I have friends who used to work at Arthur Andersen. Once upon a time, they had a great reputation. And they did fine work.
But they got greedy. The main thing they did was enter into consulting contracts with the same firms, like Enron, whose books they were supposedly auditing on a fair and impartial basis. That made them a player, with a vested interest in making thimgs look good for their client, rather than just auditing letting the chips fall where they may.
In short, like Clark Clifford and many other individuals and organizations, they sold out their reputations for cash. And, since they are in a field where their reputation is the only real commodity they really had to sell, that was the end of the line.
As with other posters, I feel very sorry for the low-level folks at Andersen, the clerks, typists, office workers, who had nothing to do with the rot at the top, but will lose their jobs with everyone else. But as for the partners and officers of Andersen, they are about to get what they richly deserve.
Like ValuJet, Andersen has just "augered in." Too bad some politicians who were up to their eyeballs in this, like Billyjeff Clinton and Senator Chris ("Sandwich") Dodd aren't augering in with them.
Congressman Billybob