#madoff

It was such a good documentary. Not too long, not too short.

I would have liked to understand better the fraudulent operation behind that scheme.

Honestly, people are as guilty as Bernie Madoff, they are just so so greedy. How can someone even believe to have 100% return without any loses.

And the institutions are as guilty as him too.

I really felt sorry for the mathematician, Markopolos who knew that Madoff was a fraud and did everything to show it, but no one believed him, until it was too late.

Some people are just too stupid.

Worst JP Morgan Chase "acknowledged a lack of oversight in monitoring Bernie Madoff's bank transactions, but the company claimed that no employee knowingly assisted in the fraud."

Some quotes :

"- And the choice he made was, he could live with himself as a liar much more easily than he could live with himself as a failure." (Episode 1)

"- He's both Bernie's savior, if you will, and Bernie's deep, enraging enemy, because Bernie, as the ultimate control freak, has allowed somebody to basically control him." (Episode 2)

"- For what Madoff needed to reassure his investors. Even before Madoff himself knew what he needed." (Episode 2)

"- A white-collar crime is different than a blue-collar crime. A blue-collar crime, the bodies drop before you investigate. And a white-collar crime, they drop afterwards." (Episode 4)

"- He chose, the methodology of death that he did, a painful solution, to atone for his sins of omission." (Episode 4)

"- Why would anybody trust me to give me business? Turn their money over to me? But the first thing I learned: Whatever you do in this business, never break your word. Your word was your bond, literally, and that was it. You trusted everybody. But nothing in this industry is what it looks like." (Episode 4)

"- People knew not to ask too many questions. If you're getting good returns and you're getting lots of money, and you're not to as any questions, you don't ask any questions. And, you know, greed has a way of doing that to people." (Kotz - Episode 4)

"- JP Morgan Chase has pled guilty to five massive criminal conspiracies involving billions of dollars within the last six years. When they get caught, they're never required to disclose the profits they made on the scheme. They just pay a fine and they go on." (Episode 4)

"- You know, my dad's crime... it killed my brother quickly and it's killing me slowly." (Mark Madoff - Episode 4)

"- Noted psychiatrists that I talked with about Madoff's case hypothesized that what Bernie was grieving was the loss of his family's adoration. It was not so much that he loved them as that he loved having them love him. Which is, of course, pure narcissism and pure sociopath." (Episode 4)

"- And the price of trusting anyone is that they can betray you liked that." (Episode 4)

Our people still lack education.  In the 1980′s America sold itself as the place to be where you could pay for an education and climb to the top of the social order. But that just ended up being another failed American Dream, that it once attempted to project into reality. 

In the 90′s, before the housing crisis, a.k.a., Subprime mortgage crisis, students began taking on massive debt for a chance to rise up the percentiles of society. The 1% was only a degree away. 

The banks dished out this cash so fast, there weren’t enough students for all the loan-sharking they were willing to do. 

And then the internet went bust for a while and professions at that top flip-flopped, and the universities and the banks got a new generation of schmucks willing to borrow cash at even higher rates for much lower returns. 

Meanwhile, some sociopath on Wall Street who was supposed to be overseeing the financial markets robbed everyone blindly because those guys also failed to conduct any real due diligence. 

As a result, the banks and financial institutions around America failed because no one was watching the guy appointed to watch everyone else. What did we do? We bailed shady bankers out of their responsibility to conduct due diligence at every level, for the safety and security of everyone else’s life savings. Slimy bankers that had just dished out piles of cash (again) for fast-food employees and undocumented immigrants to purchase part of the “American Dream,” knowing that these undereducated innocents would eventually default on those mortgages down the line, and much after they sold them off.

These were Ponzi Schemes conducted by the banks, themselves. 

But America is fantastic at breads and circuses. 

In a political context, the phrase means to generate public approval, not by excellence in public service or public policy, but by diversion, distraction or by satisfying the most immediate or base requirements of a populace[1] — by offering a palliative: for example food (bread) or entertainment (circuses).

It isn’t purposely done. It is the aftermath of a naively immature nation. One that is still figuring out all of its kinks and quirks, working to rapidly repair them to avoid further destruction of its citizens and their livelihoods.

Could we do it a little faster by eliminating most of the politics from the agendas that work best for the masses? ABSOLUTELY. 

Will we?  ......... to be continued.