Gandhi, played by Kingsley

I just watched Kingsley play Gandhi. I wanted to write my impressions of the film, but after perusing the Wiki entry on Gandhi, I would like to copy some portions that stand out:

1. Gandhi always approached an end indirectly. For example, to get women involved in the movement and excise radicals, "Gandhi exhorted Indian men and women, rich or poor, to spend time each day spinning khadi in support of the independence movement. This was a strategy to inculcate discipline and dedication to weed out the unwilling and ambitious, and to include women in the movement at a time when many thought that such activities were not respectable activities for women."

2. Gandhi would fast when violence broke out. He seemed to realize humanity's passions had to be redirected into other sources of energy and perhaps there is something in human nature that causes us to become calm when presented with someone willing to be strong and absorb our bad energy. For the first time, I understand the presence of energy in New Age doctrines. One of his best lines, in response to a comment that passive resistance would not work, was that he had never advocated anything passive--he had always encouraged active noncooperation.

3. Still, I see some potential problems with Gandhi's philosophy.

One, had Gandhi been lesser known and not a public figure, his strategies may not have worked. The media needs to be sympathetic to his cause for it to succeed. In this case, if there is no one around to hear a tree fall in the forest, it really makes no sound. So what choices do average, non-famous people have when they are attacked? This is a difficult question, especially because we know that one of the reasons India is now able to move forward and perhaps resume its status as an empire is in no small part to Gandhi's vision. Yet, if the media portrays a subjugated people or a minority as violent, individual peacemakers could become ineffective. Thus, non-cooperation and non-violence seem to require a media that is both fair as well as sympathetic to peaceful non-cooperation, but any attempt to control the media and make it "fair" usually leads to oppressive dictatorships.

Two, Gandhi was presented with good numbers. 150,000 British ruling over millions of Indians. Without scores of people to continue to sacrifice themselves, nonviolence would be too short-lived to impact an oppressor's conscience. So what does a smaller minority do, such as the Jews in Germany during the 1940's or the Muslim Bosnians against Serbia in the 1990's? (Note: another thought-provoking film is No Man's Land (2001), about Bosnians and Serbs.)

Three, the British were clearly behaving improperly, at one point massacring thousands of unarmed protesters. Evil has evolved. Very few modern oppressors would openly behave like Southern governments in 1950's America and allow the media to have a field day. Also, there is no need for high pressure fire-hoses today. A government can simply fire a missile and wipe out an entire group, perhaps thousands of non-cooperating citizens. There would be no face-to-face contact that would engender an awakening of conscience. As Stalin said, "One death is a tragedy; thousands of deaths, a statistic." Today, for example, if 100 Tweedledees decide to close off an area, prevent reporters from entering, shoot missiles and kill 100 protesting Tweedledums in the process, and then clean up the area before allowing re-entry, non-cooperation would result in non-existence. Therefore, it appears that with technology wedging distance amongst peoples--whether by a selective media or by allowing video-game violence--non-cooperation may result in an oppressor being able to eliminate any attempt to shame him. Thus, non-cooperation requires a strong media and a citizenry with enough free time to see what is happening to feel ashamed and to do something. In an increasingly busy world, where people are shielded even from local acts of violence, or work twelve hour days to make mortgage payments, a strong middle class or, counter-intuitively, a majority of poor or persecuted people, seems required for Gandhi's ideas to work.

Spike Lee's portrayal of Mookie and whether he did the right thing in provoking violence ended with two quotes from Malcolm X and Martin Luther King. I will end with one of my favorite quotes by Gandhi:

"When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall — think of it, always."

Khufu's Wisdom, by Mahfouz

Naguib Mahfouz is known as one of the preeminent modern writers, but his first novel was written at the very young age of 27. As a result, Khufu's Wisdom reads more like a screenplay than a true novel. The story revolves around several characters, primarily a pharaoh attempting to avoid being replaced. As in much of Middle Eastern literature (Hebrew saying: "Man plans, God laughs"), a battle between the Fates and humanity begins, with the pharaoh attempting to avoid his fate only to see that his own actions, without his knowledge, lead to fate having its way.

My primary issue with the novel is its disjointed style. Even so, I can see why the author eventually won the Nobel Prize--check out this beautiful passage:

Sennefer yawned again, then closed his eyes. Djedef stared at him in the feeble lamplight with eyes clouded by misery. When he was sure that Sennefer had surrendered to sleep, he moaned to himself in torment. Shunning his bed and feeling an intense unrest, he grew weary, and tiptoed out of the room. The air was moist, with a chilling breeze, and the night black as pitch. In the darkness, the date palms looked like slumbering ghosts, or souls whose tortures stretched through eternity.

In many other places, however, the writing seems perfect for a Frank Miller movie: "May the Divine Ra, Shaper of the Universe and Creator of life, bless you...[but] the Fates are making mock as is their wont and have conjured a male child." And, "Are you truly the majestic princess? Be a simple peasant girl--for a peasant girl lost is nearer to the heart than a princess found."

I have not read any of Mahfouz's other books, but I would recommend reading something else. Khufu's Wisdom was Mahfouz's first step on the path of greatness, but shows him in his unpolished glory.

Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway's Meeting

My last two posts were about shareholder meetings and heroes. They provide the perfect segue into my hero, Warren Buffet, and my experience at the Berkshire Hathaway meeting in Omaha, Nebraska in 2007. I chose to attend the meeting for several reasons, primarily because I was not sure whether my future schedule would allow me to take several days off, and to a lesser extent, whether Mr. Buffett would still be around in the next few years. Also, I have never been to the Midwest, except for Chicago, so I was looking forward to this trip.

First, if you plan to go to the meeting, plan early. All the hotels were booked almost seven months in advance, and I was lucky to get a great deal on priceline.com for the Comfort Inn at the Zoo. The location is far from some of the events, such as Gorat's and Borsheim's, but I did not rent a car and relied on the kindness of strangers, including a chance meeting with a Reuters reporter, to get me to various places. (He was very friendly, an ex-lawyer, and seemed to lament the fact that Bloomberg had sent several more reporters with more resources.) As almost everyone there was friendly, I had no problem getting around, but I do suggest renting a car if you go. Omaha, NE is spread out because they have such a low population density and lots of open space. As a result of this land affluence, the city planners could afford to build with disregard to future growth, creating sprawl. Taxis are extremely expensive because of limited competition and also the numerous highways they have to enter to get from one place to another. So even though Point A and Point B are literally one mile away from each other, sometimes you have to take two highways to get there. For a city slicker like myself, used to being able to walk anywhere or take public transportation in Singapore, Boston, San Jose, and D.C., it was a shock to see so much land and so much sprawl.

Other than renting a car, my second tip is to bring a raincoat. Spontaneous thunderstorms are not uncommon in Omaha, and its location smack in the middle of the country creates interesting weather. One day, lightning was so bad, closing the blinds at night made no difference in terms of ambiance. (Apparently, you can tell how close a storm is by counting seconds between thunder and lightning, and had I known that at the time, it would have added to the "Friday the 13th" weather atmosphere.) I (mistakenly) brought plenty of warm clothing, but Omaha is humid in May. So bring a light raincoat and some jeans, and you will be all set.

The first day I arrived at Omaha's main airport, I was happy to be there. Numerous people were there from all over the world, and I chatted up people from South Africa to San Francisco. One tip is to take the Hilton Omaha shuttle from the airport because you will be much closer to the city center and your hotel. The Hilton Omaha employees were so nice, they allowed me to take the shuttle from their hotel to my hotel at the Comfort Inn. (The Midwestern kindness is no lie.) If you have a decent-sized budget, the newer Hilton Omaha is the best hotel. It is right next to the Convention Center where the meeting is held, and its shuttles will also take you to various Berkshire events, such as sale day at the Furniture Mart (which is massive and sells much more than just furniture, including cameras, laptops, etc.). Another Hilton is a few blocks away and has a great restaurant that serves wonderful steak. This brings me to the best tip about Omaha. Have steak, more steak, and when you're done, top it off with a porterhouse steak. Gorat's Steakhouse is the most famous restaurant in Omaha due to Mr. Buffett's frequent visits, but the Hilton restaurants serve some mighty fine steak also. The only other place I had better steak was Michael Jordan's Steakhouse at NY's Grand Central station, but that's another story. (Just imagine two college students looking at the menu and trying to decide how to eat and not take out a small loan--and the bathroom had an attendant, which I had never seen before. It was all worth it, by the way.) So again, order the steak.

When I landed in Omaha, NE, I realized that I did not have my pass. Each shareholder is entitled to four passes/tickets. For most shareholder meetings, simply bringing the proxy is sufficient. Not so for this event. Here, you have to send back a small document asking for a pass when you get the proxy in the mail. If you do not do this, you can go the Convention Center the Friday before the meeting and get a pass. (I found this out after almost suffering a heart attack on Thursday, the night before I was to board the plane and saw an unusually colored paper sticking out of the annual report.) Everything worked out, and the staff was very friendly. The key point is that if you are a shareholder, you can bring three guests (at least in 2007).

I am still giddy about the visit, and there is much more to tell, but I will save the stories for another day. I shook Warren Buffett's hand, which was my last goal on my list of things to do before I turned 30. Yup, I am still giddy.

Jamba Juice, Shareholder Meeting

One of the benefits of living in California is that many popular companies are based in the Bay Area. I enjoy attending annual shareholder meetings, and the Peet's meeting this year was wonderful. While Peet's is based in Emeryville, CA, the meeting took place at the new roasting facility across the beautiful Oakland Bay. I spoke with the Chairman who told me about Peet's history (Peet's first store was in Berkeley, but Peet's was originally Starbucks and then sold the first few stores in Washington state to "some guy named Howard Schultz," as the Chairman explained, with a smile).

Jamba Juice's annual meeting--its very first one--also took place in Oakland, at the Marriott City Center near Chinatown. The Chairman was impressive to listen to, but the other speakers seemed more focused on marketing than the nuts and bolts of running a business. In an industry where location is everything, Peet's and Starbucks are snapping up almost all the great locations. For example, Peet's just opened new stores in Morgan Hill and downtown San Jose. Those could have been Jamba store locations. Unless Jamba intends on selling its product over the Internet or solely in stores, it needs to focus on locations and favorable lease terms to increase revenue. I was disappointed that the company does not purchase any futures contracts, but a corporate officer explained that the primary product they use was strawberries, and no futures market exists for that ingredient. He also explained to me that Jamba Juice tends to favor suburban locations rather than business-centric, downtown locations because suburbia offers seven-day-a-week foot traffic, whereas business districts are typically ghost towns on weekends.

Some other interesting notes: Jamba is focusing on opening kiosks in airports and perhaps also having drive-thrus. They seem to be shying away from a heavy physical presence, perhaps because of high rents--especially closer to the more residential areas in Washington and California, where strip mall rents are much higher than average. But why go public if the money raised will not be used to increase a physical presence? A private company can just as easily enter into partnerships and devise marketing plans.

The Chairman stated that he has received many offers to open stores internationally but he was being cautious about opening abroad because he wanted to carefully control the brand's image. Another speaker dropped an interesting tidbit about Jamba partnering with another major player to sell beverages in stores. If Jamba partners with Coca-Cola, which has been increasing its non-soda portfolio of assets, most recently with Caribou Coffee, then perhaps the stock will experience a short term boost.

Most disappointing was that Jamba did not offer any of their products at the meeting. For a first time meeting, however, perhaps Jamba did better than most would have.

Julian Bond, American Hero

One of my heroes is Julian Bond. Someone once remarked not to have heroes because they will let you down. I suppose that's a recognition that any human being is fallible under certain circumstances, but I don't expect Julian Bond to ever let anyone down. I have never understood why Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton seem to be more famous than Julian Bond, who is more intelligent, more articulate, and more photogenic. It's almost as if the universe reserves the best among us for those who put a little effort into searching for the divine.

His commencement speech at Loyola University in New Orleans in 2007 was beautiful. I especially liked these lines:

"Don’t let the din of the dollar deafen you to the quiet desperation of the dispossessed. Don’t let the glare of greed blind you to the many in need. You must place interest in principle above interest on principal."

In our increasingly material world, Bond and other civil rights leaders remind us what is important. I first heard him speak at an ACLU dinner in San Jose. When I left, I was a changed man. I've heard Mike Wallace, Warren Buffett, Wesley Clark, Desmond Tutu, Steve Jobs, and even Dave Barry speak, but none of them had the impact that Bond had on me. His ability to be inspirational while calmly forceful creates a powerful impact on any listener. I have tried to imitate his style as much as possible, but I cannot replicate the hold he has over an audience. It's not just charisma--Steve Jobs and Warren Buffett have that in spades; it's not a particular kind of voice--Wesley Clark has a great voice; Bond just has something that makes you feel proud to be a human being.

The Innocent Man, by Grisham

I first dismissed this book because Grisham's fiction has never appealed to me. As an attorney, I've found that my daily working life interferes with the exciting premises I am asked to accept from legal fiction. As a result, I almost made the mistake of skipping _The Innocent Man_. Grisham's first nonfiction work about families in Oklahoma brought together by unfortunate circumstances will shake your faith in the justice system. I've read elsewhere that the Supreme Court at one point almost lost its collegiality because of a split in justices who refused to affirm any death penalty conviction as a matter of principle. This book provides some insight into what the Supreme Court during Thurgood Marshall's time must have been seeing to create that kind of schism.

Grisham begins by with a plot that could have come straight out of _Moneyball_--i.e., a talented kid from the Midwest with a powerful arm gets discovered by the A's and negotiates with prudent management for a decent signing bonus. When the bonus is sufficiently raised, Ron Williamson, brimming with confidence, chooses money/salary over a college education and a scholarship, but when he is injured, his entire life is then spent fighting for a spot in the minors. When the various stints in the minors fail, Ron goes into a destructive spiral and overzealous law enforcement connects him and his friend to a gruesome murder.

I've heard lawyers say that the criminal justice system favors the prosecution because everyone assumes the D.A. only brings cases where it is sure to convict. As a result, it is terribly easy to buy into the paradigm of Eliot Ness cops arresting violent miscreants, and more difficult to imagine a perfect storm of egotistical D.A.s and the forensic specialists who could be biased because they are on the same county or public payroll and work closely with law enforcement.

What was especially stunning to me was how much the prosecution used inherently unreliable hair samples. Even as an attorney, I did not know how unreliable some so-called scientific data was, and this book was a good education for me and exposed bias I did not even know I had. Overall, an excellent book, and one that is sure to make you question the criminal justice system without the typical pointing to race as a factor.

The Winner-Take-All Society, by R. Frank

This book basically says that the rat race is harmful and we should constrain spending, because happiness isn't really what we have, but what our neighbor has; therefore, by creating incentives to spend less, we can create a trickle-down effect of less consumption and have more time and less coarseness in culture. The only problem is that the authors--as bright as they are--do not spend much time explaining exactly how a consumption tax would work. One gets the feeling that they felt going into specific details was inappropriate for a mass-market book. Along the way, we also learn about fun variations on game theory, the predecessor to Paris Hilton, and some prescient warnings on steroids. Despite the negative comments about lawyers in the book, I enjoyed it very much. The author reminds his readers, through facts and research, to be more humble and to remember that because the number of top positions is few in the U.S., it cannot be the case that all our dreams will be realized. While depressing on the surface, one may wish the participants on American Idol had read this book before appearing on national television.

Disgrace, by Coetzee

This is a Pulitzer-Prize-winning novel of a teacher, his daughter, and a family seeking justice for a terrible crime. Having read _Cry, the Beloved Country_, I was prepared for this novel to be good but average. South Africa's history lends itself well to deep, haunting fiction, but Mr. Coetzee's writing style is unique. For example, the language used here is stunning, such as inamorata; hypnagogic; jonquil; and verbena. These are not typical words one sees in any novel, but they are placed in a way that makes the entire book seem onomatopoetic, if that is possible. In addition, the characters' thoughts are delightful to see: at one point, the main character analyzes the word, "friend." It comes from freond, and then from freon, meaning love. In other words, a friend is literally a lover. Without divulging too much, _Disgrace_ absorbs the reader in an exciting plot while serving a cold dish of racial karma--it's the literary equivalent of being injected with botulin while happily dining at a Parisian restaurant. When you finish this story of a family in South Africa that has to deal with the changing demographics around it, if you understand the author's subtle point, you will view the world differently and hopefully more humanely.

The Prize, by Yergin

"Behind every great fortune is a great crime." The fortunes discussed here involve oil. Two of the most interesting figures are Rockefeller Sr., who is portrayed as a miserly monopolist; and Gulbenkian, an Armenian philosopher and consummate businessman. Yergin's delightful tome also covers world leaders from Eisenhower--who stopped the British from re-taking the Suez Canal post-Nasser--to the Shah, who replaced, then jailed, Mossadegh. Getty, the muckrackers, and other historical figures are also mentioned in detail.

A major historical omission Yergin makes is that he fails to note Kermit Roosevelt's possible role in Operation Ajax, which is discussed in Perkins' _Confessions of an Economic Hit Man_. Still, the scope of this book is incredible. We learn that oil was around one dollar a barrel in the 1940's (meaning our addiction to "black gold" is fairly new); that BP is the successor to the nationalized Anglo-Persian Oil Company; that U.S. and British policy wished to prevent Anglo-Persian's oil from falling into Communist hands, making the new millennium's current events especially interesting; that one possible reason we, rather than the British, have a special relationship with Saudi Arabia may involve FDR's superior knowledge of Middle Eastern culture, as well as FDR's polio; that at one point, Venezuela supplied 55% of the U.S.'s oil (In 2007, Canada, Mexico, and Venezuela supply most of the U.S.'s oil); that Leavittown gave rise to suburbs (fun quote from its founder: "No man who owns his own house and lot can be a Communist. He has too much to do."); and much more. This book should be required reading in every history classroom in America. It enlivens history with its detailed depictions of characters who changed the course of world history. It is around 800 pages in paperback, and is, without question, worth the time investment.

Gilead by M. Robinson

Robinson writes about a Midwestern preacher leaving a written legacy for his son. The novel takes place in 1956 and takes us inside the mind of a preacher with profound wisdom. While it sometimes comes across as an apologia and fireside chat, the content is so beautifully written that we feel privileged to listen to the words of Rev. John Ames.

Some nuggets from this book are too good not to be shared: "A little too much anger, too often or at the wrong time, can destroy more than you would ever imagine. Above all, mind what you say. 'Behold how much wood is kindled by how small a fire, and the tongue is a fire.'"

Aside from advice, Robinson's language will soothe any reader: "The graveyard was about the loneliest place you could imagine. If I were to say it was going back to nature, you might get the idea there was some vitality about the place. But it was parched and sun-stricken. It was hard to imagine the grass had ever been green. Everywhere you stepped, little grasshoppers would fly up by the score, making that snap they do, like striking a match."

Rev. Ames' ability to be self-aware and also transfer his knowledge to us makes him a special character--few characters are written as self-aware, intelligent, and articulate. Knowing his son will spend most of his life fatherless, he writes, "You are drawing those terrible little pictures that you will bring me to admire, and which I will admire because I have not the heart to say one word that you might remember against me." In an age of attention-seeking, Rev. Ames reminds us that humility and quiet compassion still have much to teach this generation. The mere act of reading Robinson's novel will transport you into a slower, more gentle world.

Whole Foods (2016)

I attended Whole Foods' 2016 shareholder meeting.  Whole Foods (WFM) is under pressure after Target, Walmart, and other retailers copied its model and began selling organic and other food.  Although WFM opened stores with unique layouts, such as the one in downtown San Jose, California, to attract customers, it's still facing intense competition.  Its meeting was business-like and efficient.  Only water, sparkling water, and sodas were served in a S.F. hotel conference room.

Disclosures: I have an insignificant number of WFM shares.  My positions may change at any time.  The picture above is with co-CEO and co-founder John Mackey.

This post was published on March 15, 2016.  

Interesting Quotes

Published on November 10, 2015 and updated thereafter. (See "Sunday Quotes" post for more if this appeals to you.)

Andrew Gelman: "Statisticians are special because, deep in our bones, we know about uncertainty. Economists know about incentives, physicists know about reality, movers can fit big things in the elevator on the first try, evolutionary psychologists know how to get their names in the newspaper, lawyers know you should never never never talk to the cops, and statisticians know about uncertainty. Of that, I’m sure."

Cary Tennis: "Because I assume that you and I belong to a quiet society of secret sufferers, that we recognize each other on the street like an underground, that we know each other to be different because we don't react like others do. We're more driven, more crazy, more desperate, hungrier, touchier, louder, always breathlessly skating on thin ice above the dragon; we know better than to stop skating and sink into the water." (2004)

Clarence Thomas: "I didn't think it was a good idea to make poor blacks, or anyone else, more dependent on government. That would amount to a new kind of enslavement, one which ultimately relied on the generosity--and the ever-changing self-interests--of politicians and activists... [T]he dependency it fostered might ultimately prove as diabolical as segregation, permanently condemning poor people to the lowest rungs of the socioeconomic ladder by cannibalizing the values without which they had no long-term hope of improving their lot." [page 56, My Grandfather's Son, 2007 hardcover]

C.S. Lewis: "Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."

George Orwell: "The real division is not between conservatives and revolutionaries but between authoritarians and libertarians."

Isaac Asimov (1980): "There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there always has been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.'"

John Galbraith: "One cannot defend production as satisfying wants if that production creates the wants. Were it so that a man arising each morning was assailed by demons instilled in him a passion sometimes for silk shirts, sometimes kitchenware... there would be every reason to applaud the effort to find the goods, however odd, that quenched this flame. But should it be that his passion was the result of his first having cultivated the demons [through advertising], and should it also be that his effort to ally it stirred the demons to ever greater and greater effort, there would be question as to how rational was his solution. Unless restrained by conventional attitudes, he might wonder if the solution lay with more goods or fewer demons." (from The Affluent Society (1998), pp. 125.)

Joseph Campbell: (1988) “When a judge walks into the room, and everybody stands up, you’re not standing up to that guy, you’re standing up to the robe that s/he’s wearing and the role that s/he’s going to play. What makes [that person] worthy of that role is integrity, as a representative of the principles of that role, and not some group of [personal] prejudices... [In order for the system to work, s/he] has to sacrifice personal desires and even life possibilities to the role that s/he now signifies.” ("The Power of Myth," Copyright © 1988 Bill Moyers, Apostrophe S Productions, and Joseph Campbell Foundation)

Junot Diaz: "Beli at thirteen believed in love like a seventy-year old widow who's been abandoned by family, husband, children, and fortune believes in God." (from The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao)

"He had secret loves all over town, the kind of curly-haired big-bodied girls who wouldn't have said boo to a loser like him but about whom he could not stop dreaming." (Id.)

‎"For the record, that summer our girl caught a cuerpazo so berserk that only a pornographer or a comic-book artist could have designed it with a clear conscience." (Id.)

Karl Marx, 1875: “Freedom consists in converting the state from an organ superimposed upon society into one completely subordinate to it.” 

Mark Lawson: "The tourist and the journalist have much in common. Both are dropped in strange places and expected quickly to interpret them -- though one is paid to do it and the other pays." -- The Battle for Room Service (1993) 

"Australia had struck me... as a sensible America. It was a nation with the same wild range of landscape, from beach to desert to throbbing metropolis, but discreetly peopled--5% of the US population in a nearly equal acreage--and these including considerably fewer psychopaths and neurotics. Australia was an America in which the populace was not possessed of the belief that it was specially blessed and directed by God, with a particular vocation to bully smaller nations." 

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi: "We shall realize that science cannot be value-free after all... Chemistry that shrugs at pollution is foolishness, Economics that discounts politics and sociology is just as ignorant as are politics and sociology that discount economics."

Pablo Neruda: I crave your mouth, your voice, your hair. / Silent and starving, I prowl through the streets. / Bread does not nourish me, dawn disrupts me, all day / I hunt for the liquid measure of your steps.

Peter Brandt (2011): "I have no respect for Congress. With the exception of perhaps two dozen members, I think Congress is worthless. I think they, as a body, have sold out the financial future of our children and grandchildren. I think the baby-boomer generation is the most selfish generation in the history of the world. I believe it is the right of all Americans to have access to health care (but I believe the current health care reform is a travesty). I have as much disgust for Republicans as I have for Democrats. I think we should scrap our current political system and start from scratch."

Robert Frost (1960): "The greatest adventure of man is science, the adventure of penetrating into matter, into the material universe. But the adventure is our property, a human property, and the best description of us is the humanities."

"Poetry has always been a beggar. Scholars have also been beggars, but they delegate their begging to the president of the college to do for them."

Steve Jobs: "I believe that what is wrong with our schools in this nation is that they have become unionized in the worst possible way. This unionization and lifetime employment of K-12 teachers is off-the-charts crazy."

Steve Jobs: "I’m a very big believer in equal opportunity as opposed to equal outcome. I don’t believe in equal outcome because unfortunately life’s not like that. It would be a pretty boring place if it was. But I really believe in equal opportunity. Equal opportunity to me more than anything means a great education. Maybe even more important than a great family life, but I don’t know how to do that. Nobody knows how to do that. But it pains me because we do know how to provide a great education. We really do. We could make sure that every young child in this country got a great education. We fall far short of that…. The problem there of course is the unions. The unions are the worst thing that ever happened to education because it’s not a meritocracy. It turns into a bureaucracy, which is exactly what has happened. The teachers can’t teach and administrators run the place and nobody can be fired. It’s terrible."

Unknown: "Without data, you are just another person with an opinion."

Warner Herzog: "School has not given me anything. I have always been suspicious of teachers. I do not know why."

Warren Buffett: "At bottom, a sound insurance operation needs to adhere to four disciplines. It must (1) understand all exposures that might cause a policy to incur losses; (2) conservatively assess the likelihood of any exposure actually causing a loss and the probable cost if it does; (3) set a premium that, on average, will deliver a profit after both prospective loss costs and operating expenses are covered; and (4) be willing to walk away if the appropriate premium can’t be obtained." (2016 Shareholder Letter) 

Albert Einstein (1929): "The only progress I can see is progress in organization. The ordinary human being does not live long enough to draw any substantial benefit from his own experience. And no one, it seems, can benefit by the experiences of others. Being both a father and teacher, I know we can teach our children nothing. We can transmit to them neither our knowledge of life nor of mathematics. Each must learn its lesson anew." 

Andrew Bacevich (2021): "[T]he era of American primacy has ended. We may date its demise from the March 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq... In the roughly two decades since, as the U.S. was squandering trillions of dollars in failed military campaigns, the global order has undergone a transformation." 

Amine Ghali (2021): "People do not eat constitutions, do not drink elections, and do not sleep under the roof of the freedom of the press." (The Christian Science Monitor Weekly, January 25, 2021, page 11)