The Reading Is Fundamental index tracks firms like academic textbook publishers, for-profit educators and sliderule manufacturers.
The RIF index, which reached its highest level (3,141,592) immediately after the election of then Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) in November 2008, sunk to a new low of √-1 in after-hours trading.
“Savvy investors in this sector are just spooked by the number of people who are wasting their precious time following these ignorant Republican douchebags,” says analyst Juan Percent of Midas Securities. “If this kind of militant stupidity continues, the only self-improvement Americans will spend money on will be liposuction and tranquilizers. The Arizona book-burnings [of Mexican-American Studies texts] have already spooked the market.”
“There was only one person intellectually qualified to head up the GOP ticket,” noted stock trader Envino Veritas, “and that was John Huntsman. He never had a chance with these doofus voters.”
Voters in the Republican primary favored former Mass Gov. Mitt Romney, whose knowledge of basic economics and American history garnered a D+/C- rating from Teachers Who Check This Stuff Out; runner-up Newt Gingrich got failing grades in ethics and geopolitics; former Sen. Rick Santorum was awarded an “incomplete” for not knowing anything that wasn’t in the Bible; while Texas Rep. Ron Paul failed both logic and finance.
Market contrarian Monet Tachs was pleased with the election results. “We moved all our cash into Doofus futures before the election,” he explained. “Now that ignorance is bliss, our portfolio is growing like shrooms on a cow patty.”