Yes, once again it’s time for me to answer some of the interesting and weird questions that all the interesting and weird people who drop in on this space offer me now and then. Today there’s a guy whose company makes him work holidays and weekends for no extra money. This coming weekend, he has a couple of weddings he wants to attend, he’s already paid for the transit and the tux, and his boss won’t assure him that he’ll have the right to go. What do you do when you work in a Stalinist environment like that? I have a couple of ideas.

Beyond that, a reader asks which is more important: great sex or great money? What do you think?

Comment of the day comes from Walter D of Toronto, Ontario, who had a thought on yesterday’s post that I didn’t think should go unnoticed, because it gave me the creeps… and a little frisson of excitement, too.

“Stock markets are little more than legal Ponzi schemes,” Mr. D wrote. “When boomers retire in big numbers and try to liquidate their holdings we will see what stocks are worth.”

Hm. That’s kind of interesting, huh? My generation is the largest in history, I believe. We were all sold on the market right after we threw away our last set of bell bottoms and deep-sixed the old hookah. In one way or another, a huge number of us have invested in the market since then, buying into the dream, accepting the assumptions on which the market operates. How much of the money floating around in there is being housed until that magic day when we finally all get to kick back and lose our last collared shirt?

What happens when we all run on that big bank and ask for our money? It’ll probably help the travel business… the housing market, maybe… who knows, maybe it’ll boost the price of certain controlled substances…

… but the stock market? Do we really want to be worrying about what those genuises are up to when we’re out someplace watching the sun set over the back nine?

Every year I go to conferences of one kind or another, where everybody sits and takes notes and listens to Wall Street nabobs one sort or other, and it’s all very serious, and there are tons of metrics in the air, and mucho PowerPoint on the screen, and it all makes me laugh. Because it’s all hooey, ladies and gentlemen.

No matter how many times you try to convince me that there is any logic to the behavior of the Bulls and the Bears, I’m just not buying it. Take today’s market. Please. Today’s CNNMoney front page tells us that

“Stocks advanced at the open after investment bank Merrill Lynch (MER, Fortune 500) said late Monday it would take a $5.7 billion writedown and sell off $11.1 billion in mortgage securities in the current quarter. The brokerage also said it plans to raise $8.5 billion through the issuance of new stock. (Full story).”

Merrill itself was off on the news of another exsanguination, but the market is encouraged! Goodie! Now, I’m sure there are a lot of very rational, very scientific reasons why the market is encouraged. Just as scientific as the risk management schemes worked out by the MIT boys who caused this whole thing in the first place.

The truth is, the kind of science that is done these days is anything but scientific. It’s speculation and guesswork, based on quantification of multiple unknowns, closer to poetry than to arithmetic. The economics that drives the market itself is ruled by theorems and suppositions grounded in pre-Relativity, pre-Quantum physics, which have long since been discredited. There are, if you get right down to it, no rules at all, not really — not in Physics, or Economics, or any other discipline that once looked solid from a 20th Century vantage point.

So who’s zooming who? Banks lose money! Bank stocks are up. Google’s (GOOG) growth moderates from Gargantuan to simply Fabulous. They go down. Companies with zero revenue trade at infinite multiples. Companies with great revenue and operating margins take the hose.

Don’t tell me it’s all rational, Bub. It’s a big old Vegas casino is what it is, where the House rules. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t feel like the House these days. I feel more like the guy whose looking for the exit into some some smaller boutique establishment where things make a little bit more sense. But where the hell is the frickin’ door?

Actual news organizations that report real news today confirmed a trend that was noticed here several weeks ago, after a trip I made to Los Angeles: People are driving less. Back then, before gasoline prices swooped to the rock-bottom $4/gallon mark, there was widespread concern that there was no ceiling on the cost of travel, and the roads were noticeably more empty than in times past. I was there last week again and I also noticed that once we were no longer flirting with the $5 atrocity, folks were creeping back onto the roads and traffic was getting lousy again. Incredible, isn’t it, that what we can get used to?

That said, we’re all in agreement that people driving less is a good thing. It shows we’re all realistic, preparing for the future, getting down to the nitty gritty, making hard choices when the going gets tough and so forth.

What is less well recognized is that in response to the economy and the general state of things as they are or might be, Americans are doing a number of things less as they strive to manage the heck out of a challenging situation. For example:

• People are eating less. This is partially because food is more expensive but also because, as a nation, we are physically fat. Even those of us who are not fat are likely to have little tummies where our washboards should be. Even fast food restaurants are serving healthier food that is, in its very nature, much easier to eat less of. The trend toward reduction in food consumption, begun on both coasts in the 1990s, is working its way inward to the nation’s gigantic midsection, where production of chicken-fried steak has showed its first CAGR decline since, well, ever. California’s recent law — the first of its kind in the nation — that outlaws trans-fats in restaurants is yet another step in the national effort to make food less tasty and appealing.
• People are smoking less. Of course, those who do smoke are smoking for the rest of us. But they won’t be around very long. The rest of us are having difficulty finding a place where we might take up smoking even if we wanted to.
• People are drinking less. There are times when I am sitting at a restaurant with a bunch of fellow business people and not one of us is drinking. True, it’s at breakfast, but I remember the 80s. Lunch is much the same. At most business luncheons the act of ordering a drink makes people look at you like you should be sucking on a bottle of muscatel in a brown paper bag. At dinner it’s a little better, but nobody comes into the office in the morning radiating gin from every pore anymore. It’s hard to see how this is helping the economy any, but it certainly fits in any omnibus of stuff that’s on the decline to no good effect.
• People are investing less. That’s because many have less to invest. Those who DO invest are earning less from their investments, which gives them less to invest going forward. This is called a “vicious circle,” and we’re in it, although it’s far less vicious for those who refuse to be in the circle at all and put their money in something other than financial instruments, like a mattress or a coffee can.  
• People are singing and dancing less.  For obvious reasons.
• People are breathing less. The air is getting worse. Al Gore was right. We’re melting, melting! And boy, is it hot a lot of the time. This makes breathing far more difficult and anything that’s more difficult than it should be is done less, obviously.
• People are reading less, writing less, advertising their products less, using social networks less, ordering from the prix fixe menu less often, shorting perfectly decent stocks less, laughing all the way to the bank far less…

There’s other things, too, I’m sure. The list is possibly endless. Feel free to offer your own. I’ll be happy to see them, more or less, at least until doing less is something we start doing less of.

I’ve got a song in my heart and a smile on my face today, and not just because it’s the end of the week in the middle of summer and all the big cheeses are melting at the beach.

I looked at the news line-up this morning and saw a trend I had not noticed in quite some time. Did you spot it, too? Happiness is busting out all over, surprising the guys who make gloom for a living.

… stocks were up at the opening of the market… well, that’s nice…

… new home sales were stronger than anticipated… of course they were. People are expecting nothing but downers right now. In spite of how much we read or download or link to, we’re always surprised because what we believe will happen next is always in line with what’s going on right now… and that’s not a fair assumption at all… so we’re always surprised, both on the downside, when it arrives and then by the upside, when it inevitably comes creeping in.

… hm… durable goods orders also are up, shocking those experts whose job it is, really, not to be shocked. Are we paying them to be shocked?

Oil prices declining! Gas prices slipping back to ONLY $4 bucks a gallon! Gas up the car, mom! 

There’s more! Cleaner, greener diesel? and Honda (HMC) reporting record profits, which means it still may be possible to be a car company if you know how to do things right?

And I don’t know about you, folks, but there’s part of me that just plain enjoys seeing guys whose business it is shorting stocks taking it in the, well, the shorts, you know? Bet against us, will ya?! Well, eat the hose, shorty!

See? Nothing but good stuff, all the time. Things are looking up. The sand is hot. The breeze is cool. The banks have hit bottom and are screaming back up the ramp. Our own auto makers are retooling their plants, getting ready to sell us a whole new generation of tin cans that get 30 mpg and better, and to sell those they’ll need to advertise, bringing up the whole media sector. And there’s a new iPhone, too! And a HUGE line around the block not far from here, loaded with happy consumers who can’t wait to ignore all the party poopers raining on the new gizmo. Go, Apple (AAPL)! Spread that sunshine, right? Sure!

Could it get any better? Well, okay, it could, I’ll grant you that. But I’ll take what we’ve got for now.

Monday will come soon enough.

An interesting letter in today’s Ask Bing grab bag. It’s been a while since I’ve looked over your questions – I don’t know why, that’s just how I roll.

Have you noticed that, by the way? “That’s how I roll.” It’s very big. That and the ironic fistbump, first pioneered by Mr. and Mrs. Obama on a national scale.

Anyhow, take a peek at the questions today. And send yours along to bingblog@gmail.com. I’ll be waiting there for you.

News that Carl Icahn will be joining the board of Yahoo (YHOO) is clearly good news for everybody involved. One can only imagine the sense of eager anticipation with which Jerry Yang and his fellow board members are anticipating the arrival of the “activist investor.” 

I put the phrase “activist investor” in quotes because it’s something of a euphemism, sort of like “freedom fighter” when used in association with the word “Afghanistan.”

Be that as it may, I’m sure there is nothing but smiles and capitalist fist-bumping going on in the streets and corridors of Sunnyvale, where Mr. Icahn’s insights into the daily management of the Yahoo business organization will, I am sure, be most welcome, as will be the pleasure of his affable and reticent company.

Sometimes when an important visitor or new associate comes to call, it’s tough to figure out how to prepare for the great event. Here are a few thoughts on how Mr. Yang and his associates might work it out:

1. As a statement on how seriously Mr. Icahn takes the various strategic options facing the company, fellow board members could don conical caps with elastic chin straps and greet his arrival with the tooting of little paper horns. Confetti will be optional.
2. As an expression of fiscal restraint, lunch should be served on paper plates. Plastic spoons and forks are advisable. While Spam is not required, mid-shelf cold cuts should suffice.
3. In recognition of Mr. Icahn’s expertise as an operating executive, every piece of paper generated by the company’s various segments should be deposited in a polite pile by his seat. A subsequent meeting should be set up immediately to glean wisdom based on his command of the details.
4. During all board meetings, an open conference call line should be established between the Yahoo board room and the office of Microsoft (MSFT) CEO Steve Ballmer in Redmond, Washington, to avoid confusion and lack of clarity in subsequent communications.
5. While it is almost certain that Mr. Icahn, with limited experience with the Internet and its many challenges, will take a low profile at board meetings, management and the existing board should make sure to listen carefully to anything the new member has to say, in the unlikely event he is moved to speak on any given issue, and to avoid the impulse to blurt imprecations. A fresh perspective from a smart source untarnished by jaded experience is always valuable.
6. Under no circumstances should Mr. Icahn or any of his associates be offered any financial incentive to go away. This would obviously be a highly insulting move, since he has joined the board as an activist dedicated to the well-being of fellow Yahoo shareholders everywhere and by no means for personal lucre.

Those are just some initial thoughts. I’m sure Mr. Yang and his team are coming up with more and better ones even as we speak.

Just a little story from the dark edge of the continent.

I was staying for the past few days at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. It’s a really nice place. A few years ago, it had gone kind of tatty, but they implemented a big revamp not long ago and did a terrific job. Sometimes when they buff a joint up after a long period of escalating decrepitude, they excise its character, history and whatever charm the old edifice had left. Sometimes, also, they fix up the lobby and leave the upstairs rooms still haunted by the ghosts of dead guys who were murdered in their bathtubs.

I stayed at one of those places a few weeks ago. In the lobby were pictures of all the great movie stars who were feted there, back in the day when you could fit all of the motion picture industry into one ballroom. How glam those pictures were! Clark Gable! Betty Grable! Tyrone Power! The Duke! All drunk off their butts, happy to be clustered like the pleiades around their glittering tables. My room upstairs, on the other hand, smelled of cheap cigars and the tired feet of washed-up private eyes hired to spy on the naughty couple down the hall.

The Hilton today is no such thing. Downstairs and up the walls are bedecked with pictures of the gang that loved to hang there when glamour walked hand-in-hand with talent and success. My favorite is in the Men’s Room on the Lobby Floor. Frank, Dean and Peter Lawford, walking down the strip near the Golden Nugget, lean and happy, skinny little ties over their cool, flat tummies. Opposite this shot, Bogart stares out, slightly petulant, a just-read letter in his elegant hand, from a picture by Hurrell, circa 1935. Near the ballroom, where so many grand events were held when there were such things, Louis Armstrong, Tony Curtis and his then-wife Janet Leigh, Marilyn, James Dean… all shot pretty much right where you are standing as you look at them and wonder where all that, whatever it was, has gone.

On the ground level, Trader Vic’s, long a sort-of tikki joke with cheesy drinks and flaming stuff on sticks, once dark and cramped under a low ceiling, has also been knocked open to the pool and sky, keeping what was cool and worthy of retro admiration, jettisoning the ironic eau de decomp that had collected around the old tropes over the years. Quite a scene there on Saturday night. The aqua lights of the gigantic swimming pool glow, illuminating the crisp, white cabanas and suites that ring its vast, watery depths. After a couple of Scorpion bowls, people can get kind of noisy. Good sushi. Very short skirts are apparently back, and stingy-brim hats and stubble for the guys.

There’s no center in LA, and until you get it, you think that’s a bummer. What it really means is that, like a giant beehive, every little cell in the honeycomb is just as potentially hot as the next. So improbably, where you are right then is just possibly where you ought to be. And the Hilton, right now, is no exception, particularly if you don’t mind the slight sensation that the specter of Norma Desmond just brushed by your elbow. 

The rooms, too, are kind of marvellous. Mine was, at any rate. Not fussy. Clean and open, with a little patio you could lie out on to observe the action at the pool and bar down below.

I say all this to make a point as clearly as I possibly can: in the world of business, it really doesn’t get any better. Did I mention I was there on business? Well, I was. And anybody who cannot appreciate an experience like this one in the line of duty should probably be shot, or perhaps be put away. Yeah, that’s right. Anybody who can’t be happy at the Beverly Hilton should be put in a mental institution.

So I was sitting on my little patio taking an hour in which I attempted to entertain not one phone call or a single message on my BlackBerry. The sun was hot. The breeze was cool. The sound of happy people splashing rose from the azure pool several floors below. On the patio above me, suddenly, came a voice. An ugly voice. Harsh. Grating. Aggrieved.

“I told SAM…” it said, “But SAM doesn’t LISTEN… to ANYBODY!… And I am SICK… of HIM!… and I am SICK… of YOU… and everybody NOT LISTENING TO ME!” I don’t know if I am capable of capturing the rhythm of the thing. Tremendous anger, righteous indignation, dripping with bitterness, and the feeling of having sustained a powerful wrong that had been visisted on him by countless enemies both seen and, more heinous, CLOSE BY… The complaints — for the one-way discourse was made up of nothing but complaints — were almost wrenched out of a spirit so tortured it could barely formuate complete sentences.

It went on like this for quite some time. After a while, I took my towel and went inside. I had a meeting to go to anyhow.

The next morning at 7AM, I was awakened by what at first I thought was the squawking of a giant crow. As my head cleared, I realized this was unlikely. Crows do not nest in the upper floors of urban hotels. The only birds I saw there, in fact, were tiny sparrows and the plastic owls they put on the rooftops to scare away other predators. Crows, maybe, come to think of it.

At any rate, this squawking — enraged, deliberate, desperately unhappy – was coming through two layers of heavy curtain and a hermetically-sealed sliding glass door.

“I don’t want to SEE you EVER AGAIN!…” it was saying. “And if you see ME… or any member of my FAMILY!… I WANT YOU TO TURN AROUND!… AND GET THE F**K OUTTA THERE! I’m the one with the MONEY… and PEOPLE… are GOING… to LISTEN TO ME!!”

It went on. I opened the doors and stepped out on the patio to hear as much as I could of the torrent of invective pouring from the opulent space above me. All I saw was the back of a tiny, extremely bronzed bald pate bobbing up and down, and one edge of a small table at which the unnamed mogul in question was sitting. On the table was a glass of orange juice and a glass of prune juice.

I’ve been thinking since then about the number of people I know who are very rich, very successful, and what that access to power and affluence has had upon their characters. And I’m very slowly coming to a conclusion. Yes, we all know that money does not buy happiness. Of course, that’s ridiculous. Of course it does. We know it does. We also know that lack of money very often buys misery. As my dad used to tell me, “Rich or poor, it’s good to have money.”

But thinking about the miserable loser on the floor above me, I find myself wondering whether there is a tipping point, where the accumulation of too much power, too much money, actually produces in their recipient the exact opposite of all that money is supposed to buy. That perhaps it’s lonely at the top because the person you have become when you get there isn’t fit for human consumption. That maybe it’s better to be in the middle of things, because that where people are clustering together for warmth and still having a little bit of fun.

I’m home now, by the way, and it’s good to be back. Maybe too much of a good thing is just that.

This securities analyst, who himself works for a firm on the brink of ruin, took the opportunity the other day to bring down my entire sector. It wasn’t hard. He simply wrote up the absolutely worst, most pessimistic doomsday scenario for my industry, and then applied it to every company in it.

He was alone in his assessment of the situation, of course. There are dozens of others who don’t see things that way. But in the current climate, he hit publicity pay dirt. Put together depressed reporters on the verge of losing their jobs, nervous – hell, frightened – investors, and a banking industry that is taking the hose, and you have a scenario when any chicken little is immediately promoted to top rooster in the imploding henhouse of capital.

If you say things will be all right one day and here’s why, nobody is going to listen to you right now. If you say that Armageddon is at hand, everybody runs for the hills and tells the world what they just heard. It’s natural. We’re in that part of the cycle.

Dawn will break one day. It always does. But in the meantime, the red death holds sway over all.

In this interim between good cheer and sanity, I’d like to remind you of the following things that were certainly going to happen in my lifetime so far:

• A nuclear war was going to sweep across the Earth, ending life on the planet as we know it;
• The Russians were going to bury us;
• Overpopulation was going to end life on Earth as we know it;
• All of Southeast Asia was going to fall like a bunch of dominoes to the commies;
• We’re on the Eve of Destruction;
• Japan was going to take over the entire world economy and run everything;
• Y2K was going to melt down every computer on the planet, leading to the end of life on Earth as we know it;
• Microsoft (MSFT) was going to conquer everybody and end capitalism on earth as we know it;
• There will be no more honeybees;
• Global warming will end life on Earth as we know it.
• Nostradamus predicted that life on Earth as we know it will end in about six minutes;
• Life on Earth as we know it will end on 12/12/2012. I’m not sure why. Perhaps you can fill me in on that.
• China is the awakening giant and will run the world very soon;
• Robert Downey, Jr. is done in show business, can’t get insured and will never make another film.

And so forth. Why do we listen to this kind of stuff? Why do we always believe it? If we’re going to make stuff up to conform to our current view of the world, why do the lone, shrill voices of despair always grab the headlines?

And for the record, my business is not going away. We will live to see that security analyst thrust from the bosom of conventional wisdom, exiled to the job of writing and distributing his own newsletter.

There are several statements that are recognized as famously untrue the moment they are uttered. Some are not printable in this context but have to do with certain aspects of sexual restraint. Others are more businesslike, such as:

• “This investment has great upside with virtually no downside risk.”
• “Our new pension plan is a terrific improvement on our old one.”
• “This company is not for sale under any circumstances.”
• “There are no further headcount reductions in the works.”
• “I have nothing but confidence in Morty. He’s a great senior officer and a true friend.”

The latter, of course, is the last thing uttered by the CEO before the Morty in question is noisily shoved out a window from a very high floor.

In that regard, the following AP wire story gave me the willies this morning:

ASSOCIATED PRESS – 7/15/08
FDIC CHAIR: DEPOSITS IN NATION’S BANKS ARE SAFE

The nation’s banking system is “absolutely safe” and Americans’ insured deposits in banks protected, the head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation said Tuesday.

“Insured deposits are absolutely safe,” Sheila Bair, FDIC chair, said in an interview on CBS’ “The Early Show.” “The banking system as a whole is absolutely safe.”

The FDIC insures bank deposits of up to $100,000 and up to $250,000 for funds in retirement accounts such as an IRA.

Bair said that while there will likely be more bank closings — like that of IndyMac Bank, which last week became the largest regulated thrift to fail — they won’t occur on a large scale and should be put in “appropriate context.”

“We’ve had five bank closings this year,” Bair said. “I won’t say that banks don’t have challenges right now. They do.” But, she noted, “No insured depositor has ever lost a penny of insured deposits throughout the FDIC’s 75-year history.”

Know what I mean?

Dear Kids, 

Just a few thoughts on what you can expect when Uncle Sam takes over. It’s not going to be all that bad. But things will be different with your new proprietor, and it never hurts to be prepared for a brand new corporate culture.

First, you’re going to have a lot more paperwork. Oh, I know you think you’ve had a lot so far, but you ain’t seen nothing yet. Financial institutions sort of invented the stuff. Add a layer of government on top of that and you’re going to put the entire logging industry back on its feet. This is because, while large corporate bureaucracies always drive accountability to wafer-thin levels — spreading it out over the entire system if they can – nobody does this better than the Feds. Trying to ascertain who made a decision on an issue is like trying to figure out which bee just irrigated a specific chamber in the hive.

Second, your lunch hours will be shorter, and your workday more regularized. Did you ever read a book about the Siberian gulag, what life was like there? Well, it’s not quite as cold, but not so different. Wake up. Go to the rock pile. Go home. Wake up. Go to the rock pile. You’ll get used to it.

On the other hand, instead of being an employee per se, you will, in fact, be part of a permanent government that rules this nation year-in, year-out regardless of who is in power at the top. Your uber-bosses will change and new ones will arrive who are pretty much the same as the old ones. This is different than corporate life, where eccentricity often confers power. Your immediate managers will be Commissars three levels down from the politicians who pass in and out of government agencies like tumbleweeds over the tundra. They will never go away. But the chance of finding them on a golf course while the bank is burning down is minimal.

You will, of course, have to sell your snappy outfits, tasty footwear and juicy ties and scarves. Go to your local big-box clothing store. Acquire three gray suits. Ties may be in black or gray, and keep the patterns to yourself. A pair of enormous black shoes will complete the ensemble.

Did I mention that if you had an expense account you just lost it? I’m not sure how many of you Freddies and Fannies do lunch. I don’t usually see you out and about. But from here on in, you can break out your attache case, because it’s going to have a permanent PB&J in it or, if you are on the west coast, something with sprouts.

Contrariwise, you can also kiss those long, frenzied weekends and ruined vacations and holidays goodbye. Government workers are not encouraged to do overtime, and they go home at 5:00 p.m. unless the Martians have just landed and some form of response is necessary. Just look at the way they handled Katrina. It’s not like they didn’t get down there, eventually. They just did it on Government time.

On the whole, it won’t be a huge shock, I don’t believe, to move from corporate governance to government corporatude. It might even be an improvement. I mean, how much fun are you having right now anyhow?

Stay in touch. Don’t forget to write. In triplicate, if possible.

Luv ya,

Dad

A friend sent me a video yesterday that really scared me. It shows a series of clips of people around the world arranging their cell phones around a small handful of unpopped popcorn. After their phones are made to ring in unison, the corns seem to pop as a result of weird vibes, radiation, heat or whatever is apparently emitted by the cellphones.

I saw the video and my first thought was, “I don’t care how stupid it looks on me. I’m getting Bluetooth.”

This subliminal message turns out to be the purpose of the video. Short story: it’s a hoax, a viral attempt to scare people about their cellphones enough to make the mental leap to the hands-free variety. Why an electronic bug up your canal is preferable to a hot cell in your ear is anybody guess. But that was the marketing concept. And it worked, at least on me.

The Web giveth and the Web taketh. YouTube was used as the medium to disseminate this hoax because, like many online venues, it is without filter for the most part and all things on it are essentially of equal value. True or false is nugatory. Is the cat really saying “Oh my my” or is it just yowling? You decide.

At the same time, others cruise the value-free environment busting people. This is quite evident on wikipedia, where a cadre of tight sphincters patrol to weed out any inconsistencies, frivolities or, at this point, fun. And so it is that Gawker came up with the blog that busted our fraudulent popcorn poppers, pooping on their parade.

What does this all lead to? A general headset, when one is cruising the Web, that all belief should be suspended, that everything that seems real just may not be? That time eventually wounds all heels?

Do we emerge with more or less faith in the things we see and hear? I really don’t know. And I’m still getting a Bluetooth.

As most of you know, I am sure, we are now in the midst of Mogulmania Week at the Herb Allen conference in Sun Valley, Idaho. At that pristine and august location, business honchos meet, break bread, and attempt to keep their gasbags aloft in rooms drained of available oxygen by the collective weight of all that ego.

Me, I’m jealous of the guys who get to go. For many years, my parents sent me to summer camp and, I’ll be honest with you, for the most part it was pretty much a nightmare. If you have to go to a camp — and it’s apparent that for big cheeses this is pretty much a mandatory exercise – Sun Valley is way better than the camps I was forced to attend.

In what way?

1. I had to travel by bus with a bunch of screaming kids who wanted to punch me in the glasses. The assembled moguls mostly travel to Sun Valley in their own private planes, and are delivered to a tidy little landing strip from whence they are whisked away to their destination in privacy and comfort.
2. I had to stay in a bunk with a couple of sinks we all had to share and a very public bathroom. One bulb, hanging on a fixture above our heads, provided all illumination. At night, we had to use flashlights to read our comics under the covers. At Sun Valley, moguls have their own private Idahos in more ways than one.
3. Cabins, of course, were one-sex only, twelve or so boys or girls per bunk. Moguls are permitted to bring their spouses and enjoy full connubial privileges. We had to go out onto the ball field for that.
4. We were forced to hike up hill and dale and engage in a wide number of rustic activities. On one canoe trip, my face was completely eaten by tiny gnats and I nearly got trichinosis from undercooked pork chops. Moguls at the Allen summer camp do engage in light rusticity, but nothing that would smear their Guccis, and the only one likely to eat your face is very often smiling into it.
5. Speaking of food, the stuff provided at my summer camp was pretty bad. I’m betting the moguls can do better than meatloaf and canned corn.
6. Once you got to my camp, there was no way to communicate with people back home and nobody knew what you were doing for weeks at a time unless you wrote postcards or letters at rest hour. At Sun Valley, there are more journalists around than there are ants on a chocolate-covered stick. Five minutes after Bob has a little chat with Betty about the upside implications of subprime, the sighting is reported on a host of online vehicles, generating the kind of speculation infinitely preferable to actual news for many media outlets.  
7. I was very homesick a lot of the time. Not so with our camping moguls. They can yell at people six, seven, eight times a day on BlackBerry and cell phones, then disappear into the gigantic thought bubble that hovers over the place for as long as they like. The best of both worlds!

Finally, after all was said and done I made friends at summer camp that I missed very much when I went back to my real world.

I don’t think moguls really have that problem.

I just spent a few minutes on a variety of websites. I’m not going to single them out, not because they’re not good (of course they are, they’re quite deft and professional and excellent in every way).

They just made me want to kill myself.

Now, as lachrymose as I may be at times, this is a solution to life’s problems that has rarely occurred to me since I was out of college and stopped reading Kafka for laughs. But I believe it would now be easy to make the case that this is the worst things have been since the Depression of the 1930s. Looking at the news, it’s possible to come to the conclusion that any light anybody sees at the end of this tunnel is an oncoming train.

The last time this happened to our economy, the public had one great solution to the challenge of keeping the national spirits up: stupid movies. This explains the entertainments that were popular between 1929 and World War II. Screwball comedies. Musicals featuring concentric circles of feathered women dancing, swimming. Horse operas.

The Internet now faces a similar opportunity which, if not taken at its crest, may lead to the demise of the medium. This is most true, I think, of financial websites, which may, if they are not careful, assume the role of the cranky old uncle at the wake who sits in a chair in the corner and refuses to get drunk with the rest of the mourners.

The job here is quite clear: to amuse as well as inform, and to give people something to think about while we all wait out this suicidal swoon brought about, in large part, by the same people who still control the message issued by the markets. Lehman Brothers (LEH), for instance, recently wrote down a staggering amount as a testament to its lack of overall comprehension in advance of current events. Yet Monday, when its analyst wrote down the entire media sector, Wall Street jumped off the ledge along with him. Go figure.

But the hell with that. That’s not going to change. What we can change is the agenda of what we’re putting into our heads. Do we need to hear about more layoffs? More writedowns? More end-of-the-world scenarios? I think not!

Instead, let’s consider the following:

• Summertime brings with it great weather and a chance to relax… except for those who have to stay at home with a bunch of screaming kids and can’t go on that vacation away from it all because of the price of fuel driving the cost of travel through the roof…

No, wait. That’s not right. Sorry. Let’s start over.

• There has never been a better time to buy an automobile! Prices are way down, incentives are up, and some companies are even paying for two years of free gasoline in order to get you into the showroom… because… well… hm.

Okay, then. Let’s try this:

• The marketplace now offers a host of fabulously-priced securities that are quite literally trading at a fraction of their true value. If you believe in the system, and that this old economy of ours will come roaring back very soon, now is absolutely the time to pick up all those terrific properties that are hopefully trading at all time lows.
• Homes, too, are now available that were once out of reach, as more and more people are forced to default on their mortgages and surrender their family abodes to the harsh gavel of foreclosure.
• And puppies are still so darned cute!

See? That wasn’t so hard, was it?

Aren’t analysts obnoxious? On the heels of the news that Starbucks will be closing about 5% of its stores nationwide, the Associated Press reports that assorted pundits feel the cuts haven’t gone deep enough. “Starbucks Corp.’s (SBUX) plan to close several hundred stores is a step in the right direction,” says the AP, “but analysts say it may not be enough to solve the problems facing the company.”

Isn’t that just like the Street? You give them 600 on the altar of sacrifice, and they want more. They’re like kids with potato chips or cookies. They can’t stop eating once they’ve gotten a taste of the good stuff. No, wait. Maybe that’s like sharks with a bucket of chum. 

The story goes on to suggest an interesting aspect of the situation. “Starbucks did not give details about which locations will be closed, but Stephen Kron of Goldman Sachs said he thinks the closings will be weighted to areas that have been hit the hardest by slumps in the housing industry and the broader economy.” 

This would make sense. We are already a nation of haves and have-nots, of huge discrepancies between the rich and the poor, two sides of the tracks, the good malls with cool and sexy anchor stores and the ones that depend on acres of wholesale shoe establishments. 

It would not be surprising to find that we are now a nation in which some people have access to really good coffee and others do not, where those who have defaulted on their home loans must walk for miles to get a decent latte. They sure can’t afford to drive. 

Of course, who can? 

So we’re officially in a bear market. You don’t have to tell anybody in a publicly traded company about it, of course. We’re in it every day. We feel it in a million different ways, in everything we do. Here are just a few: 

• When you talk with a reporter covering your business, they can barely lift their heads from their tabletops. They sigh. They mutter. They can barely come up with coherent questions. “So…” they murmur into the phone, their hearts heavy with impending layoffs and industry doom, “… what’s the rationale for your acquisition/divestiture/other again?” Much of the time, they haven’t even read the associated documentation. They’re just too sad to party. 
• When you talk with an analyst about your business, they can barely lift their heads from their tabletops. They snarl. They growl. They are defensive about their indices. Their last six write-ups have been dead wrong for a variety of reasons, but analysts have a tough time being wrong, they are never actually wrong, not really. Something must be wrong with YOU that made them be wrong, so they are quite naturally churlish about your whole situation. There is no upside. Why do you keep talking about one? 
• When you talk with sale people, they can barely lift their heads from their tabletops. Their knuckles are red with knocking on doors that will not open. 
• When you talk to merchandisers, automotive manufacturers and others who must advertise in order to sell their products, they can barely… well, you know. They cannot buy ads because their have less free cash flow with which to do so, but if they do not sell ads they will not move product and so will not have cash to buy ads and move product. They are hamsters on a wheel, with the smell of yesterday’s sawdust in their nostrils. 
• When you talk to investors… it’s not advisable. They will chew your face off if you do. 

Except for the guys who saw the dark side all along. The short sellers. The crafty few who saw the whole thing coming all along and bet correctly on which way the water would spin on its way down the vortex. They’re the ones walking down the Street, whistling a merry tune. Makes you want to smash them, don’t it?