Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently posted to the discussion thread for one of my columns at the Value Walk site:
Banned for bad behavior, Rob, and it seems to be a consistent problem versus a mass conspiracy.
Most fast-food restaurants offer food that is not terribly good for you. Is that the result of a conspiracy?
The reason why they do it is that we all like fatty and high-caloric foods. They would go out of business if they restricted their menus to fruits and vegetables.
We LIKE food that is bad for us just as we LIKE investing strategies that are bad for us. Get Rich Quick strategies SELL. Like hotcakes.
Now —
I have zero desire to restrict people’s ability to eat french fries and to drink chocolate shakes. I go for that stuff myself. I get it.
But the fast-food industry does not attempt to shut down restaurants that offer healthy menu options. So it is up to the individual whether he wants to go healthy or not. That’s the American system. That makes sense, in my assessment.
It’s not that way in the investing field.
The Buy-and-Holders claim that there is some mystical, magical research somewhere supporting their claim that there is no need to exercise price discipline when buying stocks. This is of course a 100 percent fabrication. Wade spent a lot of time going through the literature trying to find even one study that showed such a thing. He of course never found one. After 14 years of this, I am beginning to develop a funny feeling that maybe that’s because no such study actually exists. Buy-and-Hold is a marketing gimmick. Imagine!
It wouldn’t be so bad if we had the Buy-and-Holders pushing the fries and shakes that give people early heart attacks but that sell like crazy while the Valuation-Informed Indexers were pushing the fruits and vegetables that science shows are actually far better long-term choices.
But the Buy-and-Holders don’t take kindly to that sort of thing. Yes, I am guilty of bad behavior. I tell the truth about what the last 35 years of peer-reviewed research in this field says. Bad Rob! Bad, bad boy! You undermined confidence in the most enriching marketing gimmick in the history of the planet and you had to be stropped before you did more “damage.”
Some people like living long, healthy lives. Some people want to know what the research says about fruits and vegetables. I write for those people. I believe that those people matter. Those people love me and thousands have told me that they would like to have access to my stuff at every discussion board and blog on the internet.
The Buy-and-Holders don’t like me too much. They say that I am guilty of “bad behavior.”
Whether you see it as a conspiracy or not depends on whether you have caught on to the gag or not, Sammy.
Rob
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