There are many shades of Enron in the current situation. You would think that lessons would have been learned, but apparently not. Keeping assets off balance sheet - in SIVs for instance - has been a very common practice in recent years.

And that is a big part of the problem. Its been " but mom everyone else is doing it" for so long that the curruption and deception has pretty much come to be tragically expected by so may people and institutions. John