Up & down Wall Street: Bad Karma

The very mention of the name "Enron" does seem to make people go all peculiar and bend, pretzel-like, out of character. Paul Krugman, Princeton prof and New York Times op-ed columnist, it emerges, like Larry Lindsey, the White House economist, served on Enron's advisory board, and in return received $50,000 before the Times' conflict-of-interest policy forced him to quit when he started scribbling for the paper. The stock market seems to be suffering from a case of creeping Enronitus. After a splendid start this year, the market has broken down, in no small part, we think, in reaction to the spreading scandal. Investor confidence and trust, still so fragile after the blow administered by nearly two years of downswing, is being challenged again by the realization that we have just had the biggest corporate bankruptcy ever as well as lurid revelations of how the company pulled the paper (green, and adorned by numbers and the faces of revered Presidents) over so many eyes.