Rumor central: Was Spitzer after Madoff?

by on December 18, 2008 5

Here's a rumor appearing on a Wall Street traders' site 3 years ago that the SEC was planning to shut down Madoff and all his hedge funds. Just a rumor. The tipster who tipped me off to this says that it wasn't the SEC that was investigating Madoff, it was... you guessed it, Eliot Spitzer, who would have been Att'y General when this ran. I approached Spitzer recently to talk about financial stuff, on behalf of a magazine. Spitzer said He wasn't interested in talking about this stuff, happy holidays, and a day later signed up with Slate. Here's Spitzer's latest piece for Slate. Hasn't had anything to say about Madoff. Governor?

About Philip Weiss

Philip Weiss is Founder and Co-Editor of Mondoweiss.net.
Posted in US Politics

{ 5 comments... read them below or add one }

  1. Anonymous says:
    December 18, 2008 at 10:35 am

    "Of course, the SEC didn't do anything substantitive about it (other than one SEC official marrying into the Madoff family). Markopolous tried to talk the SEC into taking action by warning them that if they didn't move fast, Elliot Spitzer would beat them to it. (But now we know that the Spitzer family real estate firm, like so many New York real estate businesses, had money with Madoff.)"

    From Sailer – Harry Markopolous's 19-page letter to the SEC in 2005 – The World's Largest Hedge Fund Is a Fraud

  2. morris says:
    December 18, 2008 at 11:15 am

    I can't help think the whole madoff thing is politics. But good politics! Breaking down Neocon financing.
    After all citigroup broke with a bigger fraud on the same day madoff was discredited:

  3. Madrid says:
    December 18, 2008 at 12:03 pm

    That thread on elitetrader.com is eerie. So obviously, there were significant rumors 3 years ago that the SEC or Spitzer was actually going to "shut down" Madoff. In other words, they weren't just investigating him– they were thinking of "shutting him down."

    Then this other twist, which is that Spitzer has money with Madoff– where is Sailer getting that from? What is his source.

    I do honestly believe that Spitzer was trying to clean up Wall Street– for whatever reason, I am not sure. But I truly believe he is and was one of the good guys, trying against all odds, to clean up the corrupt cess pool that is and was Wall Street.

  4. Steve Sailer says:
    December 18, 2008 at 3:42 pm

    "Where is Sailer getting that from?"

    National Public Radio:

    NPR's Mike Pesca:

    Add the name Eliot Spitzer to the list of prominent people allegedly ripped off by Wall Street trader Bernard L. Madoff. Yesterday at Slate's holiday party Spitzer, who is writing a column for the online publication, confirmed that his family's firm had investments with a Madoff subsidiary.

    The former governor said that he never met Madoff and wasn't into "the Palm Beach scene," which he described as stuffier than he prefers, but did confirm that his family real estate firm lost money. He shrugged his shoulders in a "what can you do" way, and seemed in good spirits as he talked and joked with the crowd of mostly journalists.

    At one point, On the Media's Brooke Gladstone, who like Spitzer is Jewish, joked that "Bernie Madoff was worse for the Jews than anyone since David Berkowitz" and Spitzer replied, "Well, I was New York's second Jewish governor and look what I did."

    http://clusterstock.alleyinsider.com/2008/12/ready-to-rumble-eliot-spitzer-lost-money-with-madoff

  5. LeaNder says:
    December 19, 2008 at 6:59 pm

    A Glenn Greenwald highlight:

    According to Gershman, Spitzer has many more steps to complete in his public humiliation ritual before he should be permitted to appear in decent, respectable company again:

    I wonder if Rubinstein said exactly what Gershman reports?

    Yet unlike Eliot Spitzer, Dick Cheney — just like Berkeley Law Professor John Yoo; think tank scholar, author and former Georgetown School of Foreign Service Professor Doug Feith; Georgetown's current Distinguished University Professor George Tenet, and so many others — isn't going to be forced to endure any humiliation or remorse rituals whatsoever. As Cheney is feted by network news anchors a year or two from now upon release of the book he plans to write, there will be no real objections that this monstrous war criminal and perverter of our constitutional framework is treated like some sort of retired royal dignitary. Cheney is and will remain a symbol of profound seriousness, entitled to respect and endowed with permanent wisdom.

    Pseudo morality and double standards. Feels 19th.

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