[beckett]

I lay this at the feet of the Democrats in Congress and their acolytes in the media.

AA may have engaged in practices that wrongfully overlooked a conflict of interest, e.g., consulting and auditing for the same firm, and it may have tweaked accounting rules, or even destroyed evidence, a clearly illegal act for which the individuals involved deserve punishment if found guilty, but those failures need not have taken down the entire corporation and thrown a whole bunch of people out of work. For that to happen, attack dog journalists acting at the behest of the Democratic Party had to hype the whole thing way out of proportion in an attempt to smear the White House. What's a few thousand people out of work when Daschle needs a few lame sound bites for the Six O'Clock News?

Pathetic.

[Roger_W_Isom]

I have to agree with you there!!!!!.. the dems ALLOWED this to occur with their support of SHODDY accounting practices!!!!!

[elfman2]

"but those failures need not have taken down the entire corporation and thrown a whole bunch of people out of work. "

After 5 years of IT consulting with Ernst & Young, I think that the whole consulting/accounting industry and its incestuous, almost parasitic, relationship with the economy desperately needs a shakeup exactly like this. These big 5 firms are a monstrous financial cost the healthcare industry in which I worked. There are many reasons that they exist, but I think that providing a valued service is dwarfed by the other reasons like risk sharing, political cover, favor trading, executive incompetence and insecurity.

[RJL]

AA may have engaged in practices that wrongfully overlooked a conflict of interest, e.g., consulting and auditing for the same firm, and it may have tweaked accounting rules, or even destroyed evidence, a clearly illegal act for which the individuals involved deserve punishment if found guilty, but those failures need not have taken down the entire corporation

What you say is true. However, the politicians and Attorneys Generals and private lawsuits will make it almost impossible for them to survive.

What will really finish them is that because AA has been the auditor for the largest corporate bankruptcy, Enron, AA was also the auditor for the forth largest corporate bankruptcy, Global Crossing, and they were the auditor for the largest non-profit bankruptcy, ?Baptists of Arizona?.

Large investors will simply not put money into a corporation that uses AA as it's auditor. No corporation will keep a auditor that drives away investors.

[johnboy]

but those failures need not have taken down the entire corporation and thrown a whole bunch of people out of work

lol. arthur? arthur, is that you?

lol.

[irish_links]

Let's keep this all in perspective. E&Y doesn't want to acquire Andersen.....now. It is easy to see why. AA is threatened with a criminal indictment by the Justice Department. What firm in its right mind would want to take on that burden? After AA has settled with Justice, the situation will be very much different. E&Y or someone else will be very interested in acquiring the talent, contracts and savvy that exist at AA. Some jobs will be lost in the process, but the total certainly won't be 90,000. Andersen partners will have their equity pretty much wiped out, but they will continue their practices more or less as they always have. Take a deep breath guys and relax.