On November 8th, 1991, Ron Suskind of the Wall Street Journal wrote an article titled “Legend Revisited: Warren Buffett’s Aura as Folksy Sage Masks Tough, Polished Man.” The article was one of the first of its kind for recognizing that the image of Warren Buffett as a Midwestern bumpkin did not adequately convey the sophistication or the ruthlessness of Buffett’s personality.
On one hand, you had Buffett letting his sister file for bankruptcy, viewing the emotional matter in contractual terms (Buffett felt that the lenders needed to learn something about adequately appraising risk, and he wanted to keep his money). He would also regularly charge his daughter parking fees associated with picking her up at the airport. On the other hand, Buffett had a litany of friends publicly telling the media that “money wasn’t all that important to him.”
What caught my attention was this passage from Suskind: “His egalitarian … Read the rest of this article!