when the real debate begins. 

Nonetheless, I think all of these are important issues and I truly hope McCarthy can bring these items to the table.

But the point is that that's the time to have the discussion. Before future spending occurs. And we need to stop just talking about cutting spending, but actually do something about it. That's where we always get stuck. When the bills come due and the other side wants something we use it as a tool but once all is said and done it's back to business as usual.

Almost as if the government is simply playing games with the American people to make the appearance they want to cut spending. If they really did then the issue would not come up nearly every time the bills come due and we have to raise the debt ceiling.

Because we spent too much, again.

Even when Trump threatened to shut down the government, I thought that was a wrong-headed approach, and I am a strong Trump supporter. To me, it serves no purpose to default on our obligations and shut down the government. It doesn't help any American if that happens. And beyond that, it does nothing to actually curb spending.

To further call for McCarthy's ouster for coming to some terms around the deal, I think, is wrong-headed.

Beyond that, the animus from our side, against our side, against McCarthy is just more of the same problem republicans always have. We simply have trouble rallying around and uniting as a party. Debt ceiling aside, it kills us in elections.

We already have an uphill battle to win seats and offices as it is. When we can't unite, the other side wins by default a lot of the time. And beyond that, it's fodder for the other side and its accomplice media to spread the news that our party is in chaos. It never looks good for us. 

Say what you want about Nancy Pelosi as Speaker, but no matter what she did the democrats stuck by her side come hell or high water. Regardless of what you think about McCarthy, I think our side needs to do the same.

Because while McCarthy might not be our "winner," so to speak, if we can't rally behind him now, how are we going to be united in 2024 to win back the White House? Because one can argue that because we have such animus toward certain candidates, if we don't go to the polls to vote for whoever the nominee winds up being, it may as well be a vote for the other side to win.

Frankly, the bottom line for me is this. We're being way too hard on McCarthy. We need to give him a chance and cut him some slack and stop fueling discussions of infighting and chaos that the democrats can use as a reason NOT to vote republican in 2024.

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Chick-fil-A Next in the Crosshairs

Considering the recent debacle over a beer can depicting transgender social media influencer, Dylan Mulvaney, clearly a marketing campaign despite what Anheuser-Busch wants to say—you sent a can to an influencer with millions of followers and had to have known that influencer would post something about it—which lost AB InBev billions of dollars in beer sales, not just of Bud Light but across all brands, that they still have yet to recover from, and now with Target showing losses in a major consumer backlash over pride merchandise being marketed to kids which has plummeted the value of the company by $10 billion in 10 days...

What in the hell is a company, who was long the bastion of conservative consumer high fan-fare, like Chick-fil-A doing when it decides it wants to join in on the fun and make an effort to potentially destroy what they have worked so hard to build by introducing DDI into its work culture?

Because we are operating at a time when, and it is not just conservatives, people in general have simply had enough of woke and cancel culture and having pride and diversity and gay and transgender life rammed down our throats at every turn.

It is not a question of if there will be backlash. It's a question of when will it come?

Granted, the Chick-fil-A thing is slightly different and so maybe the company can slide quietly on this without a major impact. It's not a marketing campaign. But I think consumers see the writing on the wall. It's just one more company trying to push something, even if from a purely business perspective it makes no sense to do it.

You would think, especially from a company like Chick-fil-A, that they would have gotten a clear message from both the Bud Light and Target disasters—maybe we still want to do something but now may not be the right time to do it.

When it comes to business the thing that puzzles me the most is that the entire purpose for any business is to make a profit. That's really all there is to it. It's the only reason you exist as a business. To enjoy a profit and make money for everyone who works for the company or who owns it. 

There is no other purpose.

So, why would anyone knowingly and willingly put that potential profit in jeopardy? On purpose! Why would you do it?

I am hard pressed to figure out what the purpose actually is. Is it to strongly support woke and cancel culture and all this liberal ideology fueled garbage because you believe in it? Is it a political agenda on the part of management? Even if it is either or those things or something else, it goes completely against the purpose of being in business, which is why I am perplexed about any of it.

It also makes me wonder if shareholders may now have grounds to sue for lost value of their investments in a case like this where management has to be fully aware that engaging in any of this sort of thing is absolutely going to destroy value.

It's just not a question right now because we have the proof right in front of us and it is clear. In this environment, if a company decides to do something that will clearly drop their bottom lines, can investors say, "Hey, wait a minute. This is our company and we want you to focus on what makes us money. Nothing else matters."

None of this is to say that any group should not be acknowledged or left behind. But it is to say that we should also recognize what any group represents as the whole, and clearly the LGBTQ+ community is in the minority, and by leaps and bounds. It's a very tiny percentage of the population that is part of that community.

What's at issue here is that that small group wants the majority to conform or else. Something I have talked about extensively. No one in society should be forced to do anything. And beyond that, it's about the kids right? And I think that's really where all of this backlash is really coming from. It's the fuel for the fire, so to speak.

Had this thing not been pushed in SCHOOLS, for Heaven's sake, maybe no one would care if you had a beer can with a transgender face on it or a few tuck friendly swimsuits on the shelves at Target.

It is when it is not about inclusivity, but rather about indoctrination, not just of kids mind you, but society as a whole to simply accept their point of view or else is when the whole thing implodes on itself.

Because that's what they are doing. The LGBTQ+ community is not wanting inclusion at all. They are wanting to disrupt everyone else's lives in order to have their way. Shove it right down our throats, have pride flags flown everywhere, have children be taught about their way of life, have our television shows and TV commercials and billboards filled with Pride Awareness and Pride Agenda. 

The backlash against these companies, regardless of what their actual agenda is, is about all of that. And consumers are saying no. Enough. And it is almost as though the companies don't care if they go broke in the process. 

Perhaps there is another little hidden agenda in all of this. Destroying wealth and pushing the real hidden cause. Universal Basic Income and socialism at its core. Maybe that's what these companies are really up to? 

Who knows? All I can say is that Chick-fil-A certainly will fall into the crosshairs, and it may not bode well for the company. And once reputations are ruined, the reality is that it will be difficult to get it back. As I was always told, "It takes years to build a loyal customer and only seconds to lose one." 

I am almost of the opinion that these companies don't care. It's the only thing that makes sense to me.

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