Debra Goldman's Consumer Republic

Whatever else the president's Economic Forum accomplished last week, it proved once and for all that the people who sell politicians think Americans are much more stupid than the people who sell consumer goods do. How else to explain the visual sloganeering of the stage sets, which had the president and vice president surrounded by signage offering up beat sentiments such as "Recovery," "Corporate responsibility," "Technology and innovation," "Retirement security" and "Moving forward." It was more of the same from the White House geniuses who thought to pose President Bush against agitprop wallpaper for his famously unreassuring reassurances that not all CEOs are crooks and that our economy's fundamentals remain strong. Despite all evidence to the contrary, these savants of spin apparently believe they've found a powerful, persuasive weapon in treating ideas such as "corporate responsibility" like a logo on a Louis Vuitton handbag. Bush is hardly the first chief executive to stage-manage his presidency or the first to be slammed for it. Still, his supporters have to be disturbed at just how propaganda-like his propaganda efforts are. Even the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal was forced to avert its eyes from a spectacle that had all the spontaneity of a Communist Party congress where everyone praises the latest five-year plan. Before someone at the White House stages another made-for-TV summit, there should be a mandatory screening of the classic "1984" Apple commercial to remind the political marketers what consumer marketers have long known: American citizen-consumers identify with the rebel who throws the anvil, not with the bureaucrat droning on the screen or the passive sheep watching him. And while it's rethinking its communications strategy, the administration might take a look at the message itself. The cheerful insistence that this is just a bump on the road to our happy economic destiny may or may not be true. But it's not what we need to hear. We've just lived through the blissed-out optimism reflected in predictions of Dow 36,000. Now we're worried about Dow 3,600. Optimists are passé. Suddenly pessimists have all the credibility. It's a matter of timing. In 1995, the once-and-future top stock-market prognosticator Robert R. Prechter wrote a book called At the Crest of a Tidal Wave: A Forecast for the Great Bear Market. Alas, anyone who believed him back then was left high and dry by a wave of wealth still far offshore. In 2002, however, Prechter is finding a receptive audience for the doomsday pessimism of Conquer the Crash: You Can Survive and Prosper in a Deflationary Depression, in which he predicts woe to optimists who believe recovery is just around the corner. "If you think that all is well ... read this book before it's too late," the promotional copy warns. Karl Rove, are you listening? One might also send the White House a copy of The Positive Power of Negative Thinking: Using Defensive Pessimism to Harness Anxiety and Perform at Your Peak (2001) by Wellesley psychology professor Julie K. Norem. In it, she argues that a positive outlook can be the source of paralyzing anxiety. By setting low expectations and preparing for failure as well as success, Norem says, underachievers can realize more of their dreams than by aiming high and expecting a happy conclusion. If Norem is right, then all the economic rah-rah from the White House only sharpens the sting of the next 200-point drop in the Dow. Instead of making voters feel better in uncertain times, Bush is making them anxious by not acknowledging the possibility of unhappy outcomes. Of course, he can hardly appear before TV cameras against a background emblazoned with "Deflationary depression." Bush doesn't want to repeat the mistake of Colorado's governor, who pissed off his constituents during the worst of his state's wildfires by declaring that all of Colorado was in flames. But notice that neither of these books is in fact pessimistic. Prechter's readers are surely optimists if they hope to "prosper" in a brutal downturn that leaves others financially devastated. And Norem's "defensive pessimism" is just a tool for satisfying one's most optimistic goals. It's not exactly that optimism is out of fashion. As W. himself says, "We're America," where hope springs eternal. It is more that pessimism is the new optimism. Positive things come to those who think negative. Which is why the economic summit ultimately seemed so out of touch. While the president hopes for the best, we are looking for a guy who is prepared for the worst.

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Debra Goldman's Consumer Republic

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Debra Goldman