"the failures coming when each and every one of the industries you mentioned had heavy regulation induced and large government players involved (like Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac)"

Whoa, whoa, whoa.... Fannie and Freddie didn't cause the subprime mess. They were actually pretty late in coming into it. I was involved with that industry for three years, and I don't remember ever seeing a subprime loan bond issued by those agencies. The bonds I do remember seeing are a who's who of the banks and investment houses that closed down (with the notable exception of Goldman).

In fact, a big part of the failing in that industry is to do to the agencies that are the market's attempt at self-regulation: the rating agencies. The pain would not have been so widespread, and the flow of capital would have been much more limited, had the rating agencies correctly modelled stresses on the portfolios of these bonds. The entire industry CDO industry would have been nipped in the bud.

But they were making a mint with CDO issuance (accounting for a small part of their business but a much larger part of their fees) where they were paid by the issuer of the bonds, instead of investors! Imagine how comfortable you would feel buying medication from a company that has three different regulators to pick from and has to pay the regulator for the analysis done on their drug, and the regulators make more money the more drugs get released by these companies.

Some of the problem was caused by regulation, like the need to mark to market, but these regulations exacerbated a problem that was created entirely by the industry itself: it was a classic case of no one bothered doing the due diligence on the loans, because everyone figures someone else had done. The loan issuers figures no one would be buying the loans if they didn't want them, the securitizers were expecting some basic standards in the underwritings of the loans, and the investors were expecting the rating agencies and the issuing companies to ensure the loans were as expected by the product they were buying (the whole incentive, of course, being that the company wouldn't shoot itself in the foot by issuing securities backed by bad loans, the rating agencies were putting their reputations on the line, etc). Of course, in the end, none of these systems of internal checks worked, and companies were actually willing to risk everything they were supposed to be protecting for the money they were making for the simple reason that companies are run by people. As long as people can be irrational, measure risk incorrectly by favoring the potentially more profitable route (ask casinos why they are still in business when everyone knows they skew the odds in their own favor), markets will never be the efficient panacea some libertarians seem to think it is.

The market's role is to match demand with supply, and is best left on it's own when doing that, but "the market" isn't ephemeral, it's people. People always need to be regulated because with the market we're trying to channel their self-interest into common good (by having them provide goods and services others need/want), but that same self-interest can cause the system to break down if not managed. The government's self-interest in getting elected and always being blamed when something happens makes it the natural player in being that regulator.

Although I probably know the answer to the first one:<BR>

1)  Is it strictly blasphemy against Christianity?  Or any religion?  So would, say, a certain book that refers to a particularly religion's verses as being satanic be outlawed in Ireland?

2)  Kind of follows from the first one in a way.  Does that mean the Irish judges will now be deciding what is blasphemy or what isn't?  If they cast a wide net on affected religions, does that mean that they'll need to be theologians on several major religions for this law not be the so obviously biased for Christians?

3)  Scary freedom of speech backpedaling and medieval thinking resurgeance aside (two dumb enough reasons not to do this), is this a monumentally stupid law to pass in a country that not so long ago and for the longest time had half of the country at the other half's throat based on to which Christian sect they belonged?  The first Protestant judge that passes this judgement on a Catholic or vice versa will, I expect, be somewhat explosive.

You seem to be under the impression that the Russian retreat and drawing in of the Germans to Moscow was done on purpose. The massive encirclements of entire Russian armies would seem to contradict that assertion. They just have so much land and people that they can afford to lose more than most, and accidentally make the other "win himself to death".

That's exactly how I see it as well. I think the posters above can only calmly reach their conclusions by not really internalizing the fact that they're going to die. I did, and I wish I never had, because it's hard to think calmly about death after you've made that logically emotional leap (i.e., when you "realize" that what you've been thinking about this whole time is actually "real"). That's why I only go to bed when I'm really, really tired. I get to thinking about it when lying in bed, and it will keep me up all night.

And, you're right, the eternal afterlife is only slightly better, at least in a finite universe of slowly increasing entropy...

Sucks to realize this is all real. I really envy (as much as slashdotters ridicule) people that can take comfort in religion on the matter. There's no prize at the end for realizing the awful truth, and at least they'll be happier, on average, than I'll be during my short (always too short!) life.