Monrovia Bear Market?

The Dow Jones was above 29,000 just last Friday when Twitter went aflame with video of a giant bear roaming the suburban streets of Monrovia, Calif. The Dow has dropped about 3,500 points since then.

Pulling The Ruggs Out

Former Alabama wide receiver Henry Ruggs runs a 4.28 at the NFL combine. Former Notre Dame wideout Chase Claypool, who stands 6’4″ and has incredible hands as those of us who watched him the last two seasons know, runs a swift 4.40. Does Claypool go in the first round?

The fastest combine 40 ever was a 4.22 by John Ross of U-Dub, who now plays for the Bengals.

Dayton Place

When you think of Dayton and college basketball (unless you’re old enough to remember the name Damon Goodwin), you think of the first four, the annual preamble to the NCAA tournament. Not anymore.

The Dayton Flyers are 25-2 and are likely headed for a 2 seed in the NCAA tourney. The Flyers, ranked fifth nationally, have just two losses: one to current No. 1 Kansas and the other by just 2 points to current No. 21 Colorado.

Dayton’s leading scorer and rebounder? Obi Toppin, a 6’9″ Brooklyn (“BROOKLYN!”) native. Keep an eye out.

“Miracle”

A week ago, Donald Trump was welcoming most of the members of America’s “Miracle On Ice” hockey team to the stage at a Las Vegas MAGA fest. Six days later, he’s in the White House, intoning to close confidants (i.e., sycophants) that “It’s [the coronavirus] going to disappear. One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”

See, when you’re both ignorant and a narcissistic sociopath, it’s impossible for you to accept that there are problems seem out of your realm that are relatively simple for others to solve. Your thinking is, If I don’t know, nobody must know.

You know, I’ve been giving this a lot of thought lately but i think may have been a huge mistake to find the worst human being in America, make him President, and have him lead us to our doom. #TrumpVirus

— I Love You Maine. (@StayWonked) February 28, 2020

One day earlier in the White House briefing room Dr. Anthony Sauci, the GOAT (living) of working on infectious diseases in the USA, declared that a coronavirus spread in the U.S. was inevitable. Trump, having no insight at all but not wanting the stock market to tank any further, publicly contradicted him.

So now that it’s beginning to dawn on Donald that this problem is too big for him, he’s going with 1) hand it off to Pence and 2) it’ll take a miracle. Maybe they can all pray it away at CPAC today.

Hippo On Pump 9

FILL UP: A hippo in South Africa took an evening stroll—through a gas station! https://t.co/WlmEJuOmz5 pic.twitter.com/tsPizJOlpY

— ABC News (@ABC) February 28, 2020

I’m seeing more of these types of videos on Twitter each day. Bear enters neighborhood, mountain lion climbs back yard fence, hippo strolls into gas station. This is the only thing to remember: They are not encroaching on our space; we’ve been encroaching on theirs. For centuries. I’m with the animals.

I’m nearly completely ignorant… about this year.

1. Grand Hotel: Best Picture winner. Never saw it.
2. The Most Dangerous Game: Saw it. Based on the short story that became the inspiration for the Zodiac killer.

That’s about all I got. I think America was too busy being depressed to make movies this year.

From Thursday night’s episode of “Mad Money,” Jim Cramer recommends 10 companies to buy in the midst of the coronavirus panic:

1. Adobe (ADBE)
2. Etsy (ETSY)
3. Moderna (MRNA)
4. Nvidia (NVDA)
5. RingCentral (RNG)
6. Shopify (SHOP)
7. Square (SQ)
8. Telodoc Health (TDOC)
9. theTradeDesk
10. Zoom Video (ZM)

Every once in awhile an on-air team comes along that is a network’s and viewer’s dream. They complement one another. Each person on the team understands his or her role. There is an air of mutual respect but not stiffness. Candor, and humor, comes through. Because everyone on the team trusts one another and probably even likes one another and so each person can be themselves.

TNT’s “Inside the NBA,” which was originally just Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith, was like that. And remains so, even with the addition of Shaq. So, too, currently is CNBC’s “Squawk On The Street.” The show airs weekday mornings from 9 to 10 a.m. Hosted by Carl Quintanilla, it also features Jim Cramer as the outrageous clown and David Faber as the more reserved, responsible straight man—who is often able to get off a few good comebacks. Costello had Abbott; Hope had Crosby; Lewis had Martin; and Cramer has Faber.

Quintanilla, as host, is seamless. He keeps the vehicle from swerving outside of its lane or into oncoming traffic. He sets up his two experts time and time again, either by knowing when they’ve exhausted a given subject and moving them on to the next topic or by mentioning a story from Barron’s or the Wall Street Journal that either can sink his teeth into. Carl never gives his own opinion because he recognizes that that’s what Cramer and Faber are there for. He’s not insecure about it, that he needs to sound intelligent to have them (or us) respect him. Carl’s the Ernie Johnson of financial TV.

Cramer brings name recognition and bodacious behavior. He’s the Chuck of this crew. He also has the bona fides. With two degrees from Harvard, neither in business or finance, Cramer nevertheless was insanely successful as a fund manager in his thirties and forties. He’s also a former print journalist and is a prolific writer. He likes to play the clown, but he really does do his homework and does know his stuff.

Faber is the serious student given to the subtle verbal jab. He’s also very telegenic for, again, an erstwhile print guy. Unlike Cramer, he never gives an opinion without having sourced it thoroughly. Cramer shoots from the hip; Faber takes an X-ray of the hip, undergoes a 30-day waiting period for said firearm, goes to a shooting range, and then fires.

This is a highly functional trio. There are other “stars” on CNBC: Andrew Ross Sorkin from 6 – 9 a.m. who, unfortunately for him, shares a set with Joe Kernen. And Downtown Josh Brown, a hedge fund manager who often appears on CNBC’s noon and 5 p.m. shows, would be the guy you’d most want to have a beer with. I also like Guy Adami and Tim Seymour, both on at 5 p.m., very much. And as for the women folk, let’s give shout-outs to the L.A. gals, Jane Wells and Julia Boorstein (in New York, I think Morgan Brennan has some serious chops but none of these three have a regular daily desk spot on the network).

If you want to dip your feet into financial television, turn on CNBC at 9 a.m. weekdays. You’ll learn a little something while also being entertained by the banter (and, yes, Cramer eats his words far too often which is not to say he’s wrong but rather that he does not enunciate properly; it wouldn’t hurt to improve upon that). It’s “Inside the NBA” for fans of lower case bulls.

In dramatic literature, Doctor Faustus made a deal with Lucifer. In current events, Dr. Fauci is being pressured to make a deal with Donald Trump.

Anthony Fauci, 69, Brooklyn-born and Catholic-schooled (Regis Prep in Manhattan, Holy Cross outside of Boston), is America’s foremost authority on contagious diseases. Today Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, was told by the White House not to give any interviews on the coronavirus unless he clears it with Mike Pence’s spokesperson first.

We feel badly for Fauci. He’s spent much of the past 10 years answering the same old questions about gluten-free beer and the ebola virus (honestly, I don’t know which is more of a scourge), and now he finally gets a topic that he can get his Purel-cleansed hands on, and the White House has put a muzzle on him.

Then again, Fauci is 69 years old, presumably quite financially comfortable, and he is a dedicated health professional. Why should he care about a veiled threat that Donald Trump would hold over him about transparency? I’m fired? Woo ha! Good luck containing a pandemic that may cost you the election.

It’s just the latest example of the White House attempting to control the message at the expense of the truth. Trump doesn’t want Americans to think too much about the coronavirus because he’s truly not worried about a pandemic; he’s worried about the stock market. And he cannot brag about the Dow Jones’ record highs if it is plummeting, and as long as Americans maintain a healthy level of, say, concern about the coronavirus, the market will continue to tank.

It’s funny. The market IS the truth here. If the big spenders who truly move the levers of the market trusted Trump, the economy/market would be fine. They don’t. Whatever they may be saying in public in support of Trump, they are speaking with their investment portfolios right now. That’s where the real talk exists.

The Dow is down 3,000 points this week. Donald Trump has promoted Mike Pence to be his coronavirus czar/designated disease scapegoat. And the American best equipped to inform us is being silenced. You can be anti-science right up until you need science to save your life, or that you have to come to terms with your willful ignorance.

Enjoy your CPAC, guys.