Hi, Shrewd!        Login  
Shrewd'm.com 
A merry & shrewd investing community
Best Of BRK.ABest OfAll BoardsThe Shrewd’m WeeklyLearn to InvestHow to Become Shrewd
Search
Shrewd'm.com Merry shrewd investors
Search
Best Of BRK.ABest OfAll BoardsThe Shrewd’m WeeklyLearn to InvestHow to Become Shrewd


The week's question
In December 2024, in the thread "Re: BRK: Why Not XOM?", BreckHutHigh asked the members: "What about the long road trips with kids?" This week it is put to everyone again. The button below opens the small thread re-asking it - read what others have said so far, then give your own answer as an ordinary reply.
Answer this questionContinue to Shrewd'mThis note won't appear again
Stocks A to Z / Stocks B / Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A)
Unthreaded | Threaded | Whole Thread (62) |
Author: Umm 🐝  😊 😞
Number: of 21941 
Subject: Re: 13F : More Chevron
Date: 02/22/24 5:18 PM
Post New | Post Reply | Report Post | Recommend It!
No. of Recommendations: 28
"Again, you might not follow American politics that closely. MUSK is being punished, google the twitter files, to start you off, they are sending a very strong message to corporate America, don't FK with team DEM , comprende?"

LOL

That is some nutty conspiracy stuff Harold.

I am looking for some entertainment though so I will pretend you are serious. So which Democrat is driving this plan? Which Democrat is the person who decided they were going to go after Musk and "send a message to corporate America"? How many other people are in on the plan to send a strong message to corporate America? Does it go all the way up to the top of the national party, or is it just a local Delaware Democrat plan? What incentive did they provide to a Delaware judge in order to get her to go along since this decision will be on her judicial record? Also, if it wasn't a good judicial judgement, why wasn't it appealed? Are the higher courts in on the plan as well?

These should be easy questions to answer if your conspiracy is true, but I doubt you are going to be able to answer any of them and will likely just wave it all away as me being naive (unintentional irony by you of course....).

Here is a lesson for you to help you choose better information sources. One's that inform you rather than make you look silly and conspiratorial.

The lesson is: It is easy to concoct a nutty conspiracy by not using vague details or undefined groups. This means using words like "They", "Them", "Dems", or "The government" when talking about the conspiracy. Those vague details allow the believer to fill in their own details in their mind and make it exist as a kind of fantasy world. However, those conspiracies quickly fall apart whenever specific details are asked for because asking for specific details forces a person to bring the conspiracy into the real world and it cannot stand up. So whenever your poor sources give you a story that uses vague details you should question that vagueness.

So when you hear ""They are implanting microchips in everyone when they get a vaccine." You can ask who "they" is and what is their specific purpose for doing so and think about who else would have to know and why they would go along with it. Same logic when it has to do with ill-defined groups such as "Dems". Every decision ultimately comes from either one specific person in charge or from a committee with specific people who vote on it.

My all-time favorite ill-defined group is "The government". Conspiracy nuts like to use the government as a foil since it can seem like this big powerful entity. In reality though the government isn't one entity. It is made up of hundreds of thousands of individual people (millions if you include local governments and the military in that ill-defined group). Furthermore, it is made up of different groups that have different roles and responsibilities. Roles that are often at odds with each other. Again, each decision "The government" makes is made by either one specific person or a committee of specific people. Why not use those specifics instead? Furthermore, most of the people working for the government do not have a political axe to grind. They are career bureaucrats following the policies and procedures they are supposed to follow. Anything decision "The government" makes requires many of these bureaucrats in order to get executed. Why would these career bureaucrats go along with an illegal, nutty conspiracy?

I hope this helps you get past some of the nutty stuff your sources of information give you so you can be better educated and make better decisions.
Post New | Post Reply | Report Post | Recommend It!
Print the post
Members reply directly to Umm here — and replies get answered. Reading is free; so is joining the conversation. Join Shrewd'm »
This community has written 21,448 posts about Berkshire Hathaway. The article-length ones it recommended most:
BRK: Why Not XOM? · 62 recs · 2024
Second quarter comments · 60 recs · 2023
Berkshire's Profit Contributors · 57 recs · 2023
Summary of 2Q 2026 · 54 recs · 2026
3Q Summary · 53 recs · 2024
Unthreaded | Threaded | Whole Thread (62) |


Announcements
Berkshire Hathaway FAQ
Contact Shrewd'm
Contact the developer of these message boards.

Best Of BRK.A | Best Of | Favourites & Replies | All Boards | Followed Shrewds | Open Questions | Moving a community