Hats off to Bernard Madoff, he’s managed to achieve something remarkable even by the greasy yardstick of the United States. His well-documented crime was to initiate a Ponzi scheme, put simply, set up an Investment plan and pay investors from money paid in by other investors rather than real profits. Naughty man.
His investment group was making exceptional returns, too-good-to-be-true returns as it happens, and if it wasn’t for the global recession -which caused investors to withdraw sums that didn’t exist- he’d probably still be happily trading.
Just before we go into the Piqued rant, quite obviously due shortly, it’s worth noting the Ponzi scheme is named after Charles Ponzi who notoriously used the technique in the United States in the 1920’s. Indeed, because of the too-good-to-be-true returns Madoff’s firm was investigated eight times by the US Securities and Exchange Commission. I wonder why his operation wasn’t shut down sooner? Perhaps the US economy couldn’t afford to shut him because of what, or who, Madoff was investing his fortunes in… Oooh ruddy er.
His achievement wasn’t just to pinch over £40 billion in the space of a 16 year period, it’s to be branded ‘extraordinarily evil’ by the beak, ‘a monster who should be caged’ a ‘beast’ by some of his victims before being sentenced to 150 years in prison -which is just fucking silly as he’s 71 and in some way complements the hyperbole regarding the comments on his new found status as the devil incarnate.
What Madoff did was utterly wrong, but he needed the rapaciousness of his investors to generate a fortune, he’s not ‘evil,’ he’s a giant shit taking advantage of both capitalism and the wilfully greedy. ‘Evil’ would be, say, waging fraudulent wars via cynical deception resulting in the deaths and injury of thousands of innocent women, children and men for financial rewards beyond numbers, and then, sickeningly, in addition to not facing any sort of prosecution, retiring in cunting luxury without a care in the world… On a lighter note I had a cold beef sandwich last night whilst watching Valentino Rossi win his 100th Moto GP race, so I couldn’t really give a shiny turd.
