George Soros, a man who can annoy with some of his less-than-brilliant pronouncements on public affairs, nevertheless is an investor of genius. Well, at least he was in the 80s and early 90s when, purely out of glorious avarice, of course, he helped push Britain out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism in September, 1992. This event irreversibly damaged the reputation for competence of the then-Tory government of John Major and Chancellor Norman Lamont. Soros’s fortunes in the 1990s waxed, although he failed to exploit fully the 1990s dotcom boom and now prefers to travel the world dispensing advice. He is loathed by many on the right for his support for the Democrats. I saw him give testimony to a Treasury Select Commitee in the House of Commons a few years ago and felt that this was a brilliant financier who, like many men who are brilliant in one area, can be often rather silly in other areas (Einstein springs to mind).
But the beauty of open markets is, that even if you disagree with the views of a person, you can still trade with that person and make each other better off. Voltaire, when he travelled around England in the 18th Century, marvelled at the London Stock Exchange and how people of all religions could and did transact with one another. Well, Soros, a lefty financier, has just made the sort of deal that is likely to send those charming folk of the Democratic Undergound off the edge. Tee-hee.
Given the lefts tendency towards politically and ideologically motivated blindness, I will be thoroughly unsurprised if none of the large American democratic organizations, such as moveon.org, make much of a peep about this interesting compromise. The above is also a fault certainly shared by many on the “right” as well. An excellent example would be THIS sites incessant habit of tossing reason and logic out the window anytime George Bush and his foreign policy are called into question.
like mackerel in the moonlight he stinks and shines at the same time.
Stephan, when it comes to Bush, I think you will find that a lot of people on the “right” and libertarians are deeply hostile to much of his agenda, although not on the tax-cutting stuff. Many small government conservatives gave up on Dubya years ago.
BTW, Stephan, are you the same Stephan that so gamely tried to defend Russia’s interesting use of Polonium 210 a few weeks back as a tool of foreign policy? Forgive me if you are another Stephan.
It must be hypocrite week, first Gore gets the a stuffing over his heating bill for his mansions, Soros buys into the evil Haliburton and Aussie greenie Bob Brown uses frequent flyer points to get to Johannesburg for a greenie jamboree “which has attracted 65,000 environmental experts and lobbyists from 189 countries.”
(Link)
What next? perhaps the next IPCC meeting to be held in Bali? You could not make it up.(Link)
I’ve always believed that those who express loathing for a business, particularly a publicly-traded corporation can exercise their right to purchase enough shares of the business to attempt to change it for the better. If that’s what Soros is doing, that’s fine. The left should do the same with Wal-Mart. It would be a far better solution than the government-imposed fixes they are attempting. If he just wants to gain profit, then that’s another thing.
Tell us a bit more about Einstein, Jonathan.
James, here is something to read.(Link) Einstein was a socialist. A lot of scientists are, like Dawkins.
Given that the net effect of many socialist policies is actually to transfer wealth from the middle classes to business owners (most government programs get contracted out to private companies), it’s hardly surprising that someone like Soros would support the Democrats.
Rich