Cramer's flip-flop: 'I've evolved'

Now, Cramer is echoing the financial advisers who have long warned that individual investors almost never beat the market. The more short-term trades investors make, the more they tend to lose.

But in his 14 years as a hedge-fund manager, Cramer was a rapid trader, constantly moving in and out of different positions. Lessons from those years found their way into Cramer's previous books and onto many episodes of "Mad Money."

Times have changed, he writes. Now, partly due to new regulations on how much information executives can reveal to fund managers, "trying to game short-term movements in stocks (is) almost impossible," he says.

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To advise readers and viewers to trade short term, Cramer says, is like telling them "you too can play in the NBA." A few might be able to do it, but the vast majority won't. "I've evolved to the point where I see the daily struggle that people go through to just put away $100 a month," Cramer says. It's a more realistic approach. "I wish I wrote this book first," he adds.

But just because Cramer writes a responsible book doesn't mean his viewers will refrain from using his advice in irresponsible, money-losing ways.

The worst example is the "Cramer spike," the jump in price that stocks often make right after they're mentioned on his show.

Viewers who buy at these elevated levels will almost always lose money as inevitably the stock drops back to normal a few days later. Cramer warns against this. "I'm pleading with people not to participate in the Cramer spike," he says, urging them to wait before buying.

'Necessary and boring'

Cramer's critics might prefer he not do the show at all. "There is a component of people who are not going to listen," but there are many other people who are helped by "Mad Money," he says. So the show will go on. "I'm not going to bow to the reckless people," he says.

Cramer bridles at those on Wall Street who say all his shouting and emotion are getting out of hand. Did he really need to flip out on CNBC last August, ratcheting up the fear and anxiety in an already skittish market?

"I'm very proud of that call," Cramer says, saying the Fed really had no idea of the severity of the crisis. Arguably, Cramer was proved right by the market turmoil that followed. "I subsequently heard from people at the Fed that it had an impact," he says.

He's still criticizing Bernanke and the Fed, most recently blasting them for not cutting rates deeply enough at their Dec. 11 meeting.

In a lot of ways, this is still the same old, excitable Cramer. The book may contain sober advice on bonds and disability insurance, but he also uses it to rail against a number of targets: 401(k) plans, both for their lame offerings and companies that promote "the most dangerous investment you could ever make" -- buying your employer's stock; the high fees and lousy records of most mutual fund managers; and the journalists who criticize his record as a stock picker.

Cramer says he tried hard to liven up the "stultifying" subject of personal finance. But writing about certain topics, Cramer doesn't try to hide his boredom.

"Investing in stocks can and should be engaging, interesting and fun," Cramer writes. "Investing in bonds is something that will always be necessary and boring." The new Cramer may be turning over a new, more responsible leaf. But he's still a stock junkie through and through.

This article was reported and written by Ben Steverman for BusinessWeek.

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