Worldcom to Cut 17,000 Jobs

PS Worldcom Sucks

Worldcom is finished! My prediction is Worldcom will be completely gone before the end of the year.

The execs have to get theirs, and screw everyone else.
Employees, partners, investors.....none of them matter.....
Let's just make sure we have enuff money to retire on, so here we go again.......

Sorry but I just do not buy these "accounting mishaps."

Until they start holding CEO's, CFO's etc. responsible for these issues, this will be a continuing trend. I mean seriously, if you were the CEO, what would your personal financial gain be in doing this? We are not talking $500-$5000 here. We are talking millions of dollars. To quote Eddy Izzard, "Enough money to make King Solomon blush." Anyway you look at it, it is stealing. Stealing from the employees and from the stockholders. Put these guys into Prison. Not a cushy Federal prison but a real prison.

The damage these people do is much worse than most crimes. Most crimes effect a few individuals. These crimes effect hundreds of thousands of people.

Criminal investigations need to be done.

They have two business quarters to work with before any big debt payments come due. Your end of the year timeframe could be right.

Indeed. I'll bet dollars to donuts that it never happens, though.

Our society, controlled by the rich (of course) sees a guy stealing a candy bar a crime worthy of being shot at point blank range by security guards, yet looks the other way when the really evil criminals get caught stealing millions upon millions of dollars.

yeah, there's something wrong with that...

said by garagerock:

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Indeed. I'll bet dollars to donuts that it never happens, though.

Our society, controlled by the rich (of course) sees a guy stealing a candy bar a crime worthy of being shot at point blank range by security guards, yet looks the other way when the really evil criminals get caught stealing millions upon millions of dollars.

yeah, there's something wrong with that...

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Good points. Not to mention that these companies political contributions are extremely high.

Careers able to avoid any Laws intended for everyone else:
Politicians
Actors
Athletes
Corporate Executives
Relatives of any of the above

The technology MCI/Worldcom offers is just fine and hardly sucks, it's the people that manage the company's finance that suck. And think about this, these individuals are just a small subset of the kind and caliber of CFO's out there. Do you really think after this that many CFO's / finance people can be trusted? Until the books and balances come out for a trully thorough review will we ever know about the true nature of "Company XYZ" we put our money into and work our tails off for..

Ummmm it's REALLY simple...WorldCom Sucks. Yes it may all be managements fault, and the technology may be top notch...but in the end if the company does this poorly...it doesn't matter if the switches are gold plated, WorldCom as a whole sucks.

said by OCNBLUE:

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Good points. Not to mention that these companies political contributions are extremely high.

Careers able to avoid any Laws intended for everyone else:
Politicians
Actors
Athletes
Corporate Executives
Relatives of any of the above

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Speaking of which, it looks like the Democrats are drawing first blood:

House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.)...said Republicans, starting with the Republican Revolution of 1995, have “created an environment” conducive for corporations to break rules and escape penalty by repealing regulations and ridiculing the tax code.

I agree totally, though I don't know anybody that would agree with shooting a person at any range for stealing a candy bar.

There is no bottom to the depths politicians will go to gain some form of advantage. It's no wonder so few people vote...

said by OCNBLUE:

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Careers able to avoid any Laws intended for everyone else:
Politicians
Actors
Athletes
Corporate Executives
Relatives of any of the above

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That's why I never feel pity or sad when I hear anyone from those professions die of a drug overdose or die in a car/plane crash or their children are drug addicts. In fact, I try not to follow their news. They don't care about us regular folks and I don't give a hoot about them either.

Blow after Blow after Blow,

WorldCom needs to sit down and audition for their mortition...hey that rhymes lol. Man I have just sat and watched the headlines whiz on by. Bad publicity but yet they are the second largest communications company in the game, they damn sure don't have the second largest stock value, 28 or 29 cents per???????? dizam

CEO and CFO gone within 2 months of each other now 17,000 jobs gone??? man that sucks, When they have to file for chapter 11 thatwill send ripples all through the stock market. Anybody have any predictions?

Worldcom now at ZERO.

»biz.yahoo.com/djus/02062 ··· 6_1.html

Hey, wasn't WorldCom the company that ran those adds slamming other network providers because they were on "thin ice"?????

It sure is ironic.

You kinda live up to your avatar, don't you?

Not quite at zero, but halted from trading....

»news.moneycentral.msn.co ··· =US:WCOM

What I see is a total repositioning of priorities and lawful conduct in this country.
I remember when financial crimes were more harshly punished than capital crimes.
It is not that way these days.
The Criminal Justice System has become so skewed that justice is hard to obtain.
These criminals such as Ebbers, Ken Lay, and others, are getting away with terrible things, and ruining people's livelihoods forever, while people who run toll booths are getting their vehicles impounded and spending 45 days in jail.
Where's the equality in the system?

QWEST is ready for the big fall.

Another corporation admits to defrauding the investors and breaking financial reporting laws. One has to wonder if there is a never ending supply of scam artists and crooks at the helm of America's largest companies? As bad as the terrorist threat is to the U.S., the spreading cancer of criminal activity by our top business leaders is doing much more damage to the country. While the war on terrorism must continue, the U.S. Government must lead an effort to uncover and prosecute these criminals and the Congress must pass laws that take financial oversight out of the hands of the Accounting firms that have assisted these crooks.

I wished accountants (DF) and lawyers(CF)were as good in bed as they are with the books.

This is all the result of some very expensive games that go back to the fact democrats and republicans alike make too many laws and twist laws to make creative loop holes they deserve punishment just like the CEO's that actually understood the game. Unfortunatly boys and girls many of the CEO's and CFO's we have didn't understand it as a financial game they thought it was normal practice and a way of life because they learned liberal business managment in college not black and white business 101 its a sad situation and this little tea party in public companies is far far from over.

I am going to make this comment because of all the hot air out of Washington on broadband reports over the last month about federal funding for broadband deployment. If you would like to learn about this here is a little program you need to find and check out.

»www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/f ··· ulation/

Its kind of amazing to me that long before Joe lieberman, Billy tauzin and the same guys blowing about broadband today were at that time opening up the financial system of companies to exactly were it is today. They almost destroyed FASB in the 1990's. This deal was not a liberal or conservative problem it’s all the dogs in the legislative branches problem and their personal lobby's they support because they rarely support you the voter.

Its also sad but probably true SBC communications will probably snag this network out of bankruptcy of .02 to .03 on the dollar. That’s the buyer out of bankruptcy on the assets. Today you can get away with this looking at the Psinet Europe sale and some other deals like this going on.

It would be interesting to know if somehow they can use their federal subscriber line charge to pay for it. It says federal but well it’s that ever-floating crap game on your phone bill at your Telco’s discretion. Feds never see this money just set a cap on it. This is the charge to maintain the local network I think this should also mean the CLEC's and ISP's they have sent to the bone yard should get to use the network with out hassle because the Telco gets at least a $5.00 freebee per month per line to maintain the network.

Debtor in possession funding is impossible for this mess and the financial instutions that would do it you need to get your money far far away from them. Some will have to give them money because they are way out on the limb on this anyway.

Bad thing this crap is far from over.

The legislature made the Game in the 1990's the game was played and the recourse comes 2001-2004.

said by tomkcr:

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...While the war on terrorism must continue, the U.S. Government must lead an effort to uncover and prosecute these criminals and the Congress must pass laws that take financial oversight out of the hands of the Accounting firms that have assisted these crooks.

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Agreed. But, isn't that a little like asking the fox to guard the hen house?

said by kksdragons:

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Agreed. But, isn't that a little like asking the fox to guard the hen house?

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Unfortunately, yes it is. But if the government can't do something about prosecuting these crumbs, who will? Maybe the big investing entities: mutual funds, banks, government pension funds, and other institutional investors will wake up and start forcing these companies to put truly independent Directors on their boards so that someone is keeping an eye on these white-collared crooks.

Sorry charlie they banks were whores on all this stuff they added to the problems. Mutual fund managers got nice little lifts off the IPO's they also trade your investments with astrology hopefully they paid attention to Gann and Elliot Wave and got out weeks ago. And Pension funds Well pension fund guys have all this money coming in and they just invest though their friend the advisor. Your pension funds they may well end up the biggest sucker of all.

Pension funds are also real active in buying Retail Centers anchored by big box retailers like Kmart, Winne Dixie etc that could be some real problems for the fund.

The wheels of justice turn slowly, but they do turn.

Lay and Ebbers are too early to be prosecuted. But they will be.

Case in Point: Michael Miliken

[NG]Owner

We will just have to see, I guess....

Gee... and the first thing Worldcom does is announce laying off 17,000

How come the senior executives all don't get their multi-million salaries and stock options cut back 90% instead?!?!?!?

No, instead they puff out their chests and let go of those who can ill afford to be out of work...

damn suits....

said by NGOwner:

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The wheels of justice turn slowly, but they do turn.

Lay and Ebbers are too early to be prosecuted. But they will be.

Case in Point: Michael Miliken

[NG]Owner

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I agree the wheels are slow to the point of having to use time lapse film to ensure movement.

The problem is they need to freeze all assets of the executives or a good percentage at least. If these people are smart enough to figure out how to hide 3 billion dollars, how difficult would it be to hide a few hundred million dollars of stolen or "misguided" money?

Ken Lay lays the sob story out but probably has 50+ million in off shore accounts. I can see him moving to a non extradition country living like a king on money that should have gone back to investors and employee's 401k accounts.

Miliken went to a nice Federal Prison with tennis courts and a 27 hole golf course I think He also was paid a 500 million dollar BONUS from Drexel. You think that was maybe hidden somewhere?

I agree. This culture of corporate wrongdoing is tied closely to our current political system and the way the game is played in Washington.

Department of Homeland Security? How about independent prosecutors to investigate both political parties and their politicians with an eye on campaign contributions and finances from lobbyists and resulting legislation and bills?

Better yet: All campaign finance laws need to be reformed. NO Corporation, Non-Profit Organization, Group, PAC, or lobbyist should be permitted to give "donations"! Only INDIVIDUAL citizens ONLY, period, and no $1 million dollar "Speaking engagements" either.

Sure, both parties would have far less money. GOOD, they'd also have far less POWER then too, and more would be back in the hands of the people, not the companies.

That's exactly why it will NEVER happen.