Congressional Investigations - The New Inquisition
Over the past few weeks myriad House and Senate Congressional Committees have held hearings, calling and questioning present and past employees of the Enron Corp. to investigate why the company collapsed and whether any laws are needed to prevent another collapse like Enron's. Many of these meetings have been broadcast on CNN, C-Span, C-Span2, MSNBC and CNBC.
I've had the opportunity to watch many of them and what I see bothers me. The committees seem not that interested in gathering information as much as getting TV time to be seen by the folks back home badgering the media-defined bad guys in Enron's failure. Given what Jeffrey Skilling has had to endure, it's a wonder anyone is willing to show up at the hearings and NOT take the fifth amendment. Sure some of these guys have broken the law and deserve to be punished, but that should occur after a fair trial, not with nothing more than innuendo and Congresses want of some free publicity while pretending they are "doing the job they were elected to do" at the expense of individuals who should be considered "innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt".
Congress has every right to investigate whether any new laws need to be passed to protect employees and stockholders from rogue management, but to attack individuals who have agreed to not take advantage of their fifth amendment rights, with no evidence of wrongdoing, is wrong and should not be allowed.
03/09/02 ( 319
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