Ludicrous........please read the Washington Post article below. I plan to fax a letter to the editor. For all the negatives of the LJMs, Enron had many successes and our reputations should not get slammed because of the actions of a handful of people!

letters@washpost.com <mailto:letters@washpost.com> 

Michelle

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From:  <hmathews@houston.rr.com>
To: Wayne Franklin <xraywhf@argolink.net>, Tracy Harris <wtharris@ev1.net>, Joan Woodson <wood918@aol.com>, Tricia Esqueta <vtescueta@hotmail.com>, Christopher Daniel <usmcbrcn@aol.com>, Patti Ucci <UcciL@aol.com>, Tony Spruiell <tspruiel@midsouth.rr.com>, Don Miller <themiller@charter.net>, Susan Rouse <susanrouse@msn.com>, Sheila Pardo <spardo@houston.rr.com>, Sean Hymes <shymes@swbell.net>, Sam Zimmerman <samuel@cal.berkeley.edu>, Reggie Smith (E-mail) <reggie_smith@hotmail.com>, rick dumonte <rdumonte@kingwoodcable.com>, rodney beasley <rbeasleysprint8@earthlink.net>, Melvenia Pellerin <raps_melpel@yahoo.com>, Rajesh Dhir (E-mail) <rajgeetatx@yahoo.com>, Quincy & JO Baltrip <QJBMJB@CS.COM>, Pat Slaughter <patslaughter@houston.rr.com>, Patrick Keelan <pat-keelan@msn.com>, Pam Benson <pambenson@msn.com>, Nancy M. Simmons (E-mail) <nancy_m_simmons@yahoo.com>, Meg Wysetta <megw@kingwoodcable.com>, Maricela Chavez <mchavez@ev1.net>, lou diamond <lou-diamond@engineer.com>, Michelle Foust <lmfoust@aol.com>, Leonard Dillehay <leonarddillehay185@msn.com>, Gustavia Lee <leegustavia@hotmail.com>, Lissa Boatright (E-mail) <lboatright@houston.rr.com>, Lisa Pederson <ldpedersen@hotmail.com>, Kishore Joshi (E-mail) <kishoreajoshi@hotmail.com>, Keith DeVore <kcdevore@yahoo.com>, Jeff White <jwhite19@houston.rr.com>, Frances Ortiz <jortiz3@houston.rr.com>, Jacqueline M. Jackson <jjackson77033@yahoo.com>, Jackie Coleman <jazi2001@yahoo.com>, Terry Oswald <irongator@aol.com>, Joel Anderson <indyandy06@msn.com>, Georgia Schmidt <georgiab@mindspring.com>, Debora Whitehead <dwhitehead@houston.rr.com>, Andre Gibson <drewbgi@yahoo.com>, Chaun Roberts <droberts7@houston.rr.com>, Digna Showers <dignashow@yahoo.com>, Debra DeForge <ddefforge@hotmail.com>, Dawn Brown <dawn-brown@houston.rr.com>, Darin Meyerson <darin1998@yahoo.com>, Toby Roquemore <cmelton@houston.rr.com>, Christie Bunting (E-mail) <clb1058@hotmail.com>, Chris Foley <cfoley1@houston.rr.com>, Brooks Wimberly <brookswimberly@usa.net>, Bob Hurt <bobhurt66@hotmail.com>, Beverly Stone Jones <bstone_jones@hotmail.com>, Bertha Owens <bowens@houston.rr.com>, Barrett Hall <Barrett95@aol.com>, Anzar Hasan <ahasan@houston.rr.com>, Angie Lorio <cajunmom1222@aol.com>, an dobernecker <lrdjr3026@earthlink.net>, Amy Rios <aim_mers@hotmail.com>
Date: Wednesday, March 6, 2002 2:04:36 GMT
Subject: 

This is ridiculous. If I have offended anyone with this e-mail just let me know and I will discard your name from my address book. If not, please respond to this reporter.
Helen
----- Original Message ----- 
From: Kathy Benedict <mailto:benedict@kingwoodcable.com> 
To: William Petty <mailto:howard@petty.com> ; Wendy Hiatt <mailto:whiatt@houston.rr.com> ; Weindel, Patricia <mailto:Patricia_Weindel@mhhs.org> ; Wanda Parker <mailto:walou@mymailstation.com> ; Trish Collins <mailto:pcollins2@houston.rr.com> ; Tracy Williams <mailto:dwilliams17@houston.rr.com> ; Tom Riley <mailto:triley9999@attbi.com> ; Tim Sundel <mailto:tsundel@houston.rr.com> ; Susan Entmon <mailto:sentman@smith.alumnae.net> ; Stephen Burns <mailto:stephenburns@hotmail.com> ; Stephanie Kimble <mailto:sk-one@lycos.com> ; Shirley Isbell <mailto:Sisbell2@houston.rr.com> ; shilpa kadakia <mailto:shilpakadakia@hotmail.com> ; Sheryl Stone <mailto:skSAT7hudson@AOL.com> ; Sharon Strong <mailto:sstrong2@yahoo.com> ; Scott Wohlander <mailto:scott_wohlander@yahoo.com> ; Scott Massey <mailto:massey.r@worldnet.att.net> ; Sandy Verma <mailto:sverma1@ix.netcom.com> ; Ryan Frazier <mailto:mfrazier@ev1.net> ; Ruth Lancaster <mailto:Karlruth@AOL.com> ; Rosa Jaramillo <mailto:rjaramil@mail.mdanderson.org> ; 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Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2002 4:34 PM
Subject: Fw: Response to Enron Article by Michael Lewis, 3/3/02,Outlook Section

 
----- Original Message ----- 
From: Kathy Roeder <mailto:Kroeder@aflcio.org> 
To: benedict@kingwoodcable.com <mailto:benedict@kingwoodcable.com> ; Dvegas@kingwoodcable.com <mailto:Dvegas@kingwoodcable.com> 
Cc: Damon Silvers <mailto:Dsilvers@aflcio.org> 
Sent: Tuesday, March 05, 2002 12:41 PM
Subject: Fwd: Response to Enron Article by Michael Lewis, 3/3/02,Outlook Section

Dennis and Kathy--
I need your help getting something to as many former Enron employees as possible.  At the bottom of my message I copied in an opinion editorial that appeared in the Washington Post on Sunday.  The author makes an  absurd claim that Enron's employees somehow got what they deserved in the company's collapse.
 
We need as many former Enron employees as possible to respond to the Michael Lewis piece and counter his bizarre argument with fact.  You can email letters to the editor to letters@washpost.com <mailto:letters@washpost.com>  Include your name, address, and phone number.  I attached the letter that Mr. Trumka sent to the Post today.  
 

Wait a Minute. Didn't Enron's Employees Ride That Stock Up? 


By Michael Lewis

Sunday, March 3, 2002; Page B02 

BERKELEY, Calif. -- Not since the corporate victims of Sept. 11 rushed to Capitol Hill to demand financial reparations have there been so many expensive beggars in one place as there are now in Houston. 

Every few days brings another story of the terrible predicament of Enron Corp.'s current and former employees. Often these stories reveal a new grievance they harbor or lawsuit they have filed to recover money they believe is rightfully theirs.

On Feb. 21, for instance, came word that roughly 900 Old Enronians are seeking cash from a pair of Houston-based relief funds, and that former auditor Arthur Andersen LLP had put together a package to compensate, among others, former Enron employees.

These relief funds now have hundreds of thousands of dollars, largely because politicians looking to unburden themselves of Enron's campaign contributions have come to view the bankrupt energy trader's former employees as a popular cause. And Andersen seems never to have asked why it should be giving money to former Enron employees rather than the other way around. 

How come? Why are Enron's employees, who helped perpetrate one of the great corporate frauds of all time, more deserving of reparations than, say, Enron's creditors or, to expand the field of vision, actual poor people who never worked at Enron? 

One answer -- the answer generally assumed -- is that the blame for Enron's collapse falls exclusively on Kenneth Lay, Jeffrey Skilling, Andrew Fastow and one or two other honchos. All lesser Enronians were, like mushrooms, kept in the dark. Perhaps in some cases this is even true. In most cases -- above a very low level of employee -- it couldn't possibly be. 

We now know, for example, that it took many hundreds of people to orchestrate the huge number of spectacularly bad investments made by Enron over the past decade. Many hundreds of people were at the same time very highly paid. How could it not occur to these people that there was something odd in this arrangement? 

We also know that some large number of employees answered former CEO Skilling's call to create a phony trading floor, so that analysts visiting from Wall Street would have the impression that Enron was doing more business than it actually was. 

Many of these people -- to judge from their newspaper quotes -- seem to feel that the Potemkin village exercise is proof of corruption at the top of Enron, and thus of their case that they were defrauded by their evil masters. Actually, it shows that a lot of people should have known that something was wrong all along, and that the corruption, or delusion, extended down into the Enron ranks. 

We also know, from Enron vice president Sherron Watkins's now famous letter to Lay, that Enron's corrupt partnerships were something of an open secret within the company. 

Indeed, everything we know so far about Enron suggests that many, many employees were, at the very least, willing accomplices to the schemes dreamed up by their bosses. And now they want their money back! They are like accessories to a failed bank heist who demand restitution because the police confiscated their share of the take. I can think of two reasons they should be shamed into silence. 

The first is the example it sets. The Enron case as it is currently playing out sends the following message to corporate employees: You aren't responsible for what you do. Turn a blind eye toward corporate deceit, or even participate in the deception, and, so long as you aren't one of the top bosses, you will enjoy the moral status of the victim.

It's already hard to be a whistle-blower. This incentive structure makes it even harder. One of the striking things about Enron is that no one came forward and blew the whistle on the company. (Watkins has been cast in the role, but all she really did is beg her boss to orchestrate an artful coverup so she could continue to make lots of money.) Why will the people who work at the next Enron behave any differently?

The second reason to ignore the yelps and whimpers of Old Enronians is basic justice. The phony accounts Enron ginned up for many years allowed it to pay its employees as if they actually were conducting hugely profitable business. Even those who were profitably engaged were probably grossly overpaid for their efforts. In short, they've already made out like bandits. Why give them more money? 

I know, I know: the retirement plan! Eight hundred and fifty million dollars in worker savings vanished! 

Somehow the media reports suggest Enron forced its employees to keep their savings in Enron shares. In fact there was a brief period last fall, from Oct. 29 through Nov. 12, in which the 401(k) plan was frozen and Enron's employees were unable to sell their shares. The stock during that span fell to $9.24 a share from $13.81, a small step in the long plunge from more than $90 to pennies today. The only shares workers were restricted from selling outside that window were those pumped into the plan by the company as a match for part of each employee's contribution. (Those shares couldn't be sold until the worker turned 50.) 

For the most part, workers held shares voluntarily and could have sold them, and diversified their portfolios, at any time. The reason they didn't is that they were greedy: They had seen Enron's stock rocket and decided the smart thing to do was bet that it would keep rocketing. It's sad for them that it didn't, but should the rest of us be responsible for them, any more than we feel responsible for people who sunk their life savings into TheStreet.com Inc.? 

Probably there are a few Old Enronians -- lowly clerks, some blue-collar types out in the field, the mentally incompetent -- who deserve a helping hand. But I'll bet they aren't the ones who are now hollering for it.

Michael Lewis is a columnist for Bloomberg News, where a version of this first appeared.

? 2002 The Washington Post Company