Posted on 02/28/2011 1:24:38 PM PST by fight_truth_decay
Bernard Madoff, the disgraced financier, accused the investors whose money he lost in a £40 billion Wall Street investment fund of being greedy.
Madoff, who is serving a 150-year prison sentence, also rubbished the financial reforms introduced by the US to prevent future corruption and claimed: "The whole government is a Ponzi scheme".
He added: "These banks and these funds had to know there were problems". "It was a nightmare for me," he said. "Even the regulators felt sorry for me ... They said 'how did you live with this? Not being able to tell anybody?'"
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Delusional, truly delusional.
"All I'm asking is to make enough money to feed my children."
There is something to that. My dad always used to say that you can’t cheat an honest man.
Yes but he is right about many of his investors being absolute slime. Many had phony foundations for tax scams.
Your son killed himself because of you, Bernie. Feel that pain, you nutjob.
They made me do it. I was just following orders.
He makes a point.
So according to Madoff the government had to know about the scheme, the banks had to know about the scheme, the investors had to know about the scheme, he knew about the scheme, everyone knew about the scheme...except his family?
Sure, it’s always somebody elses fault.
What a crock of shit!
This is the important part, and VERY true!!!
Indeed, that is a claim that beggars belief.
A scheme this large could not have been run by one man, simply due to the mechanical aspects necessary to move that much money around. It is absolutely true that other people knew full well what was going on.
The only issue open to debate is “who knew?”
He is mostly correct (although he gladly went along with the charade). The only reason his Ponzi scheme unraveled was that the worldwide paper money Ponzi scheme unraveled (and was then papered over with a few trillion in new paper, loans and guarantees).
I have no idea if his family knew or not.
But others could NOT have known about this scheme.
Including the government regulators.
Yes, I know what he did is evil.
But he did have his back covered for a long time, didn’t he?
I want to see where it is illegal to be greedy. Show me.
Where is that law that prohibits greed?
Who is the authority that defines greed?
It is illegal to steal and defraud. It is illegal in dozens of different ways to steal or defraud. It has been illegal to steal and defraud since Biblical times.
If I look to Bernie Madoff to define “greed” for me, I’m really in serious trouble.
Yeah, it was everybody ELSE! Dat’s da ticket!
Puh-leeze.
Colonel, USAFR
For the most part, no, he’s not delusional. Other people knew. They *had* to know.
The banks that moved money for him knew. JP Morgan’s UK division submitted a suspicious activity report to their authorities. The US part of JPM didn’t. At least four outside parties were telling the SEC that this was a huge scam, but the SEC refused to conduct a credible investigation.
The feeder funds that fed him money from other investors, run by accredited investment managers, had to know this was a scam too. Various big investment banks who shied away from doing business with him knew he was a scam (because they refused to do business with him), but yet they also refused to drop a dime on him.
Other people knew. There is no doubt about this. There is no way in today’s markets that you can move $50B+ around and NOT leave tracks.
Bernie left tracks.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.