Enron hired Intellibridge, based in the Georgetown section of Washington, D.C., to serve as its independent �propaganda� arm by creating a news Web site and organizing conferences that would bring regulatory, political, media and business leaders together to discuss the merits of a more competitive energy market. In compiling a story on alleged conflicts of interest, it would seem that the Post would have wanted to reveal that Rothkopf was founder and chief executive officer of a company that served as a consultant for Enron, instead of framing Rothkopf�s comments as those from a somewhat disinterested third party who worked in the Clinton administration. Immediately prior to forming Intellibridge, Rothkopf served for two years as managing director of Kissinger Associates, Inc., the geo-political consulting group chaired by the former U.S. secretary of state. After his stint at Kissinger Associates, Rothkopf founded Intellibridge�originally called the Newmarket Company�with the support of several former government officials, including former National Security Advisor Anthony Lake and former Central Intelligence Agency director John Deutch, who was accused in 2000 of mishandling sensitive data while serving at the CIA and previously as an under-secretary at the Defense Department. As part of the contract with Enron, Intellibridge had the mandate to help stop the spread of the energy industry�s equivalent of the �rotten apple syndrome� through a public image enhancement campaign. Enron wanted to make sure negative perceptions about the company did not spread to segments of the American public that would hear about the company only in terms of the California energy crisis. After awarding the contract, Enron alerted Intellibridge about who its friends were�certain conservative economists, the Wall Street Journal editorial page and large industrial companies�and who its enemies were�New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, then-New York Times editorial page editor Howell Raines, who late last summer moved into the top editorial position at the paper, and consumer advocacy groups. Enron also wanted Intellibridge to create an advisory committee to help guide the public image campaign. Candidates for the committee included Cambridge Energy Research Associates Chairman Daniel Yergin, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, Economist magazine energy and environmental reporter Vijay Vaitheeswaran and Wall Street Journal columnist Rebecca Smith. Intellibridge unveiled its news Web site for Enron at an Enron-sponsored conference early last October at the Ritz Carlton hotel in Arlington, Va. Attending the conference were business leaders, politicians and regulators from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, excluding former FERC Chairman Curt Hebert, who had left FERC in August 2001 after learning the Bush administration had consulted with Enron in choosing Pat Wood to take over as FERC chairman. Soon after Intellibridge organized the conference in October, Enron�s fortunes began to crumble and the company then had too much damage for Intellibridge to control, thus putting an end to the relationship. MORE http://www.infoshop.org/inews/stories.php?story=02/02/16/9881625
