Over the last year I have seen two words in the news more than any others. Trust and Fear. In our technologically and socially advanced time it’s striking to see that when push comes to shove, it’s all back to the basic - the good ol’ emotions. We react almost panic-strucken to events around us, worried and scared that even worse things are around the corner. Who knows, the unknown is out there, out to get us all. The herd of humanity has been driven by fear down to levels where we soon can’t stand it any more. It makes you wonder, why don’t we just all collectively run off the cliff together? The only ones that don’t fear anything are the ones that already are at the bottom! The rest of us are scared to death about losing our jobs, losing our house, and losing our precious flat-screen TV. It’s pathetic when you think about it. How did we get here and how are we going to get out of this? How can we build trust again? First of all, let’s realize that America created this economic catastrophe and guess what: America will get us out of it. The Bush administration has long ago used up all their credibility and the Obama administration will have a less than optimal starting point. Chaos at Wall Street and Main Street. Over ten trillion in debt. An environment in despair. And we put all our trust to one man. Like he is the Messiah that will save us all. Like it was the Republicans fault and now the Democrats will save us. Like we don’t have roll up our sleeves and save ourselves! Get ready for a change - and how about making that change yourself first. Talk to your family and your neighbors. Decide on what’s important for you. Do you really want to make decisions based on fear? Why not seize on the opportunity to build some trust. We will always have the politicians we deserve - because we keep electing them! Let them know what you think should be done in order to build trust - and here’s my list:

1. Ensure the rest of the world - our customers and vendors - that they can trust us enough to do business with us again. We won’t make it without them. If they think all they will get from us is protectionism, weapons and worthless pieces of paper with our dead presidents on them, they certainly will not trust us. Fortunately for them, that’s a loss of only 5% of the world’s population. We need them much more than they need us.

2. Establish programs to build our way out of this crisis - in an environmentally correct way. Our infrastructure has been neglected for too long and it’s about time anyway. One by-product will be that we put millions of people to work in production and they in turn will put even more people to work in service and support sectors. Another one will obviously be a healthier environment, which after all is even more important than our economy! Take T Boone Pickens up on his wind programs, make use of the natural resources we have - and build out the nuclear and clean-coal programs - or tell me, what alternatives do we really have?

3. Lower corporate taxes to slow or at least stop the flight to low-cost countries. Why do we voluntarily force away jobs that can be done here when we instead can keep the money in the country?

4. Pave the way to the American dream for the future generations. Provide world-class health care and education to all children and end the ridiculous practice of linking access to college funds to parent’s incomes. Of course, we must also provide the world-class health care to our veterans that got injured fighting our wars for us.

5. Establish a price-discovery mechanism for financial assets. See Jeff Miller’s article.

6. Lat but not least, remember that we got into this mess largely because of lack of regulation. Even Greenspan has admitted that capitalism isn’t bright enough to regulate itself. So implement intelligent and transparent regulation legislation that includes trading the by now infamous derivatives on regular exchange, instead of over the counter - or *under* the table.