The Dow dropped 200 points today on 'below expectations' earning from McDonalds, GE, Google and others. It also happens to be the anniversary of the 1987 crash, the biggest since '29. Who was President then? (The Sainted Reagan) Today's drop wasn't a significant event, given the size of the market number, but you wouldn't know it to listen to the media.
The thing you have to remember is that the term 'below expectations' means that the companies are actually doing well and making huge profits. They just didn't meet an arbitrarily contrived number issued by market 'analysts'. You can bet that the Republicans will be screaming "economic collapse!" based on nothing of consequence.
Since the Wall Street banks dominate the 'trading', they could easily drive the market down between now and the election just to make Obama look bad. All the while these 'below market expectations' companies are collectively sitting on $5 trillion in cash and have been showing record profits all through the Obama Administration.
Since Romney made a point of challenging Obama to look at his retirement account, you can bet that they will be running ads showing your 401(k) draining away in real time as they push the market down.
If you are invested in the market, I have some bad news, it's a Ponzi scheme. The stock market makes no money. The entire value of the market is based on the willingness of new suckers to buy into the market. The replacement value of the companies in the Dow 40 is about 6000 points, as if you actually had any claim on that value.
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