Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room
The name of Enron
Corporation has become shorthand for corporate malfeasance, however most
people don't know the specifics of the story.
How is it possible that
one of the most respected companies in the world was completely built upon
smoke and mirrors? How could they get huge, respected firms like
Merrill Lynch and the Arthur Andersen accounting firm to completely torch
themselves and their business in the name of Enron? How could Enron
chair Ken Lay go from best friend (and a huge contributor) of the man in the
White House to looking at doing time in the big house? Where, if
anywhere, were the Enron execs' morals, their compassion, their humanity?
Like most great tragedies,
it all comes down to greed.
Enron: The Smartest Guys
in the Room shows the machinations that Ken Lay, Jeffrey Skilling, Andy Fastow and their
cronies hatched in the largest corporate scandal of our time, employees and stockholders and the world be damned.
It brings to light the crimes and shortcuts which were shrouded in the dark
for so long. It is told in simple, layman's terms, so that you don't
need an MBA to follow the money or the lack there of.
It is a dark
and powerful film, more shocking than any horror and yet oddly, sickly
fascinating. In particular scenes when they show Enron traders
knocking out the power grid in California all for fun and profit and
political gain you are staring into the heart of darkness.
The most amazing part of the
Enron story is that everybody lost however the ones who lost the least
were the ones committing the worst sins. It is a tragic story based on
greed, conspiracy and hubris.
Already, the story of Enron is getting
hazy in the shifting moral compass of the Bush economy. This movie is
vitally important if for no other reason than to keep all that happened
fresh in our heads.
The world has to remember that Enron is much more
than a punch line to a bad Jim Carrey movie (Fun With Dick And Jane).
People were inconvenienced. People were ruined. People
died. All so that a few fat cats could pad their wallets. Steal
from the poor and give to the rich.
The story of Enron is the story of
evil. It is a cautionary tale that must be understood and respected,
lest it happen again.
(1/06)
Jay S.
Jacobs
Copyright ©2006
PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved.
Posted: January 17, 2006.
