Anyhow, I find myself listening to Dick's Picks 20 tonight, which just happens to be the first Dead concert I ever saw and only the second overall (after a double bill of Thin Lizzy and the Winters Brothers!). I went with a crew of folks that said they'd teach me to smoke sumpthin' new, so that'd be a second new, somewhat illegal, experience. Which adds a certain anticipatory edge to things, as I'm sure you could guess. But one of our group, Mark, didn't show on time outside the theater, so we ended up going in on our own.

We got some seats in back and waited for the show to start, but suddenly there was an announcement: "Could Mr. dedalus please come to the main office as soon as possible?" Oh fuck, I thought. My fellow reprobates assured me there couldn't be any legal reason for this announcement and two of them came with me down a long hall.

And there was our friend Mark, standing next to some guy in a short sleeve white shirt and tie. As soon as he saw me, Mark ran forward, saying "dedalus, it's your brother! He got hurt bad at work, and your folks need your right now!" I vaguely remember the strange look on that guy in the white shirt as Mark spun me around and continued his frantic plea.

So Mark hustled me down the long hall, telling me what bad shape my brother was in, until we turned a corner and I said, "but he hasn't got a job, he's only 13....what are you talking about?"

And Mark said, "you idiot, how else was I going to find you in this crowd? Now where are our seats?"

So if you find yourself listening to Dick's Picks 20, or something in that vein, remember that such silly stories might be going on just in the background.

John McCain

PDF available here.

(I saw the actual clips on Chris Matthews' show tonight but haven't found them posted online yet--I'll try to update later

Update: The TPM link above has already updated the video to reflect what I was talking about. See my post three posts below to see more of what McCain has stirred up and will never be able to contain again. You sold your soul, McCrash, and this is your legacy. God help you now.

I believe the numbers reflect trading through yesterday's close. This is truly the mother of all pushing on a string scenarios.

Most of the audience sat there that evening in disbelief, jaws agape, as Dave went through his talking points. Many, perhaps most, took umbrage at his dire forecasts and confronted him (politely, but very firmly), suggesting, in a nutshell, that he had no idea what he was talking about. I heard about our economy's "resilience," about "decoupling," and a bunch of other reasons that the good times would continue to roll. Suffice it to say that Dave would have none of it, and didn't waver for one moment in his assessment of the situation. Mind you, this was the the S&P trading at near all-time highs.

The S&P500 is now down about 42% from its high one year ago. It is down more so far this October (-22%) than it was in the month of "The Crash," October 1987.

Dave has yet to issue any updated guidance on his S&P target (picking market tops and bottoms really isn't an economist's job to begin with), but the 800 on the S&P he'd been looking for ($65 in '09 operating earnings with a 12x multiple) is now just a couple of days away given that we're shedding 50 S&P points/day these days.

Even having read Dave's work for many years, I must confess my surprise at the ferocity of these recent declines. It is getting disorderly now, and volatility (as measured by the VIX) is at panic levels. There's at least a temporary bottom to be made in here somewhere. I'm not sure where it is (though I suspect it's near), and I'm not sure it will be the bottom (I suspect it won't), but we are getting closer.