Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is fair, whatever is pure, whatever is acceptable, whatever is commendable, if there is anything of excellence and if there is anything praiseworthy-keep thinking about these things. Philippians 4:8
Is your glass half full or is it half empty. Are you optimistic and hopeful about the future or are you fearful and full or doom and gloom?
If you believe the news media the world is going to hell in a hand basket. Not true. Yes things are difficult but we have been here before. In the late 70’s and early 80’s there was double digit interest rates, unemployment and runaway inflation but personal income, as adjusted for inflation is up 20% since the 1960s.
Why All the Pessimism?
In order to understand what is going on you have to take a really hard look at who the purveyors of negativity are and then drill down to understand their agenda. Without a doubt the purveyors of negativity are the media – both electronic and print. The volume of their message and the size of their audience make it easy for them to influence, persuade and downright “brainwash” the uneducated, intellectually lazy mass of humanity.
When one drills down on the stories that appear on the nightly news and the front pages of morning newspapers there is an unmistakable trend and it is all negative. Why the negative you might ask.
Good question
The simple answer is that negative news sells newspapers and network airtime. And newspapers and networks make their money from advertising. The more viewers or readers the more the cost of the advertising space. The media knows all too well that the best way to drawn a crowd is to promote negativity by showing natural disasters of epic proportion, gruesome murders, rapes, kidnappings, celebrity misfortunes, etc.
Politicians of all stripes know, just as well, that when people are stirred up and fearful they are more easily manipulated and controlled. For an example of this, I refer you to the hysteria surrounding TARP 1 and the ensuing rush to action by Congress. Paulson and Bush succeeded in hoodwinking Congress that 700 billion dollars needed to be given to the banks immediately even though there was no plan or accountability in place about how they would spend it. The politicians got out politicked.
Promoting fear allows politicians to capitalize by promoting themselves as some sort of hero with a magic solution to a multitude of societal ills – can you say Obama. It is the oldest psychological trick in the book and yet people still fall for it. All of this is very carefully controlled and orchestrated. If you think otherwise you are indeed naïve.
You can choose fear or you can choose hope.
Warren Buffett chooses hope.
“Fear is very contagious. You can get fearful in 5 minutes, but you don’t get confident in 5 minutes.” – Warren Buffett said on CNBC, Monday, March 9, 2009
CNBC: “We’ve been getting thousands and thousands of emails from our viewers. Warren, we’d like to start with one that echoes a theme we heard again and again. This one comes from Terry in San Antonio, Texas, who asks, ‘Will everything be all right?'”
BUFFETT: “Everything will be all right. We do have the greatest economic machine that man has ever created. We started with 4 million people back in 1790 and look where we’ve come. And it wasn’t because we were smarter than other people. It wasn’t because our land was more fertile or we had more minerals or our climate was more favorable. We had a system that worked. It unleashed the human potential. It didn’t work every year. We had 6 ‘panics’ in the 19th century. In the 20th century we had the Great Depression, World Wars, all kinds of things. But we have a system – largely free market, rule of law, equality of opportunity – all of those things that cause the potential of humans to get unleashed. And we’re far from done. Your kids will live better than mine. Your grandchildren will live better than your kids. There’s no question about that. But the machine gets gummed up from time to time. If you take the bulk of those centuries, probably 15 years were bad years. But we go forward.”
Buffett spoke with Becky Quick of CNBC for 3-hours. Instead of focusing on the affirming, positive statements (such as the one above) the editors and directors of CNBC choose to go with, “Warren Buffett Says ‘The Economy Fell Off a Cliff.”
Why?
There is an old saying in the newspaper business that says, “If it bleeds it leads”. Now you know why.