Anyone with with a mailing list can be a market guru. The larger your mailing list, the bigger guru you can be. Just for fun, let's say you have managed to get a mailing list with 50,000 email addresses.

Thankfully, the market will go up or go down. It doesn't matter what market it is-- the S&P, FCOJ, the Dow Industrials, oil; just pick one.

Divide your list in half. Tell one half that the market is going up; the other half that the market is going down. Let's say that the market went up the day after you did your mailing.

Discard the 25000 you mailed with bad information.

Divide the list in half and do the same thing again. Tell 12,500 the market is moving up, the other 12,500 that the market is heading south.

If the market goes down, discard those you told the market would go up.

Do it again, discarding the bad information.

Now you have 6,250 people that know you have hit 3 trades in a row.

This is when you start to pitch your fabulous computer program that can pick market direction with uncanny accuracy. Or your newsletter. Or Norma the Space Psychic.

Do it again. Now you have 3,125 people who have seen you hit four trades in a row.

Pitch them again.

Divide and mail once again.

Pitch them again.

Now you have 1600 people who have seen you hit five in a row,

Pitch them again.

Now you have 800 who have seen you hit six in a row.

Pitch them again

Now you have 400 who have seen you hit seven in a row,

Pitch them again.

Now you have 200 who have seen you hit eight in a row.

The 100, then 50, then 25.

Now you get a new sales letter, a new product, a new market and start the process again.

Yes, you, too, can be a market guru.

Nothing to it.

WASHINGTON- Several out-of-town visitors to the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History were severely frightened when they saw what they believed to be a mummy come to life and shuffle toward them.

"I almost had a heart attack," said Lana Gladdis of Paducah, Kentucky. "When I saw that thing just get up and start walking with its arm in front of it like that. I thought it was going for my throat."

"It was really creepy," opined Roger Bisby of West Memphis, Arkansas. "It out-creeped Madame Tussaud's, and that's pretty damned creepy. I wondered what the hell it was doing with all those Secret Service types surrounding it."

Carl Taylor, Security Manager, quickly responded to the incident. "I heard all the screaming and grabbed a couple of guards. It was mayhem. I was afraid there was going to be a riot. Children were running for their parents. I was afraid someone would be trampled."

"It was all just a case of mistaken identity," explained Dr. Cristián Samper, a director at the museum. "Apparently Senator John McCain had visited us with no warning and fallen asleep on one of our benches. When he awoke from his nap, he was a little disoriented and stumbled toward a group of tourists. We apologize for any inconvenience."

"John McCain is a genuine American hero," said Senator Barack Obama. "I honor him for his service and sympathize with those he frightened. Now maybe people will understand why I don't want to hang around with him at town hall meetings or go to Iraq with him. The guy just creeps me out. I can't help it."

Speakers for the McCain campaign had no comment on the incident other than to accuse Senator Obama of age discrimination.

Ms. Gladdis was arrested for threatening a Presidential candidate with her purse. She is being held without bail at an undisclosed federal facility according to Ellsworth Mauger of the FBI.

Vice President Dick Cheney was unavailable for comment.

Photo work by the inimitable J. D. Truesilver

SAN FRANCISCO - A woman who was walking in the area of Texas and Mariposa Streets was approached by male driving a car. The man asked the woman for directions to the hospital because he had caught a certain part of his anatomy in his pants zipper. He told the woman that he felt embarrassed about going to the hospital and asked if the woman could help him.

The woman said that the suspect looked like he was in obvious pain and she wanted to help him. He requested that woman get some lotion and a pair of scissors. She went to her nearby office and retrieved those items. The suspect appeared to working on his problem and asked the woman if she could help.

The woman agreed but required the man to place a t-shirt in the problem area to form a barrier so she would not have to touch skin. After a few moments she realized that the man did not have anything caught in his zipper. She told the suspect that she had to go back to work. It was then she felt that she had been victimized and called the police.

The suspect was a white male in his late 20’s with a reddish blond flattop haircut wearing a navy blue t-shirt and blue jeans. He was driving a dark blue Honda Accord.

It rubs the lotion on its skin...

From the San Francisco Police Blotter