Yesterday's market was fascinating to watch, as I do all day, everyday on CNBC, FBN, or Bloomberg. In the early morning, there was euphoria over the killing of bin Laden. By the time the market opened, the realization that another terrorist attack was now inevitable had began to weigh on the market.
Then, super-Reaganite, David Stockman who was head of the Congressional Budget Office for President Reagan, rained on the parade by pointing out the U.S. debt was a much bigger threat to the United States than a bunch of fanatic cave-dwellers. Although a lifelong Republican, he accused them of senseless spinning on the issue of taxes and thought the new Ryan tax plan was a serious mistake, as it just "riled up" the Seniors by attacking Medicare.
Almost on cue, Treasury Secretary Geithner then told us that deadline for raising the debt ceiling could be moved from May 16th to August 2nd. Hopefully, this would buy enough time for the elected-children of Congress to stop spinning their "philosophical points" and grow up. Of course, I cannot imagine this will help as we just get closer to elections with every passing day.
With Stockman's cold-water reminder of the real problem and with Geithner's reminder of the difficulty in solving that problem, the market started drifting down. Very quickly, it became Osama Who?
While America is luxuriating in the afterglow of killing bin Laden, Wall Street remains ego-centric and focused on the reality of numbers. It's a pity, as they don't know what they're missing . . .
