I think Brit's people hit this dead-on tonight, especially Kondracke, which surprised me. The "sharks in the water" remark by Feinman indicates just how overblown the press is making this affair in re: Bush/Enron. This will turn out to be a financial scandal.
Enron was engaging in funny stuff and the smart guys on Wall Street knew about it, which is why Enron was tailing off throughout the summer.
So in October, Lay calls Evans and O'Neill and intimates that there might be need for Federal help. O'Neill shields the President (God knows how many Freepers have been asking for his scalp, I don't know why) and directs his undersecretary to investigate whether the Administration should push for a bailout of Enron.
The Undersecretary, apparently a good Republican who believes that There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch, recommends no dice. O'Neill says no. Evans says no. Lay and Enron are out of luck. Three weeks later, he's in bankruptcy court.
For the Democratic theory to be correct, Bush should have helped Enron get a bailout to help his rich cronies hold on to their stock values.
But he didn't. That's where this whole thing is going to fall apart.
Meantime, however, there will be some good to come of this. Apparently, Enron higher ups were selling stock as fast as they could while the little guys were getting screwed. And they lied to their auditors, the SEC, and Wall Street.
That's called bad juju.
There will be an insider trading scandal because of this and several Enron execs will be attending seminars at Club Fed. Bush will make sure that this happens.
Needless to say, Enron's CEO is off of the Bush family Christmas card list.
Be Seeing You,
Chris