Assessing Unreasonable Risk In Politics

Our feelings are influenced by culture, our experiences and those of people close to us, media coverage, and emotional feelings of dread or hope. Assessing reasonable probabilities of risk even when evidence is available representing the size of the risk that must be confronted, in highly stressful situations, it may be ignored. People may display what is called “probability neglect." When confronted with vivid images of terrorism, emotions are intensely engaged.  People’s attention can be focused on a bad outcome rather than the fact that it is unlikely to occur. So, the actual risks are ignored. For example, it’s been shown that people are somewhat foolishly willing to pay more for insurance against terrorism than insurance against all other risks, all because the use of the word terrorism conjures up dread.“David Spiegelhalter:”  Our politicians have spent a great deal of time creating dread, fear of terrorists, fear of the loss of morals, fear of the loss of religion, fear of Democrats, fear of Republicans as our politicians conjure these scary bedtime monsters.  The American public is feeling the results of “probability neglect” from ISIS and World Conflict. And now both parties have escalated the dread to the point the American public is seeking a non-logical way to mitigate political risk to re-establish their security. Our politicians have diminished the sense of security in the nation by the constant partisan bickering and grandstanding, and now decisions are being made within the republican party constituents that could affect the entire republic. This wave of insecurity has brought about the inability of the republican constituents to display proper judgment in their current choices.