Cheers for the vote of confidence Gregster, but I took no offence with what Ross wrote. Part of my anger comes from my frustration of dealing with our tax system, understanding the many obstacles it puts in front of business, and my particular knowledge, from tax enforcement, of just how powerful, and brutal, the State is. That is, a practical understanding of the philosophical repugnance of the Nanny State, from her steel capped jackboots up.

But apart from that, how could I take offence? Ross is obviously talking about chartered accountants: I'm not one, I'm a guerrilla : )

"It's got nothing to do with what's right or wrong, and I think you're flogging a dead horse to expect anything more from them.

Seriously, when was the last time you saw an accountant run a successful business other than their own?"

[Seriously, when was the last time you saw an accountant run a successful business other than his own?]

It would be nice to see you, Ross, rail against the endarkenment. But the likes of you make it inevitable.

Don't ever let the fire go out Mark.

you're flogging a dead horse to expect anything more from them

Probably true, but who else is to know if we shut the fuck up?

Seriously, when was the last time you saw an accountant run a successful business other than his own?

My direct employer successfully runs several major businesses and is an accountant.

...the likes of Hickey and Morgan have been totally seduced--perhaps it's their natural inclination--by third way economics. These guys fundamentally subscribe to the idea of state intervention in the financial markets.

These types are of the managerial class. The think the power of the state is all that's needed to correct things. They simply don't understand the role of risk and entrepreneurship.

Now, Mark, I know you're an accountant, and I know you're a proponent of free markets, and the moral basis for them. But most accountants are simply involved in the business of moving numbers around on a balance sheet, and beyond that of informing their clients of what is legal and what is not.

Hickey and Morgan are nothing more than uber-accountants. They have no moral compass. It's all about the balance sheet. It's got nothing to do with what's right or wrong, and I think you're flogging a dead horse to expect anything more from them.

Seriously, when was the last time you saw an accountant run a successful business other than their own?

Below is my post to interest.co.nz, on the suggestion this purchase is the start by Kiwibank of much wider activities, including moving into the insurance market:

http://www.interest.co.nz/kiwi...

For those of us who understand the dreadful implications of government ownership of assets and distortion of what should be free markets, this is awful.

Did everyone realise when Kiwibank was set up that it would be a backdoor to government as an active player in the financial advisory sector, where they will have an unfair advantage over their private sector competitors via the huge uncapped pool of my taxpayer money and the avenue for crony legislation to aide them. And yes, quite possibly insurance and life insurance industries also.

National have to stop this. Stop it quick. It's the perfect example of how the State just keeps growing itself if there is not an active philosophy constraining it. There's not in the West anymore. This is entirely inappropriate in a free country that can only exist on a base of limited government.

(For anyone who has had to work with Kiwibank's ineptly printed bank statements, this is doubly a cause for concern. Governments aren’t competent to run businesses).

I'm finding myself wanting to know how PeoplesBank is going to finance this purchase. Debt financing or are they just assuming they can use my equity (that the IRD took against my wishes, as I don't believe in government owning such assets)?

And as I'm going to own this business, can I please have a look at the valuation used to make the offer.

From: http://www.stuff.co.nz/busines...

New Zealand economist and philanthropist Gareth Morgan will pump the proceeds from the sale of his $1.5billion funds management company to Kiwibank back into charity.

Other than the ‘to Kiwibank’ bit, I'm fine with that, until ...

The Morgan Foundation puts its money in social investments around the world to relieve poverty. In New Zealand it funds research to improve the level of public understanding of key issues ranging from global warming to financial literacy."The proceeds would provide a significant boost to that work," Morgan said.

Nothing wrong with wanting to rid the world of poverty, but, all the evidence from Gareth to date indicates he believes this has to be done by the brute force of the Nanny State: redistribution, tax, tax and coerce. The Morgan Foundation works like a microcosm of the Welfare State, and thus can only, ironically, make more poverty. I wonder how it reconciles, even, taxes on fuel and capital taxes on low rent properties, with ridding poverty?

Anyway, a great woman indicated, some time ago, what the real problem is here:

"Since the cause of today's collapse lies in philosophy, it is in philosophy that the battle for an Intellectual Renaissance has to start."

I fear, unfortunately, as bad as the West has fallen, we have yet a long way still to travel into the dark pit of the Intellectual Dark Ages.

...threw the moneychangers out of the temple.

Bad Jews! Nasty moneygrubbing Jews. What a terrible thing usury is. Let's put those horrible Jews in their place. Put funny hats on them. Cast them out. Good show.

You've got to read 'The Big Kahuna', Richard. The Gareth James Version.

Where was the bit where Jesus called for a capital gains tax? I must have missed it.

Whaleoil finally makes a very good point: http://www.whaleoil.co.nz/2012...

Quote:

But since Gareth Morgan has been calling for a capital gains tax, I invite him to do as he preaches, and pay some of his capital gain for his business back to the government.

After all, as Gareth lectured us in the Herald in July of this year:

“The principle of taxation is that those with the greatest ability to pay tax should shoulder the greatest burden and those with the least should be the greatest beneficiaries of State redistribution.”

Get on with it Gareth. Lead by example. Pay out 28% of your capital gain on GMI to the state.

It's not about tall poppy syndrome. Some of us, free men, understand that our long term freedom, and our long term prosperity, turns on a free market and limited government. Jesus Morgan just grew the government. The commission of every one of his investors - many of whom wouldn't agree with the Nanny State - now goes to grow the welfare state and the growing tax take needed to contain the violence of it, plus the violence of the coercive Big Brother State to extract it.

That's what he's sold out. My freedom, again.

Quite a development, in the wrong direction. It is little wonder Morgan pushes the climate change cart. He’s been hand in glove with the dim-witted power-lusters.

“Dr Morgan said that the decision to sell was driven by the need for a solid and credible succession plan for GMI; a plan that would deliver certainty for clients over the long-term.“

Or: “They let me write this Press Release. But really it’s a face-saving bailout for one of the poorest performing Kiwisaver schemes.”

“I intend to remain very closely involved with the business, being both a director and a core member of the investment strategy team,” Dr Morgan said.

Really means: “I’m going to leave home each day and go in where they’ll set me up a pretend office.”

“However, to future-proof the care of clients’ portfolios I have to be responsible and make sure the firm is well-positioned for life after me.”

Means: “It was a job too far along the trough.”

“This change will give me more time to focus on investment strategy and innovation, roles that really are of foremost importance to me and the business.”

“I’ll read up on where I got it all so wrong. It reminds me when I was a kid, and put my hand in the fire. I learned not to do it more than three times.”