In re: Kenneth Lay, Or: Finally, a chance to use se non e vero, e ben trovato

I'm not going to believe that Kenneth Lay is dead until I see the body and some DNA confirmation.

A guy with that much money, facing serious prison time and apparently sociopathically lacking in any sense of responsibility, would have the means and motivation to fake his death. It would have been much easier to disappear from Aspen, CO than Houston, TX, where he would have been watched more closely.

I know that I'm not the only person who doubts that he's shuffled off this mortal coil. I'm just kind of suprised to find myself thinking of it that way.

I'm a big fan of Occam's razor, because in most situations a simple explanation is just a whole lot more plausible than an elaborate conspiracy theory. Still, Occam's razor allows for the possibility that a more convoluted explanation is the correct one, because sometimes the world is just that weird.

Maybe Kenny Boy really did just drop dead of a massive heart attack. But given the people and circumstances involved, I think it's at least as likely that he's already started a new life as a beach bum in Rio. We'll know for sure if, after his criminal convictions are overturned -- as they probably will be, based on Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals precedent in re: abatement -- Lay comes skipping back into Texas cackling about double jeopardy. It wouldn't get him out of any civil judgments against his estate, but given the size of the guy's ego I don't think he'd care. What's a little cash to a few people when he can put one over on the whole country?

Se non e vero, e ben trovato. Try that with Occam's razor.