Quotes of the day

Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.-- Andre Gide

Never attribute to conspiracy that which can be explained by incompetence.--Jeff Bezos

Alan Greenspan needs to create a housing bubble to replace the Nasdaq bubble.--Paul Krugman, back in 2002

As Taleb points out, we notice the ones who do well a lot more because those who do badly simply drop out of sight. So it is also with predictions of disaster: We mostly get to hear about the few times that they turn out to be right.--Mark Gimein

[Detroit's] 22.8% unemployment rate is among the highest in the U.S.; 30% of residents are on food stamps.--Andrew Grossman

Somewhere Hank Paulson must be smiling. He called the TARP purchases an investment, and insisted that the taxpayers could actually make money on the bailout. And, at least with JPMorgan Chase, we did. The bank has the U. S. Treasury an aggregate of $795,138,889 in dividends on the preferred stock.--John Carney

Ryoma Igarashi likes going for long drives through the mountains, taking photographs of Buddhist temples and exploring old neighborhoods. He's just taken up gardening, growing radishes in a planter in his apartment. Until recently, Igarashi, a 27-year-old Japanese television presenter, would have been considered effeminate, even gay. Japanese men have long been expected to live like characters on Mad Men, chasing secretaries, drinking with the boys, and splurging on watches, golf, and new cars. ... Japanese women are not taking the herbivores' indifference lightly. In response to the herbivorous boys' tepidity, "carnivorous girls" are taking matters into their own hands, pursuing men more aggressively. Also known as "hunters," these women could be seen as Japan's version of America's cougars.--Alexandra Harney

Baseball is a game of nuance where three successful hits out of 10 makes you an expert. Two hits out of 10, on the other hand, makes you a real-estate broker or a shoe salesman or, in May, significantly better than [David] Ortiz whose average for the month was .143. But the painful beauty of Mr. Ortiz’s slump, is that it does feel true to the essence of a game where all the best stories, as in fiction and life, are about adversity.--Nicholas Dawidoff