QuestionerDo you think the net benefit of Doge will be positive or negative for the long-term health of the United States?
WarrenWell, why don't you give me a hard one? I think that bureaucracy is something that is amazingly prevalent and contagious even in our capital system. Big corporations, you know, overwhelmingly, most of them look like they could be run better. I'm sure Berkshire does in many respects. And government is the ultimate. So it really doesn't have any checks on it. And that's why it scares you to some extent about what the future of the currency will be, because they can print currency. And if you have people that get elected by promising people, things, and that doesn't mean that they aren't sincere about all kinds of items, but there's no politician that says to anybody that, at least if they have money, that, you know, I really think you have bad breath. And if you don't mind, would you step over and away from me? It just doesn't happen. And so I think the problem of how you control revenue and expenses in government is the one that is never fully solved. And as really dramatically certain, many civilizations, and I don't think we're immune from it, and we've come close to it. But if you tell me how in democracy, you go in and really change things. You know, we're operating at a fiscal deficit now that is unsustainable. Over a very long period of time, we don't know whether that means two years or 20 years. Because there's never been a country like the United States. But, you know, that if something can't go on forever, it will end, to quote, Herbert Stein, a famous economist. And we are doing something. this is unsustainable. And it has the, it has the aspect to it that it gets uncontrollable to a certain point. I mean, essentially you just give up on it. And Paul Volker, you know, kept that from happening in the United States. But we came close. We've come close multiple times. And, you know, we've still had very substantial. inflation in the United States, but it's never been run away yet. And that's not something that you want to try and experiment with because it feeds on itself. So I wouldn't want the job of trying to correct what's going on revenue and expenditures of the United States with roughly a 7% gap when probably a 3% gap is sustainable. And then the further away you get from that, the more to get to where the uncontrollable begins. And I think that it's a job I don't want, but it's a job I think should be done. And Congress does not seem good at doing it.