Despite many positive economic indicators entering the 2011 earnings season, the sum of various socio-economic benchmarks (highlighted by the major declines across all major market indices in the past 10 days, which have now essentially wiped out the past 12 months’ gains) is clearly overwhelming corporate America’s present efforts to drive the United States into a period of sustained economic growth.

It brings to mind the popular cliché - “perception becomes reality”, which could apply equally to either many consumers’ sentiment that the US is still in a recession, despite most economists concluding it officially ended in mid-2009 based on benchmarks such as GDP and industrial production, OR an increasingly popular notion that the US and world economic powers lack clear and decisive leadership to combat the underlying proble...