Conventional wisdom holds that investors should hold bonds in tax-protected vehicles like IRAs and stocks in their taxable accounts.

Never accept ultimatums, conventional wisdom, or absolutes.

People should try to diversify across tax-deferred and taxable accounts.

I've long loved balanced funds, especially for skittish investors, because the bonds mask the volatility of the stocks. When I was doing financial planning, I saw that people often had a hard time keeping in mind the overall portfolio, and a balanced fund kind of forces them to do that.

The decline in stocks yesterday was not the start of a trend. At this level investors should sell bonds.

Conventional wisdom holds that setting a timetable for getting American troops out of Iraq would be a mistake.