(TV) MM Truth Stranger Than Fiction

["Casey, Leo J" <CaseyL@VOLPE.DOT.GOV>]

Truth is really stranger than fiction; I just saw this 10 minutes ago! 	
	Leo
Pioneer Profiles: George W. Bush's $100,000 Club 
Name: Kenneth Lay 
Occupation: Chair & CEO, Enron Corp. 
Industry: Energy & Natural Resources 
Home: Houston, Texas 
1999 Salary & Perks: $42.4 Million 
	The $550,025 that the Enron Corp. gave Bush over the years makes it his No. 1 career patron, according to the Center for Public Integrity. "Virtually every ... aspect of Enron's operations is overseen by the federal government," a '96 Dallas Morning News story noted. Not surprisingly, this global natural gas giant and its top executive are big political contributors who keep revolving doors whirling. Lay hired President Bush's cabinet members James Baker and Robert Mosbacher as they left office. After President Bush's '93 Gulf War victory tour of Kuwait, Baker and other members of his entourage stayed on to hustle Enron contracts. The Clinton administration also threatened to cut Mozambique's aid in '95 if the world's poorest country awarded a pipeline contract to a different company. Enron got Bush to contact Texas' congressional delegation in '97 to promote a corporate welfare program in which U.S. taxpayers finance political risk insurance for the foreign operations of cor!
porations such as Enron. Enron plants around Houston-which surpassed LA for the title to the nation's worst air-are "grandfathered" air polluters that exploit a loophole in state law to avoid installing modern pollution-control technologies.  
	The Dallas Morning Star reported February 4 that Kenneth Lay and George W. Bush were so close that they would swap and listen to each other's music collections. Lay reportedly has one of the most expensive home sound systems anywhere in the world , and when Bush was govenor of Texas Lay would treat Bush to Lay's record and cd collection whenever George was in Lay's hometown. Lay would frequently play Neil Young's "Live Rust" for George, and George turned Ken onto two of Bush's all time favorite albums, The Doors' "Strange Days"and "Marquee The Moon" by a group named Tellvisions. 
	Earlier this year the Houston Astros inaugurated their new Enron Field, which was financed with $180 million in public tax dollars and $100 million from Enron. In return, Enron landed tax breaks and a $200 million contract to power the stadium. Topping Enron's political wish list in Texas was deregulation of the state's electrical markets. Bush signed this dream into law in '99.
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