“It’s all about fear and greed.”
Back when I was first trying my hand at the stock market —and losing— that’s the perspective that my father gave me.
“It’s all about fear and greed.”
You sell your position because you are afraid the stock will go down and you will lose money. You buy because you think the stock will go up and you will make money. Fear prompts one decision. Greed, the other.
This extends beyond the market to politics. Particularly, in election season, we ‘Everyday’ citizens get a chance to hear each party’s pitch on what exactly we should be afraid of, and what we can hope to get our grubby little hands upon if we just put our vote on their right group.
Fear and greed—the basis of every sales pitch. Whether it is the #lifegoals marketing on Instagram—selling a filtered, imaginary world where every bit of reality’s clutter is pushed out of the frame; or political candidates calling your views ‘deplorable’ or ‘knuckle-dragging’, or some equally friendly phraseology. You hear that and think, " I don’t want to be lumped in with such unpopular folks, I’d better toe the party line. What is it these days?”
It’s all about fear and greed.
Here’s what I want from my government: Get out of the way. Get out of the way of business. (They are the only ones creating jobs.) Get out of the way of the economy. Don’t grandstand your virtue by running down the economic engine of one part of the country in order to buy votes in another. Don’t tax us into the ground so that you can send money to other countries, participate in meaningless international agreements, pay for the high priced hookers of foreign despots you court for sweetheart deals. Don’t hamper the healthcare market and then tell me its too expensive not to let the government run it. Don’t subsidize some industries and kneecap others. Don’t tell us what we can earn. Don’t tell us how to raise our kids. Don’t tell us who we are.
We know who we are. And, we know who you are, too.
Get out of the way.
Don’t try to get me to trade my personal autonomy for free stuff. Don’t tell me that if I don’t give up my freedom, I’ll be sorry. Don’t threaten me. Don’t try to make me vote for you by telling me to be afraid. Don’t try to turn voters into prostitutes—even those high priced ones— who sell their autonomy for money.
I don’t want the government to be my dad. I don’t want the government to be my pastor or God.
Get out of the way.
Promise me that and maybe we can come to some kind of an understanding.
