I'm surprised you didn't include anything about the differences between the unfortunately named terms of "mark to market" and "mark to model". While Moody's and S&P certainly deserve a heap of blame for over-rating various tranches, it seems no one ever really had a firm grasp on how much they were were worth, and yet many funds saw no problem in resting the foundations of their portfolios on them. The financial models of firms holding these high risk investments, designed to judge the value of these wisps of intangibility, were ludicrously optimistic. And why not, given that just nudging a formula in a model could boost their declared returns? And the house of cards stood, till people had to quickly sell their bits of CDOs and suddenly nobody knew how much they were actually worth.

Don't get too enamored of your 19th century critic. There are very real differences between the tangible and intangible assets at the heart of this mess. Houses are tangible. Senior tranches of Alt-A mortgage bundles are intangible. Junior tranches of sub-prime bundles are pure illusion.

Financial crises, while messy, are usually "contained", kept away from anything but the margins of the average person's life. 1929 and the crash, or stagflation in the seventies are some notable exceptions. The financial finaglings of the past 6 years have deeply embedded the effects of the intangible economy into the tangible one. So while the commentator can assert that all is one and it's all beyond moral criticism, remember that saying "all is one" is just a way to shut down discussion, that the strong linking of hedge fund's deeds and people's homes only happened recently, and that there are plenty of other standards other than moral to judge things by.

And neither nature nor the economy is ever random. We're just ignorant.

You know that you don't have to write about these "scandals", a.k.a what happens when humans are given too much money and no privacy. I understand that there must seem to be an obligation to touch upon each new nugget of grime and contention while the facts are still pouring forth, but readers here are already getting six different viewpoints about these soap operas, even if they're trying to avoid them. Sports scandals stretch out from the sports pages and end up being tangentially reported upon by all sorts of news sources.

The erect-a-pedestal, demolish-a-pedestal cycle was ancient before our modern sports existed. People forget that the first part of that formula is the problem. There are a lot of sports storylines out there that aren't the same old rehashed morality plays. I'd much rather read engaging analysis of sports I've never encountered than one more hagiographic screed or its companion op-ed full of tempered shame and disappointment.

Restructure America, Save our Home: Dems 08

Republicans 08: GuantanamoRE!

At this point haven't we all read the evolutionary psychology debunking enough. We get it, it's a discipline which can justify any position you want to make, and is therefore worthless. Someone should just reduce the standard paragraph to some sort of acronym and move on to another subject.

On a more general note, I'm generally against the elimination of anonymous posting but the recent distribution of responses to this column(lots(?) of angry anonymous men apparently, not much of anything else) has made me question that stance.

New Orleans was never a "safe and robust city for all its residents".

Why would you call him an economist?

Comedian/speech writer or comedian/law professor are both reasonable, but there's no basis to call him an economist. Comedian/shill is of course the most accurate.

apparently has about as much scientific training has he has economic training.

And to expatriot:

Encountering True Believers teaches me one thing,

to lock my door.

Optimists should buy gold.

Pessimists should buy ammo.

maybe we shouldn't hire mercenaries?

And those who operate outside the bounds of law really can't complain about not being protected by law.

when what we really needed a defibrillator.

At least in what it prompts the player to do.

I'm about 8 hours into it, and while the character has gone to bed with somebody;

A: it wasn't until after the third date, a night playing pool

B: the player was instructed to dress to impress

C: nothing is shown.

The main plot can veer into violence suddenly, but both the sex and drug portions are eased into, and seemingly only at the speed which the player wants. Writing about the evils the players can do in GTA4 is an akin to blaming medium for its bad art.

This just in, people can write about killing hookers with a pen and paper.

UPDATE: People can draw a hooker getting killed with dry erase markers and a white-board.

For Lereah it's not about being right or wrong. It's only about expounding the position that will bring in the most income for him and his clients.

He is a shameless bridge salesman and nothing he says should ever be reported again.