Tag Archives: Digression

Sarah Palin is a Quitter, and Quitters Never Win

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Quitters Never Win and Winners Never Quit

Argh! I can hear my mother misquoting Vince Lombardi in my sleep: “Quitters never win, and winners never quit.” A simple saying that forced me to keep my word throughout my life – even when it cost me money.

Why is it these simple clichés can hold such importance as to guide our every decision? (This particular phrase was so particularly annoying that it’s guided my decisions both in and out of business for over thirty years.) There are certainly others, but this mother’s saying carries special weight; as much an integrity statement as an indictment of those who would give up without a fight.

‘Quitters never win and winners never quit’ could be the primary rule dictating everything from a second grader’s soccer game to a governor’s fulfillment of her term.

Palin is a Quitter

We’ve written good things about Alaska Governor Sarah Palin in the past, including a post that chronicled why she was a better leader than Barack Obama. That was September 2008 and this is now.

In demonstrating the worst leadership trait possible, Palin has decided that she cannot operate as a lame duck governor. (She had previously announced that she would not seek reelection.) Palin has decided to step down on July 26, 2009. Her current term was scheduled to end next year.

“I Want to Spend More Time with My Family”

While this is not the soon-to-be-former governor’s stated reason for quitting, her actual reason might as well be as lame as all the on again/off again retirements of star athletes. All we got from Palin was a quick Tweet: “We’ll soon attach info on decision to not seek re-election … this is in Alaska’s best interest, my family’s happy … it is good. Stay tuned.”

Well, as long as your family is happy…

Not so fast, Sarah. You are a quitter and we are disappointed. You were elected by the citizens of Alaska to serve them as their governor until 2010. Whether you were planning another term or not is irrelevant: they were counting on you to keep your word. When you chose to become the governor of Alaska, you agreed to serve the citizens of that frigid state and now you’re giving it up for personal reasons.

(Not to mention that you’ve passed on an extraordinary chance to shove through your agenda; an agenda you claimed was in opposition to the Washington elite. Who is going to carry your torch now? Who is going to keep your promises to the people of Alaska?)

Sarah Palin is not a Winner

News flash: True leaders don’t let personal reasons get in the way of their commitments to others. True leaders don’t let personal reasons get in the way of doing what is right. They keep their word and they never quit. True leaders are winners.

Palin is not, as we once thought, a true leader.

Much like Dan Quayle, Joe Biden and Admiral Stockdale, Palin lost more of her luster every time she opened her mouth. Her latest spat with David Letterman painted her as a died-in-the-wool Republican; someone willing to give up any sense of right for a chance to bash the Left. (Pun intended.) Every day since November 4, 2008 Palin has become more of a clown; a caricature of someone who once professed she was going to change the world of politics in Washington.

Sometime over the last eight months she stopped being a leader and became a punchline.


Good Riddance, Sarah P.

Likely, most Alaskans won’t care very much that you’re quitting. In fact, many will be relieved. Go away, Sarah Palin. Go back into the obscurity from where you were plucked and leave the future of the world to the leaders… we’ll try our best to hang on without you. (Note our tongues in our cheeks.)

Chaggle.com is the Next Big Thing – Don’t Haggle with The Manager

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Chaggle is Cool

Chaggle is the Next (Fill in the Blank)

Last month a colleague told me about this little technology startup that had carved out a pretty cool niche for themselves – and within ten minutes of hearing his description of Chaggle.com, I was happily using what should prove to be the next big thing on the World Wide Web. We’re talking the next billion-dollar company (that’s billion with a b), and that’s not hyperbole; it’s a promise.

Before you think I’ve enjoyed too much Cabernet today, rest assured that I see about 100 new Internet ventures a year, and this is the first one I’ve blogged about – and now I’m giving you a chance to get in on the ground floor.

Ground Floor Opportunity

Unfortunately, Chaggle doesn’t need cash, or I’d mortgage everything just to get a small piece. (If they do look for financing in the future, I’ll have my checkbook ready.) The ground floor I’m posting about is the chance to become one of the first thousand or so to download a service that will soon be used by millions. (Imagine if you were the 125th person on MySpace… you’d have a great vanity domain and a nice story to tell your friends.)

I’m proud to brag that I was one of the first hundred to join Chaggle, and I easily secured the Chaggle handle “Steve.” I had my pick of vanity handles and could have been TheManager, Stud_Muffin, or Roger; but chose Steve because my name is not Roger and I don’t want to use the Chaggle plug-in under those other names. (Though I’ve always considered myself a bit of stud muffin – okay, I may have had too much Cab today.)

What the Heck is Chaggle?

By now, you’re hopefully wondering “what in the world is this Chaggle anyway?”


Chaggle is an Internet Explorer plug-in that allows you to chat with fellow Chagglers (I think I made that up, so I want the credit later) who happen to be surfing the same site you’re visiting. (While we’re making up words, let’s call it Chaggling instead of chatting and Chag instead of chat.)

After a quick download of the Chaggle software you can open a separate Chaggle window that rides alongside your main browser window. As you move from site-to-site, you take Chaggle with you and you have the opportunity to Chag with fellow Chagglers about what you see on the site.

Rather than try to provide an example in detail of what you can do with Chaggle, I’ll let Chaggle.com co-founder Clayton Smith enlighten you:

The aspect of Chaggle that we feel is so special is that it allows you to bring an integrated, interactive chat capability along with you to every site you browse. So if you’re at CNBC’s website and you’re looking at an article on Chrysler’s bankruptcy, on Chaggle you can either chat about it on the CNBC.com main webpage with everyone viewing the site, or you can post comments (or web “crumbs”) that will be tagged to that specific news article’s URL. There is no other service out there that provides this level of interactivity across the web. Our goal is to make Chaggle the perpetual conversation of the Internet. – Clayton Smith

Well put, Clayton. (If you’re still a little in the dark about how to use Chaggle, check out the homepage video at Chaggle.com.)

To give you a sense of how I plan to use Chaggle, imagine I post about a cool new Web service called Chaggle and you happen to be reading the article and you are a fellow Chaggler. If we both have Chaggle turned on, you can tell me what a great writer I am via a Chag and I can respond with a warm thank you. Sounds pretty cool, doesn’t it?

What’s the Catch?

Chaggle is cool. Chaggle is useful. Chaggle is free. Chaggle is new… and that’s the downside right now. Since its Beta-version rollout on May 1, Chaggle.com only has about 100 Chagglers. (Of course, I look at this as a bonus: you can swoop in and grab that vanity handle you always wanted. Can anyone say “LonelyGirl15?”)

As a brand new service, Chaggle built their platform for the most popular browser (IE) first. To date, Chagglers can only Chag using Internet Explorer, though Chaggle is working on a Firefox version right now, and they expect it to be released in a couple of months. The Firefox version of Chaggle will work on any operating system using Mozilla’s Firefox as its Web browser (Linux, Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows, etc).

Chag Me, I’m Chagilicious

Once you download the free plug-in, find me surfing online and let’s Chag about whatever site I’m visiting. (Of course, you can just tell me what a great writer I am, and I’ll respond with a warm thank you.)

Email Etiquette for Message Importance – When “Importance: High” = “Don’t Waste Your Time”

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Quick, Read This Email… Now!

Today I received another in a long line of email messages from a certain vendor touting their newest and greatest product improvement. This email, like all of its predecessors, arrived in my Outlook inbox as a message of High Importance. Because I receive just one in five hundred messages marked “Importance: High,” I generally give these more than a quick glance when they arrive.

Imagine my surprise when I noticed a subject line this morning that read **Special Sneak Peek: (Vendor Name Omitted) New Guided Search**. I thought, “Wow, this is big news! You made an enhancement to your website that will have little to no effect on me or my business, and you sent me the details in a message marked High Importance. Congratulations! I now like you even less than I did five minutes ago.”

The Email Who Cried Wolf

No need to rehash this as a new millennium version of the famous fable attributed to Aesop, except to say that with each email of miniscule importance sent by this vendor that masquerades as a critical Top Secret UMBRA message, I lose more interest in reading anything they send… anything.

In fact, it’s become so bad that I now treat all of their messages akin to how one would treat the proclamations of a ten-year old who brags about what a big boy he is every time he makes “doody in the toy-toy.” We get it, congratulations; you pooped.


It’s not just egocentric vendors who misuse the High Importance selection in Outlook, though it does seem to be solely the province of the unintelligent and unsophisticated. Ever get the High Importance email on Tuesday afternoon sent to everyone at your company reminding you that the office refrigerator will be cleaned out promptly at 5:00 PM on Friday? Chances are your CEO didn’t send it.

You Don’t Sell Plasma

Out of every 500 High Importance emails I receive, about ten truly require my immediate attention – and none of these ten ever originates from a vendor. Here’s a quick email etiquette tip: if you’re a vendor who does not sell plasma, stop acting like you sell plasma. The more you try to make your customers care about your (fill in the blank), the less they care.

High Importance status should exist solely for those emails that require both immediate attention and for which there will be negative consequences if they do not receive immediate attention. If your email merely requires that the recipients read and respond, write “RESPONSE REQUIRED” in the subject line. Likewise, if your message requires that recipients take an action based on the email, try placing “ACTION REQUIRED” in the subject line.

What About Tagging Something “Low Importance?”

Here’s a bonus to those vendors who don’t understand basic email marketing rules, and who mark their outbound sales messages as “Importance: Low.” Likely you tagged these emails as having Low Importance out of some misguided consideration for your recipient. Congratulations, your emails are ending up in SPAM filters all across the Web. Quick tip: never mark any email as having Low Importance. If the email is truly of Low Importance, don’t send it.

For that matter, if the message only highlights some unimportant feature enhancement of your website, don’t send that email either.

Stop the Madness – Social Networking is not a Panacea

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You’re Not Ready for Social Networking

A colleague who operates a retail franchise asked me my thoughts about incorporating social networking into his Internet sales efforts. Currently, he tracks about 35% of his sales directly to customers who first contacted his store via the Internet.

As I explained to my colleague (without trying to sound like a killjoy) I have no doubt that franchisees can and do sell their wares using Facebook, MySpace and Twitter. The question, however, should not be “How do I use social networking to drive sales?” but rather “Am I ready to use social networking to drive sales?” For 99% of the franchised retail locations out there, the answer is that you’re just not ready.

“Internet sales” (let’s not call it Internet marketing just yet) is an evolution. Think of your Internet sales approach as a “crawl-walk-run” strategy and determine where your store is using this scale. For example, if you’re not closing 20% of the leads generated by your website, then you’re still crawling. Put some processes and training in place to make sure you’re selling all of the low-funnel buyers before spending hours maintaining a Facebook page to possibly attract high-funnel browsers.

I Think I Can Fly

Social networking, you see, is in the flying stage of the crawl-walk-run continuum, because it takes roughly 100 times the effort to generate one sale as a good old fashioned salesman following a good old fashioned process working a good old fashioned lead. The ROI is just not there. Spending time managing a company MySpace account without successfully managing the leads and calls you’re already getting is like skipping first, second and third base on your way to home. It’s just not a homerun if you don’t touch all the bases.


I gave him a few examples to help him determine where his store was on the crawl-walk-run continuum:

You’re still crawling if:

  • You don’t have a written, clearly defined Internet sales process that includes at least 90 days of follow-up;
  • You’re not actively managing your store’s online reputation; and
  • You don’t currently collect 99% of customer email addresses in your store.

You’re just walking if:

  • You’re not logging at least 90% of your inbound sales calls in your CRM tool for future follow-up;
  • You’re not sending monthly, targeted email messages to your database (and I’m not talking about an e-newsletter here); and
  • You don’t have a clearly defined SEO strategy that includes managing your presence on the local searches.

You might be running if:

  • You’re consistently closing 20% of your Internet leads and phone ups;
  • You employ an effective SEM strategy; and
  • You’ve exhausted all the traditional leads sources available to you and you are actively seeking new ways to drive customers into your store.

But Twitter is Cool

The sad truth to all of this is that the cool stuff you can do on the Internet in the retail business, like social networking, is useless to an Internet sales department that has failed to do the heavy lifting first. We all want to do what’s new and glamorous, but there are no magic bullets in sales – it all takes work and 99% of that work is not glamorous.

This is not to say that social networking can’t have a huge impact on a brand, because it can. As I explained to my colleague, leave the bulk of the social networking to the manufacturer (the owners of the brand) until you’ve successfully harvested the low hanging fruit for your store.

Lazy Kids and the End of Entrepreneurship in America

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The Future of Entrepreneurship in America

I noticed something strange while sitting on my front porch today: A professional landscaping crew of seven had descended on my cul-de-sac to industriously cut the lawns and trim the bushes at my home and the homes of my neighbors on either side.

While this same event happens twice each week during this time of year, it finally struck me as odd today when I realized that there were children of lawn-mowing-age living under our very roofs. In fact, of the eight kids occupying our three homes, five of them are old enough to mow lawns. (While I began mowing neighborhood lawns for cash at 9, I am only counting those kids 11 and above as being of lawn-mowing-age.)


Help Wanted: Lawn Mowing Tweens and Teens

It’s not like we never offered to let our children mow our lawns for cash. I have offered, begged, cajoled and even pleaded with both of my sons of lawn-mowing-age to let me keep the cash in the family. My oldest mowed twice last year, though once he had earned enough cash to acquire whatever video game he simply had to have at the moment, he lost interest. (We “allowed” him to lose interest because he seemed unwilling or unable to edge or trim; a feature we enjoy with our current professional landscapers.) Likewise, my neighbors have used every tactic known to mankind to see their kids on the business end of a lawnmower, all with no luck.

Something has changed over the past few decades. While I’d prefer not to sound like my father or grandfather and lament about how “this generation blah, blah, blah;” it’s important to mention that my current neighbors and I literally fought with kids in our respective neighborhoods to mow the lawns, trim the bushes or shovel the snow of childless homeowners back in the 1970’s and 80’s.

What does all of this mean?

The End of Entrepreneurship in America

American fathers and mothers of school-aged children should sit down when they read this: Your kids are destined to lead a life of indentured servitude. They don’t share the American Dream that made Gates a billionaire and Obama a President. They want everything handed to them, and that simply will not happen in the real world.

I wish the news was better, but it seems they are lazy and they are ungrateful and they’ve lost the Great American Spirit and innate entrepreneurship that built such lasting companies as Lehman Brothers, WorldCom and Enron.

The good news is that they can always get jobs as landscapers.

Proper Filenames are Critical to Proper Business Etiquette

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Sometimes You Have to be a Prick to Those Outside of Your Company

 

I just received the March 2009 purchase report from one of our company’s 50+ vendors who provide such recaps. This particular vendor chose to name the file MyCompanyMarch.xls. By “MyCompanyMarch,” I mean he put the name of my company and the month in the filename… and nothing else. I could scream. What in the world was he thinking? Clearly, he was not.

 

Imagine if all of the vendors we dealt with used the same filename nomenclature as this self-centered simpleton. If that were the case, I’d have more than fifty files on my laptop all named MyCompanyMarch.xls. Now imagine if we’d been doing business with these fifty-odd companies for a number of years; I could potentially have hundreds of files all named MyCompanyMarch.xls. Suppose I needed to find the March 2006 recap from Vendor Z; could I easily locate this file? Of course it would be cumbersome, because this vendor wasn’t thinking of the audience when he named his file, just himself.

 

Yeah, But the Vendor Can Find the File

 

When this vendor peruses through his files, he’ll easily spot the one he sent me this week. The data will be at his fingertips and he can look like a hero to anyone who asks him to retrieve it. He named the file for himself, not me. Of course, if he plans to keep his job longer than 12 months he should add the year to his filenames. Though I doubt he’ll still be employed next April. On the off chance he is, I wonder if his March 2010 recap to me will be named MyCompanyMarch2010.xls. Probably not; it’s likely that someone this unthinking will never bother to change the way they do something as meaningless as naming files.

 

(Of course, naming files is not meaningless. I just wrote that to see if you were paying attention.)


 

Using Proper Filenames is Critical to Maintaining a Free Society

 

Filenames on your computer, whether they are monthly recaps for your customers or your resume for a prospective employer, should reflect not only what you want to know about the file, but more importantly, what the intended audience wants to know about the file. Here are some examples of bad filenames (all of which I have received) and better alternatives:

 

  • Bad filename: MyResume.doc. Good filename: Smith.John.Resume.doc.
  • Bad filename: CustomerNameMonth.xls. Good filename: VendorName.CustomerName.Description.MMYYYY.xls (for example: AcmeWidgets.WidgetRetailer.OrderHistory.032009.xls).
  • Bad filename: CustomerNameProposal.ppt. Good filename VendorName.CustomerName.Proposal.MMYYY.ppt.

 

Is There a Leadership Lesson Here?

 

Not everything on AskTheManager.com comes with a leadership lesson. Sometimes, we just like to rant. Though it’s a little bit of stretch, we do think there is something leaders can learn from this.

 

Jimmy Dugan was a good leader. Despite his alcoholism and apathy, he was able to get the most out of his team. And although his team lost the AAPGL Championship (of course he was missing his best player, Dottie Hinson), his leadership helped turn a bunch of girls into accomplished ballplayers… not an easy task, even in a fictional world.

 

The next time you’re faced with a vendor, an applicant or a prospective vendor-partner who provides you with a file that includes an inconsiderate or idiotic filename, you need to take a deep breath and a page out of Jimmy Dugan’s book. I suggest using Jimmy’s words of wisdom that he provided to right fielder Evelyn Gardner: “Start using your head. That’s the lump that’s three feet above your ass.”

 

Sometimes you have to be a prick.

Secretary Duncan Should Wear a Dunce Cap

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Lessons on Leadership and Humanity from Arne Duncan

 

As we wrote last month in our post about local school administrators: “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Those who can’t teach, become administrators.” Secretary of Education Arne Duncan is the administrator of all administrators.

 

On Tuesday, Secretary Duncan was in Denver proclaiming that American children should attend school more hours each day, six or seven days each week and eleven or twelve months each year. For those of you who didn’t attend enough school to understand what that means, that’s roughly equal to at least 85% more classroom time for every child between the ages of five and eighteen. (Did Duncan bother to do the math before he made these statements? It’s hard to believe that the former head of the mediocre Chicago Public Schools really intended to propose that we increase the amount of classroom time by 85%.)

 

As the parent of three school-age children, I can tell you that more education does not equal better education. But that, my friends, is an argument for another day. (And let’s not even try to find out who is going to pay for 85% more schooling.)


 

China and India and Bears, Oh My!

 

“You’re competing for jobs with kids from India and China. I think schools should be open six, seven days a week; eleven, twelve months a year,” Duncan told a bored group of middle-schoolers in Denver.

 

His statement begs three questions: 1) What jobs? 2) Is more K-12 education the key to landing these mysterious jobs? And 3) Is this what life is all about?  

 

What Jobs?

 

Exactly what jobs are our children competing for with kids from India and China? Thirty-five cents per hour sweatshop jobs in China, or the $10,000 per year programming jobs in India? Perhaps Duncan was referring to the outflow of call center jobs to Indian companies that pay upwards of $5,000 per year. We can’t be sure, but we are fairly certain that you can’t even get an uneducated American to work for those wages.

 

Is More K-12 Education the Key to Landing These Mysterious Jobs?

 

Let’s give Arne Duncan the benefit of the doubt for a moment and say that there are indeed American jobs that can be saved. Is more education the key to landing these jobs? Can Duncan provide any guarantees that subjecting our children to 85% more schooling before they turn eighteen will have any effect on their ability to perform these jobs?

 

As someone with a public education (from elementary school through college) and a pretty good day job, I can tell you that I have interacted with hundreds of people (foreign and domestic) with more education than me who couldn’t perform my job with twice the training I’ve had. What I bring to my company (and what millions of others across the globe bring to theirs) cannot be taught with more hours of primary education – you either get it or you don’t. What counts in my job are business acumen, deductive reasoning and a high I.Q. – these are likely not going to be part of Duncan’s super-sized curriculum.

 

Is This What Life is All About?

 

Assuming Duncan is 100% right about everything; I have to know if this is what life is all about. Are we meant to be cogs fighting for national supremacy? Should we all start wearing our country’s colors and chant anti-globalization slogans? Do we want our kids to become over-educated automatons? Do we care at all about their personal, social and/or spiritual growth?

 

Duncan’s poorly planned proposal leaves no room for afterschool activities like the Mock Trial Club (which could help make some kid a great attorney), the Fashion Club (which could help make some kid a top designer), or the Operation Smile Club (which could help make some kid a terrific human being). (Yes, these clubs and millions like them exist in our schools today. We found these three at the Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School right around the corner from Duncan’s D.C. office.)

 

Duncan’s plan leaves no room for summer vacations to the Grand Canyon, Gettysburg or even Disney World. It leaves no room for summer camps or overseas trips. In other words, Duncan’s Folly leaves no room for discovery or wonder or life; it only leaves room for books.

 

I really don’t care if my kids land great jobs or if children in India and China get those gigs; I just want my kids to be satisfied with who they become and the choices they make. Of course, I’m especially hopeful they’ll make a difference in this world.

 

Taking away their childhood and everything that makes America a great place to live is not the answer, and shoving their nose in a book for eleven months a year will not help them do anything meaningful.

 

 

Madoff Accountant Friehling Could Be More Culpable Than Madoff

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If You Want the Swindlers, Get Their Accountants

“If you want the Mafia, get their lawyers,” explains Mitchell McDeere, formerly of Bendini, Lambert and Locke.

I think we’re missing the real villains in the Bernard Madoff affair. Madoff, in case you’ve been under a rock for the last few months, is the 70-year old investment fund head who just pled guilty to bilking investors out of $65 billion. (In reality, Madoff only bilked them out of the $17 billion they invested with him, not the $48 billion in imaginary profits.)

Without rehashing all of the details, suffice it to say that Bernard Madoff will be spending the rest of his life in prison – right where he belongs.

Let’s Not Stop at People Named Madoff

The swindled investors, understandably, want to squeeze the life out of everyone remotely related to Madoff. Besides Bernard Madoff, they want Ruth Madoff (Bernie’s wife and former employee). They want Mark and Andrew Madoff (Bernie’s sons and former employees). They want their pound of flesh from anyone whose name rhymes with Madoff. Though they’re missing the real villains.

The criminals they should be most angry with include the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the SEC employees who failed to investigate reports of the fraud… and Madoff’s accountant. (We’ll save our contempt for the SEC’s handling of this mess for a later post; today we’re focused on the accountant.)

No one seemed to care this past week when David G. Friehling, Madoff’s 49-year old accountant, turned himself in to authorities to face criminal charges for his role in helping Madoff get away with the biggest investment fraud in history.




If the allegations against Friehling are true, in many ways his activity is even more vile and despicable than Madoff’s. If the charges are true, he is the most culpable of all in my opinion. Friehling, you see, was tasked with auditing Madoff’s business dealings and certifying the results. Specifically, Friehling has been charged with falsely certifying that he had prepared Madoff’s audit statements in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. Those statements were sent to the SEC and to Madoff’s clients.

Friehling Could Be Twice the Criminal Madoff Is

We know Madoff is a criminal; and we hate him because he violated a fiduciary duty he had to his clients. He is a disgusting human being who should feel the full force of the law against him. However, if Friehling is found guilty, he deserves more punishment than Madoff for two reasons: 1) He violated not only a fiduciary duty to Madoff’s victims, but a regulatory duty as well; and 2) We need to do whatever we can to prevent another Madoff situation in the future.

Friehling’s firm was Madoff’s accountant and sole auditor for at least 17 years. In that time, Madoff made billions, while Friehling merely made millions. The kind of greed that drove Madoff will not be easily swayed by a few perp walks and 10 years in jail. (As I mentioned, Madoff is 70 years old, so he’s probably got ten years left.) Anyone wishing to follow in Madoff’s footsteps might be willing to trade billions today for a possible, though not probable, jail sentence down the road.

If You Want the Swindlers, Get Their Accountants

We’re back to the concept introduced by Mitch McDeere… Without a CPA to certify the fraud, you cannot defraud at the level of Bernard Madoff; although the government doesn’t seem to understand this. (Much like FBI Agent Wayne Tarrance had trouble understanding the concept when McDeere first introduced it to him.)

Friehling is the only person besides Madoff to be charged in the fraud so far; though he was released after his arraignment on bail of $2.5 million. At 49 years old, he poses a much greater flight risk than Madoff… Friehling, you see, has something to lose: The rest of his adult life. He faces a maximum sentence of 105 years in prison if convicted on all counts. Not enough, I say, if the charges are true.

Friehling has been charged with securities fraud, aiding and abetting investment adviser fraud, and four counts of filing false audit reports with the SEC. And while both Madoff and Friehling deserve to spend the rest of their lives in prison (if the allegations against Friehling are true), a greater example should be made of Friehling. His perp walks should be longer, his prison cell should be scarier and more bleak, and his name should become as well known as Madoff or Ponzi.

The same government that was asleep at the wheel during Madoff’s rise, should do everything in it’s power to prevent future Madoffs – and this means getting their accountants, and getting them good.