Posted on 01/10/2002 5:32:04 AM PST by boris
Edited on 09/03/2002 4:49:50 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
...During his run for the White House, Bush fought long and hard to convince us that he was a new breed of conservative--a Compassionate Conservative. But recent events make clear that he is actually the standard-bearer of a far more coldhearted breed. Call them the Enron Conservatives. Enron Conservatives are people who use political money and connections as levers to free themselves of all accountability to laws, regulations and responsibility--even to their own employees. Simply put, they are people who consistently, shamelessly and aggressively put their self-interest above the public interest... ...
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
-------------------------
Editor
Los Angeles Times
Sir:
I wish to warn you that an imposter is writing under the name of 'Arianna Huffington.' The piece bylined in her name appears to have been written by Molly Ivins.
Only a Clinton apologist like Ivins could become so outraged over "Enron Conservatives" who "use political money and connections as levers to free themselves of all accountability to laws, regulations and responsibility."
Al ("No Controlling Legal Authority") Gore did not provoke Huffington (Ivins?) so much. Hillary's aide, Maggie Williams, who accepted a $50,000 bribe in the White House didn't either. Neither did Johnny Chung, who viewed access to the White House as a "subway turnstile" into which one had to pump money. Nor did selling the Lincoln Bedroom like a bed-and-breakfast to high-rollers. Craig Livingstone is a free man, in spite of 900 FBI files. Betty Curry, who famously hid evidence under her bed, also suffered no consequences.
I could go on much, much longer. But basically I wanted you to find out what Ivins did with the real Huffington. Perhaps she is in the same place where Chandra Levy is hidden?
--Boris
While I'm not a W worshiper, Ariana's political career always appeared to me as genuine as her marriage to a wealthy homosexual.
She's a gold-digger whose judgment was so poor that she married a homosexual.
Arianna's still pis*ed that her husband left her for another man.
All the garbage that comes after "(take a breath):" only goes to further prove that Huffington doesnt have her head screwed on straight and hasnt for years. She has always been liberal and I suspect always will be.
Clinton-Gore sales team eased Enron's path to success
Sunday, December 9, 2001
WASHINGTON - "Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall."
This week, this old nursery rhyme has taken control of this column. From Washington to Pittsburgh by way of New York City and Los Angeles with important detours to China, Japan, India, Mozambique, Croatia, England, Germany and elsewhere in the world, we have been watching and reading about the great fall of Enron.
What a fall and from what a great wall! The Enron Corporation's 50-story building had always cast a shadow on Houston's South Street, and it glittered in the sunlight as Enron began to fall and stockholders scrambled to dump their shares. And Enron's shares were dumped - the value of company shares fell $22 billion (yes, that's a "B"!) in the past six weeks!
"All the King's horses and all the King's men couldn't put Humpty together again." As in the nursery rhyme, so in fact.
Enron, the Texas-based international energy giant now seeking escape from bankruptcy, faces huge problems with even attempting to put its mirror-like combine back together again. And, despite the "King's men" having help with the heavy lifting from the White House, Congress, the courts and hundreds of faceless bankers and bean counters, this Dumpty just won't fit together anymore.
Even the new name of Dumpty reflects on a stricken giant. Shares valued at $90 each this August are selling for 10 to 26 cents. These once wonder-shares have been degraded to "junk" as thousands of investors rapidly dumped 173.6 million shares. Dumpty Enron, facing losses worldwide that add up to more than $5 billion, now is a monster under stress - and it is a monster that is both shameless and insatiable.
Dumpty is sniffing around its key creditors (J.P Morgan, Chase and Citigroup) for what is called "debtor-in-possession" loans of more than $1 billion. This shows the truth behind the adage that if you owe a bank enough (Enron owes some $3 billion), you own the bank.
The geniuses of the 21st-century marketplace will now learn a sobering and exceedingly painful truth. The kindly, gentle and truly awful socialist pediatrician, Dr. Benjamin Spock, was effectively responsible for Dumpty Enron's collapse and for much else that is wrong with our Republic today.
Because of the genial old doctor, generations of decent American babies developed into troll-like kids ready to stamp and scream until they got what they wanted. Undisciplined, and having forfeited love for abhorrence, they became gargoyle-like adults, liberally laced with Prozac, whose creed was, "If you get away with it, it's cool. Getting caught is bad, so be more careful next time." Dumpty Enron got caught!
The so-called "popular press," in its usual searches for the clay feet with which they invest every well-known person, will now try to link Enron's present woes to the White House. Too bad, guys, you should have started investigating Enron's ties (ties not links) in 1993 and onward to the sales team of Bill Clinton, Al Gore and Ron Brown.
Congress is to initiate hearings as to what went wrong with Enron. It's a safe bet to assume that a major part of the investigation will center on Enron's 5,000 Houston employees who may be jobless within a few days. Jobless and learning that their pension plan was based on company stock that has lost 99 percent of its value. As they live on their unemployment and Social Security pittances, these unfortunate thousands can think about how their employer and its accountants, Arthur Anderson (paid at $1 million a week), inflated profits on paper and scaled down the company's debts. To get away with that kind of "little illegality," a close-mouthed loyal staff is vital. Already prosecutors from the Securities and Exchange Commission, Internal Revenue Service, San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York City and Houston are finding voluble and knowledgeable witnesses eager to cooperate. Subpoenas for individuals and records are now being served.
Yet with so many politicians from both political parties being the recipients of Enron's political donations in both hard and soft money, objective justice may not be easy. Moreover, Enron was generous to the last cent of other people money! Its corporate leaders funded business schools and scholarships, and gave and gave to the United Way! Even Houston's giant sports arena, home to the Astros baseball team, carries the name "Enron Field," a little vanity that cost a mere $100 million for a 30-year deal.
Enron had the best brains that money could buy, but gave the word "ethics" a whole new meaning. The cowboys of Dumpty Enron talked up a storm about ethics; but only a few at the top realized that "ethics" was an acronym for "Enron thinks how income can (be) stolen."
That's a stretch; but look at their 1994 sales team - Clinton, Gore and the late Ron Brown - a trio unlimited and uncontrolled in their cunning and greed.
In what seems to be eons ago, before Gov. Bill Clinton became president, the late, much loved and little lamented Ron Brown was Clinton's good friend and a power broker in the National Democratic Party. Ron Brown had a friend, a congressman from Houston, the late Mickey Leland, who died in 1989. Until his passing, Leland was a shining light in the Congressional Black Caucus and a dedicated socialist, who was one of the Institute for Policy Studies' delights.
From 1984, when Enron was conceived, Brown and Leland were there snapping up unconsidered trifles of money for use in their campaigns against the free market. Mickey was able to ease a lot of Enron's early problems through the Houston City Council by playing his "equal opportunity card." He had also become an African expert who initially took the Enron message to that continent, a chore that was taken on by Ron Brown, Clinton's secretary of commerce, before the latter met his untimely death in a highly controversial plane crash in Croatia. (Untimely, because had Secretary Brown lived, he would have faced multiple criminal indictments that could have precipitated an even earlier fall for Bill Clinton and his gang.)
Now we get to that old puzzle about chickens and eggs, and what came first! Ron Brown, Al Gore and Bill Clinton introduced Enron to market managers in Russia, China, Indonesia and India. In India, Enron quickly became involved in one of that country's most massive corruption investigations, contracts were canceled and Enron was out.
On the other hand, Enron introduced the Clinton team to Lippo Industries and thence to China's People's Liberation Army (a wonderful source of political cash), to John Huang, another good provider and to nameless, numberless Arabs who never arrived with empty pockets. If we look at a list of those attending coffee klatches at the White House, we can learn why a storm of doubtful deals enabled Enron to quickly control one-quarter of the world's electricity and natural gas. But, that wasn't enough. The ever-so-greedy Dumpty moved in to water deals in Massachusetts and Europe, paper mills in Canada, gas pipe lines throughout the world, fiber optics, television, mutual funds and information gathering. In turn, that led to risk analysis, a name that those clever Texans quickly changed to "reward realization!"
The rewards were good! Enron, with sales assistance from Tony Lake, then Clinton's national security adviser, persuaded the impoverished, war-torn country of Mozambique to sign a $770 million electric power contract. Mozambique signed because Tony's salesmanship was persuasive. If the Mozambicans didn't sign, he indicated that their congressionally approved $44 million U.S. aid payment would never be made.
And there was the Croatian caper. In the days when Franjo Tudjman was Croatia's dictator and pretending to be both a reformed communist and best friend of America in the Balkans, poor Franjo had a problem. He and some of his very best friends were wanted as war criminals by the Hague's International Court of Justice. Enron wanted a power contract with Croatia. Enron offered a deal to Tudjman. Sign up with us and we will use our gang in Washington to make sure you and your friends don't go to jail.
Tudjman signed. Enron made a heap of money. Nobody went to jail. Everyone was happy - until Tudjman died of cancer. Then the lid was off, his Croatian Democratic Union was defeated and the new boys in power in Zagreb could not believe how much of their budget went to pay the electricity bills from Enron.
Somebody - probably another Dr. Spock child eager to tell on his peers - prattled! Under quiet pressure from the Croats, another deal was made and a couple of guys were charged as war criminals. Electricity costs went down (but not to the consumers) and as a part of the deal nobody talked, except about the wonderful vacations that they were enjoying in the Caribbean.
This could be called a "cautionary tale." There are two cautions. The first: Beware of the Spock babies now that they are nearing retirement and losing whatever sense they had. The second: Investigators all, beware, as you look into the depths and shallows of Enron you may, if you are truly unlucky, find the truth. And, if you do, these truths won't make you free, just well informed.
Since Sept. 11 and the anthrax outrage, some government departments have expanded and dispersed around the Washington region. One department, identified by the usual alphabet soup of letters and much concerned with gathering and processing intelligence and information from all over the world, now finds itself in a building where, a few floors below its official quarters, there is a restaurant and bar.
The deputy director of this government enterprise is a gentleman with a liver like the soles of an old boot. He sits in the bar from 10 a.m. until noon. Then he leaves for lunch; but he resumes his bar watch at 2.30 p.m. and leaves with his car pool at 5 p.m.
Our poster boy does not waste his day. Throughout his vigils, colleagues from other agencies visit him with their reports and requests. Information is exchanged and even one or two job applicants have been interviewed. And, of course, every day and every hour, his flatterers and flunkies, who make sure that his check is paid, surround the deputy director.
With cold weather forecast, the prospects of stories from warm, comfortable quarters, while appealing, are canceled out by a hereditary need for cups of strong tea!
"Dateline D.C." is written by a Washington, D.C.-based British journalist and political observer.
URL: http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/opinion/datelinedc/s_7142.html
I wish others understood that simple reality. The "R" doesn't mean "righteous" -- just "Republican". Too many think the two words are synonymous, though.
I've read Arianna's other articles on her website, and she's good at taking Dems and Reps to task over their bowing down to campaign contributors. If Enron's contributions bought special access to the White House, Bush has relinquished any claim to "compassionate conservatism" -- well, at least the compassionate part, anyways.
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