... walk into a bar. No, wait, that's not what I want...
In the interval before this morning's Mike and Mike show became the Tiger Woods Scandal Hour, they were talking about Tim Donaghy and his allegations about the NBA, which basically amount to the league being just a few steps up from the WWE. Mike Greenberg in particular kept blasting these rumors as completely outlandish because the sort of game-fixing Donaghy alleges would be blatantly illegal, and if it was exposed, people would go to jail. "These are wealthy and powerful people," he said, more or less, "You're crazy if you think they'd risk jail to get an extra game in the Kings-Lakers series."
While Donaghy is very likely full of crap, this is a terrible counter-argument, for the reasons alluded to in the title. Eliot Spitzer was a wealthy and powerful man, and you'd be crazy to think he would be frequenting $5,000/hour prostitutes while Governor of New York. And yet... Bernie Madoff was a wealthy and successful businessman, and you'd be crazy to think he was running a massive Ponzi scheme. And yet...
To paraphrase H. L. Mencken, it would be difficult to go broke underestimating the arrogant stupidity of wealthy and powerful men.
Humanities & Social Science
Comments
You raise an interesting point about Madoff & Spitzer! And what about some of the blatent missed calls in football? My general sceptisim and main point about conspiracy theories is that I just hate like hell to give in to the Dan Brown / Tea Party crowd.
Posted by: J-Dog | December 8, 2009 9:13 AM
Bernie Madoff was a wealthy and successful businessman, and you'd be crazy to think he was running a massive Ponzi scheme. And yet...
Madoff was able to get away with what he was doing for as long as he did in part because of this very factor. I don't recall the exact timeline, but people were on record several years (perhaps a full decade) before the news came out that Madoff's dealings were fraudulent. The SEC did a whitewash investigation or two. The prosecutors only got their case when Madoff himself admitted the fraud.
Wealth and power can be every bit as addictive as alcohol or gambling. For that matter, so can the thrill of getting away with something.
Posted by: Eric Lund | December 8, 2009 9:42 AM
Tiger Woods enjoyed somebody else's putting greens. He is in arrears for greens fees. What is the big deal?
Posted by: Uncle Al | December 8, 2009 2:34 PM
It's a poor argument because rich and powerful men do not go to jail in this country (Madoff went to jail because his wealth was exposed as a lie).
NBA rule #1 - The degree to which the rest of the rules apply to an individual or team is in inverse proportion to the amount of merchandise that individual or team sells.
Posted by: mingfrommongo | December 8, 2009 3:16 PM
I assume you watch basketball on TV. I found his observations perfectly plausible, and immediately wondered if the sabremetric folks include the referee assignments in their database. If not, a bit of retrospective analysis would show the bias he alleges. After all, beating the spread consistently at the 80% level is pretty strong evidence that there is something to look for.
Posted by: CCPhysicist | December 8, 2009 7:15 PM