Okay, I’ll admit it. I am guilty of this – as are many in the media and the majority of people I talk to – of talking about all the doom and gloom of 2010! Heck, I did an entire interview on it. This doesn’t mean, however, life and all the fun of living ceases to exist as we know it….. perhaps just as we knew it. So, I think that while none of us can deny that things have certainly been better than they are at the moment, we have to remember - this is America and it will turn around!

Look, let's count our blessings.  Relatively speaking, incomes generally have never been higher, the environment has never been more looked-after, crime has never been lower, people have never lived as long as they do now, so for the most part, life has never been better! We spend less for food and shelter than ever before in history - so we have a lot more money left to spend on fun.  Sure, we may have overdone it a bit (ok, maybe a lot), but we will get our act back together and things will continue to get better.  You can bet on it.

Now, I understand that I have been pointed and somewhat sharply critical of our leadership (I am of the opinion they deserve it) but they, like everyone else, are eventually going to be replaced and when we are faced with a real crisis, we always make the right choices.  That is precisely what is wrong with “doom-and-gloom-forever” scenarios.  You know, the ones that say America's best days are behind us and we'd better get used to it.  They always assume that we are somehow either stupid or out of ideas.  We're not!

In a democracy, change ALWAYS comes with turmoil - otherwise the public prefers the status quo. If you really think about it, that is probably healthy.  It prevents acting on too many things, which will resolve themselves by doing nothing. So if you think about it, this goes for about 95% of problems we face not only nationally but individually.  With time, there are some problems that just go away.

If you think a Mono-cultural dictatorship like China or a society riddled with class (caste) barriers like India is going to overtake us, well, wake up – it’s not going to happen.  We are the world's greatest democracy, we respect our people, and our diversity allows us the broadest range of opinion and insight that any country has ever had in world history.  So, yes, we are headed into a bad period but we will come out the other side victorious.  Don't bet against it. It's a sucker move.