We Like the Boom

• Yes, indeed. We like the boom! The stock market has been booming for almost 4 years (March 2003).  And since July 2006, the market has been trending up without even a pullback.  Despite those of us who keep looking for a 5-10% pullback, it just hasn't happened.  So turn up the bass, crank up the sound, and lets rap with Tigra and Bunny.
• From Henry Blodget, put your favorite guru to the test!
• Tomorrow night is one of the awards shows.  Oscars, I think. I get them a bit mixed up from TV, to movies, to music.  It's just another awards show of Hollywood acknowledging their own.  Lots of expensive dresses and jewelry.  Lots of lists of "who looked hot" and "who did not."  On the movies, I like the movies that are entertaining, not the ones that win the awards.  Know what I mean?  Often times, I find the winning movies a bit boring.  I view movies as an escape from reality.  A break from the day-to-day grind.
• Todd Harrison on Fortress Investing Group in his Marketwatch column, Have we seen this movie before?  "Billy Ray Valentine said in "Trading Places" that the best way to hurt rich people is by turning them into poor people. In one fell swoop, Fortress Investment Group made a lot of wealthy folks wanting for more." 
• As folks are doing their tax returns, I'm reading and hearing more questions on the telephone tax credit refund.  Here's a column up at Five Cent Nickel on it and potential abuse.  He notes in the blog that “While the vast majority of taxpayers are claiming the telephone tax refund correctly, we are seeing some clear abuse involving overstated refund requests. People requesting an inflated amount will likely see their refund frozen, may have their entire tax return audited and even face criminal prosecution where warranted.”
• Larry Kudlow on the Hillary vs. Obama fued.
• Mark Hulbert on the contrarian view of bull market.  The bull market in stocks is still alive, even if closer to its end than to its beginning.  That has been the conclusion reached for several months now by contrarian analysis, as reported several times in this column.   Yeah, that's what I think and I'm wondering if I'm in the crowd.  I mean, expecting some sort of correction or pullback within the bull market.
• Greg Mankiw on Budget Options, wonders if "we could increase the gasoline tax by $1 and reduce all ordinary income tax rates, AMT rates, and dividend and capital gains rates by 2 percentage points to produce an approximately revenue-neutral tax reform."  Hmm.
• Kind of rainy here today.  Everytime I head outside I get peppered with raindrops.  Being lazy.  Got the Rutgers vs Villanova game on.  Looks like there is a break in the rain, so I'm going to try to get a bike ride in.