Business Model: the Pirate's Code

It being a $election year, the Feds make a lot of noise about slapping Godzilla-$acks on the wrist, but charge them pocket change for it.

Tiabbi:

...On the list of crimes perpetrated by the big banks during the crisis period, naked short-selling probably isn’t near the top. But it definitely exists and it was almost certainly a tool that contributed to the mammoth-killing of firms like Bear and Lehman Brothers. The big banks like Goldman enabled this game by closing their eyes to shoddy locates in order to make sure they kept their prime brokerage clients. They’ve been caught at it before and now they’re being caught at it again. But you can add this to the list of offenses that the banks will get off for with a mild fine ($450,000? Are you joking) and the usual facsimile of legal consequence...

Ah yes, we're beyond crude things like admissions of guilt in our guvmint of $ophisticrat $ophistry.

The Third Way is kind of like the Pirate's Code.

More of a set of guidelines than a real set of rules.