But the big picture is still stagflation: rising interest rates and costs, and slowing economic growth and corporate earnings. That is not an endearing picture for traders unless of course you are bearish.

Here is an example of something that bothers me in this market. The sell-side refuses to accept facts and common sense. On Friday, General Electric announced earnings of $0.38 for the 1Q05, which was a penny above consensus estimate. But, immediately, the PR news releases went out to say that "blowout" earnings were up 25 percent on "surging" revenues, yada yada.

"For the full year, GE said it now expects earnings of at least $1.78 a share, 2 cents higher than the previous low end of its forecast. The Fairfield, Connecticut-based company kept the top end at $1.83 a share."

So, if you go back to the January 14 Value Line report by Edward Plank, you will see his estimate of $0.37 for 1Q05 and $1.80 for 2005. Therefore the GE results were not deserving of myth-making, earth-shattering words like "blow-out" and "surging". I continue to ask, why do media editors do this? Is it professional? Or is it just acknowledging that GE is a major advertiser and you want to stay in their good books.

Now here is the real problem for investors: editors who sustain this bull nonsense are misleading people. For example, including the recent quarter, the past four quarters of GE earnings are .38+.38+.51+.38=$1.65. But 2Q05 for GE is expected to come in at .43, so the Y/Y earnings will be $1.70. Then the 3Q05 earnings are expected to be .45, so the Y/Y earnings will grow to $1.77. Then in 4Q05, if GE doesn't have a real blow-out quarter of 0.55, Y/Y earnings will come in at under $1.79, and investors will decide that their "inflated" expectations were unreasonable.

Thirty percent of 2005 is already history, and it has been quite a number of years since GE last enjoyed the hype it is getting this year. In fact, if you look at the gap between the year-to-date high and low price for the stock, you will see the low is 94.6 pct the high. At no time in the previous 10 years has the gap been less than 76.5 pct.

And if you look back another nine years, you will see the lows of 65.7 pct, 51.2 pct, 53.2 pct, 68.8 pct, 59.0 pct, 66.5 pct, 62.7 pct, 65.5 pct and 68.0 pct of the highs, resulting in a 10-year average difference between the annual high-low of 36.3 pct, which is quite a difference from this year's 5.4 pct.

All I'm saying is that the GE publicity machine has got the pedal to the metal, and as soon as they lift, I think there is going to be a huge sucking sound as the GE price drops back.

On average, which is midway between optimism and pessimism, I expect to see GE trade at a PE of 20 times current earnings of about $1.65, which is $33. Friday's close was $35.75, and the stock is $36 in the pre-open. It's no bargain.

When I look at the profit engines of GE, I see finance at 33 pct of all profit, but if interest rates are rising, that will bear down on a rising profit picture. Healthcare is 11 pct, insurance is 3 pct and NBC Universal is 12 pct. If there is any slowdown in the economy, it's going to affect the media group. Aircraft engine orders have been strong, but I'm not certain that the airlines are in that great shape that recent pricing power increases are sustainable for GE's transportation group.

At the end of the day, GE is on the Cara Global Best 100 list of companies. But if investors are pinning their hopes that GE is going to pull the equity market up by the bootstraps at this crucial juncture, I think they ought to think twice.

GE stock is probably ten percent over-priced today, which is a marker for me to decide where the broad market is in its point of cycle.