Fast Money MBA Spills the Beans Early

In a surprise move, CNBC's Fast Money MBA Challenge announced the winner before the show was even over. The season finale had the Texas Longhorns take on Yale and a David vs. Goliath battle. I, of course, was rooting for the home team of Texas.

About half way through it appeared that the Bulldogs had won. Than it was announced that the two teams were going to have $100,000 (to Texas) and $110,000 (to Yale, because they had the lead) in stock market picks and the results would be announced after 6 weeks. For what ever reason, I decided to visit the website and there it was announced that Yale won the $200,000 prize.

I don't know how this happened. Was it a mistake? Was it meant to emphasize the power of the web? I have no idea. I would think that CNBC would want as much attention as possible for the TV show as possible. But they chose a different strategy. The person who came up with such an approach should consider going back to school for him or herself.

CBS Should Hire Stone Phillips...Fast

Stone Phillips was "let go" today from NBC following a fifteen year as co-anchor of the very popular "Dateline" program. I believe that CBS should hire him fast.

The 53 year old veteran broadcast journalist is smart (Yale graduate), very articulate, handsome, and projects himself very well. He has won numerous Emmys and Peabody Awards over the years and has a reputation of being extremely professional. I believe he would be an excellent replacement for Katie Couric, who will be likely to leave CBS in the near future, in my opinion.

He has the right look and style to attract the younger set that Katie was suppose to get, but he is a mature enough male not to chase off the primary audience of nightly news (males who are 60 years old or older).

He wasn't let go because of lack of talent, but because of Draconian efforts by the peacock network to keep costs down. He isn't being replaced by anyone. Instead his co-host, Ann Curry will do the whole show on her own. Ann is extremely popular on the highly rated "Today Show" so choosing someone who had to go was quite simple in this scenario.

I believe CBS should jump on this. They can acquire him at a very competitive rate because of the circumstances he is under. I believe they should get him pinch hitting for Katie and put him in right away as the permanent anchor of the weekend news broadcasts. Don't be surprised if this happens quickly. Don't be surprised if this happens sooner rather than later.

I believe if we don't find him at CBS we will see him at the new Fox Business Channel in a very prominent role. This will not be the last we see of Stone Phillips.

US Troops Appear Much Smarter Than Kerry

In vintage (John) Kerry (D-MA) arrogance, the Senator told an audience "You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.” The natural response to that by me was "ouch." Surely the Senator will own the inappropriateness of the remarks and distance himself. After all, we can all think of individuals whom we know who are well educated and successful and decided to risk it all for their country. The most classic example is Pat Tillman, who was a successful safety for the Arizona Cardinals with a multi-year contract worth millions and who graduated with a 3.8 GPA in three and a half years from Arizona State University with a business degree. Hmm, financially successful, very smart, and a volunter who gave it all for his country. I'm sure his family, friends, and former teammates appreciate that. I personally know of college educated individuals who chose to volunteer to fight for their country when they had plenty of other options.

Kerry was immediately taken to task by the media and the Republican party. I'm sure the rest of us who would make such a stupid remark would quickly apologize. Instead, Kerry has decided to defend his behavior and now describes his remarks as a "botched joke." The "uneducated ones" wasn't the soldiers, he now explains, but the Bush administration who got us "in this situation." I remind the Senator that the President, who is the butt of many jokes because of his unique language, did graduate from Yale and went on to get an Harvard MBA. Also, Bush actually made better grades than Kerry during his college years. Furthermore, it is clear by what he said about the troops that all of our collective interpretation is exactly what he meant. This argument that those who serve in wars are not smart is as old as military history itself. This was the mantra of critics during the Vietnam War and he was one of the leaders in that anti-war effort. And wasn't true then and it isn't true now. Furthermore, those who fought now are actual volunteers, which wasn't always the case during the Vietnam war. This makes his remarks all the more hurtful, in my opinion.

Senator Kerry has been caught, red handed, taking a position that he desperately needed to apologize for and distance himself. Instead he moves from a shovel to using heavy equipment in his effort to destroy his political future. I feel confident that any and all of our troops are smarter then that.