[ZNPaaneah]

As I read about Enron's debacle it becomes a fascinating account of how a house divided cannot stand.

On one side of this house were the people who did deals. The deals were valued over the life of the deal in the first year and then all the profit was booked, and the salesman was given a big fat bonus based on 20 years of projected earnings.

The other side of the house were the people who ran day to day operations. No real appreciation for them, no bonuses.

Obviously this created a very bitter, nasty atmosphere in the company and the day came when all those earnings projections evaporated. The people responsible to run the day to day were blasé and appeared completely apathetic to this, of course the result was a collapse in earnings, which in turn meant a collapse in stock price and all those fat cats with the stock options lost everything. Fitting.

Although this is not the criminal portion that Fastow was responsible for, it was the corporate structure that Lay and Skilling put in place, hence they should be held accountable for the demise.

Another result of this was that as problems were detected by the group who did the day to day they initially notified Skilling and Lay, however since those doing the deals were the darlings, the messengers were shot, and the lesson was clear, ignore all problems.

Again, a corporate climate that Lay and Skilling instituted.

Enron was not brought down by a crooked CFO, he was merely a symptom. They were brought down because of "the house divided" set up by Lay and Skilling where some people were encouraged to fudge numbers, and those responsible for dealing with these lies were disparaged.