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:: MAX BLACK ::

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." --C.S. Lewis

"The Swiss pocket knife of conservative thought on the web..." - Eli Kardrakian

"Bookmark Max and dump your subscription to the newspaper; if you don't have a birdcage you really don't need it anyway..." - Shirley St. James

:: Tuesday, July 19, 2005 ::

SCOTUS NEWS: Keep your eye on NROs Bench Memos but Tradesports is where the real action is. As of this moment, Jones is way out in front.

Given Tradesports amazing track record, you've got to believe Edith Jones will get the nomination - all the big money is on her.

6:30 PM Central Update: Wow, watching Tradesports is thrilling; Luttig is slowly gaining on Jones.
6:35 PM Central Update: Luttig/Jones losing ground, they're buying Roberts!?
6:40 PM Central Update: Unbelievable, the money's on Roberts
6:45 PM Central Update: All the gas is going out of Luttig/Jones - looks like it's Roberts. This is fascinating.
6:47 PM Central Update: CNN just announced it's Roberts! Tradesports predicted Roberts 10 minutes before CNN announced it - not a great "prediction" but it had it before the public announcement.

Well, it's all over but the shouting. If you want to check out a boring Tradesports contract, take a look at "Rove Resignation" - not alot of action over there.

Final update for this post: Orin Kerr over at the Volokh Conspiracy has an interesting post on the inaccuracy of Tradesports (or predictive markets generally) in predicting "the discretionary decision of one person, as compared to predicting the collective outcome of the individual decisions of many" noting that Tradesports players incorrectly predicted Rehnquist's retirement based on little more than press reports. However, Kerr also noted the market started to move toward Roberts about an hour before the official announcement which seems about right for this kind of contract - the market had it right even if the "prediction" was only an hour in advance of the actual outcome. Whatever the case, it was fun watching the probabilities collapse and Roberts emerge as the nominee 10 minutes before the AP announced it.

:: Max 5:38 PM [+] ::
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