Quick roundup in the WSJ Deal Journal by Michael Corkery about Goldman Sachs's great week:

• Lusting after cheapo Fannie Mae housing tax credits so it can offset its taxes and perform its required community-reinvestment duties without creating new affordable housing.

• Scoring swine flu vaccine at a higher rate that Memorial Sloan-fucking-Kettering Cancer Center, for Christ's sake. And getting the vaccine while kids around the nation are told there's no vaccine to be had.

The view from Bernie Madoff's ex-house in the Hamptons.

From Molly Bernhart at Fierce Finance, this slideshow: "House party: The most infamous properties of 2009." Not just Bernie Madoff's abodes, but also the Wells Fargo Party House and others.

Hey buddy, can you spare a prepaid debit card? (Salon, Andrew Leonard)

Trite headline masks a fascinating story on the (legal) scam of companies' giving you rebates in the form of pre-paid debit cards. The always useful Leonard points to a March story about the ubiquitous Andy Cuomo's fight against them and offers other useful links.

Judges' Frustration Grows With Mortgage Servicers (NYT)

Federal judge in Phoenix hauls a high-ranking Wells Fargo exec to court and forces him to be grilled under oath by an average homeowner about why the hell the bank won't respond to her application for a loan modification.

Lehman Brothers Failure May Have Saved Us All (WashPost, Steven Pearlstein)

"Lehman's failure may have sped up the process by which all this lousy lending was revealed and the losses acknowledged, but the financial reckoning was inevitable."

Football, Statistics, and Agency Problems

Winning strategy: Don't punt. Same goes for financial sector. Points to study "Do Firms Maximize? Evidence from Professional Football."

The Unwitting Birthplace of the 'Death Panel' Myth (WashPost)

LaCrosse, Wisconsin — that's the place. Good story explains why.

NO PITY FOR CITI: US WATCHDOG BLASTS BANK'S LACK OF BAILOUT EXIT PLAN (NY Post)

However, Citigroup is believed to have a bonus system ready to go.

MORE HEADLINES FOLLOW

Bernie Madoff's Hamptons home is finally up for sale, and it's got way more than just celebrity value.

Inexplicably, CNN's Les Christie came away unimpressed after he toured the house at 216 Old Montauk Highway. I don't know what studio Christie shares in Manhattan, but he focused more on the $7 million (or thereabouts) seashore home's unostentatious furnishings ("Think Formica") than on the fact that every fucking room has an ocean view. And that view is better than anybody else's in the extremely fancy neighborhood because Bernie's house sits way closer to the ocean than his neighbors' mansions do (see the pic above). Plus there's a stone fireplace, a nice swimming pool, and greenery all around.

Deputy U.S. marshal Roland Ubaldo, sounding more like a realtor, called the place "simple, stylish, but understated." Perhaps to compensate for Madoff's overstated "investments."

Corcoran (naturally) won the right from the U.S. Marshals Service to peddle the place and is asking $8.75 million. (Zillow has pictures.)

The mansion market is depressed, so that figure is likely to drop. But if Bernie's house is still out of your range, you'll have to make do with the priceless (yes, free) report due out this week on the SEC's botched handling of Madoff. An estimated 450 pages and 500 exhibits, including a record of all the tips the SEC ignored. Should be juicy.

BERNIE 'DYING' IN JAIL: '20 PILLS FOR CANCER' (NY Post)

"There's been much speculation as to why Bernie Madoff took the entire fall for the scheme -- and rumors of his suffering from pancreatic cancer surfaced many months before he arrived at the Butner, NC, complex in June." We didn't really think he confessed because his conscience got to him, but we did think he confessed because the market's plunge would have soon unmasked his phony boast of steady profits from his "investments" anyway.

'Cash for Clunkers' Environmental Benefits Are in Doubt (ABC)

Roundup of criticism (not only on possibly dubious environmental impact) of clunker program, including a mention of this Berkeley study, "The Implied Cost of Carbon Dioxide Under the Cash for Clunkers Program," which says the smokin' deals are "an expensive way to reduce greenhouse gases."

Roubini Sees Increasing Risk of Double-Dip Recession (Bloomberg)

Haven't reached the bottom yet, says NYU's self-promoting but often right economist.

Apple Highest Grossing Retailer on Fifth Avenue as Crowds Swell (Bloomberg)

Apple defies recession. Everyone wants an iPhone. Despite the annoying TV ads with the treacly music.

CITY DEALING TO MAKE LUXE CONDOS CHEAPER (NY Post)

At last: affordable housing in New York City. A $500,000 condo might wind up being marked down to $300,000. And developers/bankers would get $50,000 per apartment for doing this.

NASA May Outsource Amid Budget Woes (WSJ)

Federation runs out of money, thinking of hiring Ferengi to fly the Enterprise and the rest of Starfleet.

MORE HEADLINES FOLLOW

Stocks Drop in Global Pullback; U.S. Economy Is Still Sputtering (WashPost)

Reaction from one investment strategist: ""Whether it's the facts catching up with the expectations or the expectations catching up with the facts, I'm not sure which." You can those words to the bank. WSJ speculation, Telegraph (U.K.) on fears that rally's over; Seeking Alpha's The Mole on the bear.

Foreclosures Rise With Unemployment Rate (WashPost)

"The country's growing unemployment is overtaking subprime mortgages as the main driver of foreclosures, threatening to send even higher the number of borrowers who will lose their homes and making the foreclosure crisis far more complicated to unwind." In the first quarter, prime foreclosures outnumbered subprime ones.

Squeaking by on $300,000 (WashPost)

Droll profile of one Laura Steins in ritzy NYC suburb Harrison: "[S]he's months overdue for a visit to her colorist, a telltale sign of economic distress for a woman such as Steins."

Fox News on pace for best year ever (AP)

Sailing on its swift boat with its three Gilligans — little buddies Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck, and Sean Hannity — Fox has seen its viewership rise 11 percent from last year. CNN and MSNBC are down.

MORE HEADLINES FOLLOW

Hollywood Upstages Beijing: WTO Hands China Its Biggest Defeat in Trade Battle Over Movies, Music, Books (WSJ)

Ruling "could help break open the tight controls that have crippled the ability of filmmakers, musicians, videogame designers and other artists to widely market their creations at reasonable prices." Other major trade clashes between China and U.S. are also coming to a head.

Madoff Had Affair With Ex-Hadassah Finance Chief, Her Book Says (Bloomberg)

Sheryl Weinstein, former chief financial officer at Hadassah, a major Jewish women's organization, fesses up to an affair with Bernie. She and her hubby (and Hadassah) not only lost their asses to Bernie, but she personally lost hers to him. Now we know that Bernie made at least one deposit.

Fed Starts Rollback Of Rescue Efforts (WashPost)

Great. Now how about the rest of the country? Among other woes: another month of record-high foreclosures.

Jackson Earnings Grow by Millions After Death (NYT)

When it comes to the battle of dead pop stars, Elvis has left the building, and MJ has taken the stage. In the 48 days since his death, Michael Jackson has earned $100 million in film and merchandising deals, and his handlers expect another $100 million by the end of the year. Co-executor says, "Clearly that's a new record for estates that likely will not be broken."

Under Pressure, Obama Defends Health-Care Plan (WSJ)

Teabaggers outside, friendly folks inside. Too friendly and too respectful inside, reminiscent of the carefully screened audiences at the "town halls" that Dick Cheney and George W. Bush conducted. Best quote from a teabagger outside: ""Adolf Hitler was for exterminating the weak, not just the Jews and stuff, and socialism — that's what's going to happen." "Jews and stuff" — sounds like a chain of Bar Mitzvah-themed gift shops.

G.M. Puts Electric Car's City Mileage in Triple Digits (NYT)

It took a fucking bankruptcy to make GM get on the stick and finally roll out a fucking electric car.

U.S. economy has bottomed: George Soros (Reuters)

He should know. He's one of the world's most aggressive, barebacking tops.

Stocks are up, cash-for-clunkers will stay in business — things are looking up, you say.

Except that consumer spending is up (good, they say), while personal income is down. And Obama's Making Home Affordable program? Sluggish at best. Some loan-servicers haven't modified a single damn loan.

But why should they offer refinancing to help homeowners stave off foreclosure, even if the government pays the companies to do so? Aside from illegal scams, the banks usually make more on fees when a house goes into foreclosure.

Enough about your homes. We're still waiting the collapse of the commercial real-estate market.

A good sign that can't be ignored? The value of U.S. homes rose 0.5 percent from April to May, the first time in three years that the S&P/Case-Shiller index of 20 major cities has shown any increase whatsoever.

Headline writers across America are trumpeting that the worst may indeed be over.

Caution: Home prices are still much lower overall than they were a year ago. And Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody's Economy.com, lives up to his company's name by moodily calling this only a "temporary respite" and predicting that the slide will continue.

Besides, unemployment is such a crisis that consumer confidence is falling. That fresh news today from the Conference Board's confidence index sent stocks into a slump.

Put down the yo-yo and pick up on the Wall Street Journal's quick-read overview today, "The Great Recession: A Downturn Sized Up." It may not make you feel better, but it may help you understand exactly why you don't feel so hot.