It fails everybody, pretty much, the American Dream, but people are driven by it. I don't think we're driven by the same sense of hope in Europe. We're driven by pessimism more.
I believe passionately in preemptive pessimism, especially before a book comes out. I expect the worst both from reviewers and sales, and then, with any luck, I may be proved wrong.
Pretty much any day is a good day to go to the ballpark, but that first day of the season is special. It's spring. The grass is green. Pessimism is impossible - at least, until the other team scores.
Pessimism is only the name that men of weak nerves give to wisdom.
With the sole exception of President Bill Clinton, whose 'bridge to the 21st century' evoked the vision and optimism of other great Democratic presidents of the 20th century, such as FDR and John F. Kennedy, pessimism about America's economic future has been the hallmark of modern progressivism.
When thinking about the future, it is fashionable to be pessimistic. Yet the evidence unequivocally belies such pessimism. Over the past centuries, humanity's lot has improved dramatically - in the developed world, where it is rather obvious, but also in the developing world, where life expectancy has more than doubled in the past 100 years.
In securing the future of the planet, we secure happiness for ourselves. One of the aims of the Greens is to turn around the tide of pessimism amongst the young people of the world.
Pessimism and optimism are slammed up against each other in my records, the tension between them is where it's all at, it's what lights the fire.
It is true that I am not one of those who laugh at utopias. The utopia of today can become the reality of tomorrow. Utopias are conceived by optimistic logic which regards constant social and political progress as the ultimate goal of human endeavor; pessimism would plunge a hopeless mankind into a fresh cataclysm.
I don't believe in pessimism. If something doesn't come up the way you want, forge ahead. If you think it's going to rain, it will.
