ASPEN, COLO. - For at least an hour, Houston and Enron must have seemed a million miles away for Ken Lay as he and his wife, Linda, dined on Italian food Monday night, the two tucked inside the cozy Bella Mia Restaurant just minutes from their idyllic rental estate off Snowmass Creek Road. There, at a table near the kitchen, the couple laughed and talked. Lay had his traditional chicken Parmesan, while his wife chose Penne Alla Siciliano, pasta with eggplant, garlic, tomato, feta cheese and basil in marinara sauce…. But then the whispers and stares started. A few people pointed with their heads toward the Lays’ table. Finally, someone said something. Not in any brave, direct way — but with their back turned, making utterances loud enough for the target of derision to hear.
While I have no particular desire or need to speak ill of the dead, let’s not get all weepy about the late Ken Lay and his creeping pariah status. This is a man, after all, who not only actively participated in bankrupting the company he founded, but also in stealing the retirement funds of thousands of his employees. Ken Lay was not a good man, not the sort of person one would remember fondly for all the times he helped little old ladies cross the street. No, Ken Lay was representative of the worst sort of corporate greed mongering…and we should not forget that. Lay was just another corporate greehead whose untimley passing shouldd not be cause for fond remembrances. Former Enron employees could and should be forgiven for metaphorically dancing on Lay’s grave.
Even though Lay was convicted of essentially raiding Enron for his own financial benefit, he continued to live the lifestyle of a spoiled corporate mogul. Unlike many of the employees whose 401k’s he vaporized, Ken Lay and his family never had to worry about where their next Big Mac was coming from. No, they still had the lavish home in Houston and the vacation home in Aspen. No one in the Lay family has any financial worries. They got the gold mine…and Enron’s employees got the shaft. If there’s an express lane to Hell, Lay deserves to be on it.
You’ll have to pardon me, then, if I don’t get all soft and mushy because a few people lobbed some impolite comments in Ken Lay’s direction. Given what he did to the people who worked for him, if all Lay had to deal with were a few furtive glances and some unpleasant comments, then he was getting off easy. Given the crimes he has been convicted of, he and his family should have been living off food stamps while his accumulated wealth was redistributed among Enron employees and shareholders. Ken Lay and his family should have been living at the Star of Hope shelter in downtown Houston instead of commuting between his River Oaks home and his vacation home in Aspen. Lay deserved this and far worse. That he continued to live a life of luxury and ease before dying in one of the favorite playgrounds of the rich and famous only speaks to the shortcomings of our judicial system.
No, Key Lay should have died a miserable penniless pauper, dependent upon the goodwill and handouts of others to survive. Considering what his greed and avarice did to so many who looked up to him and busted their asses for his company, if there was any justice in this world, Ken Lay would have died a lonely, bitter, and impoverished man. That may strike some of y’all as totally devoid of compassion on my part, but after working for Enron as a contractor, this story hits pretty close to home.
Lay deserves none of the accolades being tossed in his direction by friend, family, and business associates. Because of his greed, thousands of Enron employees- people who BELIEVED in the company- lost everything they had worked for. And yet Ken Lay continued to live in his world of denial, privilege, and stolen wealth. I can only hope that Lay will be a victim of his own bad karma. That would be a just and fitting punishment for a man whose greed and avarice harmed so many so grievously.
Good riddance….
