Daily Links From Glimpse From a Height

• The Presidential Race in Historic Context
  From the University of Virginia’s Miller Center.  At the CCU News 21 event on Friday, Jay Ambrose praised Ted White’s “Making of the President” series of books, in large part because of his historical perspective.  So, get some historical perspective.
• Derivatives and the 2008 Crisis
  Synthetic Assets: Finally, we have the fact that New York Fed jumped on the CDS market after the Bear Stearns bailout – and didn’t allow Lehman to fail until after “centralized settlement among major dealers” for credit derivatives was implemented.  Previous industry commitments with respect to credit derivatives were focused on back office infrastructure issues […]
• Cooperative Robots
  I think “Flight of the Valkyrie” might have been more appropriate for the formation flying. Let’s hope they also incorporate the Three Laws.
• Act of Valor
  We went to go see “Act of Valor” last night.  Yes, the technology was out of this world (the miniature recon drone was jaw-dropping), but without the teamwork, it wouldn’t mean anything. The sheer complexity of the operations they enable together boggles the mind.
• TED: The New Rules of Innovation
  3D Printing and Nanotech make an appearance. So the innovators are the ones who will figure out how to put these tools together the best.
• Obamacare Cost Rises Again
  And those are just the costs that admit to not knowing anything about: At a congressional hearing Tuesday, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who is in charge of carrying out the health care law, indicated she was unaware of the changes.  At issue are subsidies that will be provided under the health care […]
• Registering Disapproval
  Tracking Rassumussen’s Partfy affiliation: From the comments: “Anyone remember the Intrade odds for the D’s keeping the House only 6 months out? It was 56%. We all remember how that played out 6 months later, right?” I can’t verify this, but it does seem as though Intrade is better the closer you get to the event, so […]
• The Bravest Man In Iran
  Next, we’ll find out he was humming “Hatikvah,” too.
• Redesigning the Camera
  The Lytro gets a field test. Eventually, this is going to be combined with better low-light optics, and more of the capabilities of an SLR.  And 100 years from now, having one of these will be like having a Kodak Brownie on your collector’s shelf.
• Lose-Lose
  From the Archbishop of Chicago: If you haven’t already purchased the Archdiocesan Directory for 2012, I would suggest you get one as a souvenir. On page L-3, there is a complete list of Catholic hospitals and health care institutions in Cook and Lake counties. Each entry represents much sacrifice on the part of medical personnel, […]
• Footnotes to “Footnote”
  A gloss on the Israeli film that lost out to A Separation. The film is a talmudic tragicomedy, a morality play about “the masters of those who know.”  Those who have been sequestered in these cloisters will see the film with a special dose of libidinal gusto, but the fun of the movie allows a […]
• China: We Love Iran
  Sure, we’ll buy their oil and fill their gasoline gap. More evidence for Robert Kagan’s basic thesis: multipolar world orders are unstable, and stable world orders reflect the nature of the dominant hegemon, whether you – or they – like it or not.
• Three Percent? Really?
  Actually looking at every day prices tells a different story.  ”According to this index, the prices for everyday items like food, beverages, fuel, power, and prescription drugs have risen 8.1 percent in 2011.”  I’m not an inflation paranoic, but I am an inflation hawk, and an economy that’s growing at barely 3%, with prices rising […]
• Nanofiber Breakthrough: Medicine And Microprocessors
  “A new method for creating nanofibers made of proteins, developed by researchers at Polytechnic Institute of New York University (NYU-Poly), promises to greatly improve drug delivery methods for the treatment of cancers, heart disorders and Alzheimer’s disease, as well as aid in the regeneration of human tissue, bone and cartilage.” Yet all of this almost […]
• Have Housing Prices Bottomed?
  Investors may think so: Bottomed, maybe.  But it doesn’t look as though they think they’re headed up any time soon, either.  There’s still a lot of backlog to work off, and still a lot of foreclosures to work through.
• Gas Prices: Who’s To Blame, And Who Gets Blamed, And Why
  First, who’s to blame: Contrary to what it would now have you believe, choking off production under federal leases was quite clearly a priority of this administration from the start. When gas prices reached $4 per gallon in the summer of 2008, the Bush administration reached a bipartisan agreement to open virtually all of the […]
• Bruselas, Tenemos Un Problema
  Now, before the EU fiscal agreement is even agreed-upon, Spain needs more time: In effect, this means that in order to meet the agreed deficit target (4.4% of GDP) by the end of the year, Spain needs to find total savings of €44 billion. The new centre-right government slashed some €15 billion of spending last […]