In this month's Farrah-or-Michael-bedecked Vanity Fair, Mark Seal has a profile of Ruth Madoff. Well, sort of. Certainly he has dozens of comments and quotes from those who knew and worked with her, back when she and Bernie were high-school sweethearts in Queens, to her days as a modest young housewife, and through the rise and fall of the family's glittering, ill-gotten social career. All of these quotes, after all, are given in hindsight - and as in any such case, it's impossible to know who's claiming to have "always" suspected what and to what extent her current infamy is coloring their recollections of a woman who, apparently, was something of a chameleon anyway.

Having read the piece you come away with the impression that Ruth was a Stepford wife - or a woman who never lost her outer-borough rough edges. A warm and supportive employer or a demanding martinet. Social or cool. Desperately insecure, or at ease. Retiring or funny and warm. A perfectly controlled hostess or a foul-mouthed harridan. A canny businesswoman or a trusting wife who, personally, lost her father's inheritance. A pathetic victim or a selfish charlatan.

One thing's for sure: Bernie was her life. The consensus is that Ruth devoted herself to making his life comfortable, to looking perfect for him, and would hear no word spoken against her husband, even in jest. Says one family friend, "Ruth was absolutely under Bernie's thumb. If Bernie said, ‘Jump,' Ruth would say, ‘How high?' If her makeup was slightly off, he'd say, ‘What happened to your face?' For Ruth, looking good was all for Bernie."

Even on the subject of her guilt, acquaintances are divided. While no one believes in her total ignorance, some point to the fact that she lost some of her own money to the scheme as a proof that, up until that time at least, she couldn't have known everything. While everyone says she was canny and sharp-eyed and ran Bernie's books in the early days, it's also understood that she didn't have much of a grasp of modern technology, and one computer teacher quoted in the piece says he thinks any kind of online banking would have been beyond her. Says Seal,

In the course of writing three stories on the Madoff case for Vanity Fair, I've spoken to close to 100 people who knew Ruth, Bernie, and their family, and the majority believe that Ruth must have known about the scheme. Otherwise, if she was embarrassed, ashamed, betrayed, and confused, as she said in her statement, why did she stay with Bernie during his three months of house arrest-apparently at the cost of losing her sons, Mark and Andrew, who say they haven't spoken to their mother since the still not fully explained day in their parents' kitchen when Bernie confessed his crime to them with Ruth standing nearby? She's still under scrutiny by investigators, as are her sons, Bernie's brother, and Frank DiPascali Jr. and Annette Bongiorno, who directed Madoff's investment-advisory business, on the 17th floor of the Lipstick Building, in Manhattan. One longtime observer of the Madoffs told me that Ruth's statement, like everything preceding it in the case, may very well be just one more example of Bernie Madoff's brilliance at deception and manipulation. He always ran the show, and probably still does, the observer believes. From the day he turned himself in and pleaded guilty, Madoff was determined to take the fall alone. He continues from behind bars to try to control every detail of his destiny, including, at least one person is willing to venture, Ruth's statement.

As one former friend puts it, "Quite frankly, I don't know whether she knew or not-and I don't know which is worse. Either way, it's a tragedy for her. He's ruined a lot of families, but none worse than his own." Despite the fact that Ruth has, as the piece terms it, "cut a deal with prosecutors to keep $2.5 million in exchange for surrendering a potential claim to $80 million in assets, including her homes," and despite the rage her oblivious and ass-covering public statement has engendered, there are moments when you forget. When it's hard to, in one thought, reconcile the woman's loneliness and coupon-clipping with the entitlement and ill-gotten gains and, at best, total disconnect from reality. Perhaps this is why the author takes the precaution of beginning each section of the six-page article with a quote from one of Madoff's defrauded investors - all in circumstances far more straitened than Ruth's.

I think this is part of what fascinates people - perhaps especially women - about this case. On the one hand, this was a model of rarely-seen, retro marital unity unusual in a milieu where we're used to seeing multiple spouses rather than high-school sweethearts. Indeed, her behavior reads like a template from a mid-century good-wife's guide, down to turning a blind eye to possible infidelity. Says Seal, "She called her incarcerated spouse Doll, Darling, Baby, and Sweetie. She tried not to be dull or depressing; she wanted to be at her best for him." In short, she had no life beyond him. I think we have a certain scorn for that. And yet, there's more: maybe this is what makes it so confusing, her behavior so enigmatic: why devote your life to standing by your man, only to let him take the fall alone? Of course, that's what her husband wanted - people are pretty sure he's committed to going down solo - and it seems like she doesn't know how to operate outside his orbit. But still, I wonder if this doesn't factor into our contempt (not that there aren't plenty of legitimate reasons for it): she's getting off scot-free...and letting him go it alone. At best this is blind loyalty in the face of self-respect. At worst, despicable - and still depdendent. Is it just that she's out and free and relatively affluent? Sure. But I think there's another element that adds to our vitriol, and has spared Madoff's sons and brother. Yes, she's stood by him; yes, she visits him as often as possible. But compared to a life of such unity, this feels discordant. And I think we hate what we don't understand almost as much as what we know is deeply wrong. Ruth gives us both.

Ruth's World [Vanity Fair]

Jenny Sanford has not been terribly cooperative with the media. When, we wonder, will we get the confessional, the tearful appearance, the angry tirade we're clearly ready to believe? Since, amazingly, she hasn't felt like doing this in the ten days since her world came crashing down, we're forced to search for clues - the reliable "friends and family" (who seem to think she's okay) and, obviously, the wardrobe. This is tricky, because unlike the tight-lipped spouses who resentfully stand by their men in a comfort armor of pearls and suiting - de facto First Lady Wear - Sanford has continued to dress as she did before the furor, in a relaxed vacation wardrobe that gives nothing away. But aha! According to the Washington Post's Robin Givhan, this is in fact more revealing: There is, she says

"something splendidly defiant in the wardrobe Jenny Sanford, the wife of Gov. Mark Sanford, has been wearing the past few days...when she appeared before the cameras she was dressed like she'd just come in from a leisurely bike ride amid the wildflowers, during which she did not perspire. Mrs. Sanford did not look stern or brokenhearted. Mostly, she seemed about as aggravated as if she'd run out of sunscreen. One photograph has her in white pedal pushers and a blue paisley peasant blouse. In another, she's again wearing white shorts but this time with a coral-colored, flower-print tunic. Another photograph catches her in the kind of loose-fitting paisley tunic one might wear over a swimsuit. She's wearing sunglasses, carrying a large shoulder bag and showing a little thigh. But what's most noticeable is that she's not looking like a constrained — or strained — political wife who uses clothes like a suit of armor. Instead, it's just the opposite. She comes across as a woman set free. Everything about her style is breezy.

The hieroglyphics of a public woman's grooming are complex, the paparrazzi archive is our Rosetta stone. When we feel for her - or are supposed to - a woman's blithe relaxation can be a sign of empowerment and independence. But how about when the shoe's on the other foot? Take the reviled Ruth Madoff. One rarely reads an account of her in which her impeccable presentation is referenced - "carefully groomed," a New York feature calls her, while Madoff's secretary described her as "meticulous." Now, we gleefully read about her gray roots and her demotion to jeans. This deterioration is regarded, not as a sign of a liberation from a charade, but as the cracks in the careful facade. Says New York,

In the public eye, Ruth has come to represent the spoils of her husband's criminal activity: The lifestyle, the furs and jewelry, the fancy hair salon, the clinking glasses at parties, the trips around the world-they all seemed like they were her domain, orchestrated and enjoyed more by her than by the stone-faced, withdrawn Bernie. It didn't matter that Ruth came from modest beginnings; something about the way she carried herself-her highlighted hair, the upturned collar and petite physique-played into the stereotype of the pampered, free-spending wife.

There's similarly little to go on with both women - both have been media-shy, giving terse sentences and avoiding the press, while newshounds depend on guarded, or gleeful, statements from tenuous acquaintances. One is a victim, one an accomplice - or so they are perceived in the popular imagination, whatever the reality of Madoff's situation. Sanford promptly distanced herself from her husband's tax-fueled antics; Ruth has failed to renounce her ill-gotten gains to anyone's satisfaction. The women have nothing in common save an accident of time-frame and a distaste for the public eye. So why are both reduced to their grooming?

Maybe it's because they're both figures who are defined, for us, in relation to their husbands. Weirdly, while Sanford has thrown his wife under the "soul mate" bus, Madoff has done his damndest to keep his wife out of it, whatever her crimes - is part of it our contempt for letting someone protect her? Maybe a part of the collective consciousness feels, unfairly or not, that if we are to accept these women as living on their husband's terms, they have earned this kind of superficial, traditionally feminine scrutiny. Whatever the reason, there's something depressing about it. But here's something that, through all the mishigas, has managed to consistently put a smile on my face: Franni Franken. Franken is obviously not a political wife by vocation; she's a free-spirited woman who dresses like my mom - which is to say, acreatively-tinged boomer. And yet, check her out on the podium when Al spoke to the press about his election: she was in a First Lady costume! A boxy, Chanel-style suit and a scarf, less! It looked completely strange, and unnatural, and yet was unspeakably endearing. Probably because, at the end of the day, it actually had nothing to do with who she is, said nothing about who she is, save that she's new to politics and is trying to match the dress code. She was smiling and laughing and totally unguarded, and as a result, you didn't need to analyze the clothes, any more than you would a man's suit. And that was refreshing.

In Hubby's Time Of Trouble, She Can't Be Bothered [Washington Post]
How is Jenny Sanford coping? [GMA via Politico]
Poor Ruth [New York]
What The Secretary Saw [Vanity Fair]
Daily Show [Min 21]

Here's her statement, as run by Wall Street Journal:

I am breaking my silence now, because my reluctance to speak has been interpreted as indifference or lack of sympathy for the victims of my husband Bernie's crime, which is exactly the opposite of the truth.

From the moment I learned from my husband that he had committed an enormous fraud, I have had two thoughts — first, that so many people who trusted him would be ruined financially and emotionally, and second, that my life with the man I have known for over 50 years was over. Many of my husband's investors were my close friends and family. And in the days since December, I have read, with immense pain, the wrenching stories of people whose life savings have evaporated because of his crime.

My husband was the one we (and I include myself) respected and trusted with our lives and our livelihoods, often for many, many years, and who was respected in the securities industry as well. Then there is the other man who stunned us all with his confession and is responsible for this terrible situation in which so many now find themselves.

Lives have been upended and futures have been taken away. All those touched by this fraud feel betrayed; disbelieving the nightmare they woke to. I am embarrassed and ashamed. Like everyone else, I feel betrayed and confused. The man who committed this horrible fraud is not the man whom I have known for all these years.

In the end, to say that I feel devastated for the many whom my husband has destroyed is truly inadequate. Nothing I can say seems sufficient regarding the daily suffering that all those innocent people are enduring because of my husband. But if it matters to them at all, please know that not a day goes by when I don't ache over the stories that I have heard and read.

Well, thanks. One could ask how she could work as Bernie's partner and retain her total ignorance, why she's stuck with him to the exclusion of a relationship with her sons, why she withdrew a cache of money days before her husband's arrest, why, if she's so cognizant of all these devastated lives she's clung tooth and nail to those ill-gotten gains that weren't seized, and why she was caught trying to secretly sell antique jewelry purchased with said gains. But this is a hard day for her, and there's genuinely no satisfaction to be found in any aspect of this situation. So we'll just let her words speak for themselves. "Nothing I can say seems sufficient regarding the daily suffering that all those innocent people are enduring because of my husband." That, at least, is undeniable.

Ruth Madoff Issues Statement Regarding Husband's Fraud [Wall Street Journal]

In a story titled "The Loneliest Woman in New York," the New York Times chronicles the series of petty humiliations that is the post-Ponzi life of the shunned scamster's moll. As everyone knows, the Madoff sons, eager to put as much distance as possible between themselves and prison, have cut off all contact with both parents. Ruth has been banned from her salon. She can't go to her gym. No merchants will deal with her, and restauarants are out of the question - if it's not scruples motivating the business, it's awareness of the number of defrauded customers they'd risk offending.

But of course, it's more than that: Bernie Madoff is, quite literally, the worst person in the world*: he defrauded widows and orphans, holocaust survivors, charities, his own synagogue. And just when you think he can't get worse, he does! Not since cold-eyed movie Nazis have we had such an unambiguous villain. And by extension. Ruth becomes a Prada-clad Eva Braun, at best a dupe who didn't want to examine the source of her lifestyle (which the Ethicist has declared unacceptable!), and at worst, criminally complicit. While Ruth hasn't been charged, she's tainted by her position as "director" at Bernie's firm, and by the alacrity with which she moved to transfer $15.5 million, as well as various baubles, bangles and beads. Maybe just following orders, but it's been a while since that garnered much sympathy. Of course, her trials are pretty tame in light of her husband's crimes - no highlights is hardly piano wire, here - but considering that, at this juncture, that's exactly what they are, the collapse of her life as she knew it still must loom pretty tragic for Mrs. M.

The Times contrasts Ruth Madoff's cold reception - "she is viewed as an unrepentant beneficiary of ill-gotten wealth, a petite and well-dressed embodiment of the collective, bloated greed that helped topple the stock market and the housing industry" - with that of the wives of other disgraced moguls, like Mrs. Ivan Boesky or Mrs. Michael Milken, who were perceived as injured victims and ultimately, and with work, got their rehabilitation on. But Ruth Madoff, who blows off the press and who's made no statement of contrition - or even a disavowal of her involvement - seems unrepentant. Never mind that she's probably acting under a lawyer's orders; she's losing the public sympathy battle spectacularly. Says some public-image consultant, "'In America, we love tearing people down and then bringing them back, but she hasn't played the game...All we see is her living in a world of stolen money. If I were her, I'd devote my life to charity - an orphanage or a pet shelter would be a good place to start.'" Of course, the fact that Ruth's pet charity - the Gift of Life Bone Marrow Foundation - got defrauded by her husband for $2 million may make this easier said than done.

Whatever you think, there's something ugly about people's willingness to shun her - reflexive blacklisting and bullying are never attractive, even when they're understandable. Sure, there's schadenfreude - and there are pretty few people around to blame. But Ruth Madoff's position is nothing if not ambiguous, and we've rushed to judgment. And after all, Bernie Madoff fooled an awful lot of people - is in inconceivable that a sociopath could practice the same disconnect with his wife for 49 years? Does it even matter?

Even Seema Boesky, whose ex-husband's name became synonymous with insider trading and the excesses of the 1980s, feels conflicted..."My immediate reaction was utter sympathy for this woman," Mrs. Boesky said in a telephone interview, adding that she does not know Mrs. Madoff. "I wanted to write her a letter, reach out to her, take her out to lunch. But my lawyer said, ‘No.' "

Even for those who feel a reflexive distaste for this sort of mandated judgment, there is an element of Greek drama to the situation that, to the rest of us, feels right. Even beyond the particulars of her case, her shunning seems consistent with what we understand of the world of the rarified. In high society, as in high school, you live by the code and you die by the code. Doesn't it seem like Mrs. Madoff probably understands that too?

*Okay, top 100

The Loneliest Woman In New York [NY Times]
Ruth Madoff's Duty [NY Times]
No Apology From Ruth Madoff [ABC]