LAST EDITED ON Dec-13-01 AT 10:51 AM (ET)Great phrase. But hope you expand your view of this. As I've said before, Enron is Us....Dems and well as GOP. It's the whole direction our society has gone, encouraged by Clinton as much as anyone. Only trying to pin it on the GOP, ignores the bigger picture.
The more fundamental issues of Enronomics are these. Since the 1970's the values of our society have been pushed away from a reasonable balance of business and other goals and aspects of society. We've all bought into a blind worship of markets, and the sublimation of other values. Enron is a logical outcome of that.
1)When every basic service is privatized and commoditized and deregulated, the public gets screwed. Everyone who bought Enron stock or endorsed their approach bought into a basic principle: The energy that people need for survival should be a way to generate big profits, rather than treated as a public service that either breaks even or makes a modest profit. Enronomics is based on private companies making immense profits by adding an extra useless layer to the process of producing and distributing energy. Those profits are added into the costs that real people have to pay for services that are not optional for them.
Take it to the real-world level: The executives' big houses and extravagent lifestyles are paid for by making it impossible for a poor or lower-income working family in the northeast to be able to afford to heat their home in the winter. The huge dividends that investors (large and small) demanded from Enron stock came from the food budget of some widow who can't pay her light bill.
This is true in health-care, media and many other sectors that deal in products and services that are basic and required by everyone.
2)We have become greedy and lazy. We no longer invest in companies that we believe in for the long-haul. Investors (big and small) demand instant wealth, "all gain and no pain." This puts pressure on companies to squeeze every ounce of profit out of their operations, to the detriment of workers and consumers. Also ultimately to the detrement of the companies themselves, due to an inability to engage in long-term planning.
3)We idolize excecutives who can accomplish seeming financial miracles, without looking at how they created those miracles. Companies that are held up as models of modern business may make a good return, but they are also screwing workers, communities, consumers and others aspects of the common good in the process.
4)We are stratifying the class system in modern society. We've created asmaller and smaller elite who are better off, while the rest of of the population is left with the crumbs. We lived with the illusion that it was different in the 90's, but when the shit hit the fan with the current recession -- especially after 9-11 -- the true nature of these inequalities is revealed.
4)Democrats have bought into this as much as the GOP. The only difference is that Enronomics reflects the honest core belief of Republicans that the answer to everything is business. The Democrats have lost their core beliefs that there needs to be a balance of capitalism with civic goals. The Dems have gone too far from their traditions, bought into EWnronomics and tipped the balance towards policies that favor business at the expense of other social goals.
If the Dems really want to stand out, they should address these bigger issues, and truly be the party of reform again, not just an opportunitstic party that only looks for political points to score.
Ultimatly, IMO, if the Democrats offer a positive basic alternative vision to what Enron represents, that also is a message that will resonate with a large segment of the public.
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