OUCH: Dow Jones plunges 512 points; but don’t worry, President Obama’s birthday parties unaffected.

UPDATE: Reader Dave Ivers emails: “Having just had a discussion with a close friend on the Left, I truly believe that Obama and probably all of the Left think that 3.5% GDP growth year on year is some sort of natural phenomenon and that no matter what they do it will happen. They then proceeded to trash the things that make that 3.5% growth happen.”

Once again, the Robert Heinlein quote:

Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.

This is known as “bad luck.”

It can’t be repeated enough.