Evanston: the market is an ass
Evanston: the market is an ass
In OLIVER TWIST, when Mr. Brumble is told “the law supposes that your wife acts under your direction,” he replies, "If the law supposes that… the law is a (sic) ass—a idiot. If that’s the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is that his eye may be opened by experience."
While I do not doubt that the law is an ass, it has become manifest that the market is an even bigger one.
The system cannot fail me because I rejected it all my life and extricated myself from it more than thirty years ago, but I cannot remember a time when I was more sickened by the arrogance of those in political and financial power.
I have often heard of “the wisdom of the market.” “True value will be decided by the market.” “The market knows.” And I never understood that.
This is the market that said a decade ago, before the bubble burst, that Warren Buffet was past it because he didn’t understand the new paradigm of the dot.coms. This is the market that valued oil at $150 a barrel a few months ago and $35 dollars today. This is the market that is a herd and reacts with hysteria to rumors.
I am not a Christian and, as I have written before, I think one should live so that he or she doesn’t need a holiday from his or her life. But if Christmas is anything, it is a religious holiday, not a commercial orgy, and I am sickened by “the market” reacting to every unfavorable report of Christmas retail sales.
The NEW YORK TIMES has just run an article claiming that Illinois is not the most corrupt state because based on convicted officials per capita, North Dakota is. This is the fallacy of statistics. The entire state of North Dakota is petty cash. What other state has three former governors imprisoned in the past few decades? What other state has a political machine to equal in arrogance and greed Illinois’ Combine? What other state has a governor who has so blatantly--and stupidly--tried to sell a senate seat?
The examples, political and financial, are disgustingly endless, and I add only one more. A financial firm that received ten billion dollars from the U.S. government to avoid bankruptcy has just paid almost eleven billion dollars in Christmas bonuses to its staff. This has been justified by claiming that such bonuses are an expected part of management's compensation and necessary for the firm to hold on to “good people.” These are the same “good people” who made the decisions that drove the firm to the brink of bankruptcy and helped move the world into recession. I am in awe of their greed and arrogance and indifference to the consequences of their actions.
I have always gone to sea to go to sea; but this time I can hardly wait to escape from the land.
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The photograph is an artificial marvel of technology. It was taken before dawn in almost total darkness. The view is to the west. The bright lights are the elevated South Boulevard CTA--better known as the “El”--station.
It is a combination of three handheld exposures--normal, +2 EV, and -2EV-- combined by a program called Photomatix Pro into one HDR (High Dynamic Range) image. The camera was a Nikon D90, noted for its low light ability, with a VR (vibration reduction) lens, but even so the ISO of 3200 is a number beyond belief during most of my life.
After generating the HDR image, I made other adjustments in Apple’s Aperture; and then reduced noise with the Noise Ninja plug-in.
The final product bears little resemblance to what either the camera or eye saw. I have no problem with that. A larger version can be found here.
Sunday, December 21, 2008