After having read a number of school board “audits”, and read about Enron etc, and looked beyond that to other instances, it’s clear that audits are generally worthless as a rule. The auditors are shown what they are shown and not allowed to color outside the lines.

Find a discrepancy and every damn time the auditors will say “oh, that information was not provided to us”.

It’s like if you hired a judge for your own prosecution. What judge is going to find you guilty?

See also ratings agencies in 2008.