Re: Turning point / Greece bailout, the economic meltdown and security threats to the US
>'Securitizing' mortgages made the hustle easier, because people no
>longer even had to pretend they knew what the hell they were buying.
Which has sharply limited my sympathy for the investors who bought
that stuff: 'caveat $uckwit', or somesuch.
> it just happened that the market, in this case, was founded on the
> delusion that real estate could only keep going up.
FWIW, Gilliland's _Rosinante..._ SF novels start with trans-Mars
habs being sold almost for scrap when their builder collapses :>
>The reference is to the Dutch tulip mania of the 1630s, commonly
>regarded as the first great economic bubble of the capitalist age.
Of course, though I find 18th C. French financial history to be
richer (e.g., "never trust a helpful Scotsman"). OTOH, ISTR that the
Dutch Indies Coy had elements of a scam, which has to have consim applications.
... I'd disagree only partly, by saying - to switch metaphors - that the financial racket was merely the pimp, connecting johns and hookers in the real estate...
... The focus on paper (that turned out to be tres dodgy) was a big factor. Not that commercial R.E. in the US didn't turn out to be sucky too (still in death...
... 'Securitizing' mortgages made the hustle easier, because people no longer even had to pretend they knew what the hell they were buying. But Wall St. (and...
... Which has sharply limited my sympathy for the investors who bought that stuff: 'caveat $uckwit', or somesuch. ... FWIW, Gilliland's _Rosinante..._ SF...
... Same here, which is why I brought the point up. Pimps are, rightly, not an admired social group, but the underlying meretricious behavior was on the part...
IRL, I read somewhere that call centers in India were also benefitted by the same process. Overcapacity in the transPacific cable lines caused a bankruptcy,...
... Even with radically lower (x0.1 or better) lift costs and hab material from ET sources habs are going to be as small as necessary for the foreseeable...
... A point that inspired me, as promised, to a blog post at Rocketpunk Manifesto: http://www.rocketpunk-manifesto.com/2010/07/economic-bubbles-in-spaaace.html...
... Step 1: Lie to Congress about how expensive the Space Shuttle will be. Say it'll be $100 per pound, and that this will lead to all sorts of awesome space...
I have two general assumptions when I think of a space station effort as being serious rather than farting around in space. I freely admit this is along the...
... It's worth noting here that "Astronaut Farmer" might not be a job, but a leisure activity. I believe it was observed on MIR that cosmonauts often spent...
... Well, the example from the Soviet Union was that farmers were allowed to tend private plots after working on the collective and they could sell the produce...
I have two general assumptions when I think of a space station effort as being serious rather than farting around in space. I freely admit this is along the...
... Couldn't most tending be remote (school kids would do it for free ... more than a couple of cm per day. Actual system maintenance would want skill, & maybe...
... Look, my demands are quite modest. I want single-stage to orbit, FTL drives, and a crew of Orion slave-girls, green-skinned or otherwise. Barring that,...
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