@dubosea4 - that is the correct way of thinking about it.
<<offset any potential future losses to unrelated capital gains>>
remember that the money that went into the IRA was pre-tax money, so the Government isn't going to let you take a tax loss (i.e. helping you offset your losses) on something you never paid tax on in the first place. THey already helped you out by not requiring you to pay tax prior to placing the money into the IRA; in that way, they share the loss by not requiring you to pay tax on the money in the first place.
make sense?
