Economists as a lot are a curious group of people. Their most useful function is arguably predicting and preventing financial collapses. Yet, these academics who gain so much notoriety and traction during times of financial …

In 2009, the now infamous private security firm, Blackwater, incongruously renamed itself after the noble gas Xenon. The new name, Xe (pronounced Zee), purportedly signaled a change in scope of the organization away from US-funded …