Top 92 Enron Quotes & Sayings

You know Texas is - even more now that Enron has bit the dust - it's held up on the back of small businesses.

These guys [the Catholic church] make Enron look like altar boys.

Enron's president, Ken Lay, passed away last week. So, I guess even God lost money on that Enron deal. I believe the official cause of death was listed as "karma." The family asked in lieu of flowers, please send some elderly retiree's entire life savings.

Enron and 9/11 marked the end of an era of individual freedom and the beginning of personal responsibility.

Wouldn't it be great if all of Osama bin Laden's money was tied up in Enron stock?

I remember when I did my Enron film, my executive producers at the time felt very strongly that I should mock the Enron executives more viciously because everybody wanted that moment.

The collapse of Enron was devastating to tens of thousands of people and shook the public's confidence in corporate America.

Before Enron, I think people were a bit more naive about the way things worked, and I think Enron pulled the curtain back on unsavoury practices that turned out to be a lot more widespread.

The big rumor going around is, we may begin bombing Iraq. Or, as the White House calls it, Operation Keep Enron Off The Front Page.

Are you familiar with 9/11? Building 7? You know what was in there? All the Enron stuff. I guess that building went down on its own.

I predict that in the years ahead Enron, not Sept. 11, will come to be seen as the greater turning point in U.S. society.

Before the New York Times starts running "Portraits in Grief" of former Enron employees, it's worth remembering that even after the collapse, Enron stock is still worth more than the entire Social Security "trust fund."

Ken Lay has, does and will continue to accept responsibility for the fall of Enron. He was the man at the controls. But failure is not a crime.

You're used to seeing values listed on waiting-room walls. Communication, integrity, excellence, and respect. Those were actually Enron's values.

At the height of the Enron mania, the company's market value was $65 billion. Once the dust cleared, the final value was $0.

But the most important thing is, Enron did not cause the California crisis.

The Enron scandal calls into question the integrity of the entire capitalist system, which previously we assumed was based on honest, straightforward greed.

If it were not for government regulation of big corporations, executives at companies like Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, they could have cheated investors out of millions.

The collapse of Enron and the subsequent collapse of Arthur Andersen were tremendous tragedies. But as I stated at the time of my indictment on July 8, 2004, failure does not equate to a crime.

Bush began helping Enron in the eighties.

I'm a good learner. I can dig in. I knew nothing about mark-to-market accounting when I started the 'Enron' film.

Some members of Congress now are complaining they are underpaid. They want to propose a pay raise. You can't blame them. A lot of them took a big income hit when Enron folded.

The Houston Astros want to change the name of Enron Field where they play. I guess the Enron name could cause problems for them. Like players could steal a base and then deny it.

During the Enron debacle, it was workers who took the pounding, not bankers. Not only did Enron employees lose their jobs, many lost their retirement savings. That's because they were at the bottom of the investing food chain.

Enron had already collapsed and filed for bankruptcy protection by the beginning of 2002. But despite complaints from short sellers that corporations had used accounting gimmickry to inflate their profits, many investors thought the crisis at Enron was an isolated case.

The not-quite-sort-of lie works here too - often an ad will announce that "Congressman Johnson voted for a bill that gave tax breaks to companies like Enron." True - although the bill allowed all companies to accelerate depreciation of copying machines. Yes, Enron benefited, but Enron also benefited from the revolution of the Earth around the sun. Hardly an argument to freeze the planet in one spot.

We will not rest until the wooden stake is punched through the heart of the Enron lawsuit against us.

In the case of Enron, we balance our positions all the time.

But indeed a market like California is not good for Enron.

Things that have happened with Enron and companies like that, where they've squandered their employees' pension funds, I think it has brought a new level of anxiety. People don't feel like they can trust their employer.

A corporation like Enron is a person with a legal identity and no ethical accountability.

What Enron was doing, what caused investors to embrace it in a rapture of baffled awe, was hiding debt.

Currently, we're finding that about 75 percent of potential jurors have anger or deep-seated hatred toward anyone associated with Enron.

Enron CEO Kenneth Lay has apparently just slipped across the border into Pakistan.

Enron - although an extreme case - is hardly the only company with a hollow set of values.

Last week convicted Enron crook Ken Lay died of a heart attack. They announced they were going to cremate him. Where he's going, why bother?.

Well, the manhunt continues for that elusive evil mastermind, but I'm telling you Enron CEO Kenneth Lay remains at large.

Most unfortunately, Enron's plunge into bankruptcy court also cost many of its rank-and-file employees their savings.

I've never commented much about my experience at Enron except to say, when I was there, it was a much more pipeline and asset-oriented company.

Laws were changed and regulations repealed until an Enron can set sail without responsibility, supervision, or accountability.

Many Enron employees lost 70 percent to 90 percent of their retirement assets after the company indicated that it would re-state profit reports.

Buying only what you know can end in disaster. Just think about Enron's employees and business partners, the 'locals' who bought lots of its stock because they thought they were in the know.

There was loose talk of Enron management practices and reminders of a scandal at the University of Toronto, when a big donor corporation, Eli Lilly, was said to have vetoed the appointment of an academic who doubted the effectiveness of Prozac.

I happen to represent Enron here in Houston. We have many good corporate citizens here in Houston. Enron happened to have been one.

The only beef Enron employees have with top management is that management did not inform employees of the collapse in time to allow them to get in on the swindle. If Enron executives had shouted, "Head for the hills!" the employees might have had time to sucker other Americans into buying wildly over-inflated Enron stock. Just because your boss is a criminal doesn't make you a hero.

In the Enron scandal, whistleblower Sherron Watkins is now calling herself Enron Brokovitch. She testified Ken Lay was duped by the other executives. Oh, yeah. When is the last time you got duped and made $100 million?

You don't want another Enron? Here's your law: If a company, can't explain, in one sentence, what it does... it's illegal.

Because the sad fact is that the Enron Corporation and others manipulated with unfortunately great effect the energy market in the West Coast starting in 2000.

Playboy magazine is now doing a 'Women of Enron' pictorial spread. ... Apparently the only thing these women have left to shred is their dignity.

The environment changed with Martha Stewart and Enron.

I wish I could undo what I did at Enron but I can't. I understand that I deserve punishment. Your honor, I accept the prison sentence that you are about to impose and will serve it without bitterness.

'Power Play' is a morality tale for our post-Enron world and - not incidentally - wildly entertaining. Nothing wrong with that.

I take full responsibility for what happened at Enron. But saying that, I know in my mind that I did nothing criminal.

Pete Wilson deregulated energy as a pay out to Enron, and we blamed Gray Davis.

Early 2000s, we get Enron, which tells us the books are dirty. And what is our repeated response? We just keep pulling the threads out of the regulatory fabric.

The CEO of Enron, Jeffrey Skilling, married one of the Enron secretaries this week. It's amazing how romantic these Enron guys can be when they realize that wives can't be forced to testify against their husbands. Skilling said today she was the best secretary Enron had ever had. She could shred 950 words a minute. ... I guess they are on their honeymoon right now. That's going pretty well. Hey, he's used to screwing Enron employees.

Former Enron founder Ken Lay and CEO Jeffrey Skilling found guilty in the Enron case. Ken Lay is so guilty I'm surprised people aren't calling him Congressman Ken Lay. Wait 'till these guys find out in prison that insider trading has a whole new meaning.

Ken Lay, the disgraced former chairman of Enron, found a way to escape his legal problems: He died after being convicted of fraud and conspiracy charges.

People are treating the Stewart case as seriously as Enron when it's really over trivia.

If you look at the great frauds of all time, Enron had that phantom trading floor. What Herbalife has is it has phantom or fictitious customers.