A Welcome to War Heroes

Dear Editor:

Hedge Funds caused our families to lose 15 to 20 percent of the value of our equities this past week. This, according to CNBC's Jim Cramer and Fox News' Bill O'Reilly. These same hedge funds recently spiraled the price of oil to $148 dollars per barrel, and when consumers baulked at paying over $4 dollars a gallon at the pump, hedge funds shorted oil equities, which brought the price of oil, and ultimately gas, back down to near $3 dollars per gallon. This smacks of market manipulation.

Unlike mutual funds, most hedge funds, because of their overseas status, go unregulated by the USG and Security and Exchange Commission. Yet these same funds have hundreds of billions of dollars to pump up the price of oil or any other commodity (rising food prices) and short the market on the downside, contributing to the falling price of equities and further loss of wealth to our portfolios. The American public would be appalled if they knew who were the biggest investors in hedge funds, according to Fox News' Bill O'Reilly, and he names two - the endowments for Yale and Harvard. Many other large corporations and institutions are also involved.

You and your family worked for years to invest in mutual funds, 401Ks, IRAs and individual equities, only to see your hard earned wealth vanish in two short weeks, when, on October 1st, hedge funds began liquidating their assets. These same funds are now shorting the market, further exasperating an already calamitous situation and contributing to the market's decline. We can ill afford to sit idly by while hedge funds manipulate the equity markets, the price of commodities and our economic well being.

We demand from our government representatives that hedge funds be fully regulated, else we see a replay of rising food and gas prices and another crash of our equity markets in the not too distant future. Only through the united voice of many will our government act, else YOU, your parents and children will see never see economic prosperity, while hedge funds and those corporations invested in them get rich.

John M. Lemandri

John M Lemandri of VA 12:54PM October 11, 2008