SHATTERED GLASS/STEAGAL:

Once again, Congress, in its inimitable circular firing squad fashion, has done what the 9/11 terrorists could not do - help bring down the capitalist system - first by eliminating the wall between gunslinging investment banks and real banks, whose explicit FDIC guarantee let widows and orphans sleep well at night. Now B of A is buying Merrill Lynch. Then they, and other chickencoop SelfRewardingOrgs abandoned the uptick rule and mandated that mortgage lenders stop "redlining" neighborhoods where police would not even go. No wonder one of the internet Dictionary's definitions of Congress is "sexual intercourse".
Despite the Fear and Loathing brought on by the weekend, Sentiment numbers look surprisingly Bullish - comparing them to my infamous rally call on July 14: the SPX is 12 points away from that summer rally inception; the CBOE put/call ratio is actually 1 pt. higher now at 86 (huge); the VIX, at 25.6 is less than 2 pts. away; the Inv.Intell. survey is still inverted in favor of Bears (rare), and the AAII is almost as bad at 29 vs. 54. Birinyi bloggers, which I sometimes follow, showed a 65 to 21 bear/bull ratio.
Finally, the SDS, which is the short S&P500 ETF, saw weekly Volume not seen since that week in July, and Money Market Funds increased by a large $45B ( they always miss rallies!).
Here are the stats:

MktSentiment. 9/11/2008 Prev. Week.....5Yr.HI......LOW

DJIA ………. 11421………11220………..14093............7286
Nasdaq………. 2261…………2255…………2810.............1114
S&P500…….. 1251…………1242………….1561………..776
CBOE Eq. put/call …86……………73……………..92-1/08….....46-1/03

VIX ………. 25.6………….23.0…….…….44… 9/02 bull..10.0-7/05 bear

McClellan Osc……….-6……………2……………91-5/04 bear...(-81)-5/04bull
McClelSum……….…-237………..-195…………..1568-6/03.......-1187
Newsletter Surveys:
Inv.Intel -Bull:…..…38.2………….37.8……….…63 (12/04bear)......35-6/06bull
Bear:………… 41.6…………40.0…..………… 38.2-3/03.......16-6/03

AAII-Bull/Bear ……29.3/54.9……37.0/43.2……..n/a n/a
Public/NYSE Spec.-…15.3…………17.3…….….
Bullish%- ………46……………45SELL………….…88 -2/04bear.....19bull
*Insider corporate sellers.15:1…….14:1………..97………….4
Mutual Fund Inflows..(6.5B)………..L(.4B
ETF InflowsL………..7B…………5.1B
Money Market Inflows: 44.4B…….19.3B