1. A runaway boxcar is about to run over five people walking on the tracks.

Some universal human weaknesses can result in irrational behavior during an economic boom.

One poorly aimed rubber bullet might be all that is needed to turn the next street protest into an outright civil war.

And you can hit it again. That's kind of ham fisted. You might just push it into a third keyhole or whatever, so you don't do that.

Countries putting money on the barrelhead want assurances that their resources will not be used frivolously, and they want to know that they will be repaid.

Stock market movements are certainly hard to explain, but there are reasons to believe that Brazilians might be rationally exuberant.

In the Middle East today, it is reckless and radical invading a country, wrecking its institutions, and expecting that freedom will grow in the ensuing state of anarchy.

Now it has become clear that John McCain who once criticized George W. Bush s tax cuts as imprudent and refused to vote for them has succumbed to this potion.

The reason for the contradiction is straightforward. Countries putting money on the barrelhead want assurances that their resources will not be used frivolously, and they want to know that they will be repaid.

In China, the widespread euphoria about the economy is reason for concern. Some universal human weaknesses can result in irrational behavior during an economic boom.

Instead of commanding much of northern Sri Lanka, they are now confined to a shrinking pocket, and are reduced to mindless military stunts such as the recent bombing by light aircraft of the tax administration building in the capital, Colombo.

But this view assumes that all member states adhere to the Union s underlying economic values of fiscal prudence and market reform. Problems could arise only because of unanticipated shocks, temporary local political difficulties, and the favorite culprit irrational markets.

My homeland has become a place where too many people are victims, succumbing to a virus, or gunned down by a drug trafficker assaulted by a robber, shot by an ill trained policeman, or kidnapped by a member of a criminal gang.