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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: lorrie coey who wrote (28859)	8/10/2000 4:20:40 PM
From: Raymond Duray	Read Replies (5) \| Respond to of 769670

Hi lorrie, I was worried about offending you if'n you was a real big Dubya fan from the Ralph Reed school of religious intolerance. Now that I'm reassured you're not, I'll step a toe a little furtha into this Harken bidness. Just for your information, I have gotten everything I know about this matter from Molly Ivins' terrific book, "Shrub". I'm just the messenger, so none 'o you right wing lunatic fringe types come after me now, y'all hear me?? OK, about this awl bidness.... A few years back, before Dubya made a killing off'n corporate welfare up in Arlington on his Tehas Rangers deal, he was in da awl bidness in Midland. Now we's tawkin' 'bout his second time around that carousel. I'll let you read about his first failed partnership that almost made him a millionaire in the book. Right then, harken to my story.... Seems that Harken Energy was doin' real well (pun intended) for a while, then it waddn't doin' quite so well a'tall. This happens in the awl bidness. Remember the mid eighties when awl prices were on a yoyo string? Well, that makes for some interesting adventures in finance. One of which was that Harken, which W. had a lot of common stock in as an officer, got a call from some of their bankers up in New Yawk City. The gist of the call was that the financiers had decided that with the price of awl way down, there really wasn't a heck of a lot of reason to re-up on the loans that they was pouring into a dry hole. So, within a few months, Harken's cash flow was going to be severely restricted. Now, this of course was privileged information. What do you suppose Dubya did? Well he did what any intelligent insider would do, naturally. He dumped his shares at the top. Without lettin' on a word about what was about to transpire in the next quarter. Now, I don't resent that. Heck, everybody dumps shares. But what I do wonder about in a man who portrays himself as a model of righteousness and clean living, is the fact that the SEC only got wind of his sale eight months after his transaction. As you well know, this is a violation of Rule 144. Now when confronted with this, George W. Bush told the investigator/reporter that he had filed the proper 144 filing in a timely fashion and that the SEC had "lost the paperwork". The SEC has no record of any such documents. Now my point is this, I don't mind a little hanky-panky in the Oval Office. Shoot, that's just a little youthful indiscretion. But what I object to is the cavalier way that someone who is running for President may not have my best interests as a retail investor in mind. Clearly, all those who sold their Harken shares after it had tanked 30% from where GWB sold his might feel a little betrayed. There was good news from the SEC today, by a vote of 3-1, they decided that "selective disclosure" was not to be allowed, in spite of the industry's best effort to make sure that privileged information continued to flow to the annointed few. A small victory for the retail investor, which I'm convinced the guys on the 85th floor are scheming to circumvent as I write. Thanks for getting the joke, I was worried. Come to think of it, I still am. But my plan, should we decide against orthodoxy of religious sort in favor of orthodoxy of the big bidness sort in November, is to buy the heck out of all the big polluters, big awl and defense contractors. They'll all be gettin' sweetheart deals and regulatory relief. You can count on it. Best, Ray