Enron: What difference does it make?

hyperspace

Can someone help me understand what the whole stink is about the fact that Enron contacted the Treasury for help, the Treasury essentially said "tough, you gotta pull you're own wagon", and they failed? I mean, it is horrible about all the folks losing all their 401k along with their jobs, but why does it seem everyone is trying to make a scandal about the gov't not bailing them out? Is it just the media running with nothing, or is there a legitimate issue here? Just trying to understand this thing....

jltrent

30 billion dollars missing sounds like a pretty big deal to me. I think we need to find out what happened. From my experience starting at the top would be a good place to start.

turbo

Thats exactly what was being said when the whitewater investments, caused the banks in Arkansas to fail. The only difference there is that the government did indeed bail out those savings and loans cos.Everybody clammed up and , the flap finally blew over.The government spent millions more (after the bailout) trying to bring the real higher up guilties to justice, with no, but no cigar.I feel sorry for the investors but, if you put all your eggs in one basket, you , it's hard to plead your case.Democrats just want to get mileage outa this issue.

GreenLantern

Turbo hit it on the mark. The Dems just want to get back at the republican for 8 years of hearings, investigations, and scandals. Yeah, the white house was all chummy with the big wigs from Enron but I think for actually doing anything illegal, it's just not there. But then in politics it's guilt by association.I feel sorry about all the people on the bottom rung of the ladder who lost their savings, especially when you consider the higher ups cashed out early. But on the other hand, those people didn't invest wisely. They owned too much Enron stock. Never put a large percentage of your stock/savings into the company you work for!

royc38

The doemcrats won't dig too deep. They will find Clinton and Schumer in the hole.

jet

The fact that the higher ups sold out first is the scandel.enron leveraged energy,that is (bought all)(tried to corner the market)and then resold it to other resellers after marking it up outrageously. what a bunch of crooks.Now we pay again,to investigate,to bailout,to reimberse-just wait and see.don,t even get me started on nafta.ford is going down the tubes because they shipped all of the good jobs over sea and now no american can aford to buy a new car.poor poor ford.nafta was a short term shot in the arm.now that our savings are gone,so is the earning power.it has to even out, unfortunatly it will take to long to bring the rest of the world to our level so we will have to come down to there level.how can we compete with some one that can work for $3.00 a day. when we can,t even pay our trash bill with that wage.sorry got carried away whew.nafta is the stump of all evil.

7mm_ultra_mag_is_king

jet, as far as nafta goes I don't think that most people understand exactly how much damage it has done to our country. In short,,we sold out and we will probably never get it back.

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when all else fails........................

turbo

I never did like the idea of other people watching over my investments, most of these stock brokers are plying the stock market themselves, when they steer you into investments they also own, do you really believe their going to get on the phone with you if there is a sell out going on?, Heck no, they won't call until they've cashed out first.It's the nature of the beast; first things first..

idsman75

The Dems and the Repubs BOTH received funds from ENRON. The Dems received $100K just one week prior to going belly-up. Whether it's $100K or $100,000,000, all hands that touched the money are equally guilty if this is wrong-doing. I love the fact that the media is reporting on how Republicans were meeting with ENRON execs last summer and were so chummy chummy. Let's see here....national energy crisis spreading outward from Kalifornia like a disease....ENRON is one of the largest energy providers.....makes perfectly good sense to me! They tried blaming the economy on Bush tax cuts but that obviously didn't work. They raise all this hooplah over "the homeless problem" now that Republican is in office. Nothing is working so let's try the scandal bit and see where we can go with it.

ADfree

The liberal media just HAS to have some way of attacking the president, they tried bad-mouthing the war and it failed, so this is their chance. I find it rather amusing that they are focusing on the pols when it looks like there is nothing abnormal... they get money from everyone. The coverage and investigation need to focus on Enron, where there probably is REAL wrongdoing![This message has been edited by ADfree (edited 01-12-2002).]

jet

enron didn't produce anything ,they were midlemen who muscled there way in because they could,capital talks.our previous good economy was do to the short term aspects of nafta(good import/retail profits ) but now we don't have the working/earning/spending base we had before nafta.too be a prospeous nation we must producenot retail,or broker.

usmc2498215

In the famous words of Jack Nicholson, in his part as "The Joker"; "what this town needs is an enima"!

turbo

Speakin og Kalifornia, when Governor Davis took office their was a $70,000+ Million dollar surplus, it's all gone, do to the energy contracts he scretly entered into, the state will be buying energy for ten years on last years high enegy costs, because of this. In fact, the state is selling surplus energy at pennys on the dollar, because of the lack of need of what was forcast to be needed, due to mild winter, and conservation.Today, there is no surplus, and he is being pressed to raise taxes, and fees for other services.This guy has aspirations of becomming Prez, I wouldn't vote for him.

offeror

My parents own stock in the bank my mother worked for for many years. I know that when your company gives you stock as partial compensation or as benefit it can "seem" different. And it may be that you have no one to tell you that the best thing to do when you can't afford risk any more is to move your profits into a money market account. Elderly who leave the bulk of their money in stocks are asking for trouble (according to the people I've talked to about retirement planning). I've already left one company which refunded my 401k and I took it upon myself to pick a fairly "up" moment to call the broker and move the money from mutual funds to money market. He actually questioned the move by suggesting that since the order would not register until tomorrow the market might dip. I told him, "do it." And as it turns out saved a significant amount of my cash from the next dip, which came about the time I would've been forced to take the action if I hadn't done so earlier.

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"The 2nd Amendment is about defense, not hunting. Long live the gun shows, and reasonable access to FFLs. Join the NRA -- I'm a Life Member."

thebutcher

I don't think anyone in Dubyas cabinet knew anything, but when there is this much corruption involved, then I think it doesn't hurt to look, just to keep everyone honest. It shouldn't be political, though.As far as blaming investors for not diversifying, I think some have missed the breadth of this scandal. Enron execs broke into the store, stole all the goods, sold the wares, made a profit, and screwed the rightful owners of the merchandise. This isn't bad investment, it's theft.[This message has been edited by thebutcher (edited 01-16-2002).]

offeror

butcher --I didn't know it was that bad. I have been concerned that my folks have held onto the bank stock hoping it will recover the the healthier highs it had 5 or 10 years ago. Apparently they haven't been too smart about their credit card business. If my parents didn't own their stock, I'd say it served them right, but....