You think that's bad? Ken Lay apparently hand-picked 2 members of the FERC (including the chairman)! Nice to see all those campaign contributions pay off!<NFG>
story.news.yahoo.com
Enron CEO Gave List to White House
Thu Jan 31,10:13 PM ET
By MARCY GORDON, AP Business Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - Former Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay, a friend and backer of President Bush, gave the White House recommendations for appointment to a federal energy commission last spring. Bush eventually appointed two of the people on Enron's list.
Lay gave the list of names to Clay Johnson, Bush's personnel director, White House spokeswoman Anne Womack said Thursday. Among the eight or so names were Pat Wood, now chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and Nora Brownell, a member of the commission.
"It was one of many, many recommendations that he (Johnson) received" from industry executives, members of Congress and state officials, Womack told The Associated Press.
Disclosure of Lay's recommendations to the White House come as congressional panels investigate the relationship between Houston-based Enron Corp. and the Bush administration. The Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating the company's complex accounting and the role played by its auditor, Arthur Andersen, which has acknowledged destroying Enron-related documents.
A senator leading an investigation said Thursday that Enron had not cooperated in providing important information on the complex web of partnerships used by the company to conceal massive debts. The company's attorney said it doesn't have the documents sought.
As head of a major campaign donor wielding significant influence in Washington, Lay enjoyed access to top government officials of both parties. The White House has acknowledged that Lay met once privately last year with Vice President Dick Cheney, who headed a task force that formulated the administration's national energy policy.
Lay disclosed the existence of the list of Enron favorites in an interview being broadcast Friday on PBS' "NOW with Bill Moyers."
"I brought a list, we certainly presented a list. ... As I recall, I signed a letter which in fact had some recommendations as to people that we thought would be good (FERC) commissioners," Lay said in the interview, which was taped last May but never aired.
Bush, as Texas governor, had appointed Wood in 1995 as head of the state's Public Utilities Commission. Wood has been an advocate of market-oriented regulation of utilities, a position espoused by Enron, a big, aggressive energy trader that had become a favorite of Wall Street.
Bush appointed Wood as FERC chairman in August, replacing Curt Hebert.
Hebert said in the PBS interview that Lay "has asked me to take certain positions but I've had those conversations with Ken Lay for a long time. And have disagreed with him for a long time."
Brownell, a member of Pennsylvania's Public Utility Commission, was nominated by Bush in March. During her time on the state commission, Brownell helped oversee Pennsylvania's electricity deregulation.
Lay will be the star witness next week as a blizzard of hearings by several congressional panels put the Enron debacle under intense public scrutiny.
Enron officials "just simply have not cooperated" in providing the documents sought, said Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., chairman of a Senate Commerce subcommittee. "We again renew our request."
An estimated 3,000 partnerships, some with names of "Star Wars" characters such as Jedi, were created by Enron, which took a 97 percent stake in each of them and brought in outside investors for the remainder. The partnerships were kept off Enron's books and helped create the accounting debacle that pushed the company into the biggest U.S. corporate bankruptcy filing ever on Dec. 2.
Dorgan said the committee had no immediate plan to subpoena the documents from the company.
Robert Bennett, a Washington attorney representing Enron, said, "We have been fully cooperating with them."
The committee has asked Enron for documents that the company doesn't have and must be obtained from the partnerships or people representing them, Bennett said in a telephone interview. "We are exercising enormous good faith in cooperating with that committee," he said.
Lay has agreed to testify Monday at the committee's hearing. Dorgan and Bennett said Lay has not asked for immunity from prosecution as a condition.
In a related dispute between Congress and the Bush administration, investigators at the General Accounting Office told the White House on Wednesday they would sue to make officials identify the industry executives, including some from Enron, who met last year with Cheney's energy task force.
The GAO, Congress' investigative arm, is first giving Bush a chance to review his decision not to surrender the information.
Bush has refused to hand over documents from Cheney's energy-policy task force, saying to do so would encroach on his ability to seek outside views. The administration is arguing that the presidency would be harmed by release of documents Congress' investigators are seeking.
Comptroller General David Walker, who heads the GAO, said the lawsuit naming Cheney and possibly others will be filed in two or three weeks unless an agreement is worked out. He said Thursday he was "hopeful" for a compromise but was proceeding with plans to sue.
Walker said the GAO had hired the law firm Sidley Austin Brown & Wood to represent it in the suit.
Hope the GAO wins their suit against the White House...this is beyond outrageous. |
