Slope of Hope Blog Posts

Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.

Voting with the Stars

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A hodgepodge of “celebrities” have vowed they will move (typically to Canada) should Trump win. They include Miley Cyrus, Cher, Whoopi Goldberg, Rosie O’Donnell, Jon Stewart, and Bryan Cranston.

As a point of reference, here are the stars that pledged they would leave the country in 2000 and 2004 if Bush was elected President:

  1. Alec Baldwin
  2. Kim Bassinger
  3. Tina Fey
  4. Barbra Streisand
  5. Robert Altman
  6. Sean Penn

And here’s the list of those who actually followed through with their pledge.

  1.  .

There is only one appropriate response to this:

No One Will Be Happy

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Near the end of the book The Big Short, there is a scene in which two of the principal characters are sitting outside in downtown Manhattan during the throes of the financial crisis. The entire financial world is in absolute pandemonium, but as they look around them…………nothing. Birds are singing. Children are playing. People are walking around, getting their errands done. A guy passes by on a bicycle. Nothing is different than it ever was.

That’s always been one of my favorite parts of the book, because the contrast between what those guys were experiencing (being completely and utterly enveloped in global chaos) and what was going on in the normal world is applicable in so many facets of life.

I begin this post with that anecdote because, with but a single week left until we have elected a new President, it seems everyone is convinced that Things Will Be So Different once the deed is done.

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The Month of Trade Prior to a Presidential Election Since 1992

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Due to some of the speculation around the slope about the effects of an election on the market, I decided to look at the last 20 years of elections.  They’re a pretty mixed bag among the lot.  Some were steadily uptrending the month prior, some were in choppy ranges, and some sold off for a couple weeks and rallied right back.

I sum it up to useless data.  No edge there.  Carry on as if wasn’t happening.

election 1992 (more…)