This is about the most interesting thing said in this entire thread, and about the least addressed. What is missing, or has been added, to make this living room boring and sometimes tedious to people who valued it and were valueable before? I want it back, too. If you would, do an ask-the-Gulch and see what people say. Ask "do you go to the Gulch more or less than you did a year ago? Why? What would you like to see that would help that boredom go away?" I'll help you tabulate the results. I would bet that the complaints seen on this thread alone would be a large part of it: people get treated in ways they don't like. Why? This is not anarchy - is anything done about that, or has the Gulch been cut loose to float away?

I had done something similar with the Janus family of funds. When I investigated the details of which stocks were owned in which funds, there was more overlap than I was comfortable with. If I am seeking some protection through diversification, I will recognize that I am not going to get the huge win, but I'm not going to get any nasty surprises either. For the huge wins, I am counting on myself. ;)

The 'one basket' is the One Company. Our IRAs are spread across fifty or sixty holdings, virtually none of which comprise more than 1-2% of the total holdings... equities, bonds, whatever. It's not like they put all your money in one bucket. Check the fisher.com website for a better view of who they are and what they do...
Whatever.... I just wanted to make sure that misconception, if any, was clarified.
Best wishes and good luck, whatever you choose.

Thanks for the tip. I have that much, but that would be putting too many eggs in one basket for me.

Subscribe to MarketMinder.com's weekly summaries or daily briefings. We've been with Fisher as our IRAs' money managers for nearly twelve years... beginning in 06.04, and they've only missed one reallocation trend in that period because they hadn't been observing or tracking some of the Government's influences on the economy... so they missed part of the Housing Bubble's Bust. Now they have a department dedicated to that.
Their philosophies are consistent over the years. If you buy into their Kool-Aid policies of what they do and why, you, like I, will tend to stop following the financial mainscream media's howling and cancel all of your financial newsletters.
As I finally deduced some decades ago, financial newsletter publishers (ALL of them) are publishing their religious beliefs in order to make extra cash on the side. If they weren't, WHYTF would they try to educate people to compete in the financial investment markets Using Their Strategies?!?!? Think competition and free markets, scratch your head, then cancel your expensive subscriptions.
A dear friend of mine connected us with Fisher when, in retirement, he discovered he was spending too much of his life tracking the market and managing his investments and not doing any better than Fisher.
At 49, you might not reach the minimum threshold buy-in to be a Fisher Client (currently $500k) but if you do some day, I'd strongly recommend them.
And no, I don't get a toaster if you sign up with them :) .
I left Schwab because they were cookbook and didn't have any hands-on help for me.
I bailed on Smith-Barney when our IRAs were losing money and the broker was bragging about their new high-end SUV and home remodeling. They were not in business to help ME, either.
Fisher makes money based on its clients' balances. If they want more fees, they need to increase the values of all clients' portfolios.
Took me decades of pissing money away on get-rich cold-callers to learn my lesson.
And hey,... no charge for this screed, either!
Enjoy!

Enjoy your retirement, plusaf. I'm only 49. A couple more years like the late 1990s would have been enough, but I have been treading water for 15 years now.

Same for me, Mama...
and one of the biggest turnoffs for me has been debates on Religion and Does God Exist.
(or was Hitler really a Christian or Atheist or FSM Believer...)

As a friend said to me MANY LONG years ago, "If, in the next ten minutes, I could convince you that God Exists... OR that God does NOT Exist.... and, out of that epiphany, you were to change your behavior or outlook on life....
THEN YOU REALLY SHOULD LOOK AT HOW YOU'RE BEHAVING NOW!
And still people debate the wrong issue.

And I kept telling everyone to read MarketMinder.com instead of the Mainscream Media, and hardly anyone did.
So, the last week or so hasn't been All That Bad, has it... just as MM and I expected.
Nothing grows to the sky OR sinks to the bottom of the deepest ocean trenches.

Well, negative rates haven't done shit for Japan, and to the other point, Where Else IS There To Go?
With all the shortcomings of the US government and its policies, my wife and I can't come up with any other country that doesn't have similar or worse issues They're bitching about.
We toured part of Great Britain last summer, and the papers and TV programs and just about everyone we overheard were complaining about Almost Exactly The Same "Problems" we'd heard in the US before we left.
It's The SOLUTIONS and ANALYSIS that's failing us and them, too.
One thing that's kept me very cheerful is that I was born in late 1945, just after the end of WWII, and I've lived through, survived and enjoyed some of the BEST Times I could have imagined in the US.
Today, as the Millennials worship Bernie for his promises to let them off the hook for their stupid and "unacceptable" college loan debts, I revel in the fact that my life expectancy will certainly not let me suffer from their mistakes for but a small percentage of my life span.
I've tried to open some youngsters' eyes to the history and viewpoints but except for a VERY small number who can still Think and Reason, for most of the rest, it's like Pushing On A Rope. Futile.
So, I've found my alternative: Enjoy life as much as possible for as long as I have left. It's worked quite well since I got an early retirement in '02. One of the Only Things I'll Ever thank Carly for.
Cheers; Enjoy!

Yep, that's me.. except I got voted down for NOT having religious convictions or views shared by enough others.
The endless 'views and opinions' of the early days when AS1 was first being created; the limitless opinions and complaints about which actor or actress should have or should Not have been cast in some part or another... bored me to tears. None of our opinions or votes could have changed anything.
Now we're doing the same thing with a made-for-TV version?
Or debating which presidential candidate Will Be The Best (or Worst) President Ever "Next time"?
Do some of you / Can some of you imagine how discouraging it is to offer Critical Thinking Questions and process into discussions here and get zero response or insults in return?
I came very close to ending my subscription and support at the last renewal time, and right now I'm not sure I didn't make a mistake BY renewing.

Funny thing for me is that I dropped my hardcopy subscription to our local paper here in Raleigh due to increasing costs, and that's freed up time for me to catch up on some Reason Magazine issues from the past year and a half that have been waiting for me.
I've discovered that Many issues that are bitched and moaned about Today were addressed in depth and thoughtfully at least a year ago in Reason.
And they're still bitched about today.
You think THAT isn't discouraging, too?
Well, it is.

Maybe you should watch Man Of Steel

WoW! . Alex is wonderful -- like Jobim whom you
mentioned in PoJ ... delicious! -- j

p.s. check out this guy::: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rxk1W...
(just in time for valentine's!)
.

no definitely am! I love accomplished musicians. https://www.facebook.com/alex.depue.9...

sounds like you need a kickstarter with lots of COOL drawings. Interesting.

I have been focused on my concept of creating a business for the Industrial-scale production of organic food and using that as a platform for marshalling my desire to do 'Terraforming' (which I defined as: "Creating Beautiful Gardens.On Other Worlds")

However I fell into the trap of getting all excited about the idea and its hypothetical potential while neglecting the fact that a business won't go anywhere without customers.

I like to make some comments on topics that I feel people are going to have strong opinions on, in order to point out facets that I previously hadn't considered.

This one should jump start your mind.

https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...

something tells me that Kaila is not impressed. -- j
.

Yes, and people find it in the black market. We should look at what goes on exactly in Venezuela to anticipate a bit what will happen here. The socialist end-game is being played out in real time for us to see there.

Where there is a will, there is a way ...

I'd like to concur with all that you've said an add a piece more... I'm a producer, and agree with the fundamental tenants of objectivism. I support this site financially (notice the little $ by my name) and contribute to conversations when time allows. All of that said, the voices of the echo chamber have openly stated that I would not be welcome in their gulch because of my religious beliefs. How many others got a bad taste for this site over that kind of attitude, and have infact shrugged this gulch? I know I nearly did, but I chose to overlook the little minds and support the larger mission of educating more people to the ways of Galt.
So if I asked here, and if there was a voting button for it, how many here would accept me in the gulch, with the understanding that my money and my principles are not server-able from my beliefs? How many others took the conversations at value, and see the people here as no different than the looters that want them to change their ways while still providing the means for their own destruction?
I'd contend that some portion of those people didn't get bored and leave, they shrugged galtsgulchonline, silently left, and you are just now noticing they are going missing... guess it's the flip side of the coin, they didn't need the gulch as much as the gulch needed them.
I guess that makes me a Hank or Dagny, refusing to shrug.... yet...

sounds like you read Harry Browne's book about living free in an unfree world. I agree with what he says. One has to know the rules the government sets down, the penalties, and the liklihood of being prosecuted.

As to gold, I keep mine in the "bank of the backyard" outside the control of the banking system. The problem comes in when one tries to spend it after its made illegal. The last time it was illegal, it took I think at least 20-30 years before the illegality was removed. Thats a long time, and I doubt one could buy things like cars or houses using hidden gold. It would only work for black market purchases, for which one might face possible jail time.

You're kidding, of course.
Bored at the Gulch, the news, your creativity? Short attention span?
My mom always said the same thing when as a kid I told her I was bored (Transliterating) "Gai shlug dienen kopf in vant." -- go hit your head against the wall. That should cure your boredom. Easy to see that she was eastern European. Ever since I retired, I have become the most unbored person you ever met. (Unbored is not a word, isit?)

At some point you'll have to make a judgement call as to which of those actions you can get away with ignoring. Gold confiscation, among many others, might fit in that category.

The only morally credible response to the sociopaths is to ignore and/or disobey as many of their dictatorial edicts as your particular tolerance for risk allows.

Have fun with it!