investing is gambling. If the investors didn't know what they were buying they shouldn't have bought it. If they were being lied to then it's a case of fraud.
I don't see anyone who wants to bail out people who bet on losing horses in the kentucky derby.
I don't see what any of that has to do with my point.
To reiterate, the Madoff scandal was a decades-long failure of government regulation. Regulation eventually prevailed, but only after thousands of investors were defrauded. The fact that Madoff was ostensibly regulated lowered the perceived risk of investment, thereby increasing the harm that was ultimately done.
Had the SEC not been in essence vouching for Madoff, many of his victims may have been more cautious and therefore avoided becoming his victims.
It was a fraud, and the comparison with gambling is a strawman. It's not a matter of bailing people out if they take one of these crash courses and don't profit from it, it's a matter of preventing the courses from defrauding people and holding them responsible if they do.
I don't see anyone who wants to bail out people who bet on losing horses in the kentucky derby.