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I hate to break into thois sob session, but . . .from Bloomberg:

07/03 00:35

Dollar Rises vs Euro; Factory Orders May Highlight U.S. Appeal

By Mari Murayama

Tokyo, July 3 (Bloomberg) -- The dollar rose, putting it on track for its biggest two-day gain against the euro in seven weeks, on expectations reports today and tomorrow will show factory orders are rising in the U.S. while falling in Germany.

The U.S. currency strengthened to 98.35 cents per euro from 98.65 in late New York trading yesterday, when it gained 0.5 percent. The dollar traded at 120.06 yen from 119.85 after rallying as high as 120.21.

U.S. factory orders probably rose for a third month in May, climbing 0.5 percent, a Bloomberg News survey of economists shows. A report Monday showed manufacturing grew in June at the fastest pace in almost 2 1/2 years. In Germany, Europe's largest economy, a report tomorrow will probably show factory orders dropped 0.2 percent in May, a survey showed.

``We're seeing many strong reports for the U.S. and weak ones for Europe,'' said Minoru Shioiri, foreign exchange manager at Kokusai Securities Co. ``More signs of the difference between the two regions may convince us'' to buy dollars, he said.

The dollar pared some of its gains as the decline in U.S. stocks to a 4 1/2-year low yesterday heightened concern more money will flow out of the nation's assets.

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Plus isn't a falling dollar good for exporting American made goods?

If you kept cash or TBills since '98, you would have outperformed the S&P, and would have crushed the Nasdaq performance.

The Fed is out of ammo, debt is at alltime highs, and confidence is in a freefall. Stocks are still more expensive (in terms of earnings) than they were BEFORE the crash in '87.

Tick-tock...tick-tock...tick-tock...

Anyone care to say where the major indexes bottom out? Naz=600, DJIA = 4500.

A cut in the capital gains tax would save Washington's bacon. But ignorant Democrats prefer to demagogue "the rich," and Republicans fear the charge of "favoring the rich" more than they fear war with the Muslim world. There are enough fools in Washington to destroy the country without any help from Islamic terrorists.

Very well said. Except the Democrats are not "ignorant" - - those scumbags know exactly what they are doing. Republicans who fail to act for fear of the scumbag Democrats and their tactics, however, are indeed cowards. The Republicans need to get dirty - - they need to go down, way down, to the bottom of the sewer and fight the scumbag Democrats where they live.

And Roberts surely knows that a miserable economic slump is exactly what the Democrats strive for. What better way for the Democrat Party to create more parasites to add to their core constituency? Ha! Terrorists don't need bombs when they have the Democrat Party to help them destroy a once-proud nation.

First, there is overwhelming evidence that the trade "deficit" is manipulated by foreign countries' accounting methods, which are much like ENRON'S. Several studies have shown that, for example, Japan "double counts" many items (take an overhead projector: Japan counts the projector, but also counts the glass, the metal, etc.) This artificially inflates the trade deficit and has FOR YEARS.

Roberts SHOULD KNOW THIS BECAUSE HE WAS IN THE REAGAN ADMINISTRATION when the critics were raising the same issues and he and others pointed this out!!

Second, the problem is not "the economy," the problem IS Iraq, Al-Quaeda, and the PLO. Markets are jittery in large part because of threats of terrorism. Pick your industry: airlines? Yes, they were in trouble before 9/11, but you can't deny that the terror attacks really hurt. Computer markets are disrupted due to uncertainty.

But Roberts pins it down even further, which is entrepreneurs, especially high-tech entrepreneurs, are NOT finding any venture capital. VC funds have dried up. This is due to a) expectations and b) TIGHT MONEY. The Fed is still too tight on the money supply. Until VC returns, don't expect a boom.

Of course I agree with Roberts that anything and everything should be done regulation-wise to improve the climate---but this has little to do with the trade deficit bogeyman that I heard throughout the 80s which was as bogus then as it is now. Doesn't anyone remember "the Japanese are going to control all the new markets?" Now, do you really believe Belgium and France are going to dominate anything?