Stupidity

The Guardian had an article about a man that made millions from hedge funds. I don't know how he did it, but basically he bet against the sub-prime mortgages and made a fortune. Then he said “goodbye suckers” and sailed off into the sunset. He had some interesting things to say:
"The low-hanging fruit, ie idiots whose parents paid for prep school, Yale and then the Harvard MBA, was there for the taking," he wrote. "These people who were (often) truly not worthy of the education they received (or supposedly received) rose to the top of companies such as AIG, Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers and all levels of our government," he said.
"All of this behaviour supporting the aristocracy only ended up making it easier for me to find people stupid enough to take the other side of my trades. God bless America." To read the whole article go here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/oct/18/banking-useconomy
So that's it then. Or it is according to this guy that says we are in this financial mess due to stupidity.

But if you think about it; nearly every mess that the world has got itself into involves a lot of stupidity. And most of the stupidity comes from the belief that other people know what is best for them. It comes from stupid things like faith, trust, and obedience. And, as a rule, the reason why we are so faithful and obedient to our so called leaders is because we are stupid. And when it all comes down to dust it is only ourselves that we have to blame. If we retrace every cause and effect – aside from blind luck, or damn bad luck – almost everything eventually comes down to personal responsibility. And there's a very interesting thing that happens when one truly accepts personal responsibility: the angry, emotional, side of the pain goes way. As such there's no one to crucify but ourself, and most of us begin to see reason before we decide to do such a radical thing as that! The only thing to do is to admit to stupidity, and to make a mental vow to try not to do such a thing again.

But our leaders are still at it, and rather than admit that they were wrong they prop up a corpse and then tell us that it's still alive. Yer right. And I've got some swamp land in Florida that is about to be drained; the crocodiles have agreed to a treaty, and I'm assured that they will move to a new place very soon.

Stupidity is part and parcel of life. And if it's true that all opposites are part of the same thing, then one cannot act intelligently until one admits to ones inner tendency to act stupidly. And so let's admit it. Our leaders are stupid, and we are stupid, and the only way out of this mess is to admit it.

Yer right.