Is Madoff going to Get Off?

Is there going to be more example of how the rich get away with everything in this "democratic" society? Or are we going to see an example set with Bernie, like we did with Bernie Ebbers? You remember him. He is the other most recent rich white dude that our system decided to use as an example to make a statement to the public that our system is fair. I wrote about that Bernie irony back on January 2, 2009.

It looks as though Madoff is going to "Get Off". Well, it's not sure just what getting off for him means, but a plea bargain is being negotiated at this time. He may get as little as one count of securities fraud which would lead him to a 20 year sentence, along with a $5 Million fine. The fine should be easy for him to cover. As far as the jail time, I think that he will be golfing for a few years and then get out, or even do no time at all. Which would be no surprise.

Although, he could also get a bit more. With one count for every client which would lead him to a life in prison sentence. Being that there is no record of any trades ever made through the years of his bilking $50 Billion from his clients, I would say that only one count of securities fraud, for him, may be a bit on the lenient side.

What if there were no other rich white folks involved in this situation. Is it that there is pressure from our societies elite families that Madoff is going to be dealing with the system. If there weren't rich people that were scammed, and Bernie, being the "highly respected, investment guru, socialite of New York, would he be doing time? Without the blasphemous words from the elitist crowd of the upper crust of society, those movers and shakers that get the prosecutors, mayors, and police Chief's elected, would there be such a stink for justice?

Will we ever know...?




This, the 262nd entry in bloggoland! Thanks for reading and coming back. I always enjoy the comments, emails and the banter!!


(c)Copyright 2009 Doug Boggs

Bert and Ernie makes Bernie and the Shell game...

Bear with me and see this through as I make my point...This one is interesting and fun...

Bert and Ernie were basically the only Muppets to appear in the Sesame Street pilot episode, which was screen tested to a number of families in July 1969. Their brief appearance was the only part of the pilot that tested well, so it was decided that not only should Muppet characters be the "stars" of the show, but would also interact with the human characters, something that was not done in the pilot.

Bert and Ernie are roommates. Bert is good friends with a pigeon named Bernice, and is President of the National Association of W Lovers, a club dedicated to the letter "W". I am unclear if he is a fan of George Bush...Ernie's performance of "Rubber Duckie," wherein he sings affectionately about his squeaking toy duck and the joy it brings him during bathtime, became a modest mainstream hit, reaching No. 16 on the Billboard Hot 100 in September 1970.

A typical Bert and Ernie skit follows one of two similar patterns, both beginning with Ernie devising a hare-brained idea and Bert calmly attempting to talk him out of it. Usually this ends with Bert losing his temper and Ernie remaining oblivious to his own bad idea. Sometimes Ernie's idea miraculously turns out to be correct, much to Bert's evident frustration.

An example of a Bert and Ernie skit is the banana in my ear joke:

Bert: "Hey, you've got a banana in your ear!"
Ernie: "What?"
Bert: "I said, YOU'VE GOT A BANANA IN YOUR EAR!"
Ernie: "What? I can't hear you; I've got a banana in my ear!"

Bert: "Hey, you've got a banana in your ear!"
Ernie: "I know, I'm keeping the alligators away."
Bert: "But there aren't any alligators on Sesame Street!"
Ernie: "I know, it's working!"




No, this is not a picture of Ernie's brain on drugs, but an Abalone mollusk. Scientists have identified a group of genes, in the tropical marine Abalone mollusk, that control the formation of shapes and color patterns on the shell. A study published in the open access journal BMC Biology reveals that the shape and color patterns on the shell of the mollusk mirror the localized expression of specific genes in the mantle, a layer of skin situated just below the shell. The authors of the study identify one gene in particular that controls the formation of blue dots on the shell of the mollusk.

Another report found in the publication, Nature, done by University of California, Berkeley, researchers, indicates that we share the same genes that have been responsible for establishing the left-right asymmetry of animals for 500-650 million years, originating in the last common ancestor of all animals with bilateral body organization, creatures that include everything from worms to humans.

If you look at the the myriad of pictures you can find of our universe of different galaxies and other constellation formations you can compare them with those from snowflakes, to seashells, to crystals, cauliflower, coastlines, and broccoli and blood vessels. Our world, as well as the universe, possess some incredible patterns. Nature is filled with seemingly unlimited examples of amazing algorithmic arithmetic art.




A fractal, as seen above, is generally "a rough or fragmented geometric shape that can be split into parts, each of which is (at least approximately) a reduced-size copy of the whole," a property called self-similarity. This term was coined by Benoît Mandelbrot in 1975 and was derived from the Latin fractus meaning "broken" or "fractured." A mathematical fractal is based on an equation that undergoes iteration, a form of feedback based on recursion.

Recursion, in mathematics and computer science, is a method of defining functions in which the function being defined is applied within its own definition. The term is also used more generally to describe a process of repeating objects in a self-similar way. For instance, when the surfaces of two mirrors are almost parallel with each other the nested images that occur are a form of recursion, like the infinite mirror exhibit at the local county fair.

Ebber, found in the urban dictionary means: The ultimate, above all, astounding, incredible, the best, top, something that nothing is better than. Perhaps we need a new definition, through a fractal style of symantics?

Let's use the recursion definition and combine Bert and Ernie to make, Bernie. Then, let's look at a couple of repeating situations, in a similar way whose functions are applied and nearly mirror themselves on some financial parallel plane. I'm talking about Bernie Madoff (pronounced Made-Off) and Bernie Ebbers.

Bernie Ebbers was the CEO of WorldCom (later known as MCI) which filed for bankruptcy in 2002, the largest bankruptcy in US history at the time. In 2005, Bernie was found guilty for his role in accounting fraud that cost $11 billion, and he was sentenced to 25 years in prison - the longest term for a CEO of a Fortune 500 company at the time, says CNN.

Bernie Madoff, without regurgitating all of the latest dailies, was the CEO of the largest Hedge fund that was recently discovered as a 40 year long Ponzi scheme that bilked the investors to the tune of $50 Billion. A new world record!!

Now, according to the urban dictionary, Ebber is the grandest of them all...well, it seems that definition is now needing a change to a new Bernie.




This, the 229th entry in bloggoland! Thanks for reading and coming back. I always enjoy the comments, emails and the banter!!


(c)Copyright 2009 Doug Boggs