History is a set of lies agreed upon.
– Napoleon Bonaparte
Most people prefer to believe their leaders are just and fair even in the face of evidence to the contrary, because most people do not want to admit they do not have the courage to do anything about it. Most propaganda is not designed to fool the critical thinker, but only to give moral cowards an excuse not to think at all
– Michael Rivero
Every man gotta right to decide his own destiny,
And in this judgment there is no partiality.
So arm in arms, with arms, we’ll fight this little struggle,
‘Cause that’s the only way we can overcome our little trouble.
– Bob Marley, Zimbabwe
A Thousand Words On Conventional Wisdom
Conventional wisdom. Many market analysts define conventional wisdom in relation to what direction the market is going to head in the future, but I think this is an utter mischaracterization of the concept. For example, someone that is bullish on the market right now is likely to see conventional wisdom on stocks and the economy as overly bearish after ten years of no returns for U.S. equities. In contrast, someone that expects a market collapse will say that everyone is a cheerleader and that the “conventional wisdom” after such a huge rally is for stocks to continue to go up. This is not how I would describe conventional wisdom and all is does is drag the debate into the intellectual gutter. Rather, to me conventional wisdom is more the “zeitgeist” of the financial and economic community at any given time. Zeitgeist is defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as: the general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era. In this sense an “era” will generally mean a lengthy period of time, several decades or perhaps even more extended periods. That said, what is interesting is that every cycle in the global economy seems to bring forward distinct “mini-zeitgeists” that the experts create to justify market movements or give credence to economic dogma.
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