Just Received A Nigerian Scam Email From Treasury Minister Henry Paulson.
Dear American:
I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.
I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had
crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.
I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This transactin is 100% safe.
This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred. Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.
Yours Faithfully,
Minister of Treasury Paulson
Not sure what a Nigerian scam email is? Patrick over at Cash Money Life has a great explanation for why it is called a Nigerian 419 Scam. Anyone else get one of these? 
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I’ve seen this. Hilarious stuff!
Wow… it’s sad to think that people will actually fall for that.
I saw this yesterday on some other pf blog. Not that they’d gotten the email as a scam, but that they’d seen someone write it up as a joke. I guess the real scammers figured it was a good thing and are now running with it.
I just did a search. Looks like it originated over at The Nation in the post Bailout Satire.
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/jstreet/363133/bailout_satire
I read that letter twice and I don’t see any mention of Nigeria. Stop maligning Nigerians!
That’s brilliant!
Now that the government is going to be scrounging for cash, I want to see spam plugging low rates for advertising in 1040 forms.
[...] Just Received A Nigerian Scam Email From Treasury Minister Henry Paulson. addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fcashmoneylife.com%2F2008%2F09%2F24%2Feconomic-rescue-plan-mortgage-bailout%2F’; addthis_title = ‘The+American+419+Scam’; addthis_pub = ”; [...]
I got that, but I didn’t make it far enough in to realize what it was. I thought “This person expects me to believe he’s with the US Treasury?” and deleted. Now it makes sense…
I got one like that from Chris Dodd, Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. It had a P.S. from Barney Frank saying there “was no crisis.”
Funny and sadly true. I hope Americans will do the right thing.