The National Journal Political Stock Exchange

Our cousin company, National Journal, has partnered with Intrade to launch the first branded political stock exchange this cycle.

We call it NJPSE.

I'll be writing a weekly handicapping column that will be tasked with explaining why youse all decided to buy who you bought and sell who you sold.

In one sense, the exchange represents the apocalypse for good-government types who bemoan the application of horse race and football metaphors to politics. Sorry about that.

But from our vantage point, it's a novel way to get a sense for the aggregate daily swings of opinion among the political elites. If you believe -- as I believe -- that the political elites can influence the worldviews of the non-elites, then there is some merit to this venture.

Regardless, it's fun. And it's free -- we'll give you free (fake) NJ Dollars to play with.

Please check it out. Fairly soon, when the gods of IT are smiling, I'll add a ticker of NJPSE data points to this page.