Nor did he bother mention that Clinton and Senator Joseph Lieberman, who will do anything for a buck from Silicon Valley, led the charge to kill FASB's recommendation to expense stock options back in 1994---which subsequently resulted in the spiraling out of control, legalized embezzlement we had going on in those executive suites the next eight years.
Message 17249383
And so, the FASB voted in April 1993 to require companies to treat options as an expense, based on the estimated future value of those options. The vote produced a political tsunami that started in Silicon Valley, gathered force in Washington, and slammed into Norwalk, Conn., where the accounting board is based.
The Clinton administration weighed in against the FASB. So did institutional-investor groups, who said the rule change would muddy financial statements. A nonbinding resolution opposing the FASB rule change passed the Senate by a vote of 88-9. Its sponsor, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, a Connecticut Democrat, later proposed legislation that would have, in effect, put the FASB out of business. The Business Roundtable, a group made up of major corporate leaders, threatened to refuse to adhere to FASB decisions.
By the end of 1994, the FASB withdrew the rule, deciding instead that companies would have to disclose the value of their options only in a footnote in their annual reports. At the time, Silicon Valley was starting to power the strongest U.S. economy in a generation and a bull market in stocks, and nobody was in the mood to tinker with success.
It's a huge stretch to suggest that corporate malfeasance is solely a Republican problem; the fact is that politicians from both sides of the aisle have been sufficiently bribed by the likes of the Larry Ellisons of the world to do nothing on our behalfs---especially with regard to expensing stock options.
Best, Huey |
