I had an epiphany today regarding the difference between what is and what is understood to be. I think that when it comes to absolute matters in life; our inclination is to fall back on time-forged human reactions to the trigger-emotions of hope, fear and greed.

After a few years of instruction from the financial bulls of the new south, I have learned that there is no better example of this than as is played out daily in the free financial markets of our time. You see and hear reports from the corporate mega props that would lead you to believe that there is a cause-and-effect nature to these markets. In reality this idea is the equivalent of a pharmaceutical company purporting to have patented a pill that can dictate the next thought to enter your head. It is misdirection in its most virulent form, and it is astonishing that most of us have not caught on.

Think about it. If you are (or have ever been) engaged in the information that is bandied about as to why this market did this and that stock did that, and so on, then why would we not just make the market respond in a perpetually positive direction through these various stimuli? Why are bear markets and recessions necessary (if not natural)? The explanation to this leads one to understand that it is nearly as hard to work-out this financial jaberwocky as it is to try to explain it in writing. So, we tend to fall back on what we do understand when investing…."this idea scares me", "that one sounds good", "that one (the one I really want to buy) is going to make me rich", and things of this nature.

The truth in all of this is that we are all being bamboozled to believe that there is a golden ticket, and that prospering in a free economy is as easy as finding the right button to press. In essence, we have all been manipulated to equate proper wealth building fundamentals to the same means by with which any lottery is conducted.

Doesn't that sound really wrong?

The inherent problem is that we do not want to expend any more effort in considering this notion. It has always lead us down the primrose path, and who has time to ponder such things any way? So, we reach out to those oversight institutions (which no doubt were founded on the notion of getting to truth), that have discovered people do not pay top dollar for that which is true, they would rather that which fits into the refined permeable membrane of their custom crafted self-interest filter. Unfortunately, we have failed to realize that the companies that mold the perceptions and preferences that lead to our choice of these filters, now own the oversight institutions that we get the information from...just check out the ownership of your local newspaper if you do not believe me. These forces are bound by the virtues of the code of the First Church of Fiduciary Responsibility, and that calling is (in the grand scheme of things) so much more purposeful to them than looking for truth. "After all," they say, "Isn't truth just that silly little island that we longed for in our youth which leads to silly little transcendental or post-modern houses?" "And, didn't those houses' walls collapse on the poor fools who inhabited them long ago?"

Capitalism is a noble concept (true statement adhered to by this author), and, to the best that I can tell, worth the risk. It is one of the fundamentals that our nation was built upon, and the grandest of experiments that (in its uncorrupted form) seems to provide proof to hypotheses about global freedom and democracy everyday. However, any economist worth his or her right to own a copy of Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei would not deny that a free-economy is just that. It is built on its inalienable right and responsibility to never be manipulated. It is (in its own way) a living organism that will respond to stimuli how it damn-well pleases. Any claims to the contrary are quick-pitches from traveling salesmen in the hopes that you will respond one-way-or-another.

And, therein lay the misdirection.

You see, it matters not what your response is. The devoted members of the First Church of Fiduciary Responsibility (and those elected officials who falsely believe that they can control it) get very wealthy as long as you do something.

So then, are we to take our resources off of the altar (and with it those hopes and dreams for our futures) and stuff them back into our mattresses at home?

Probably not.

Turn, rather, to those who have learned that the First Church of Fiduciary Accountability does not stand without your reaction to their quick-pitches, and therefore have to perform as well as they sell. What is it that these members of the bourgeoisie discovered that has advanced them to aristocracy (as an aside, I do not subscribe to the notion that America is built on class warfare….I lived in the UK, and therefore know what the remnants of that kind of economy feel like. I merely use this verbiage to invoke a visual image).

Forgive the indulgence here….it is faith. Not faith as it pertains to the way it is bandied about (rather wantonly at times) in religious circles. However, it is a faith that can be (to some degree) correlated to that which followers of Christ adhere to.

It is the truth, because it always has been. As improbable as it might seem to the skeptics. Even when you can not see it or sense it...it remains.

It not only holds up to scrutiny and attack, it takes those opportunities when under the heaviest scrutiny and attack to attract the casual observer and invite them to be bold enough to consider the ramifications of a truth rooted in the timeless code of a master artist's handiwork (for the record, I do not equate Hamilton's institutions to that of God's...however they must have been inspired by something).

Does this mean that we are to cast our resources into the kitty and wait for the profits to start pouring in free from concern and due diligence?

Heavens no.

Faith in an investments ability to turn a profit involves discipline (author's emphasis on the word's root)….discipline typically is managing those emotions (fear, greed), paying close attention that they do not impede any progress created by adherence to the truth. The truth that proper, prudent investing earns the investor substantial amounts of money over long periods of time in which there will indeed be seasons of suffering and great angst.

However, the end of these seasons will be met with the unfailing prosperity of the free-market capitalist's promises of a greater return than the losses sustained. All of this culminates (if the investor does not waiver) in the accumulation of substantial and sustaining wealth …that is the faith which is at the heart of all TRUE free market economies. That faith is augmented by the grander emotion of Hope (that you can prosper), and (in some very advanced capitalist circles) the grandest of them all...Charity (you can use that prosperity to better the lives of others)...

I find it very interesting, this notion of correlation between the pursuit of the Capitalist and that of the faith of the Christ follower. There is no cavalier intent on my part as it pertains to winning the souls of those motivated by money to Christ. As a cultural observer I am attracted to the similarity of the plight in both pilgrims' journeys.

Likewise this brings a bit more perspective in the on-going political coup over the misinterpretation of Jeffersonian writings that have lead some of our elected and appointed leaders to indicate that Christianity and its principals played no part in our nations formation and therefore should be banished from every national institution.