As if this world does not have enough problems these days, it appears that many key members of corporate America have been discovered to be everything from fakes and liars – to outright thieves.

The first of these crooked companies was Enron, who a few months ago, got caught bilking employees and stockholders out of billions of dollars. In fact, the news showed a video of an Enron company meeting where the slimy CEO is shown encouraging employees to invest their pensions and 401K plans into Enron stock – stock that the CEO sold to pay for his greedy lifestyle, leaving his employees in the dust. And despite the current hearings and investigations – it is too late – because the money was spent by the greedy and the innocent are left holding empty bags.

ImClone was the next mega-company to get caught red handed. But in this case – the CEO is not the only one with his hand in the cookie jar – so is Martha Stewart’s. The home décor diva is apparently connected to the ImClone scandal because she is friends with the company’s CEO and through her friendship – allegedly received an inside stock tip that made her millions. But that stock tip is now costing her close to a half of a billion dollars as her company’s stock and her reputation continue to slide further and further into oblivion since she was named in the scandal.

The third company to join the fray was WorldCom – who somehow managed to mis-record $3.8 billion dollars in costs – bringing the multi-million dollar communications company from the top of the mountain to the verge of bankruptcy – and costing thousands of employees their jobs.

Personally, I can’t fathom how these three mega-corporations “accidentally” managed to let such astronomical mistakes “slip through the cracks.” Of course we all know that these were not mistakes – but calculated thievery by some of America’s biggest and most powerful businesspeople.

So what next?

Since I heard about the diabolical behavior of these modern day white collar gangsters, I have wondered if any other corporations are doing the same thing. I have worked in businesses where I have seen tens and even hundreds of thousands of dollars pass through my fingers – but when you are dealing with hundreds of millions of dollars – corruption is inevitable. In these huge corporations, you have CEO and Presidents that not only earn enormous salaries – but receive multi-million dollar holiday bonuses. Where do you think that money comes from? I think with the discovery of these three scandals – we are beginning to find out.

If anything comes from this corporate wake up call, I hope that a Federal Overview Commission is established that has the authority to regulate any corporation that is worth over a certain amount of money. By doing this, we can get a handle on corruption and hopefully prevent another business from collapsing onto itself once the scheme is uncovered – costing innocent middle class workers their jobs, their pensions – and their security. I also hope that Congress throws the book at the CEOs of Enron, ImClone and WorldCom and makes an example of these Three Musketeers by taking them out of their lavish lifestyles – and throwing them in a cold and unforgiving prison. And furthermore – I hope that any CEOs that are out there doing the same thing these three clowns did gets the message that it is not right to mess with people’s jobs, futures and pensions just so you can add a few more zeros to the end of your savings account balance.

I guess if we learned anything from these scandals, we learned that the old saying is indeed true – absolute power does corrupt…

…absolutely.