No room for the real crooks?

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Tomgram: Nick Turse, A Silent (and Violent) Epidemic
In a recent interview about our economic meltdown moment, economist James Galbraith spoke of widespread fraud in the financial system, pointing out that, in response to the Savings and Loan scandals of the 1980s, "there were 1,000 felony convictions for S&L insiders and about 700 or so went to jail. This is a bigger crisis, so you could easily be talking about a larger number of convictions."

Here's what's strange, though, at least for now: The only significant person to be brought up on charges, tried, and sent to jail, as far as I know, has been Ponzi-schemer par excellence Bernie Madoff. A few smaller-scale Ponzi-schemers are lined up behind him, possibly on their way to jail as well. As for the rest of the looters at the top of our semi-collapsed financial system, all of them, as far as I can tell, have either been allowed to go about their business or, at least, take their booty, including bonuses, and head for home to await better times.

Glorious leader appears on TV

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QUENTIN LETTS watches the PM's fightback on TV
We had a lot of hand movements. He might, I think, have been doing some cat's cradle games with his family of late. His hands certainly seemed to be doing that sort of thing in front of the camera yesterday morning. It was like watching a man doing charades, trying to convey the idea of changing a car's headlights. Or maybe fiddling with an old TV set's horizontal control knobs.

He then started doing synchronised pointing, both forefingers stabbing the air. Toro! Ole! I think it was intended to make him look assertive; Gordon the man of action. It worked pretty well. From time to time his left eyebrow went walkabout but otherwise this was a more convincingly statesmanlike premier than we saw in that awful YouTube film.

'To be honest, what I've seen offends my Presbyterian conscience,' he said, talking about the MPs' expenses fiddles. He returned to this theme, talking about how he had been brought up in a family where 'integrity and telling the truth was what mattered'. Those who have longed for Mr Brown to show the electorate more of his 'back story' will be pleased by this development. Others might worry that the voters will look at the way he has squandered so many billions of pounds of our money in the past year and think, 'so how come THAT didn't offend your Presbyterian conscience, chum?'

Guff alert

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Dodgy academic PR -Ben Goldacre-  Bad Science
Now you may be inclined to think that a journalist should be capable of doing more than simply reading, and then rewriting, a press release: but we must accept that these are troubled times. Through our purchasing behaviour – and I assume someone cleverer than me measures these things competently – we have communicated to newspapers that we want them to be large and cheap, more than we want them to be adequately researched.

So in this imperfect world, it would be useful to know what’s in academic press releases, since these are the people of whom we are entitled to have the highest expectations. A paper in the Annals of Internal Medicine this month shows very clearly that we have been failed.

Celebration time, come on!

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Israel moves closer to banning mourning of its independence
Public commemoration of Israel's independence as a day of mourning could become a crime subject to prison penalty, should a bill approved on Sunday by a ministerial panel be brought to the Knesset and cabinet for vote. The Ministerial Committee for Legislation on Sunday approved a preliminary proposal which would make it illegal to hold events or ceremonies marking Israel's Independence Day as a "nakba," or catastrophe.

Rather than holding barbecues and parades on Independence Day, Israeli Arabs and Palestinians usually take the day to commemorate the dispersal of Palestinians during the 1948 War of Independence.
Advertisemen. Palestinian refugees around the world and Israel's Arab citizens mark the Nakba on May 15, the day after the British mandate over Palestine ended in 1948. Nakba Day is often observed by the Arab population in Israel with marches through destroyed villages.

According to the bill, those found in violation could face up to three years in prison.

Via Cameron Reilly

Production beyond capacity

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A Failure of Capitalism (V)--Doing Too Much at Once

The Daily Dish
A recent and very pertinent literature in economics--"organization economics"--emphasizes the costs of hierarchical management in slowing and distorting the flow of information up the chain of command and the flow of orders down it. The problem is compounded when as in the federal government the top layers are political appointees who may have little experience with the operation of the agency they find themselves managing.

Obama is extremely able and self-confident and has appointed on the whole very able people to his staff and to the departments; some of them are brilliant. But the capacity of brilliant people, appointed to high positions in the federal government from outside, to screw up is legendary. The danger is amplified when the government tries to do too much. The economist Frank Knight used to quip that although production beyond capacity is a contradiction in terms, it is observed every day in academia--to which we can add, in the U.S. government as well. There is danger that the government is trying to do too much and that the economic consequences will be negative and serious.
Much of this analysis can be applied to the UK experience. Well worth a read.