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I think it's incredibly important that managers and CEOs do take control of the accounting treatment of their books and records. The concept of I'm not an accountant is certainly an abused concept. It is really important to take control and understand the translation of what is going on in that company through those financial records. So, I completely agree with that, and I don't think enough of that actually does occur. And, it would be good.
I think the tools are available, also. There is a lot of concern right now about financial reporting, yet when you think about it, if the will is there, the tools are available. There are certain improvements that we can make. Certainly, we can talk about some of the micro issues that can be improved, but the tools are currently there. We have a very good system.
We have a very good system — to pick up on your comments, Marty. We have a very good system. I think management does see themselves as fiduciaries for the equity shareholders. They could do a better job of that in some cases, and in that case, hopefully people will vote to improve that.
But, on the credit side, I will say that I think we do take a secondary position with management, as creditors. There is not as much disclosure for liquidity positions. The current market environment demands more of that. But, that's a point in time issue, and I think there are some improvements we could make that would allow better information to flow through to the creditors of a corporation.
But, I also believe that most of that should come through the market. That, really, the market is the best discipline. If you go back over the last ten years or so, the places where we've seen the greatest improvements in financial disclosure in different parts of corporate America have been in areas where there were problems and the market disciplined the process and improved the disclosure to clearly lower the cost of capital at those firms. They felt absolutely required to improve their reporting. And so, there are certainly examples of those improvements that are out there.
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