By Rick Aristotle Munarriz (TMF Edible)

( January 5, 2000 ) -- What's wrong with a little retro? Paul, ball-hogging the taglines with his excellent "the Dow is then, the NOW 50 is now" jump shot, fails to realize that every dog has its day. And, it's true, a lot of the Dow components are pound puppies.

But a kennel can smell like daisies if the wind blows the right way. And, with the highest-yielding Dow stocks turning in their worst performance in 10 years, it seems that the companies in the lowest tier -- those the NOW 50 have left behind in the land of forgotten equities -- are poised to bounce back the strongest this year.

Now, a few stars aren't enough to make an index shine. The S&P 500 had a lot of the tech bellwethers like AOL, Microsoft, Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO), and even Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO) toward the end of the year. However, the Dow 30 still whipped the S&P last year (25% return for the Dow vs. 20% for the S&P). It's an impressive showing when so many Dow stocks were out of favor.

It is that batch of downtrodden players that will serve the all-weather Dow well if 2000 is as rocky as 1999 was not.

Paul makes a great point that threw me for a loop. The NOW 50 was inspired by the community; he points out how you -- yes, you -- have been an astute visionary. We conduct a vote at the end of every Duel. Six months later we take a look back to see if the bull or bear won. Our Voting Fools have sided with the winner 42 out of 62 times. That is amazing. That is Foolish. That is a tip of the hat in your direction even if you vote for Paul this week.

But, remember, when you and the Fool trustees chose the NOW 50 stocks, the Dow must have had some kind of credibility if the community picked a majority of the Dow 30 companies for NOW 50 inclusion. Let's consider the rest:

The Not NOW 14 Companies

Alcoa (NYSE: AA)
Honeywell (NYSE: HON)
Boeing (NYSE: BA)
Caterpillar (NYSE: CAT)
Kodak (NYSE: EK)
Disney (NYSE: DIS)
General Motors (NYSE: GM)
Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HWP)
International Paper (NYSE: IP)
J.P. Morgan (NYSE: JPM)
3M (NYSE: MMM)
Philip Morris (NYSE: MO)
SBC Communications (NYSE: SBC)
United Technologies (NYSE: UTX)

You want to pelt me, but how? Without International Paper, how are you going to make spit balls. Without 3M, how are you going to plant that "Kick Me" Post-It on my back? Without SBC, how are you going to call me in the wee hours to ask me if my refrigerator is running?

The Dow still matters, and like Alcoa's old jingle, we can't wait for tomorrow.

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