More details about the rise & fall of Enron. Now here is what I don’t get. November 8, 2001, “Enron says it overstated earnings dating back to 1997 by almost $600 million.” How can it possibly take you four years to figure out that you have overstated your earnings? That just doesn’t make sense to me. Nothing like a little creative accounting to make things look good, huh? Gee, I sure wish the rest of us could get away with that! And there should be a special place in hell for management who tries to get away with things like telling their employees that “OUR PERFORMANCE has never been stronger; our business model has never been more robust. … We have the finest organization in American business today” just 2 months before the company’s hidden financial problems surfaced. “In an Aug. 27 e-mail, Lay announced the details of an employee stock option program which spoke of “a significantly higher price” for Enron stock in the future. Selling for $37 a share in August, Enron stock now sells for 68 cents. The stock was at $83 a share a year ago.”
And considering the fact that Ken Lay and the other Enron executives donations made the company President Bush’s biggest financial supporter through two governor’s races and the presidential election, don’t tell me that they weren’t expecting some special treatment. Granted, they might not have gotten any special treatment, but they certainly expected it. And the story isn’t over.
