During the [memorial] service, family members eulogized Lay as a loving husband, father, stepfather and grandfather. One stepson, Beau Herrold, read four pages of fond childhood reminiscences of Lay, going back to the days when Lay was courting his mother, who was then a single mother of three. Lay embraced him and his siblings as though they were his own children, Herrold said.
Another stepson, David Herrold, said he was saddened by Lay's death and "angry because of the way he was treated the last five years of his life. I'll leave it at that."
Such indignant outrage from David! Such fluffy nostalgia from Beau!
Lay left his previous wife and kids to court his secretary, who happened to be their mother. This is what Republican family values look like in practice.
As far as embracing people as though they were his own children, Lay's loving largesse did not extend to those he was legally responsible to — his employees and most especially the participants in his 401(k) plan. He was a fiduciary to the plan, meaning that he must manage it, by law, in their best interests and not in his own. Not only did he not live up to his duty, he abdicated in the most spectacular way possible: by personally siphoning hundreds of millions of dollars in cash while encouraging his employees to put their life savings in soon-to-be-worthless Enron securities. So much for being a loving "stepfather" to his employees.
Ken Lay was at best criminally negligent as a CEO and as a steward of his employees' money, crimes for which he will never pay. And neither will David, whose purloined inheritance was guaranteed by his stepfather's death, and whose indignant outrage is totally misplaced.
David, if you want to understand the anger of the rest of the world at your stepfather, get a mirror, you little shit.
