blindwatchmaker

I have missed Matt's columns since he went on parental leave.

Does anyone have recommendations for anything similar to scratch that itch?

> 2008 was bad because the collective banks of the US realized trillions in mortgages were money on the books that wasn't real and was never going to be real

An even larger amount of money was placed on bets on whether those mortgages were real, as opposed to the mortgages themselves.

Not a hostile question, I'm genuinely trying to understand this: How is liquidity provided by, for example, someone interjecting themselves into a trade that was already going to happen?

High rents and debts are a massive drain on the economy. Less disposable income means less to spend on consumer goods and services, which hits real businesses hard, and leads to fewer jobs. The fictitious growth in the FIRE sector is not going to mask the growing death spiral in the rest of the economy forever.

> You know what Chicago and Mexico have in common? Failed liberal policies.

Agreed. It's time to get Tough On Crime, and declare a War On Drugs. Shame no one's thought of it before.

I'm not overly concerned with hurting a politician's feelings. I am bemused at the idea that someone can observe the last few decades of the capture of the government and major political parties by corporate and oligarch interests and the increasingly lucrative payoffs to these people, and not come to the transparently obvious conclusion that these are commercial relationships.

This is institutionalized and legalized bribery, not just 'access' or 'networking' or whatever euphemism you want to use to couch this in niceties.

> Another way to think about it is that if people were actually straight up buying votes on a regular basis the prices would likely be much higher

And as I said earlier, the campaign contributions are window dressing for the rest of it and I gave a concrete example. Families like the Clintons have made massive amounts of money cashing out after office, and secured lucrative sinecures for their daughter while in it.

These people and their families are insanely well off as a result of their work in government, and its not because they legislated or governed in the public interest.

Sorry, but it is that simple. We live in a second gilded age with near total regulatory and legislative capture and trying to soft pedal it by using euphemisms like 'strong networks' does not obfuscate the fact that this is a commercial relationship between bought politicians and the corporations that buy them.

In the face of overwhelming pieces of evidence, year after year after year like the article being discussed here, doing so is just pointless sophistry and contrarianism for the sake of it.

I'm sure it's just coincidental that senators and their family/friends frequently get lucrative positions on the boards of various companies, investment sweeteners, and actual positions in these companies for family. For example Joe Biden, a leading Democrat, has been in bed with the credit card industry for most of his career and supported/written legislation in their interest. MBNA was one of his biggest donors and hired one of his sons at an executive level, no doubt with very high pay.

The campaign contributions are just window dressing for the rest of it. It absolutely is bribery.

GP is not the one being disingenuous.

Could be wrong, but I think India and China rail is government run.

Re: documenting code, I've gotten a lot of conflicting advice over the years, with some people insisting code should be documenting, and others insisting on docstrings.

The 'pressure to undergo abortions in case of fetal abnormalities' sounds the only potentially troubling part of that, but I don't exactly get what's 'authoritarian' about insisting women with complications stay and be be monitored in the hospital, or firing people based on poor performance?

Am I missing something here?