>[It's official, no?]
It's true, but not yet official - until the Business Cycle Dating Committee of the NBER says so <http://www.nber.org/>. And they ain't said so yet. In the 1990-91 recession, they made the official declaration when the recession was almost over.
Today's employment report was awful. The stock market, populated by plucky optimists, was unfazed, certain that prosperity is just around the corner.
Doug