We as spiritual beings or souls come to earth in order to experience the human condition. This includes the good and the bad scenarios of this world. Our world is a duality planet and no amount of love or grace will eliminate evil or nastiness. We will return again and again until we have pierced the illusions of this density. The purpose of human life is to awaken to universal truth. This also means that we must awaken to the lies and deceit mankind is subjected to. To pierce the third density illusion is a must in order to remove ourselves from the wheel of human existences. Love is the Answer by means of Knowledge and Awareness!

Enron Evidence Said To Implicate Treasury Secretary O'Neill 
Citizen.org 
1-20-1

WASHINGTON, DC - Public Citizen today called on Treasury Secretary 
Paul O'Neill to explain evidence indicating that he helped Enron 
continue hiding information about its financial condition and took 
actions enabling it to funnel potentially billions of dollars 
belonging to shareholders and employees into offshore tax havens.

In a letter to O'Neill, Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook said 
she is "deeply concerned" about O'Neill's actions. She asked the 
secretary to provide detailed information about his communications 
with Enron executives and Bush administration officials about the tax 
havens.

"The secretary owes the public an explanation," Claybrook said. "His 
actions have created a tremendous appearance of impropriety. He has a 
duty to taxpayers, Enron shareholders and Enron employees to clarify 
this matter."

In 1998, the Clinton administration began making moves to crack down 
on countries whose lax banking regulations permit U.S. companies to 
hide money in offshore tax havens. Clinton threatened strict economic 
sanctions on all nations with lax banking regulations, effective July 
2001, in an effort to create a global trend toward increased 
financial transparency.

But on Feb. 17, 2001, O'Neill announced that the Bush administration 
was going to review the matter, effectively delaying it. As a result, 
Enron and other companies could continue to hide money in the Cayman 
Islands and other offshore accounts. Enron has 874 subsidiaries 
registered in the Cayman Islands and other nations with weak bank 
disclosure laws.

On Nov. 27, 2001, O'Neill's office announced that according to an 
agreement with the Cayman Islands, that nation would not have to 
tighten its banking laws until 2004. That would give enough time for 
companies to move their assets and destroy their records.

O'Neill's efforts must be viewed in the context of the more than $1.1 
million Enron contributed to Bush's presidential campaign and 
inauguration, Claybrook wrote. She noted that O'Neill's 
responsibility is to collect owed taxes -- not to facilitate tax 
avoidance -- and that if Enron and other companies are hiding money 
in the Cayman Islands, he has an obligation to end that abuse.

Public Citizen first raised questions about the offshore tax havens 
in a report about Enron issued in late December, Blind Faith: How 
Deregulation and Enron's Influence Over Government Lotted Billions 
from Americans.

In the letter, Public Citizen asks O'Neill to answer detailed 
questions about his decisions regarding the tax havens; provide a 
comprehensive list of his contacts with Enron executives, President 
Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and their staffs about the issue; 
explain the extent of his knowledge about tax havens being used by 
terrorists to hide money; explain why he took the steps; and more. 
  
http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=1000  

*****

Monday January 21 7:39 PM ET 

Enron Probing Document Destruction
By PETE YOST, Associated Press Writer 

WASHINGTON (AP) - Enron is looking into the reported destruction of 
documents that allegedly took place at its Houston headquarters after 
the federal government began investigating the company, an attorney 
for the bankrupt energy giant said Monday night. 

In an on-air interview with ABC News, a former Enron executive, 
identified as Maureen Castaneda, said the shredding of documents took 
place in an accounting office on the 19th floor. 

Castaneda displayed one box of the shredded material which ``I 
got ... when I was leaving work to basically use ... for packing 
material. 

``There were ... a lot more than this,'' she said, standing next to 
the box. She said some of the shredding may have occurred as recently 
as this month. 

Castaneda said the destruction began after Thanksgiving and continued 
to at least last week. 

The Securities and Exchange Commission began looking into Enron in 
mid-October. 

``We are investigating the circumstances of the reported destruction 
of documents,'' Washington attorney Robert Bennett, who is 
representing Enron, said in a statement. 

``In October 2001 the company issued several directives to all Enron 
employees worldwide that all relevant documents should be preserved 
in light of pending litigation,'' Bennett added. ``If anyone violated 
those directives, they will be dealt with appropriately.'' 

The reported shredding at Enron follows revelations over the past 
week and a half about document destruction at the Arthur Andersen, 
Enron's accounting firm. 

Some of the shredded Enron paper displayed in the ABC story contained 
the word ``Jedi,'' one of the entities involved in an array of off-
the-books partnerships which kept hundreds of millions of dollars in 
Enron debt off the company's balance sheet for several years. 

Plaintiffs' attorney William Lerach, who is suing Enron's board and 
officers, said he plans to take the box of shredded documents to 
federal court. 

Enron's inquiry into shredding at its headquarters came as 
congressional investigators pressed for public testimony by an 
Andersen auditor fired over the destruction at the accounting firm. 

``This whole sorry affair keeps getting uglier by the minute, and 
we're determined to get to the bottom of it.'' said Ken Johnson, 
spokesman for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which has been 
investigating the destruction of documents at Andersen. 

``Making bad business decisions is one thing, but trying to cover up 
bad business decisions is another,'' said Johnson when told of the 
reported shredding at Enron. 

Fired Andersen auditor David Duncan told investigators that Andersen 
had ample information when it evaluated the controversial partnership 
arrangements at Enron that were a big factor in its bankruptcy. 

Duncan ``did not sit there and say 'Enron hid all this information 
from us and therefore we couldn't count right,''' said Rep. Jim 
Greenwood, R-Pa., who heads a House panel investigating the collapse. 
``It was more of ... 'we made mistakes.''' 

Rather than giving a ``mea culpa,'' Duncan gave ``a wea culpa; he did 
not point the finger at Enron,'' Greenwood said Monday, 
characterizing the comments the fired auditor made last week to 
congressional investigators. 

Duncan's lawyers sought to delay his public testimony, scheduled for 
Thursday before the House Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee, 
arguing that Duncan needs more time to prepare. 

But Greenwood, who chairs the subcommittee, rejected the request, 
saying Duncan ``doesn't really need to recall every detail of what he 
did for Enron. We're focused on the destruction of documents. We'll 
subpoena him if we have to.'' 

Andersen chief executive Joseph ``Berardino is saying that the 
company found fault with Duncan's destruction of documents. He 
(Duncan) needs to defend himself,'' said Greenwood. 

If Duncan testifies, the hearing will pit him against Andersen's 
legal department and company management in Chicago. 

Appearing Sunday on NBC's ``Meet the Press,'' Berardino criticized 
Duncan and defended attorney Nancy Temple, who advised the Houston 
office by electronic mail on Oct. 12 about the firm's document 
destruction policy. That was just four days before Enron announced 
more than $600 million in third-quarter losses and took the first 
step in disclosing details of the partnerships. 

Berardino said Duncan displayed ``at the least ... extremely poor 
judgment'' for his part in discarding the documents in October and 
November. 

Berardino said Temple reminded the Houston office of the policy to do 
away with some documents ``because accountants are pack rats ... We 
save lots of stuff that's not relevant.'' 

But Duncan told investigators ``it was unusual'' for a company lawyer 
to emphasize the document-destruction policy. 

Meanwhile, a lawyer for Kenneth L. Lay, Enron's chairman and chief 
executive, said Lay disposed of millions of dollars in Enron stock 
before the company's collapse last year because he needed to raise 
cash to repay loans, not because of concerns about the health of his 
company. 

Attorney Earl J. Silbert said Lay had put up shares of his Enron 
stock as collateral for other investments. On at least 15 occasions 
between February and October last year, Lay returned shares to the 
company to repay $4 million he had received through a credit line. 

However, Silbert also said that Lay held onto some stock, detailing 
one transaction in which Lay exercised options to purchase 68,000 
shares of Enron stock on Aug. 21. 

``He continues to hold that stock today,'' Silbert said. 

In other developments: 

-The State Department disclosed that Secretary of State Colin Powell 
referred to Enron's problems regarding a power plant in India in a 
discussion with India's foreign minister last April 6. Enron was 
trying to collect a $64 million debt on the project. According to the 
State Department, Powell said failure to resolve the matter could 
have a serious deterrent effect on other investors. 

-New Jersey's two U.S. senators, Democrats Robert Torricelli and Jon 
Corzine, urged the federal government to inspect Enron's natural gas 
pipelines to ensure against accidents. Enron spokesman Mark Palmer 
said ``our pipelines are inspected continuously and the hardworking 
men and women who have devoted their lives to the safe operations of 
these pipelines would have it no other way.'' 

-Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said accounting firms should be barred 
from providing management consulting services to the companies they 
audit. ``These conflicts have led to the kind of hide-the-debt shell 
game that took place at Enron,'' said Boxer, who will introduce a 
bill to ban the dual role. 

-Consumer advocate Ralph Nader said a special counsel should 
investigate Enron rather than the Justice Department's criminal 
division. Nader also said Bush administration officials should have 
alerted the Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange 
Commission last fall when contacted by Enron Chairman Ken Lay about 
the company's growing problems. 

*****

Enron, Chase, Citigroup and Bush (The right relationship is 
everything)
1/18/02 
Robert Lederman
robert.lederman@worldnet.att.net

Chase, Citigroup, Bush and ENRON (The right relationship is 
everything)

Hey, what a surprise. the most corrupt President (Bush) is linked to 
the most corrupt corporation (Enron) which is financed by the 
Rockefeller's two main banking groups (JP Morgan/Chase and 
Citigroup). Bush gets all his ideas (as does Giuliani) from Chase 
Banks' Manhattan Institute, founded by CIA director William Casey... 
who funded, armed and trained bin Laden and the Afghan terrorists we 
are fighting. Ken Lay, Enron CEO and Bush's top contributor is a 
member of David Rockefeller's Trilateral Commission. It's a small 
world after all!
 See http://baltech.org/lederman/ for details on the 
Chase/Bush/Nazi/CIA connection behind much of modern US history. None 
of these connections are allowed to be reported on in US newspapers. 
For example, name one paper since 9/11 that has reported that David 
Rockefeller built the WTC. Too unimportant a detail to mention? -
Robert Lederman
--------
London Financial Times
Editorial comment: Enron and the role of the banks
Published: January 16 2002 20:34 | Last Updated: January 16 2002 
20:38 
"The more that is learnt about the collapse of Enron, the wider the 
ramifications become. Failures in the audit process and the 
vulnerability of many employees' pensions have now been joined by 
concerns over the actions of the banks. The Enron debacle has 
highlighted fundamental weaknesses in the US system of financial 
regulation, which has failed to keep pace with changes in the 
industry. 
The latest concern centres on the role of JP Morgan Chase, one of 
Enron's two main bankers. It was involved in an offshore company used 
by the energy trader to move risk off its balance sheet. The 
disclosure of the existence of such off-balance-sheet arrangements 
accelerated the downward spiral in the company's share price and led 
to its eventual bankruptcy. 
The Securities and Exchange Commission is now investigating whether 
JP Morgan has also misled its shareholders by making loans to Enron 
in the form of oil and gas trading contracts. Insurers who face a 
claim from the bank on surety bonds that guaranteed the contracts 
allege that they were loans dressed up as trades to keep them off the 
bank's balance sheet. JP Morgan has already revised its estimate of 
its Enron exposure from $900m to $2.6bn (£620m to £1.8bn.)The SEC 
probe is adding to the criticism of risk control procedures at the 
bank, formed in 2000 by the merger of Chase Manhattan with the 
venerable House of Morgan. 
JP Morgan and Enron's other lead bank, Citigroup, are the largest of 
a new generation of banking groups formed by combining commercial 
banks and investment banks to provide a one-stop shop for big 
corporate clients. The theory is that companies will give the 
lucrative investment banking mandates for mergers and acquisitions 
advice, share issues and bond finance to the banks that put loans on 
the table. 
Enron was, until the past few weeks, the sort of case study used to 
justify the creation of investment banks with big balance sheets. By 
being prepared to make hefty loans to Enron, Citigroup and JP Morgan 
beat less well endowed competitors in last year's race to advise it 
on restructuring and refinancing options. They worked hard - 
unsuccessfully - to persuade the credit rating agencies not to 
downgrade Enron. 
That they are able to do both investment banking and commercial 
banking is a consequence of the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act that 
had separated the two since the 1930s. It was meant to stop conflicts 
of interest that had contributed to the Great Crash of 1929 but 
proved increasingly unworkable as commercial banking, investment 
banking and the insurance industry converged. 
The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act that repealed the old legislation in 1999 
did nothing to rationalise financial regulation, however. The old 
regulators continued to do their work - the SEC as securities 
industry watchdog, the Federal Reserve on banking and the Commodity 
Futures Trading Commission on derivatives. The result is that no 
single regulator has an overall view of large financial 
conglomerates, leaving them free to organise their businesses in ways 
that have consequences for clients as well as investors. The 
weaknesses of this approach will have to be dealt with when the dust 
has settled around Enron."
---------------------------------
Check out Citigroup's board of directors
>From : http://www.responsiblelending.org/citidir.htm
Citigroup, Inc. Board of Directors
C. Michael Armstrong, Chairman and CEO, AT&T
AT&T, 32 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10013 tel 212-387-5400
Alain J. P. Belda, President and CEO, Alcoa
Alcoa, 201 Isabella Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15212 tel 412-553-4545
Kenneth J. Bialkin, Partner, Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom
Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom, Four Times Square, New York, NY 
10036 tel 212-735-2130 fax 212-735-2000 kbialkin@skadden.com
Kenneth T. Derr, Chairman and CEO (retired), Chevron
Chevron, 575 Market Street, San Francisco, CA 94105
John M. Deutch, Professor, M.I.T.; former Director of CIA
M.I.T. Dept. of Chemistry, Room 6-208, 77 Massachusetts Ave., 
Cambridge, MA 
02139, tel. 617-253-1479 fax 617-258-5700 jmd@mit.edu
Ann Dibble Jordan, Consultant
2940 Benton Place, Washington, DC 20008
Robert I. Lipp, Citigroup
Citigroup Inc., 399 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10043 tel 212-559-1000
Reuben Mark, Chairman and CEO, Colgate-Palmolive
Colgate-Palmolive, 300 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10022 tel 212-310-
2000 
Michael T. Masin, President and Vice Chairman, Verizon Communications
Verizon Communications, 1095 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 
10036 tel 212-395-2121
Dudley C. Mecum, Managing Director, Capricorn Holdings
33 Khakum Wood Road, Greenwich, CT 06831
Richard D. Parsons, President, Time Warner
Time Warner, 75 Rockefeller Plaza, New York, NY 10019 tel 212-484-8000
Andrall E. Pearson, Chairman and CEO, Tricon Global Restaurants 
Tricon Global Restaurants, 1441 Gardiner Lane, Louisville, KY 40213
Tel. 502-874-8300
Robert E. Rubin, Chairman of Executive Committee, Citigroup
Citigroup Inc., 399 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10043 tel 212-559-1000
Franklin A. Thomas, former President, Ford Foundation
TFF Study Group, 595 Madison Avenue, 33rd Floor, New York, NY 10022
tel: 212-753-3200, fax: 212-753-6703, email f.thomas@tffsg.org
Sanford I. Weill, Chairman and CEO, Citigroup
Citigroup Inc., 399 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10043 tel 212-559-1000
Arthur Zankel, General Partner, Zankel Capital Advisors
20 E. 68th Street, New York, NY 10021 212-734-4173
Gerald R. Ford, former President of United States 
P.O. Box 927, Rancho Mirage, CA 92270

*****

BusinessWeek.com
1-18-2

Enron's Hero - With A Smoking-Gun Letter  
By Wendy Zellner, with Stephanie Forest Anderson, in Dallas and with 
Laura Cohn in Washington
http://www.businessweek.com 

Sherron Watkins' memo to CEO Ken Lay spoke volumes about the 
company's behavior. So did the higher-ups' tepid response 
  
At last, someone in the sordid Enron scandal seems to have done the 
right thing. Thanks to whistle-blower Sherron S. Watkins, a no-
nonsense Enron vice-president, the scope and audacity of the 
accounting mess is becoming all too clear. Her blunt Aug. 15 letter 
to Enron CEO Kenneth L. Lay warns that the company might "implode in 
a wave of accounting scandals." And now that her worst fears have 
been realized, it is also clear that Watkins' letter went far beyond 
highlighting a few accounting problems in a handful of off-balance-
sheet partnerships. Watkins' letter lays bare for all to see the 
underbelly of Enron's get-rich-quick culture. 
  
Watkins, 42, a former Arthur Andersen accountant who remains Enron's 
vice-president for corporate development, put her finger on the rot: 
top execs who, at best, appeared to close their eyes to questionable 
accounting maneuvers, a leadership that had lost sight of ordinary 
investors and the basic principles of accounting, and watchdogs -- 
the outside auditors and lawyers whose own involvement may have left 
them too conflicted to query the nature of the deals. Perhaps the 
question shouldn't be how Enron collapsed so quickly -- but why it 
didn't implode sooner. 
  
A REVEALING REPLY 
  
Lay's response to Watkins' complaints is nearly as damning as her 
letter itself. Yes, he talked to her for an hour. And, yes, he 
ordered an outside investigation. But contrary to Watkins' advice, he 
appointed the company's longtime Houston law firm, Vinson & Elkins, 
despite the obvious conflict: V&E had worked on some of the 
partnerships. And Enron and V&E agreed there would be no "second-
guessing" of Andersen's accounting and no "detailed analysis" of each 
and every transaction, according to V&E's Oct. 15 report. The inquiry 
was to consider only if there was new factual information that 
warranted a broader investigation. V&E declined comment. 
  
Surprise: V&E concluded that a widespread investigation wasn't 
warranted. It simply warned that there was a "serious risk of adverse 
publicity and litigation." And Watkins' letter reveals the inadequacy 
of Lay's response in the months following CEO Jeffrey K. Skilling's 
sudden Aug. 14 resignation for "personal reasons." His departure 
triggered the letter. 
  
Lay never fully disclosed the partnerships or explained their impact 
to investors, even as he vowed there were no accounting issues 
and "no other shoe to fall." Even after Enron revealed on Oct. 16 a 
$1.2 billion hit to shareholder equity related to the partnerships, 
Lay continued to express ignorance about details of these deals and 
support for Chief Financial Officer Andrew S. Fastow, who managed and 
had stakes in certain partnerships. On Oct. 24, Fastow was removed 
from his job and promptly left the company. 
  
TENACIOUS AND COMPETENT 
  
Watkins, an eight-year Enron veteran, is not some disgruntled 
naysayer who is easy to dismiss. Her lawyer, Philip H. Hilder, says 
she became familiar with some of the partnership dealings when she 
worked in June and July in Fastow's finance group. Her position 
allowed her to review the valuation of certain assets being sold into 
the partnerships, and that's when she saw "computations that just 
didn't jibe," says Hilder. 
  
Former executives say the Tomball (Tex.) native was tenacious and 
competent. "She wasn't really an alarmist," says one former Enron 
employee. Her mother, Shirley Klein Harrington, a former high school 
accounting teacher, calls her daughter "a very independent, 
outspoken, good Christian girl, who's going to stand up for principle 
whenever she can." Watkins had previously worked at Andersen in 
Houston and New York and then for Germany's Metallgesellschaft. 
  
At those companies, she befriended Jeffrey McMahon, whom she helped 
recruit. Now the CFO at Enron, McMahon "complained mightily" about 
the Fastow partnerships to Skilling, Watkins told Lay in the 
letter. "Employees question our accounting propriety consistently and 
constantly," she claimed. McMahon didn't return calls. Skilling has 
denied getting any warnings about accounting. 
  
RED FLAGS 
  
Watkins didn't stop there. Five days after she wrote to Lay, Watkins 
took her concerns directly to an Andersen audit partner, according to 
congressional investigators. He in turn relayed her questions to 
senior Andersen management on the Enron account. It's not known what, 
if any, action they took. 
  
Of course, Skilling and Andersen execs shouldn't have needed a letter 
and a phone call from Watkins to figure out something was seriously 
amiss. Red flags abounded. And Watkins, for one, had no trouble 
putting her finger on questionable accounting practices. She wondered 
if Enron was hiding losses in off- balance-sheet entities while 
booking large profits from the deals. 
  
At the same time, the outside partnerships were backed with Enron 
stock -- a tactic sure to backfire when it was falling -- and no 
outsiders seemed to have any capital at risk. Was Enron creating 
income essentially by doing deals with itself? "It sure looks to the 
layman on the street that we are hiding losses in a related company 
and will compensate that company with Enron stock in the future," she 
wrote. 
  
In the end, Watkins grasped one thing that Enron's too-clever- by-
half dealmakers didn't: Enron's maneuvering didn't pass the smell 
test. Even if Enron and its high-priced auditors and lawyers can 
ultimately show that they followed the letter of the law, it matters 
little. As Watkins herself wrote, if Enron collapses, "the business 
world will consider the past successes as nothing but an elaborate 
accounting hoax." And that seems destined to become Enron's epitaph.
=========