August 15, 2003

Defending the 'Terrorism Futures' Market

By DAVID GLENN

"The idea of a federal betting parlor on atrocities and terrorism is ridiculous and it's grotesque," declared Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) last month. The project that so exercised him was the Policy Analysis Market, a trial program financed by the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The market was designed to allow participants to place conditional bets, such as: If there is a coup in Jordan in the first quarter of 2004, then economic activity (or terrorist casualties) in the

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