Hightower Lowdown

CEOs are feeling a bit unloved these days, what with their corporate fiefdoms crashing, investors howling for blood, Congress investigating their finagling, and, gosh, even George W. taking rhetorical shots at them.

For the superrich, living well is the best revenge. If you’re going to sulk, sulk in style by building yourself a gargantuan getaway. That’s what Andrew Fastow is doing. The mastermind of Enron’s maze of offshore partnerships, which led to the loss of thousands of jobs and billions in retirement wealth for workers, is building an 11,000-square-foot chateau in Houston’s posh River Oaks section.

Likewise, Diana Brooks, the CEO of Sotheby’s who recently pled guilty to price fixing, has retreated to a $4 million waterfront compound in Florida to lick her wounds in luxury, and even the beleaguered Martha Stewart is losing herself in the renovation of two huge homes she owns on her $15 million New York farm. WorldCom CFO Scott Sullivan is living large, constructing a $15 million, 24,000-square-foot Mediterranean-style mansion in Florida with its own private lagoon.

But the King of Corporate Excess is Gary Winnick, who led Global Crossing into bankruptcy and escaped with $730 million in his knapsack. Gary’s now putting $30 million into restoring the grandiose, 23,000-square-foot California mansion he calls Casa Encantada—House of Enchantment.

And they wonder why polls now rank CEOs below mad-cow disease in public approval.