Enron as an Inkblot Test
In 1921, the Swiss psychoanalyst Hermann Roschach published his research on the interpretation of inkblots in the book Pyschodiagnostik. Since that time, there has been a school of psychiatry that supports then notion that the reaction of patients to inkblots can be used to analyze personality - the so-called "Roschach Inkblot Test." The idea is that people will project their own preoccupations on to an image of random inkblots. There are different views on the interpretation of patient responses to inkblots, but there is no doubt that the term "Roschach Inkblot Test" has become a metaphor for any event where the interpretation of the event says more about the observer than about the event. The responses to the bankruptcy of the Enron energy corporation, in many cases, is suh an inkblot set.
For those who dearly wish to see a Republican scandal, the "closeness" of Enron to members of the Administration represents the "appearance" of untoward influence. Who knows, there may be a scandal somewhere that has not been discovered. It appears now that Enron executives asked for special considerations and were denied by Administration officials. Indeed, it seems Enron received more favorable consideration from the previous Administration. Enron executives accompanied that the Clinton Administration's Trade Representative Mickey Kanter and Commerce Secretary Ron Brown on foreign missions to drum up business. This was not an evil thing. Kanter and Brown were doing something that many want the government to do: help gain American businesses entrees overseas.
It is ironic that Enron lobbied heavily with the Clinton Administration in favor of passing the Kyoto Accords. The agreement would have shifted American energy production from coal to natural gas. The shift would have benefited Enron with its large stocks of natural gas. Now alignment of goals between Enron and the Clinton Administration does not imply corruption. The Clinton Administration was ideologically inclined to support Kyoto and were not pushed into that position by contributions from Enron.
For those who want ``campaign finance reform,'' the Enron case represents additional reason to limit political contributions, and hence free speech rights. In actuality, the situation persuasively makes just the opposite case. If Enron bought influence with all its campaign contributions and could not buy a bailout to save itself, then they managed their lobbying even worse than they did their main business.
For those who oppose privatizing some portion of Social Security, the fact that Enron employees lost great fractions (if not all) of their the 401(k) retirement savings when the Enron stock collapsed is one more reason to avoid trusting people to make their own decisions about retirement investment. Of course, such a conclusion deliberately overlooks the fact that any partial replacement of Social Security investments on the part of individuals would be far more diversified than a fund comprise of a single stock.
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