So swindler Bernard Madoff has been given a 150-year sentence for defrauding investors out of $13 billion. In case you didn't see it, the 150 years was a combination of several sentences: 40 years for international money laundering; 20 years each for securities fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud and false filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission; 10 years for domestic money laundering; and five years each for investment adviser fraud, making false statements, perjury and theft from an employee benefit plan.

Although the idea of Mr. Madoff being locked up, and the key thrown away, is satisfying - he lived the life of luxury he stole from his victims - much that is odd attends the whole business.

First, how come the fraud amounted to 'only' $13 billion, when many newspapers had reported amounts as great as $171 billion?

Newspapers routinely call criminal suspects "alleged", in case they are innocent; why isn't the mention of speculative numbers accompanied by the same word, in case they're wrong (which they almost always are)?

One reason the number was so 'small' was that Mr. Madoff stole only what his investors had contributed. To make it clearer, say I give you $100 to invest. Each year for 10 years afterwards, you tell me that I've doubled my money. At the end of 10 years, I would nominally have $102,400. If it turned out that you'd spent the $100 on Day One, and it was all gone, my actual loss would be $100, not $102,400.

That example is not so far-fetched. If you told me I could double my money every year for 10 years, I'd be right to doubt you - or anyone who promises to deliver, or says he is delivering, much beyond what everyone else in the market is able to achieve.

In the example I've provided, I'd simply laugh at you. No one, apparently, laughed at Mr. Madoff until it was too late. When one investment analyst, quite some time ago, wrote a deeply convincing paper about Mr. Madoff being a crook, the SEC and everyone else laughed at the analyst. No one is laughing now.

It is laughable, however, to suggest that Mr. Madoff was the only person involved in a scheme of this magnitude. The authorities have so far only charged one other person with complicity, but say 10 others are under suspicion. Wouldn't the guilty be likely to flee if they heard they were under suspicion? Why would they stick around?

Then too, the whole business of sentencing is ridiculous. Murderers are often given life sentences, only to be released some years later. A life sentence often isn't a life sentence.

Now a man aged 71, with a life expectancy of 13 years, has been given a sentence that would last, if he did, past his 221st birthday. That really is a life sentence. Wouldn't it be more reasonable for the judge, having added up the penalties, to have sentenced Mr. Madoff to spend the rest of his life in jail, with no possibility of parole? What would be wrong with that? How could that be worse than 150 years, almost all of which Mr. Madoff will be unable to serve, allowing him, in death, to cheat the court system?

Some have noted that Mr. Madoff's sentence confirms that the courts regard crimes against property much more severely than crimes against persons. That's true in Bermuda, too. Why? You can replace a billion dollars. You can't replace a lost loved one.

Finally, money leaves a trail. If you throw sufficient numbers of trained people at the history of financial transactions, you can discover what happened. Mr. Madoff didn't spend $13 billion in cash, that's for sure. Whatever he did with the money, the paperwork will exist to show what he did.

When the Bank of Credit & Commerce International collapsed in the 1990s, some $20 billion was missing. No one found a penny of it. Then as now, thousands of accountants were out of work and would have enjoyed tracking down who got what. Why that never happens is beyond me.

* * *

Equally outside my grasp is why responsible people would be so caught up in talking down the economy, especially now that a fragile recovery has begun. The New Yorker recently ran a lengthy article, in which the reporter interviewed any number of financial "axperts" who prophesied the collapse of the economic system.

Magazine articles are not necessarily supposed to be balanced. Believe me, I know. But the article The New Yorker ran was the equivalent of shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theatre, when not everyone who knows what's going on is convinced that there is evidence of fire.

Irresponsible and uninformed commentators talking down the economy has been a cause of what has gone on in the past 18 months. If I tell you that you're ugly often enough, you might start to think you're ugly. You'd believe me much faster, however, if I told you that you were good-looking a few times. In fact, you'd probably believe me first time out.

* * *

The big tennis tournament reaching its conclusion this weekend is being held at Wimbledon. My forecast for the ladies' title is that one of the Williams sisters will win it. Wimbledon is pronounced "Wim-bull-dn". Not Wimpleton, as news commentators on almost every TV channel I watched this week contrived to call it.

How difficult is Wimbledon to pronounce? Apparently as difficult as Westminster, which too many people insist on calling West-minister. Terry Lister is a West Minister. The city is Westminster.

I accept that some British names are pronounced oddly. Beauchamp is pronounced "Beecham". Cholmondeley is "Chumley". Golf, by the way, is correctly pronounced "goff". In English, a valet is not pronounced to rhyme with ballet. It's pronounced to rhyme with ballot. These are tricky, and half of you think I'm wrong (good luck). But Wimbledon is pronounced the way it is spelled. How difficult is that? Very, apparently: I once heard it referred to as Wimpytown.