OpEd: Pundits, Weather Forecasters and Hedge Fund Investors

Well it's only been a week or so since Jamie Dimon said his bank made a TWO Billion dollar trading error...which was a THREE BILLION dollar trading error the next day, and by the end of a week went to "maybe" a FIVE Billion dollar trading error, and then he has the smartest "Quants doing the math..... And just last night, the race was so close to call, in fact it was just about ONE VOTE separating the candidates..your vote?....and ...well...it was not close after all... Money can buy elections, make a note of it. Here is the other take away that I was not expecting from the last week of the campaign----I went to film the seminar on the pension funds for government workers, and in fact the finest pension managers in the country, the Wisconsin Retirement System. The financial instability....volatility....unpredictability...lack of regulation...has led to a situation where one cannot...you cannot individually...the state cannot collectively...know for a long time in the future enough to GUARANTEE an 8% rate of return...the only guy that did that was Bernie Madoff.....and you know the rest of the story there... The problem is that in times of Civil War, there is little time for thorough discussion....and sound bites will not suffice to discuss it. Stay tuned.