Thoughts on Eron decision from an Ex-Anderson guy

[katty]

more: http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/5/25/124158/643

Thoughts on the Enron decision from an ex-Andersen guy
by clammyc
Thu May 25, 2006 at 09:41:58 AM PDT

As we all know, the Enron decision was announced. And coming from someone who (as well as my wife) lost my job at Andersen as a result of this debacle, I wanted to share some of my thoughts about it.

Yes, I am very excited that Lay and Skilling were found guilty of all these charges. And yes, it is some vindication. But I will say that this whole mess, which I lay (no pun intended) at the feet of Bush and Cheney for reasons that I will get in to below, has had huge repercussions and a major impact on both my life and my wife's life as well, not to mention MILLIONS of Americans in so many ways. So there is a different perspective and angle here that hopefully adds some value here.

More below:

clammyc's diary :: ::
For starters and for those who haven't kept up, the Andersen conviction for shredding documents was overturned nearly exactly a year ago UNANIMOUSLY by the Supreme Court. So not only did 70,000 US employees - hard working US employees who had no knowledge that Enron was even an Andersen client - lose their jobs over this, we lost our jobs for no reason.

Our (my wife and mine) anger was directed in a number of areas. First, while illegal activity is always wrong, Andersen was clearly the scapegoat for this widespread fraud. We asked ourselves (and our colleagues) why none of the brokerage houses that fraudulently pumped up the stock of Enron weren't taken down. I mean, to those who lost their life savings from this - Enron employees, other investors, or anyone else - they relied on the stock information that the analysts fraudulently provided.

We asked ourselves (remember it was back in 2001 at the time) why Cheney and Bush's ties to Enron executives weren't being probed.