The Big Picture - Macro Perspective on the Capital Markets, Economy, Technology, and Digital Media

Fareed Zakaria has reached the terribly obvious and long overdue conclusion that the right wing in the US is a fantasy-based denier of reality.

Whoopee.

After years of globally embarrassing foolishness, a cowed and cowardly media is belatedly showing signs of speaking Truth to Power.

For his observation that the earth is round, serious people are showering Zakaria with effusive praise. While the reality based observations are long overdue, it is embarrassing that we feel so compelled to applaud it. People seem to be forgetting: This is what media is supposed to do. The role of the press is to point out the absurdities of the powerful, afflict the comfortable, reveal what those in Power want to keep hidden.

Of course, that has taken a back seat to much more important events, such as Anthony Weiner’s junk shot, Michael Jackson’s untimely death, and an especially close American Idol final.

Bread & Circuses, anyone?

What does it say about our damaged US democracy and its wounded 4th Estate (aka corporate media) that merely making an obvious assertion is news? Is it an event when an essential element of a functional democracy actually has the bravado to tell a significant political movement that “No, the earth is not flat.”

The right wing has long embraced magical thinking. You can see it across a spectrum of thought: It is a short hop from believing that  Supply Side Tax Cuts are self funding to all other manner of nonsense. From denying Evolution to managing Health Care costs to Global Warming, it is a continuum. Making no-plan invasions of other countries is the natural progression of such magical thinking. If your beliefs are righteousness enough, then the outcome is assured by a munificent deity.

As a personal belief system, that may be fine, but as government philosophy, it makes for horrific policy decisions.

The Retreat from Empiricism has been detailed over the years, but not by the mainstream media. It has been the alternative press — websites, blogs, critics outside of the mainstream — who have stated the obvious for many, many years. Somehow, the Media missed nearly all of it. It wasn’t until after the Katrina disaster that the scales fell from Press’ eyes. Suddenly, in the middle of George W. Bush’ second term, the Press found their voice. Years after 9/11, after the national terror alert was manipulated for political purposes, long after the Nation was lied into a war of choice through dishonest and deceptive means at great cost in blood and treasure, did the Media found its voice.

Heckuva job there, Press corps . . .

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Previously:
Attack of the Dumb Journalists (October 29th, 2005)

Journalists, Heal Thyselves (December 26th, 2006)

Seeking the Truth — Or Obscuring It? (August 20th, 2010)

Marion Maneker on Zakaria’s Truth Telling (June 16th, 2011)

Sources:
How Today’s Conservatism Lost Touch with Reality
Fareed Zakaria
Newsweek June 16, 2011
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2077943,00.html

Retreat from Empiricism
Jay Rosen
Press Think, December 18, 2006
http://archive.pressthink.org/2006/12/18/suskind_empiricism.html

I wanted to point out that the loon of the moment, Harold Camping is now hitless after two at bats.

The religious zealot/jackass made a similar end of world prediction in 1994, which if memory serves failed to come to pass.

And it is an otherwise delightful evening, no Armageddon anywhere in sight . . .

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Previously:
Waiting for the End of the World (November 27th, 2010)

Harold Camping on Larry King Live “1994?” Pt 1/3

Harold Camping on Larry King Live “1994?” Pt 2/3

Harold Camping on Larry King Live “1994?” Pt 3/3

The Rapture (in blue) beats “World End May 21″ (red)  — at least on Google Trends. What chance did Harold Camping’s end of days have versus 2000 years of Armageddon fear mongering?

The Rapture folk know the first rule of forecasting — hence the indefinite date for the World’s end versus getting too specific.

Coming on (12/21/12) — The Mayans (or not) !

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Via Google Trends

There is an Evangelist named Harold Camping, who claims the world will end tomorrow.

He has violated the first rule of forecasting: You can give a price target ($0) or a date (tomorrow) but never both at once.

Besides, the end of world forecast carries additional risks. People have been making Armageddon forecasts for, like, forever. So far, not one has paid off. Oh-fer-∞.  (Perhaps the long  shot odds are attractive to risk takers).

But its a stupid bet for the simple reason that there is no upside:

a) If you are right, your counter-parties will be dead and unable to pay off the wager.

b) If you are wrong, you look a fool AND have to pay out your obligations (Hey Moose, Rocco, help the judge find his wallet …)

The Mayan predictions of the end of the world holds no sting for them — their world ended a long time ago.

Harvard historian Niall Ferguson knows this lesson well — in Colossus: The Rise and Fall of the American Empire, he describes the inevitable decline of the United States, but neglects to give a “Sell By” date

The intertubes are all abuzz about something Larry Kudlow said on TV last week:

CNBC’s Kudlow: Be grateful the human toll is much worse than the economic toll from Japan quake!
(This message on Google Buzz)

CNBC’s Larry Kudlow illustrates why there’s such hatred of the Wall Street ethic, as he suggests that we should be grateful that the “human toll” from the recent horrendous quake in Japan is much worse than the “economic” toll on the markets. Every so often, these guys let their true feelings slip out:
(YouTube / 24 seconds)

Now, c’mon.

This was obviously little more than a slip of the tongue. Its LIVE TV for crying out loud — the guy is on at least 2 hours a day. Everyone who does these live shows eventually trips over their own tongue.

That doesn’t mean it was a major Freudian slip revealing his true thoughts.

Understand that I disagree with Larry about pretty much EVERYTHING. I cannot ever recall being booked on the show where we didn’t have a significant debate about a major issue: We disagreed about nearly everything George W. Bush did, about the credit bubble in 2005, the housing boom in 2006, why you should not buy the banks in 2007, why the market was so dangerous in 2008, why the bailout of Bear Stearns was a terrible idea, and how all of these big banks committed suicide.

But Kudlow did NOT mean what he actually said . . .

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I’m scheduled to do Kudlow Thursday night,and I’ll ask about this . . .

This morning, I am going to violate my self-imposed admonition against advising billionaires how to spend their money. How to invest it is what I do for a living, but how to spend it is something else entirely.

The basis for this rule waiver/advice was a front page NYT article: After Business and Politics, Mayor Tests Opinion:

“After conquering Wall Street in the 1970s, crushing competitors in the information-technology industry in the ’80s and reigning over New York City politics for the past decade, the ever-ambitious Mr. Bloomberg now wants to dominate a new sphere — the world of opinion . . .

Not everyone inside Bloomberg L.P. is enthusiastic: its news arm is known for bleaching stories of extraneous adjectives, conjunctions and descriptions, adopting a just-the-facts ethos that has earned it a reputation for fairness.”

What I find most appealing about Bloomberg is his modus operandi:  He is a data-driven, nonpartisan, centrist thinking Technocrat. That stands out from the typical modern pol, so dependent upon spin. But Bloomberg can turn that to his advantage, with a little unconventional thinking and a broader approach to journalism, media and opinion-making.

Bloomberg found success in financial data by being the most accurate, comprehensive, and timely source dedicated to that data flow; the competition could not keep up, and now Bloomberg owns the space. But I suspect being merely another source of opinions in a very crowded space is far less likely to achieve much more  than a passing success for hizzoner.

Why? Because Bloomberg LLC is the anti-opinion news source. For the traditional opinion makers, BBerg’s trength is a disadvantage.  That alone makes it unlikely it will attract a broad following.

What Michael Bloomberg should do however, is Jiu jitsu that “weakness” into a potential advantage.

How? Consider the numerous intractable problems facing the nation. When it comes to policy making, there are several issues in particular that lead us astray:

1) Agnotology and the rise of the Flat Earthers

2) The slow demise of competitive Investigative Journalism

3) No penalty for being “Reality Challenged”

As it relates to the opinion making that Bloomberg wants to pursue, I suggest he consider aggressively undertaking the following:

1) Establish a “Round Earth Think Tank:” The goal is to produce definitive research on who is manufacturing ignorance, bad info, propaganda. Create an accurate data driven set of facts. As long as policy makers are debating reality, it becomes impossible to respond to real issues

2) Facilitate Investigative Journalism: Whether its helping organizations such as Pro Publica or using the Business Week platform for deeper dives, Democracy does not work well without an aggressive Fourth Estate.

3) Punish the Agnotologists: Use your platform, celebrity and non-partisan reputation to punish those people that consistently lie to the American people. Call out the political figures that constantly make false claims; challenge the ongoing debasement of knowledge and scientific method.

4) Establish a PAC: Donate money to opponents of these candidates. If you are going to run for public office on a campaign of disinformation, expect to face well-funded opponents.

That is my simple advice for Michael Bloomberg: To influence opinion, you must understand the state of current opinion-making, and how it got that way. To truly influence opinions, one needs to see the flaws in the current process — and fix them . . .

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Source:
After Business and Politics, Mayor Tests Opinion
MICHAEL BARBARO
NYT, February 28, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/01/nyregion/01bloomberg.html

I have been rather dismissive of the agnatology from global warming deniers and hacks like Pat Michaels.

The notorious climate skeptic of the CATO Institute has admitted on CNN this weekend that 40 percent of his funding comes from Big Oil. Note that is what he admits to; his disinformation campaigns might be funded in considerably greater amounts than that.

When the media quotes him, they should disclose where the funding for his “skepticism” came from. As the ExxonSecrets profile of Pat Michaels sums up well, he is “possibly the most prolific and widely-quoted climate change skeptic scientist.”

Fareed Zakaria deserves a round of applause for challenging Michaels directly to cough up a figure for how much oil money he receives to defend the status quo:

ZAKARIA: Let me ask you what people wonder about, advocates like you. They say —

MICHAELS: I’m advocating for efficiency.

ZAKARIA: Right. But people say that you’re advocating also for the current petroleum-based industry to stand pat, to stay as it is, and that a lot of your research is funded by these industries.

MICHAELS: Oh, no, no. First of all, what I’m saying is —

ZAKARIA: Well, is your research funded by these industries?

MICHAELS: Not largely. The fact of the matter is —

ZAKARIA: Can I ask you what percentage of your work is funded by the petroleum industry?

MICHAELS: I don’t know. 40 percent? I don’t know.

Not a bad investment by the oil industry: Put up 40% of the funds, but use 100% of the junk science . . .

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DISCLOSURE: We are long Arch Coal (ACI) and Suncor (SU)   As I have said, you can burn fossil fuels and own V12 cars, or even invest in the energy sector, but please don’t be hypocritical by pretending that you are not impacting the climate.

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