The! Biggest! News! of! the! Day! - Not Merrill Lynch Writedown, Amazon Earnings, or Record Heating-Oil Bills

Here are some of the contenders for today's biggest...news...of...the...day...

• A writedown of $7.9 billion by Merrill Lynch (MER) "for subprime mortgages and asset- backed bonds"...
• Earnings from Amazon.com (AMZN) that topped expectations but raised concerns about margins...
• Earnings from Boeing (BA)...
• A look [subscription required] into the potential for "record heating-oil bills"...
• A "new scare" from Countrywide Financial Corp (CFC) as it is said that "Some loans classified as prime when they were originated are now going bad at a rapid pace"...
• A partnership between Google (GOOG) and the Nielsen Company...
• A warning by Corning Inc. (GLW)...
• A move by eBay (EBAY) into the world of "microfinance" where "investors can lend as little as $50 to would-be small business owners around the globe"...
• The potential impact of the Southern California wildfires...

While those are all stories worth watching, I think it is obviously clear that the biggest story is this

• Judge bars use of partial prints in murder trial - "A Baltimore County judge has ruled that fingerprint evidence, a mainstay of forensics for nearly a century, is not reliable enough to be used against a homicide defendant facing a possible death sentence"...
• Emotions Run Amok in Sleep-Deprived Brains - "Without sleep, the emotional centers of our brains dramatically overreact to bad experiences, research now reveals"...

Fingerprints aren't reliable? This is an outrage! I don't think I can handle this! Get out of my way! Leave me alone! What are you looking at!!!!!!

[Yawn]....I guess I should have gotten some more sleep...