Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently posted to the discussion thread for another blog entry at this site:
I know goons like you want me to keep it zipped about the microwaves in cars, but that would be a felony. I don’t want to commit a felony…..no way…..not this boy. We need to get over that big black mountain created by Rob and his anti-microwave goons and then we can enjoy good stuff, after good stuff after good stuff. It will be a win, win, win,win,win.
This is Buy-and-Hold in the year 2023.
It’s not how it started out. It’s what it has become.
I believe in the original Buy-and-Hold vision – research-based investment advice. New research is published as time passes and the investment advice offered needs to change with it.
Rob
The microwave research is just as valid as your interpretation of investing strategy research.
That’s for each investor to decide for himself or herself.
You believe what you believe and I believe what I believe. I am going to continue to express my beliefs in posts that have my name attached to them.
Rob
Investors have decided they don’t like your strategy. They don’t want to be broke like you. Yet you still want the world to change for you.
Thousands of investors expressed a desire that honest posting re the last 42 years of peer-reviewed research be permitted at every site. Had the site owners enforced their own site rules, some of those thousands would have become Valuation-Informed Indexers in time. Some would have elected not to take that path. It should be their choice, not the choice of a small number of internet goons.
I want the world to change because of what the last 42 years of peer-reviewed research says, not because of what I say. I believe that humans learn new things over time and get to live better lives because of what they have learned. I was a Buy-and-Holder once upon a time. Why? Because one of the core principles of Buy-and-Hold was to use peer-reviewed research to guide one’s stock investment strategy. Research permits us to learn new things. So every now and again we need to learn how to pronouce the words “I” and “Was” and “Wrong.” That’s a good thing, not a bad thing. Acknowleding when you got something wrong permits you to move on to something better.
Rob
If these thousands want to see your posts, then they have that choice. They can read them here or they can let you post on their own website. No one else has any obligation to allow you to post on their website, just like you block posts on this website. Given your horrible track record on investing and poor behavior, it appears that website owners have been well justified to block you.
We disagree. I believe that every site owner should follow his or her own posting rules. There were many people at the Motley Fool board who believed that Greaney’s retirement study was a legitimate piece of research. I knew from the first day that I posted there that it was in error. I knew that he was abusive and that he had a good squad, which I lacked. So I kept it zipped for three years. I should have spoken up on the first day. By not speaking up, I helped create the false impression that his study (which lacked a valuation adjustment) was legitimate research. “After all”, a community member could have concluded, “no one is saying that the study is in error, it must be correct.” Sites at which people do not feel free to post their honest views are a scam.
That’s my sincere take.
Rob
Every site owner can dictate the content on their website. The courts have already ruled on this.
So, if in the days following the next Buy-and-Hold Crisis, one large web site elects to permit honest discussion re the past 42 yesrs of peer-reviwed resesarch, we can all begin living better and fuller and richer lives than snyone imagined possible back in the days before publication of Shiller’s Nobel-prize-winning research. That sounds good to me. Does that sound good to you?
Rob
So, in the last 20+ years, none of your buy and hold crisis predictions have come true. Meanwhile, your retirement plan failed and you went broke. Your wife divorced you and you lost your house. After all that, you still think you are right and everyone else is wrong?
Not everyone else. I believe that the thousands of our fellow community members who expressed a desire that honest posting be permitted at every site were right on. I also believe that the Buy-and-Holders were right when they made it a core principle of their approach to stock investing that investors look to the peer-reviewed research for guidance on what works. I believe that as a nation of people we will do what it takes to return to that principle in the days following the next Buy-and-Hold Crisis.
Rob
Yes, thousands want honest posting, as long as it is truthful. The problem is that you have a different definition for what constitutes “honest” posting. Also, peer-reviewed research is not someone’s opinion on what one guy said.
If you have a different opinion re what Shiller showed with his research, I’d be grateful if you would say what it is. He must have said something new or else he would not have been awarded s Nobel prize.
I say that Shiller showed that valuations affect long-term returns. Whst do you say that he showed that was new?
Rob
Rob Shiller confirmed that we should not use CAPE to time the market and has continually recommended for people to stay in stocks. Those links have all been provided. Do you need it again?
I’ve suggested scores of times that you drop the abusive stuff for one day and invite Shiller to the Bogleheads Forum to find out in detail what he believes about market timing. So far no interest.
The fact is that Shiller published a paper in 1996 warning investors that those who stuck with a high stock allocation despite the crazy high prices of the day would live to regret it within 10 years. For some funny reason that sounds like market timing to me!
Rob