I saw Paul Thomas Anderson’s movie The Master last weekend. The plot involves a disturbed World War Two navy veteran, played by Joaquin Phoenix, who by chance winds up in the inner circle of a cult led by a man played by Philip Seymour Hoffman. Despite terrific acting by Hoffman and Phoenix, as well as Amy Adams who plays the cult leader’s wife, the film is, in my humble opinion, tedious and empty. Neither of the main characters is interesting. The veteran is a not bright, nor charming, nor much of anything other than too flawed to hold down a job for long or engage in meaningful relationships with others. The cult leader is neither charismatic nor inventive enough to have developed an intriguing philosophy or a worldview that is sufficiently appealing so that we can understand why people are roped in. Nor does the movie explore the psychology of the followers. What are they searching for? What need does the cult fill for them? The script doesn’t bother with such questions. Nor does it tell much of a story.

What is fascinating, however, is the debate over what the movie means. Is it “a love story between two men with titanic egos”? Is it about two men drawn together by latent homoeroticism? Is it an examination about “what it means to be part animal and part human”? Do the two men represent “two parts of L. Ron Hubbard,” the founder of Scientology? Is it “an allegory that shows how contemporary America is adjusting to a new reality brought on by a different act of war – 9/11”? Is it about how religions and the prodigal son? Here’s a link to an article listing these and other theories.

The joke, however, may be on everyone who thinks the movie must be about something. Early in the film a psychologist gives the navy man a Rorschach test. Is it a coincidence that the movie plays out like a Rorschach test among critics and audiences? Everyone sees something different in it; and what they see may say far more about them than the movie. Moreover, on several occasions followers of the cult realize that the leader doesn’t have a consistent or coherent philosophy; he’s just making it up as he goes along.

And so, Paul Thomas Anderson, I’m on to you. You made a movie – cast with famous, talented actors, shot with gorgeous 65mm high-definition film – that everyone assumes must be important. But, in fact, you just made it up as you went along. You are the Chauncey Gardener of writer-directors. Because you are dressed well and hanging with the right people, people attribute profound meaning to what you’re saying. In fact, you're just peddling gibberish.

Photos - Left: Peter Sellers as Chauncey Gardener in the movie Being There. Top: Paul Thomas Anderson.

Those of us who are political junkies read with great interest lots of polls during election campaigns, but we should ignore surveys that ask voters whether something will make them more likely or less likely to vote for a particular candidate. For example, Gallup asked voters whether Romney’s 47-percent statements will make them more likely or less likely to vote for him. Gallup reported that 36 percent of registered voters said that Romney’s remarks made them less likely to vote for him, 20 percent said Romney’s remarks made them more likely to vote for him, and 43 percent said it made no difference. If you want more worthless data, such as how independent voters answered this question, you can find them here.

Why do I think these kinds of surveys are worthless? People cannot reliably tell us what motivates them to make decisions, including decisions about which candidate to vote for or what product to buy. People are significantly influenced by emotional rather than rational responses. They themselves may not consciously understand what motivated them to make a particular decision.

Here’s a small example from my own life. Often I find myself comparing products. Maybe I want to try a new breakfast cereal. I find a number of candidates that look good to me on the shelf. I like to think I’m a pretty rational decision-maker, and I read the nutritional information on the sides of the boxes. I look at the calories, fiber content, whether the cereal is made from whole grain. I also consider which cereal appeals to me the most, which I think I’d enjoy. Finally, I narrow it down to four cereals. They are not identical – they have different pros and cons – but in my mind they are equally balanced. I agonize for a moment or two and then randomly throw one in my shopping cart. On the same shopping trip, I want to get a sun screen. I examine the ones available. I look at the SPF factor, whether it’s water resistant, promises “won’t run into eyes,” and the price. There is nothing else that I (consciously) care about. I narrow it down to two – say Coppertone and Banana Boat – that are both SPF 50, make the same claims, and are identically priced. It’s a toss-up. Again, I randomly throw one in my shopping basket. When I unload my purchases at home, I discover that I bought the same sun screen last summer. More surprisingly, I have an unopened box of the exact same breakfast cereal in my cupboard. Oh yeah, I forgot, I bought it some weeks ago after believing then, as now, that I was genuinely torn among a wide assortment of choices. Even when I don’t know why, I make the same choices over and over again. I’ll bet this happens to you too.

Steve Jobs was asked whether he used consumer surveys to help design the iPad. “No,” he said. “It’s not the consumer’s job to know what they want.” Matthew Willcox, Executive Director of the Institute of Decision Making, writes that Jobs probably meant that consumers aren't good at telling you want they want. You can access an interesting short piece by Willcox about what drives decision-making here.

That does not mean that all surveys and focus groups are worthless; it means they have to be designed and interpreted with great care. If my law school were to ask incoming students who were also accepted by a competing law school why they chose us, I’d take their answers with a grain of salt. It would be more revealing to ask what they thought about the two schools: Which school has a better reputation? Which school has a better faculty? Which school is harder to get into? Which school did their parents prefer? Which school did their friends say was better? What guide books and web sites did they consult? Which school has smaller classes, more clinics, higher job placement rates? The issue isn't which school is actually harder to get into or has smaller classes. We know the objective answers to those questions. It’s what applicants thought the facts were. Then we can try to correlate what they thought with what they did.

Comparing polls that were taken shortly before and after Romney’s 47-percent remarks can tell us a great deal. Voters and consumers can tell us whether they would choose A or B. But a survey that asks whether one is more or less likely to vote for Romney because of his remarks is treacherous because, at best, people have a tenuous grasp on why they choose as they do.

Mitt Romney’s remarks suggesting that the 47 percent of Americans who don’t pay federal income taxes are nothing but a bunch of parasites living off the public trough may have an enormous impact.

I’m not speaking about whether Romney’s remarks will prove lethal to his presidential campaign, though that may well turn out to be the case. After all, he insulted nearly half of the electorate. Voters who think that Romney was talking about them or their family members – a retired grandparent, a disabled sibling, an uncle who was laid off by his employer, a cousin stuck in a low-paying job – are likely to be unforgiving. But even if Romney’s remarks turn out to be decisive in the 2012 election, they may have an even greater impact on the nation for other reasons.

Romney’s world view – expressed so revealing in his remarks – reflects a narrative long popular in right-wing circles. According to this narrative, the country is neatly divided into responsible, productive citizens and irresponsible, shiftless moochers. I use the word “shiftless” deliberately, knowing that it’s tinged with a racist innuendo, because I fear the right-wing narrative is historically tied up with racial stereotypes, even if everyone who today buys into that narrative is not a racist. The narrative continues: Democrats cater to the parasites by promising and providing government entitlements. Even more nefariously, Democrats want to make these voters dependent on government because that solidifies their loyalty to the Democratic Party.

The narrative explains, at least in part, the mysterious hatred that so many right-wingers have for Democratic politicians. Those who subscribe to the narrative do not believe Democratic politicians hold different – but principled – views on ideology and economics. They see Democrats as cynical, unpatriotic politicians who, for self-interest, are willing to subvert the initiative, self-reliance, and virtue of their fellow Americans.

This narrative explains why cries about American exceptionalism and American decline resonate so powerfully with the right-wing. According to the narrative, America was once a unique place – a shining city on a hill – populated by a self-reliant and virtuous people. But liberals and Democrats have been subverting self-reliance and virtue in much the same way that the Roman emperors subverted the Roman Republic by giving the people bread and circuses. Some liberals and Democrats are doing this consciously and maliciously; some are fellow travelers who are going along to get along; some are well-meaning but naïve – but all are precipitating American decline.

If this narrative is paranoid, it’s the same kind of paranoia that during the Cold War led the John Birch Society to believe that many American statesmen – up to and including President Dwight D. Eisenhower – were engaged in a secret Communist conspiracy to subvert America. A key difference is that the Cold War right-wing conspiracy theory was expressed directly while today’s conspiracy theory is generally expressed through symbols and coded language.

Another key difference is that in the 1960s William F. Buckley Jr., his co-editors at National Review, Senator Barry Goldwater, and other courageous conservatives – at no little risk to their own interests – ultimately denounced the John Birch Society and declared that its conspiracy narrative was lunacy.

Mitt Romney has unintentionally done the nation a service by dragging the right-wing narrative at least partially into the light, where it can be identified and debated. To what extent does Romney’s version of the narrative jibe with reality? That discussion has already begun as news organizations and think tanks put up stories – complete with tables, bar graphs, and pie charts – about whether what Romney said was accurate. If this discussion is robust enough, its benefits may be great indeed.