Confidence

As I was stumbling into mid-morning today the little television in my kitchen was tuned to one of the cable news networks. A ‘Breaking News’ event announced that Hank Paulson was about to address the nation with an update of the bailout package. As I reached to turn off the TV I noticed that the network had placed a small box on the bottom of the screen updating the Dow Industrial Average as what’s-his-name began speaking. I thought, ‘Wait, this will be interesting.’ Sure enough, with every conniving word that rolled off his tongue the Dow dropped 75 points from an already pathetic deficit of -225. As I write this it continues to dance and hover at -300. Okay class, what does this tell us about confidence in leadership?