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Lewis’ need to anchor his tale in personalities results in a skewed misreading of the subprime crisis and why and how it got as bad as it did. The group of short sellers he celebrates were minor-leaguers compared to the likes of Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank and John Paulson. But no one on the short side of these trades, large or small, should be seen as any kind of a stalwart hero and defender of capitalism. Circumstances converged to create a perfect storm of folly on the buy side, beginning with essentially fraudulent mortgage originations at ground level, which the short-sellers – whether trading at the multimillion or multibillion dollars level – took advantage of. That they walked away with large profits may be enviable, but there was nothing valiant about it. In the end, Main Street, having been desolated by a mortgage-driven housing bust, now found itself the buyer of last resort of Wall Street’s garbage. —“Debunking Michael Lewis’ Subprime Short Hagiography,” Yves Smith, Naked Capitalism

To achieve uniformity, and to maintain quality control, Donnell likes all his cows to be on the same estrus cycle. That’s why, in April and May, during breeding season, a lot of them wear seeders—vaginal plugs carrying progesterone, each with a blue string for easy removal in a few days. The progesterone keeps the cows from coming into heat. When the plugs come out, each cow gets a shot of prostaglandin, which ultimately results in ovulation. At that point, one of the cowboys puts on an arm-length plastic glove and inserts an artificial insemination syringe loaded with 20 million sperm cells. George Self, who has cowboyed at the R. A. Brown Ranch for 57 years, is by far the best at this. “He has a gift with his hands to know how to feel into a cow that most people don’t have,” Donnell says. George will feel the reproductive tract with one arm, then with the other hand, guide the syringe through the cervical rings (the tricky part) and deposit the semen at the opening of the cervix. It takes maybe 60 seconds per cow, and every cow on the ranch, 1,300 in all, is bred that way, as many as 400 in a single day. —“Breeding the Perfect Bull,” Jeanne Marie Laskas, Smithsonian

Most families from Negros will justify the in-breeding as a way to keep the family jewels within—but if money was really the issue, why not just double-up and marry into another rich family? Or perhaps Lino Brocka was on to something when he made a film in Negros many years ago and spoke to historian Modesto Sa-onoy about mejorar la rasa (improving the race). It appears much more plausible, though, that incest was practiced religiously in the old days because it was safe and convenient—and because, frankly, more marriages and families stuck together and stayed happier that way. But speculation on how it affects the bloodline cannot be avoided, because if you play with the same test tubes for too long without washing them, you’re going to end up with something weird. —“At Play in the Fields of the Lords,” Jose Mari Ugarte, Rogue