Trying to interpret market's gyrations

After observing the wild gyrations of the Wall Street arena since the government propped up the market to stabilize it, it appears that the media reports increasing unemployment and more reports of home foreclosures plus consumer debt plus our own country's deficit. A great amount of people continue to invest in the stock market forgetting "that what goes up comes down" and forgetting October 1929 and the market crash.

As a survivor whose family lived through the Great Depression, I suggest a book depicting families' accounts of the crisis of 1929. It is titled "We Had Everything But Money."

Today's trading on Wall Street is due to the property in the world markets to a great degree. We, who represent the select majority, are beginning to see the federal government lowering rates effect on yields on CDs while consumers face higher costs on almost anything one purchases.

These gyrations of the everyday trading clearly indicate that even the wizards on Wall Street have their uncertainties of the marketplace.

Perhaps it is time for Washington to look at our own problems instead of continuing to fund an apparent no-win victory in Iraq and get back to basics.

O.C. Bud Grey

Arlington Heights