Large of law numbers. There are a lot of idiots out there. I had a buddy; super nice, super funny guy, late 20's, but financially an idiot.
He sent a $1,000 check as "collateral" to some online "bank" to get a $10,000 "loan". I explained to him that this isn't how any of this works and he just paused and said, "Huh, so should put a stop payment on the second check?" He had sent them another $1,000 as some sort of second round of collateral for the loan or some other nonsense.
I went here first too, I thought I need to start putting my laptop on the right side of my main screen to make me lean the other way to increase my mood.
Sometimes I feel like I was taking crazy pills, but I distinctly remember major news agencies like the BBC calling BS with pretty hard facts about the whole WMD thing, but no one really cared. (In America or Britain anyways)
To address your second point, it is merely about satisfaction, not solutions or best optimal outcomes. The question is neutral to what the current state is or what the future state should be, only on their satisfaction with it.
There isn't really a conflicting result if 50% of the people think we should live in a theocracy and 50% think religion should be outlawed if 0% of them are satisfied with the status quo.
I'm here to tell you the hard truth, that the stock market will remain absolutely static for the foreseeable future, stocks are going to the troposphere!
One thing a therapist told me during a session one time is: "It sounds like your life just sucks right now". It isn't always something internal, but the outside world impacting us. Chin up, do it for your son, best of luck my man.