[lbo-talk] Re: Warren Buffett's philanthropy

Marvin Gandall marvgandall at videotron.ca
Tue Jun 27 12:43:04 PDT 2006


Luke Weiger wrote:


> Actually it's a pretty bad article--make that really bad. Walsh points
> out
> the obvious fact that Buffett owes his extraordinary wealth to capitalism.
> He does nothing to show that Buffett made capitalism any more vicious than
> it would otherwise have been. It's true that we'd have less need for
> charity in a better world, but thank goodness for those who actually do
> something to make an imperfect world better.
========================== Walsh said that the idea was neither to "demonize" nor get "dewy-eyed" about Buffett, which I think is the right attitude. I didn't get the impression Walsh was trying to show that Buffett "made capitalism more vicious" - he was complimentary about Buffett's personal qualities - but he did offer the reminder that Buffett occupies a particular role in the system which can be quite destructive and at odds with his better instincts, and that this has be to taken into account alongside his more positive contributions. I'm not sure the Sage of Omaha wouldn't agree.



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