Eric King is a partisan. You can tell by the level of emotion in his voice. I always discount those guys for the simple reason that sound judgement is almost never accompanied by frantic arm waving. That said, I would not dismiss him entirely. The problem he and many others suffer from is not an error of judgement per se, but of timing, and ironically his interview with Barry Ritholtz clearly illustrates this.

Nonetheless, the Eric Kings are valuable contrary indicators. The more frantic they become, the more confidence you can have in taking the other side. That's not to say you should short them blindly - that would be standing contrarianism on it's head. Contrarians don't go short because the Erics of this world are long. They simply take them into account in framing their own view. They are valuable sentiment indicators you can't afford to ignore, because by proxy, they tell you what a lot of other people are thinking.

Eric defers somewhat to Ritholtz because as the interviewer he has to, but you can see he isn't really listening. To me, it's not how strong an argument you make, but how well you listen to the other side. We've all run across these guys at parties. You try to have a conversation, but you know they're not really listening because they're too busy thinking of what to say next. By the time you've figured that out, you look around you, and the room is empty.

ebear