Blame it on Bernie

There has been a lot of loud, public scorn directed at Bernie Madoff recently, much of which he has certainly earned. However I find myself wondering what it is we are avoiding when we spend so much time on Madoff. After all, there are plenty of people who can no longer retire, who lost life savings in the market, who had never even heard of Bernie Madoff before the scandal, let alone invested money with him.

Sure blaming Bernie is easy, especially since he has done some truly reprehensible things. But as he will be spending the rest of his life in prison, railing against him is hardly a productive use of time. For his victims, this may be a necessary emotional outlet. For the rest of us, it is a dangerous blind spot that could easily trap us. What makes Bernie so easy is that he is tangible. He has a face, a (highly recognizable) name, and best of all, a clear and apparent crime. The cause of the rest of our economic woes, by contrast, remains frustratingly elusive.

Perhaps, now that the trial is over and Madoff himself is being locked away, we can start to look at the bigger picture. How has privatizing our public safety net endangered many of our futures? Why are we so slow to realize that sometimes "the market" is not the only or the best solution to our national problems?

Is the plight of Madoff's many victims terrible? of course it is.
Would it be slightly better if they could be certain they would have a public, national healthcare plan and a robust social security agency to turn to? Absolutely.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/business/economy/10bailout.html?_r=2&hp

from Today's Times:

"Mr Geithner also expressed concern that too many government controls would discourage private investors from participating."

hmm, know what makes me not want to invest in Corporate America right now? Corporate America. These banks, car companies, ect ran themselves into the ground (some more than others, of course) with little to no government involvement. That they are still fighting to maintain business as usual (excessive compensation, bonuses for nonperformance, private jets) is what makes me avoid them like the plague. What could government possibly do to make it worse? I mean, I know the GOP is trying hard to send the tattered remains of our economy up in smoke with their ridiculous hard-on for tax cuts, but aside from that I tend to think that government might be able to inject a little (gasp) calculability, a little common sense into the economy by putting the brakes on some of our most out of control entrepreneurs. Anyone who can still argue for a totally unrestrained, unfettered market has not been paying attention for the last year. so i say: GIVE IT UP. Accept government intervention where it can be helpful, and we will all work together to do things better from now on? deal?

*whew* i feel slightly better now. daily news fueled rage purged.

"The Federal Reserve and the Bush administration believe the threat of defaults by A.I.G. on a lot of unregulated derivative contracts creates a national emergency. It’s too bad they didn’t think of that when they were opposing any efforts to regulate those markets. That would have been interfering with free enterprise. This move, somehow, is not."

This is from the blog of the New York Times chief financial guy. A) how weird is it that he agrees with me? B) how come when I say it im a crazy leftist who doesnt understand the economy?

*sigh*

http://www.bronxcb8.org/index.php?menuoption=about

Community Board 8 in the bronx has a great website