Different Opinion

The costs for the war in Iraq are increasing, reports the Washington Post:

"The latest war request would push the total cost of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and other efforts since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to $277 billion, according to the CBO. That figure well exceeds the inflation-adjusted $200 billion cost of World War I and is approaching the $350 billion cost of the Korean War, according to Commerce Department figures. "

With the current and projected future U.S. central government deficits, supplying bombs to the military is tightly linked to supplying bonds to the treasury market. Lots of them.

Is the Swedish Central Bank, the Riksbank, sliding from its inflation-rate targeting? Or will it have to cut the repo-rate in the face of the currently low inflation despite the central bank governor's strong and pronounced bias towards hiking rates? This is the topical discussion after recent decreases in market expectations in the future repo-rate in the wake of the Governor's speech last week.

Sveriges Riksbank - Low inflation, but outlook remains largely the same: "The fact that I did not advocate further or larger interest rate cuts was not merely due to the expectation that inflation would be in line with the target two years ahead; it was also due to the strong growth in demand. The Riksbank has explained on previous occasions that it is reasonable to take some account of developments in the real economy, both because these say something about inflation in the longer term and because a stable real economic development is important in itself. "

The Swedish paper Ny Teknik, published by the Engineer's Organization, recommended these Klein Bottles as christmas gifts for those who "already had everything" and an interest in mathematics too. I didn't notice it in time for christmas, maybe next year?



Here is a short background from the vendor's site:

In 1882, Felix Klein imagined sewing two Möbius Loops together to create a single sided bottle with no boundary. Its inside is its outside. It contains itself.

Take a rectangle and join one pair of opposite sides -- you'll now have a cylinder. Now join the other pair of sides with a half-twist. That last step isn't possible in our universe, sad to say. A true Klein Bottle requires 4-dimensions because the surface has to pass through itself without a hole.

It's closed and non-orientable, so a symbol on its surface can be slid around on it and reappear backwards at the same place.You can't do this trick on a sphere, doughnut, or pet ferret -- they're orientable.