Enron is as Enron Does

Posted by: Lokisfur
on April 26, 2005 @ 04:13 PM EST

The documentary on Enron, ENRON: The Smartest Guys in the Room shows without a doubt that smarts without any sense of right or wrong, without any spiritual connection to a higher calling is dangerously stupid.

The word “God” is not even mentioned once. But like a big elephant in the middle of the living room which the filmmakers chose to completely ignore, God was always on my mind conspicuous by His absence.

I kept hearing the words of Jesus, “love thy neighbor as yourself”, “do unto others as you would have them do unto you” and “how you treat the least of me, is how you treat me.”, echoing between the lines to let me know that God was the answer to the question that all these smart men had gotten so incredibly wrong. Man’s inhumanity to man knows no bounds – whether it’s in the form of an SS soldier at Dachau or an Enron energy trader turning the electricity off on thousands of elderly people in San Francisco.


[Click title to read the rest of this blog entry.]

The film is powerful; Only made less so because of the obvious partisanship of the filmmakers. There’s the usual “Michael Moore-ish” gratuitous scenes of then-Governor Bush in less then presidential posture, and in proximity to Ken Lay, vaguely alluding to a conspiracy that never existed.

There’s also the usual whitewash of any wrongdoing on the part of the Democrats and Clinton White House. After all it was Bill & Company who looked the other way and signed off on all of Enron’s criminal hijinks while receiving more money from Enron then was ever given to Bush the Elder or the current President. The fact remains -- Enron did most of their crimes under President Clinton. Enron got caught and prosecuted by the GOP led Congress and President Bush.

But It was clear that the filmmakers must have understood that truth was not on their side regarding Bush and steered clear. They never sketched out more of a connection between Enron and The President then a few sound bites and I gave the film a pass on those. I figured that "post-Fahrenheit 9/11”, Bush bashing and lies of omission are just the necessary price of admission for any documentarian who wants to get their film into the right festivals and art houses leading to a three picture deal, a book, and a chance to change Jimmy Carter’s Depends diapers at the next Democratic convention.

So the film leaves the Bush bashing to a minimal and smartly and methodically focuses on the real truth – Enron is about Greed…..not politics. And the greed in this country is non-partisan. It runs deep, far deeper then I want to believe but have no choice but to acknowledge.

It was horrifying to see the collusion between Lay, Skilling, Fastow, the Enron traders, The SEC, the bankers, accounting firms, etc. as they created a “house of cards” to line their pockets with untold millions of dollars. All the while, thousands of Enron workers, and hundreds of thousands of honest investors were led to believe that the company was healthy. And they had no reason to believe it wasn’t. Backed by reams of documentation that was given the good Wall Street seal of approval year after year, Enron seemed to be on the solid footing granted by the established integrity of the American Banking System and the prudent laws governing commerce in the great United States.

Integrity. Prudence. Solid foundation. It was all a horrible lie. All these people who should have been blowing the whistle on what was going on…who could have come clean at any time….were busy cooking the books and stealing as much as they could get their hands on.

Where was the humanity? How could people who have achieved so much in our society have such a callous disregard for human life? It sickened me. Had any one of these creeps come to believe what was written on the back of every stolen dollar in their pockets – “In God We Trust.” – then the simple power of a good conscience and a God centered heart would surely have led one of them to prevent the tragic collapse of Enron and the destruction of thousands of peoples lives who lost everything they had worked for and believed in.

The movie ended by letting the audience know that the former Enron employees have brought a class action suit to the tune of some 30+ billion dollars against the banks who floated Enron while knowing the company was engaged in illegal activity. I hope they win. There is something wrong with a system that would put a man in prison for 10 years for holding up a liquor store, and sentence another man to much less time for stealing millions and destroying the lives of thousands of people. You know, there out to be a law against it....more importantly there ought to be more people with the honor, integrity and courage to speak out when the law is broken.

Chris Ward can be reached at lokisfur@aol.com

E-mail this entry to a friend.

[Previous entry: "The Art of the Possible"] [Next entry: "Morning Blend - Wednesday, April 27, 2005"]