Ah, the memories that this must bring back.
Watching a video shot five years ago this month, defendants Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling looked up on a big screen in court Wednesday and saw themselves predict that by now Enron would be "the world's leading company."In the celebratory video, Skilling and Lay stood onstage at a February 2001 employees meeting. Lay then pulled a cord to reveal a sign with their new vision for Enron.
"We want to move from being 'the world's leading energy company' to be 'the world's leading company,' " then-CEO Skilling said to applause from employees. He noted he would change his vanity license plate from "WLEC" to "WLC."
"Five years from now I think there's a good chance we could be the leading company in the world."
Not a whole lot else of interest going on in the trial. Skilling defense attorney Dan Petrocelli got prosecution witness Mark Koenig to admit to some errors in his testimony. Loren Steffy thinks they were glancing blows and not direct hits on him, while Tom thinks it's the prosecution that swung and missed. How much more fun do you think the jury room would be if these two guys were to be in it?
Next up, former Enron Broadband CEO Ken Rice, who didn't exactly cover himself in glory during that trial. That cross-examination ought to wake people up a bit. And finally, Tory has a Wall Street Journal story about "Houston's still-conflicted feelings about Enron and its former executives" that's thankfully short on the angst. Whether or not this city has "moved on" regarding Enron's collapse and its supposed effect on our psyche, at least the media seems to have mostly gotten bored with thumbsucker stories about it. For that, I'm grateful.
Posted by Charles Kuffner on February 09, 2006 to Enronarama | TrackBack