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Politics : The Donkey's Inn -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mephisto who wrote (1773)	1/3/2002 11:28:27 PM
From: Mephisto	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 15516

Senate Democrats Plan to Subpoena Enron Papers " Kenneth L. Lay, Enron's chairman, is a top supporter of President Bush. Mr. Lay met privately with Vice President Dick Cheney last spring when the administration was drafting its energy policy, and several recommendations adopted by the administration echoed longstanding goals of Enron and some other companies that favor quick deregulation of the energy business." New York Times January 3, 2002 By JOSEPH KAHN W ASHINGTON, Jan. 2 - Senate Democrats said today that they planned to subpoena documents from Enron executives and to examine the company's high-level connections to the Bush administration as Congress steps up its inquiry into the company's collapse. The investigation will most likely focus on a wide range of concerns about Enron, including whether its executives or board members broke the law, whether accounting rules should be tightened and whether the Securities and Exchange Commission or other government agencies should have done more to spot trouble at the company. Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, the chairman of the Senate Government Affairs Committee, said the subpoenas begin "a search for the truth, not a witch hunt." He said his main concern was the interests of shareholders who might have been deceived by the company's statements about its financial health. "The fact is that more than 60 percent of the American people own stocks, and their interest in the security of their investments and retirements is at the heart of our committee's interest in Enron," he said. "The suddenness with which this company fell is shocking," he added. Mr. Lieberman said that his panel would also look at Enron's political ties to both Republicans and Democrats, but particularly its links to the Bush administration. Kenneth L. Lay, Enron's chairman, is a top supporter of President Bush. Mr. Lay met privately with Vice President Dick Cheney last spring when the administration was drafting its energy policy, and several recommendations adopted by the administration echoed longstanding goals of Enron and some other companies that favor quick deregulation of the energy business. "Knowing that Mr. Lay, at least, and others played an active role in the formulation of energy policy by the Bush administration, we've got to ask whether the advice rendered was at all self-serving," Mr. Lieberman said. It is unclear how aggressively Mr. Lieberman will pursue questions about Enron's political influence. Last spring, he vowed to investigate aspects of the Bush administration's energy and environmental policies. But he was criticized by some other Democrats and environmental groups for not digging deeply enough. Mr. Lieberman's hearings, which are scheduled to begin Jan. 24, are among several overlapping investigations by House and Senate committees as well as by the S.E.C. and the Justice Department. Senator Carl Levin of Michigan, a Democrat who heads the Senate subcommittee on investigations, joined Mr. Lieberman today and announced that his committee would issue subpoenas for documents from Enron executives, board members and Arthur Andersen, the company's outside auditor, as part of an effort to find out whether top officers violated any laws. Mr. Levin said he would seek to learn more about the company's use of private partnerships formed to remove debt from its balance sheet, an accounting device that may have helped raise Enron's reported earnings in recent years. Both Mr. Lieberman and Mr. Levin said they were interested in exploring reports that company executives used accounting tricks to prop up their broadband trading entity, something they suggested might have helped inflate the company's stock price before investors lost faith and wiped out the company's market value in late November. "The more you read, the more you get angry about what seems to be basically trading within themselves, pumping up stock value," Mr. Lieberman said. Report on Andersen By Bloomberg News WASHINGTON, Jan. 2 - Arthur Andersen, the auditor of Enron, said today that it had received unqualified good marks from its peer reviewer, Deloitte & Touche. Andersen said in a news release that Deloitte's review of 240 of its audits for the year ended Aug. 31 found "reasonable assurance" that the firm's quality control standards comply with professional standards. Andersen, the fifth-largest accounting firm, had asked Deloitte for additional scrutiny in light of financial reporting issues at Enron. Deloitte said it independently determined to conduct additional checks in light of Enron's collapse. The Public Oversight Board, an accounting industry oversight group, plans to look at the adequacy of the peer review system in light of the failed Enron audits. The system puts some of a firm's reports on public companies under scrutiny by other accounting firms to assure investors that the firm's methods comply with professional standards. The expanded peer review was not supposed to examine Andersen's handling of Enron, Charles Bowsher, the chairman of the oversight board, said last month. Instead, the review looked at "the systems, processes and procedures" Andersen relies on when faced with situations like those at Enron, he said. nytimes.com