There's A Certain Status To Suffering In

Yet Another Hedge Fund Manager Explained Icelandic Banking To Me This Way: You Have A Dog, And I Have A Cat. We Agree That Each Is Worth A Billion Dollars. You Sell Me The Dog For A Billion, And I Sell You The Cat For A Billion. Now We Are No Longer Pet Owners But Icelandic Banks, With A Billion Dollars In New Assets.

All That Was Clear That The Profits To Be Had From Smart People Making Complicated Bets Overwhelmed Anything That Could Be Had From Servicing Customers, Or Allocating Capital To Productive Enterprise.

The Only Thing History Teaches Us, A Wise Man Once Said, Is That History Doesn’t Teach Us Anything.

Above All, Recognize That If You Have Had Success, You Have Also Had Luck — And With Luck Comes Obligation. You Owe A Debt, And Not Just To Your Gods. You Owe A Debt To The Unlucky.

A Tourist Can't Help But Have A Distorted Opinion Of A Place: He Meets Unrepresentative People, Has Unrepresentative Experiences, And Runs Around Imposing Upon The Place The Fantastic Mental Pictures He Had In His Head When He Got There.