THE ENRON BUSH CONNECTION

Etherzone ^ | NOTE---- 9 Feb. '01 | Uri Dowbenko

[rdavis84]

POWER SCAM:
THE ENRON BUSH CONNECTION

By: Uri Dowbenko
February 9, 2001

The phony US energy crisis has deep ties to the Bush Family.

One of the prime beneficiaries of the "crisis" is Enron Corporation and its Chairman Ken Lay, a major corporate and personal contributor to George Bush Jr.'s presidential campaign.

Even though California Gov. Gray Davis has reached into California residents' deep pockets to bail out the utility companies through emergency legislation, Washington Gov. Gary Locke has balked.

According to KCPQ-TV's Chris Daniels' "A Disturbing New Twist in Western Power Troubles, "Governor Locke says, 'It's unjustified, it's obscene, and clearly hurting all consumers.'"

Like other western governors, Locke has had to pay for electricity at any price.

In November of 1999, for example, electricity was purchased for $29 a megawatt hour.

A year later, the price increased to $160 an hour, according to sources at Tacoma Power.

Last month it was at $525.

Locke expressed his indignation saying, "I've very disappointed in President Bush that the new administration will not be intervening."

But why should he intervene?

One of Bush's largest campaign contributors is Enron Corporation, a Texas-based company which is part of the defacto global energy oligopoly-cartel.

Although diversifying into other business, Enron has been best known as the largest buyer and seller of natural gas in the United States. Its 1999 revenues of $40 billion had made it the 18th largest company in the United States.

Enron is also invested in energy projects around the world, including the UK, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, the Philippines, Indonesia, China, India and Mozambique.

One of the global energy cartel's most visible players, Enron saw its corporate profits rise 34 percent in the fourth quarter of 2000.

Enron shareholders should ask -- did dividends come from price gouging US citizens?

How George Bush Jr. Got Layed

Federal Election Commission records show that Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay donated more than $350,000 directly to Bush campaigns since 1997.

Lay also gave another $100,000 to Republican candidates and fundraising committees.

In addition, Enron Corporation, including employees, also donated $1.5 million in soft money to Bush and Republican committees.

More recently, Lay and his wife donated $10,000 to the "Florida Recount Fund," and another $100,000 to the "Presidential Inaugural Fund."

As one of his fundraising "Pioneers," Lay helped raise more than $100,000 for Bush's campaign for president.

In consideration of these numbers, is it too much to ask for a phony and contrived power "crisis" as a payback?

Naah, not at all...

According to newswire reports, as a new energy advisor for President Bush, Ken Lay says that precap prices for wholesale electricity in the West "is not even a short-term solution." |

Not coincidentally, Enron is the largest power marketer in the United States. A cap would limit the prices it and other wholesalers could charge to utilities. Wholesale power prices were deregulated under the landmark 1996 law but retail rates were not.

Lay said the federal government should limit itself to an "advisory" role, letting California leaders resolve a "pretty much self-inflicted problem."

California's rolling blackouts have come as the two large utilities, PG&E Corp. and Southern California Edison, have struggled under huge debts through buying electricity at higher wholesale prices than they can recoup under the retail rates they are allowed to charge.

In the short term, Lay said, the state government will have to "buy the power to fill the short positions of the utilities."

And to ensure Enron's unconscionable profit, he should have added.

Enron's Pug Winokur, Shadow Government Insider

On the Enron corporate website, one of the Board of Directors, Herbert S. "Pug" Winokur, Jr., is described as Chairman and CEO of Capricorn Holdings, Inc., and Former Senior Executive Vice President, Penn Central Corporation.

As the Insiders' Insider, "Pug" Winokur has been such a permanent fixture in the Washington Old Boy Network that he's even mentioned in a 1978 book by Daniel Guttman called "The Shadow Government."

Historically Winokur's Capricorn Holdings was used as an investment vehicle in NHP, an apartment management firm headed by Roderick Heller III.

In turn, NHP's assets included oft-purloined and defaulted HUD Section 8 subsidy housing, a notorious and well-known vehicle for fraud and money laundering.

Winokur was also on the Board of Directors of Harvard Endowment Fund, which purchased 50 percent of NHP, making the prestigious Harvard a prototypical, but very low-profile, slum landlord. (See Bushwhacked: HUD Fraud, Spooks and the Slumlords of Harvard" http://www.conspiracydigest.com/bushwhacked1.html)

It should also be noted that George Bush Jr. attended Harvard Business School. Later, after Bush joined Harken Energy Corp and became a director, the largest stock position and seat on the board was acquired by Harvard Management Co.

Ironically, from 1988 to 1997, Winokur was also the Chairman and CEO of DynCorp, one of the government's largest contractors in data acquisition and management.

Since DynCorp had a contract from the Department of Justice, Winokur would have profited from the DoJ Asset Seizure Program, as well as HUD's Operation Safe Home seizures which targeted low-income tenants and mortgage holders in the inner cities.

In addition DynCorp is one of the lead contractors for the new phony War on Drugs in South America called "Plan Colombia," another tax-payer supported scam to bring monies into DynCorp's coffers.

Now there's a guy who understands that the only way to do a deal is to get it rigged from the very beginning.

Enron's Son of a Spook

Enron dealmaker Frank Wisner, Jr. muscled the company into lucrative overseas contracts, most notably in India and the Philipines.

Enron's deal to manage a power plant in the Philippines was due largely to Wisner's efforts. Based in Subic Bay, a former US military outpost, the power planet was taken over by Enron in 1993, two months after the last US troops left the base.

Wisner is also credited with helping Enron win a $2.8 billion deal in India, building a power plant near Bombay. Now the project is under heavy fire for being over-priced, and the deal continues to simmer with allegations of bribery.

Wisner Jr. must have learned his tradecraft from his father Frank Wisner Sr., one of the CIA's prime operatives.

Wisner Sr., who worked at CIA from 1947 until just before his "suicide" in 1965, was involved in 1) the 1954 CIA coup in Guatemala, toppling the goverment of Jacobo Arbenz for United Fruit Company, 2) the 1953 overthrow of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadeq, and 3) the secret operations against Indonesian President Sukarno.

Unlike his spooky father, Frank Wisner Jr., however, was a former Pentagon official before his job at Enron.

Enron's Ken Lay and the Bush Boys

Enron Founder and Chairman Kenneth Lay also worked in the Pentagon for the Nixon administration during the Vietnam War.

Lay is a close friend of George Bush, Sr. In fact, his Houston home in River Oaks is near the Tanglewood residence of the former President and CIA Director.

Although there have been no published reports of Bush Sr. doing favors for Lay, three of the Bush Boys have used their father's name to get contracts for Enron.

According to an article by Seymour Hersh in the New Yorker, Neil and Marvin Bush tried to influence government officials for an Enron bid to rebuild Shuaiba North power plant in Kuwait.

Ironically this power plant was destroyed in George Bush's Persian Gulf War. Enron abandoned the bid a year ago.

In 1988, then Texas governor George Bush Jr., reportedly telephoned Rodolfo Terragno, Argentina's Public Works Minister, to ask him to award Enron a contract to build a pipeline from Chile to Argentina.

"He assumed that the fact he was the son of the president would exert influence. I felt pressured. It was not proper for him to make that kind of call," Terragno told The Nation.

Finally, when Carlos Menem, another Bush Sr. crony, became president of Argentina, Enron won the bid.

Neil Bush, director of the failed Denver-based Silverado Savings and Loan, created a subsidiary of his oil company to conduct business in Argentina in 1987.

Argentina finally got so fed up with the Bush Boys, they formally had a parliamentary investigation regarding their so-called "business dealings.

Enron Rigs Washington During the Clinton Years

Even though it has strong ties to the Republican Party, Enron also did remarkably well during the Clinton years.

Most importantly, they got a ban lifted on Export-Import Bank financing of projects in China.

This allowed Enron to move forward on overseas projects guaranteed by US taxpayers. In other words, if Enron "fails," you pay.

Enron also got new rules instituted at the Ex-Im Bank that allowed the bank to finance projects on the basis of projected cash flow.

This insider track helped Enron make multi-billion dollar deals overseas with US taxpayers guaranteeing their performance.

* March 1993, Enron made a deal to develop new European markets for Russian gas.

* November 1993, Enron made a $1 billion deal with Turkey to develop two power plants. Ex-Im Bank provided $285 million in financing. The Overseas Private Investment Council(OPIC)covered insurance costs.

* August 1994, Enron made a deal to build a power plant in India. ExIm provides major financing and OPIC provides an additional $100 million.

* November 1994, Enron made a deal to build a $130 million power plant in China. Ex-Im Bank again provided the financing.

Moral of the story? When you're a monopoly capitalist, it doesn't matter who's in office. Republicans. Democrats. They all bribe the same.

Lawsuit Against Enron Alleges Conspiracy

Unfazed by the bogus and contrived energy crisis, the San Francisco City Attorney is filing a lawsuit against Enron and eleven other companies.

The filing says that Enron "conspired to restrict supplies and drive up prices" costing consumers additional charges "on the order of 1 billion dollars."

Washington's Governor Locke says President Bush needs to take counter-measures or the economy will suffer on a national level.

"If the federal government doesn't act, you're going to see a lot of jobs go away, a lot of business close down..." says Locke. "We need help from the federal government immediately to help stabilize the situation."

Is this Enron's first visible and public Bush payoff?

It just might be the best "energy crisis" money can buy.

Published in the February 9, 2001 issue of  Ether Zone.
Copyright © 2001 Ether Zone. (http://etherzone.com).
Reposting permitted with this message intact.

[t4texas]

You are a TOTAL idiot!!!

Are you implying that W has complicity?

Was he on the Enron board?

Is there any reason that he should have been able to divine the accounting hokey-pokey (which by the way the IVy league MBAs could not) that was Enron propaganda?

Get real dude!

What is your position on the latest OBL tapes . . . no, let me guess! They are VRWC counterfeits, right?

[SierraWasp]

"In 1988, then Texas governor George Bush Jr."

I won't quibble about the "Jr." even though it's wrong, but two gross errors in the same sentence makes the whole "hit piece" intensely suspect and easy for me to reject in it's entirety.

In 1988, Daddy Bush, the 41st was running against Dukakkis and "W" wasn't governor! Maw Richards was!!!

Honest to goodness, do you self annointed purists, obsessive cynics and obnoxious Liberaltarians actually think a candidate, or their volunteers can afford to be so picky that they can hire private investigators to research all the dirty laundry of each and every possible contributor?

The few hundred thousand contributed by this entity was a drop in the bucket compared to the millions "W" raised in a relatively short time. At least he didn't rob a reservation of poor Indians in El Reno, OK and then have his Secretary of Interior turn around and screw them out of any kind of consideration for their money.

Democrats have always believed, as Jesse Unruh of CA once said: "If you can't take their money, drink their booze, screw their women and still vote against 'em, you're in the wrong business!" At least Republicans do legitimate things to make government more business friendly to provide legitimate employment for alla yew union, purists, cynics and annoying gripers that keep borrowing this pap from the Demonicrats, trying to support moral equivalence when there is NONE!!!

(/ranting & raving)(grin)

[rdavis84]

"The only real problem I have with this editorial is the political viewpoint of the author. He seems to WANT federal intervention into a private business (like price controls). I stand firmly against federal intervention in any kind of private corporation. I approach the issue from a Randian viewpoint."

Agreed 100%. It's interesting to observe the current crop and some older crop put their best efforts at Transferring any given article Author's views to the poster of that article. My personal stand is and always HAS been that there is too much government, that they dance to too many special interest puppetmasters, and they no longer have ANY concept of the Constitution.

I'm crushed.

But I'll get over it.

[Ben Bolt]

Bump ! Sorry I missed your reply .

[tubebender]

That'll be a Dead Bookmark tomorrow. A thread last night that only had a few excerpts of this info got deleted after about 100 replies.

What took them so long???

[tubebender]

Uri Dowbenko, the author of this article is a real crackerjack.

So he DID create the Yugo!

[rdavis84]

"Get real dude!"

Always a dead giveaway to the mental, possible physical age of a poster.

Why don't you read, even if it's kinda tuff, my replies? Then mentally separate that from the "article". O.K.? Dude.

[Kath]

Unlike you, I demand proof which of course can't be provided when you are spreading rumors and garbage.

[Kath]

Because someone accepts campaign pledges doesn't make them responsible for what the company does. You and your liberal buddies are reaching. There's nothing here but your active imagnations

[Nita Nupress]

I just have one question:

How will I know it's really you after you get a new screen name and send me a "howdy" FReepmail?

Perhaps you could just pick out a new name now and tell it to me tonight. That way I won't feel like I'm being accosted by a FRanger. ;-)

[Kath]

>>>>>>I'm not sure who is the bigger fraud, the author of the article or the individual who posted it.>>>>>>

How about both. That would be my vote.

[isthisnickcool]

Can you point to a specific reply on this thread that would indicate FReeper support of Clinton?

Not even gonna look. But in my previous post I mentioned the Dem. hacks pushing this Enron talking point.

Hey, maybe Ken Lay was in on that moon landing hoax?

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Seriously, I was referring to the article, not what you said under it.

As for Enron, the board of directors and senior corporate officers are in a ton of hot water. They were involved in some really questionable backdoor deals that they didn't tell their stockholders about. Those deals wound up losing a hell of a lot of money (obviously; they're bankrupt now). They were also cooking the books to make Enron's financial picture look better than it really was. The word around the campfire right now is that the top guys in the company sold off all their stock to get some cash before it became public that Enron was crashing and burning. They're now being sued by their stockholders for $25 billion.

[horsewhispersc]

Here ya go Kath, do you want to know anything else, like the 25 billion lawsuit against them or how these Chiefs lined there pockets with gold while deceiving 1,000's of people who are out of work.

I just found out their att'y has filed to move the case from NY to Texas, now I really wonder why they want to do that!

Congress Probes Enron Downfall

Business/Economy

Source: AP

Published: Wednesday December 12 8:17 AM ET Author: MARCY GORDON

Posted on 12/12/01 6:41 AM Pacific by boston_liberty

WASHINGTON (AP) - Congress is investigating the collapse of Enron Corp., whose swift downfall left countless investors burned, thousands of employees out of work with decimated retirement savings and the once high-flying company in federal bankruptcy court.

The huge energy-trading company has declined to send any officials to a hearing by two House panels. And investigators for another committee are trying to locate Enron's former chief financial officer, the lead architect of complex partnerships that are under government scrutiny.

Amid the company's strife, nearly 600 employees deemed critical to its operations received more than $100 million in bonuses last month as Enron faced a merger that unraveled and then bankruptcy.

Wednesday's hearing by two panels of the House Financial Services Committee was designed to help Congress and the public ``understand as best we can what structurally went wrong, what mistakes were made and what mistakes were not noticed,´´ Committee Chairman Rep. Michael Oxley, R-Ohio, said Tuesday.

Subjects being examined include the Houston-based company's accounting practices, potential securities law violations and Enron's handling of its employees' 401(k) retirement investment plans, Oxley said.

Joseph Berardino, chief executive of the accounting firm Arthur Andersen LLP, which was Enron's longtime auditor, and Robert Herdman, chief accountant of the Securities and Exchange Commission, were testifying as requested by the lawmakers.

The SEC is examining Enron's use of questionable partnerships that allowed the company to keep some $500 million in debt off its books, and has issued subpoenas to Andersen related to its auditing of Enron's accounts. Enron, which only months ago was the nation's seventh-biggest in revenue, has acknowledged that it overstated profits for four years.

Absent from the hearing was Enron Chairman and Chief Executive Kenneth Lay, who had been asked to appear by the lawmakers.

``I don´t think they want to, or are not prepared to answer some very pointed questions about what went wrong,´´ Oxley said.

Enron spokeswoman Karen Denne said neither Lay nor any other Enron officials were testifying because ``we don´t believe we would be able to adequately serve the interest of the committee while at the same time trying to serve the interest of our creditors, shareholders and our current and former employees.´´

Lay, who built the world's largest energy trader by buying electricity from generators and selling it to consumers, is no stranger to Washington. He is a friend of President Bush and one of his largest campaign contributors, donating $250,000 to the Republican Party during Bush's run for president and raising at least $100,000 for Bush from other donors.

Lay was among the executives who met privately with Vice President Dick Cheney as his task force formulated an energy plan last spring.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee, which is conducting its own probe, has given Enron's former chief financial officer, Andrew Fastow, until Dec. 21 to meet with committee investigators or face a subpoena to testify at a hearing. ``Quite simply, he cannot be found,´´ said Ken Johnson, a spokesman for Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La., the panel´s chairman. ``We are troubled by his unresponsiveness.´´

Committee investigators sent a letter to Fastow's attorney in Houston. A Fastow lawyer recently denied rumors that his client had left the country, saying Fastow is in the United States, though he rarely appears in public because he and his family have received death threats since his ouster from Enron in October.

Enron filed for bankruptcy protection from creditors on Dec. 2, following a six-week downward spiral, and also filed a $10 billion lawsuit against smaller rival Dynegy Inc. for scrapping a proposed buyout. In addition to the SEC probe, Enron also is under investigation by the Justice Department.

The Labor Department is looking into Enron's handling of its employees' retirement benefit plans. Before filing its bankruptcy petition, Enron prohibited its workers for several weeks from selling stock held in voluntary retirement plans while the share price plunged. Worth more than $80 a year ago, Enron's stock has tumbled to less than a dollar a share

[rdavis84]

"How will I know it's really you after you get a new screen name and send me a "howdy" FReepmail?"

O.K. I'll write this real small, don't let anybody see it! I'll put a "smiley" :-) at the start of my FReeMail. Then I'll rearrange all the letters in my new screenname so they read like some kinda code. Then I'll tell you how to un-scramble them. See how easy it'll be. BTW, I've been thinkin' of rdavis85.

Just between meenu, ;-)

[isthisnickcool]

Fastow's lawyer is David Boise.

[Le-Roy]

Well, there was the affidavit from William Casey, Director of the CIA, and the I.G.'s own report detailing numerous instances...but of course any evidence of that nature has been whitewashed by the 'official' version of events, and the laughable proceedings of the Intell. Committee.

If you'd like to know more, you can still access more than you'll ever have time to read, without ever leaving FreeRepublic, just by doing a Google search.

It is my contention that the overwhelming preponderance of the evidence forces one to conclude that facets of the CIA, and other portions of our gov't., had direct complicity in the flood of drugs entering this country - not just in L.A., and not just through one or two administrations.

[Osinski]

Oh how condescendingly low a Bush apologist can go. Namecalling is a sure sign of lack of argument. Go soak your head.

[Osinski]

Fastow's lawyer is David Boise.

THE David Boies from Judge Saul Sanders fame?

[rdavis84]

"As for Enron, the board of directors and senior corporate officers are in a ton of hot water. They were involved in some really questionable backdoor deals that they didn't tell their stockholders about."

They REALLY do need to do some jail time, and in a regular prison. But I know that won't happen; fines and community service, betcha.

This whole, I say again Whole, article should be instructional to folks about a very detrimental and very prevalent situation that most here are willing to just write off as "normal". "Connections" and "Good Old Boys"

Well, the folks who may not be able to comfortably retire because of it will take it seriously. And the ONLY way to start decreasing the prevalence of this is to mete out actual Justice.

But politics says that won't happen, so, sorry folks, it might be Your Retirement next. Or should I just tell them " TOUGH!"?