Kenny Boy Finally Indicted

After 3 long years, the Feds finally indicted Ken Lay in the Enron fiasco.

I don't know what took so long but I was starting to worry that this pal of George W. was going to escape prosecution.

If it wasn't an election year, he probably would have. I keep thinking about the thousands of Enron employees who lost everything not to mention states like California who were overcharged by the millions by these gangsters.

Yeah, and while I new it wouldn't happen, I am disappointed that he is being allowed to "surrender". He should have been arrested the normal way - having his door kicked open in the middle of the night by a bunch of men in black fatigues and then being thrown on the ground with the muzzle of a full auto rifle jammed against his temple.

Unfortunately the media isn't covering this story completely:

Ken Lay did meet with the President and the Vice President in the Oval Office.

Ken Lay gave $420,000 to the President's party over three years.

Ken Lay donated $100,000 to the President's inauguration festivities.

Ken Lay stayed overnight in the Lincoln Bedroom at the White House 11 times.

Ken Lay had access to the administration at its highest levels and even enlisted the Commerce and State Departments to grease deals for it.

The taxpayer-supported Export-Import Bank subsidized Enron for more than $600 million in just one transaction.

The really interesting thing about the above is not that it occurred at all.... But that it occurred.....



Wait for it......


......


.......

<font color="pink"> Under THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION!!!!!! </font>

Silviron:
Unfortunately also, the Enron folks gave a ton of money to get the present administration elected. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon15.gif
These gangsters play no favorites, and have the money to play both ends against the middle.

A ton of pennies?
A ton of gold coins?
A ton of hundred dollar bills?


Could you be specific? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Really, this sort of discussion belongs UnDeRgRoUnD , at least for as long as it exists.

There's plenty of blame to be spread amongst the 2 parties but the Lincoln bedroom claim has been pretty well debunked.

More damning to me, is that Enron hired a great many Clinton appointees and that Clinton's former treasury secretary is the one that arranged/approved a number of Enron's loans.

This thread, I predict, will get ugly. Watch yourselves and be civil, please...Or take it over to the CPF-U....

--dan

Don`t think international crooks have any strong political views, greasing democracies comes just as easy as greasing dictatorships.

Adam

Oh yes, America is corrupt as well. but when people get caught they generally get thrown to the wolves /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

We wallow in our corruption rather than try to hide it or deny it. When folks fall in America they tend to fall hard, whether it's folks that are stupid enough to have their pictures taken with naked prisoners of war or folks that run companies like enron.

I think our choices in the world are not between countries that are not corrupt and those that are. But countries that know it and at least make token gestures to fix it, or countries that think they are somehow above the same troubles and so cover it up. Token gestures can be improved, denial is a lot harder to deal with.

Bush's Federal Energy Regulatory Commission refused to intervene when electrical pricing went throught the roof.
Reliant Energy, which at one point charged the state of California $1900 per megawatt-hour for electricity, or approximately 6300% more than the historic norm of $30/MwH, is charged with "fraudulent and manipulative trading practices. There is a huge list of power suppliers that followed suit with the practice started by Enron.

Below is a excerpt fromt the taxpayer and comsumer rights group. It is estimated that the costs actually approach 45 billion from loss of business as well.
According to FTCR, energy company manipulation of the California energy market allowed the firms to overcharge California consumers by more than $20 billion between 2000 and 2001 and to excessively price long-term energy contracts with the state by approximately $22 billion dollars.
We are still paying off this debt on a monthly basis for overcharges and it will continue for over 10 years. It will wind up costing each taxpayer hundreds and hundreds of dollars.

The unsettling thing is, I suspect that Enron was not unique among big business in their attitudes and activities. I've a suspicion that the bulk of American industry is represented by Enron.

I confess, I've no links of support. It may not be logical, and certainly doesn't pander to the emotional view we want to believe. Still, I thought it worth planting seeds of suspicion. YFMV (your feelings may vary)

he was a good singer but i hatd him in the gambler

He was a good singer, but for some reason I always thought he was faking a hickiness in his songs. Oh, well.

[ QUOTE ]
keithhr said:
...Federal Energy Regulatory Commission refused to intervene when electrical pricing went throught the roof...

[/ QUOTE ]

Interestingly, it was the State of California that set up this system and DID INTERVENE in this electrical crisis by forcing PG&E and SoCal Edison (I have no love for either) to pay these exorbitant prices and prohibiting them from negotiating better deals--And when the two utilities were virtually bankrupted--then the Sate of California (Governor Grey Davis) through the www.caiso.com (California Independent System Operator) promised to pay these exorbitant rates using public funds. And then at the peak of the pricing crisis--our Governor signed long term contracts that locked in very high power rates for years to come.

Look at one of their press releases from 1997:

CLIDK ON: Cal-ISO Names Committee to Foster Competition in New Electricity Market Place (RTF format)

[ QUOTE ]
(Folsom, CA) A Market Surveillance Committee is now in place to assist the California Independent System Operator (Cal-ISO) in maintaining a level playing field for companies competing in the state's newly restructured electricity marketplace.

The Cal-ISO Board of Governors, at its regularly scheduled meeting Wednesday, December 10, 1997 in Sacramento, approved the blue ribbon panel of experts. The Market Surveillance Committee will act as a market watchdog, providing independent expert advice to the Cal-ISO and recommending corrective action to prevent abuses of the system. The three members are:...

The Marketing and Information Protocol adopted by the Cal-ISO requires the establishment of a Market Surveillance Committee on or before ISO operations commence January 1, 1998. Committee members are required to be independent of participants in the restructured California electric markets.

The Cal-ISO will take over operation of the bulk of the state's power grid next month when California ushers in a free-market electricity industry. The not-for-profit corporation is chartered by the state to safeguard the reliable delivery of electricity and ensure equal access to California's "electron freeway".

[/ QUOTE ]

As Moe (?) said in the Simpson's--"...Blue Ribbon Committee--they don't get any better than that".

About two years after the creation of this monstrosity, we were having rotating electrical outages, near bankruptcy of two public utilities and some $25,000,000,000 (billion) in public debt (generated in just a few months of "government intervention") without one vote of either elected state government officials or public bond approval.

Yep--it takes big government to make big screw-ups.

-Bill

http://news.bostonherald.com/national/view.bg?articleid=34958



Kerry and Teresa Heinz Kerry reported more than $250,000 in Enron stock ownership before the firm's 2003 collapse. Kerry also was forced to return a campaign contribution from an implicated Enron executive.



A Heinz family trust bought between $250,000 and $500,000 of stock in December 1995, just days before Heinz Kerry announced Lay would serve as a member of the Heinz Center philanthropy, Kerry's Senate financial disclosure documents show.



Lay stayed on the board after Enron's collapse and a Heinz Foundation spokeswoman defended Lay in news reports amid the fraud accusations as having ``a good reputation in the environmental community.''

I would be very careful about mentioning either of the current presidential candidates in the Cafe... It has been requested that we do not get into the presidential campaign here...

-Bill

Pg&E and the republican governor Pete Wilson were the ones that pushed for deregulation before Gray Davis became Governor. While price skyrocketed he tried to bring some level of stability to the market even at the higher costs of long term contracts. Everything was out of control with the manipulations that were going on. Pg&E had just transferred billions of dollars to its parent company so it could file for bankruptcy.

DUH! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/twakfl.gif
Sorry, posted without noticing someone beat me to it.