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>First, is this an issue of morals? I don't think it is. This is an issue about business and nothing to do with morality at all.

I'll bet Dan Lay (Enron CEO) would agree with that 100% ;-)

But, I disagree. We are now seeing in the stock market the results of a decade (or more?) of corporate behavior not being controlled by morality. Can we have ethics without morality? I do not believe so, because morality is the foundation of ethics. I am not saying religion, but some would argue that the foundation of morality is religion, and the foundation of Religion is God. Ulitimately, your ethics depends on your view of and/or sense of accountability to God. Considering the many world religions, this give ethics a wide lattitude, ranging from "I wouldn't hurt a mosquitoe" to using airliners as missles on skyscrappers. The Judeo-Christian ethic has for centuries been the dominant standard, and remains so today, despite protests of some minorities. That business has separated its conduct from the prevailing morality is demonstrated not only by Enron, WorldCom, etc., but by the AllState CEO who decided to fire 6,400 AllState insurance agents 'to save money'. He is revealed for the rascal he is when it was learned that the vast majority of the fired agents were nearing retirement and would have begun collecting those expensive retirement benefits. In other words, AllState "Enroned" its agents. Similar crimes are committed when businesses 'reclassify' the job descriptions of old and/or higher paid employees, then layoff the employees and hire them back to do the same job and half the salary. This is also why we have 'ethicists' (sp?) advocating the post natal 'abortion' of babies as ethical. I'd call it murder.