Can the media talk a recession into existence? I wrote yesterday about journalists' endless repetition of the prediction [1]. They've been mentioning it almost once a day for the past month, despite the Federal Reserve's declaration that '08 would NOT see the r-word. Even The New York Times ran the headline "Fed Expecting '08 Slowdown, Not Recession" (November 21)!

But I'm not the only one who's noticed. Chris Pummer of MarketWatch wrote a scarily similar story the same day highlighting Starbucks as an economic indicator, Christmas shopping pessimism, and distortion of the Fed's we-will-not-have-recession-in-'08 report [2]. Pummer says we're "needlessly skittish." The Business & Media Institute couldn't agree more!