[UPDATE: HUGE KUDOS TO DAULTON, WHO HUNTED DOWN THE RIGHT INFO IMMEDIATELY!]
My uncle has asked me about the content of the following e-mail, which was evidently blasted all over God's green earth on May 19 by something identifying itself as "alex-usa." It got to him in seven forwarding steps, so evidently it is making the rounds. (I've checked to see if it was addressed in a previous diary, and based on searching on "Ken Lay" and "Kenneth Lay" tags and some reading, I didn't see it. If it has been, sorry.)
Enron is not one of my areas of detailed knowledge, so I'm hoping that people will take a moment to point out, line by line, what in here is a flat-out lie, what's a distortion, what lacks critical context, and what if any of what's left is true. I do vaguely recall hearing that Ken Lay was the top individual GOP donor; am I right? When?
Thanks in advance for your help. This is not the last time, I expect, that we'll have to do this. I've tagged this diary "disinformation," which is probably a good category in which to collect such efforts.
Here's the e-mail in its original form:
How Enron worked the President for favors:
This is an interesting bit of information that you don't hear much about.
A...Enron's chairman did meet with the president and the vice-president in the Oval Office.
B..Enron gave $420,000 to the president's party over three years.
C..It donated $100,000 to the president's inauguration festivities.
D..The Enron chairman stayed at the White House 11 times.
E..The corporation had access to the administration at its highest level and even enlisted the Commerce and State Departments to grease deals for it.
F..The taxpayer-supported Export-Import Bank subsidized Enron for more than $600 million in just one transaction. Scandalous!!
G..BUT...the President under whom all this happened WASN'T George W. Bush.
SURPRISE
It was Bill Clinton!!
Please pass this on so the whole Country will know.
The Media won't tell anyone about it !!!
End of message. When you're done puking, please fisk it. Thanks again.... Danby