The market certainly made it easy to get back to trading this week, with stocks starting out on a bullish foot after ending last week with a concerning pullback. We still say it's too soon to count out a sizeable pullback though. As James Brumley of the Under the Radar Movers service explained today, rollovers are a process rather than an event. Bullish pushbacks are just part of the process. Today's jump hardly rekindled an uptrend. In fact, the market is still so on the fence today, we're not even going to talk any more about it, nor are we going to show you a chart. There's just nothing there worth worrying about. Instead, let's devote our time today to things that actually matter.... Today's focal point is going to be something a little different. Today I want to respond something I guess many of you may have also seen posted over at MarketWatch.... a chat with Robert Kiyosaki (the guy who wrote Rich Dad, Poor Dad), and his thoughts on the current market situation. I don't want to get into everything he said. Heck, I agree with some of the premises he laid out. I do take issue with a couple parts of his Q&A with MarketWatch though. He said: "We're on the edge of a cliff right now. We have never been here before. If you're still saving money when interest rates are negative, you've got to be crazy. When you're investing for the long-term in the stock market, where there is no connection between stock price and reality, you're crazy." I get where he's coming from. I really do. Most of you will know be now we've been nervous about the market's ridiculous valuation for a while. That, coupled with the calendar, could make September an agonizing month. In fact, if September isn't agonizing enough and doesn't fully correct our valuation problem, the usual Q4 rally could quickly be undone again early next year. Respectfully to Mr. Kiyosaki though, it's not quite accurate to say we have "never been here before," with interest rates at jaw-dropping lows. My guess is he's saying it more for effect and less as an empirical assessment. The problem is, some investors - too many investors - will take his comment at face value. I will concede that these persistently low interest rates aren't the old norm. On the flipside, might they be the new norm? Perhaps more important than that debate, though, is this question: Are the companies you own making enough money on your capital to satisfy you compared to the alternatives? Not that earnings or earnings growth have been stellar of late, but corporations aren't booking losses, and some are growing the bottom line. At the end of the day, stock prices are driven by their underlying earnings, or at least the market's opinion of those trailing and projected earnings. Until that changes, stocks have more than enough merit. I'll also make it clear there will come a point in time when the market really is about to fall off a cliff, which will kick-start a bear market. It will likely coincide with a recession. There's not been one recession the economy hasn't been able to quell yet, however. Some have been better quelled than others, but they all end sooner or later, and they all ultimately become great buying opportunities. Just for the record though, I don't see a recession-driven bear market on the near-term horizon. The current malaise is just that... malaise. My guess? I've seen this before. I see it all the time, actually. Since someone else can't do something (make money with stocks) they'll claim nobody else can either. You and know that's now the case though. There's always somebody out there getting something fruitful out of the equity market. As for what he recommends buying, again, we again take issue with his picks. He said: "Your job is to stand on the edge of the coin and listen to both sides. I love gold but I don't use gold as an investment, I use gold as an insurance policy, a hedge. Because I suspect the U.S. dollar is going to be toast in a few years. Now, if it doesn't, I still have gold. I'm hedging my positions all the time." Kiyosaki went on to say: "Real estate is a long-term hold. It's not liquid. I don't care if the market is up or down. What I'm looking for is a bargain. I make most of my money when the markets crash. I made most of my money in 2007. I made even more money in the subprime crash. I don't care about the overall economy or the markets. I'm looking for an opportunity that no one else sees. I like residential real estate. I don't invest in REITs or anything paper." Again, we get where he's coming from. He's not coming from where the average person is though. The average guy on the street, or even the above-average affluent guy in the street, isn't equipped to buy a bunch of raw real estate. And respectfully to Mr. Kiyosaki, I'd like to learn more about how he made money (presumably in real estate) in 2007 and 2008 in the midst of the meltdown. Maybe he made it afterwards, by buying in the crisis and then selling during the recovery. You'd think he would have made that clear though. The way he voiced it, it just seems like he saying whatever comes to mind that sounds like it might draw a crowd. We're also fans of SOME gold and maybe SOME means of playing the U.S. dollar. And he's right - they're a hedge of one another. If he's actually holding both as he says though, he may find himself so hedged that the two offset one another to the point where he makes no net progress. That's why we have our doubts about him owning meaningful positions in gold AND positions that benefit from a rising greenback at the same time. At some point, if you really want to make any money in this game, you have to take a chance. The more you hedge, the more you cap your overall returns. Look... buy stocks. Keep 'em for the long haul... and we mean long haul. Use funds for the stable, safer portion of your portfolio. If you like real estate but can't buy an entire apartment building or a bargain house, go ahead and buy REITs. Are they perfect? No, but they're as close as any of us are going to get to a reasonable risk/reward scenario. We also think most investors can even dabble with some more aggressive trading for a part of their portfolio. Like it or not, stocks are still the best game in town for the vast majority of individuals, and easily the most liquid. They're also scalable, allowing you to start small. And if you want some great advice from someone that knows how to actually make some money in the stock market regardless of the environment, John Monroe of the Elite Opportunity Pro newsletter is your guy. He just "gets" how the market works, adapting for all the curve balls it throws. He really should write a book of his own, but until he does you can access his money-making insight by becoming an EO Pro subscriber. The folks who've signed up absolutely love it because it's great advice when there's not much other great advice out there.