Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently posted to the discussion thread for another blog entry at this site:
“I earned the $500 million, Anonymous.”
Who says you earned this? I think I have earned $2 Billion for my work. Does that mean I will see it?
I have the laws of the United States on my side. That tells me something.
I have seen thousands of my fellow community members say that the debate that I launched was the most important debate that we ever saw on our boards. That tells me something.
I have my name on the most important piece of peer-reviewed research published in the past 30 years. That tells me something.
I had a fellow who was universally recognized as the smartest numbers guy in our community decide to devote eight years of his life to exploring the implications of my ideas knowing that he would not receive a penny of compensation in return. That tells me something.
I have had investing advisors call me on the phone and talk to me for hours because they want to learn more about Valuation-Informed Indexing and how it can help their clients. That tells me something.
I have had several college professors include links to material posted at my web site as part of the required reading for their courses because they felt that the material was so important and could not be found elsewhere. That tells me something.
I have had you Goons reduced to making use of death threats and demands for unjustified board bannings and tens of thousands of acts of defamation and threats to get academic researchers fired for the “crime” of doing honest work. That tells me something.
I have had many of my fellow bloggers come up to me at Financial Blogger Conference events and tell me that they find great merit in my ideas and that they hope that the day will come when the entire blogging community can talk them over in a civil and reasoned way without you Goons around. That tells me something.
I have seen Robert Shiller awarded a Nobel prize for his “revolutionary” (his word) research findings.
I saw the economic crisis that was predicted in a book published by Shiller in March 2000 come to pass and destroy millions of middle-class lives and even undermine the confidence of many on both the left and the right in the political system that permitted this to take place. That tells me something.
Everything that I have seen since the morning of May 13, 2002, tells me that we did the right thing as a society when we elected to make financial fraud a felony, a crime punishable by a prison sentence. Nothing that I have seen cuts the other way. So, yes, I have come to the conclusion that we got that one right and that we are going to see reasonable (and I hope charitable) enforcement of our laws in the days following the next price crash, when as a society we come to realize that the harm done by Get Rich Quick schemes that is so evident in the long run is often hidden from most of us in the short term.
I have earned $500 million and a lot more from my work of the past 15 years, Anonymous. It is very, very, very important work. I am humbled to have been handed the assignment that I have been handed. I will do everything in my power to carry out the assignment in a way that works best for every single person involved. And that’s that. I will solider on with love in my heart for you Goons but also with love in my heart for the millions of middle-class investors whose lives you are in the process of destroying with your nasty and ugly, and, yes, criminal abusiveness. The motto that I call to mind with every post I advance is to be as honest as possible without crossing the line and becoming uncharitable while also being as charitable as possible without crossing the ling and becoming dishonest. I hope that works for you.
If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. I don’t have it in my powers to make you happy about it. I need to accept that reality whether I like the idea or not.
I wish you all good things. If that helps, I can deliver that much.
Rob
That’s right, Rob. That $500 million is as good as in the bank. Time to order the yacht and Mercedes S class sedan!
Those things aren’t my style, Richard. I have never owned a new car. When I receive the $500 million, it is my intention to enjoy my first new car. I doubt that it will be a Mercedes S Class Sedan, although I suppose that that is possible. I am 100 percent certain that there will not be a yacht in the picture.
I will be working in those days (this will presumably be after the next price crash) to explain to the world why the Wall Street Con Men and the members of their various internet Goon squads behaved as this did. In short, I will be working to get your prison sentence reduced a bit. Is that not important work? I think it is important work indeed. I think it is work that is 10 times as important as any work that Bill Gates or Steve Jobs ever did (no diss intended to Gates or Jobs). The people of this country need to be able to place their trust in investing advice professionals if the society is going to continue functioning as it always has. Because of the circumstances in which I have been placed, I am uniquely positioned to help restore that trust. So I intend to step forward and do that important work.
And of course I intend to be properly compensated for it. Jobs was compensated for his work. Gates was compensated for his work. We all use computers and cell phones. So their work touched millions. But we all also put money away for our old-age retirements. We all need to know what the peer-reviewed research says and we all need to feel safe expressing our sincere views at every discussion board and blog on the internet. I am in the process of opening every discussion board and blog on the internet to honest posting re safe withdrawal rates and scores of other critically important investment-related topics. I am sure not going to apologize for doing such important work at a time when no one else was willing to take on the abuse dished out by you Goons to get the job done. If I were to accept one dollar less than $500 million, I would be sending a signal that this matter is not as important as it truly is. I would be insulting the millions of middle-class people for whom I do this work. Not this boy. Find someone else, you know?
If you do not like the idea of me receiving a check for $500 million, you should have checked yourself when you first started walking down the dark path that you find yourself on today. I certainly did not intend to be starting a process that would end with the receipt of a check for $500 million on the morning of May 13, 2002. It is you Goons who made my efforts so important by being so brutally abusive in your efforts to deny the millions of middle-class people who want access to honest reports on what the last 36 years of peer-reviewed research tells us about how stock investing works who did that. You set things up in the way that they have been set up. I merely played the cards that were dealt me in the best manner available to me. I came to earn $500 million (times a big multiplier — the $500 million figure is a low-ball figure aimed at putting the nasty stuff behind us as quickly as possible) as a result of your lack of concern for the financial futures of MILLIONS of good middle-class people who never did a thing to any of you Goons to deserve such treatment.
It is the people of the United States (through their elected representatives) who wrote the laws against financial fraud. It is the people of the United States who will be bringing you to justice. Yes, I will speak up on your behalf. There are things that I can say in charity that I believe should be said and it is my intent to go ahead and say those things despite it all. But I am not going to insult those people by pretending that this matter is of lesser importance than the creation and promotion of personal computers and cell phones. When people plan for their retirements, they are planning for decades of their futures. They have a right to access to accurate and honest numbers. The person who opens up their access to honest and accurate retirement planning numbers has added value to this world of a whole big bunch more than $500 million.
I have a funny feeling that there will not be one person alive in the United States (including my good friend Jack Bogle, even including most of my Goon friends) who will say otherwise in the days following the next price crash. But I have been wrong before and it is possible that it is happening again. In the event that I am wrong, I would in all likelihood be the last to know. So we will have to wait a bit to find out how things play out play out in the days following the next crash to find out for certain.
I hope that works for you, Richard.
Rob