An Important New Book on The Disease of Progressivism

James Ostrowski is out with an important new book, Progressivism: A Primer on the Idea Destroying America,

Ostrowski is a trial and appellate lawyer and author from Buffalo,. He has served as vice-chairman of the law reform committee of the New York County Lawyers Association (1986-88) and wrote two widely quoted reports critical of the law enforcement approach to the drug problem. His articles have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Buffalo News, Cleveland Plain Dealer and Legislative Gazette. His policy studies have been published by the Hoover Institution, the Ludwig von Mises Institute, and the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C.

He is a hardcore libertarian and his book is going to have impact.

Progressivism is the disease that is, indeed the idea destroying America, Ostrowski's book explains the  how and why of it and what can be done about it.

From the table of contents:

Introduction
1. What is Progressivism?
21 2. We Are All Progressives Now
3. The Origins of Progressivism
4. The Failure of Progressivism
 5. Progressivism’s Archenemy—True Liberalism
6. Progressivism’s Vanquished Foe—Conservatism
7. War is the Health of the Progressive State
 8. Progressivism as Utopianism
9. A Rogue’s Gallery of Progressives
10. How to Bury Progressivism and Restore American Liberty
Conclusion 

The first review of the book is here.

The Truth About Churchill, Truman, FDR, Wilson and Trotsky

The problem with the history we are taught in schools is that it is taught by instructors with an interventionist bent using history books based on interventionist theories. It is hard to sift through the nonsense to create a clear picture, since in many cases key facts are distorted or omitted.

Being the curious type, I have imagined that, if I were a billionaire, one thing I would do is find someone who was very intelligent, could write well, and understood the importance of liberty and say to this person, "Look, you have 10 years, 20 years, whatever it takes, study the 20th Century for me then write a report about what the world wars were about and what the leaders were really like. Tell me who the real bastards were and how the world got into these wars."

I no longer dream of the day I will be able to put such a person under my employ to find the truth. The report has been written. Great Wars & Great Leaders: A Libertarian Rebuttal, the collected writings of Ralph Raico, provides all the important details of the 20th Century world wars. It details how the wars came about, and reveals the truth about the ruthless leaders that are responsible for millions upon millions of deaths.

Forget whatever else you are reading, this is the book you need to read now. It is informed, intelligent writing with wit. Most important, it reveals the truth about the 20th century great wars, by a man who understands liberty.

In the foreward, Robert Higgs tells us that Raico attended Ludwig von Mises's famous seminar at New York University and also completed his dissertation at the University of Chicago under F.A. Hayek. He was also a friend of Murray Rothbard's. Enough said for credentials on understanding the value of liberty. You will see that understanding clearly shine through in this book.

In this book Raico covers it all, including much detail on how the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand led to World War One. Raico details the wicked role that Winston Churchill played in the expansion of the war. You won't for a minute think of Churchill as a hero after reading this book. Raico shows that Churchill had a sick love for war. "It began early," writes Raico. "As a child he had a huge collection of toy soldiers, 1500 of them, and he played with them for years after most boys turn to other things...He loved war as few modern men ever have- he even loved 'the bangs' as he called them..."

You will learn that most of those, from all sides in the wars, were nothing but madmen seeking power. And Raico does not protect so-called great U.S leaders. For example, to provide us, for a taste of the power-crazed Truman, Raico takes us to the post-World War ll period and informs us that, "In May 1946. Truman decided that the proper response to the strike of railroad workers was to draft the strikers into the Army." The House actually approved his proposal in a bill that passed 306 to 13, but the bill was rejected by the Senate.

The evil power hungry ways of FDR, Stalin, Wilson and Trotsky are all in Raico's report. Remarkably. it is all done in 235 pages, but read the 235 pages and you will understand the real history of the wars.

If your knowledge about the world wars of the 20th century is limited by what you learned in high school and college, this book will stun you. It puts the history of the entire period in perspective. It helps you understand the power mad leaders that are required to get the world in to war. In short, this book is a great weapon against war.

How to Profit if a Huge Asteroid is About to Crash into the Earth

James Altucher and Douglas R. Sease are out with a great new book, The Wall Street Journal Guide to Investing in the Apocalypse.

In the book, they claim that a lot of doomsday threats are over-hyped, from pandemics to terrorist nuclear threats. I agree. Their basic thesis is that you should ignore the emotional hype, analyze the situation for what it is and make some money from it. They call it "event based investing".

I am partial to this type of investing and I think it provides great opportunities for profit. The book is a great introduction on how to become such an "event based" investor. Beyond this becoming an event based investor, the book can be of value to the person simply holding a mutual fund  portfolio. By understanding how things are hyped, it may prevent an investor from selling out of mutual funds in panic, at just the wrong time.

But, most of all, the book is a well researched handbook on the major potential panics of our time and the reality of what really is likely to happen and what is not. For example, with regard to terrorist attacks in the U.S., Attucher and Sease tell us that it is easy to underestimate the difficulty of building a nuclear weapon, and that it is inconceivable that a group of terrorists hiding in caves could even begin to understand where to start to build a nuclear weapon.

Even a "dirty bomb" would be difficult to assemble, they tell us.

As for cyber-terror, they say hacking is one thing, but that it would take an extremely powerful computer with very detailed knowledge to take down a major institution.

Bottom line, they write: "While terrorist attacks aren't likely to be either pervasive or persistent, our fear of terrorism is both pervasive and persistent. In that disconnect lies opportunity."

In addition to pooh poohing, threats that aren't likely to develop, Altucher and Sease teach us how to keep real disasters into perspective and not always view them as world ending events. From fear over flu viruses to asteroids flying towards the earth, they teach us how to "fade the fear", how to invest through the front door and back door.

My only quarrel with the book is the clear lack of understanding by Altucher and Sease of the business cycle and what causes it. In their short bursts of discussing economic downturns, it's clear they hold a  pedestrian Keynesian view of what causes the cycle. At one point, they write: "Inflation is not necessarily a bad thing." Like I said, the book is well researched, but I do wish the authors had spent time in research at Mises.org to polish up their understanding of the business cycle, so that it would have been on a par with the rest of the book.

That said, the book should be read by every investor. It will help in keeping investors from panicking and it will help those with independent minds to lean how to event trade. The book generally discusses the major panics that could occur but the authors also briefly refer to "mini-asteroids", which are panic situations that are not global in nature, such as the recent events in Libya, but are of enough of a concern that investment opportunities exist.

Thus, for the wannabe event trader,  the book should be read, to get the general sense of how to trade full blown panics and "mini-asteroids". It also should be kept near all investors desks to be pulled out whenever one of the biggie panics hits the market, since the relevant panic-related chapter will help calm the nerves and will also provide specific stock trades that may make sense to implement.

And don't miss the chapter on asteroids. I'm tempted to say the chapter is earth shattering, but in the chapter, the authors tell us that a biggie asteroid is heading toward earth, which astronomers are tracking and they expect it to pass very near earth on  Friday April 13, 2029. But cool cats that Altucher and Sease are, they tells us why you should not panic, how to fade any asteroid fear that may develop, and list specific front door and back door stocks to invest in should panic develop.

Just In Time: An Important New Book for a World in a State of Flux

Even the casual observer of news must realize that the world is shifting at its core, that the future may very well be much different than the world we live in today.

The uprising in Tunisia and Egypt are just two examples of people desiring to be free of oppressive governments. In places like Tunisia and Egypt, the oppression is obvious. In other cases, such as the United States, the government moves may be a bit more slick, but the edge to the banksters and other power elite is becoming more obvious. In the U.S. this has spawned the Tea Party and others suspicious of ever-expanding government.

My chief complaint with these anti-regime movements has been that there seems to be no clear understanding of what the current regimes should be replaced with. The average man seems to have little understanding of the importance of free markets and its importance in creating a prosperous society.

In his new book, Rollback: Repealing Big Government Before the Coming Fiscal Collapse, Thomas E. Woods, Jr. addresses my complaint. Aimed primarily at a United States audience, the book brilliantly weaves facts with theories to explain why the United States is in the financial mess it is in today and the way out of the financial mess.

The book is remarkably detailed with the important facts. I am certainly not one who is unfamiliar with the facts surrounding the financial crisis, yet, time after time, I found myself saying as I read Woods' book, "I didn't know that."  Finally, I had repeated "I didn't know that" to myself so many times that I looked up to see what page of the book I was on. It was page 14. If the book had only contained the new facts I had learned in the first 14 pages, I would have been satisfied with the book, but the book goes much deeper.

Woods carefully dissects the fiscal crisis facing the United States. He explains the problems with Social Security and Medicare. But, he does so in a manner, and with the facts, that I have not ever seen done before.  For those who are advocates of freedom, reading this book will sharpen their understanding and mastery of the subject ten-fold. The case for free markets is argued so well that it may find some converts among the open minded anti-free market types (and even, perhaps, among some of the not so open minded).

But Woods doesn't stop with the problems of social security and medicare. In particular, I liked his discussion of the monetary system pre-Federal Reserve. He completely destroys the arguments of Fed apologists and bomb throwers, such as Paul Krugman, who charge that a the pre-Federal Reserve period was a period of laissez faire banking with booms and busts gone wild. Woods carefully takes the reader through the facts. He carefully details the interference that the government played in the pre-Fed era and also details how the booms and busts pre-Fed were much less intense than they are now.

He also explains what parts of the Glass Stegall Act were, and were not, repealed, and how this had nothing to do with the recent financial crisis. Woods also explains why deflation is not bad for an economy, and why it is not even bad for businessmen who must sell their products at lower prices. The fearless Woods also takes the knife to the military budget and explains how bloated that monstrosity is.

When Victor Hugo wrote, "All the forces in the world are not so powerful as an idea whose time has come," he was dead on and we can see that by what is going on in the world today.  The idea of regime overthrow is in the air throughout the world. Woods' book compliments this idea, by providing the collection of ideas that show how important free markets are to the solution of current problems.

This book needs to be read by every person who is sick and tired of the raping of the taxpayer, who is sick and tired of the edge given to banksters and other power elites. It needs to be read by every member of the Tea Party, so that they gain a fundamental understanding of the problems of big government that they are protesting and what the real solutions are.

In fact, this book is so important that it should be read by every person that is a voter. The book should be debated far and wide. Indeed, I recommend that you put down whatever else you are reading and read Rollback, now. The book has the potential to become a game changer. It has the potential to become a  major influence. Once you read it, you will know what I mean.

True Grift: Matt Taibbi Tells Some Stories

There has probably never been a more appropriately titled book than Matt Taibbi's Griftopia. That's what the book is, total grift.

Taibbi has been running for some time a sort of  long-con, a grift, if you will, on America's intelligentsia. The intelligentsia, naturally, don't have the time to study, excess reserves, the regression theorem or praxelology, or anything else that might enlighten them as to what is currently going on in the economy. But they sure can picture Goldman Sachs as a vampire squid sucking money out of their pockets. Taibbi did paint this picture for them and, thus, Taibbi, the financial expert was born. It's doubtful he understands excess reserves, the regression theorem or praxelology, either, but by borrowing from a web site here, and a web site there, he does put together a string of paragraphs in a form the intelligentsia can appreciate, by also borrowing from the writing style of Hunter S. Thompson.

Consider: If I am in a bookstore browsing through books, the first thing I do is look through the index of a book to get a sense for the topics that are covered. I picked up Griftopia in a bookstore to browse. I looked for the index, but much like Bernie Madoff back up statements, Griftopia  has no index.

After the index, I usually turn to the acknowledgements to see who the author thanks, as kind of an indication as to who the author has been hanging with. In Taibbi's book, I eagerly turned to the acknowledgments, since it has been rumored that what Taibbi really does is, as I said before, simply borrow themes from other web sites, without attribution. Finally, I thought, he would disclose his sources that remarkably track the information on some web sites. But, alas, this would not be the case.

Griftopia has the most unusual acknowledgements I have ever seen in a book. It is really more of an explanation as to why Taibbi doesn't need to acknowledge anyone. And now, I recount from memory, because I didn't buy the book. Taibbi does acknowledge some guy whose name I think is Dave, and that's it. After that, Taibbi tells us his sources are secret. You know, the way Bernie Madoff told investors that his investment methods were secret. Then Taibbi tells us that well maybe they aren't all secret, but the names are in the chapters, so there is no reason to mention them in the acknowledgements. And that's it. No thanking of any muse, of any friends. No thanking of a wife, a brother, a sister, a colleague, a girl friend, a mistress, a dominatrix. No one else. Yikes, if it wasn't for the fact that it might be seen as a cheap attempt to get more hits, I might wonder if Taibbi is a damn deep-sea cephalopod of some sort, thousands of feet deep in the ocean having no contact with humans. 

From there, I did move on and read the first chapter of the book, it's about Sarah Plain. It's written in the tone of a man who desperately wants to sound like Hunter S. Thompson, but who clearly doesn't want to be cremated and have his ashes blown out of a canon, after he dies.

Let me tell you something. You can't write like Hunter S. Thompson unless you are perfectly willing to be cremated and have your ashes blown out of a cannon, or better yet have your remains eaten by a cephalopod of some sort. And thus, when all is said and written, we are left with nothing in Griftopia but the facts in each chapter.

The facts presented in this first chapter, presumably a strong chapter designed to entice the reader to read on, are as follows : John McCain chose Sarah Palin as his running mate when he ran as the Republican candidate for president in 2008.

I did not read on. I did not buy the book.

In thinking about the book, the only people I think could find the book useful would be the miners in Chile who were trapped for 69 days, but only if they would have been trapped for 6.9 years, instead. It would have brought them up-to-date in an almost picture book like way.

So thus, we have another book we can throw on that pile, i.e., buy it only if you are in a position where you must buy a gift for a person you hate. Trust me, the person won't get past the first chapter and will find the book of no value at all.

A New Low at EPJ

When publishers send along new books to EPJ, as policy, I will either review the book or at least mention I have received the book.

Thanks to the publisher of SuperFreakonomics, I have now stooped to a new low. They didn't send me the book, just an image of the cover.

I have never been a big fan of Freakonomics (see Inside The Mind Of Steven D. Levitt : A Review of Freakonomics), so maybe it's a shrewd move by these cheap bastards to only send me an image of the cover.

This book is apparently a coffee-table version and includes, according to their promo blurb:

A by-the-numbers tally of a high-priced call girl's career, and a tracking sheet from an intensive survey of Chicago street prostitutes.

The blurb goes on:

Whether probing the intricacies of sex change operations, the effectiveness of child car seats, or what really motivates people to do good, the Illustrated Edition of SuperFreakonomics employs photographs, drawings, and graphs...

What more can I say? I'm thinking you really don't need this book for yourself and there is certainly no reason you would want to give this book to a friend. But, if you are somehow in a delicate position where you are required to give a gift to someone you really don't like, say Paul Krugman, then this book could really do the trick.

The Four Books You Need to Read to Understand Austrian Economics

Dr Eamonn Butler, Director of the Adam Smith Institute, is out with a new book, Austrian Economics: A Primer.

It would be difficult to overestimate how valuable of a book this is as an introduction to Austrian Economics. I now consider it part of a four-book set that one needs to read to develop a basic understanding of Austrian economics.

To get an understanding of correct economics, a beginner should start off by reading the first eight chapters of Andrew and Peter Schiff's  How an Economy Grows and Why It Crashes. Reading the first part of the book is the easiest way to get a quick grasp of basic economics from an Austrian perspective. (Note: I advise to read only the first roughly 100 pages because following that the Schiffs go on to explain monetary inflation in a confusing fashion that will only befuddle the reader.)

Following the Schiffs' book, the beginner should read Henry Hazlitt's Economics in One Lesson. This book is a tour de force of how proper economic thinking should be done.

This should be followed by Murray Rothbard's What Has Government Done to Our Money. This is the best introduction to money and how the government distorts money in ways that ultimately result in inflation. In fact, this slim book is the perfect substitute for the chapters on inflation where the Schiffs would leave you confused.

The final book of the four-book set is Butler's book. This book is as hardcore of an introduction to Austrian economics as you can get. Whereas the Schiffs and Hazlitt discuss basic economics, they do not identify the thinkers behind the theories they are using. Butler names the names. They all here, Menger, Böhm-Bawerk, Mises, Hayek, Rothbard, Kirzner and others.

Butler in a non-technical easy to follow fashion discuses and explains such original Austrian concepts as marginal utility, opportunity cost, the importance of time and ignorance and the business cycle. He also provides an important short history of the Austrian School of economics, as he explains the concepts the 'Austrians' have developed.

Thus, Butler's primer is a very important addition to understanding Austrian economics as it ties the basics to the various important Austrian players and the contributions they have made.

Butler's book can also be valuable beyond the role it plays for the introductory economics student. Often I find when running into graduate students in economics or MBA students, many are only being taught mainstream Keynesian economics and are, amazingly, unfamiliar with Austrian economics at all. These students may grasp parts of what the Schiffs and Hazlitt teach, so that for these students they may be directed directly to Butler's book. I'm sure that they will be quite surprised as to the role Austrian School economists have played in even such basic concepts as marginal utility and opportunity cost. (They may even associate the name Menger with the discovery of marginal utility, along with Jevons and Walars, but never realize that Menger was the founder of a school of economic thought that went well beyond marginal utility.)

Finally, Butler's book can play an important role as a reference guide for the student of Austrian economics who is just past the basics, but may need a quicker refresher on a specific topic. Butler's book is without question the most accurate and honest depiction, at the basic level, of Austrian economics and its theorists.

BONUS RECOMMENDATION: If you are looking for a complete explanation of Austrian school business cycle theory, there is nothing better than Austrian School Business Cycle Theory by Murray Rothbard.

SECOND BONUS RECOMMENDATION: After taking Federal Reserve economists head on when they said in 2004 that there was no housing bubble, I walked into the lion's den, the New York Federal Reserve Bank, after the housing market crashed and told them in no uncertain terms why their theories were wrong. My book, The Fed Flunks: My Speech at the New York Federal Reserve Bank, details how I forecast the housing bubble and 2008 financial crisis in real time and includes the speech I gave at the New York Fed that rocked the canyons of Wall Street.

 -RW


         
           

Learning from The Madoff Victims

A new  book is out on the Bernie Madoff scam, The Club No On Wanted To Join. It is a compilation by Alexandra Roth (a Madoff victim) of the words of many who lost  because of Madoff.

The victims included many who were retired, and had to seek new ways to generate income at an advanced age. Although the media portrayed the victims as the super wealthy, and there were those, there also were others who scraped up as little as $30,000 and invested with Madoff through feeder funds.

This book is haunting in the sense that most people did some level of due diligence before investing with Madoff, or invested only after being advised to do so by a person they trusted. They felt comfortable in the investment. These were not blind greedy people. They weren't seeking an outrageous gain that made no sense.

In thinking about the victims, it is hard to see what they could have done not to be fooled by Madoff. You would have had to be a very sophisticated investor not to be sucked in by Madoff. On the other hand. how a legitimate audit by the SEC or FINRA could have failed to protect against Madoff shenanigans boggles the mind.

Thus, there is a lesson for us all here. Never put all your eggs in one basket. In fact, I recommend for most that at least 50% of all money be put aside for investment  in four separate categories as outlined in the book by Harry Browne, Fail-Safe Investing. After you have half your assets set up the way Browne suggests, then it is fine to try other investments, but even in this half of your portfolio you should have at least four completely different investments.

There's another reason to read The Club No One Wanted To Join,  for those interested in studying how people cope with huge changes in financial circumstances. In that sense this book is truly inspiring. The story of Robert Halio and his wife, as well as the story of many others is incredible. He was retired and lost 95% of his money to Madoff. He couldn't get a job in his old career, so has gone to driving people around and building quite a business doing so. There are other stories like this in the book. If things are tough for you because of the Great Recession, pick this book up and find how difficult things can be, and how people pick themselves up after the intial shock.

One also hopes that this book becomes a standard reading in schools that teach those who will become money managers. With this book you get a really hard dose of how Bernie Madoff damaged a lot of peoples lives. Maybe some future money manager after reading this will realize the damage  of  stepping over the line can cause, and maybe, just maybe, stop himself before its to late.

And finally, this book is a great antidote for those who think government agencies will be there to protect them. These people found out the hard way that the government agencies, the SEC and SIPC, and the quasi-government agency, FINRA, are a joke and do nothing but protect their turf.

As victim Roth put it:

We have come to the unavoidable conclusion, that there is no one looking out for the small/average investor. Not the SEC, not SIPC, not FINRA, no one. In fact they try to protect themselves from the investors.

But most of all this is about haunting financial loss and recovery, Maureen Ebel wrote in part to Madoff that is included in the book:

I was left with what was in my wallet and what was in my checking account.

You did not destroy my faith in humanity because I have received so much generosity and kindness from so many. I became poor, and at the same time I became rich in the knowledge of people's goodness.

There are few books like this around. And as I said, up and coming money mangers should be the first in line to read this book.

But for the rest of us it is a reminder to be alert, with interest rates as  low as they are there are likely to be many mini-Madoff's operating and promising a better return.

The Book Washington D.C Is Afraid Of

It should be obvious to every observant American that the government based out of Washington D.C. is out of control. From a country founded on the concept of freedom, the executive branch, the legislative branch and the judicial branch ignore the fundamental precepts of the Constitution and attempt to regulate "the People"  and take at will.

It seems there is little "the People" can do, with all three branches of government ganging up against them. Tom Woods, though, argues that there is something that can be done, and that something is nullification.

In a brilliant book, Nullification: How to Resist Federal Tyranny in the 21st Century, Woods'  educates readers on the Constitution, and what it means, in a manner that most assuredly you did not learn in High School or college. Most importantly, Woods focuses on the concept of nullification, a concept that goes back to Thomas Jefferson. The concept being that states have the right to nullify unconstitutional laws.

As examples of nullification, he discusses the current attempts by some states to legalize medicinal marijuana (despite opposition at the Federal level). He discusses the actions by states that for all practical purposes nullified the federal Real ID Act of 2005. Woods writes that half of the states issued formal declarations that they had no intention of  complying with the federal mandate. Woods states that “resistance was so widespread that although the law is still on the books, the federal government has, in effect, given up trying to enforce it.”

Woods also points out that nullification  can go beyond the state level and be carried out on an individual level. He cites jury nullification as an example.

Most intriguing, Woods suggests that nullification could take the form of states requiring its citizens to send federal income tax money to the states where it would be put into escrow accounts, where the states then individually determine what legitimately should go to the federal government, with perhaps the states sending the rest back to its citizens.

If you haven't figured it out, this is a radical book, but it is radical constitutionalism, soundly argued. Given the overbearing reach of the Federal government, the nation, outside of Washington D.C., is fed up. This is the book that can provide the manual to take back the country. There are already indications Washington D.C. is scared of this book. I am writing this on Saturday June 26,  after returning from the Borders Books at the corner of 14th Street and F Street in Washington D.C. This Borders is just two blocks from the White House. Woods' book is officially not scheduled to be released until Monday June 28, but as is often the case,  the book was put on the shelf a couple of days early.

When I spotted the book it was face forward, the way they put books they want to promote, but there was only one copy. This struck me as odd given that the book was face forward, which suggested to me there was originally other copies. Further, since the book isn't officially out until Monday, it's doubly odd there is only one copy. I found a clerk and asked him if he could tell me how many copies of the book the store originally received. He looked it up for me. First, he noticed that the book wasn't officially out until Monday, but that the store had originally received 6 copies. He looked confused that there was only one copy left. I said to him, "That's alright. I think I understand."

A book that provides a playbook on how to reverse out of control government is selling like hotcakes just blocks from the White House. I get it. Some people are very afraid of this book and need to find out what is in it real fast. They know this book has nation changing potential. I say buy the book, get the nullification argument down cold, get in on the debate and scare the hell out of Washington D.C.

Bourbon for Breakfast: Living Outside the Statist Quo

The bow tie wearing Jeffrey Tucker views the world through a quirky eye. I know this from reading his occasional articles at LewRockwell.com.

Over the years, I have read his pieces on  such topics as shower heads and shaving cream, and have always marveled at the focus he puts on things I generally pass over.  His columns have expanded my world. I have stopped using shaving cream on his advice and I now take a shower with gushing water thanks to the subversive advice he has provided on that subject.

Warren Buffett once remarked, something like, he wouldn't mind being locked up in prison if the right people were locked up with him. If I am ever locked up in the slammer, I want Tucker in the place with me. I just know his observations on the joint would be very unique, things I would never notice, and almost make the place fun, but I also know he'd eventually figure some quirky way to breakout.

Fortunately, none of us needs to get thrown into the slammer to enjoy Tucker's  perspective on things. His writings have now been compiled into a book, Bourbon for Breakfast: Living Outside the Statist Quo


Now, I have a notorious disagreement with Tucker when it comes to Intellectual Property rights and he has an entire chapter on the damn thing, but I am willing to overlook this flaw and highly recommend the book because the rest of the book is simply clever, fascinating  and fun.

If you haven't read much Tucker, then you owe it to yourself to pick up this book and read it in the morning with, yes, a coffee with bourbon. And if you are trying to educate a hardcore interventionist about freedom and libertarianism, get him this book. Tucker will go on and on about shower heads and stop signs and the interventionist won't even know what happened, but he'll start to see small problems with intervention, and he may even use a screw driver to adjust his shower head.

An Important Book: "The Quants"

Just finished reading Wall Street Journal reporter Scott Patterson's The Quants.

This book is must reading for anyone who wants to understand the quant world, which means, if you are a market trader or investor, you need to read the book. It provides in depth details of the quants and how they lived and traded before, during and after the financial crisis caused their mathematical formulas to blow up in their faces.

Patterson knows how to tell a riveting story so at times the book even  becomes a real page turner.

His description of how Boaz Weinstein placed a "capital structure arbitrage" trade on GM that went awry when Kirk Kerkorian started buying GM common stock, and how Weinstein handled the tense period, is worth the price of the book alone. But, this is only one tale of many.

Patterson's description of the confrontation between quant Peter Muller and skeptic Nassim Nicholas Taleb is awesome.

In short, after reading this book you will get a true sense for the big time money world of quants and how they operate. This can be of extreme value when trading for yourself.

You will also learn the Achilles heel of quants, they have no clue as to business cycle theory and they fail completely in understanding that there are no constants in the field of human action, and therefore, regardless of how long a trading mathematical program works, they fail to understand that it is subject to price activity far outside the expected range.

Patterson is silent on the topic of business  cycle theory, but he does make clear in the book that Taleb's warnings about extreme price activity were spot on, and that the quants failed completely in appreciating the warning.

Hopefully, by reading this book, you will learn from the quants mistakes and not make them during your own personal trading in the years to come.