“Men of intemperate minds never can be free: their passions form their fetters.” –Edmund Burke
“We are always paid for our suspicion by finding what we suspect.” — Henry David Thoureau
There’s a story I am fond of telling, the origin of which is forever lost between synapses destined never to fire again. A professor, in an experiment, assigns to two different groups of students the same project. Go out and survey a certain number of people. The students were told to ask one question, with only a yes or no answer. One group was told that the average or expected results would be 60% yes and 40% no. The other group was told to expect 40% yes and 60% no. The groups came back, and both groups got what they were told to expect. Expectation and perception are two very big shapers of what we commonly call “reality” or “life.” Unfortunately, the liberal media often actively shapes our perceptions in the most imperceptible ways. And it is almost never for the good.
With regard to the economy, it is almost exclusively destructive. To paraphrase Jack Nicholson in As Good as it Gets, We’re drowning here, and they’re describing the water. But it is more like a constant drumbeat of a sort of fatalistic, mololithic press that cries “Recession! Recession!” with the wince of a masochist, barely able to hold back a giant grin. For good news is truly no news these days. Consider the inane and utterly unnewsworthy coverage of gas prices on a weekly basis when our economy was actually growing. Now that gas prices have fallen precipitously, where is the coverage? Where is the silver lining that comes with this recession? I’ll give you a hint: you won’t ever hear of one on ABC or CBS or NBC. You won’t find stories about the natural business cycle in your local, state or national newspaper. No one will ever actually admit that the government can’t prevent, fix, or shorten a recession. Because that doesn’t fit with their story. Its no wonder we’re in a recession. We’ve been talking ourselves into one for the last 3 years. This is why the consumer confidence index is such an important economic indicator. Consumer confidence is by definition a psychological factor– guided by perception as much as hard economic reality. The only fix for this economy is a vital combination of individual action and collective optimism. Individually, we must prepare ourselves for the worst but hope (in the Obama meaning) for the best. Collectively, we need to remember we still live in the greatest nation in the world and have the most economic opportunity of anyone. And focusing on the rising water will only hasten our demise.
