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

To: Charles Tutt who wrote (277980)	7/19/2002 2:36:20 PM
From: Srexley	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

"NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks were pinned lower in early afternoon trade on Friday after Johnson & Johnson , a drug giant often seen as a safe haven in uncertain times, confirmed it was the target of a federal probe" Isn't this being tough? The SEC (under Bush's watch) is requiring the 1,000 largest companies in America to submit their earnings with the signature of the CEO and CFO so there will be no way for the big guys to avoid responsibility. There are more SEC "probes" going on now than any time in history. My point about Bush not being a prosecuter goes directly to your meaningless statement that "nobody has even been indicted". Are you suggesting he is telling the DOJ not to indict? Or do you think it is the President's job to indict people? Justice takes time, and in America you are (or used to be anyway) INNOCENT until proven guilty. No matter how many Congressmen (women) and Senators call you names in public. I will bet you that there will be plenty of indictments. The only thing I see in the way is the democrats trying to unseat the toughest head of the SEC ever or continuing to lie to the public that Bush is for the crooks. "Of course he should bring the crooks to justice" We agree on this, and so does President Bush, no matter how many times you demos say he doesn't. If there are no indictments a year from now I may switch over to your side. But I bet there will be plenty. Most of corporate America is honest, and those that are not are shaking in their boots. The top 1,000 companies are being watched. ps - Hasn't the accounting firm Arthur Anderson been charged with something?

To: Charles Tutt who wrote (277980)	7/19/2002 2:46:48 PM
From: Steve Dietrich	Respond to of 769667

And if he gives anymore speeches, the market is likely to go to zero. More than Harken or Halliburton, i'd like to see this administration held accountable for their fiscal malfeasance with the federal budget. Just consider the 10 year 1.3 trillion dollar tax cut. Instead of crafting a fiscally honest tax bill, they used accounting tricks to sneak in a much larger cut. After nine years, they pretend all the cuts are rescinded so they can count the tenth year (the most expensive year) as if taxed at 2000 rates. Imagine if a corporate CEO tried a stunt like that. Then there's the bogus growth assumptions. They use one set of assumptions to predict a large budget surplus, then they turn around and use completely different growth assumptions (more pessimistic assumptions) to say Social Security is in trouble. Again, imagine a CEO using this kind of dishonest accounting trick. Bush has an MBA, wants to be known as a CEO president, yet has offered knowingly dishonest budgets, has missed on both earnings and revenue every single quarter, and his company's stock is in the toilet. Average Americans may not pay much attention to this stuff, but investors do and they're taking their money out of the US. What happens to a CEO with performance like that in the real world? SEC investigation, bankruptcy, resignations, possible civil and criminal lawsuits... What happens here? Steve

To: Charles Tutt who wrote (277980)	7/20/2002 5:17:33 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 769667

A few greedy executives topple markets BY ANDREW GREELEY Chicago Sun-Times Editorial July 19, 2002 and could spoil it all for Republicans Last week we saw a speech by the president on Wall Street send the stock market tumbling again. When he began to talk, the market had inched up in hopes of tough reforms. In the midst of his talk it turned down and then plummeted for the rest of the day and the rest of the week. Investors quickly realized that his program was long on rhetoric and short on enforcement. The president's words were just what the market didn't need. Despite his speech and perhaps because of it, the plunge continued down almost 700 points. According to subsequent stories, the weakness of the speech was the result of a powerful intervention from Vice President Dick Cheney, who argued that tough action against business corruption would punish the whole of American business for the crimes of a "few rotten apples." So many Americans watch their retirement savings slip away in the name of protecting American business from too much government interference. On Election Day in November, they may protest with their votes. Indeed, the president's Wall Street speech may in retrospect appear to be the most decisive political event of the campaign. He came to New York to talk the market up. Instead he talked it down. The fundamental flaw of a socialist economy is stagnation. The fundamental flaw of a capitalist economy is greed. Both lead to corruption. Greed is the necessary risk of economic growth. Not all American corporate leaders are greedy to the point of corruption, yet there is, perhaps necessarily, a miasma in the American business world that creates a certain predisposition to the "deal," the "fast one," the "big buck." Not all the apples are rotten, but the tree may have many rotten branches. One merely has to consider the huge salaries paid to CEOs, the dazzling golden parachutes that are given to a CEO who has been forced out, the egregious loans to company officers or directors, bonuses unjustified by corporate performance, mergers that leave big debts (like the AOL Time Warner mess), and dubious stock options. Obviously shady games are played every day in the business world. Most of them are not technically illegal, but perhaps more of them should be. However, these and similar matters of corporate routine create an atmosphere in which, especially during a time of prosperity, one can easily slip over the line to behavior like that which characterized Enron, Global Crossing, WorldCom, Tyco, ImClone, etc., etc. The temptations in a "quick buck" environment to take chances with other people's money and perhaps with the law are not irresistible perhaps, but very powerful. Both the president and the vice president made their fortunes in such a corporate environment, indeed in the quick-money world of oil millionaires--a world in which they were obviously insiders. They may have violated no laws (or they may have), but understandably perhaps, they find it hard to yield to public demand for the containment of corporate greed. It is hard for them to be part of the solution because to some extent--how much we don't know--they are part of the problem. We do not know the full story of the president's ventures with Harken Energy. He argues that the Securities and Exchange Commission ''cleared'' him. He does not admit that his father had appointed the head of that agency and that its general counsel at the time of the investigation had been the younger Bush's personal attorney. Moreover, there are some aspects of Halliburton's financial arrangements when Cheney was in charge that on the surface raise questions which the SEC does not seem interested in asking with any degree of urgency. Similar doubts led to the Whitewater investigations of former President Bill Clinton, which found no evidence of wrongdoing and then veered away into an exploration of his sex life. Compared to the games that Bush and Cheney may have played, the hundred thousand dollars of Whitewater seem to be chicken feed. Where, then, are the demands for impartial investigations? Why are there not editorial suggestions that a special prosecutor be appointed to investigate both men? Maybe after the November elections, the timid Democrats in Congress may ask some serious questions. suntimes.com