Gregory Bergman
Editor-in-chief, CapitalWatch
That the market rose this week didn't surprise me. But, with the
Bergman Buy Index up over 65% last week since we started in February, I
sold off many positions because, well, it was up 65%. We are starting
with a new hypothetical 100k and keeping the 61k in cash to buy
hypothetical PPE for the new, albeit hypothetical, nation.
"June gloom" is indeed coming. If not in June, then in July or
August, or September. But it will come long before a vaccine, the only
development that would justify continuing this rally.
I picked a couple of gold plays last week, and I'm going to stick
with them. I have added some equities in the index to replace those
sold. (Charts and stocks below.)
Bergman Buy Index 1: Started Feb. 28 with $100k hypothetical capital
Ending Capital: $165,875.105
$100k back in Bergman Buy Index 2; $65.9k held in CASH.
Bergman Buy Index 2: 33 stocks as of June 2 (some from old index remain.)
Two-week performance: 4.77% increase. Restarting hypothetical capital of $100k.
The Bergman Buy Index is "independent," and lacks outside influence.
Just like the way the end of this paragraph lacks a smooth segue. To
wit, speaking of "independence"....
Independence Day
Last week, I argued, in part, that the United States of America
should have been reconstituted as a new Republic after the Civil War
with the introduction of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments to the
Constitution. A change in the legal name of the United States would
surpass symbolic change; it would be the change of a "real" kind.
But now I do not think that's the way to go. Instead, it may be time
for a new nation, with "liberty and justice for all--who wear a mask."
Celebrate Good Times. Come On, That's All it Need Be.
First, I typically celebrate July 4 the same way I do any holiday: I
eat whatever it is that people eat (hot dogs, mostly), and I drink
whatever it is people drink (beer, mostly). Hot dog stocks to buy are
Nathan's (Nasdaq: NATH) and Tyson Foods (NYSE: TSN). The former has
remained remarkably stable this year considering, while Tyson Foods, for
all its trouble, has now traded sideways for months at around $60 per
share, down from around $80 before the selloff. The company will see a
drop in revenue this year due to plant closings, but as restaurants do
pick up, so will this stock. The food industry is safe long term, and
Tyson is a safe player within it.
Now, back to the Fourth. As I said, I just eat crap and drink. I do
not, admittedly, recite "The Declaration of Independence," nor do I
reread David McCullough's epic 1776 and revel at the courage of the
upstart colonists who dared to challenge the mighty British Empire. Just
as when I celebrate Cinco De Mayo, I do not delve deeply into the
history of the Battle of Puebla and the Mexican victory over the French.
(Sorry, cultural appropriation police, I just eat tacos and drink
margaritas.)
Reducing a whole culture to a few food and drink items? Maybe. But
how exactly am I supposed to celebrate these holidays if I am to
celebrate them at all? Should I don a 19th-century Mexican military
uniform, head to the French Embassy, and bayonet a diplomat? What about
the Fourth? Should I put on a tricorn hat, grab a musket, and head to
rural Pennsylvania to die of smallpox? Yes, smallpox. You see,
anti-vaxxers, people used to die of smallpox before a vaccine was
developed.
But this year, as I lock myself inside--and I hope my fellow
Americans do, too--I just might use the time to reflect a little bit on
what "independence" means today, and just what it is we are supposed to
be celebrating.
Imagined Realities With Unimaginable Problems
In truth, we are celebrating nothing real whatsoever. Nation-states
are nothing more than some legal entity bound by some documents created
by lawyers (the good kind way back when). They are imagined realities
that serve as a framework for the cooperation of millions of people.
Sometimes a nation-state is additionally bound by the mostly homogenous
ethnic or cultural heritage of its people, which is most evident in
island nations like Japan, but sometimes it doesn't seem to be bound by
anything other than hastily drawn borders (think of the Middle Eastern
countries being drawn up by empires in the early 20th century and the
predictable conflict that ensued).
Remember when those cunning but unwise Neocons proclaimed that the
Iraqi people will "treat us as liberators?" Well, which Iraqi people
exactly? The Kurds? Yes. Some Shiites? Maybe. The Sunnis, whose grip on
power was just violently stripped away? Probably not.
The U.S. thinks of itself as unique in that it is a nation founded on
the ideal of freedom. Of course, that "freedom" didn't trickle down to
the slaves, for whom the new nation's subsequently ratified Constitution
might as well have been the Magna Carta. Progress towards that ideal
has been slow, and sometimes, we have even reversed course.
But we are still one republic, like it nor not, bound by the reality of the Rule of Law, however unreal it might be.
But should we be? Are we a "people," as the colonists insisted in the first line of the greatest essay ever written?
"When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one
people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with
another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and
equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle
them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they
should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."
One people.
Well, we were not one people then (again, slaves), nor are we one
people now. And I am not talking about race. I am not talking (directly)
about political parties. And I am not advocating for any of the
multitude of state-focused successionist causes, which are more popular
than you might think in places like Texas, Alaska, Vermont, Hawaii
(native Hawaiians), and California.
Instead, I am talking about the 50% of people in this country who say
that, even if offered, they will not volunteer for a proven vaccine
against a virus that has killed over half a million people during the
largest social distancing effort in history. With most of the political
tribalism in this country reflected by geography, the anti-vaccine
propagators span political and regional boundaries. They may wave
different flags. They may shout different slogans. They may hold
different values. They may have different views on the economy and
political organization. But the one thing they do have in common is that
they do not wear a mask. That is the common thread that binds
them, whether they like it or not, together. And it says more about them
as people than anything else.
The "Unmasked" are indeed a distinct people, just as we, the "Masked" are a distinct people in our own right.
Therefore, on this Independence Day, we must "dissolve the political bands which have connected them [us] together."
One Nation, Divisible
I call today for the creation of a new nation: The Multistate Association of Sane Kinfolk (M.A.S.K.).
And so, it is with "decent respect to the opinions of mankind" that
we, the Masked, should, "declare the causes which impel them [us] to the
separation."
Now let us articulate the many "injuries and usurpations" of the
Unmasked, for it is high time that we "let Facts be submitted to a
candid world."
Because this is a financial column, I will use bullet points:
· They refused to Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and
necessary for the public good. (Haircuts do not count as a public good,
however terrible your hairstyle may be).
· They have led and continue to lead the charge in the
denigration of expertise in science, medicine, and other disciplines.
· They have put our children in danger, susceptible to once
eradicated diseases like the measles. This happened in Marin County,
California, of all places; so-called progressives are some of the
biggest supporters of the anti-vaccination movement. (This is what
happens when you get your medical science from Playboy Playmates rather
than physicians.)
· They have repeatedly forwarded "articles" on Facebook which
claim that The Gates Foundation, long involved in the effort to
eradicate polio in India, "tested an oral polio vax in India between
2000 & 2017 and paralyzed 496,000 children." (The WHO says that 17
children were paralyzed due to the vaccine. The agency estimates that 1
in 2.7 million oral doses results in vaccine-associated paralytic
polio). "But of course," the Unmasked may retort, "the WHO is corrupt
and is run secretly by Bill and Melinda Gates who, rather than sail
around in a yacht forever, have decided to spend their billions giving
Indian children polio because that's what rich people do."
· The Unmasked (the liberal faction) have been inconsistent
with their public health positions, championing BLM protestors, even
ones not wearing masks, without any mention of the potential public
health fallout.
· They [the Unmasked] are guilty of "depriving us in many
cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury." They prefer the media and the
comment section on YouTube videos to assume that role instead.
· And finally, the leader of the Unmasked (Sorry, unmasked
liberals, Trump is with you on this nonsense) has "excited domestic
insurrections amongst us."
It is due to the aforementioned grievances above that, "We [the
Masked] must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces
our Separation, and hold them [the Unmasked], as we hold the rest of
mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends"
And "for the support of this Declaration," I pledge, "My Life, my Bergman Buy Index, and my sacred Honor."
We could go that route, in some form, anyhow. Talk of a civil war is no longer hyperbole.
Or, we could try to find a way to keep the nation together. That is,
until we all grow up and end the nation-state as a political entity once
and for all. Interconnectedness, not independence, should be the goal
of the human experiment.
The Beginning of the End of the End of History?
In the history of humanity, we have gone from hiding in caves from
storms to literally making it rain--or trying to, with cloud seeding.
And forget Covid-19, for the better part of human history, a common
cold was not an uncommon way to die. We have gone to the moon and back
and back again. We have decided that, for the most part, maybe
ritualized human sacrifice is a bad idea. But some things have not
really changed, just modified.
We went from small tribes fighting with other tribes to nation-states
fighting with nation-states to alliances of nation-states fighting with
other alliances of nation-states.
Then, after the defeat of communism and fascism in their purest
political forms, there was talk of globalization and the "end of the
history" in what now seems like a naïve 1990s fairy tale as a
nationalist wave rips through the West.
Precipitated by static wages, a rising cost of living, inequality,
celebrity-worship, reality TV, police incompetence and violence,
increased racial awareness, immigration, terrorism, trade deficits,
unequal NATO contributions, loneliness, rising illiberal free-market
states like China remaking capitalism and, of course, Covid-19,
nation-states are once again the primary political actors.
With supply chains so fragile and interdependent, globalization has
shown its weaknesses, giving fodder to ideas like "America first."
Independence, whether for energy sources or mask production, has taken
on new urgency in the minds of national leaders and their citizens in
every region across the globe.
But this current moment, this rising tide of nationalism, if we take
the long view of human history, will pass. It will end either in the fog
of nuclear war or in a peaceful return to the path of globalization. A
path to bring the world closer together politically, economically,
philosophically. Because if, when you close your eyes and think of the
world in 1000 years, it is populated by imaginary things called
nation-states, you seriously lack imagination.
That reminds me. For the new nation, the Multistate Association of
Sane Kinfolk (M.A.S.K.) let us set an example by saying "Hello" to John
Lennon, and "Goodbye" to Francis Scott Key.
If we are not quite ready for that, let's at least stop flying jets
over sporting events so as to avoid unnecessary confusion and anger over
symbols. Because when Kaepernick is kneeling to the anthem as F-16s
scrape the sky above, he is not saying anything about your brother, his
service, or the plane he flew that was shot down over Hanoi.
With all that said, have a good and safe and physically distanced
Fourth of July. And remember, since it means nothing really, we might as
well enjoy it together.
Better to celebrate anything (or nothing) six feet from one another than remain miles apart.
Gregory Bergman
Editor-in-chief, CapitalWatch
(The opinions expressed in this article do not reflect the position
of CapitalWatch or its journalists. The analyst has no business
relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
Information provided is for educational purposes only and does not
constitute financial, legal, or investment advice)
