How strong is the stock market?

The market doesn't look that strong today as it's down 250. That could be anomaly or the start of a bear market. It's possible that the 17000+ the Dow has reached won't be seen again for some time as it looks as though a good part of the rise was due to companies buying back their stock. Some interesting numbers:

• Russell 2000 index that measures the performance of smaller capitalized companies is down 3 percent this year versus the big capitalized companies in Standard and Poor’s 500 – which is up 8.9 percent year-to-date through the close yesterday.
• the number of stocks advancing versus the number declining. Last week, the New York Stock Exchange had 1604 stocks advancing versus 1622 declining. Nasdaq, for the same period, had 1093 advancers versus 1742 decliners.
• Last week, 307 Nasdaq stocks set new highs while 433 set new lows.