Youth Politics

This is going to be a short post because I’m busy with some big changes to this blog.

First of all I’d like to mention a new blog I found called Youth Involved. The website is written by a 15-year-old who is interested in the world of politics, which is something I fully endorse and encourage. The blog itself is fairly new, however it is well written and is excellent as far as opinionated posts as well as getting some interesting current events coverage.

The website is www.YouthInvolved.com for those who are interested. I highly recommend at least checking it out. Subscribing is fairly easy to do as well, and I have already done so.

Okay so some updates:

1. I’m going to be getting a logo sometime next week I believe. I think it’ll look pretty cool and I look forward to being able to use it.

2. I want to redesign the site and am in the process of doing so. The current layout seems… boring. Plus, I can’t use widgets with WordPress which is kind of a shame. I noticed that Reconstitution 2.0 updated their design and I think it looks pretty awesome and a ton more modern. I also happen to like the 3-column theme, and may experiment with 3 columns. What do you guys think about this move? Would I redesign be beneficial?

3. I think it’s fairly difficult to subscribe to this site’s RSS feed the way it is done now. I’m working on making it a whole lot easier. Email subscriptions seem to be the easiest way for people to subscribe and I want to jump on that bandwagon.

4. I will not be attending Obama’s inauguration due to my being in college at the time. Although I will try to convince my family to attend as we’re about an hour away from D.C. Traffic is probably going to be the primary reason for opting not to go.

Stay tuned for more updates later on in the week and happy holidays!

I felt it was time to put up an update on how my stocks have been doing. For my earlier update check out Apple and Google Investments – 2 Weeks Later.

The market has been fluctuating pretty heavily on a day-to-day basis, but in the end it looks like the market is going nowhere fast. A lot of the recent fluctuations are due to the government’s decisions regarding the auto-maker’s bailout plan, which as of now has not gone through. However, the market fluctuations are not nearly as important as the fluctuations of the stocks I care about. I did however track how Google and Apple did with relation to the ups and downs of the market. Specifically I wanted to see if they generally went up when the market went up, if they went down when the market went down, or if there was no correlation.

You’ll notice there is a positive trend when looking at the Google stocks, however Apple’s stock has fallen since December 7. Here are further details as to how both stocks are doing:

GOOG has gone up 25.85 points since December 7th, and AAPL has fallen 4.3 points, for a net gain of 21.55 points. Not bad in a struggling market.

In general I found that yes, the stocks are largely influenced by how the market is doing on that day. Both stocks rise significantly on good market days, and they both drop significantly on bad days. When it comes to marginal gains in the market or marginal drops, both stocks react based on news given on that particular day for both companies.

Apple seems to be taking a bit of a hit given the recent lawsuit about false advertisement, and just recently MSN money’s StockScouter changed its rating on Apple from moderate buy to hold. I wasn’t really planning on making any moves, but it doesn’t seem like anyone should be buying any more Apple stock for now.

Currently, Google is trading at $310.17 a share, and Apple is at a flat $90 per share.

I expect a huge bounce in the market on inauguration day with Obama stepping into office. The market really only needs confidence, and Obama being sworn into office can provide just that. In the long run I don’t think it’ll make any difference, but I’m sure day traders are looking forward to that day. Of course we’ll have to see if the auto bailout passes, and then if it makes an impact on the market as well. I expect it to have about as much of an impact as the 700 billion dollar bailout (not much at all).

If you’d like to receive continued updates as to how I’m doing, make sure to sign up to my RSS feed!

This is a question I ponder often:

Who knows best what the direction of the country should be, the government or the people?

Let me provide some insight here. If the government knows what’s best, then the people’s say really doesn’t matter because the people are most likely wrong. In that case, the whole concept of “majority rules” is undermined by an elite that thinks it knows better than us, the people.

However, if the people know what is best, then the people should be voting on as many decisions as possible. Sure we elect representatives that are supposed to do just that, but we all know that representatives can’t accurate represent your own personal decision every time. My question is, do the people really know what’s best?

There are idiots out there in the world. That’s a no-brainer. These idiots are regular people and can vote and help to make decisions. The question is, if the majority of the US are idiots, should they be able to dictate America’s every move? I’m not saying this is the case, but suppose that all of a sudden most of the American people became extremely irrational. Would it be wise to have “majority rule”?

Think back to the pre-civil war era. The majority supported slavery, but was this a wise decision? No it was not. It’s a prime example of majority rule gone wrong in my opinion.

We elect officials who typically understand what is going on far better than the average citizen. We try to appoint economists and financiers into financial offices, military personnel into defense positions, and other such experts into their respective offices. Why? Because if the people were to appoint ME into some cabinet position, I would be at the very least useless, and most likely a big hindrance.

So here’s my question: What decisions should the US government make alone, and what decisions should be strictly decided by the people?

I’ve been following several economic blogs for quite some time now, and one that I do check up on regularly is FixThePig. Now, since this is mostly a political blog, I probably don’t touch on many of the economic issues that surface themselves unless they are really making a political impact. I’ve found however that FixThePig really complements this blog well when it comes to economic issues. And, as you all know, the economy and politics is almost always intertwined.

I like the blog. It’s simple, easy to read, and has great information and ideas on current and future economic issues. At times I even use it as a news source, or for a different perspective than mine on the current state of the economy. I always provide my input when I have one to give, even if it may differ from the author’s because of how inviting the blog is to commenting. It’s definitely a plus when it comes to a debatable topic such as economics.

As an avid reader and follower of FixThePig, I noticed a contest that they are currently holding for a chance to win $50 in cold hard cash simply for commenting. How cool is that? All you have to do is leave some good feedback on posts and you’ll maybe make yourself a bit of money! Seems like a good deal to me!

You can also get even more chances to win by writing up a full post on your own blog about the FixThePig contest. Now you’re all probably saying to yourself right now that it’s really the only reason I’m writing this post. I’ll be honest, it’s a very powerful incentive, but I would have eventually given a shout-out to FixThePig anyway, and am considering adding them to my “Awesome Political Blogs” section, which I am of course planning to rename.

If you want in on a potential $50 in your wallet, check out FixThePig’s Contest Page. Just comment or make a blog post about the contest and you’re all set for a chance to win!

My apologies for not posting anything political. The attack in Mumbai was shameful, and although I feel sorry for the victims of the attack, I don’t have much to add that you couldn’t find at other news sources.

Today I checked the progress of my two investments, Apple and Google.

Now, had I had a lot more money, I could have invested a lot more into both of these companies. But, because I am dirt poor, I have to settle for almost zero stock in both of them.

Here are what I bought my stocks for and how many:

3 Google @ $262.22
2 Apple @ $81.97

Total amount invested then is $950.60.

When I checked today, both my Google and Apple stocks have gone up a moderate amount. Here’s what they look like now.

Google: $283.99
Apple: $94.00

The total amount in my account right now is $1039.97. Which means I have profited 89.37 in two weeks. Not bad considering I came into this with very little money. Percentage-wise I’ve gained 8.6% from what I’ve invested so far. I don’t know if that is any good, but I like how things have been turning out considering the slumping economy and all.

I am going to continue to monitor my progress on a daily basis. That way my graph will look a whole lot better. I’ll be able to see the ups and downs, as well as how I could have done better. I’m also interested in looking at trends between these stocks and how the Dow Jones Industrial Average performs as a whole. So far I’ve noticed that my stocks go up when the Dow Jones closes positively, and my stocks decline a bit when it closes negatively. We’ll see how that continues however.

As it stands right now, I have optimally allocated my money into these companies. Google has gone up more, and since I cannot afford anymore Google stock, then no other configuration of stocks would have given me as much of a profit. Of course, there are probably better investments out there on the market, but I’ve decided to give the tech industry a shot.

I’m also interested in figuring out when I should bail out my money and try other opportunities. I would love to see Google rebound back to 700-800 dollars a share, and I have similar hopes for Apple. But is that realistic? Will they ever bounce that high again? Will Obama’s inauguration boost investor confidence and send my stocks skyrocketing? We’ll see.

If you know of any other companies worth looking into for investment, let me know. I’m quite interested in short-term investments.