Tag: bookish

In my RSS reader, I have an category for economics. The feed fills up, but I don’t read everything in it, I usually mark all as read only looking for those pieces that look interesting. I like reading about economics because it helps me to understand how the money side of the world works. Most everything I read about makes me depressed or angry.

Along those lines, I picked up Michael Lewis’s The Big Short:Inside the Doomsday Machine. Lewis is good story-teller. He identifies a person or people at the center of a trend or situation and tell their tales. Often those tales make them into heroes. In Moneyball, Lewis writes about the rise of sabrmetricians in baseball with the Oakland Atheletic’s GM, Billy Beane, the living embodiment of the story. In The Blind Side, the hero is Michael Oher, a talented left tackle to bodyguard quarterbacks. In Liar’s Poker, the hero is the author the only sane person to realize that Wall Street is run by a bunch of crooks: smart people would best be served to avoid the ruthlessness of business.

In The Blind Side, the heroes are the people who made mad cash on the financial meltdown of 2000s. They took a look at the madness, saw it for what it was, and made bets against it. At first, they were incredulous that everyone didn’t see it their way. Then it began to bother them. They began to suspect that the financial industry was a bunch of hucksters making money any way they can, but especially by lying.

As I read this book, I was at first fascinated by the people who bet short against the market. They looked as if they were the only honest ones — honest with themselves and honest with their clients that the financial world is just a bunch of crooks. Then I read from my RSS feed which debunks The Big Short. After that, I didn’t find it so fascinating. I didn’t read it with much enthusiasm, and it got slower and less interesting.

For what it’s worth, the financial market and their handling of the mortgage crises is criminal. No one knew anything which lead the mortgage market susceptible to fraud and looting. The lenders making easy money made it easy to ignore their standards. The banks making easy money made it easy to leverage themselves dangerously. The investment firms making easy money made it easy to find new, more innovative ways to fuck us. They all lied to themselves. If they hadn’t learned, there is no such thing as a free lunch.

This is how our world works. It is run by a bunch of greedy crooks. They’ll fuck our shit up for their glory. Those who sell. Those who buy. Those who go long. Those who short. It is a game to make the most money any way possible.

I finished The Big Short earlier this week. What I know is this: the financial money racket is filled with assholes.

B-

Earlier tonight, me and the usual suspects were at our usual haunt, the bookstore. I didn’t bother getting a volume of manga or a book, because my nightstand is currently full. The seed did. I’m at the usual haunt so often that I’ve accumulated plenty of books. It may almost be impossible to read them all. Except that you buy them, you must read them.

Here’s how I am getting through them.

I’ve decided to read more than one book at a time. “Incredulous!” you say. But that is the only way you can get through the backlog. When you read a book, and you find that it sucks, but don’t want to not finish, then you’re stuck if you only read one at a time. If you’re on several books, you can always switch from the sucky one to the good one. It will take longer but you’ll eventually finish the sucky one.

I’ve also kept a bathroom book. When conducting you’re business, read a few pages or a chapter or two. But be careful, your may feet fall asleep.

Finally, know when to say when. If the book really does suck, and you wont finish it. Cut your losses. Start a new book. Forget the sucky one forever perhaps donate to library.

Those are some of the tips I shared with the usual suspects. If you’ve got more then feel free to share in comments.