Madoff Sentenced to 150 Years

Small victory for justice

The old fraudster, Bernie Madoff, is actually going to spend the rest of his life in prison for ripping all those people off! It's a Fourth of July miracle!

Truth be told, there was nothing special about Bernie Madoff except for his candor. Let's face it: The whole thing is a big Ponzi scheme. As long as suckers keep shoveling money in through their 401(k) contributions, everything's fine in the markets. That's pretty much how it works. It's all idle speculation that has little to nothing to do with business results. There are probably several dozen high fliers out there who deserve Madoff's fate, but they either haven't been caught yet or managed to adhere to the letter of the law in stealing everyone's money.

The weirdest thing about this is the way none of his employees, including people with intimate knowledge of the business operations caught on to the swindle. How does that happen? A massive swindle like that is not executed by one man without somebody else getting suspicious at some point. In a weird way, Bernie Madoff is a man of honor: He took the fall so that others could skate. You have to admire a captain who goes down with the ship.

Anyway, I'm glad justice was served on this guy, but I have to wonder how much money his sons stashed away in Switzerland.