Why market bears have the better sounding arguments

by Paul Kedrosky:

1. Things fail more often than they succeed. Pace availability heuristics, it is easier to think of examples of things failing than succeeding, so it gives bears more fodder.
2. Bears have the past, and bulls have the future. Bears get to argue from data, while bulls argue from what might happen.
3. Apocalypse is seductive. There is something about the thought of imminent mass ruin that really gets people's attention, as has happened with the overdone coverage (hello, Matt Drudge!) of the current credit problems in the market.
4. There is a Puritanical urge in America wherein people want to believe they (or better yet, their neighbors) will be punished for their prior success, etc., so it stands to reason that stocks will punish people after they make them a lot of money.
5. Bears have been generally wrong for so long that they have to know how to tell better stories.

I don't agree that strongly with .1. (there's a lot of success--who wants to go back to the past), .2. (there have been more bull runs than crashes, which is why you would be a bizillionaire if you put a chunk into the market a century ago), .3. (i enjoyed Mad Max, but would not want to live there).

My good friend BUC in the Tradesports pit like to hear my market outlook. Well, it hasn't changed from this.