"seized opportunities created by deregulation"?

Editor,

Ken Lay did not "seize opportunities created by deregulation". He bought deregulation -- by being George Bush's biggest campaign contributor throughout George's entire political career.

George Bush -- (who claims he doesn't know Ken Lay, despite his having appeared in a Ken Lay Christmas video singing Kenny Boy's praises to the heavens -- have you guys not heard of Greg Palast, investigative journalist for the BBC?) -- obligingly appointed Ken Lay cronies, suggested by Lay, not only to the FERC, but also to Texas's equivalent of the FERC when George was governor of Texas.

When Enron, in collusion with Duke Power, Dynergy, Reliant, and other electricity market predators, were gaming the California electricity market in 2000 and 2001, Dick Cheney suggested, and Ken Lay's FERC agreed, to refrain from capping electricity prices in California -- to let "the market" take care of itself -- a market that was being deliberately manipulated by totally unnecessary power plant closures whose only purpose was to drive down electricity supply and drive electricity prices through the roof.

If George Bush's Justice Department had prosecuted Ken Lay and his co-conspirators for the real crime of ripping off California rate-payers for $9 billion, the roles of George Bush and Dick Cheney in that conspiracy would inevitably have come to light. So they prosecuted only Lay and Skilling for securities fraud, leaving the public in the dark.