I know, it's a tough question...
Bernie Madoff's son committed sideways a few weeks back, spurring John Robbins ask the question, Who's Done More Damage, Bernard Madoff or Alan Greenspan?
I think mine is the more relevant question.
The anger at Madoff is misplaced. He's a piker compared to the federal government. After all, the multi-trillion dollar progressive ponzi schemes cooked up in DC dwarf Madoff’s mere 50 billion dollar one. And people voluntarily turned money over to Bernie.
The progressive ponzi scheme was crafted with confiscated money and the flim flam was kept afloat by Federal Reserve currency manipulation, stealing from workers and savers by a constant devaluation of the dollars we earn. This drove savers into the arms of Wall Street because we needed to invest in securities just to stay ahead of inflation.
Bernie Madoff just proves the old adage: "If anybody besides the federal government tried that, they'd go to jail!" Bernie's mistake was stealing without a government license.
11 comments:
Your old adage reminds me of the bumper sticker: "Don't steal! The government hates competition!"
Sometimes I really wonder if conservative have even a tenuous grasp on the fundamentals of capitalism. People did not "voluntarily" give money to Bernie Madoff so that they could be defrauded. You do understand that, right? There is no government program akin to a "Ponzi scheme." You do know what a Ponzi scheme is, right? You do recall the Republicans behaving like economic-fascists by proposing we invest public money in the stock market, right? You do understand that it was lack of regulation, in particular the repeal of Glass-Steaglall, a mainly Republican intiative, that paved the way for the mortgage meltdown and recession?
Jeez. I'm as liberal and progressive as you can get, and I'm more of a capitalist than any conservative I know.
JMJ
JMJ= you really live in your own little world don't you? Ever hear of Social Security?
Jersey: You are a collectivist. Your language betrays you:
"You do recall the Republicans behaving like economic-fascists by proposing we invest public money in the stock market, right?
It's the people's money! Government should not be "investing" it for us in nonexistent lock boxes.
The mortgate meltdown was caused by government "regulations" that shielded the ignorant and the venal from the consequences of their actions.
From thefreedictionary.com
The high returns that a Ponzi scheme advertises (and pays) require an ever-increasing flow of money from investors in order to keep the scheme going.
The system is doomed to collapse because there are little or no underlying earnings from the money received by the promoter.
Al gore's lock box is empty, Jersey! Time to stop believing in fairy tales.
Federal, state and local government ponzi schemes have created between $50-100 trillion in unfunded liabilities, depending on whose numbers you use.
>lack of regulation...that paved the way for the mortgage meltdown and recession?
I didn't think there was anybody left that was batty enough to still believe that myth. There was no real deregulation. The deregulation that the wacky shriekers blabber about was no meaningful deregulation at all.
As for regulation, were you aware that the 2010 Code of Federal Regulations has 225 volumes, for a total of 35,367 pages of fine-print (not even regular-sized print) regulations.
No free society has 35,367 pages of regulations, in any font size.
>You do recall the Republicans
Why did you switch to talking about Republicans? I thought you were talking about conservatives.
>I'm more of a capitalist than any conservative I know
Clearly you don't know any conservatives, in the sense of individuals dedicated to maintaining the absolute principles of liberty established by the Founders (the only meaningful sense of the word "conservative" in a discussion of American politics).
being forced to lend to people who couldn't pay back was such a great freaking idea!
As someone who was in the industry for sometime, I could not get over the actions of the people who had no responsibility. I would see customers getting loans that I was required to give, yet I knew the people were going to be in over their head and that they had no intentions of keeping their commitments! Yeah, we needed more regulation!
Hi Silverfish . . The Bernie bandit is old news. I think it was Barnum that said "there's one born every minute". Ponzi schemes will be active a thousand years from now. If we get that far.
Frankly I'm more concerned about people like Jersey McJones. They think more government and less freedom will cure all of our societal ills.
Mr. Obama is trying very hard to prove that it won't. More government, more huge bundles of legislation, and more legal restrictions, make lawyers rich and happy and citizens downright mad!
It's voters like Jersey McJones that got us into this mess, and those voters were Republicans and Democrats. Let's get a little definition here. Both of these outfits have failed to support and abide by our founding documents.
Let's re-define political parties as 'CONSERVATIVE Libertarian' and 'LIBERAL Socialist'.
And let's insist on a REAL platform of intentions from each !
Stay cool. . . Bump
Thanks, Old Man!
You are so right to remind us of Hayek's phrase...
"to the socialist of all parties"
No one here is defending statist republicans.
Sorry, but I just have to address this garbage.
//People did not "voluntarily" give money to Bernie Madoff so that they could be defrauded. You do understand that, right? //
Wrong.
They voluntarily surrendered money to someone who was offering things that were too good to be true. The old saying goes, "if it's too good to be true, it probably is". They should have done their homework better, these were educated people who were not stupid. It's not like he went to the homes of elderly SS people and conned them out of their nest eggs here.
Shame on Madoff for doing it, but shame on the gullible fools who thought Madoff could make them richer in an abnormally short amount of time. i feel bad for them, but when you take risks like this you could pay a high price for your lack of financial maturity.
//There is no government program akin to a "Ponzi scheme."//
Wrong again. SS is the biggest and it is not voluntary.
//You do recall the Republicans behaving like economic-fascists by proposing we invest public money in the stock market, right? //
Wrong again, three strikes and you are out. They proposed opportunities for voluntary participation, but the Dems had so many people scared to even consider such a notion because that would have stripped them of some of their power to "lord" over the people.
Democrats, statist GOP, and progressive government proponents are content with you having the least amount of choices as possible. It's sad that you don;t see that. Basically that means you are "voluntarily" making yourself a subject of the federal government by allowing them to seize and retain control over you and your right to choose.
You may have that much faith in the federal government, but I don't. I dare you to name one government program that functions efficiently and meets the needs of the people they claim they are trying to serve. Other than the military, I can think of none.
Aren't the two the same? The entire board of Directors for Goldman-Sachs are all BHO "CZARS". The Liberal attack on Wall Street is simply a shell game so you don't notice that the government has funneled huge amounts of wall street and wall street funnels huge amounts of money back to "the taxpayers".
“You do understand that it was lack of regulation, in particular the repeal of Glass-Steaglall, a mainly Republican intiative, that paved the way for the mortgage meltdown and recession? “
Jersey
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivmL-lXNy64&feature=player_embedded
This will shoot a hole right through that ‘theory’
-Bank Affirmative Action-
Watch at the 3:00 mark. Clinton Admin knew the sub-prime meltdown would come.
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