Fannie and Freddie have now been placed under conservatorship.
posted on Sep 5, 2008 - View this thread

Norfolk & Holmes is no ordinary estate agency.
posted on Aug 22, 2008 - View this thread

Upclose and personal on the man, Nouriel Roubini, who predicted the subprime crisis. Apparently we're in for a long long haul out of this mess. Oh, and it may be the end of America (reg req'd) as we know it.
posted on Aug 16, 2008 - View this thread

Subprime crisis worse than we thought... The Shire, an Oregon housing development based on Tolkien's Hobbit village, is in foreclosure.
posted on Aug 4, 2008 - View this thread

Zimbabwe: Tsvangirai Withdraws MDC From 'Sham' Poll. Apparently he agrees with Mugabe's claim that only God can remove him from office. Prev Zim.
posted on Jun 23, 2008 - View this thread

Fiscal Pressures Lead Some States to Free Inmates Early, says the Washington Post. Across the United States, a financial crisis is brewing in our nation's correctional systems. California, which has the largest prison system in the nation, (housing 170,000 inmates with a capacity of only 100,000), plans to increase the budget for new prison construction by 7 to 14 billion dollars, on top of releasing 22,000 nonviolent prisoners on unsupervised parole. Other states, especially Michigan, face an even more dire situation...
posted on May 5, 2008 - View this thread

Superstar Scottish comics writer Grant Morrison is about to tear the DC Universe apart again with Final Crisis, the latest in a series of apocalypses and world ending events he's inflicted on various comics worlds over the years. But there was a time before fame when he wrote the tie-in comic for ZOIDS, the robot dinosaur children's toy. So what did he do? Ushered in the apocalypse, in the form of THE BLACK ZOID.
posted on Apr 17, 2008 - View this thread

Flowers are losing their smell. The discovery could be one of several factors in the "colony collapse disorder" that is wiping out honey bees around the world. Even a brief glance at the titles of the news articles on Wiki reads a bit frighteningly, as do the previous mentions here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.
posted on Apr 17, 2008 - View this thread

Bacteriophages ("phages" for short) were the only effective treatment against infectious diseases until antibiotics came along during WWII.

Phages are the most ubiquitous organism on Earth. They are naturally occurring viruses that infect bacteria and bacteria only. We live in a sea of phages. Our bodies are more phage than human. There approximately 10 to the 32 power of them around us. That's 10 with 32 zeros behind it.

Antibiotics cannot keep up with evolving infections, while phages naturally co-evolve with the bacteria.

Currently we are in a growing antibiotic crisis and phage therapy is getting a serious look again. Here's a fascinating discussion from National Public Radio.
posted on Apr 4, 2008 - View this thread

Holy Shit! What am I going to do without MOZZARELLA!!!!!
posted on Mar 28, 2008 - View this thread

Peace Without Borders. Colombian singer Juanes put together a concert calling for peace, as a result of the recent crisis between Colombia and Ecuador (and tangentially, Venezuela). Remarkably, it was held from the bridge between Venezuela and Colombia, in what is normally a very problematic border, and it featured the great Carlos Vives, the Dominican Juan Luis Guerra, and others.
posted on Mar 16, 2008 - View this thread

Nitroeconomics (if you want to sound more scientific you can call it synthetic economics) is different. It is set in the virtual world of Nitropia, which doesn't exist but easily could.... We can use nitroeconomics to understand real situations in the real world, such as the subprime crisis, with a simple three-step process.... The first cool thing about Nitropia is that it has no financial system at all. Unlike other, inferior virtual economies, it does not distinguish between "money" and other virtual objects. A monetary token in Nitropia is an object like any other - a magic sword, an inflatable penis, or whatever. A player in Nitropia who has a lot of money just owns a lot of these tokens. There is no special, separate "bank balance."

A[n Austrian-school] straightforward explanation of the present financial crisis (part 1)
posted on Jan 17, 2008 - View this thread

Yes, the Subprime Mortgage Crisis was 2007's top national business news story for the second year in a row (and odds on favorite to Threepeat), #2 news story overall (TIME put Pakistan at #1, for AP, it was the Virginia State Massacre). But then I saw that it was the #1 local news story in my town.
posted on Jan 4, 2008 - View this thread

A graphical, animated explanation of how collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) work, by Felix Salmon, Maryanne Murray, Jeffrey Cane, Jacky Myint, and Shazna Nessa. The collapse in CDO valuations and the resulting losses to investors played a major role in the recent banking crisis. Via Paul Krugman.
posted on Dec 6, 2007 - View this thread

Two hedge funds that predicted sub-prime crisis see corporate debt as next casualty Two hedge fund firms that racked up huge gains betting on the subprime mortgage meltdown have begun winding down those trades and looking elsewhere. They're now betting against corporate debt using derivatives.
posted on Nov 15, 2007 - View this thread

Weatherfilter: Widespread flooding in the UK leaves hundreds of thousands of homes without water and power. Extraordinary scenes of the floods command many of the front pages of Monday's newspapers. The Environment Agency has warned water levels are expected to exceed those of the devastating floods of 1947.
posted on Jul 23, 2007 - View this thread

vivoleum ExxonMobil has hit upon a novel and renewable source of fuel "Attendees paid 50 dollars a head to hear a speech from the National Petroleum Council, a group that also advises the White House on oil and gas matters. It was rumoured a new joint energy policy from the Canadian and American governments was coming."
posted on Jun 14, 2007 - View this thread

...A few days ago the chief of the Israeli police resigned after an investigation that found several of Israel’s highest police officers guilty of corruption and negligence. This came within a week of the forced resignation of Israel’s Chief of Staff from the military because of the fiascos of the second Lebanon war... some ten days after Israel’s minister of justice was convicted of sexual assault while on duty... after Israel’s president – who holds a largely symbolic position – resigned temporarily following charges of rape and sexual misconduct. ....several other investigations are still pending, not least two or three directed at the Prime Minister himself, Ehud Olmert, concerning corruption and favoritism... Suddenly the Palestinians and the Hizbullah, and even Iranian nukes, have taken a back seat: Israel does indeed seem in danger of imploding from within, at least as a viable democracy.

Is Israel Falling Apart ?
posted on Mar 4, 2007 - View this thread

Tomorrow morning at 7:46am, the US Population Clock will hit 300 million. As the world population continues to grow at a similar rate to ours, perhaps its time to start asking some questions. After all, if you can read this post, chances are you don't live in Africa, where "more than 2,500 children are dying each day," simply for lack of access to fresh drinking water. Its so easy not to worry about when you're not the 1 in 5 who can't get a clean drink. But there's lots of ways you can help.
posted on Oct 16, 2006 - View this thread

Infinite Crisis begins today. In 1985, DC Comics released Crisis On Infinite Earths -- arguably the biggest retcon engine in comicbook history. The goal of the Crisis maxi-series was the unification of disparate DC timelines and dimensions (designated as numbered or lettered Earths) into a single universe. Beloved heroes died and new heroes emerged. Twenty years later, DC is putting all of its heroes and villains back in harm's way with Infinite Crisis. Building steam from plot elements in last year's critically-acclaimed Identity Crisis (written by NYT Bestselling Author Brad Meltzer) and a quartet (1, 2, 3, 4) of related mini-series published over the last six months, Infinite Crisis (penned by Geoff Johns) promises to be just as jarring as the original Crisis. So jarring, in fact, that flagship characters of the DC Universe will be pitched forward in time, a year into the future. To account for the lost time, a weekly series called 52* will start in May of 2006. And when the dust settles, DC will start progressing all of its characters and stories in real time.
posted on Oct 12, 2005 - View this thread

New federal study released today finds that overweight folks —not the obese, though—have a lower risk of death than those who are average weight. Some welcome these findings as the death knell for “fat hysteria.” The study also concluded that deaths related to obesity are actually a third of what has been reported by the CDC. Seems rather counterintuitive, no?
posted on Apr 20, 2005 - View this thread

The world's greatest humanitarian crisis is happening in the Darfur region of Sudan. The US special envoy, John Danforth, asks, "Is the US engagement in Sudan worthwhile? There are so many issues in the world that need out attention."

Maybe he should ask some of the refugees.
posted on Mar 22, 2004 - View this thread

The Day Britain Stopped tells the story of what might happen if the 'integrated' transport system in the UK fails. On BBC Two last night, it made for shocking viewing and would doubtless have caused some people to question the idea of leaving the house, let alone getting on a plane to go anywhere. You can watch the full ninety minute programme online by following the link above if you've got the time and the Real One player.
posted on May 14, 2003 - View this thread

Crisis. The homelessness charity Crisis is looking for a few volunteers for work in London over the Christmas/New Year period. There is a list of current vacancies here. This seems to be quite a good thing to do if you are free over the holiday period, and I wonder if any MeFi'ers have considered getting involved in something like this?
posted on Dec 22, 2002 - View this thread

Libertyunites.com is a crisis relief site where you can donate directly to the charity of your choice, with no fees or costs...
posted on Sep 18, 2001 - View this thread

Act for Change : California’s electricity crisis Act now and be heard! Express your own position on the California energy crisis by sending an email to the state speaker of the Assembly.
posted on Jan 19, 2001 - View this thread