Posted on 06/30/2009 6:40:17 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- On a sunny June morning in downtown Manhattan, the kids at the Columbus Park playground had to share their swings, slides and benches with photographers, reporters, cameramen and the people they had come to see: Bernie Madoff victims.
There is not enough room on the sidewalk in front of the Daniel Patrick Moynihan United States Courthouse on Pearl Street to contain the Cirque de Madoff. When Bernie the Smirk is making his way inside -- as he was Monday to receive his 150-year jail sentence -- the crowd is so large it must expand across the street to the playground and down Mulberry Street, which runs perpendicular.
Not that everyone minds.
"Criminals are good for business," said Sam Ng, owner of Sam's Traditional Deli at 30 Mulberry as he rushed to fill orders coming from the horde for hot and iced coffee. "I think they should put him in jail for a long time."
Presumably, Ng hopes Madoff didn't act alone, if only to help his sales.
Ng and the kids in the park know that the Bernie Madoff spectacle, once compelling for illustrating the grandeur and scope of his fraud, is in danger of losing its relevance. It's been six months since Madoff's scam was uncovered and six months we've been hearing the horror stories.
By now, you know them by heart: the lost retirement, college funds, endowments, nest eggs and jobs. Madoff created 10,000 financial nightmares. There's not enough money to cover the losses. We get the idea. See WSJ story about the victims.
(Excerpt) Read more at marketwatch.com ...
"It's not right," Friedman said. "If the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.) came into a bank, everyone would get their money back, and they would get the money that's on their statement. With SIPC they don't want to pay you the value of the money on your statement because they don't have the money."
He added, "They are making up the laws to suit themselves."
Friedman wants SIPC to reimburse Madoff investors above and beyond the maximum $500,000 it insures on brokerage accounts. Even though the FDIC, until recently, had set limits on deposit losses, Friedman thinks SIPC should throw its rules out the window just for him.
No
Nope. Five hundred grand is the maximum. Take it or leave it.
HECK no.
No.
Madoff led them to believe that they had the inside track on something.
In other words: cheating. They were good with that.
And I think Madoff was punished far too severely for what he did, especially when one sees how violent criminals are sentenced to and serve far less time than Madoff will serve.
The people deserve their original investment $.
Nothing more.
No.
I don’t.
Nope
Why not.
The line starts behind Al Sharpton and the Slavery Reparations posse.
No.
I stand corrected.
They giggled amongst themselves when they thought they were making consistent double-digit returns year over year.
They are so greedy they refused to investigate what no one in their right minds would believe.
It was their gamble and their pseudo-high when they thought they were winning, so let them live with their real hangover.
Why would the taxpayer owe them? They bet on a doped horse that was disqualified and they lost. They made a bad bet.
No, Madoff owes them.
Sounds like he’s wining for a bailout and this should be cut off at the knees.
From whom? Not from me.
You go ahead and send them money.
Didn’t you mean to say:
HELL NO !!!!!!!!
Not out of my pocket they don’t.
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