The Cost of Fear

Even the world’s best pros are so consumed with avoiding bogeys that they make putts for birdie discernibly less often than identical-length putts for par, according to a coming paper by two professors at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. After analyzing laser-precise data on more than 1.6 million Tour putts, they estimated that this preference for avoiding a negative (bogey) more than gaining an equal positive (birdie) — known […]

Continue Reading →

Mozilo Charged with Fraud

In 1997, I almost went to work for this man and his company. Some of my colleagues did go to work there. Now the company's gone under, and he's charged with fraud by the SEC. After my visit to his operation, I can't say that I'm surprised. It was a testosterone-infused money-money-money operation that left me feeling ill at ease. One time in my life when my gut instincts steered […]

Continue Reading →

On Lawyers and Torture

There’s been much commentary the past weeks over the legal memos released by the Obama administration, in which lawyers for the Bush administration were asked to give an opinion as to the legality of certain so-called “enhanced” interrogation techniques (which were of sufficient severity and cruelty that most people would call them “torture”).  I’ve read the memos (which are available here), albeit not word-for-word, and find myself disagreeing with those […]

Continue Reading →

Poisson d’Avril Excellent!

Sur France 2, cette émission m’a bien eu!  Je l’ai regardé le premier avril avec ma femme, et je l’ai dit, “je me demandais souvent si les éoliennes pourraient ralentir la rotation de la terre.”  J’ai vraiment cru cette emission!  Mais aujourd’hui je découvre qu’elle était un “poisson d’avril.”  Heursement, je ne suis pas seul … regardez le 114 commentaires ici. Bien fait France 2! This report on France 2 […]

Continue Reading →