Buffet: Who Really Cooks the Books?

Recently, a few C.E.O.'s have stepped forward to adopt honest accounting. But most continue to spend their shareholders' money, directly or through trade associations, to lobby against real reform. They talk principle, but, for most, their motive is pocketbook.

For their shareholders' interest, and for the country's, C.E.O.'s should tell their accounting departments today to quit recording illusory pension-fund income and start recording all compensation costs. They don't need studies or new rules to do that. They just need to act.

Amen to that. Right now, I only feel truly comfortable investing my money with a couple of real financial straight-shooters: Warren Buffet and Bill Gates. No negative accounting surprises there.   

4:17:11 PM  comment []    

Moral Equivalency?

She consideres Sharon an evil man who has no interest in peace. She cited the visit to the temple mount and this raid as provocative actions that are calculated to keep the adjacent Jew-haters (aka Palestinians) riled up. I am inclined to agree with her. She is of the mind that the Palestinians are headed by psychopathic, murderous thugs; and she thinks the Sharon government is headed by democratic, murderous thugs.

I had a similar discussion with another friend a couple of weeks ago and pressed home the point that the Arabs are cukoo-for-cocoa-puffs Jew-haters who have no interest in peace. But maybe not, the Iranians seem to have some moderate leanings. Oh, but they're not Arabs. Persians. And they're Shiite, not Sunni Muslims.

Questions:

• Arab leadership vs. Arab masses. With regime changes and increased democracy, would things get any better?
• Israel's right to exist. Who will accept that "the Zionist Entity" is there to stay?
• Culture of victimhood. When will Arabs stop blaming Jews (and everyone but themselves) for their failures?

The Arab Street

The US is not a democracy, it is a democratic republic. Majority rule is not the abiding principle, the rule of law is. And a big part of the rule of law is protecting individual rights: protecting minorities from the majority. Our founders feared mob rule and subsequent tyranny, so they added an explicit Bill of Rights to the Constitution before sending it out for ratification.

The Arab world may have sham elections, but they don't have freedom. And I don't think they're likely to get freedom anytime soon. Unless things change radically.

Pushing them into the sea

For the majority of Palestinians, the goal is to eliminate the "Zionist Entity", the state of Israel. Common sense tells us this won't happen any time soon. And even if the Arabs succeeded, what would be the result? Israel has 200 nuclear warheads; they have 4 missile-toting submarines cruising the Mediterranian Sea. If the Israeli's lose, they will nuke Mecca, Medina, Riyad, Bagdhad, Teheran, Damascus, Amman, and maybe even Cairo. Hundreds of millions will die. This can't happen.

How can we be expected to act like grownups?

This seems to be the main Palestinian argument. We are victims of humiliation and have been uprooted from our lands. How can we help but hate and kill and provoke our oppressors? This is understood as a Newtonian certainty.

Life is tough. Yes, you should be angry, you displaced, dispossessed, and downtrodden. Use anger as a motivation, not an excuse. In sociology class in college, I learned Heidegger's term geworfen, or "thrown-ness". Where did fate throw you in this life? What advantages and handicaps do you possess? Children and sociopaths blame others for their failings; adults look at many sides of the problem and do a "searching and fearless moral inventory" of themselves. My children learn conflict resolution skills in elementary school. This is not taught or encouraged in Jihadland. Indeed, quite the opposite occurs.

A solution, find me a solution

I don't know how to solve this problem. Right wing Israelis will continue to build new settlements and provide all kinds of provocations to the Palestinians. The Palestinians will continue to do the bidding of their Arab masters: pleading impotence and hopelessness and inevitability. With a wink and a nod, they'll keep the attacks coming.

The solution is that someone has to win.

If the Arabs win, they will show no mercy towards Jews. They're nothing but pigs and monkeys. They massacre their own without much compunction, why not Jews? There will be rivers of blood in the streets of Haifa, Tel Aviv, and even the sacred city of Jerusalem. It will be genocide. And then it will be genocide of a different sort. Of the nuclear sort. This can't be allowed.

If the Israelis win, they will show mercy. They will control their soldiers. They will provide medical care to the wounded on both sides. They will act like aggrieved -- but moral -- people.

And once the Arabs have lost, they'll find that they've won. Yet another new Marshall plan rolls down the assembly line, and we turn intransigent, intolerant enemies into friends and allies.

It's the only moral thing to do.  

9:29:53 AM  comment []