POINT OF VIEW: One Bull Who Actually Likes This Market

NEW YORK --Bulls and bears hate this mean market. But there's one bouncing bullish exception.
Tuesday was one for the bears, with the Dow Industrials down 91.34. But, hey,
the bulls have had their strong up days recently, too. This market just likes
torturing investors.
Dow Theory Letters' Richard Russell, whom I watch because I somehow presume
he'll call the bottom of this bear market as he did in 1974, continued bearish
last night.
But he's not particularly excited and even observed that "for a continuation of the decline, both [Dow Industrial and Transportation] Averages will have to violate their recent lows." (Roughly 10000 and 3350 respectively.)

One exception is John Dessauer of Investor's World.
Dessauer is usually optimistic, often for reasons I find emotional rather than analytical. But right now, he's especially cheerful.
In his most recent letter, he was really pounding the table. He summarized his
position.
"Stay invested in stocks. Corporate profits can beat expectations once again
this year."
Dessauer argues forcefully that oil prices are a bubble, which he even compares to the great gold blow-off in 1980. But he pounds again: "Stocks will rise even when oil stops rising. They will rise even further when oil prices come down."
Dessauer, one of the few internationally oriented letters, is generally, but not always, bullish on the dollar. For example, he wrote last year that the dollar "may fall further, but nothing near 20%." Both turned out to be true.
But the dollar hasn't gone into the free fall that the trade deficit was supposed to precipitate.
Dessauer thinks he knows why. He writes: "The evidence is overwhelming that
our current account deficit is driven not by spendthrift Americans but by foreign investors with a thirst for dollars."
He is very impressed by controversial Fed governor Ben Bernanke, who in a recent speech described a global savings glut - "which helps explain both the increase in the U.S. current account deficit and the relatively low level of long-term real interest rates in the world."
Dessauer's conclusion (pound, pound!): "The global savings glut is one more reason why the dollar will not collapse...the U.S. is the favored destination for savings since there isn't a sensible alternative to the dollar...it will be a long time before China and the other developing countries feel secure enough to cut back on their dollar-based savings and reserves."
Dessauer also dismisses inflation on the grounds that the monetary base has
recently been growing less than nominal GDP growth.
Dessauer obviously wishes the market would stop torturing investors too. Last
Friday, after one of those up days, he wrote: "Well that's more like it...I wonder if this will mark the turning point, when reality begins to replace irrational anxiety."
But he's not wavering.
I am still uncomfortable with Dessauer's reasoning, partly because he seems to
place a lot of faith in fixed exchange rates, typical of former bankers, and partly because it sounds too much like the New Era delusions that seem to mark market stops.
But Dessauer's long-run record is pretty good by Hulbert Financial Digest count, although he has slightly lagged the market.
In his last letter, he recommended Colgate-Palmolive Co. (CL) and sold First
American Corp. (FAF) and Artisan International Fund.