http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/17/opinion/17buffett.html?_r=1&ref=opinion

Quote :

"DEAR Uncle Sam, My mother told me to send thank-you notes promptly. I’ve been remiss. Let me remind you why I’m writing. Just over two years ago, in September 2008, our country faced an economic meltdown. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the pillars that supported our mortgage system, had been forced into conservatorship. Several of our largest commercial banks were teetering. One of Wall Street’s giant investment banks had gone bankrupt, and the remaining three were poised to follow. A.I.G., the world’s most famous insurer, was at death’s door. Many of our largest industrial companies, dependent on commercial paper financing that had disappeared, were weeks away from exhausting their cash resources. Indeed, all of corporate America’s dominoes were lined up, ready to topple at lightning speed. My own company, Berkshire Hathaway, might have been the last to fall, but that distinction provided little solace. Nor was it just business that was in peril: 300 million Americans were in the domino line as well. Just days before, the jobs, income, 401(k)’s and money-market funds of these citizens had seemed secure. Then, virtually overnight, everything began to turn into pumpkins and mice. There was no hiding place. A destructive economic force unlike any seen for generations had been unleashed. Only one counterforce was available, and that was you, Uncle Sam. Yes, you are often clumsy, even inept. But when businesses and people worldwide race to get liquid, you are the only party with the resources to take the other side of the transaction. And when our citizens are losing trust by the hour in institutions they once revered, only you can restore calm. When the crisis struck, I felt you would understand the role you had to play. But you’ve never been known for speed, and in a meltdown minutes matter. I worried whether the barrage of shattering surprises would disorient you. You would have to improvise solutions on the run, stretch legal boundaries and avoid slowdowns, like Congressional hearings and studies. You would also need to get turf-conscious departments to work together in mounting your counterattack. The challenge was huge, and many people thought you were not up to it. Well, Uncle Sam, you delivered. People will second-guess your specific decisions; you can always count on that. But just as there is a fog of war, there is a fog of panic — and, overall, your actions were remarkably effective. I don’t know precisely how you orchestrated these. But I did have a pretty good seat as events unfolded, and I would like to commend a few of your troops. In the darkest of days, Ben Bernanke, Hank Paulson, Tim Geithner and Sheila Bair grasped the gravity of the situation and acted with courage and dispatch. And though I never voted for George W. Bush, I give him great credit for leading, even as Congress postured and squabbled. You have been criticized, Uncle Sam, for some of the earlier decisions that got us in this mess — most prominently, for not battling the rot building up in the housing market. But then few of your critics saw matters clearly either. In truth, almost all of the country became possessed by the idea that home prices could never fall significantly. That was a mass delusion, reinforced by rapidly rising prices that discredited the few skeptics who warned of trouble. Delusions, whether about tulips or Internet stocks, produce bubbles. And when bubbles pop, they can generate waves of trouble that hit shores far from their origin. This bubble was a doozy and its pop was felt around the world. So, again, Uncle Sam, thanks to you and your aides. Often you are wasteful, and sometimes you are bullying. On occasion, you are downright maddening. But in this extraordinary emergency, you came through — and the world would look far different now if you had not. Your grateful nephew, Warren Warren E. Buffett is the chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway, a diversified holding company."

12/2/2010 5:11:45 PM

i'm sure he is thanking Uncle Sam. Without his Uncle, he'd have lost a fuck-ton more in the crash, lol

[Edited on December 2, 2010 at 5:50 PM. Reason : ]

12/2/2010 5:50:08 PM

We would have all lost more.

12/2/2010 7:00:45 PM

Quote :

"We would have all lost more."

Such is how capitalism prevents runaway wealth accumulation. Everything lost would have quickly been made back, just in the hands of different people.

12/4/2010 10:01:18 AM

Quote :

"In the darkest of days, Ben Bernanke, Hank Paulson, Tim Geithner and Sheila Bair grasped the gravity of the situation and acted with courage and dispatch."

Ahahahahahahahhaahaha. I'm sorry, this is too fucking good.

12/4/2010 10:05:15 AM

Quote :

"Everything lost would have quickly been made back"

To quote you, facts not in evidence.

12/4/2010 10:59:00 AM

Quite true, no counter-factual can be run.

12/4/2010 11:06:09 AM

I think its pretty obvious Buffet is one of the "bad guys" now. He's using his considerable influence on the government to prop up his own companies and its pretty sickening.

It pisses me off how he plays the gee golly I love America when he's getting sweetheart deals and shaking hands with the devil now.

12/4/2010 3:52:30 PM

^ Annnnnnnnnnndddddd time to stop taking you seriously

12/6/2010 12:41:25 AM

Quote :

"Such is how capitalism prevents runaway wealth accumulation. Everything lost would have quickly been made back, just in the hands of different people. "

Different people being those in Asia :-/

12/6/2010 12:46:32 AM

^^ of course Buffett is thankful, the government saved his wealth at the expense of the American people.

They spent copious amounts of money to prop up his hemorrhaging insurance and banking businesses and his ratings agency so he could offload his capital into other things that were on firesale.

If it weren't for the government he would have lost 70-80 percent of his networth to ready able buyers ready to scoop up his mistakes for cents on the dollar.

Of course he owes it to them to put in a good word, they helped him save face and continue his urban legend legacy as someone who cares about the American public.

12/6/2010 1:39:59 AM

Yes, he is the only one the government helped out in this entire debacle. We're all at such a loss that he will continue to give away his fortune at the expense of the American taxpayer!

Fucking idiot.

12/6/2010 6:24:18 PM

Quote :

"We would have all lost more."

As sound monetary and fiscal policy have not been the order of the day, we all still stand to lose a great deal.

12/6/2010 7:00:16 PM

^

12/6/2010 10:49:54 PM

Quote :

"As sound monetary and fiscal policy have not been the order of the day, we all still stand to lose a great deal."

You could say the same thing about global warming, neither are a very immediate threat.

12/6/2010 11:02:37 PM

What serendipitous timing, Dan Wilson of the SF Federal Reserve Bank released a study yesterday informing us that the net effect of the stimulus was 0 jobs:

Quote :

"A study by Daniel J. Wilson of the San Francisco Federal Reserve Bank, suggests that the net job creation from the $814 billion stimulus bill passed in February, 2009, was zero by August 2010. In the first year, the stimulus "saved or created" 2 million jobs (not 4 million as repeatedly claimed by the Administration), but this number proved to be short lived, paying for temporary jobs, at a very high cost of $400,000 per job "saved or created.""

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/12/net_job_impact_of_stimulus_zer.html

Original paper here: http://www.frbsf.org/publications/economics/papers/2010/wp10-17bk.pdf

12/7/2010 8:55:19 AM

p. 117 of this edition of Keynes’s General Theory

Quote :

"Ancient Egypt was doubly fortunate and doubtless owed to this its fabled wealth, in that it possessed two activities, namely pyramid building as well as the search for precious metals, the fruits of which, since they could not serve the needs of man by being consumed, did not stale with abundance. The Middle Ages built cathedrals and sang dirges. Two pyramids, two masses for the dead, are twice as good as one; but not so two railways from London to York."

Anyone know what Keynes was saying here?
http://homepage.newschool.edu/het//texts/keynes/chap10.htm

1/10/2011 12:13:51 PM

I would take it to be a critique on the inefficiencies of competition.

1/10/2011 6:31:52 PM

Competition being so inefficient it would have been better to have instead built a Pyramid?

1/10/2011 6:47:33 PM

A pyramid only serves one person, if we shared a pyramid, it would defeat it's very purpose. A train is different, and one train line could serve pretty much everyone. This is more or less what he is pointing out, or at least what I believe to be his main point from what you quoted.

1/10/2011 7:09:12 PM

Good place to note that the reason Buffet is such an advocate of the estate tax.

he owns a life insurance company that makes a shitload of its money off people buying policies to specifically avoid the estate tax.

Since he loves the estate tax so much why does he plan to give all his money away when he dies instead of paying the tax?

Fucking hypocrite piece of shit.

1/10/2011 8:00:44 PM

Yeah, fucking asshole, how dare he give his money to charity.

1/10/2011 10:55:55 PM

Quote :

""Good place to note that the reason Buffet is such an advocate of the estate tax. he owns a life insurance company that makes a shitload of its money off people buying policies to specifically avoid the estate tax. Since he loves the estate tax so much why does he plan to give all his money away when he dies instead of paying the tax? Fucking hypocrite piece of shit.""

Every person is free to give their money to charity before they die and avoid the tax as well, and he's never advocated preventing people from doing so. Hypocritical would be if he worked around the estate tax to bestow the money to his relatives, or if he advocated preventing others from donating their money to charity before death. He also advocates for higher income and capital gains taxes that would directly affect him. Your outrage is misplaced you fucking piece of shit.


[Edited on January 11, 2011 at 1:25 PM. Reason : .]

1/11/2011 1:24:46 PM

The ones who rail against the estate tax the most will never come close to breaking the lifetime exemption amount.

1/11/2011 1:30:02 PM

Quote :

"The ones who rail against the estate tax the most will never come close to breaking the lifetime exemption amount."

In 2009 roughly 2% of estates would have qualified, either that's a very vocal minority or a lot of people are overly optimistic about their future.

[Edited on January 11, 2011 at 1:37 PM. Reason : .]

1/11/2011 1:36:55 PM