Open Letter to Rep. Waxman

1/16/02 | BOBTHENAILER

[BOBTHENAILER]

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January 14, 2002

Rep. Henry A. Waxman
2204 Rayburn House Office Bldg.
Washington, D.C. 20515

RE: Enron Investigation

Dear Rep. Waxman,

During a recent viewing of a popular cable news program it was noted that you had established a tip line relative to the Enron collapse. I applaud your efforts to uncover fraud, mismanagement, self dealing and improper political activities. In that light, the following is submitted for your unbiased examination, which I’m sure you’ll agree is warranted:

1. Government records reveal the awarding of seats to Enron executives and Ken Lay on four Energy Department trade missions and seven Commerce Department trade trips during the Clinton administration’s eight years.

a. From January 13, 1995 through June 1996, Clinton Commerce Secretary Ron Brown and White House Counsel Mack McLarty assisted Ken Lay in closing a $3 billion dollar power plant deal with India. Four days before India gave final approval to the deal, Enron gave $100,000 to the DNC. Any quid pro quo?

b. Clinton National Security Advisor, Anthony Lake, threatened to withhold aid to Mozambique if it didn’t approve an Enron pipeline project. Subsequent to Mr. Lake’s threats, Mozambique approved the project, which resulted in a further $770 million dollar electric power contract with Enron. Perhaps, if NSA Advisor Lake had not been so busy strong-arming for Enron, he might have been focused on something obliquely related to national security like, say, Mr. Bin Laden? Could it be that a different, somewhat related, investigation is warranted?

c. In 1999, Clinton Energy Secretary Bill Richardson traveled to Nigeria and helped arrange a joint, varied, energy development program which resulted in $882 million in power contracts for Enron from Nigeria. Perhaps if Energy Secretary Richardson had been more focused on domestic energy, we might have avoided:
i. The catastrophic loss of nuclear secrets to China and concurrently
ii. developed more domestic sources of energy.

d. The Hague’s International Court of Justice wanted Franjo Tudjman, Croatia’s dictator, for war crimes violation. Enron wanted a power contract with Croatia. Enron operatives offered a deal to Tudjman, give us the contracts and we will use our Clinton administration connections to ensure that you and your friends don’t go to jail. Tudjman granted the contract, Enron had a multi-million dollar contract and nobody went to jail. I didn’t realize that the PC crowd in the Clinton administration gave “get out of jail free cards” to International war criminals.

e. Subsequent to leaving Clinton White House employ, Enron hired Mack McLarty (White House Counsel), Betsy Moler (Deputy Energy Secretary) and Linda Robertson (Treasury Official). Even a person without a high school diploma (no disrespect to airline security screeners) can see that this looks like Enron paying off political favors with fat-cat corporate jobs, at the expense of stockholders and Enron pension employees.

f. Democratic Mayor Lee P. Brown of Houston (Enron headquarter city), received $250,000 just before Enron filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Isn’t that an awful lot of money to throw away right before bankruptcy?

The Democratic National Committee was the recipient of hundreds of thousands of dollars from 1990 through 2000. The above matters appear to be very troubling and look like, smack of, reek of, political favors for campaign payoffs. I know you will find out.

2. Recently, former Clinton Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin called a top U.S. Treasury official, asking on Enron’s behalf, for government help with credit agencies. As you well know, Rubin is the chairman of executive committee at Citigroup, which just coincidentally, is Enron’s largest unsecured creditor at an estimated $3 billion dollars.

3. It is extremely curious that Senator Joseph Lieberman would be chairing a committee investigating Enron, when it is a fact that his single largest contributor is Citigroup ($112,546), which just so happens to be Enron’s largest unsecured creditor. Enron owes Citigroup approximately $3 billion. Is Senator Lieberman truly investigating Enron, or merely helping his single largest campaign contributor find a way to get their $3 billion back. Shouldn’t he recuse himself like Attorney General John Ashcroft did?

4. Dynergy, an energy company which recently sued Enron, donated thousands of dollars to your campaign, Mr. Waxman. Are you truly investigating Enron, or merely helping out those good-ol’ boys who gave you money? Shouldn’t you recuse yourself from any Enron investigation as Attorney General Ashcroft did, in order to remove even a sniff of impropriety?

During examination of your website, an article was noted, entitled “Energy Bill Rewards Industry Contributors”. The headlines state that the Energy Industry receives billions in tax breaks for millions in contributions. While that attention grabbing title may look good, it falls on its face to the blows of economic reality. Natural gas prices are currently very low; without the proposed tax breaks, drilling for new supplies will continue to drastically decline. Without new drilling, this country once again faces a demand/supply imbalance.

During the six month mini-crisis relative to California demand/supply shortage in the winter of 2000, your positions were documented in vehement opposition to the marketing and natural gas pricing practices of Enron, et al. (see item C ii above). I’m sure you’ll remember those heated times well. Why, even the Attorney General in your fair state recommended homosexual rape of Ken Lay by some convict named “Spike”. I don’t remember you repudiating his comment. By the way, what ever happened to all the price gouging investigations. ANYTHING?

The title of the Energy article indicates your focus to be “Political contributions for beneficial legislation.” In that light, I would suggest a companion article, in exactly the same vein, be added to your website, titled as follows:

“Gore’s Airline Safety Committee Shelves Tough Recommendations.”
The bylines would be: airline industry contributions of approximately $400,000 to the DNC, result in the dropping of very expensive committee recommendations, prior to September 11th (see item 1b above). It could go on to question whether the changes in safety regulations would have made a difference on Sept’ 11th. It should further be noted, that due in part to Linda Daschle’s lobbying efforts and perhaps in part to Senator Tom Daschle’s largest contributor (NW Airlines $40,000) the Airlines received billions of actual bailout dollars. This would definitely appear to be a topic worthy of investigation.

Current news articles reflect your position on Enron to now be advocating, after the fact, Bush Administration intervention to save Enron. Please explain how you can justify that position, with its diametrically opposing stance, depicted on your website, which castigates the administration for giving tax breaks to Energy Industry contributors. You can’t have it both ways.

It is sincerely hoped that the above factual information will be beneficial in your investigation. Anyone with a nose for political scandal, which I know you have, will recognize the stench of improper political activities represented herein, in items 1-4 and the airlines safety scandal.

Very truly yours,

Sender

c.c. Mr. Brit Hume, FOX News, ABC News, Mr. Bob Schieffer, CBS News, NBC News, CNN

[harpo11]

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