A man who identified himself as Lee Perry held up a homemade sign proclaiming Lay's innocence. Perry said he did independent auditing of the company in its heyday and that everything was on the up and up.
"I've heard all the talk about what people think will happen," said Perry, who believes the trial will exonerate the former CEOs.
Enron is one of the most written-about companies in history, particularly with respect to its auditing and accounting players. But, naturally, a Google search of "Lee Perry" turned up nada.
Of course, if you've already spent nearly $100 million on your defense, you can probably afford to buy a few pseudonymous asskissers to stand around outside the courthouse, complete with "homemade" signs designed to casually impress the Houston Chronicle.
What I want is a complete list of every scumsucking fuckstick Democratic asshole Senator who voted for Cloture. That's what I want.
I don't know what to DO with that list, not yet -- but I know for GODDAMNED sure I won't be VOTING for any of them, lt alone sending them any goddamned MONEY.
Frankly, right now I'd like nothing better than to torpedo the entire lot of them. Just dump them like so much worthless, leaden, VICHY MOTHERFUCKING BALLAST.
I got nothin', folks. Don't look over here if you want comfort or a nice, uplifting LIVE TO FIGHT ANOTHER DAY speech.
Sequels suck.WaPo: "...Americans dipped further into their savings, pushing the savings rate for all of 2005 into negative territory at minus 0.5 percent. That was the lowest annual savings rate since a decline of 1.5 percent in 1933, a year in which the country was struggling to cope with the Great Depression."
Supporters of George W. Bush are lambasting Sen. John Kerry for a threatened filibuster against U.S. Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito. But 15 years ago, their attitude was different as backers of George H.W. Bush wielded the filibuster to block a probe into Republican secret dealings with Iran that could have doomed the Bush Dynasty.
In 1991, the Democratic-controlled Senate was planning an investigation into whether Republicans had conducted secret negotiations with Iran’s Islamic fundamentalist regime during the 1980 campaign, when Jimmy Carter was still President and Iran was holding 52 Americans hostage.
The unresolved hostage crisis destroyed Carter’s reelection hopes and gave an important boost to Ronald Reagan when the hostages were released on Jan. 20, 1981, immediately after he was sworn in as President and George H.W. Bush became Vice President.
A decade after those events, some Democrats wanted to get to the bottom of recurring allegations that George Bush Sr., a former CIA director, had joined clandestine negotiations with Iran in fall 1980 that may have delayed release of the hostages for political gain, what was called the “October Surprise” mystery.
Meanwhile, Republicans were worried that a full-scale October Surprise investigation might implicate Bush in near-treasonous talks with an enemy state and devastate his 1992 reelection campaign. Confirmation of the allegations also would have eviscerated the legitimacy of the Reagan-Bush era.
So, in November 1991, Republican leaders used the filibuster to block funding for the investigation. The Democrats mustered 51 votes – a majority – but fell short of the 60 votes needed for cloture. A fully funded investigation was prevented.
For 25 years, since Dubya's CIA daddy secretly negotiated with Iran, the Bush family has established and expanded its duplicitous reputation as the true Axis of Evil.
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Author James FreyPresident George W. Bush confessed to Oprah Winfrey on Thursday that he made up details about every character in his memoir "A Million Little Pieces"the case for going to war against Iraq and the talk show host apologized to her viewers, saying she felt "duped."
"I have been really embarrassed by this," said Winfrey, whose praise for Frey's book in September helped make it the top-selling book on nonfiction lists in the United States last yearapathy toward Bush and Cheney's disingenuous rationales helped lead to the deaths of 2,200 American soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians.
"I really feel duped," she told FreyBush on her television show. She said he had betrayed millions of viewers.
At one point early in the interview FreyBush said he still viewed the work as a memoir, not a novelwar as "on terror" instead of "on Iraq." By the show's end Winfrey made him admit he lied.
"This hasn't been a great day for me," he said. "I feel like I came here and I have been honest with you. I have, you know, essentially admitted to ..."
"Lying," Winfrey interrupted.
"To lying," he said. "It's not an easy thing to do in front of an audience full of people and a lot of others watching on TV. ... If I come out of this experience with anything it's being a better person and learning from my mistakes and making sure I don't repeat them."
On the ever-expanding scale of American liars, Frey is small fry.
And yet this is what we focus on in hundreds upon hundreds of prominent media stories — one celebrity's trivial embarrassment, instead of the deaths of thousands.
WASHINGTON -- Rankled by the rich retirement payouts many troubled companies make to executives, Congress is moving to block such companies from funding the lavish packages.
The provision, tucked into legislation that would shore up the federal agency that provides a safety net for private-sector pensions, would keep financially troubled companies from setting aside any special pension benefits for top executives if their pension plans for rank-and-file employees weren't adequately funded.
Disclosures about bankruptcy-proof supplemental executive retirement benefits at some airlines, including a $45 million fund set up a few years ago for 35 top officials by Delta Air Lines Inc., have galvanized bipartisan support for reining in such perks at other beleaguered companies.
"We've heard too many stories of top executives of bankrupt companies sticking workers with unfunded pensions while running off with millions of dollars of so-called nonqualified pension benefits," says Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican.
[...]
The shift toward a dual system started in 1994, when Congress passed a law intended to limit the cost to taxpayers of runaway executive pay. The law barred companies from taking a tax deduction on compensation in excess of $1 million a year for any current employee. The result: Companies began setting up supplemental pension plans that encouraged senior managers to defer compensation.
Over time, the plans added generous benefits and covered a greater number of salaried employees. Now, more than 90% of the largest companies offer nonqualified deferred executive compensation plans, according to a new survey of the 1,000 largest companies by Clark Consulting, a Chicago benefits consulting firm. Most companies have expanded the programs to include all managers with annual salary and bonus exceeding $150,000, benefits experts say.
Many members of Congress think the proliferation of supplemental executive retirement plans has contributed to the trend of companies freezing or terminating defined-benefit pension plans. They reason that if executives have their own rules for setting aside money, they have less incentive to maintain nest eggs for their employees.
Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat on the Finance Committee, took Glenn Tilton, chief executive of UAL Corp.'s United Airlines, to task at a hearing in June for striking a $4 million benefit deal when he joined the airline while other workers were taking pay cuts. The benefit deal, Mr. Tilton said, was designed to compensate him for benefits he would have received from his former employer.
"The question of a double standard is very important and resonates with people in the middle class," Mr. Wyden said.
The double standard also represents yet another missed opportunity by Democrats to take control of the conversation.
Alito is a smart, experienced and knowledgeable jurist. I have no doubt of his legal ability. On balance, the Senate should give more weight to excellence than judicial philosophy.
[...]
Given the times in which we live, we need and deserve a Supreme Court willing to examine independently these extraordinary assertions of executive authority. We can fight and win the war on terrorism without inflicting upon ourselves and our posterity another regrettable episode like the Red Scare and the Japanese internment. But that will happen only if the justices of the Supreme Court are willing to fulfill their essential role in our constitutional system.
Whatever else Alito may or may not have made clear about his views on such issues as abortion, federalism and religious freedom, he has certainly made clear that he has no interest in restraining the acts of this commander in chief. That, in my judgment, poses a serious threat to the nation and is a more than adequate reason for the Senate--Republicans and Democrats alike--to deny his confirmation to the Supreme Court.
A "serious threat to the nation."
Serious! Threat! To the nation! Call Homeland Security: we found a terrorist and his name is Sam Alito!
The sad thing is it's probably true: Alito probably is a serious threat to the nation. Forget abortion, who cares. Alito has made it clear that he wants to make the presidency an unrestrained dictatorship. Our Diebold democracy will become, if it hasn't already, a farce and the laughingstock of the developed world.
Stone is a law professor at the University of Chicago and the author of "Perilous Times: Free Speech in Wartime from the Sedition Act of 1798 to the War on Terrorism."
The Justice Department won't disclose how many whistle-blower suits have been filed against contractors in Iraq. But the only Iraq-related False Claims Act case on which the Justice Department so far has announced a decision, it declined to intervene.
That case was filed in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va., by two individuals who alleged that Custer Battles LLC, of Fairfax, Va., overcharged the government for expenses on work in Iraq. The company was awarded contracts totaling $38 million -- partially paid with $4 million in cash -- to provide security at Baghdad Airport, and later to help guard distribution of new Iraqi currency, although the tiny concern never had provided security services before.
The Justice Department declined to say why it decided not to back the case -- filed by a former Custer Battles employee and an employee of a subcontractor -- citing department policy. Robert T. Rhoad, a lawyer for Custer Battles, denies wrongdoing by the company, and said he was optimistic that the case would be dismissed. After suspending Custer Battles from receiving new contracts because of the fraud allegations, the Air Force in Sept. 2005 reinstated the company, declaring it eligible again for contracts. An Air Force spokeswoman said contracting regulations require it to reinstate a company after a year if the Justice Department hasn't taken action or requested that the ban be extended.
A tiny company with no experience gets a $38 million contract, including $4 million in cash. Nothing suspicious there.
Even the number of whistle-blower suits, let alone the content of those suits, is now a state secret. You would think that the Justice Department was working for the contractors instead of the American public.
The Bush administration on Wednesday asked a federal judge to order Google to turn over a broad range of material from its closely guarded databases.
The move is part of a government effort to revive an Internet child protection law struck down two years ago by the U.S. Supreme Court. The law was meant to punish online pornography sites that make their content accessible to minors. The government contends it needs the Google data to determine how often pornography shows up in online searches.
In court papers filed in U.S. District Court in San Jose, Justice Department lawyers revealed that Google has refused to comply with a subpoena issued last year for the records, which include a request for 1 million random Web addresses and records of all Google searches from any one-week period.
The Mountain View-based search and advertising giant opposes releasing the information on a variety of grounds, saying it would violate the privacy rights of its users and reveal company trade secrets, according to court documents.
Nicole Wong, an associate general counsel for Google, said the company will fight the government's effort ``vigorously.''
The Enron trial is by no means a certain victory for prosecutors. The task force, composed of about a dozen lawyers and another 12 federal agents, will be outgunned in both manpower and financial resources. Skilling has paid his lawyers more than $20 million out of his pocket and $17 million more from insurance proceeds. Lay has shelled out millions of dollars more.
A guy robs a liquor store and then flashes a fat bankroll of cash when his lawyer wants his fee. Where'd he get the cash? How is this Skilling/Lay situation any different?
Hey, California, remember those billions you and Grandma Millie paid in fake energy overcharges? Here's where some of it went — it's the fat bankroll Skilling and Lay are flashing in front of their 24K gold-plated attorneys.
Skimble, I live in [Chicago zip code] and today received the same letter as you did back in January of 2003. Initially I pitched it, but a few minutes ago I dug it back out of the shredding pile, did some googling and found your blog. (I'm sure you get plenty of crack-pot email, to illustrate the validity of my claim; the only piece of my letter that is different from yours is that the month is hand written in the top right but the year is not.) The "men in black" have not visited as of yet, and the name of my "Assigned Field Agent" is female so I doubt it will be your tall man. It is interesting that this study is still ongoing, I guess it takes a bit of time to "interview" 200,000 people. I did find some governmental information that seems to support your conclusion. If you're still curious just google, "0930-0110" omb, and a bunch of info will be at your fingers. I want to give a preemptive Thank You for preventing me from even opening the door for these g-men/women.
Best regards, [signed]
You're welcome, Anonymous, that's why we bother with the damn blog — because the press won't tell you what you need to know.
The fact that this all happened back in 2003, long before we learned about the NSA spying and secret renditions and all the rest of the neo-Soviet nonsense that characterizes American life nowadays, only proves the point once again: J. Edgar Hoover is alive and well and living in Washington DC.
Kids, if you don't know who Hoover is, go ahead and google the bastard (special Martin Luther King Day search terms).
A case like this highlights a point seen in a number of white collar crime prosecutions when a high-level, and well-paid, executive or professional engages in misconduct that involves seemingly trivial amounts. Is it worth it? Wal-Mart's 2004 proxy statement (here) discloses that for 2004 Coughlin earned $983,894 in salary, an incentive payment of $2.8 million, a restricted stock award of $2 million, and other compensation (i.e., perks not including the ones he stole) of $252,082, which in addition to his ownership of 948,832 shares, which are worth over $40 million. The annual dividends on his stock holdings alone probably exceed the amount of the fraud he will admit, so in the end it's not the money. Instead, I think it is a sense of entitlement, and a belief that one is not doing anything wrong because the person is not a criminal like those people who rob a 7-11.
It's true. A half-million dollars is petty cash for a jamoke like Coughlin, but because he didn't actually hold up a liquor store and get caught on the surveillance camera, he somehow feels he's better than the common criminal.
This, in a nutshell, is what's wrong with the American zeitgeist in the power elites today — the sense of entitlement felt by the Skillings, Lays, Abramoffs, Lesars, and all the other white collar crooks whose hubris will someday become their ticket to infamy.
Is it even necessary to point out that Thomas Coughlin was a Bush contributor? Not including Wal-Mart's Republican PAC, of course.
New details have emerged of how the growing number of prisoners on hunger strike at Guantánamo Bay are being tied down and force-fed through tubes pushed down their nasal passages into their stomachs to keep them alive.
Where is Pat Robertson's reflex condemnation of this unholy behavior?
The very existence of the official insanity at Guantánamo Bay is further proof that Jesus Christ is not God — because if he were, he would strike down the entire Bush dynasty-administration for crimes against his Creation.
The group raised $2.5 million from three Abramoff clients, including $1 million from Russian businessmen, the Post reported. Abramoff worked with [Former DeLay chief of staff Edwin] Buckham to organize a 1997 trip to Moscow by DeLay.
Buckham's lobbying firm, the Alexander Strategy Group, employed DeLay's wife, Christine, paying her $115,000 during three years. DeLay's lawyers have said she was paid to determine the favorite charities of members of Congress.
$115,000 to Tom DeLay's wife to determine what everyone already knows? Seems like a lot. The favorite charity of GOP members of Congress is, of course, themselves.
And who knew that Russian businessmen cared so deeply about U.S. families as to lighten their pockets by $1 million?
"[Addington] lives in a modest house in Northern Virginia, takes the subway to work, and shuns the parties and perks of office. He usually has the same simple meal every day -- a bowl of gazpacho soup. Though born in Washington, he styles himself as a 'rugged Montana man' in the image of his boss, and he has a photo in his office of Cheney shooting a gun."
The most cluelessly homoerotic administration in history.
Hallibuton's shares have surpassed highs hit five years ago thanks to rising energy prices. And lucky insiders have been guzzling up the profits.
Company insiders sold $24 million in stock in the fourth quarter, eclipsing the five-year average of $5.9 million for this period, according to data from Thomson Financial. [...]
Insider selling spiked in July, September and December, when the stock tested five-year highs, notes Mark LoPresti, senior quantitative analyst at Thomson Financial. [...]
In 2005, five senior executives sold nearly a million shares for roughly $55 million in 2005, eclipsing sales of 154,000 shares for $5.9 million the previous year, according to Thomson data.
Andrew Lane, chief operating officer, Bert Cornelison, general counsel, and Mark A. McCollum, chief accounting officer, are among the executives selling shares. [...]
David Lesar, chief executive officer, has been the most aggressive seller. He pocketed $6.9 million last month by selling 107,000 shares after exercising options on most of them. The options were priced between $31.55 and $51.50, and the sales were conducted under a fresh trading plan Lesar adopted in August.
This year, Lesar made more than $46 million selling nearly 778,000 shares -- about 70% were options-related sales -- since he started selling in April. Even so, he continues to maintain a stake of just under 700,000 shares with the help of option grants. [...]
"[T]his guy is getting pretty fat option grants," says [Harris Hall, director of equity research at Singular Research]. This is a "classic example of the company that is getting sweetheart deals from the government and insiders are making out like crazy."
