The parade of promises is marching down Main Street. For too many months to come, politicians of all descriptions, parties, and ideologies will be courting our votes... they have the cure for all that is wrong in the world, they tell us. With crystal clear hindsight, every candidate criticizes the decisions of every incumbent, from the Town Council of Podunk to The Presidency itself.

Whatever happened to the Stock Market Cycle; the Interest Rate Cycle; Baby Jane? How did Wall Street get away with pushing these facts of financial life down the basement stairs? Most investors, I'm beginning to believe, and all financial advisors, media representatives, and market gurus have abandoned these fascinating curves for the comfort of a straight-edged twelve-month playing field.

During every correction, I encourage investors to avoid the destructive inertia that results from trying to determine: "How low can we go?" and/or "How long will this last?" Investors who add to their portfolios during downturns invariably experience higher values during the next advance. Yes, Virginia, just as certainly as there is a Santa Claus, there is another market advance in our future.

Every correction is the same, a normal downturn in one or more of the Markets where we invest. There has never been a correction that has not proven to be an investment opportunity. You can be confident that the Federal Reserve, as hypnotized as it is with keeping inflation under control, is not going to cause either a financial panic or a prolonged recession with tight money and high interest rate policies.

The vast majority of Americans are investors, although many don't realize it. The vast majority of Americans are creative with their 1040 numbers, although most won't admit it. The majority of Americans would agree that investing, retirement planning, and estate preservation would be easier to manage if the Internal Revenue Code was comprehensible.

The Investor's Eye view of politics is a simplistic, practical, dot-connecting approach to sorting things out so that win/win change can be considered. Real World politics is not concerned with such things, and that is one of the most serious problems facing investors today. As outlined in Investment Politics 2008, there are at least ten issues that require government action if we are to maintain our competitive position in the World Economy.

As an investor, I've always wondered why Social Security is such a problem. What's so difficult about managing this particular Trust Fund, and why is it so different from other investment accounts that pay out a constant stream of income? The private sector does it routinely with defined benefit pension plans and fixed annuities, so what's the big deal? Is Social Security failing because it hasn't been invested soundly, or is there some other reason?

The most obvious explanation is politics, but we're running out of time for finger pointing, and Social Security is solvable in a surprisingly painless manner.

Most people (including myself) would insist that Equity Investing is the most difficult to master. After all, that is the venue for: erratic price fluctuations caused by an endless supply of social, economic, and political variables; the standard Wall Street misinformation, corporate malfeasance, self- serving financial gurus, and product sales persons; a myriad of popular and market moving speculations from IPOs to Option and Margin strategies; thousands of media talk shows and their financial markets' experts.

It matters not what lines, numbers, indices, or gurus you worship, you just can't know where the stock market is going or when it will change direction. Too much investor time and analytical effort is wasted trying to predict course corrections... even more is squandered comparing portfolio Market Values with a handful of unrelated indices and averages.

Stocks, bonds, index funds; averages, recessions, market rallies and corrections; mutual funds, technical analysis, financial statements; commissions, taxes, and discount brokers. Just how much do you know about investing, or perhaps a better question: is there any "know" in the investment vocabulary? So many terms, ideas, and strategies; so little time and money! Here's a list of thirty mostly-true or mostly-false comments for you to kick around with your friends and fellow investment bloggers:

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