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Ben Bernanke, Chairman of the Federal Reserve, is scheduled to testify before Congress on December 3rd. The hearings will determine whether he will be confirmed for another term.

Bernanke is faced with increasing criticism for his handling of the financial crisis and lack of transparency. Representative Ron Paul has a bill before the House demanding an accounting of what the Fed has done with all the money it is spending.

The only thing that has been devalued faster than our precious dollar is the perpetual slide in government credibility. Over the years we have heard countless times about the importance of a strong dollar from our leaders.

"Our administration believes in and will do everything in its power to support a strong dollar" or something like this has been spewed out by Republicans and Democrats alike, yet there is little evidence that the policies put in place over the past century have done anything of the sort. Perhaps there was one person that took the heat and did the right thing -- Paul Volcker, during the Carter administration, who had to deal with dizzying inflation.

In this week's (November 9) Preview Section of Barron's (subscription required) I was surprised to find that on Wednesday (11/9) it is noted that Computer Sciences (CSC), Applied Materials (AMAT), and Macy's (M) reported "profits." How do they know this?

On other days they refer to the "earnings" of various companies reporting. Perhaps I am splitting hairs, perhaps it is editorial haste (like you might find on our site), or perhaps there is no difference in some people's minds? From my perspective there is a difference between earnings and profits. Every quarter, public companies report their earnings. They do not always report a profit.

Yesterday it was announced very loudly that "my pal Warren" was going to acquire the 77.4% of the Burlington Northern Santa Fe (NYSE: BNI) railroad, that Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A) does not already own, for $100 per share, offering about a $24 premium to Mondays closing price.

Talk about putting your money where your mouth is -- yikes! Buffett has gone all in, betting the economy is healing, and silencing anyone that questioned his integrity or motives for cautious optimism saying it was all talk!

What a week it was and it is starting off with more of the same! The day before Halloween the market gets spooked. The Dow drops 200 one day, rises 200 the next, and falls 250 to close the week. Yes, financial pundits could point to meaningful stories about the dollars rise, consumer spending sagging, the recession ending and so forth to explain market reactions but there is more to it than that.

Even among the 15 positions discussed in Where should granny put $50,000? only the Vanguard Total Bond Market exchange-traded fund (NYSE: BND) and the Kellogg Co (NYSE: K) were up last Friday. Good thing I advised "granny" to put half her funds in the ETF.

How desperate can they get? First I received a very long-winded, 10+ page e-mail from Motley Fool with the following sales pitch :That's why I'm offering you the chance to join Motley Fool Stock Advisor for just $79 -- that's 60% OFF our regular membership rate. But a word of warning: This special discount will be available for a limited time only!

Two days later, I received another 10+ page, jargon-filled e-mail blabbering on about the virtues of the newsletter while trying to create a sense of urgency because the clock was ticking and I was going to miss out.

For the past 48 hours people have been asking me if I thought the market would pull back after the Dow Jones Industrial Average surpassed the milestone of 10,000. Business journalist's and guru's alike have suggested that there might be some profit taking or "selling into strength" and the recent highs would not hold.

As the market proved yesterday, up about a half percent across the board, with the Dow closing at 10,062.94, up 47.08 in last-minute buying -- that is just a lot of noise.

I am in a bit of a quandary. You see, I love those paranormal shows like Ghost Hunters, Paranormal State, Most Haunted, and Ghost Adventures. This genre has taken over programming in a majority of the bigger cable channels and it is now trying to take the movie world by storm.

Don't get me wrong, movies about ghosties and ghoulies are nothing new, but a little independent movie company has decided to hop on the ghost bandwagon by making a film called Paranormal Activity. It was made for just $11,000 over a week -- yes, a week. Well, if you have heard any of the buzz about this film, you know that it is set to take movie viewers by storm.

We keep hearing that consumer spending propels 70% of our economy and that we will not see real growth without an increase in consumer confidence, meaning spend, spend, spend. This is very bad advice! Let other people spend -- you should be saving!

This is a theme I have been hammering on all year and I will continue to do so. I believe this is so important to our personal and national long term health that any true investment discussion, be it on the web, radio, television, newspapers or magazines, is just blowing smoke if it is not a primary focus.

They say you should not look a gift horse in the mouth. Sorry folks, sometimes you do. In the case of the recently catapulting Newcastle Investment Corp. (NYSE: NCT), which I bought at 60 cents a share, I am.

I have been following this company for a while and have both made and lost money. Although it started out as a penny stock for me it has jumped over 150% in a week and closed today at $3.61 up $0.39 (12.11%) -- for a total gain to date of 502%. So why am I complaining?

Yesterday my 2009 portfolio closed up 201% for the year. It has been an interesting journey, and while it is rather self congratulatory to discuss it, there are lessons to be learned.

Before I review some of the reasons I was able to do this I want to make it clear that I do not think this can be easily repeated; I look at the portfolio every day thinking this is too good to be true, and we all know what that usually means.

Last Friday the market reacted favorably (or less negatively) to the latest report from the Labor Department's unemployment figures of 9.7 percent in August, as employers cut 216,000 jobs last month. The percentage is up but the raw numbers are trending down allowing for a sigh of relief on Wall Street with the major indices all up over 1%.

Many would argue that when it comes to the truth, the government is prone to favor aesthetic figures instead of the straight data. I tend to agree with this view as the numbers appear sculpted to be the least offensive.

If you are not reading the commentary we receive then you are missing some gems. One of our regulars reminded me of something "my pal Warren" said: "... find companies which can be run by idiots because sooner or later an idiot will be running it."

In Buffett's case he can actually call them up and talk to them. In many cases, he could probably get them to resign. For most of us, all we know is basic things like how's the stock price or has the idiot been indicted?

Some of the venom spewed at General Electric Company (NYSE: GE) every time I write about it, is getting kind of old. I understand the criticism of Jeffrey Immelt, the CEO who takes the blame for everything that is wrong with the company and the economy.

I too have felt that he might have done more. In particular, while I argued Monday that most of the companies divisions were well integrated, or at least related, I am not sure that entertainment has to be a part of the mix, and the company is on the record to jettison the appliance division already.

In considering the plight of the GE shareholder, myself included, what exactly is it that investors would like Immelt to do?

The United States Postal Service has been heavily promoting it's flat rate deliveries based on the the size of the box instead of the weight in an attempt to retrieve some of the business that it has lost to Federal Express Corp (NYSE: FDX) and United Parcel Service.(NYSE: UPS) over the years.

The increasing use of the internet has reduced snail-mail traffic, hurting USPS revenue, while the internet has increased the traffic of package delivery services as sites like Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) and eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) continue to expand their businesses and new enterprises and existing traditional companies expand their web presence.