Landmarks in Hypocrisy, Friday Edition

What happened in the Enron corporation? "Arrogance gave way to recklessness, which in turn opened the door to criminality" (according to Kurt Eichenwald's analysis in the NYTimes).

So what does Ken ("Kenny Boy") Lay do when the jury comes in with a unanimous guilty verdict yesterday? He stages one of those Pharisee moments that we've come so to expect from the Higher Income reaches of the Republican Party: He gets his family and friends together in a circle prayer in the courtroom, in full view of the press and spectators, not because he's a pious believer as much as he's a showman in the face of overwhelming evidence of greed, corruption, lying, theft, and malfeasance. "God's got another plan right now," says Lay. "We'll all come through this stronger and more reliant on God."

It's become practically a fashion statement under the Bush II regime, to wrap oneself in the mantle of religiosity just ahead of the clanging of the iron bars.

If Lay were a sincere Christian, he would have conducted his praying in private, out of the glare of publicity.