Thanking Mr. Madoff
As the world focuses on the misdeeds of Bernard Madoff, who pleaded guilty Thursday to operating a multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme, at least one person — granted, not one of his defrauded investors — is singing his praises. Writing on The Big Money, Chadwick Matlin has gone so far as to pen an open letter of appreciation to Madoff.
What has the disgraced businessman done to warrant such a gracious gesture? Well, according to Matlin, Madoff:
• Forced the government to acknowledge “just how crappy the SEC is at doing its job.”
• Giving Americans a villian — a wealthy, white, Jewish villain who defrauded Holocaust survivors, at that — at whom they could direct their anger about the economy’s nosedive.
• Inspired the creation of a whistleblower’s office at the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to keep track of and investigate fraud-related tips.
Matlin concludes: “Without you Bernie, we would have stewed in our internal anger. And we would have had nobody to catalyze change for the future. Know that while you spend the rest of your life in jail, I’ll be thinking of these noble contributions. And I’ll be thankful.”
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
