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"Still, a man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest."
We've got some bad habits we need to change.  And I'm including YOU!

Today's market action was ugly again, enough to reverse my Momentum
indicator negative, signalling a Sell.  The only good thing was volume
fell to -11% below average.  That tends to lessen the emphasis of the
signal, but then I really didn't believe Wednesday's Buy signal.

For many years I've been convinced there are "teachers" and learning
opportunities ever present in life--we just need to be awake and aware.
Katrina seems to demonstrate the human nature in Paul Simon's lyric.
But it's a human nature that affects our investing.

We have a strong tendency to reject what we don't want to hear.

Residents rejected the evacuation notice, knowing they're living below
sea-level.  But then so are the Dutch and the Venetians.  But it goes
further.  A quarter century ago the decision was made to build
protection around New Orleans for only a Category 3 hurricane.  Count
with me: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5!  The Army Corps of Engineers needed $20M to work
on the levees, but the 2005 budget gave them $3M.  Who wasn't listening?

The Labor Department released the unemployment rate today, 4.9%, the
lowest in 4 years.  And we know the poverty rate has been increasing for
the past 4 years.  I heard the Chairman of the President's Council of
Economic Advisors tell the country the economy is robust, everything's
fine.  What's wrong with this picture?

Think it's just them?

Some places in the county real estate agents love to advertise the
5-mountain view: Hood, St Helens, Ranier, Jefferson, and Adams.  This is
a good thing?  Excuse me, those are all active, or at best dormant and
NOT extinct, volcanoes!  They're manifest evidence of the Cascadia
Subduction Zone.  Eighteen times since the last Ice Age, 13 times in the
last 5,000 years, it has produced magnitide 9 earthquakes.  Remember
Anchorage?  The last time was January 26, 1700.  You're all prepared,
right?  How long could you run with no services, like New Orleans, with
just the resources and cash you have on hand?  Got a rendezvous?

Conversely, we also tend to listen to what we want to hear.

So we get pandered to all the time because we respond to it!  We are
pitched solutions to problems all the time based on preconceptions and
idologies.  California had economic problems.  They were persuaded to
elect another actor.  Has he fixed the problems?  Not according to most
Californians.  Social Security is a problem.  Are we being pitched a
practical, workable solution, or OUR solution and THEIR solution.

These few examples are just my way of saying we need to have investing
strategies which are practical and workable, but also take into
consideration our own human natures.  I know some of you can't use the
7% Solution to protect yourselves from losing money on falling
positions.  It happens!  What are you doing about it?  Too busy to do
your own investing?  Got a broker?  Trust me, he know what to say to you
and what not to say.  Nobody has your best interests more at heart than
you!  You need to learn to manage your own investments.  There are no
excuses.  As used to be said when I was a younger man, "Sh*t happens."
"Ready or not, here I come!"  Trouble plays that game.

 Price    Vola-    Momen-   Volume   Oscil-   Summ.
 Change   tility   tum               lator    Index
 -__+     -__+     -__+     -__+     -__+     -__+

 __|_     _>__     _|__     _<__     _|__     __<_     08/29
 _|__     _>__     _|__     __<_     _|__     __<_     08/30
 __>_     _|__     __|_     ___|     __>_     __<_     08/31
 __>_     __     __<_     09/01
 _>__     ___     __>_     __<_     09/02

Timing Signals:  I don't use or recommend timing signals, but they're
fun to watch.  If I did though, well, I might use something like this.
(Be warned!!  It tends to whipsaw around signal points!)

Last Signal: SELL       Date:  09/02/05 S&P:    1218
Winner or Loser:  Loser                 By:     -2

See my market tracking charts for '03-'04 and my investment strategy
study at my website(s):
http://www.xprt.net/~pgrogers/Pers.html
http://www.geocities.com/paulgrogers/Pers.html



Paul Rogers, paulgrogers{at}yahoo.com                       -o)
http://www.angelfire.com/or/paulrogers                   /\\
Rogers' Second Law: Everything you do communicates.     _\_V

... There are more things under heaven than are accounted in
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