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I heard a comment once that stereotyped Alaskans. Basically it said something along the lines of Alaskans generally have a dark side. Why else would they choose to be living in Alaska of all places if not to escape something? Sly and wicked dark humor I thought. Looking at all these...

One side is misleading people and blinding themselves to evidence in an all out effort to win. One can participate in a debate, misrepresent oneself, and completely ignore the facts and maybe even convince other people one has the right of it. Any argument on any position is defensible in...

True the Democrats have shown themselves to be as Arnuld observed a bunch of girlie men. Kerry should have been able to destroy Bush in a debate by challenging Bush to retract the smearing Bush's campaign was conducting on Kerry's war record and if Bush refused to do so blast Bush to...

From the Washington Post Fact Checker: "Obama has no background in economics. Who advises him? The Post says it's Franklin Raines, for "advice on mortgage and housing policy." Shocking. Under Raines, Fannie Mae committed "extensive financial fraud." Raines made millions. Fannie Mae...

There is a name for that kind of political system: anarchy. I wonder if you'd have enjoyed living in the Wild West. Considering there aren't any countries like that anymore except in maybe areas of Africa I'll hazard to guess that there is a downside to it.

On what is this idea of futility based on? There are successful precedents for massive government intervention helping out in a financial crisis. Of course there will be pain and it's basically a mitigating action but there are various degrees of hurt. There is reason to believe that decisive...

If the brother-in-law was an isolated case, maybe the evidence that he was dangerous and Palin's eagerness to have him gone is understandable. However, I seem to recall there was another example of the Palins not liking someone being hired and expressing themselves in such a way to as to give...

I've always found the idea of linking an amount of charitable giving to one's morality or character and using it as a scorecard repulsive. Many people use it to show off their supposed morality and it ultimately comes off as artificial. There are so many tyrants in history who were paragons...

So what's the general sentiment? Was there a short selling cabal of hedge funds in existence? If so are people here sympathetic to them? Or did they get their just desserts served to them by the regulators? When speculators were attacking Thailand and other Asian markets in 1997 where did...

The press is too dumb to understand and needs its sources to spell everything out for them.

It will be interesting to see if this will help or if the theoretical drop in liquidity will merely make the trading even more volatile.

No one put a gun to the head of financial institutions and told them to buy Fannie's and Freddie's debt. They did that of their own volition. They could have just as easily said no. Goes for most of the other exotic financial products out there. The situation is similar to the junk bonds of...

How about after factoring in devaluation vs most of the major world currencies? After 8 years one expects prices to have gone up so it isn't a big deal if houses appreciated and your salary has gone up since you are presumably older and more experienced. Why is it that the threshold for...

Ah the FDIC. A great thing ain't it? Anti-big government people complain relentlessly about the Fed but not the FDIC yet the FDIC was created under the term of that FDR guy and his what could be termed as socialist policies.

I don't know. As has been said this is a once in a generation kind of situation we have here. I do not know if the normal rules apply. Some important supports have been broken and we are in what may be a third wave down leg. It is September and there is yet October to follow and the bulk of...

Incredible. There are people here trying to compute intrinsic value based on share price. I suggest some of you hit the books or examine your logic.

How did their sworn enemies become our sworn enemies? Can you explain that again?

Is the value of one dollar the same to someone who earns $50,000 as it is to someone who earns $50,000,000? Depends on your measure. Objectively, yes. Taking into account the concept of diminishing marginal utility, no. What is the ultimate end of taxes? Is it to increase wealth? Or...

As I understand it the immediate reason for bankruptcy isn't that they don't have net assets it's that they don't have net current assets. Although I guess without having a clear idea of what their liabilities and potential liabilities are one cannot say for certain how good a chance AIG has of...

I remember when Paul Krugman was the lone wolf in the wilderness criticizing G.W. Bush for his policies. Now the majority of Americans seem to agree and are unhappy with G.W. Bush. He seems far more prescient than others. Is there currently a right leaning economist/columnist that comes...