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Strategies & Market Trends : VOLTAIRE'S PORCH-MODERATED -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: T L Comiskey who wrote (53608)	7/9/2002 12:41:45 PM
From: Dealer	Respond to of 65232

Hi TL! they own the law makers......... I guess we gonna has to git more than one answer.... We also need some speedy trials.. d

To: T L Comiskey who wrote (53608)	7/9/2002 1:32:32 PM
From: abuelita	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 65232

timmy - there is something to be said for middle east laws. rose

To: T L Comiskey who wrote (53608)	7/10/2002 1:27:18 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 65232

The Corporate Scandals: Cleaning Up The New York Times Editorial July 10, 2002 Reacting belatedly to the continual reports of malfeasance undermining investor confidence and threatening the economic recovery, President Bush came to Wall Street yesterday to deliver his "clean up your act or else" message to corporate America. He sounded at times like a sheriff, warning of jail time for crooks, and at other times like a preacher admonishing business executives to look deep into their souls before issuing their next quarterly reports. At its core, however, the president's address was disappointingly devoid of tough proposals to remedy underlying problems in accounting, corporate governance and the safety net of federal laws and regulations that is supposed to prevent abuses. It was one of those speeches that promise more than they can deliver, which is probably why expectant markets found no reason to rally after Mr. Bush left the lectern. For instance, his call to strengthen enforcement resources at the Securities and Exchange Commission by $100 million sounded good at first blush, but it falls far short of what is needed to revive a critical agency — one that his administration was merrily weakening until the business scandals hit the headlines. Mr. Bush rightly condemned the glaring conflicts of interest at Wall Street firms whose ostensibly independent research analysts have touted stocks solely because they were investment-banking clients. But it was New York State's attorney general, Eliot Spitzer, not the Bush administration, who cracked down on these conflicts. Mr. Bush missed an ideal opportunity yesterday to vault ahead of the pack and seize command of the reform campaign. He embraced sensible proposals that have already been introduced by others, such as the New York Stock Exchange, and that have already gained traction in response to the accounting scandals at Enron, WorldCom and elsewhere. Mr. Bush's endorsement of the stock exchange's new guidelines calling for independent directors and shareholder approval of stock-option plans allowed him to appear bold while actually remaining on the sidelines in the fight to restore the integrity of financial markets and public trust in them. The president was right in urging companies to ban outrageous loans to executives — an easy call. But he should also have pushed for re-examining the more complicated issue of how corporations handle executive stock-option grants and finding ways to reflect them realistically as an expense. The biggest disappointment was Mr. Bush's failure to insist on a forceful reform of the accounting industry. Auditors are the primary guardians of business integrity, and in the recent boom they lost sight of their mandate to serve the public, not company officers. The House passed a weak reform bill in the spring. But the president at best appeared to be equating it with the more meaningful proposal the Senate is currently considering. The Senate bill, proposed by Paul Sarbanes, would establish an independent oversight board for the industry, and place limits on the consulting work auditors can perform for companies. Mr. Bush would have best served the interests of the tens of millions of Americans who want to continue entrusting their retirement savings to the stock market if he had transcended partisanship on this one issue and directed his party's leadership in the House to adopt the Senate's version of accounting reform. Establishing a Justice Department task force on corporate fraud is a fine idea, as is Mr. Bush's effort to make corporate insiders personally liable for their misrepresentations, and to make them return ill-gotten gains. Americans no doubt appreciated the president's tough talk about punishing executives who commit crimes. But what they really wanted to hear from Mr. Bush was how he intended to prevent corporate fraud from occurring in the first place. He had little to offer on that score. nytimes.com