The DOW climbs to 10,000

Today the DOW climbed over 10,000 for the first time in over a year, and Americans are understandably pretty excited about it. Reporters are interviewing experts who proclaim that the recession is over, and that we can credit it all to the stimulus bill that President Barak Obama so wisely signed into law at the beginning of his term in office, nine months ago.
On the surface, this seems like great news, and we should all be out in the streets celebrating such wonderful news. Ticker tape parades should be littering the streets and we should all find ourselves on shopping sprees that would make Paris Hilton look like a pauper...But we aren't.
We aren't, because something doesn't add up, and we the American people know it. We remember that the government printed money to the tune of a trillion dollars, a number so large that we choose to spell it, rather than use digits. A trillion dollars that largely went to the very same companies who's stock prices have been rising since. Companies that needed the money due to their own incompetence. Companies that, according to the national unemployment rate 9.8% still aren't hiring. Companies that, according to our government, saw lower that expected sales this quarter for something like the millionth quarter straight.
So how do companies that are not selling their products and show no sign of growth have stock prices climbing? You guessed it! With the stimulus money!! So before you run out and start buying stock again, think it through, because as in almost everything else these days, things arent quite what they appear.