On the Brink of System Failure

Andy Snyder|February 9, 2023

Hold my hand… we’re going for a bit of a stroll this morning.

Over the weekend, we got into an altercation on the farm. The last time this happened, we ended up with one bad guy on the run… another in a headlock… and nearly a dozen troopers drooling for some action.

This time, it wasn’t burglars we caught red-handed.

It was an idiot and his two drug-riddled friends.

Just past noon, we drove by the southern end of our farm and noticed a blue car where no cars should be. We thought maybe it was somebody changing a baby’s diaper or a fella making a phone call.

We thought about letting it go but decided to turn around and pull in for a chat.

There were three people in the car. Experience had our neurons firing out a message of trouble.

They were right.

It didn’t go well.

High and Mighty

The fine young man we encountered was stashing contraband into his trunk as we pulled our truck tight against his door – ensuring we kept the upper hand.

“You can’t tell me to leave,” the red-eyed bozo chirped out.

Oh boy… we had a hot one. Ignorant… entitled… and reeking with the stench of grandma’s glaucoma medicine.

“I’ve got my medical card,” he said when we called him on it.

We reminded him that such things don’t let him get high and drive onto somebody else’s property.

He didn’t believe us. He refused to leave. His friends got feisty, and things got hot. The trio listed all the ways I was wrong for asking them to leave.

They were downright convinced I had trampled their rights.

Finally, the strung-out one in the back had enough. “Let’s just go,” he mumbled.

“Really?” the ringleader said. “Should we?”

And off they went… likely home to load up YouTube and binge on videos touting the entitled and the ignorant.

But this story is not done. Do you have time to keep strolling?

We’ll end up in the land of investing, we promise.

Shameless

At the same time we were dealing with the high and mighty, a balloon was drifting overhead.

You’ve heard that story. It’s a doozy. Everyone seems to have a different take on it.

It’s Trump’s fault. It’s Biden’s fault. These things happen all the time. This is the first in history.

Nobody is telling the truth.

The folks in China are certainly giggling, knowing they got it all on tape!

It reminds us of another balloon incident. You may remember this one. It, too, was filled with deceit and finger-pointing… and this one even involved jail time.

It happened on a clear fall day near Fort Collins, Colorado, back in 2009.

At 11:29 a.m. local time, Richard Heene picked up the phone and dialed 911. His son was missing, and Heene said he believed the boy was likely being carried into the heavens by a homemade helium balloon that was surrounded by a million volts of electricity.

It was huge news. The drama of a missing 6-year-old boy was carried live around the world. We tuned in via radio on our way home from the office.

Thirty-four of the top 40 searches on Google that day were related to the “Balloon Boy.”

Presumably less sophisticated than the one the Chinese government just sent overhead, Heene’s balloon was made of plastic tarps, duct tape and some aluminum foil. When it all came crashing down about 12 miles from Denver’s airport, the squadron of National Guard and police helicopters following it quickly reported that, gulp, there was no boy inside.

Perhaps he was what they saw fall out several miles ago. The media panicked.

But no… little Falcon was back home hiding in the attic above the garage. When Wolf Blitzer got him on camera later that evening and asked why he didn’t come down, things started to unfold.

“You guys said that, um, we did this for the show,” the 6-year-old said while looking toward his old man – a wannabe actor and shameless self-promoter.

Ruh-roh…

The next morning, the promotion was still paying off. The family was invited onto Good Morning America and then the Today show… where the son puked – live on camera – each time he or his dad was asked about the comment to Wolf.

There’s at least one kid who doesn’t fib well.

But it turns out that lying about balloons has consequences… or at least it used to.

The actor-turned-balloon-enthusiast-turned-felon was sentenced to three months in jail and ordered to pay $45,000 in restitution. His wife was also found guilty in the plot. She got 20 days of “weekend jail” – what modern society now deems a dad’s time with his kids.

There’s a smart lesson in all this.

We think it’s one of the most important of our time. Andy isn’t just wagging his finger again – at least not entirely.

Ballooning Lies

Things are screwed up out there.

Entitlement is a dangerous mentality. We had folks who truly believed we were wrong for kicking them off our land – as if we were some cop on TV whose job they wanted to eliminate via the nightly news.

The lack of truth, sincerity and good morals has parents putting their 6-year-olds in the spotlight and lying about the craziest things in hopes of a few minutes of fame and an easier paycheck than they’d get from an honest day’s work.

There may have been consequences back in 2009… but not these days.

In 2020, Colorado Governor Jared Polis publicly pardoned the Balloon Boy’s parents, saying there was no need for them to have a criminal record… they had their own sense of guilt to burden them.

The poor folks had been through enough.

It’s no wonder we’ve got criminals in our backyard. We’ve given them the upper hand.

And the higher we go, the worse it gets.

The folks in Washington are lying about that damned Chinese balloon… and everything else… from the economy to their “secret” documents. We all know it. This latest gag is a story about nothing, and yet it’s another hoax for the ages.

Getting back to where we belong… it’s no wonder investors don’t trust the data. It’s no wonder meme stocks soar hundreds of points before falling to the ground, burning countless investors along the way. And it’s no wonder investor sentiment remains near record lows.

A healthy economic system and the markets that oxygenate it feed on trust. Without it, the system fails.

When we let our leaders lie – and actually reward the ones who spin the best tale – we fail the system, ourselves and future generations.

It’s a stupid balloon. But the fuss over it shows us just how dangerous our world has become.

Be well,

Andy

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