~ Today’s Water Cooler: Politics, pandemics; Democrat plotting; RFK doens’t make the cut for the debates; how a serious country (Finland) handled bird flu; The physics of knitting. ~
Saturday, July 19, 2025
Power in Sovereign Debt Markets: Explaining the Uneven Debtor–Creditor Landscape and Its Implications
A long time ago, the US intervened on the side of underwater sovereign borrowers. Private creditors now extract even more than back then.
Inside Big Oil’s Business as Usual: Failure on Climate and Profits from War
A new report shows oil majors fall short of meeting Paris Agreement targets while fueling global military conflicts.
Bird Flu and Biomedicine, An Essay on What We Might Expect
Bird flu as a case study in the category error of libertarian medicine, the misuse of preprints, and resulting poor public health policy.
2:00PM Water Cooler 6/18/2024
~ Today’s Water Cooler: Politics, syndemics; the Trump v. Biden debate; the Black vote, and who will get it; epigenetics: heritable memories? ~
The United States Is the Main Obstacle to Peace in Palestine
A good, high level review of how Israel’s long-standing and now accelerating ethnic cleansing in Palestine depends on US backing.
Quelle Surprise: NYT Piece on Nigeria’s “Worst Economic Crisis in Decades” Completely Ignores Its Disastrous CBDC Experiment
The world’s largest live CBDC program (to date) has so far been a destructive flop. And that is probably the last thing the editors of the New York Times want its readers to know.
Private Equity Becomes Roach Motel as Public Pension Funds and Other Investors Borrow As Funds Remain Tied Up
Oopsie! Private equity firms are hanging on to investor money for an unseemly amount of time! What to do?
Land Grabs Squeeze Rural Poor Worldwide
Under the radar, investment funds have been buying farm land in poor countries, leading to substantial price rises.
2:00PM Water Cooler 6/17/2024
~ Today’s Water Cooler: Politics, syndemics; Trump polling shows effects of conviction among independents; first Harris mailer; Biden fundraiser video; H5N1 cluster continues apace ~
Insufficient Supervisory Board Competence as a Risk Factor for Banks
Banking and financial market expertise is by no means a given.
Next Stage – The General Staff’s Targets After Putin’s Feint
Putin threw down a marker with his immediately-rejected peace offer last week. So where might the war go now?
