28 January 2008
Does the current economic situation scare you? Make you want to hide in the closet? Understanding free market economics would help make you feel better, but in the meantime just turn off television's talking heads. They provide little if any useful information and spread fear like peanut butter - the toxic kind they have been making in Georgia. They got your attention, didn't they? That's what they get paid to do. TURN OFF THE TELEVISION SET.
And while you're at it stop listening to the politicians. And pay as little attention as you can to reporting on what diplomats are saying. And you'll feel a lot better if you read less about the details of what happened on the crime scene yesterday.
This is not to suggest that we need to thrust our heads in the sand; it suggests that we need to resist internalizing every little sensational detail the media, and partcularly the talking heads, feed us. Lies? No, but many, many half truths; and even more half baked opinions designed to inflame - or scare.
But if you cannot do that, read between the lines. Read or listen to more than one source, and find out a little about the background of the issue under discussion. And then give it enough time to percolate. The news changes daily.
But Amadinajad says...Amadinajad is a rabble rousing liar intent on upsetting you. All politicians do that, but Near Eastern politicians revel in it - it is their culture; it is what they do - all the time. And what did the Russian embassy say? What would you expect the Russian embassy to say? It's spokesmen are trained to say what is in the interest of Russia for them to say. In fact spokespersons all over say what their masters want them to say; that's what they are paid to do. Lies? No, half truths; well, sometimes lies.
Don't be sheep, for heavens' sake. DON'T LET THEM MANIPULATE YOU. Think for yourself. In his book The Myth of the Rational Voter one of Bryan Caplan's four systematic biased voter beliefs is that things are always worse than they are. Got that Henny Penny?
