Nash thinks little of that explanation - especially as it applied to Apple vs. Cisco circa. 2009 - but he reserves his greater scorn for something other than that discretionary decision: the Dow Jones Industrial Average itself: "Look, I'm just going to say it. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is ridiculous ... a mathematical farce."

Nevertheless, Nash did the math using the rules that Dow Jones uses. Had Apple instead of Cisco replaced GM in 2009, we wouldn't be talking about the Dow and the 13,000 mark because it would be over 15,000 by now.

Remember two things:

A committee made that decision using "subjectivity" and "discretion."

And in a presidential election year, nothing matters more than public perceptions about the economy.