Before the economy busted you kept hearing the talking heads on TV say the the fundamentals of the economy were good and that the media were trumping the problem up. I have not seen not one of those talking heads say, “oops my bad, I was wrong”. The stock market is indeed influence by news but it also is influence by the realities of what was going on in everyday life. The tech bubble that blew earlier this decade was bad but this recession is a whole different kind of monster. We are talking about housing, the biggest investment most Americans will make in their life. Last year around this time you would keep hearing on TV that the “sub prime crisis was contained”. Obviously they were wrong. This is not the time for I told you so, this is the time to listen to your gut more than any talking heads on television. You know better than any professional whether your financial portfolio is sound enough to start spending and investing again.