What is going on?

The Dow Jones, the main US share index, reached another record high as it breached the 13,900 mark on Friday - a day after setting a fresh record.

The Dow Jones index of blue-chip stocks closed up 45.52 points, or 0.33%, at 13,907.25. It had earlier reached a new intraday trading high of 13,932.29.

But then:

US retail sales unexpectedly dropped by 0.9% in June, a report from the US Commerce Department says - their biggest decline in almost two years.

Sales were down 0.4% even without the effect of a slump in the car market, the cause of much of the fall.

Yet Tony Snow is telling us:

To walk out of Iraq right now would plant a seed that ultimately would lead to destabilization there, hundreds of thousands of deaths, loss of our influence in the region, would create instability throughout the Middle East throughout East Asia, throughout Europe. And sooner or later it would come to our shores, to a shopping mall near you.

And Bush is saying:

It's better to fight them there than here. And this concept about, well, maybe let's just kind of just leave them alone and maybe they'll be all right is naive. These people attacked us before we were in Iraq. They viciously attacked us before we were in Iraq, and they've been attacking ever since. They are a threat to your children, David, and whoever is in that Oval Office better understand it and take measures necessary to protect the American people.

I don't know whether to buy stocks, sell stocks, go shopping, or drag out my box of plastic wrap and duct tape....