[ExI] Belief in Market Efficiency

[spike]

> ...On Behalf Of Damien Broderick
> Subject: Re: [ExI] Belief in Market Efficiency
> 
> At 06:03 PM 1/31/2009 -0600, I wrote:
> 
> >>Equal rights under law is one thing
> >
> >And that one thing is an ideological fairytale
> 
> and I should have added: As Keith Henson, to his outrageous 
> misfortune, is probably the one among us who knows this best 
> and most cruelly... Damien Broderick

This notion brings up a host of interesting questions.  What if Keith had
been Mr. Brown?  Imagine a kind of down and out hungry minority guy
picketing in front of the Co$ compound and generally causing them
discomfort.  What would our legal system have done then?

Mr. Brown's case made it sound like he was a street person, homeless,
hungry, basically a decent sort as evidenced by his submitting to the
authorities.  I don't know what else they could do other than send him to
prison, for if free he would soon get hungry again.

I object to Mr. Madoff being under wimpy house arrest in the penthouse.  He
should be in with the general population at the federal pen.  They should
send letters to all his relatives and friends, letting them know that any
gifts they received from Uncle Bernie must be turned over forthwith, or face
charges of receiving stolen property.  This would be more than an idle
threat, with the knowledge that Uncle Bernie was down at Club Fed making
lists of those to whom the money and jewels were sent.

Here's another thought in this scattershot post: the same conditions that
allowed Madoff to do his thing surely resulted in dozens of similar cases
that haven't collapsed yet.  I can imagine funds in which the organizers
stole only a little, so their funds have 80 or 90 percent of the funds they
are supposed to have, with no practical way to make up the difference.
Madoff's may be the biggest pyramid scheme, but I suspect there are scores
if not hundreds yet to be revealed.

spike