-Caveat Lector-
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/24/opinion/24KRUG.html?todaysh
eadlines
December 24, 2002
The Good Guys
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Time magazine's persons of the year are three whistle-blowers:
Sherron Watkins of Enron, Cynthia Cooper of WorldCom and
Coleen Rowley of the F.B.I.
They deserve to be celebrated. After all, thanks to Ms. Watkins and
Ms. Cooper, Jeff Skilling, Ken Lay and Bernie Ebbers have been
indicted, and the politicians who did their bidding have been
disgraced. Thanks to Ms. Rowley, incompetent officials at the F.B.I.
and C.I.A. have been removed from their posts, and we've had a
searching inquiry into what went wrong on Sept. 11.
Oh, I'm sorry. None of that actually happened. The bravery of the
whistle-blowers was real enough, but Time seems to be celebrating
what should have been, not what was.
This past year brought shocking revelations about how American
institutions, from corporations to government agencies, really
operate. But the whistle-blowers haven't been rewarded; Time
makes it clear that Ms. Cooper and Ms. Rowley are personae non
gratae in their organizations. And those on whom the whistle was
blown have mostly gone unpunished. Last week one F.B.I. official
singled out by Ms. Rowley — he blocked an investigation that might
have averted Sept. 11 — received a special presidential award.
I'm a history buff, so the events of 2002 made me think of a
historical parallel — the English peasant rebellion of 1381. The
rebels very nearly took London, but were turned aside by King
Richard II, who promised to end the oppression of the common
people by the aristocracy. As soon as the danger had passed,
however, he made it clear that promises to little people don't count.
"Villeins ye are, and villeins ye shall remain."
During the late spring and summer, amid corporate scandals and
tales of F.B.I. ineptitude, Americans received many promises of
reform. But once the political danger had passed, all those promises
— even, incredibly, the promise that families of victims would get to
choose one member of the Sept. 11 commission — became non-
operational. Villeins ye are . . .
Yet some good guys did win victories.
Time named New York's attorney general, Eliot Spitzer, "crusader of
the year." Mr. Spitzer's achievement shouldn't be overstated; he
didn't "save capitalism," as some would have it. The $1.4 billion
settlement he wrung out of the securities industry was a small
fraction of what investors lost on highly touted stocks, stocks that
insiders knew were worthless. And while the settlement requires that
investment banks pay for some independent stock research, it
probably won't be enough to erase suspicions that analysis is
slanted in favor of big customers.
But Mr. Spitzer achieved far more than anyone else, and more than
anyone could have expected. With no help from federal regulators,
who should have been taking the lead, he used the limited powers
of his office — the power to investigate and to publicize the outrages
he found —— brilliantly. It's a tribute to his effectiveness that
powerful congressmen tried to shut him down, by inserting language
into reform legislation that would have stripped state attorneys
general of the right to carry out Spitzer-type investigations. (What
about states' rights? Oh, that only applies when states want to, well,
you know.)
You also have to admire Mr. Spitzer's style. Key to his success was
the discovery of incriminating internal communications. Addressing
an investment industry dinner, he told the audience, "It is wonderful
to be here this evening, because I really want to put faces to all
those e-mails."
So I'm glad that Mr. Spitzer has gotten his due. But let me put in a
plug for another group of good guys who haven't gotten their due:
California's long-suffering electricity regulators.
Back during the crisis of 2000-2001, those regulators were ridiculed
for saying that energy companies were manipulating the market.
Nobody except an Op-Ed columnist or two believed them. But over
the course of 2002, as incriminating memos and tapes came to
light, they were fully vindicated. As with Mr. Spitzer, the
compensation they have recently managed to extract — $1.8 billion
in refunds — falls far short of the tens of billions looted from the
public. But also like Mr. Spitzer, they've done very well given the lack
of cooperation, and often active hostility, from Washington.
If truth be told, 2002 was a very good year for cynics. But it's the day
before Christmas, so let's be thankful for our gifts: the good guys
who made a difference.
Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company
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