Creating brand new cities, infrastructure and shopping malls is certainly one way to maintain double digit economic growth year after year, as the video below from Nathan's Economic Edge demonstrates. The best bit though, as you will see, is that the orgy of lending,...
War Photography – Libya and dual mag wielding grannies.
Spotted in passing at ZeroHedge, Reuters' photographer Goran Tomasevic has an amazing collection of his Libyan (and more general Middle Eastern) photographs online at Reuters (here). The photo below from the collection caught my eye. You would not want to get on the...
Shocking new Tsunami video – unbelievable images.
Having seen many clips of rushing waters and destruction, I was not expecting the images in the video below which show just how truly terrifying the Japanese Tsunami actually was. While watching for the first time, pay attention to the city view to the right hand side...
The complete visual history of US finance.
An excellent FTAlphaville article from Friday that has kept me busy for the last hour or so and is well worth looking through : The NY Fed’s Liberty Street Economics blog on Friday flagged an epic testimony to graphic design and American financial history. It’s a...
Can I see your papers please?
Whilst standing in the queue at WH Smiths in Manchester airport this morning I was intrigued to hear the till staff asking to see everyones boarding cards before they would serve them. As I worked my way down the queue I watched every single person behave like a good...
UK finally looking to follow European Traffic light policy?
As I am off to Estonia tomorrow, the following Telegraph article is quite timely : The Department for Transport is carrying out research to see whether the existing use of traffic lights around the clock is justified. One council, Portsmouth, has applied to the DfT,...
Portugal goes tits up – how long before the IMF arrives?
So maybe I was a little hasty with the light blogging post as this Reuters article probably signals yet another European bailout and another step towards IMF/German ownership of the entre continent : (Reuters) - Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates said on...
Elsewhere – light blogging
Proceedings will be somewhat light for the next 2 weeks as I stretch my little wings and fly across to the other side of Europe to visit my Estonian co-conspirators. I will be poking my antennae up on occasion during my stay but it all depends on which variety of...
Why would a shut down reactor be running at a higher temperature than when it’s running normally?
What have we got so far? Japanese nuclear reactors shut down automatically when the earthquake hit the country but the electrical system failed after being swamped by a 10m sea surge which lead to a loss of coolant/coolant scenario. The residual decay heat generated...
Philip Hammond removes the right to independent evidence testing in drink drive cases.
An interesting report from The Telegraph on the results of the governments review of drink driving legislation which removes a suspects rights to independent verification of their positive breath test : Drink drivers lose right to demand blood tests Motorists who are...