THE HUMAN CONDITION / OPTIMISTS & PESSIMISTS : The ever-hopeful ask, ‘What’s wrong with looking on the bright side?’ The ever-wary ask, ‘What’s wrong with being prepared?’ : Half Full, Half Empty

There’s bad news and worse news for pessimists. Let’s get the bad news over with first: There’s plenty to be down about these days.

The polls report that voters are gloomy about the state of the nation; many Americans think the economy will never see the light of day.

Let’s not even talk about drugs, disease, sexism, racism, injustice, poverty, riots, the national debt and the fact that there’s never any parking. So, pessimists, rejoice and be bummed.

So what’s the worse news? Pessimists still get a bad rap.

Blame it on the optimists, those deluded Pollyannas whose outlook is as cliched as it is annoying.

Is there any way to cure these fools? Don’t hold your breath.

“This country and the world needs an antidote to the misguided outlook of the optimists,” says Jack Duvall, the grumpy-but-articulate spokesman for the Benevolent and Loyal Order of Pessimists (BLOOP).

This Iowa-based national organization holds its annual convention as close as possible to April 15--which holds the dual distinctions of marking the yearly income tax filing deadline and the anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic.

“We urge people to speak up and join us,” says Duvall. “We think it’s healthier for them and healthy for society in general.”

Maybe so, but it’s still more socially acceptable to put on a happy face. Duvall’s organization boasts 200 members; the Optimists Club trounces that with 160,000.

In seeking out admitted doomsayers for this article, optimists outnumbered pessimists 3-to-1. Duvall was willing to provide numbers of pessimists as far away as Alaska who might have gone on the record, but the phone numbers were either no good, or nobody returned the calls.

It figures.

Dennis Stark, 45, admits to being cynical and proud of it. Stark’s job as chief engineer for a Silicon Valley company constantly exposes him to people with bluebirds on their shoulders. But he maintains that a healthy dose of doubt is important in business.

“I work with a lot of Pollyannas. We can’t communicate,” he says. “They refuse to accept the possibility that something will go wrong. I can say it might rain, and they can give me 20 reasons why it won’t. I think that’s bad planning.”

Duvall, of BLOOP, couldn’t agree more.

“We consider pessimists to be synonymous with realists,” he says, adding that just because you’re a pessimist doesn’t mean you have to be unhappy.

“Ninety percent of the time, we (pessimists) are right. Ten percent of the time we are pleasantly surprised.”

John Biroc, an Encino psychologist, points out that there is a darker side to the much-touted optimism. In manic-depressive disorder, for example, the manic part can be compared to optimism gone haywire; depression is like pessimism out of control.

When optimism gets out of hand, Biroc says, “it goes beyond the realm of reality--(the patient) gets a sense of entitlement and can’t have relationships because they feel others are beneath them.”

Biroc says such disorders are not very common, and they’re not necessarily all bad. “A lot of people can get by with them,” he says. “Some of the greatest people in the world are manic--they have an incredible energy force.”

Despite the fact that pessimists might never get their day in the sun, these days they at least might get to say “I told you so.”

“Denial has gotten this country into its current troubles,” says Duvall.

But don’t hold out for elected leaders to solve optimism-related troubles, Duvall says. Politicians are worse than the rest of ‘em.

“ ‘It’s Morning in America’ is the all-time best phony optimists’ political slogan,” he grouses. “We’re still suffering the hangover from that morning.”

Career Choices

Optimists become:

* Actors

* Presidential candidates

* Teachers

* Used car salesmen/women

* Venture capitalists

* Professional gamblers

* Weather forecasters

* Wedding coordinators

* Aerobics instructors

Pessimists become:

* Political pollsters

* Economists

* Bank loan officers

* Repo men/women

* IRS agents

* Studio heads

* Journalists

* Divorce lawyers