The "Zombie Bears"

Yesterday I was reading a post on Zero Hedge, and while the post itself did not interest me much, it was the comments section that sent me into another tizzy, There was a reference to a Barry Ritholz post (which I missed) entitled "Zombie Bears: Time to Admit the Recession is Over". Now, mind you, the recession has been technically over for a year and a half, and in that intervening time we have had what can be best described as a "recovery-less" recovery. Apparently the trigger for this latest round of debate was yesterday's intitial claims numbers, which came in about 40k or so better than expected. The problem, as I see it, is that this does not necessarily indicate a trend, and the number was still over 400k, which is still horrible. It seems that we are supposed to be cheering "less bad" as if that was good. Not me, folks, in my book, mediocrity sucks. If we pump something like $4 trillion into the economy and the unemployment rate drops only to 9.6%, it seems like we are doing something wrong. But, that notwithstanding, it is the debate itself that is getting on my nerves. What difference does it make to Barry Ritholz, or anyone else, if someone doesn't think the recession is over.? Why are these clowns (such as the infamous David Tepper, a fund manager who went on CNBC the day QE2 was announced and told the viewers to buy, because "everything was going to go up", and then it was revealed in SEC filings that he was selling at the time) so determined to get us to buy stocks?

The bottom lime here is that Wall Street is NOT on your side. We are essentially on your own when treading in the markets, and the sharks are circling. That is the reason I have remained fiercely independent. I do not have an agenda, I don't tell you what to buy, I don't tell you who to vote for, and I don't pass myself off as an "expert" that knows what is best for you. I am simply trying to educate, probably myself more than my readers, and that comes best with trust. If I violate that trust by telling you I'm going balls to the wall short and you better do the same if you want to get rich, and then blame the PPT when I'm wrong, I violate that trust. Frankly, I am getting thoroughly disgusted with not only the mainstream financial media, but some of the blogoshere as well (some of which has actually become part of the mainstream financial media) for these agendas, both bullish and bearish (the next time someone tries to get you to buy gold bullion, ask him a simple question: if it is such a good investment, why are you selling it?).

One commenter on the Big Picture put it best:"Yes, the recession is over, just like the Korean War is over. Ooops."