When I was a boy, a shady-looking character sidled up to my father on a midtown street, whispered a few words, and slunk away when my father shook his head sternly at him.
I asked my father what the guy wanted, and he told me he had tried to sell him a cheap, knock-off watch and that the trick was to behave furtively so that the potential buyer would infer the watch was stolen and hence worth much more than was being asked for it. Pop went on to say that the scam couldn't work on him in any event, even if he wasn't wise to it, since "I don't buy stolen goods".
Clearly most if not all of Madoff's victims assumed that he had insider contacts and information -- illegal to trade on, of course -- that all but guaranteed his past and ongoing outsized success. And instead of behaving like the apparently archaic, stiff-backed moralist who was my dad, they smiled, winked and eagerly bought the watch.
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