Emotions like anger, fear, and grief serve a function. Shame, too, serves a function. When we do something that violates our own values, we feel shame. Shame is a particularly excruciating emotion, and it lets us know that whatever it is that we did that we’re ashamed of is something that we never, ever want to do again.

But once the event that causes us to feel a particular emotion has passed, and we have changed our behavior to cope with the situation effectively, it’s important to let that feeling dissipate. Shame is no different.

To actively, purposefully swim around in negative feelings is more than an indulgence, or a bad habit; it can actually be dangerous. With shame, this has been shown to lead to a greater likelihood of repeating the shameful behavior itself.

While attention is fixated on Iraq and Afghanistan, the possibility of a number of other wars clearly emerged in the past few days, three in particular.

Starting January 30, a total of five undersea telecom cables have been mysteriously cut in the Persian Gulf and the Middle East area.  This is no accident, comrades.  Someone has been slicing them.  Someone with submarines to do the slicing.  Who could that be?  And what would be their target?

That's a prelude to war in the Middle East.  How about a war in Europe?  One being promoted by Condi Rice and our State Department in support of Moslem narco-terrorists taking over a Christian country?

That would be a region of Serbia called Kosovo.

Close to home is a third war on the horizon, between Venezuela and Colombia.

“My third set of masters,” Malinali thought to herself. These people, these “Spaniards” were different from any others she had known or even imagined. They seemed to her to almost be not of this earth. Perhaps they were from the stars, she thought.

“Are you afraid of them, Little Miss Dry Grass?” she asked herself, summoning her courage, her sense of humor, and the memory of her father all at once. Yes, a part of her was afraid, of course. Who wouldn’t be? Then she heard her father’s counsel: “What reason do you have to be afraid? Have these strangers shown themselves to be cruel and unmerciful, or kind and forgiving? They are impossibly fierce in battle, yet impossibly generous in victory. Use your intelligence, learn how to gain the respect of these Spaniards. Never forget, Malinali, you are a still a Queen! Never show any fear!”

Her thoughts were interrupted by the words of the stranger who spoke Mayan. He addressed them all assembled on the floor of this great floating home.

People are more free and prosperous as a result of the work of Gary Becker, John Blundell, Leonard Liggio, Gordon Tullock and Henry Manne, all of whom passed away during the last eight months.

Henry Manne, dean emeritus of the George Mason University Law School, and one of the founders of the field of law and economics, died this past Saturday (1/17), at age 86.

Most lawyers know little about economics, and as a result, many judges make unnecessarily harmful decisions. Dr. Manne, who was both a lawyer and an economist, had been influenced by the work of Ronald Coase and Aaron Director (who had been professors of his at the University of Chicago Law School) and by economists Milton Friedman, Armen Alchian and others.

Henry Manne's impact will remain for generations, not only from his own writings, but from the influence he had on his students and others that he mentored (including yours truly), and the fact that courses in law and economics are now taught in many law schools.

In May 2014, one of the true economic giants, Gary Becker, at age 83 left us.

Becker had made important contributions to our understanding of the motivations for discrimination, crime and drug addiction. He was always a pleasure to be with because of his many original insights into human behavior.  Awarded the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 1992, his mentor Milton Friedman (Nobel Laureate in 1976), said that Gary Becker was the best student he ever had.

Emotions have a very liquid quality; they move, they flow, they take on the form of their container. Like water in a stream, when they are in active motion they have a clear purpose and direction; when they get stuck they can become stagnant and even putrid.

Ignoring negative feelings doesn't make them go away, it just makes us unaware of them; but dwelling on negative feelings after they have already served their purpose can keep us stuck in them, stagnant in emotions that should have long since run downstream.

Every emotion has a function. Anger is a response to trespass; when somebody crosses a line or a boundary, we get angry in response, and that anger provides us with the energy and motivation to get them to stop. Fear is a signal that there is danger, and it narrows our focus on that danger, and can give us the incentive and energy to escape that danger. Grief is a response to loss and it can allow us to feel and mourn the loss, and to appreciate what we had.

Our emotions are not always accurate, though...