Thank you very much for your Ken Lay observations. That adds to the historical record. I hope others join in with there recollections. And sorry I had to edit one word–some of our readers might be under aged!

Note that Einstein did not simply declare that the “science was settled.” Nor, it appears, did he ever call anyone who doubted his theory a “denier” or threaten any such person with a Nuremburg-like trial.

On the other hand, as a reporter I’d known Ken Lay since the mid-1980s (including the ill-fated nomenclature explosion of Enteron). My experience was with a guy who, I concluded, was much more interested in government policy and politics than in running a business. In those days, Richard Kinder kept the business balls juggled while Lay played games in Washington.

When Kinder got passed over in favor of Jeff Skilling (the empressario of virtual businesses), the balls started falling out of the air. Kinder went on to great success, focusing on fundamentals of gas transmission. Enron, of course, collapsed like the House of Usher.

An anecdote that might be of interest. In 1992, when I was serving as a consultant to non-utility generators, one of them (the late Cogen Technologies) asked me to represent the company’s interests at an RNC-concocted event to draft an energy platform for the upcoming Republican convention. Tom Korologos ran the event. I laughed when I accepted the job, as I am a Democrat. But my client didn’t care. They just wanted someone at the table who understood energy politics and its part of the business.

The whole thing, of course, was a sham designed to raise energy company money for the GOP. It was a pay-to-play deal, with each company at the table kicking in $2,000 for a seat. I took another $2,000 for about two-days work.

After the first meeting, I wrote a draft platform plank on energy. It was goof-and-spoof: classic Republican red meat. No subsidies, reduce regulation, free-up markets, end utility monopolies, etc. Get rid of DOE. Drill, drill, drill. I knew the drill very well.

When we met again (I think it was at the Hay-Adams, maybe the Willard), many of the folks there shook my hand and told me how much they admired my draft platform plank. A guy from Bechtel positively groaned in pleasure.

Then the group adopted draft language entirely in the opposite direction — supporting continued and greater subsidies for such things as Section 29 (coal-bed methane) gas, alleged synfuels. more DOE R&D and CRADAs, etc. It could have been written by J. Bennett Johnston.

Sitting at the table for the first time, smiling like the Cheshire cat, was Ken Lay. It was Enron’s “plank” that the fund-raising RNC group adopted.

Of course, as I knew at the time, the whole exercise was meaningless, as the GOP adopted a very different plank — I don’t even remember what it was, except that it was entirely anodyne — and Bill Clinton went on to wax GHWB in the general election, where energy was an entirely insignificant issue.

That’s one of my recollections of Key Lay’s approach to management. I have more (has anyone heard of Intellibridge?) , but they begin to get boring.

Ken Maize