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If you are looking for a little helpful advice on how to react to the current bout of stock market volatility, here are a few thoughts from a couple of fine bloggers.

Eddy Elfenbein, Crossing Wall Street: "At times like these, traders madly scramble for 'plays.' Solar stocks, for example, are doing well today. I strongly advise against chasing any of these 'Japan plays.' I remember that on the first day of trading after 9/11, shares of Sturm Ruger jumped more than 10 per cent. Why? Were we all going to buy guns to shoot the terrorists? As you might expect, it didn't take long for RGR to give back all of its gains."

Barry Ritholtz, The Big Picture: "The time to look for the emergency aisles and where the exits are located is before takeoff, not after the wings fall off the plane. You must have a plan in place to deal with unanticipated events, a just-in-case things head south scenario. Ideally, you put this plan together when you are objective and unemotional and calmly contemplative - not when things are figuratively and literally melting down."

Meanwhile, Doug Kass has a sobering list of tragedies that have struck the world this decade. "The new normal is abnormal and is bound to haunt investors for some time to come" is the way he puts it -- although you could just as easily conclude that the world is, and always was, a dangerous place.

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