O.k. Doug, as to who intervened, if you really want to know, I'll quote my source directly:

"Consider Richard Baker, the Louisiana Republican who chairs a House subcommittee on capital markets, securities and government-sponsored enterprises. [Who has recently bemoaned the scandal.] ...

"Yet Mr. Baker was a strong opponent of a standards board proposal, that recently was approved, that requires companies to better disclose their use of derivatives . . . .

"When the standards board pressed ahead, Mr. Baker introduced a bill to allow public companies to object to proposed accounting principles in federal court. He described his proposal 'as a legislative remedy to a flaw in the private sector process for developing financial accounting standards.'. . .

"The SEC, which oversees the standards board, also has frequently been caught in a cross-fire from Congress, which it has complained makes it harder to impose needed regulations. . . .

"Senator Joseph Lieberman . . . opens a hearing today into Enron's collapse. Among the questions he says he is probing: 'Why did Enron's auditors allow the compahy to overstate its profits for four years by over a half a billion dollars, using what now appear to be very questionable accounting practices>'

But Mr. Lieberman . . . is a longtime critic of the accounting board, and he has rallied opposition to its proposed rules more than once. Recently, he challenged one to overhaul the accounting for corporate mergers and acquisitions, an issue of importance to the high-tech industry. In the fall of 2000, amid the tight presidential race, Mr. Lieberman joined with a bipartisan group of 13 senators in a letter urging the standards board to postpone consideration of the changes until Congress reconvened in 2001.

The letter, among other things, claimed the accounting changes 'will make mergers and acquisitions very difficult for high-technology companies.' In the House, California Reps. Christopher Cox, a Republican, and Calvin Dooley, a Democrat, introduced a bill for a one-year moratorium on the standards-board proposal.

The proposal called for new disclosures on mergers and acquisitions. Companies cried foul, complaining the change would reduce their earnings. Under pressure from Congress, the standards board backed off, but still required new accounting that gives investors more information about the true initial costs of acquisitions and how to track the investment over time." [Emphasis added.]

Wall Street Journal (1/24/02) at page A20. If you want to know more, read the article. Or read the 20 or so articles that have appeared in the WSJ and the New York Times (and I assume the L.A. Times as well) over the past two weeks

Doug, you really, really should read a grown-up newspaper from time to time. One pays for the privilege of having an opinion by making the necessary effort to keep informed. Watching television may be useful in knowing what impression a politician makes in a speech, which seems to be the basis of many people's voting decisions. It won't tell you much about what is happening in the real world. Nor will the Drudge Report.