Any comments about Mr Madoff?

[Kaliayev]

The thing that annoys me most about Madoff is that he ruined it all before I could get in on the game.

I could have been rich, rich I tell you!

[tw]

Originally Posted by Zhuge Liang

The thing that annoys me most about Madoff is that he ruined it all before I could get in on the game.

Steven Greenspan, a psychiatry professor at the U of CO wrote a book about the factors and psychology of a scam. After his book (Annals of Gullibility)was published, "with supreme irony", he lost half his retirement investments with Madoff.

Greenspan wrote:
The basic mechanism explaining the success of Ponzi schemes is the tendency of humans to model their actions, especially when dealing with matters they don't fully understand, on the behavior of other humans."

Greenspan explains the Madoff ponzi scheme AND Saddam's WMDs.

Greenspan also noted the scam is particularly powerful within an ethnic or religious group as Ponzi demonstrated in 1920 Italy. Religious people particularly because: if another believes your religion, then he must be trustworthy. Nonsense. Rarely are the most religious also the most trustworthy. Just another example of why religion justifies so much of what those same people would otherwise call 'evil'.

How to identify the greatest ‘evils’? Let religion be a basis of any decision. Madoff was particularly influential – could promote his lies easiest - among other older Jews.

[Kaliayev]

Originally Posted by tw

Steven Greenspan, a psychiatry professor at the U of CO wrote a book about the factors and psychology of a scam. After his book (Annals of Gullibility)was published, "with supreme irony", he lost half his retirement investments with Madoff. Greenspan explains the Madoff ponzi scheme AND Saddam's WMDs.

Greenspan also noted the scam is particularly powerful within an ethnic or religious group as Ponzi demonstrated in 1920 Italy. Religious people particularly because: if another believes your religion, then he must be trustworthy. Nonsense. Rarely are the most religious also the most trustworthy. Just another example of why religion justifies so much of what those same people would otherwise call 'evil'.

How to identify the greatest ‘evils’? Let religion be a basis of any decision. Madoff was particularly influential – could promote his lies easiest - among other older Jews.

Good stuff. I've often taken an interest in the work of con artists and the mechanisms behind the process. Its amazing how much of an effect the right image can have on someone.

[tw]

Originally Posted by Zhuge Liang

Its amazing how much of an effect the right image can have on someone.

Even on the expert who wrote the book.