Bush, the corporations' flag-carrier
Enron's collapse exposes the folly of his
cash-for-influence policy
" This is precisely how Bush mixed business and politics when he
was governor of Texas.The oil and gas companies who
supported his candidacy were given free rein, at secret meetings
with Bush officials, to write their own rules when it came to state
policy on emissions control. They, not surprisingly, chose a
voluntary scheme with equally unsurprising consequences for air
quality in Texan cities. "
Julian Borger
Tuesday January 15, 2002
The Guardian
The familiar paraphernalia of political scandal is being
assembled in Washington. At the last count, two criminal
inquiries and six congressional hearings were scheduled on the
Enron scandal. In the legislature, reduced by the war on
terrorism to the role of cheerleader, everyone wants to be a part
of it.
Both parties know how the rituals of scandal can define a
presidency. Reagan managed to shrug off most of the damage
caused by the Iran-contra affair, while Clinton was overwhelmed
by the Monica Lewinsky saga and is unlikely to have an airport
named after him.
Now it is George Bush's turn. Enron, a gigantic Texan energy
trading firm and the biggest single sponsor of his political career,
collapsed dramatically last month amid allegations of fraud and
insider trading. The inquiries will ask familiar questions: what did
the administration know and when did it know it? Was there a
cover-up and did the Bush team help?
These are the staples of Washington scandal, but this time they
may be the wrong questions. They focus on whether anyone in
the administration broke the rules. The whole point of the Enron
affair is that it discredits the rules of the game. It exposes the
institutionalised corruption at the heart of US politics - a casual
exchange of money and power that Bush has made his
trademark.
The seamy subject of campaign finance briefly captured the
attention of the US electorate in the early months of the Bush
presidency when it was apparent that big campaign contributors
were being paid back one presidential decree at a time. Enron
will bring it back into focus.
Investigators are poring over Enron's contacts with the
administration last autumn, when the company was fighting for
its life, looking for signs of illegal meddling in the market. In fact,
the big trade-off for the company's campaign contributions was
made months earlier.
Enron executives had six meetings with the vice-president, Dick
Cheney, and his staff when he was drawing up the
administration's energy plan in the spring, a fact that has
surfaced only since the company went bust. The White House
has refused to tell Congress which other industrial magnates it
consulted in drawing up the plan, which is broadly speaking a
polluters' charter. Few, if any, environmentalists were invited.
This is precisely how Bush mixed business and politics when he
was governor of Texas. The oil and gas companies who
supported his candidacy were given free rein, at secret meetings
with Bush officials, to write their own rules when it came to state
policy on emissions control. They, not surprisingly, chose a
voluntary scheme with equally unsurprising consequences for air
quality in Texan cities.
Governor Bush introduced sweeping tort reform, making it harder
for ordinary Texans to sue corporations. And he appointed Pat
Wood, nominee of Enron's chairman, Ken Lay, as head of the
state's public utility commission, where he promptly pushed
ahead with the deregulation the energy companies had been
asking for. Last year, after Lay failed to persuade the head of the
federal energy regulatory commission to agree to Enron's views,
Bush gave Wood the chairman's job.
Of course, this constant barter of cash for influence represents
politics as usual. Some Democrats also took serious amounts
from Enron, but as a party they are also beholden to other
interest groups, like unions and minorities, tempering corporate
control. In the president's case, corporate influence appears
almost unmitigated.
Bush has pushed through the biggest tax cuts in a generation,
heavily weighted to the wealthiest 5%, and backed an economic
stimulus package brimming with corporate tax breaks and
amnesties. This was marketed along with the old palliative, the
trickle-down effect: tax-breaks for corporations and the wealthy
create jobs further down the economic food chain. Bush
portrayed his policies as anti-recessionary before September 11,
and as downright patriotic afterwards. The message was a
familiar one. What's good for Enron (or insert your corporate
name here in return for the appropriate campaign donation) is
good for America.
The Enron debacle is potentially so dangerous for Bush because
it makes it painfully clear that the old equation does not hold.
The Enron executives got rich even as their company was
plunging into the abyss, taking its employees with it.
It is the ultimate nightmare for the corporate welfare state, for
which Bush has made himself flag-carrier in chief. The
executives in this case have shown themselves to be anything
but patriotic. They were revealed instead as rapacious
asset-strippers.
The Democratic party has to seize the Enron affair with both
hands. With the mid-term congressional elections about to take
off, it might just shake the nation out of its patriotic trance and
revive a debate over how US politics is bought and paid for.
julian.borger@guardian.co.uk |
