Fiorina's name has come up in politics even before she left HP. She was a fundraiser for McCain in last year's campaign, and a visible spokeswoman until she committed one gaffe too many. Now she seems to be plowing ahead with a campaign, despite a recent brush with breast cancer.

Polls show her faring poorly against incumbent Democrat Barbara Boxer. And the newfound populist mood will prove hard for her to exploit, given her own pay record. (Her lukewarm proposal to put executive pay up to an annual shareholder vote seems unlikely to score points.) A Boxer fundraiser is already jumping on the news, sending the following email to supporters:

I just wanted to pass along some late-breaking news: According to a post this afternoon on the San Jose Mercury News website, during a
trip to Washington, DC on Tuesday, former HP CEO Carly Fiorina said she is "seriously considering" challenging Senator Barbara Boxer in 2010.

Fiorina reportedly received more than $150 million during her time at HP — including $21 million in severance pay after she left under fire — while laying off more than 25,000 employees as CEO, none of whom received the kind of golden parachute she did. Now she has millions of her own dollars to pour into a possible campaign against Barbara Boxer.

Another weak point for Fiorina: Her championing of visas for skilled workers at a think tank she just joined. America needs immigrant talent — but that's a tough issue to sell to voters.

Hurd himself is taking a $290,000 pay cut, or 20 percent of his salary, which would look more impressive had his pay not risen 31 percent last year. HP executives are getting their pay cut 10 percent, though they can better afford it than the economically strapped rank and file.

With Congress putting executive pay under the microscope, it's a well-timed publicity stunt. The net effect on HP's financials will be small. But it's more than just a flashy PR move: It is putting a theory touted for decades in academia into practice at an unprecedented scale.

MIT economist Martin Weitzman suggested in the 1980s that instituting pay cuts instead of layoffs could make recessions shorter and less painful. By setting base salaries lower and making pay more variable with a business's financial results, companies could avoid cutting jobs and increase workers' rewards in good times. HP is trying exactly that, with a change to its bonus plans that could make up for the pay cuts if times do well.

HP is not alone. Teamster-represented truckers at YRC recently agreed to a 10 percent paycut. AMD, a Valley-based chipmaker, has instituted "temporary" pay cuts (as opposed to HP's permanent ones).

But HP, the 14th-largest public company by revenues in the U.S., has given license to the rest of the Fortune 500 to consider the idea.

It will hardly mean an end to job losses. HP is still in the middle of a three-year, 25,000-person layoff stemming from its acquisition of EDS, a rival tech-services outfit. But it could spell a future when people are laid off because their jobs truly are redundant, not because times are, as corporate memo-writers love to say, "tough all over."

There's only one problem we see with this idea: Wall Street was famous for its highly variable pay. The bonus plan may have worked for a while, but it did not end well. The high-risk, high-reward system is thoroughly out of favor now. Are we ready to become a nation of workplace gamblers? Or will America's corporate culture face death by a thousand cuts?

• Don't hope for much. Past experience tells us those laid off will not be treated well. EDS has been known to time layoffs to minimize severance paid.
• Leave when you can. Given the prospects of a skimpy severance, you might as well get out sooner rather than later. EDS has a sordid history as a service provider. Although the guys in the trenches are long gone, the management culture that brought you the $8 billion Navy-Marines IT debacle is alive and well and is now moving to a new host environment. Trust me — another six months at the company will not add anything to your resume. Start your job search now.
• Aggressively market yourself. Polish the resume on standards like Monster and CareerBuilder. Make sure to also hit specialty sites like Dice.com, Cybercoders, and Jobfox. Update your professional networking pages. LinkedIn is an obvious one, but have you thought about your college's alumni directory?
• Clean up your online persona. Yes, most employers don't actually waste time checking your social-network profiles. But why take chances? Play it safe and delete anything even vaguely unprofessional from your Facebook and MySpace pages.
• Attend mixers and job fairs. Not because you'll get a job there, but just to get practice interacting with other people. Your next job will require more face time, not less.
• Meet with the headhunters. You may not love them but they can be effective. Visit your friends at Robert Half and the other usual suspects.
• Keep your sense of humor. HP's layoffs are large in scale, but you're not the first person to endure a flurry of pink slips at the workplace. Some of the revenge stories written by other people in the same situation are epic.

(Photoillustration by Jackson West)

This week, the HP vice president indicted for leaking trade secrets from IBM, his former employeer, pleaded guilty. Dude, UR DOIN IT RONG. Atul Malhotra allegedly emailed the goods to a coworker, drawing a big red arrow back to his own forehead. Ready to cash in on your inside info? Follow this six-step plan.

1. Be sure the secret is worth something. You don't want to risk your neck over info the company is already required to file with the SEC.

2. Pick the right potential buyer. Start with senior VPs or members of the executive team -– someone who can and will play ball.

3. Establish an anonymous Internet presence. Only do email from Internet connections that can't be traced back to you. Local Wi-Fi hotspots and unsecured home networks are your friend. Never use the same email address to contact more than one person. Don't just change addresses, hop from Gmail to Hotmail to Yahoo. Skyhook is developing a wonderful hybrid positioning system to pin down your location based on IP address. Keep that in mind.

4. Ditch email for prepaid phones from T-Mobile, available at your local Target, it a mark shows interest. But remember that if a 911 operator can find your location, so can anyone else. Check for security cameras in the area before you dial or take a call.

5. Use an untraceable method to transfer the info. British agents used Bluetooth or IR devices disguised as rocks to pass information. Get creative: A dropped USB stick, a misplaced folder, or a shared Google Doc all can work. The Madrid bombers created email drafts that others could access, so nothing was ever sent through an SMTP server that could be tracked. You needn't be high-tech. Aldrich Ames carried top secret documents out of the CIA in paper bags.

6. Hide the money. Never break omerta, lest you end up like Pink Cadillac Guy in Goodfellas. Living beyond your means always tips people off. It happened to Ames. And keep your mouth shut. James Hall III overshared with a Russian spy who turned out to be FBI. Earl Edwin Pitts' ex-wife and Robert Hannsen's brother-in-law helped turn them in. That's the downside of a successful sale: You sell the company's secret, but saddle yourself with one of your own.

A self-taught hacker, Rigano says he discovered the vulnerabilities and coded the exploits on his own time, which he says is none of HP's business. "I have the right to sell what I want," he says. He told me he attracted mostly Chinese and Russian buyers, but claimed he never found takers for the HP or SAP "vulns" and exploits. He said he stopped selling black-market code in January but didn't explain why.

An HP spokeswoman admitted the company has a rogue employee in France and said it was investigating along with the FBI. When I told Rigano this, he became incensed. "This is real bullshit," he said, and threatened to sue anyone who claimed he was the target of any investigation.

He may be right: It's possible the company has been investigating another Gallic code crasher whose online nickname is t0t0, and who in May 2007 posted offers for SAP 0days that were traceable through HP's network. By connecting his various aliases with email addresses he has used over the years, I was able to track t0t0 to Paris's Institut Supérieur d'Electronique, France's premier high-tech college, where it appears he's an instructor. T0t0 didn't respond to repeated interview requests.