Bailout be damned the economic meltdown orchestrated by the Democrats and Soros continues.

From Fox Business:

The Dow celebrated the one-year anniversary of its all-time high by closing below the 9000 threshold for the first time since June 2003 and ending in the red for the seventh straight day.

The worst financial crisis since the Great Depression continues to engulf Wall Street, carving out 5,500 points from the index since last October, including 2,200 points over the past seven days alone.

The Dow Jones Industrial fell 678.91 points or 7.33%, to 8579.19, the broad S&P 500 dropped 75.02 points, or 7.62%, to 909.92 and the Nasdaq Composite lost 95.21 points, or 5.47%, to 1645.12. The consumer-friendly FOX 50 dropped 54.54 points, or 7.37%, to 685.16.

“Having an eight-handle on the Dow is a scary picture but it’s just representative of what we’ve seen over the last 10 trading days. It’s pretty scary business,” said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at Jefferies & Co. “It’s just unheard of. We’re getting to that point where it’s impossible not to think we’re hitting a bottom.”

Thursday’s plunge came despite an absence of any major negative developments. Instead, the markets focused on the continued uncertainty of the credit crisis and fears the global economy will slide into a recession.

As has been the case for much of the past week, the markets fell off a cliff at the end of the day, with the Dow tumbling 500 points in the final hour.

“I think we’re in the middle of what is panicked selling,” Scott Wren, senior equities strategist at Wachovia, told FOX Business. “I don’t know if we’re at the moment of maximum pessimism, but I think we’re pretty close.”

And the media has had nothing to do with that for the last eight years. World markets aren’t faring any better:

Oct. 10 (Bloomberg) — Asian stocks fell, with the region’s benchmark index headed for its worst week on record as a credit freeze deepened, worsening the outlook for the global economy.

Commonwealth Bank of Australia slumped 5.5 percent after higher borrowing costs showed interest-rate cuts by global central banks have failed to encourage banks to lend. Yesterday in the U.S., the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell below 9,000 for the first time since 2003. BHP Billiton Ltd. lost 7.2 percent after crude oil declined to the lowest in a year.

“Investors are pricing in a reasonably significant and protracted recession,” said Troy Angus, who helps manage $3.1 billion at Paradise Investment Management in Sydney. “The market’s anticipating corporate earnings in Australia to go down 20 percent at least.”

Japan’s Nikkei 225 Stock Average plunged 4.5 percent to 8,742.48, set for the lowest since June 2003. Australian shares headed for their worst week since the 1987 stock market crash. South Korea’s Kospi index fell to its lowest since June 23, 2006, while a plunge in futures triggered a halt in program trading.

The MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 1.5 percent to 90.92 as of 9:28 a.m. in Tokyo. The measure is headed for a 12 percent weekly decline, the worst since the index was created on Dec. 31, 1987.

The regional benchmark dropped 42 percent this year as mounting mortgage-related losses at financial firms caused credit to dry up, toppling banks including Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and slowing global demand for Asia’s exports.

As I write this the Hang Seng is down 8%, Iceland is facing the end of its banking business, the Nekkei is down 9% and Yamoto Life has filed for bankruptcy.

Looks like it’s TEOTWAWKI for real kids. Get your money where you have access to it and buy tangibles like canned good, guns and toiletries. The way the economy is going they’ll be worth more than their weight in gold.

Cross posted at the world’s most neglected survival blog.