Scatological and Eschatological

One means obscene--particularly words dealing with excrement, and the other means biblical, "end of the world" and "the last judgment." When people opened the Wall Street Journal and read the front page story about a man named Markopolos who had been warning the SEC about Bernard Madoff for NINE years, there were probably a few choice words both obscene and theological that spewed over the coffee cup. All I said was, "WOW." I don't swear or use the F-word, but if I did, this would have been the day to let loose.

"Securities and Exchange Commission investigators discovered in 2006 that Bernard Madoff had misled the agency about how he managed customer money, according to documents, yet the SEC missed an opportunity to uncover an alleged Ponzi scheme.

The documents indicate the agency had Mr. Madoff in its sights amid multiple violations that, if pursued, could have blown open his alleged multibillion-dollar scam. Instead, his firm registered as an investment adviser, at the agency's request, and the public got no word of the violations.

Harry Markopolos -- who once worked for a Madoff rival -- sparked the probe with his nearly decadelong ..."

So what were their excuses, both the SEC watchdogs and the media watchdogs? Well, it seems we had a bunch of yapping Chihuahuas guarding a pit bull.

No definitive evidence [that's your job--to find it]

Could have been a vendetta [isn't that what they said about the John Edwards' mistress story and bloggers finding the phony CBS Bush documents?]

Occasionally he got facts and dates wrong [like you never do!]

"Once" he misstated a date [sometimes I mix up my kids' birthdates--that doesn't mean they weren't born]

So "Marco Polo" discovers the guy who "Made Off" with the funds and trust of thousands of investors and charities all over the world, and the Security and Exchange Commission headed by Christopher Cox (former Republican congressman appointed by Bush) with a budget of $900 million a year and an enforcement staff a third larger than it was in 2000 can't even follow up on nine years of tips. I think once Cox falls on his sword and takes the blame, this item will be removed from the SEC page.

During his tenure at the SEC, Chairman Cox has made vigorous enforcement of the securities laws the agency's top priority, bringing ground breaking cases against a variety of market abuses including hedge fund insider trading, stock options backdating, fraud aimed at senior citizens, municipal securities fraud, and securities scams on the Internet.

And then there is FINRA, which WSJ says has an even bigger budget than SEC.

"Then there's the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), a "self-regulatory organization" funded by industry. Its 3,000 employees ride herd on the brokerage industry, and these private cops are armed with an even bigger budget than the SEC. FINRA doesn't disclose tips and complaints when they don't result in enforcement action, so we can't know for sure whether FINRA was contacted about the alleged Ponzi scheme." To catch a thief

I realize the op ed page and the news pages of WSJ are different--one conservative the other the most liberal of all news sources in the USA--but just maybe if the journalists hadn't been chasing every positive story they could find about Obama, they just might have turned up this one.