Time for the stockmarket to smell the coffee?

Michael Panzner reproduces a graph that implies a possible 25% fall on the Dow, factoring-in a little overshoot.

A new theory of the Big Bang

13.7 billion years ago, an ape-evolved creature supervises the last stages of construction, before testing the Large Hadron Collider.

Your money - no hiding place in the Crash

I've spent some time trying to find out where's a safe place for any little wealth you and I might have. Looking at the Great Depression for a precedent, Jesse suggests it's more a game of cat-and-mouse, or fox-and-geese. No "fire-and-forget," then: we will have to keep looking, thinking and acting. (htp: Michael Panzner)

Palin for Prez?

If her words are her own (and her delivery certainly is), I think I've heard a potential future first woman President of the USA, and it's not Hillary. Is it too late for McCain and Palin to swap?

P.S. I notice Donal Blaney is thinking the same.

The financial brakes are on

Mish argues that CPI inflation is now overstated because it ignores house prices, with the result that real interest rates should be viewed as high already.

Avoid using Google Chrome?

Some think so.

Shale oil - are we ready for it?

After the recent oil price rises, is shale oil now economically viable, or not?

No paper tiger

Shortly after the Ossetian excursion, Putin tranquillizes a tiger. Could he be sending a message over to the south-east?

What I don't know about humanism

When did humanism come to mean atheism? Erasmus wasn't an atheist.

I've been to a humanist funeral (eulogy and a reading from Tolkien), and the celebrant gave an embarrassed laugh when (out of habit) I shook his hand on leaving the crematorium.

Modern atheism doesn't seem quite rational to me. I can't find it easily, but there was an ancient Greek philosopher who, denying the soul, told his followers to throw his body into the road when he died, and when they raised the possibility that wild animals might come to eat him while still alive, told them to put a stick in his hand. That's being consistent with your beliefs.

"The Humanist view of life is progressive and optimistic, in awe of human potential, living without fear of judgement and death, finding enough purpose and meaning in life, love and leaving a good legacy," says the President of the British Humanist Association. Why all this preachiness?

Doubtless I'll be enlightened by some of these paradoxical zealots in the comments.

Marc Faber: backs US dollar against Euro, US economy better than Europe's

Here.