First, I would like to simply thank our subscriber-friends for your kind words regarding the passing of Grandma “Mary” and our family gathering to commemorate her life.

I returned home yesterday afternoon from Michigan to my dear wife and children.  No sooner had we sat down to our Sunday meal and given thanks from our hearts for our re-union, wellbeing, and provision, that we all burst forth with exciting stories to share from the last five days.  This wonderful story-telling would not have stopped until late in the evening, had we not needed to take everyone “trick-or-treating”.  This too was a delight – walking to neighborhood friends beneath clear, early evening skies framed by the beautiful color of deciduous trees in late October.

The markets are now resting on the eve before the single-most important election event in many years.  We shall soon see if the voice of reason and balance will again find its place in the halls of our government.

As stock investors, we are left with nothing else than to exercise patience as we cast our own ballots and wait for the outcome of tomorrow’s election.

At the same time, we must also wait for the markets impression of whatever the Federal Reserve will soon unveil concerning quantitative easing.  We may get a glimpse of this on Tuesday/Wednesday.  On Friday we will get a picture of the employment landscape from the U.S. government.

All of this then will be lumped together and evaluated in terms of real corporate earnings and historic precedence of 3rd year presidential cycles (which, by the way, are very favorable for stock investors).

We’d like all of you to note how little the market flinched in the face of the news concerning the foiled terrorist attack involving explosive freight aboard aircraft.  Note too please that this is the third significant terrorist attack that has been thwarted which has been reported in the mainstream press since President Obama took office almost two years ago.  We have no doubt that should one of these awful plans have taken place, the market would have reacted momentarily  negatively.  We are however noting that – investors at large – are perhaps more “adjusted” to these realities than we were in 2001.