Throughout the week over at Securities Docket, I highlight the most interesting columns and blog posts from around the web on the subjects of SEC enforcement and securities litigation. Here is a digest of my picks for the week ending March 12:

Should the U.S. Provide a Ponzi Scheme Bailout? (Peter Henning, DealBook)DealBook | March 11, 2010Many of the investors of Mr. Madoff and Mr. Stanford have been devastated, both financially and personally, and it is difficult to watch the federal government bail out companies that made questionable decisions while individuals are left to fend for themselves. But the fact that these firms received government support does not mean that every worthy claimant should receive the same treatment.

Ponzi schemes inflict enormous damage on those enticed to invest in them. In the end, however, it is hard to justify giving special compensation to the investors of Mr. Madoff and Mr. Stanford just because they lost significant amounts of money with little prospect of any recovery.

Harry Markopolos, SEC Chairman? (David Weidner, WSJ)The Wall Street Journal | March 11, 2010Mr. Markopolos also lacks support for a role as SEC Chairman. For as much as he's lauded for his pursuit of Mr. Madoff, many find him a boor and, they argue he'd be overmatched in such a high position.

"He is what the commission needs only if the commission needs an emotionally unstable idiot savant," said John Coffee, securities law professor at Columbia Law School. "You cannot be serious. He was right but that does not mean he will be right again."

Book Review: No One Would Listen (Richard J. Tofel, WSJ)The Wall Street Journal | March 9, 2010A crusading legislator who had made a considerable reputation following up on whistleblower charges once told me that nearly all the whistleblowers she had met shared two qualities. First, they were onto something-that is, there was at least some truth to what they were saying. Second, they were "a little bit nuts." The jacket of "No One Would Listen" identifies Harry Markopolos as "the Madoff Whistleblower." He would seem to fit the pattern.

Please God, don't allow a new generation of Gordon Gekkos (Chris Blackhurst, London Evening Standard)London Evening Standard | March 8, 2010When we look back at where it all went wrong, one of those we have to blame, surely, is Michael Douglas. That's right, Douglas, the actor; not a nerdy banker coming up with some new-fangled financial instrument set to bring down his world.

It was Douglas who portrayed Gordon Gekko — an amalgam of the real-life arbitrageur Ivan Boesky, corporate raider Carl Icahn and junk bond king Michael Milken — in the 1987 movie Wall Street.

Madoff Losses Down from $65 Billion to $20 Billion (Doug Cornelius, Compliance Building)Compliance Building | March 3, 2010How do you value fraud?

When the Madoff ponzi scheme collapsed the claim was that there was $65 billion in losses. That was the total dollar value on the account statements given to investors. Of course, that number was fictional because there were not real assets behind those numbers.