Let me start by stipulating: I fully understand that snappy titles attract readers to articles. I’ve tried that trick myself on occasion, though without noticeable success. So maybe that’s all Gallup’s doing in today’s article, “An Inexplicable Jump in Americans’ Long-Term Optimism”.

Or maybe it’s more subtle than that. Perhaps the editors at Gallup are sneaking in a Stewart-like funny, describing with a smirk the reality we’re supposed to believe in.

When I was living in Rochester, NY, the local paper once had an article on research about depression, which showed a significant disparity among days of the week and parts of the day. The researchers reported, but claimed to be without an explanation for, the result. The part of the week most highly correlated with depression, it turned out, was Sunday afternoon.

(h/t Froomkin)