Oh Lay!

Enron Corp. founder Kenneth Lay finished six days of testimony today.

"I loved Enron very much," Lay told jurors in his federal fraud trial. "I think we built a great company. I think the most painful thing in my life was watching Enron finally have to go into bankruptcy."

Awww. That's sweet. He loved Enron. See, he has a human side. He's not an evil robber baron.

The sick part about this is that this isn't even the trial for what his company did to the energy market and economy as part of it's dirty rotten tricks for profiteering. This was Lay's trial for playing funny games with money to make it look like Enron was making money while it was in fact a big sucking cash hole.

Here's an NPR story (with audio) on Enron's market manipulation tricks. Below is a transcription of an excerpt from audio of a conversation between "Bob" and "Kevin" that you can hear at the NPR link above:
Kevin: "So're the rumors' true that (bleep) taking all the money back from you guys? All that money you guys stole from those poor grandmothers in california?"
Bob: "Yeah! Grandma Millie, man. She's the one who couldn't figure out how to f-(bleep)-g vote on the butterfly ballot..."
Kevin: "Yeah (laughing)"
Bob: "...Now she wants her f-(bleep) money back for all the power you charged right up... jammed right up her ass for f-(bleep) $250 a megawatt hour..."
Both: laughing and laughing and laughing
Keep in mind that these men KNEW they were being taped. And guess what? They just didn't care. This is the culture of Enron. This is what Mr. Lay is mourning the loss of.

To read more about the Enron induced energy market chaos, go here.
For more transcripts of excerpts of Enron tapes, go here.
For a movie that plays these tapes without deleted swears (in their fully potent form), rent "The Smartest Guys in the Room".
Then rent "Yes Men" (a documentary about anti-corporate prankster activists) and "Fun with Dick and Jane" (a surprisingly funny and anti-corporate mainstream cinema poke at Enron/Worldcom like corporate malfeasance and shenanigans) because you'll need the laugh.