This weeks Barron's (subscription required) talks about The Next Warren Buffett. Of course nobody believes that's going to happen. The headline is cast to grab attention and sell papers, just like mine, but it's not happening: no way, no how!

Barron's discusses in it's story the strong possibilty that David Sokol, 51, the curent chairman of MidAmerican Energy Holdings Company is the most likely to succeed Buffett. MidAmerican has $39 billion in assets and is a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK.A). The headline should really have read "succeed" not be the "next".

Lakers owner Jerry Buss told reporters Thursday that he would consider trading Kobe Bryant and said he must behave in a business-like manner. To Buss, this means being open to all offers and considering anything where he thought he could get equal value - Yeah right!

I'm sure previous owner Jack Kent Cooke was all ears when Hall of Famers Jerry West and Elgin Baylor played out their careers on the Lakers. After Kent Cooke (also an astute business man) did his listening, he also probably laughed so uncontrollably he was not in a condition to answer the owner or general manager that was speaking to him.

Dr. Buss must be consulting with the very young ladies he has been dating, because it is beyond my imagination that trading Kobe is still being discussed. Besides, what equal value (LeBron? Duncan?) could he be talking about?

Players would think twice about joining a mediocre team with a disintegrating management team that let go of Jerry West, Shaquille O'Neal, Derrick Fisher (now back), and traded Caron Butler for disappointing, disappearing center Kwame Brown.

When Jerry West was our GM, you had players that took less pay to come to the southland. Shaquille was right, this owner has lost his touch. Not only would it be silly to trade Kobe for three other players, but I would do the reverse. I actually would trade four for one: our front office, Mr. Buss and kids, plus Mitch Kupchak, to get Jerry West back.

Yesterday I half-heartedly went to see the Pixar / Disney (NYSE: DIS) movie "Ratatouille" with my 11-year-old son. To my great surprise it was fantastic. The story, quality of animation and superb writing were cleverly executed. If Pixar continues to produce this highly imaginative level of animation then the first class Walt Disney tradition lives on.

It may appear that the entertainment industry is being diluted, fragmented and slowly surrendering to the Internet via vast amounts of "product" created by amateurs and wannabees, but this is deceiving. The Web has allowed for the immediate distribution of a diverse range of ideas in new media such as YouTube (Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG). It has created a platform to launch what otherwise might be undiscovered talent. But we deceive ourselves if we think this will ever be a substitute for the top talent assembled by Pixar / Disney.

For example, we know that there are more people playing basketball then ever before and they have greater skills too. However, we still pay top dollar and flock to see Kobe and Shaq, even though they now play on opposite coasts. We want to see the best. While the web has proven to be informative, entertaining and democratizing it is not Hollywood. While it has exposed us to new ideas, (and garbage) and provided opportunity to millions of people and new artists, for the most part it is a new delivery system and a new marketing platform. It is not Disney or Dreamworks and it never will be.