Shall we keep pretending? 

Clearly that’s the plan of the MSM, where you’d think we were in some kind of rally while critical index levels are falling by the wayside right and left on a daily basis.  This is very much like 2008, when the Global Economy was collapsing and an endless stream of a-holes came on TV to tell you not to worry – and they kept people from worrying – until it was too late.  

I don’t want you to think I spend hours digging up bad stories – those are just today’s headlines!  If it were not for the DESPERATE attempts of the G8 Central Banksters to prop up the markets, I’d be gung-ho bearish but, as it is – I’m just cashish and very, very cautious.  The next bit of bad news is likely to be the Durable Goods Report this morning (as I’ve been warning) and this should bring us to the lows for the week – where we’ll be saved by Yellen (hopefully) at 5pm.

Still, is this what you call an investing premise?  Is this a reason to take your lovely US Dollars and trade them for stock shares of companies that have to do business in China and Asia and Europe and South America?  Those places all have SEVERE problems, even if you believe our country does not.  

Not only are stocks historically VERY EXPENSIVE at the moment (and, without AAPL income, we’d be higher than 1929 on the rest of the market), but the risk is VERY HIGH and a lot of the data you are seeing is suspect, at best.  Forget the fact that VW’s profits have been FAKE for the last 5 years, since they were based, in part, on the revenues of cars that they never should have sold at profit margins they only enjoyed BECAUSE THEY CHEATED (very sub-prime of them).  Those profits will reverse the way Countrywide’s fake profits reversed (and many others) and the way the dot com bubble burst when all those paper profits went up in smoke.