We’re Both Getting Dirty: Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices and I are both being financially bled by the same thing — and it isn’t each other. The pig in Charlie Munger’s parable is wearing a federal badge.
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Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices and I are both being
financially bled by the same thing — and it isn’t each other.
The pig in Charlie Munger’s parable is wearing a federal badge.
We’re Both Getting Dirty
Honest
Politics
By Brent Lambi
OPINION | May 24, 2026
Charlie Munger said it plain. “Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty, and the pig likes it.” I want to say something today that an opposing party in active litigation almost never says. Berkshire Hathaway and I are both being hurt. By the same thing. And it isn’t each other.
Let me state my interest plainly. I am the pro se plaintiff in Case No. CI 26-1752, Douglas County District Court. I sued Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices entities for breach of a Buyer’s Listing Agreement and defamation. Separately, I have a federal civil rights and FOIA enforcement case pending in the U.S. District Court for the District of Nebraska, Case No. 8:26-cv-00101-SMB-RCC, against components of the DEA, DOJ, and DHS.
Those two cases should have nothing to do with each other. They do.
Here is what I believe, in plain English. A federal officer, acting outside the lawful boundaries of their office, has reasons to want my state defamation case bogged down. Discovery in my state case touches my federal case. If my state case never produces discovery, their exposure shrinks. Delay protects them. Resolution exposes them.
That is the pig in the pen.
Now here is what most writers would never admit. Berkshire is not the villain in this story. Berkshire is bleeding too.
Count the costs. Defense counsel fees, billed by the hour, in a case the math says should have settled. Insurance reserves tied up. Brand exposure every week the case stays in the news. Discovery motions, depositions, sanctions briefing — none of that comes cheap. Every dollar Berkshire’s insurer spends defending this case past the point where settlement made sense is a dollar shareholders will not see. Charlie Munger could have done that arithmetic on a napkin.
And me? I am a pro se plaintiff carrying my own load on two fronts at once. Filing fees, transcripts, expert costs, the unrecoverable hours of my own life. Reputation hits in a small civic-journalism market. Stress I will not pretend does not exist.
Both sides of the “v.” are losing money. The only party making a return on this litigation is the federal actor who benefits from delay.
Which raises the only question that matters: why is this case still being fought the way it is being fought?
I do not believe Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices, as a sophisticated business defendant, would choose to fight a routine state defamation and breach-of-contract case this way.
The conduct does not match the math. Defenses calibrated for delay, not resolution. Discovery resistance that costs more than the underlying claim. A posture that drives up fees on both sides while the actual exposure sits unchanged.
When the math does not work, somebody else is doing the calculations.
I believe — and I will say it directly — that the defense strategy in this case is being shaped, influenced, or coordinated by interests outside the four corners of the Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices contractual relationship. A third party. One with its own reasons. One whose interests are not Berkshire’s interests, and are certainly not mine.
If that is true, Berkshire is not the defendant. Berkshire is the host. And I am the bait.
Charlie Munger warned about exactly this. When you wrestle with a pig, the pig sets the rules. The pig picks the venue. The pig decides how long the fight goes. And when it is over, the pig walks away clean while everyone else is covered in mud and short on cash.
So I will say what a writer and a plaintiff can say at the same time. Berkshire, look at the bill. Look at who benefits. Look at who keeps pushing for more depositions, more delay, more motion practice in a case that should have closed months ago. Whose money is paying for this? Whose strategy is this actually serving?
And then look at the door. I am open to resolution. I have always been open to resolution. A buyer’s agency dispute is not a constitutional crisis. It is a contract and a duty of care, and grown adults find a number. If Berkshire’s actual decision-makers want to talk — not the defense apparatus, the actual decision-makers — the door is open.
What I am not willing to do is keep wrestling indefinitely while a federal officer profits from our fight.
That is the story. A pig in the pen. Two parties getting bled. One actor laughing.
Charlie Munger told us how this ends. We both get dirty. The pig likes it. The question for Omaha, for Berkshire shareholders, and for every lawyer billing on this case, is whether anyone is going to do the obvious thing: stop wrestling each other, and look at who let the pig in.
The author is the pro se plaintiff in Case No. CI 26-1752, Douglas County District Court, and in the matter docketed as Case No. 8:26-cv-00101-SMB-RCC, U.S. District Court for the District of Nebraska. The opinions expressed are the author’s own and reflect allegations and beliefs based on the public record and the author’s observation of the proceedings. Nothing herein is intended as a finding of fact against any party. All parties named are presumed entitled to a full and fair adjudication on the merits. Honest Politics welcomes responses for publication.
