Bye bye Bernie (Ebbers)

Guilty - as charged

For those that -- for whatever reason -- seem to believe the old adage that Republicans are the best friends of business and will never clean up the Corporate corruption, I'd like you all to do some googling or other searching and read the headlines that note that former Worldcom CEO Bernie Ebbers was found guilty as charged.

He's now facing up to 85 years in jail for crimes commited primarily during THE CLINTON YEARS.

Before some of the Bush bashing crowd pipes up and cries "what about Enron and Ken Lay?" his time is coming too. You might, just might be able to cry about Dick Cheney at Halliburton, but you'll first have to prove the case there, and that may not be as easy.

In any case, Bernie Ebbers is just the first in the series. Be ready for more of his ilk to join him soon (if they don't wise up and start making deals with the prosecutors quickly).

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Hi, Terpfan. (University of Maryland, Fighting Terapins, is that the origin of your nick?)

I don't know if you have read my Blog on CEOs: Who Needs Them? from a few weeks ago, and I don't blame President Bush, but some things to point out:

1- Mr. Ebbers hasn't been sentenced as yet, nor has the appeals process been exhausted. But realize that it has been 3 years since MCI went bankrupt. It has now "recovered" by screwing the investors and those companies unlucky enough to have done business with them. They maybe recovered 10%, probably less. Most stock holders got nothing. Justice has not been served. In fact, the bad guys won this round, IMHO.
2- Dennis Kozlovski from Tyco has finished one mistrial and is going through another trial. In New York. I suggested that he be held in Rikers Island, alongside guys who are accussed of stealing less, but who listens to me?
3- Martha Stewart's wealth doubled while she was in prison to over $1 bilion. Dropped soon after she got out. Maybe she'll violate parole 'cause "she needs the money?"

Ken Lay may very well die of natural causes before he does jail time.

In no case does the punishment fit the crime for these people who ruined lives. And it wouldn't make any difference what party the President was from.

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Hi Larry -

yup on the origin of the nick name. Love my Terps, even if they are not playing in the big tourney this year

(first time in 11 years though, a healthy run, including a national championship a few years ago).

I did see your excellent blog entry on CEOs. Well done and dead on.

Agreed on the points you raise about these folks potentially appealing for eternity. Still, even guilty verdicts is better than many expected.

Personally, I'd like to lock these folks up and throw away the keys, and that's just to start. As you note, there isn't a punishment that we can carry out that would fit the crimes they commited and pay back for the ruined lives. Perhaps it would be best just to turn these morons over to the employees that they screwed over and let them mete out the justice. But that would be considered cruel and unusual.

As to the party in power - I still hold much of this happened while Dems controlled the Presidency, the Justice department, etc. I saw far too many people ready to claim that Bush was just gonna let big business run rampant. That has clearly not been the case.

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