In his column, editor Greg Ettling reminds us to keep track of this year's directory.
This issue being your annual suppliers directory, you’ll want to keep it handy for year-round reference. Last year, we had numerous calls from people who inadvertently recycled their April issue, and we ran out of extras very quickly. This is the first year we’re including an association directory, and we only listed those groups which returned a directory form. If you’d like your organization included in future directories, send us a note requesting the 2004 directory form.
Forget the Dow, the S&P 500, Mr. Greenspan, gross domestic product, housing starts, unemployment figures and any other economic indicators. War seemingly is the only thing that matters to our current economic situation. There are a lot of good signs out there – benign inflation, inventory growth, construction spending and still–strong home sales chief among them – but they all are overshadowed by the prospect of war. One leading economist says the ebb and flow of news from Iraq and North Korea has accounted for 30 percent to 70 percent of the daily variations in the markets for the past five months. And all of this has been happening with war merely looming; everything will be somewhat different if and when that first body bag shows up on CNN.