“The Perfect Is The Enemy Of The Good”

    Actor01 Oct. 05 14.04

 

 

“The Perfect Is The Enemy Of The Good”

How 9-11 & The War On Terror Covered Up HealthSouth & The Certificate Of Need

(try and spot the tongue-in-cheek)

..

12 months after 9-11, Ms. Alice Martin, the U.S. attorney in Birmingham and her counterparts from around the country were called to Washington for a conference on corporate fraud and white collar crime with Attorney General John Ashcroft, Deputy attorney general Larry Thompson and SEC chairman Harvey Pitt.  In her hand written notes at the meeting, Ms. Martin, a 46-year old former nurse turned lawyer jotted down this line: “The perfect is the enemy of the good”.  She said in an interview that what that meant was that, “Your case doesn’t have to be perfect.  You don’t have to prove every crime.  If you’ve got enough evidence to back up a few good charges, don’t work for another year nailing down every shred of evidence for every possible charge that might be there.

Wall Street Journal, Friday, April 04, 2003, (ref: wsj200) “HealthSouth Case Emerges As A Model Strategy” by Anne Carrns in Atlanta, Carrick Mollencamp in Birmingham, and Deborah Soloman and John R. Wilke in Washington

Two and a half years later, on June 28, 2005, HealthSouth’s Chief Executive Officer, Richard M. Scrushy was found.. not guilty on all charges.

If only the feds had worked just another year, nailed down just a few more shreds of evidence, and found just a few more possible charges..

..what might they have uncovered?

The federal government’s case obviously wasn’t “perfect”.

..or was it?

Think real hard and try to remember what were you doing.. hours after the September 11 terrorist attacks?

Were you back to business-as-usual.. hours after the terrorist attack?  Probably not – but for the Alabama legislature 9-11 was.. just another day.

“In 2001, HealthSouth, with support from the Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman, won a State Senate vote to exempt the company’s planned $300 million high-tech “digital hospital” from the state process for approving new hospitals.  PACS controlled by HealthSouth lobbyists contributed $63,000 to state politicians before the vote, which came just hours after the Sept. 11 terrorists attacks..”

(Wall Street Journal, Friday, May 09, 2003) (ref: WSJ288) By Ann Carrns in Atlanta, Sarah Lueck in Washington, and Evan Perez in Montgomery Al.

Now think real hard and try to remember the first terrorist bombing of the World Trade Center in February of 1993.  If you remember that.. then you probably remember two days later on the 28th of February when Attorney General Janet Reno began the assault on the Branch Davidians.

Sorry, that was a trick question.

There is absolutely, positively, no way whatsoever you remember that.

Why?

Because Attorney General Janet Reno did not begin the assault on the Branch Davidians. 

The Acting Attorney General was Stuart Gerson.. not Janet Reno. 

Stewart Gerson was a senior advisor for the campaign of George H. W. Bush during the 1988 Presidential election, and a member of the Bush Administration’s National Health Policy Working Group as head of its Medical Malpractice Reform Working Group.

Back to healthcare.

The story of Medicare begins when, in the mid 1940s, at the start of the cold war against socialism, President Truman first suggested socializing healthcare

1947 marks the beginning of the “digital revolution,” the first actual war against cancer and it was the year the word “cancer” was first permitted to be spoken on the radio.

In 1947, the Dead Sea scrolls were discovered, the CIA was founded, and Arthur Anderson had been cooking Halliburton’s books for just about a year.

The 1940s was a very, very busy decade.  For instance, July 7th 1947 was the first flight of the British Rolls-Royce Nene jet-engine.  It just happens to be installed in a Russian fighter jet referred to as the MiG-15.  The Rolls-Royce engine was “gifted” to Russia with the Queen’s blessing because at the time.. Britain was strapped for cash and Prime Minister Atlee was a liberal so historians won’t be recording this event as an un-American affair and a technology transfer to a cold-war enemy.

A day later, on July 8th 1947, the Soviet Union declined to participate in the Marshall Plan and a UFO reported to be traveling about the speed of a MiG 15 crashed in Roswell, New Mexico.  The UFO was immediately stripped of all Rolls-Royce patent numbers and insignias by the newly founded CIA.

Eleven cold-war years later in 1958, the Deputy Director of Rolls-Royce visited Peking, China and was “horrified” to discover that the Russian MiG planes had counterfeit versions of the Rolls-Royce Derwent and NENE engines.

In August of 1950 President Truman ordered the U.S. Army to seize all the nation’s railroads to prevent a general strike.  The railroads are not returned to the owners until two years later.

Civics 101: As a rule, socialists seize industries because they are socialists – capitalists seize industries to prevent labor strikes.

In 1960, thanks to the patriotic efforts of Rolls-Royce, the cold war is off to a smashing good start, machinists are earning an average of $1.56 an hour and the title of “computer programmer” was included for the first time in the U.S. Census.

Thirty-five years from now the computer programmer will be earning up to $200.00 an hour which is equivalent to $400,000.00 a year.
This is what is known as “bad planning” if you are a global labor expert and it will mark the first time and probably the last time this level of wage inflation has ever occurred during any industrial revolution throughout history.

It is around this time that the United Nations begins to freak out about this seemingly inexorable rise of wage inflation in the information age so they start to give some serious thought on how to proceed with the globalization of the jobs that the digital revolution is going to introduce.

First on the list is the passage of the India Electricity Supply Act.

Mother Theresa is then given the title of “Patron Saint Of Offshoring” by the Calcutta Department Of Commerce and she is soon assigned the job of India’s Electrical Utility Supervisor.  This is when Mumbai went by the name Bombay. 

Back to healthcare.

Healthcare services are of the most difficult professions to globalize so in 1950 UCLA began its “Willed Body Program” to lower the costs of the war against cancer a little.

As a rule – all roads lead to globalism.  Enron is a good example of one of these roads.  Since medical professions are difficult to outsource – as another rule – all roads lead to Medicare Fraud

So, in 1962.. H. Ross Perot founded EDS to do information technology work for large corporations and cook the books for the upcoming Medicare and Medicaid program.

It eventually becomes glaringly obvious that exploitation of this program was one of the primary purposes of the Medicare and Medicaid program to begin with.

In 1964, “My Fair Lady” became a film that teaches undocumented and third-world workers such language as “the rain in Spain falls mainly on the plane” and “is the head of the household there” and “Verizon is offering 1000 free minutes”, and “I love menial jobs Americans don’t want”

On July 30th 1965, President Johnson signed the Medical Care Act of 1965 into legislation.

That same year, the founders of National Medical Enterprises (now known as Tenet Healthcare) recognized the potential for healthcare monopolization through fraud in the new Medicare system.

Four years later they founded NME and began their healthcare monopoly play with the purchase of 10 hospitals, nursing homes, an office building and some undeveloped real estate in California with $23 million in capital secured from the sale of public stock.

Two days before Christmas 1971 not a creature was stirring as President Nixon signed the “National Cancer Act” committing vast sums of other people’s money to fighting the dreaded disease of wage inflation in the healthcare service and information technology industries.

The following year.. three ships crossed in the night.

Newt Gingrich received his PhD. from Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia and Richard M. Scrushy and Eric R. Hanson (while “waiting tables” at the University of Alabama) also began to observe the potential for fraud in not only Johnson’s Medical Care programs but also Richard Nixon’s new Certificate of Need and War on Cancer programs as well.

The third ship is another story entitled: George H.W. Bush And The U.S.S. Erbitux”

Now Richard and Eric realized that there was a huge war on cancer windfall and nobody could legally construct a hospital without the Federal government’s approval.  This offered the potential for three different monopolies (REITS,) hospital construction, and.. healthcare) all subsidized by the defrauding of a few big “liberal socialist programs” and it is the likely foundation for Hillary Clinton’s vast right wing conspiracy which as it turns out was so vast.. it actually included her.

Question: How do accountants sweep book-cooking, Medicare fraud and securities fraud under the rug?

Answer #1: With two brooms, one broom known in the accounting biz as the “expectations gap” which was coined by Carl D. Liggio in 1974 for the fact that the public thinks accountants are supposed to catch crooks while the accountants say they aren’t.  Carl Liggio eventually becomes the General Council of Ernst & Young

(Wall Street Journal, Wednesday, June 11, 2003, 9ref: wsj296) “What Ernst Did For HealthSouth” by Jonathan Weil

Answer #2: Another broom referred to by Richard M. Scrushy as “Pristine Auditing” (we’ll get to that later).

By 1975, National Medical Enterprises was the owner of 23 hospitals and a home healthcare business and the founders once again quickly observe the potential for government fraud in nursing homes and home care. 

Late in 1975 two more ships pass in the night.

Captain Orrin, pilot of the U.S.S. Hatch is elected to the U.S. Senate representing the state of Utah and begins “public service” in 1977.
Quick note: If you suspect Medicare fraud occurring at your place of employment – this is not the guy to call – unless you are.. an inside shareholder.

The other ship is the U.S.S. Oracle, founded in 1975 by Larry Ellison.

That same year the founders of NME are confident that Nixon’s Certificate Of Need program shouldn’t represent too much of a hurdle to their healthcare monopoly play, so National Medical Enterprises purchases Stolt, Incorporated, a hospital construction monopoly.

By 1980, after purchasing the Hillhaven Corporation (long term care) National Medical Enterprises is able to boast of a presence in 33 states as well as a secured 5-year, billion dollar health care contract in Saudi Arabia.

By 1982 National Medical Enterprises’ revenues exceed $1 billion and NME owns 193 hospitals and nursing homes then it buys National Health Enterprises (66 long-term homes).

A year later National Medical Enterprises purchases the Psychiatric Institutes of America (PIA) – 21 mental health centers and forms recovery centers of America (RCA) extending NME’s financial corruption into the arena of not only the elderly but now the mentally ill.

NME now monopolizes two patient demographics that will have difficulty comprehending their medical bills.

President Johnson’s corporate healthcare program of 1965 is in full swing and entrepreneur, Richard Scrushy is well on his way to learning how the healthcare business really works.

He is giving serious thought to founding his very own Medicare funded healthcare empire and in 1984  Richard Scrushy and Aaron Beam, Jr. found HealthSouth.  George H. Strong, a private investor and chief financial officer of hospital operator Universal Health Services becomes a HealthSouth director.

The following year C. Sage Givens, founder of private ventures capital fund, Acacia Venture Partners became a director at HealthSouth.  As HealthSouth’s empire begins its downfall in the early 2000s, Strong and Givens, along with eventual newcomer and glass hospital construction monopolist Larry Striplin are the members of HealthSouth’s audit committee which is reported to have only met once during that period and therefore the committee is cited as a cause of the accounting problems.

In other words, the audit committee forgot to meet while they were cooking the books.

In 1985 Raymond L. Mathiasen, a specialist in accounting “expectations gaps” joins NME following a 19-year career with Ernst & Young
 
Also this year the Texas healthcare and the energy industry put on their boots and dance the two-step as Charles A. Lemaister and Kenneth Lay begin to serve as Enron board members.  LeMaister eventually becomes the President Emeritus of the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center.

In 1986 HealthSouth goes public and the “great communicator” recommends phasing out of the “certificate of need” (CON) program and signs a law repealing it.

This “act” lends the question: “Repealing it” for whom?  If Reagan (the great deregulator) repealed it this year then why did it have to be repealed by the Alabama State Legislature hours after the planes hit the World Trade Center?

It is beginning to look like Medicare, Medicaid, the war on cancer, and the certificate of need programs are legislative tools to coordinate healthcare monopolies.

Sometime around Reagan’s 1986 repeal of the “certificate of need” and HealthSouth’s IPO, Orrin Hatch wrote to federal bank regulators on behalf of an individual whom, eventually if not presently, is involved in the hospital construction business.

His name is Monzer Hourani.

Remember?  These are the hospitals one needs to get [buy] a Certificate of Need to construct.

Orrin Hatch urged them to consider Hourani’s explanation of why he defaulted on a loan.  Hourani had been managing a small real-estate investment for Senator Hatch in the 1980s.  After 1996 or “a few years later” (which is a Latin term for “1991”) Senator Hatch worked to arrange a $10 million loan for Mr. Hourani from the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI; founded in Pakistan in 1992) and BCCI later collapses in a money laundering scandal and is closed by regulators.

In 1987 As speculation begins to peak in stocks and real-estate, Earnst & Young, the accounting enterprise that specializes in not catching accounting crooks, is at it again, as former E&Y accountant, Weston L. Smith joins HealthSouth as an officer in the reimbursement department.

April 7th of 1987 marks the inception of an organization of Catholic businessmen calling itself Legatus.  A week earlier on the 29th of April, 1987.. the Fed “began to ease” Depression Era banking limits.

And less than a month and a half after the fed began to ease the depression era banking limits, President Ronald Reagan made his famous remark at the Berlin Wall:

“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down these accounting walls.”

Get it?

“Tearing Down Walls”?

Sanford Weill “got it”.

And.. the market crashed as the DJIA falls more than 500 points on October 19th 1987.

The year after the crash Richard Botts joined HealthSouth, Inc.  It is said that “his situation mirrors in some ways the dozen of HealthSouth executives who will eventually plead guilty,” so it is likely that Ernst & Young are around here somewhere. 

In the early 1990s Eric Hanson is in the market for a used Lincoln sedan so he buys one from Harold E. Ford Sr. (a congressman from Memphis Tennessee).  Just by coincidence HealthSouth is seeking and receives state approval for at least two new rehabilitation hospitals in Tennessee, including one in Memphis.  At this time, Mr. Ford, who’s son succeeds him in Congress is now a lobbyist whose clients include HealthSouth’s “partner” in Memphis.

What is a three-letter word for Medicare fraud?

Answer: W-a-r

In 1991 Operation Desert Storm begins, KPMG starts to provide tax compliance and advisory services to HealthSouth and some HealthSouth executives, and.. National Medical Enterprises is under investigation for fraud and kickbacks within its psychiatric division.

After three years of fraud and kickback investigation, in July of 1994, NME pays $363 million in penalties and $16 million in state penalties to conclude the investigation.

Another quiz:

Medicare Math Question: A few billion dollars in Medicare fraud minus $379 million in penalties equal how much profit?

In April of 1992, “a HealthSouth patient files an improper billing (“Transmittal 1753 For Dummies”) for physical therapy by unqualified personnel case in Texas”.

Approximately a year after this improper billing case Newt Gingrich begins consulting Richard Scrushy.. er.. scratch that.. Richard M. Scrushy begins consulting Newt Gingrich on the healthcare business in the small college town of Waleska, Georgia.

By June of next year it will become apparent that Congressional Minority Whip Gingrich was left out of the Medicare fraud loop on this “unqualified personal” investigation.

The year is 1993 and National Medical Enterprises is still settling insurance fraud lawsuits relating to its psychiatric business.  This settlement is for $215 million

Following the February bombing of the World Trade Center, the April bomb assignation of the President of Sri Lanka and the March bombing of the Bombay Stock Exchange (the same day of Janet Reno’s “swearing in”,) conservative think tanks from around the country set out immediately to institute plans to protect America from the Radical Islamic fundamentalist threat facing the nation.

In early June of 1993, infuriated at the failure of the Clinton administration to send representatives to the site of the first terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, Congressman Newt Gingrich coordinates a 20-hour satellite TV course entitled: “Defending America Against The Arab Terrorist Threat” at Kennesaw State College, Georgia. 

Not!

What did he really do?

He began to “Renew American Civilization” by collaborating for the next three years with America’s leading thinkers, practitioners, intellectuals, consultants, journalists and..

.. drum roll please..

and. . . . . . . . .   Richard Scrushy?

I have heard of a poor judge of character before.. but please…

“June 01, 1993”

“Beginning in the fall quarter of 1993 and again in the Winter quarters of 1994, 1995 and 1996, Congressman Newt Gingrich will teach a for credit class offered through the School of Business Administration in Kennesaw State College in Kennesaw Georgia.  In addition to the 150 graduate and undergraduate students who enroll for the class on campus, it will be offered through a satellite uplink and through video and audio cassettes to students across the country..
“It is important to understand that the content of the class, while ultimately the responsibility of Congressman Gingrich, will be developed in collaboration with dozens –and ultimately hundreds– of Americas leading thinkers and practitioners.  Among those already committed to participating in this process are intellectuals (Edwards Demming, Evertt Carl Ladd). management consultants (Steven Covey, Darly Conner), journalists (Bob Novak, Dick Williams, Joe Klein), political and government leaders (Lamar Alexander, Clarence Thomas), and business leaders (Tucker Andersen, Richard Scrushy).”

(“The Long March Of Newt Gingrich”, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/newt/newtcollege.html)
huh?

“business leaders (Tucker Andersen, Richard Scrushy).”?

And in seven years, what this elite group of thinkers and intellects come up with is described in the headlines as the..

“Greatest Accounting Fraud Ever”?
 
Fraud that is so systemic and enterprise wide that by 2003 even Richard Scrushy himself is convinced that there are “8,000 companies with s— on their balance sheets”?

So.. rather than busy themselves with the ones who hate us, hate our freedoms, hate our way of life and hate our western way of living, the think-tanks focus on industrial monopolization, healthcare anti-trust, securities fraud and accounting fraud.. and enterprise corruption.

Very few individuals knew more ways to commit Medicare fraud and monopolize the healthcare industry then the business leader Congressman Newt Gingrich hand-picked to help “Renew America”

And as much as First Lady Hillary Clinton knew about the politics of health care the HealthSouth Medicaid scams went right over her head.

or did they?

In 1998, a HealthSouth patient filed an improper billing for physical therapy by unqualified personnel case in Texas that allegedly dates back to this date of April, 1992, so by the time Congressman Gingrich’s “Renewing America” course was in motion, HealthSouth had been cooking Medicare billing for services that just didn’t happen for at least a year.

For you sports nuts out there.. that patient.. was Bo Jackson.

Just kidding..  but not to worry pop culture fans.. there are plenty of big Hollywood names in entertainment on the way as the ‘Story of HealthSouth” unfolds.  Remember Leslie Scrushy’s medical clothing line, “Upseedaisies”?

On June 01, 1993, also the same day Newt Gingrich and Richard Scrushy begin their college courses in “Renewing American Civilization,” Metro Goldwyn Meyer Director, Jeffrey C. Barbakow’s employment commences as President and CEO of National Medical Enterprises and marks the point where Hollywood and healthcare begin a little bit of new-economy cross-marketing.

Two months later in August, 700 federal agents raid NME (National Medical Enterprises) corporate head quarters and regional offices, seizing hundreds of documents relating to the psychiatric hospital fraud.

Other events in 1993 include:

Excerpt from: “How 9-11 & Anthrax Covered Up ENteRprise corruptiON”
 
Here is a Indian foreign investment tip for global utility businesses like Enron.

If you really want India to pay your energy bills maybe you should think twice about indicting your executive officers.. and shredding your documents?

Back to healthcare..
 
The year is 1994 and Newt Gingrich leads Republican opposition against Clinton Administration and orchestrates “The Contract To Secure The Homeland Against The Islamic Terrorist Threat”  He gathers over 300 Republican candidates on Capitol grounds for its signing in September.

In a motion for summary judgment, the presence of non-government employees in the working groups of Hillary Clinton’s healthcare task force is revealed. 

For those readers that are interested in starting their own healthcare monopoly this is what is known as the “Project Crimson” phase of a changing of the healthcare monopoly guards and it helps to start doing a little corporate name changing and relocation as well.

The “Fall Quarter” of Newt and Richard’s “Renewing American Civilization” comes to a close and Richard Scrushy, Michael Martin, HealthSouth’s treasurer and other businessmen take Capstone Capital Corp. public as a real-estate-investment trust that owns health-care facilities, including 10 sold to the REIT by HealthSouth.

National Medical Enterprises agrees to sell almost all of its psychiatric hospitals to Charter Medical Corporation (now Magellan Health Resources) and its rehabilitation facilities and outpatient clinics to HealthSouth Corp.

In July of 1994, National Medical Enterprises pays $363 million in penalties and $16 million in state penalties to conclude the three year investigation into fraud and kickbacks within its psychiatric division.

During the “Winter Quarter” quarter of Richard and Newt’s business course, HealthSouth buys 30 hospitals from National Medical Enterprise for $300 million cash?

It is this year that Senator Lieberman helps block an accounting industry proposal to force companies to deduct employee stock options from profits.

On the first day of the fourth quarter of this year, the SEC is “forced” to scale back operations as congress fights over funding.

And what a fight it must have been.

This is what Newt Gingrich refers to as “deregulation” and “small government” and “getting rid of unnecessary government spending” and what Warren Rudman and Tyco’s Marc Belnick refer to as NASD “structure and governance”

The year is 1995.

Repair on the World Trade Center is still in progress.

Congressman, Newt Gingrich is now Speaker House Of The House.

“We hang the petty thieves, but appoint the great ones to public office”  (Aesop; 600 B.C.)

Bloomberg News reports that U.S. Speaker Newt Gingrich “wants Scrushy in Congress and Alabama businessmen want him to run for governor.”  (Bloomberg News)

“Gingrich appoints one of his top donors HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy to head a secret task force on Worker’s Compensation Reform. Scrushy raised $38,000 for Gingrich’s 1994 campaign at a fund raiser at a HealthSouth facility in Alabama.”  (Roll Call 25/01/1996)

Now America has two “secret healthcare” task forces.

This preoccupation with healthcare so shortly after the first attack on the World Trade Center must be very confusing to Al Qaeda and Hamas.

But the feds are on the case.. and the Federal Election Commission fines HealthSouth hospital construction subcontractor, Monzer Hourani, $10,000 for illegally reimbursing employees for donations to Senator Orrin Hatch’s campaign.

How many days can you rent a bulldozer for $10 thousand?

In 1995 HealthSouth acquired 130 independent rehabilitation centers.  Remember Newt’s $4.5 million advance on a book deal with Harper Collins?

“..People recovering from job-related injuries on workers-compensation should use the time to learn new skills.  The best of the nation’s rehabilitation hospitals (such places as HealthSouth, which did Bo Jackson’s surgery) have made enormous strides in this direction.  The difference in what can be accomplished in these programs is often astonishing.”  (“To Renew America” Copywrite 1995, Chapter 12; pg: 148-149)

As the “Winter Quarter” of Newt and Richard’s college “Renewing American Civilization” business course nears its end, HealthSouth, Inc., …

..buys NovaCare hospitals.

“Balancing the Budget and Saving Social Security and Medicare”  …  “Those who think the situation is still too distant to worry about need look no further than Medicare to understand that America is on the precipice of substantial fiscal problems.  Medicare is the foundation of health care for out senior citizens.  It is a government monopoly, and therefore inefficient, wasteful, and slow to adapt to innovations in technology and management.  As a result, the system is rapidly growing out of control.  Fraud, waste, and mismanagement divert resources that ought to go the medical care of our senior citizens.”  (“To Renew America” Copywrite 1995, Chapter 7; pg: 95-96)

A government monopoly on healthcare is now morphing into a another corporate monopoly funded by a government monopoly?

And what is all the to-do about fraud?

“In the second largest settlement ever for healthcare fraud, Caremark International Inc, has agreed to pay $161 million in criminal and civil fines for paying kickbacks to doctors and submitting false billings to the government.  As part of the settlement the government will drop a potentially more damaging charge that Caremark violated a federal anti-kickback statute.  If Caremark had been convicted under that statute it would have been barred from participating from Medicare and Medicaid programs for at least 5 years, government officials said.  (17/06/1995; Chicago Tribune; “Healthy Penalties in Caremark Fraud Case”)

This is the kind of law enforcement that allows Caremark (now CVS Caremark) to become a monopoly in Prescription Benefit Management.

Richard Scrushy has got to be a little bit envious of Caremark’s amazing luck and achievment following this settlement.

Wait a second?

Is Caremark a Birmingham, Alabama company?

“HealthSouth Corp, Birmingham Ala., said it will purchase for $125 million more than 120 outpatient rehabilitation centers from Caremark International Incorporated in the latest of a year-long spree of acquisitions.”  (Wall Street Journal; October 17, 1995)

“The deal will expand HealthSouth’s operations to more than 700 centers, including some of those that will soon be acquired from Sutter Surgery Centers, Inc. and Surgical Care Affiliates in recently announced agreements”   (Reuters; October 17, 1995)

Talk about a good investment opportunity..

oops.. spoke too soon.

November 11 of 1995, National Institutes of Health director Harold E. Varmus wrote to all institute and center directors, rescinding “immediately” a policy that had barred them from accepting consulting fees and payments of stock from companies.

Where in the Bristol Meyers world is.. Louis Freeh?

Well, it is about time for the “Winter Quarter” of Newt and Richard’s “Renewing American Civilization” business course up there in Waleksa, Georgia, and you know the drill..

.. HealthSouth buys Advantage Health for $325 million

job well done.. guys

“as of the end of 1995” HealthSouth now operates 850 outpatient and rehab facilities in 44 states with projected revenues of $2.6 billion in 1996..

.. please accept this token of our appreciation..

.. December 1995, Time Magazine names Newt Gingrich..

 “Man of the Year”

  

It is the year 1996 and the “Winter Quarter” of Newt Gingrich and Richard M. Scrushy’s “Renewing American Civilization” business course is in session.

HealthSouth now operates 850 outpatient and rehab facilities in 44 states. 

Between the years of 1996 and 2001, HealthSouth, Inc. books Reba McIntire, Alabama, Faith Hill, Amy Grant, Brooks and Dunn, and KC and the Sunshine Band for annual management meetings at Disney World.. then..

 ..bills the cost to Medicare.
“the [Medicare] system is a perfect example of bureaucratic planning that becomes wasteful and guarantees misallocation of resources.”

(Newt Gingrich, “To Renew America” Copywrite 1995, Chapter 7; pg: 95-96)

KC and the Sunshine Band.. is a “perfect example”..  “that’s the way.. uh huh, uh huh..”

“medicare is the foundation of health care for our senior citizens.” 

(“To Renew America” Copywrite 1995)
The Medicare program may be the “foundation of health care for our senior citizens” but it is starting to look like Medicare is also supporting Vivendi, Universal, MCA, Arista, RCA, Warner Brothers and Tommy Mottola’s Sony BMG as well.

“If you are a customer that means you can ask about price and quality.  You can shop around and check your bill intelligently … If each citizen becomes the primary checker of his or her medical bills, we will see more competitive practices and a dramatic drop in fraud and waste.”

(“To Renew America” Copywrite 1995)

Exactly how would a citizen go about checking the Medicare bills of Brooks & Dunn, Sony, Reba McEntire and Universal records?

Here is the point when something starts going wrong with HealthSouth, Richard Scrushy and Newt Gingrich.  The three year-old public internet and its inherent electronic freedom of expression begins to interfere with its very first Healthcare monopoly play.  Richard and Newt’s “Renewing America” program is about to face its first information age challenge.

The 293rd HealthSouth post on the brand new Yahoo Financial Bulletin Board offers a great example of the future of freedom of speech on the internet.  The following was located and printed on January 11, 2004. Keep in mind this is the 293rd post of 165,910 posts as of January 11, 2004.

“Yahoo Message Boards: HRC [HealthSouth Rehabilitation Corporation]”
July 27, 1998 05:32 pm
Msg: 293 0f 165910
by: STOCKMISTER69

“jr111 & dcm555- your postings are in bad..”

“You should think before you speak!!!!!”

“I plan to copy these postings (RE: Federal Investigations) and fax and mail them to Richard Scrushy, HRC’s Chairman and CEO, William Horton, HRC’s legal counsel, and the SEC compliance division for their review

“This will include your Yahoo names and addresses from this site”

“Sorry Boys..”
Stockmister69’s post was a response to the remarks made by posters, jr111 and dcm555’s post 5 days earlier.

“22- July – 98 02:50 pm”
“dcm555” 
 
“I can’t believe anyone would invest long-term in this pyramid scheme calling itself a company.  This bubbles gonna pop just like Columbia, Oxford, and MedPartners.  The only thing propping this thing up is the fact that Scrushy’s bull#$% smells better than his buddy Larry House’s.  For all the longs, just hope the Feds knock before they kick open the door on this billing scam.”

Now we’ll discuss Richard Scrushy’s concept of Ernst & Young’s “Pristine Auditing”

Pristine auditing is another “perfect example” of Newt Gingrich’s “misallocation of [Medicare] resources”

“According to the company’s self-published book “The Story of HealthSouth” Richard Scrushy got the idea for facility inspections one day in 1996 while lying in bed … He assigned HealthSouth internal auditor Theresa Sanders that year to work out the details.”

(Wall Street Journal, June 11, 2003, ref: wsj296, “What Ernst Did For HealthSouth”, by Jonathan Weil, pg: A1, C1, C5)

Ernst & Young is about to begin charging Medicare accountant-level fees to do janitorial inspections at HealthSouth facilities.

This is a portion of Richard Srushy’s 50-point check list for Ernst & Young auditors:

But you can’t blame Ernst & Young.

At the time of the Ernst & Young’s “pristine audits, E & Y was one of the world’s fifth (now fourth) largest accountancies and they have only been around for 100-years.. so it is understandable how their accountants are a little hazy on the specifics of their job requirements.

When Ernst & Young, UBS, and Arthur Anderson were founded in 1903..

On June 11, 2003 the Wall Street Journal printed the following:

 “Ernst & Young LLP collected 2.6 million from HealthSouth Corp for conducting janitorial inspections of the health services company’s facilities in 2000 and 2001 according and advised it to classify the payments as “audit related fees,” leading HealthSouth to make inaccurate public disclosures about Ernst & Young’s fees for non-audit services.”

(Wall Street Journal, June 11, 2003, “What Ernst Did For HealthSouth”, by Jonathan Weil, pg: A1, C1, C5)

Remember John Ashcroft, Alice Martin and “the perfect is the enemy of the good”?

If only the feds.. and now, the Wall Street Journal, had worked just another year, nailed down just a few more shreds of evidence, and found just a few more possible charges..

..what might they have uncovered?

The proceeding is another example of just one of many of the internet whistleblowers that follow as the story of HealthSouth proceeds.

It is worth noting that as of this point in the history of internet freedom of speech the Yahoo Financial Bulletin Board is only 500 messages old!

 “Isn’t the pristine audit crap a joke.  This is the same company that is run by hillbillies telling its employees to be pristine.  HRC is an irritating company to work for and I for one am glad to have that albatross off of my neck”

(August 21, 1998, Yahoo Finance Bulletin Board, HRC (HealthSouth) Msg. # 501 of 320584, Message Title: Ernst & Young, author: I_Am_Dirk_Diggler; 40/M/Intercourse, Pa)

“Pristine Audits” in 1998? 

Isn’t that two years before 2000 and 2001?

This is one of those time fudging tricks.  Example: I confess I cooked my company’s books in 1998 [when in reality.. I also cooked my company’s books in the years leading up to 1998 as well].

Now the legal system sets out to cover up HealthSouth and.. Ernst & Young.

Richard Scrushy’s lawyers sue this Yahoo poster in the Court of Common Pleas of Centre County, Pennsylvania Civil Action – Law
The settlement includes a public retraction on behalf of the defendant.  Highlights of the legally forced retraction are as follows:

..and by the middle of May, 2003, 16 of HealthSouth’s executive officers plead guilty to fraud?

“highest moral and ethical character”?

Note: Medicare whistleblower tip: If you are looking for fraud.. follow the money – not the morals.
And Scrushy’s lawyers know this all to well.. so Counsel takes the usual moral diversion routine and avoids any direct reference to Ernst & Young’s “Pristine Audits”.

As self-appointed protector of the healthcare finances of America’s senior citizens and possible 2008 Presidential candidate, rather than punishing a Medicare fraud whistleblower, Newt Gingrich should have given this internet poster an award.

This is what corporate lawyers do to actual whistleblowers.  And this also explains why in 2007 Newt Gingrich is having second thoughts about internet freedom of speech.

Although in some cases, it is possible.. good luck finding whistleblower messages related to both HealthSouth and Global Crossing on the Yahoo Financial Bulletin Board.  So much for the information highway.

Here is something about the internet that doesn’t make much sense.

They gave the public a few information tools called the computer, the word document and the internet in 1993 and then they carried out the “Greatest Accounting Fraud Ever”?  George Washington (the father of the country, canal executive, and whiskey monopolist,) had to have turned over in his grave.

So, Johnson’s socialist Medicare system and Newt’s “elderly” are now paying Ernst and Young to do janitorial inspections at accountant salaries.

If you want to run your own healthcare monopoly all you have to do is tell Ernst & Young that you had a dream while lying in bed.. and Ernst &Young’s accountants will stop auditing your balance sheets. 

It is that simple.

Remember Ernst & Young’s “expectations gap”?

There is a hint of an “expectations gap” in Richard Scrushy’s “pristine auditing”.

The people expect the accountants to catch crooks when the accountants say they aren’t, and in HealthSouth’s case the accountants actually expect to do janitorial inspections instead of what they are being paid to do.

“E & Y arguing that the cleanliness of a facility is “audit related” goes well beyond the pale of sanity and common sense,” says Lynn Turner, the SEC’s chief accountant from 1998 until 2001.”

Wall Street Journal, June 11, 2003, “What Ernst Did For HealthSouth”, by Jonathan Weil, pg: A1, C1, C5) 

“beyond the pale of sanity..”?

Reminder: Bloomsberg reported that U.S. Speaker Newt Gingrich wants Scrushy in Congress and Alabama businessmen want him to run for governor.

(Bloomsberg News)

On March 17, 2003 you will get to watch how war covers up HealthSouth and.. Ernst & Young.. and pristine auditing.. and Medicare billing fraud.

War will also cover up Enron, and Dynegy, and 58 other energy companies, and Rite Aid, and Caremark, and Merck, and Bristol Meyers Squibb, and Global Crossing, and WorldCom, and Tyco, and Arthur Anderson, and..

.. “8,000 companies with s— on their balance sheets.”

On March 18, 2003, the Federal Bureau of Investigation placed a hidden recorder on Mr. William T. Owens and recorded a conversation between William Owens and Richard M. Scrushy.

During the conversation Mr. Scrushy told Mr. Owens “I can’t sleep.. I am convinced there are 8,000 companies out their with s— on their balance sheet.”

(Wall Street Journal, Monday, April 14, 2003, pg: A3) 

Note: The conversation “lacked a smoking gun” because it wasn’t a secret conversation, it was a phony secret conversation because Owens told other HealthSouth executives “I’m wired”

And this is one of the many smaller ways the FBI covered up Richard Scrushy.

You will see a big one coming up in a future article.  And.. by the way, for those thousands upon thousands of possible readers that were involved in creating and covering up HealthSouth Corp the answer to your question: “Is the author actually going where it looks like he is going with this HealthSouth series?”

The answer is yes..  and then I am moving onward with Tyco, Enron and WellCare Health Plans right after HealthSouth.

As the internet whistleblower, Michael Vines.. would say, the author is just trying to “get the truth out there.”

Now lets switch gears for a second and try to figure out what on earth Richard Scrushy might have meant with his “8,000 companies” remark.

How 8,000 companies responded to the first attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 (to use Lynn Turner, the SEC’s chief accountant’s words) goes well beyond the pale of sanity and common sense.

“8,000 companies” has that “enterprise” conspiracy kinda sound to it.  Just what the hell did Newt’s course up there in Waleska teach Richard Scrushy?

Remember the whole “bridging the digital divide” thing and the “Alabama legislature hours after the terrorist attack on 9-11” thing?  HealthSouth’s “digital hospital” was one of the many “divides” that needed to be bridged.

Every industrial revolution throughout history has required the “bridging” of the disruptive science andor  technology that brought about the “revolution”.

Why?

Simple answer: Labor costs

Industrial revolutions have always introduced a new set of management-labor challenges.

Cooking management’s books and then covering the book-cooking up with war and destroying the paper trail, then censoring speech by suspending the Writ of Habeus Corpus and then revising history is a tried-and-true, sure-fire way to out-negotiate.. labor.

Here is how it has always worked:

bada bing..

..you just created a fresh load of new millionaires – during the..

“Greatest Accounting Fraud Ever”

go figure..

It is that easy.

It is that boring.

But.. it is that easy.

And it is often called “Renewing America”.

This is why Richard M. Scrushy was certain there were 8,000 companies with s— on their balance sheets.

This is called “enterprise corruption” and the cover up is the reason that Judge Michael Obus on September 30th 2004 refused to submit the enterprise corruption counts to the Tyco jurors saying he thought they would find it too confusing

If the radical Islamic fundamentalists thought they hated our way of life in 2001 – just imagine how much they would have hated our way of counting money if they had known the entire nation and all 5 global accountancies were cooking the balance sheets in the eight years leading up to 2001.

Financial justice might have prevailed if only the terrorist attack hadn’t destroyed the CFTC (that would be Enron Board  member, Wendy Gramm) and the SEC Enforcement Office in Bldg #7 on that fateful day.

now back to healthcare..

In 1996 Tenet’s Medicare fraud is still being.. “resolved”.

After HealthSouth billed Medicare for a Reba McEntire performance, Utah Senator Orrin Hatch saw opportunity in the entertainment business and he began penning patriotic and religious songs.

He collaborated with John Perry’s mother Janice Kapp Perry – a professional singer-songwriter whose cousin married Mr. Hatch’s daughter – on “My God Is Love,” a CD reflecting the two Mormon’s religious devotion.

Mr. Hanson’s firm (remember the Certificate of Need thing?), U.S. Strategies Corp. is receiving at least $55,000 a month from HealthSouth.

Mr. Hanson’s firm worked Capital Hill, monitored state issues and helped develop applications for state approvals for new hospitals. 

Next, Joel C. Gordon sells his company, Surgical Care Affiliates, Inc. to HealthSouth and William Hicks, a graduate of Duke University who is a healthcare analyst covers HealthSouth.  Mr. Hicks is named one of the Wall Street Journal’s All-Star Analysts.

In May of 1996 MedPartners Proposes the acquisition of Caremark.

“until last year MedPartners/Mullican was a little-known offshoot from HealthSouth Corp, a Birmingham based healthcare company, where MedPartners chairman and chief executive, Larry R. House has been a top officer.  Currently MedPartners/Mulliken is affiliated with about 6,000 physicians in 23 states and provides healthcare to more than 800,000 health-maintenance organization participants..”

(Wall Street Journal Europe; May 15, 1996)

The year is 1997.. 

A little historical perspective..

By the year 1997, Raytheon had been illegally exporting communications equipment to Pakistan for about 7 years.

Remember what I was saying about  upgrading potential enemies?

In 1997..

By the way, who is Ali Al Johani and why can’t the oil-rich nation of Saudi Arabia afford its leader’s medical bills?

Between 1995 and 2002 Lucent and a Swiss company ACEC SA, paid more than $15 million in bribes to Ali Al-Johani, who served as minister of Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Post Telephone and Telegraph.  In exchange for the bribes, Mr. Al-Johani allegedly directed Saudi Telecommunications Co., a company created by the Saudi government, to make descisions in Lucent’s favor.  The bribes consisted of free use of private jet for Mr. Al Johani and his family; payment of Mr. Al-Johani’s medical expenses; hotel stays for Mr. Al-Johani and his family at luxury hotels in New York and Seattle; and, at Mr. Al-Johani’s direction, $2 million in gifts to a Seattle hospital.

(Wall Street Journal, Friday, August 12, 2003, “Saudi Telecom Company Accuses Lucent of Bribery in Lawsuit)

Continuing on with 1997

While Hollywood is focusing their cameras on Kathleen Willey and Monica’s blue dress, Ernst & Young and Richard Scrushy are still working out the details of janitorial inspections at HealthSouth’s facilities.

HealthSouth and Coke sign a five year exclusive agreement for Coke to provide its beverages at HealthSouth facilities.  Remember the pristine audit?

It is also in 1997 when the internet songbird, Michael Vines, starts working at HealthSouth.

He is one of three employees overseeing expenses and the purchase of equipment at the company’s 1,800 facilities.
You will hear more about him later.

Scrushy’s friend and business partner, Hanson (the Certificate of Need lobbyist) gets married in 1997 and Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle and Senator Tom Harken (D., Iowa) participate in Hanson’s wedding.  Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah says he wrote a song for the ceremony.

Why do I have a feeling the wedding expenses got billed to Medicare?

Late in February 1997, Monika Lewinski, daughter of a California Oncologist, has the “blue dress” encounter with the President, and Federal agents raid Columbia/HCA affiliated hospitals in El Paso Texas, making the probe public.  Investigations had been under way about year.

“A California Oncologist” in the current health care climate?

hmmm…

In March “Modern Healthcare” prints:

“To a degree [Larry] House is trying to do with physicians what Richard Scott of Columbia HCA Healthcare Corp is doing with Hospitals, create a national brand-name profit-driven delivery system.”

(Modern Healthcare; March 24, 1997) “Design and Conquer; Larry House’s Blueprint For MedPartners Results In Phenomenal Growth”
In April, MedPartners acquired the health business unit of Aetna Inc., known as Aetna Professional Management Group.

Which Richard Scott was “Modern Health” talking about?

In July 1997, Columbia/HCA Richard Scott resigned, along with Columbia president David Vandewater.  Thomas Frist was named new CEO.  Several Columbia/HCA managers are indicted.

So several Columbia/HCA managers are indicted for trying to create (what “Modern Healthcare called) “a national brand name profit delivery system”?

Isn’t that what Richard Scrushy and Sony are trying to do?

In November 1997, Thomas Frist outlined a UBS-style “Project Crimson” plan to shrink the hospital by shrinking its home health companies and cutting its hospital network by one-third.  He created an Office of Ethics and Compliance and appointed Ethics Czar Alan Yuspeh to reinvent company’s ethical culture.

Here is an enterprise corruption tip:  “Ethics codes” exist to suspend “ethics codes”

Quick note for federal Medicare fraud watchdogs: It is not a matter of “are you committing Medicare fraud?”

It is a matter of “what types of Medicare fraud are you committing”.

The number of ways you can commit Medicare fraud are only limited to the number of CPT codes available.

By the way.. under which CPT code does HealthSouth bill Medicare for the Walt Disney musical entertainment?

So 1997 is coming to a close, and in a bit of an Enron/HealthSouth connection.. on the 10th of November..  Richard Celeste is sworn in as United States Ambassador to India.  He holds this post until April, 2001. 

He served as a director of HealthSouth.

In the fall of 1997.. according to the SEC, company accounting personnel appealed to Mr. Scrushy to end the earnings manipulation.

The SEC says that Mr. Scrushy refused.

The agency said that he said:

“Not until I sell my stock.”

Now it is early 1998 and HealthSouth share value tanks and tanks fast.. after the HealthSouth patient I previously  referred to in Texas filed a lawsuit that alleges that since 1992 HealthSouth had been charging for professional services not provided by.. professionals.

Are Texas patients checking on their medical bills online like Newt Gingrich said they should?

As the 8,000-company countdown continues.. on March 11, 2003 Bristol-Myers conceeds that between the years of 1999 through 2002, its accounting had been “inappropriate” and that sales in 1999 thru 2002 (while Louis Freeh was the Director of the FBI) were inflated by up to $2.5 billion.

That makes two more companies Richard Scrushy was right about. 

Here is a good one..  Louis Freeh joins the board of Bristol Meyers Squibb in September of 2005.

Did you catch that Louis Freeh thing?

Read the last four sentences one more time.

Freeh is on the board of the drug company that cooked its books – on his watch?

It is 1998.. and John Mendelsohn becomes a member of the board of ImClone Systems, Inc.

He had been a scientific advisor since 1993 and the week of September 16th, 2003 he announces he is stepping down.

Remember what Aesop said about petty thieves and great thieves?

In late July of 1998, Birmingham radio announced that Scrushy and HealthSouth have developed a PAC (Political Action Committee) called 21st Century.

Discussion included the possibility that Richard could be positioning himself for a life in politics (after he “sells his shares” of course) and.. they mention the governor’s office.
 
In 1998 Tenet purchases Allegheny Health Education & Research Foundations (Pittsburgh) eight Philadelphia area hospitals for $345 million in cash, $30 million in working capital and $233 million in continuing support for Allegheny University of the Health Sciences

Michael D. Martin, HealthSouth’s treasurer.. is named a company director of HealthSouth.

On the 26th of February 1998 HealthSouth is mentioned on CNBC as one of the top 5 stocks to own, but thanks to those damn Yahoo internet posters, its share value tanks from $30.00 to $7.5 from June 1998 to September 1998.

CNBC?

What drive-by, liberal-media corporation owns NBC anyway? 

Is HealthSouth installing any GE MRIs lately?

In April 1998, Motorola, and Nokia are added to Scrushy’s 8,000 company list as they transfer about $2.7 billion to the Uzans, a prominent and wealthy Turkish family supposedly to finance Telsim’s operations.

The Uzans use the money to fund their economic empire and pay for private airplanes, yachts, helicopters, multi-million dollar apartments in New York and elsewhere. 

(Wall Street Journal, Friday, August 01, 2003, “Court Finds Turkey’s Uzan Clan Cheated Motorola”)

Motorola, Nokia, Raytheon, and eventually Tyco, seem to be trying to secure America’s spot as #10 in information technology in the world? 

The Uzans never seem to make it to the lists of the wealthiest and over-compensated executives.  I believe they call this shrewd business tactic.. “globalism and foreign nation building”?

On April 14, Al Gore is still working on his White House email backup problem as he announces the contributions of three high-technology companies that also have “s__t on their balance sheets” (Quest, Cisco and Northern Telecom) toward an ultra fast data pipeline and some needed network equipment.

Al Gore says: “We will end the days when the days the World Wide Web is known by some as the world wide wait”

How long do we have to wait for those lost emails?

Two weeks later, on the 29th of April, despite the Texas patient’s lawsuit for fraudulent billing, CNBC and Merrill Lynch continue to provide some f____d-up investment advice and push HealthSouth stock.

The following week.. the Fed, Treasury and SEC launch a public fight to quash Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) study of new regulations for derivatives.

Guess what happens to the CFTC and the SEC enforcement office on 9-11?

Hint: Here is a quote regarding that fateful September day when the Alabama Legislature freed HealthSouth from Nixon’s Certificate of Need laws:

“All documents related to investor lawsuits are gone”

But this is another series of articles..

Back to healthcare.. and a little bit of HIPAA and medical privacy related news.

On May 16th 1998, Richard Scrushy was featured at the University of Alabama Commencement in Coleman Colliseum.

He received an honorary doctorate of Humane letters degree for charging for professional medical services not performed by medical professionals.

The day after Richard’s U of A Commencment, the Wall Street Journal reported the following:

“Starting this fall Reader’s Digest plans to send millions of people with high blood pressure, high cholesterol and other conditions something extra with their magazines; a booklet filled with articles and prescription drug ads, all about the very ailment each subscriber has … What the subscribers may not realize is that the booklet stems from an aggressive new tactic in the reach by marketers to collect and use sensitive personal data to target customers.  It also marks a new frontier in magazine publisher’s cozy relationships with their big advertisers … By the end of the month the magazine says it will have nine million names on file, including 771,000 arthritis sufferers, 679,000 people with high-blood pressure, 607,000 with high cholesterol, 406,000 with frequent heartburn, 206,000 with osteoporosis and 406,000 smokers.  Reader’s Digest has meet with Bristol-Meyers-Squibb (of Waksal, ImClone and Freeh fame; remember? Bristol Meyers Squibb is cooking the books the same time the Wall Street Journal is publishing this article, which makes companies like BMS and CVS Caremark super-trust-worthy with personal medical information,) Eli Lilly, Glaxo Wellcome, and G.D. Searle (that would be “the” Rumsfeld.. “Searle”) about sponsoring booklets.

(Wall Street Journal, Friday April 17, 1998, “Drug Companies Are Minding Your Business” … “Reader’s Digest Targets Patients By Their Ailments” … “Prescriptions, Toll-Free Numbers Yield A Gold Mine For Marketers”

Think about things here for a moment.

CVS Caremark (Scrushy’s Caremark), HealthSouth’s $4.6 billion worth of Medicare fraud, 16 guilty HealthSouth executives, and they will all wind up with the personal medical data of how many patients?

You will see in a later chapter that medical privacy legislation (ala Tommy Thompson) was a bit of an issue with respect to HealthSouth’s “digital hospital”.

Wouldn’t it be nice to know “the very ailment” each politician has?

Not for the sake of marketing as much as the sake of democracy and whether the politician is more concerned about their own health than upholding “law” and.. the Constitution?

Just to put Scrushy’s 8,000 companies concept into further perspective.. nearing the end of June 1998, a heatwave in the Midwest combined with a shortage of electricity send prices soaring.

A trader with Federal Energy Sales Inc. in Ohio defaulted on his contract and refused to deliver the power.

His trading partner in Arkansas defaulted as well.

Two other traders with whom Federal had contracts, the City of Springfield Illinois and a large trading company in Greenwich CT also subsequently default.

Prices that normally average about $30 a megawatt hour jump as high as $7,000.

This was because of energy “swaps” carried out by “unknown traders”. 

Enron had just signed contracts in Chicago 6 months earlier. 

The following month (July) 1998.. Enron doubled its quarterly profit.

Here is a history problem with one of Richard Scrushy’s 8,000 companies:

A few years from 1998.. journalists will regularly report that the “start of Enron’s problems” occurred in December of 2001. 

This is complete nonsense.

Enron stopped cooking its books at the end of the second business quarter on July 01, 2001.

A company’s “problems” don’t “start” when they stop cooking their books.

A company’s problems start when the company starts cooking its books.. which.. in Enron’s case was immediately after the first bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993.

Companies cook their books in order to afford predicted labor cost problems (often associated with disruptive technologies such as the computer and the internet).

Why did Enron start cooking the books.. in 1993?

And.. as the cost of electricity in India got cheaper, the cost of electricity in Illinois got higher?

Utility industry history buffs at this point should do a little research on.. Sam Insull.

On the 27th of July 1998, Birmingham radio announced Scrushy and HealthSouth have developed a PAC (Political Action Committee) called 21st Century.

Discussion includes possibility that Richard could be positioning himself for a life in politics and they mention the governor’s office.

The following day, Monika Lewinski reaches an immunity and cooperation agreement with the office of independent council, Enron doubles its quarterly profit on the back of strong trading gains made on spiking Midwest power prices, and CSFB healthcare analyst Mr. Capek makes his first call on HealthSouth.  Shares are in the upper 20’s.  Capek puts a “strong buy” on HealthSouth with a target price of $37 to $40.  Nine weeks later the shares are $10 dollars.

What is a nine letter word for CSFB?

Q-u-a-t-t-r-o-n-e

Late in March of 2001, Peter Emch from CS First Boston (CSFB), professes that HealthSouth’s “digital hospital” project would be the prototype for as many as ten hospitals to be built in different markets.  Very nice!  We all laugh.  Hi five to Hatch, Hanson, and Hourani!

What is a 17 letter word for Quattrone?

c-o-n-f-l-i-c-t-o-f-i-n-t-r-e-s-t

If only that pesky medical privacy thing would go away.

Homework for tonight? 

Look up the difference between the words: “require” and “request”.  Tommy Thompson will be quizzing you later.  Just imagine what medical promotions Reader’s Digest will be sending to Tommy’s family.

Meanwhile as Hollywood’s (GE’s NBC; as in 10-20% owner/investor of India’s Enron Dabhol plant?) cameras focus on what might be on the blue dress, the Department of State is pleased that Turkmen Minister of Oil and Gas Arazov announce Turkmenistan’s selection of the U.S. company Enron to carry out a feasibility study funded by the Trade and Development Agency for a trans-Caspian gas pipeline.

And a week later.. the White House physician draws a vial of blood from Clinton.

Get out the popcorn.

How exciting that was!

But how would one make wise stock investments if one paid a little too much attention to a Lewinski morality play?
 
Four days after President Clinton’s blood is drawn, the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania is bombed killing 231 and injuring 5,000 and a week later Global Crossing goes public.  Three days later, President Clinton testifies before the Grand Jury and admits intimate contact with Lewinski.  Three days later U.S. Tomohawk cruise missiles target Kandahar, Afghanistan and sites believed to be Osama bin Laden’s training camps.

The event that happens on the day after the attack on Osama binLaden’s training camps is merely a weird coincidence.. but.. as a coincidence.. it is noteworthy.

Remember the “pristine audit” guy from Intercourse, Pennsylvania that the CEO of HealthSouth sued for posting his comments on Yahoo?

“Isn’t the pristine audit crap a joke.  This is the same company that is run by hillbillies telling its employees to be pristine.  HRC is an irritating company to work for and I for one am glad to have that albatross off of my neck”

(August 21, 1998, Yahoo Finance Bulletin Board, HRC HealthSouth Msg. # 501 of 320584, Message Title: Ernst & Young, author: I_Am_Dirk_Diggler; 40/M/Intercourse, Pa)

..

Richard and Newt just got busted.. by the internet.

 

 Hey.. the powers-that-be are the ones calling this an “era of greed” not me. 

be-patient.JPG

 

end of Chapter 2

you should pick up a copy of the book when it comes out

 

and one more time.. predicting market “crashes” is not rocket science

 

 

“I knew we’d screw it up”

Actor09 Oct. 06 12.22 


Pages