The Ellensburg Other ~ The Air Is Killing Us!

Dateline Ellensburg, WA…

The local newspaper, The Daily Record, reported Thursday that Kittitas County is ‘working to address air quality’ in the area. The headline may as well have read that ‘the county is reckoning on commencing to beginning to start cleaning up the air here’. A smaller caption read ‘State, Local Officials trying to avoid federal involvement.’ At the bottom of the page, it is noted that Ellensburg has been ranked as one of the most polluted areas in the state since 2012.
Holly Myers, spokeswoman for the County Health Department, noted that if the federales send in the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) they will measure pollutants properly, “If it (the EPA) measured for the lower health sensitive level, that would mean industrial permits would go down and it would be costly to business in the area.

A spokesperson for the Washington Department of Ecology, Sue Billings, says that if the EPA came in to fix the air quality ‘it would give Kittitas County a negative image…This kind of thing gets into the AARP and tourist magazines and the community gets a stigma…’

Let us condense the above information into a consumable ‘byte’…Kittitas County and Washington State health officials are ignoring a dangerous health issue for years because they value business over people’s lives.
Considering that all businesses run off the backs of people, taking the side of business on this issue is more than a little irresponsible.

When this writer moved to the county, we first consulted websites which give information to people who are moving or planning vacations, etc. Sperling’s Best Places said (and probably still does) that Ellensburg has air quality that is 98.5% pure!!! The officials are more concerned with glossing over the issue than the risk to community health…

VOTERS, remember names and be sure to vote against those who poison you.

So, what happens next?.…well, this blog gets sent to the AAA, the AARP, Bestplaces.com and all those other sites which trick people into coming here to be poisoned. Then we contact them to see where they got their information (call it lies) as regards the air purity here. We will report our findings.

Up until January 29, 2015, the County did not find it necessary to provide information concerning poor air quality. A particularly nasty day made local headlines on November 20, two days after the center city crematorium filled the two blocks surrounding the public library with noxious fumes. The thermal waves carrying the putrid smell could be seem emanating from the chimney of the funeral parlor – which is located in the center of the most populated area (duh) and in breathing distance of Central Washington University. How many parents are paying to have children come here to absorb carcinogens which may not form cancer cells until years after they graduate?

This kind of hiding from the government is unhealthy. It is as unhealthy as Vantage Highway, where reports of people incapacitated by breathing problems are reported weekly, if not every other day, in the Record. When the writer moved to the Burg, he developed a breathing problem after a month or so. Every morning, he woke feeling fine and, as soon as he opened his windows or stepped outside(into the air), developed a hacking cough that took hours to clear each morning. He stupidly attributed it to ‘hay fever’ and pollen from the world famous Timothy Hay grown here.

Speaking of the hay…it is shipped around the world because it is reckoned to be the best. Do the buyers know that it is steeped in fine particle pollution throughout the entire growing cycle? What does the fine particulate pollution do to the livestock it is fed to, way down the line?

So here in Kittitas, business is more important than people…and they admit it in the newspaper. You have to credit them for that much…but the tourist magazines need to hear about it for any action to occur, it would seem – talk about the Power of the Press!

Storage Whores ~ How ‘Sell’-ebrities Devalue Our Treasures

Gentle Readers,
While we enjoy ‘reality tv’s’ foray into the collectibles business, we can’t ignore how they are stealing money from us while we watch them. Reality is now defined by scripted episodes, sort of like professional wrestling only with antiques.
Antiques Roadshow, the premier PBS series on collectibles, presents real opinions by real auction experts who tell real prices on items that any of us may own. We find this to be very interesting and helpful. The once-respectable A&E Network gives us Storage Wars, the once-believable History Channel doles out Pawn Stars (and obviously does not ‘fact check’ stories Rick Harrison tells suckers, er, customers about their soon to be lost valuables) and TruTV, among the most audacious channels, shows Hard Core Pawn.
The premise is the same for all three – somebody makes a mint while somebody else gets screwed. Yes, it sounds like Washington, DC.
Nonetheless, in efforts to lowball the poor stiffs who feed them, items which once held value to us are picked apart, scoffed at, niggled over and usually sold at a huge loss to the poor nitwit who sells it. The other two take place in pawn shops while Storage Wars follows collectors who buy storage bins and sell the priciest items within. If you have watched these shows for a few seasons, you may have noticed that prices are going lower on all the items. Even when figuring out how much an item from storage is worth, a leather jacket will be said to be worth ten dollars. We know damn well they cost more than ten dollars, even used…unless you are very slick and crafty at getting bargains.
On a recent episode (recent to us, anyway) of Pawn Stars, Harrison talked a customer out of a vintage cap gun/holster collection. The seller wanted $250 and ended up taking $65 for the collection of guns and holsters. Last year, we found some old cap gun holsters in out stuff while moving and put them on Ebay, not expecting much. We had three holsters with no guns. One holster had the buckle ripped off and another was missing the gun sheath. We sold them for $350, all together. That was OUR reality!

Do you get the idea?
Our Superman lunchbox with thermos from the sixties used to sell for over $800 to collectors. Thanks to Ebay, the set has fallen to under $500. If anybody finds one on a ‘reality show,’ the reality will be that the price goes down.
Remember…all those idiots on Duck Dynasty grew those beards just for the show!

this is a free blog. as such, expect some typos….
thanks for reading!

So Where Do People Actually Read This Crap??????

Gentle Readers,

We certainly appreciate your patronage!
We find it gratifying to reach so many places around the world. If you wonder where people read this drivel, er, wonderful blog, then here is a list of countries that your fellow readers have checked in from.
No matter where they are in the world, they are still stuck on one tiny screen…are we all? We shouldn’t even question it, since it brings us traffic…ha…but it is the magnificently humble nature of us to be amazed that you all took the time to look…
and Thanks!
In order of readership, here where others are suffering through this along with you!

United States
United Kingdom
Canada
Australia
Germany
France
India
Brazil
Netherlands
Singapore
Ireland
New Zealand
Italy
Pakistan
Taiwan
Philippines
Norway
Japan
Switzerland
Sweden
Belgium
Cambodia
Spain
Denmark
Hong Kong
Thailand
Mexico
Portugal
Iraq
Turkey
Hungary
Poland
Republic of Korea
Bahrain
Jordan
Yemen
Indonesia
Croatia
Romania
Puerto Rico
Bulgaria
Bangladesh
Czech Republic
Ecuador
Egypt
Finland
United Arab Emirates
Chile
Israel
Viet Nam
New Caledonia
Lebanon
Venezuela
Russian Federation
Slovenia
Myanmar
Estonia
Jersey
Argentina
Ghana
Namibia
Saudi Arabia
Austria
South Africa
Uruguay
Afghanistan

The Approaching Evil of Corey Booker

Concerned Citizens,

This is a short one but we did want you to skip back here a few blogs and remember the warning we gave about flagrant fatso Gov. Chris Cartman Christie putting former Newark Mayor Corey Booker in a NJ senator slot after the death of another old cheat. Just skip back about five or six posts and look for the fat guy.

We could not help but notice the cutesy-ootsey bald head getting off a plane with our Manchurian President, Baccarat Obama, a week ago or so.

Do remember that the basic cause for all this concern is what the late but great Amiri Baraka told us about Booker wanting to sell Newark’s water and water rights to a corporate entity and other devious reason Booker is not a good man.
We wondered why he was on the plane with the Chief but we did a quick search to see the once close friends have had a rift between them. In fact, one thing we found was a Huffington Post report noting that Booker spelled Obama’s name wrong on a list of NJ delegates. The two are at odds but how did the city mayor get to be at odds with the Prez so fast?

Why?
Do you wonder why?
Why?

Just remember that we warned you first when looking for guidance in the future…

this is a free blog and, as such, may contain typos….

How To Make Money On Legal Marijuana

Faithful Readers,
We thank your for all your recent support by visiting this blog and hope you will keep it up…we promise to keep writing if you do. Today we want to talk about how to make money…a lot of people hate money but want it. They blame one percent of everybody else for taking their money…this may well be true but there are ways to get your cash back, legal ways in case anybody from the law enforcement community perked up their ears when they saw this title.
First, we have the legislation from the FED last week which allows banks to fund pot growers in legal states…this is the biggest read-between-the-lines green light that the USA could get as regards the future of our fav weed. People make livings from it and raise families here. They buy new cars and lighting systems, soil and pots. They put money back into the economy and they have hope in their eyes. They are not waiting for a pension and know they have averted the dead end that most young people find themselves facing these days when thinking about a ‘career’…what a word!
But you do not even have to grow it or smell it or even touch it to make money. You can buy stocks through your favorite brokerage which will put you in the pot business, more or less. But how to make moey? Buy low and sell high is the logic.
At this point the stocks sell at incredibly low prices, like 3 or four shares for a dollar. The first such stock we cashed in on was Medical Marijuana Inc (MJNA) which is kind of a stinker and we are happy we got out with our pants on that one but we did make a few hundred dollars. When we first heard about it, Bruce Perlowin, the Prince of Pot, was at the helm. It looked like a good thing and Perlowin talked it up on CNBC but jumped ship and now runs HEMP, Inc (HEMP). Due to his dodgy ways we do not recommend either one of these but prefer to stick to rowlife, Inc. (PHOT) at this time…
Growlife, Inc., the indoor lighting/hydroponic/cash-lending-to-growers conglomerate is our new favorite and they stand more to gain than any company from the FED decision to allow mariuana lending.
They have been buying up major growershop chains and were the first company to announce that they would lend money to new grow operations to get set up. All summer long it languished at under five cents a share as we told everybody we knew to go and buy some. Now it is at forty cents a share and that represents roughly a 1400% gain on your money in the six month period from today back to August 18, when it was three cents a share. Compare that to the dismal 1-2% return on a 15-month CD!
Of course, playing with penny stocks is like playing with fire but the idea is to buy a bunch when it is at a low point and sell a portion when it hits a high – a large enough portion so that the remaining shares are yours for free. It is still at a price where you can do that
This is new industry. Do you realize how rare a new industry in the USA is? What was the last one…computers/internet services? Was that a money-maker for those who got in early? As of December 2103, Growlife has a former Microsoft/Yahoo! executive running operations and some other high-tech moneyed names are also lurking in the background. There is a lot of cash to be made here. Of course money is evil but you need money to live.
Live is evil spelled backwards.
If the ‘one percenters’ are taking all the money, why not grab a few crumbs as they flake of the sides of the monopoly money stacks. Why let them make all the money and complain?
So while we do not promote rich pigs running our lives, we do like to pick their pockets and when we see them piling onto something, we look for loose change on the ground…

This is a free blog so do not look at the typos…

Amiri Baraka, Chris Christie and the Rape of New Jersey

Humble Readers,
When Amiri Baraka passed away on January 9 of this year, we lost a great american.
During his life, Baraka said a number of foolish and incendiary things. He called all white men ‘fags’ and called for the rape of all white women by black men – talking about going for a reaction! As he got older, his racist rants lightened up.
We spoke to him in the year before his death and race division was not the answer to our problems, as he saw it. We are past that and the only way we can save this country is for all people to unite. In fact, the only way we got to interview him was to tell him that his message did not get to enough white people and that most readers of the publication we wanted to interview him for were white. When we first asked for an interview, we were met with laughter but once we explained why we wanted to interview him for Beatdom, he relented.
The movements by the lower and middle class groups cannot be exclusive to race or party. The only way to beat the commercial-industrial-military complex that has most people beaten down is to unite, not to fight each other. Instead of attacking another race, why not join together and go after the rich bastards who you think have all your money? Even Baraka admitted that the election of Obama served to widen the gap between races, which had been a huge focus of civil rights groups. The issue of Civil Rights keeps slipping into the news. Before he died, Mr. Baraka pointed to the Trayvon Martin case, which exploded shortly thereafter. He also called out the Tea Party, a huge racist group.
Another prescient bit that AB (as his staff called him) told us involved a certain Mayor of Newark. This guy got elected by the people of Newark and robbed them for decades by signing a deal with Prudential Insurance to allow them tax-free access to do business in Newark. Corey Booker, the conman in question, has deprived the citizens of Newark countless dollars. One Prudential building is worth ‘about 300 million dollars a year in taxes’ according to the late poet. That is 300 million a year since 1970.
Besides allowing Prudential to usurp city services and plaster its name over all the buildings and landmarks it can defile, Booker (at that time) was trying to sell the water rights belonging to the city, as well as 200 acres of land where water springs from. This does not seem in the best interest of the people of New Jersey.
NO interest in the people of New Jersey???? How can we even use the phrase without mentioning, our Hero Sandwich, Chris Christie?
When the sitting Senator of New Jersey died last year, Governor Christie rewarded Booker for his mis-deeds (and likely payoffs pushed up the ladder) from the Newark scams. Booker has a pretty face and shiny bald head. He is black.
Black or white, he obviously is consumed by greed from the inside out so color doesn’t matter. What matters is – where he is going from Senator? If Christie eats himself through the press and doesn’t get to the 2016 primaries, Booker could carry out his agenda and be counted on to keep kicking the graft up the ladder to the big guy. Another good, thing…he is even whiter than Obama…look!
Is he our future? Is Christie our future? Do we want a future?

This is a free blog so do not pay attention to the typos, if you find any.

One From The Poetry Corner

Esteemed Readers, Bottom Feeders and Counters of Meters, today we bring you an installment of the Poetry Corner. We promised to keep this blog going, so we are happy to be in your face.
The following poem is the first in what will be known as the ‘Yakima Cycle’ by Michael Hendrick, a drunken friend of ours who can’t be trusted with your daughter…a sad one, boys and girls, sniff, sniff. He redeems himself with his poems…maybe not this one but he seemed quite insistent that we publish it for him and it is a ‘limerick’ really. As per our buddies at the Encyclopedia Brittanica a limerick is a popular form of short, humorous verse that is often nonsensical and frequently ribald. It consists of five lines, rhyming aabba, and the dominant metre is anapestic, with two metrical feet in the third and fourth lines and three feet in the others.
These short rhymes often involve a city name. We chose Yakima as our city and Mr. Hendrick, in his infinite kindness, offered to share poems written just for this blog…a saint of a man, is he.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A certain young woman from Yakima
got randy but had quite a hacking cough.
Though she sounded a fright,
she loved a new man each night.
Her ten kids proved that she did not whack’em off.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Now, Kids…it is nothing against women, nothing against Yakima and most certainly not against masturbation…if anything, is insulted here, it is the Rhyme itself, but it endures, year after year.

Oddly, though…the most popular blogs here are the ones having to do with insults and words and we find that to be very interesting and think we will do our best to include more such material in days and weeks to come.

Welcome to the Working Week!

On Occupying Wall Street…What Would Allen Ginsberg Do?

 Gentle Readers and Reasonable Minded Thinkers,

 We see here a photo of Allen Ginsberg, taken by Jerry Aronson, maker of The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg, which is reviewed (with four more exclusive photos) in Beatdom Issue 9. It was taken at Grant Park, Chicago, in 1968 during the infamous riots at the Democratic National Convention.

 Ginsberg chanted to distract the protestors from marching because he did not want them becoming active due to his presence and ending up with their blood on his hands because he incited them to challenge armed police.

 Allen Ginsberg is universally-known as a good and kind man. In Aronson’s film, a comment is made by counterculture icon Ed Sanders about how to decide if a course of action is right or wrong. He offers that the best choice is to ask ourselves, ‘What would Allen do?’

Today, someone took umbrage to the fact that we stated that the list of ‘demands’ offered by the protestors have nothing to do with day to day trading activity on Wall Street. The demands, if anything, would benefit Wall Street. Take the end of the war on drugs, for instance. If that were to happen and sweet marijuana were made legal, it would open up a whole new industrial segment and provide jobs for millions and bring billions into the economy yearly. Companies would be formed, like the already existing Medical Marijuana, Inc, (MJNA.PK), which would put a whole new breath of air into the sagging sails of the US economy.

The protestors want student loan forgiveness. If student loans were forgiven, people would have more money to spend on other things. This would lead to an increase of profits by many industry segments, including food, clothing and consumer discretional spending, to name just a few. The increased profits would lead to stronger balance sheets and the value of the stocks of these companies would rise with the tide. How is this an anti-Wall Sreet agenda?

How about ‘free education kindergarten through college’?  That one seems to undermine the whole financial system, alright, as who is going to pay and since we have never had any children we certainly hope these protestors have pockets that are deep enough to pay our share. Again, though…what does this have to do with Wall Street…not one bleeding thing!

Oh, and let us remind you all that these are ‘Official’ demands. Who is the official? Did the protestors elect another Obama-like figure who is the Official and presides over them? Speaking of His Nibs, the Prez, most of these protestors look like the same foolish bastards that were campaigning for Obama in the first place and if it were not for the pissing contest between Obama and the GOP in Congress, we would not be in the bad economic shape we are in.

The problem lies in Washington, not on Wall Street. Regulatory statutes are not voted on by the men and women who broker trades on Wall Sreeet. They are voted on by the elected official picked by the american voters. Put the blame in the right place if you expect any real action. This is the real world. School is out for ever, as Alice Cooper said.

Then we have the repeal of capital punishment…another hot topic on Wall Street. We guess what happens is that when somebody is meant to be executed, they are transported to New York City, where a bunch of stock brokers have a secret back room where they hang, dismember, gas, stab, shoot and stone the poor people who do not have jobs because Obama does not agree with Congress…does this make sense to you? Odd, it makes no sense to us but this is what people are getting their heads busted over.

Who is the great mind who thought of having all the kids go out and get gassed and clubbed by the garda? Who put the lives and safety of all those people behind their own twisted ideology and is responsible for the violence that the protestors wear like the red badge of courage? Who is the face behind this? That is your criminal. There is the evil force du jour.

Equal Rights for women…gee, we have seen many successful women on Wall Street. As long as they can hustle the equities, they are equal. As long as they make money for their company, they are equal. In the minds of the protestors, however, Wall Street is a place in New York City, once the most progressive city in the world until LA got the jump with medical marijuana, where woman are held in dungeons and treated like serfs. This is all getting a bit silly but we reckon you get the idea.

Why Wall Street? It does not make the laws. Wall Street is their saviour, if these moron would open their eyes. If they had jobs, they would not be in the park. If they were looking for a job, they would not be in the park. If they had not voted for Obama, they would not be in the park. Why not Washington? Why not in front of the White House?

These kids are amateurs, for one thing. They have no grasp of how society works, if they are in NYC and the problem is in DC.

They will affect no real change, except for the change in a few profiles when the billyclubs break their noses and open their foreheads. It is more likely that some old guy, some old WWII veteran, who’s wife died because she could not get the proper medical attention or because they could not afford medicine due to the tactics of our elected officials – the ones who are paid to represent our voices and then take money from lobbyists to stick up our collective ass. One of these old guys is going to take his hunting rifle down off the wall, where it has been collecting dust for 20 years and go to DC and plug himself a few pols. As he is led away in cuffs, some of his buddies from the VFW will see him on TV, while drinking at the bar, and feel the ‘band of brothers’ emotion that got them through that great war and take to DC with their own guns. They will not care about mace because they will just shoot. They are not far from dead and what they had is being taken away bit by bit, so what do they have to lose? Not a damned thing. The old guys are our hope for change, not these young wankers who think it is time for a party and may as well get their childhood agressions beat out of them by a uniformed cop.

Occupy Wall Street? Why not occupy Disneyworld?  That would hurt a lot more people. It would dent the tourism, airline, automobile rental, hotel and restaurant businesses from Florida to all ends of the USA because people would not be buying gas or taking planes or stopping to eat or staying at a hotel on their way to the wonderland of american moronism. This would really hurt Wall Street.

With the elections coming up, all this protesting does is to keep focus off the real issues and agendas facing the american people…like voting for somebody with a brain who can get us out of this mess.  This is the sort of thing the FBI of CIA could arrange to keep the country is a state of upheaval so the light is not shone of the FEMA camps they set up in Denver, CO, this weekend. Did you hear about that? – or was there not enough space for the news on both so you hear about the protestors, instead? These kids in the parks deserve what they get. Anybody who is dumb enough to challenge a policeman, whether you are on the right side or the wrong side of moral boundary, is gonna get one up against the side of the head. That is how it works. It has always been that way and if you do not get it, you are a right imbecile!

These people act surprised that the police are hurting them…what the fuck? The city is broke enough and can’t feed kids in school and has other programs where funds have been cut and now they have to pick up the tab for all the overtime the police are working to contain this foolish fracas.

We hope that every cop who gets paid overtime for working the Wall Street Occupation, cashes his check and takes that money right to Wall Street and purchases some stock in American companies. Then, the ‘occupation’ would actually help the economy. We wonder how many displaced pretzel and falafel vendors have gone out of business because they could not find space to park their food carts. This occupation is for idiots but we are a nation of idiots so it will probably drag on for a while…but on the bright side, at least they are not teabaggers.

 

 

 

My Stock Blog Redux ~ DOW, DNN, SD, HERO, MPEL

     Kind Readers,

     No, we are not dead.  We are still dealing with the mysteries of the PC and why we can no longer load photos on here the way we are supposed to, as well as other matters of universal importance.

     After our last stock blog, you probably thought us to be insane.  All the stocks we listed went down.  Well, if you look further, you will see that the whole market went down and not just in the USA but all around the world.  What this does is to create a ‘buying opportunity’.  When quality stocks get low in price, you do not sell them, you buy them from idiots who think they are not good, based on their perception of performance.

     The market has turned from Bear to Bull today and a rising tide lifts all ships.  That is an expression Mark Haines used to use a lot.  He was a morning commentator on CNBC and died yesterday at age 65.  CNBC tells you what they want you to hear but Haines was a regular guy and went for the cheap jokes a lot. We will miss him.

     So let us take a look at the damages.  The first stock we mentioned was Dow Chemical (DOW), which was around $40 a share when we told you about it.  At the moment, it is up .95 cents at $36.05, digging its way back up from the correction.  DOW is the least of our worries and we almost wish it would stay low until the end of June, so that we get more shares when the quarterly dividend is paid out.  Watch for it to keep climbing, though.  Now India has drought that threatens to make cotton even more expensive and DOW has the answer to drought.

     Hercules Offshore Drilling (HERO) was $6.10 a share when we told you to buy it.  It took a dive but always held above that six dollar mark, like a winner.  Since then, Obama has turned around on American oil and natural gas, so expect these oil service companies to thrive.  At the moment, it is at $6.43 a share, up almost 5% for the day.  It will keep going up but even if you had only bought a thousand shares and sold them now, after three weeks, it would still get you a $330 profit…but that is small potatoes as you will see in days to come.

     Similarly, Sandridge Energy (SD) is up to $10.88, also showing around a 5% gain today.  We did not tell you about this one yet but now is the time to buy.  We own it.

     The casino group Melco Crown Entertainment (MPEL) took a dive, too, but is up almost 7% today on active trading. It is at $10.64 and it was $10.63 when we told you about it so, if nothing else, it held firm while many stocks floundered and continue to do so.  This one is going to really take off later in the year.  Their most recent yearly report, issued last week, shows that MPEL has swung to a profit, after posting losses for a number of reporting terms.  It was not much of a profit, a penny a share, but it repressents the swing from losing money to making money, which is what it is all about.  They crossed the threshold and are ready to rock.

     Speaking of rocks, look at Denison Mines (DNN).  It is holding its own, considering the badmouthing and backsassing that uranium mines are getting these days.  It is at $2.12, down .07 cents from when we told you about it but this is a long term play and an entry level of $2-something is excellent.  Uranium and other raw materials will be needed to help build the new world intrastructure, no matter how dangerous people think nuclear power is this month.  The fact is that nuclear energy is never going away, so invest in it while it is cheap and get some oil stocks to carry you until we are past the use of fossil fuels.

     Added May, 26, 2011 3:13pm EST

     We are adding this note to point out the significance of Sandridge Energy (SD). At this time, the price per share is $11.97usd.  If you had bought it yesterday, when we said it was up to $10.88, and sold it today (at today’s high of $12.13) you could have shown a profit of $1250.00 in 24 hours on a $1,088.00 investment.  That is about a 13% gain overnight…try making that percentage on a CD!!!

My Stock Blog ~ DOW, HERO, DNN, MPEL

     Gentle Readers,

     Today we discuss one of our favorite subjects and, in so doing, we must change the rules a bit.  This blog has a disclaimer which says everything you read is fiction and not to believe a word.  In writing about stocks, we shall stick entirely to the facts and there will be no funny business.

     As far as the matter of disclosure goes, we do hold positions in every stock that we make note of.  We do not do picks and pans.. We only tell you our picks.  With no formal training in Finance and having lived by the seat of our pants for most of our years, we have found that the stock market can be equally as kind to the little person as it can to the big boys – if you make the right decisions.

     One must never expect instant success.  In fact, a good rule of thumb is that you will lose money on two out of every five stocks you invest in.  Those losses can be used to bring down the taxable amount of your gains, so they are a known risk which is necessary.  Sometimes things change, even if you do the homework or due diligence (DD).

     What authority do we have, then, to write about stocks and equites?  We trust Bank of America, who has a ‘performance’ tab on our brokerage account which indicates that in the first financial quarter of 2011 (Q1), we handily beat the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq.  Our portfolio gained 13.3% while these others gained around 5-6%, as a group.

     We take certain matters into consideration when buying, such as insider trading, institutional buying, the balance sheet, the profit margin, earnings and potential in the world around us.  We picked these first four companies to illustrate how studying the world news will lead you to your best picks and profits.

     Take Dow Chemical (DOW), which has been climbing in share price with almost no hurdles.  Many think of DOW as the enemy but they are not aware of the good things that DOW is doing for the world.  The share price keeps breaking news 52-week highs and is trading at around $40 a share.  They have just upped their dividend to a dollar a share and are at the end of assimilating the purchase of the world’s largest chemical company, Rohm and Haas, which it bought in the last two years and opens them to far more revenues, especially from emerging markets.  In their most recent yearly report, DOW showed revenues of $16 billion from their Asian operations.  This is up $9 million from the previous year and China is just taking off but that is only a small part of the story.

     Watching the news last night, we could not help but notice the warnings of impending droughts threatening grain crops in both China and the USA.  There is only so much water in the world, right?  True, however,  yesterday Dow Water & Process Solutions, a division of DOW, was awarded ‘Desalination Plant of the Year’ by Global Water Intelligence for its seawater reverse osmosis facility in Kumell, Australia.  This is the third largest desalination plant in the world.  Not only does it produce one third of the water for the city of Sidney but ‘energy requirements for the plant are offset with 100 percent renewable energy from a 67-turbine wind farm’ and the plant also employs an extensive marine life monitoring program.  DOW is bringing clean water to many parts of the free world where it is badly needed.  It will be needed even more badly in the future, as natural water resources are said to last only another ten years by many scientists.  That is where the money comes in.

     Dow makes many other products and has been increasingly environmentally-conscious. although it is perceived as a behemoth monster that wants to kill us all.  They have a very strong global presence, far ahead of the rush to invest in ’emerging markets’.   Forty dollars a share is prohibitive but you must remember that you get the same percentage of profitable return on a thousand dollars as you do on a million.  Take a look!

     Next we have Hercules Offfshore Drilling (HERO).  This one is a bit of an underdog, thanks mostly to Obama’s moritorium on drilling on American soil, even though foreign companies can drill here.  The fuss over the moritorium finally got to fever pitch and Secretary of Interior Salazar lifted the ban and started to allow contracts for drilling to be issued.  Right now, HERO has contracts to drill for Chevron and a few other refiners.  The earnings from this activity will show on balance sheets starting at the end of Q2.

     While it is selling at a discount of $6.10 a share as this is typed,  this stock traded between $35-40 until the shite hit the fan in 2008.  Since then, it bought the equipment of another troubled drilling company and now controlls 40% of the shallow water drills in the Gulf Coast.  The book value of the stock is $7.43, based on current assets and equipment.  When you consider that the failing company HERO bought the equipment from was selling for about $35 a share less than two years ago, this stock shows huge potential for upside…that means money!!!

     Here is where ‘looking at the world around you’ comes into play.  Our next pick is Canada’s Denison Mines Corporation (DNN).  This one is a little riskier and is for people who want to make money in ten years, as opposed to today or tomorrow.  This one traded between $10-15, going to a high of around $20 in 2007; as of this writing, it is down to $2.19 a share.  On the balance sheets, this is currently showing a loss of four cents a share, however, this company is a miner than specializes in uranium, vanadium, silver, gold and other minerals…mostly uranium.  They also recycle uranium.

     You may not like uranium but it is better to have ‘safe’ uranium than ‘unsafe’ uranium and keep in mind that construction on the last nuclear reactor in the USA was started in 1976 and that these facilities are going to need to be updated, upgraded and so uranium is under-rated and hated at this point in time.  In a little while, people will want uranium again and there is a shortage…unless you look at the large mine DNN just found in Mongolia, nice and close to the Asian markets which will be going nuclear.  The demand for uranium is much higher than supply.  Another plus is that Canadian stocks tend to do better than American stocks, in general, for various reasons we will not go into at this time.

     So, if you look at the world and see the panic, interest, discussion, worry and fuss over ‘energy’, it would seem that the best way to make money is to stick with the oil producers until the alternative forms of energy notch higher growth stats.  In the meantime, DOW has wind farms, solar shingles and other solutions.  The future seems to be nuclear, so uranium will rise again.  By having all bases covered – diversification is the term – we can make a little money on the way things are going…and why not?  The big boys do it…why should money only be for the rich?  We deserve some, too…

     If you think I am a fool and that this stuff is all a gamble, then i suggest you take a look at Melco Crown Entertainment Ltd. (MPEL) of Macau, which is trading at $10.63 at this time.  If you have ever followed gambling stocks, you may have seen how fast they shoot up in price and wish you had some.  In 2006, Macau replaced Las Vegas as the gambling capital of the world.  The revenues are much higher than Vegas and the owners of MPEL, the Ho family, were there long before the Sands, the MGM or WYNN got there.  Take a look at a chart for the Sands (LVS) and see where it was about two or three years ago, compared to the price now.  Not only does MPEL have the advantage of being on Macau’s Cotai Strip longer than the newcomers, it has a Hard Rock Cafe opening this year (which may not seem like a big deal to you but if you live in a communist country where thrills are limited, this is a big thing!).  Aside from that, there will be shuttles running gamblers there from mainland China by the end of the year and it is said that the Chinese are loyal to country, so you can imagine where they would prefer to drop their cash.  Remember, gamblers all know that the odds are always with the house – so why not buy part of the house, while it is cheap?

     That is it for this time.  These descriptions could be better but that would require a full blog for each stock.  That would not be a problem but the key is timing and the markets are down right now, along with stock prices.

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