Thank you to Howard G. Buffett!
I am glad that Howard Buffett has a sober understanding of how the russians operate. They will not engage in good faith unless you demonstrate that you are able and willing to fuck them up.
this post was submitted on 08 Apr 2025
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I have mixed feelings about this headline. On the one hand, it's good to see this much money going to a good cause. On the other hand, I firmly oppose the ability of any one person to control this much money.
Compare this one guy's donation to a good cause against all the other billionaires donating money to the Heritage Foundation, MAGA, etc
Billionaires "donating" to foreign countries sounds like bribes for rare earth minerals.
No billionaire is altruistic. Bill Gates is the best example.
An altruistic billionaire is an oxymoron. If they were truly altruistic, they wouldn't be a billionaire.
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Not the OC but the problem I have is in just one private citizen's ability to influence so much military power. While historically this isn't new and in this case it does overall good, I think that this kind of thing is a slippery slope that eventually could lead to billionaires funding wars to manipulate market elements for profit.
I also hate that it just moves forward this idea of "individuals and charities will pick up the slack" when they dismantle everything good the government does.
The world would be better off if all excess wealth were perpetually redistribed
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Sounds like those motherfuckers need to pay some taxes, clearly.
That's your take away?
Yep. A single billionaire funding a war effort is abhorrent.
This one happens to be on the right side, but there's absolutely no guarantee that his will be the case for any of these fucking psychopaths.who horde wealth. They all need to go.
Counterpoint - under the current administration, paying taxes might help Russia more
But would the current administration be the current administration without wealth hoarding psychopaths?
No, it would not.
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Absolutely. What other reasonable response is there?
It's easy to say the right things when you know you're never going to be held accountable for your words.
That's your takeaway?
Yes. If we lived in another reality, and there was a true progressive about to pass a 100% tax on all wealth over a billion dollars, Warren would be showing is true colors very, very quickly. It's easy to say the right thing on this because he knows he'll never have to pay a dime more than he does right now.
He's a dragon among 700 or so other dragons sitting on unimaginable wealth that he will never spend in his lifetime. He deserves nothing but disrespect.
It's easy to say the right thing on this because he knows he'll never have to pay a dime more than he does right now.
And it's easy to make sweeping statements based purely on hypotheticals and your own assumptions. In our reality, he's one of the biggest advocates for raising his own taxes.
about to pass a 100% tax on all wealth over a billion dollars
Here's the first sentence of that article that you didn't read:
A 70% marginal tax rate. A 77% estate tax. A 3% tax on every dollar over $1 billion of net worth.
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Seems like you make your own reality
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Fuck this asshole for existing - I don't give a shit what he does, good or bad, because no single person should get to decide what happens to that much stolen wealth.
Billionaires should not exist, but in a world where they do the ones that give away some of their billions are less terrible than the others.
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I have mixed feelings. His gist is basically that he agrees billionaires shouldn't exist and that there's no ethical billionaire and he wants reforms to make it so they don't. But he argues that we live in a system where billionaires are inevitable and that it would be stupid not to invest wisely and make billions if he can because if he doesn't someone else just will and he can use the money for good.
However, even if you buy this narrative of good billionaire, you can just look to his ties will Bill Gates and the Bill and Melinda gates foundation to see that, even if he did mean well, his perception on how to do good is completely twisted.
Oh no, not that horrible person Bill Gates who checks notes saved 50 million peoples lives
Bill gates put a lot of effort into making monopolies. He tried to stomp out Linux. And, part of his whole weird philantrophy was trying to circumcise the men of Africa to save them from aids but inadvertanly likely increased the spread of aids which is just one case study in how his foundation can help but also does harmful bananas shit.
Listen to the behind the bastards on him. Warren buffet might get a pass if you squint, but Bill Gates is a bastard.
Edit: I would like to say that "increased the spread of aids" is probably misleading in that I make it sound like the program overall increased AIDS in Africa. That is not true. There is controversial evidence that circumcision may decrease the spread of AIDS. There's controversial evidence that circumcision led the risky behavior in circumcised men who felt they were immune after circumcision. The data, since its an uncontrollable population study, is messy. But, Bills foundation involvent in Africa has had many unintended consequences across the continent that has saves some lives and cost others and no one man should have such strong say on the health policies of an entire continent. Personally, I also feel very strongly no one man should have such strong sway on campaigns which result is mass surgery on the genitals of an entirely different group of men when there are arguably better ways to mitigate disease transmission.
Fifty. MILLION.
The man should literally be made into a saint. "Oooh Linux blah blah" FIFTY FUCKING MILLION LIVES SAVED. The man has far outweighed anything bad he's ever done in his life.
Bill Gates has saved 50 million lives according to Bill Gates. But his business and philanthropy practices have directly and indirectly led to degradation of quality of life and death in such complex ways we can't even put a number on it.
Because Bill Gates, and generally philanthropy from people of his generation, want to throw money at a problem without asking the people they are trying to help how to help them. When you just try to save people without including them in the process because you think you know better than them what's best for them, there's usually pretty unintended and bad side effects.
So, not only was he a pretty cut throat and immoral business man, but even when he tries to buy his way into being a good person with the money he makes from his business practices that rely on monopolies and unethically cheap labor, he fucks it up.
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There's a tweet floating around the Internet that says: "You know that question where you're asked if you'd press a button for a million bucks, knowing it would hurt someone somewhere that you don't know? That's how you get billionaires. They're pushing that button as often and as quickly as they possibly can."
Billionaires are motherfuckers. All of them.
So if Warren wants to do the morally correct thing why doesn't he hire assassins to kill the bad billionaires?
A good person turning into a billionare by accident would donate all his extra money away as soon as he gets them. There aren't any good billionares.
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All billionaires deserve the vast majority of their wealth to be seized, but I vote we spare this one the guillotine.
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