While everyone's looking at Sarah Palin and anticipating John McCain's speech tonight, a quick look at the stock market showed a 345-point drop (3%) in one day.

OUCH! What's going on here?

Wasn't the worst supposed to be over? Wasn't the recovery supposed to be started? Personally, my finances have been slaughtered this past year.

It would be nice to know about the major players who started today's selloff. Certainly, there wasn't all bad news today. The price of oil went down again.

What appears clear is that 2008 is shaping up to be a miserable economic year. The political implications should be obvious.

For the presidential race, the main issue should be the economy, not 9-11 or national security (important as they are). "Change" is a very powerful economic message.

For New York City and New York State, a lower stock market means disaster. You all know that. That means that David Paterson must stand strong and cut, cut, cut, veto, veto, veto.

Does anyone else have any opinions on what happened in the stock market today?

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080904/economy.html

The Labor Department reported that new applications for unemployment insurance rose to a seasonally adjusted 444,000, up 15,000 from the previous week. Economists had expected claims to drop to 420,000.

That news, plus disappointing sales reports from retailers, sent financial markets down as investors lost hope for an end of the year recovery. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 344.65, or 2.99 percent, to 11,188.23, its worst tumble since June 26, when it fell more than 3.03 percent. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 2.99 percent, and the Nasdaq composite index slid 3.20 percent.

Stocks fell even though the price of oil dropped to its lowest in five months on worries that the slowing global economy