When Guthrum the Viking king was planning for war with England’s Alfred the Great, he would seek the council of his high priest. The priest would divine from the entrails of rabbits wither the gods favored Guthrum on that particular day. This is exactly how pagan war-room planning sessions went.

When Bush’s high priests: Rumsfeld, Rice, & Powel; were in their war planning sessions for the invasion of Iraq, they got together and decoded intel trails that had equal evidence for and against the possession of WMD by Saddam. They deciphered the intel in a way that gave them reassurance now was the time to go to war. This is not a similar thing to Guthrum’s high priest deciphering entrails; it’s exactly the same thing in every single way.

When pagans needed rain for a good harvest and thus increased prosperity, they looked to their chief priest to perform a rain incantation or dance ritual. This is how pagans actions were a result of their belief in the ritual having some efficacy.

When we want our stock market to go up and thus increase our prosperity, we look to our Federal Reserve Board of Governors to lower the discount rate or engage in another round of QE. There is no actual mechanism by which increasing bank reserves (the outcome of QE) can increase asset prices. The mechanism is a fluid coupling, not mechanical- QE influences investor preferences towards riskier assets- that’s it. That is the sole linkage between QE and asset prices. We believe QE and lower rates make asset prices go up. Our behavior reflects our belief- so we collectively acquire assets and hesitantly dispose of them. So price goes up. This is not a similar thing to pagan rain dances, it’s the exact same thing in every single way…