Bullish or Bullsh$t?

Barrons's is bullish on stocks.

MSNBC is bullish.

Marketwatch is bullish.

The Wall Street Journal is bullish.

62% of managers in Barron's Big Money poll are bullish.

I'm not bullish. Except on bonds. I will buy 30-year Treasuries sometime this week. I have student loan cash-flow issues to work out, otherwise I'd be buying those bonds right now instead of writing this. I think we're seeing a classic case of dead cat bounce. The market is up 300 points on a day when manufacturing contracts 3 times as much as expected. It is a hallmark of the bear market rally that the market ignores bad news. So, the only question I have for myself is, "Will the economy be worse six months from now?" I have very little doubt about it. Credit is still contracting. Iron ore companies are cutting production and steel prices are plunging. So my timing sucks. What else is new? Applying a little game theory to Barron's, we can conclude that the smart money's already in stocks. (If they're bullish, they've already been buying all last week.) Therefore, the bounce is almost over, and the next move will be to take some profits and run.