Francisco Madero was a revolutionary Mexican leader in the fight for property rights in the early part of the 20th century. Madero, a longtime politician, upset the very powerful seven-time Mexican President Porfirio Diaz by running against him in the 1910 election.

Obama defends his policies…Commodity currencies should outperform…Global Power Shift Index…And Now… Today’s Pfennig!

What the heck is going on? The Dow has just had its best weekly performance since March 2000. CNBC is full of whopping and high-fiving. The Obama administration is breathing an audible sigh of relief. And mom and pop investors all across the US are no doubt considering putting more of their savings back into the market.

Oil prices slipped on Thursday as concerns about weak global fuel demand outweighed strong economic growth in China and better-than-expected U.S. banking results.

I could almost hear the collective groans of disbelief as soon as readers read my forecast. It was a column I wrote almost three years ago, warning about the impending U.S. real estate crisis and projecting that home prices were set to tumble by as much as 40%. Turns out I actually under-estimated the scale of the bust. Prices have fallen much more than that in some areas – and may fall even further. The are obvious reasons for this. The economic recession. The evaporation of available credit. A huge increase in unemployment. And, of course, the mere fact that the housing market had simply risen to bubble-like proportions and needed to correct. But there’s a bigger problem – and it’s…

Oil prices rose for the third consecutive day on Friday, nearing $72 a barrel, as rebel attacks in Nigeria hit output from the OPEC-member country and economic optimism propelled equities markets higher.

O! Bama! Whither takest thou us? There are two broad theories concerning the great men of history. One says that history is made by great men. The other says great men are made by history. But here at The Daily Reckoning we think they’re both wrong. In our book, great men don’t really exist. They are merely invented by the historians. History needs heroes. Sometimes tragic heroes… sometimes comic… the historians take what they’ve got to work with and set them spinning. But if you look at their leading characters closely, they look little different from the rest of us… just fellow passengers on the big bus.

In the currency market, the dollar crashed against the euro. Late Friday, the euro was trading at $1.3627 vs. $1.3403 on Thursday.

Wall Street is constantly hung up on finding the next giant economy. Is China going to continue to grow as a superpower? What about India?

I never thought an 18.6% decline could actually represent good news. But in an example of how desperate we’ve become for it – particularly concerning the U.S. housing market – many have jumped on the fact that it was the first time in 16 months that U.S. home prices didn’t drop by a new record. Wow… where’s that champagne?