Recent Accountability Commentaries

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Pushback
COMING MONDAY: James Comey – the interviews and the book! Former NBC News Anchor Tom Brokaw is the latest high-profile individual to be accused of sexual harassment by a female colleague. As reported by Variety (Apr. 26), former NBC reporter Linda Vester “…alleged that Brokaw physically tried to force her to kiss him on two separate occasions, groped her in...
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May 2, 2018
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To Tell the Truth
I remember watching a popular TV game show where a panel of celebrities would watch as three individuals would stand before them each claiming to be the same person. A statement was read describing some unusual adventure or occupation. The task for the panelists was to ask a series of questions of each person in order to determine who the...
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April 30, 2018
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The Right Thing
“I’m embarrassed, ashamed. I think what occurred was reprehensible at every single level. I think I take it very personally as everyone in our company does and we’re committed to making it right.” That’s Starbucks company founder and Executive Chairman Howard Schultz talking to CBS This Morning host Gayle King about his reaction to two black men who were arrested...
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April 20, 2018
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The War Against Lies
In the world of ethics, you don’t fight fire with fire. You sue. As reported by Reuters (Apr. 17), “The parents of two children killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook school massacre have sued conspiracy theorist Alex Jones for defamation, accusing him and his website InfoWars of engaging in a campaign of ‘false, cruel, and dangerous assertions.’ … “The parents...
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April 18, 2018
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The Ethical Take: “Attack on Our Country” Edition
What’s going on? I’m gone for only three weeks and… alright, let’s get into it. Mr. Zuckerberg Goes to Washington – And it doesn’t exactly go well for the great Stone Face. After the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica scandal – in which Cambridge created a personality application, posted it on Facebook, then scooped up and used the personal data of approximately 87...
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April 16, 2018
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Bad Blood
It sounded like a good idea. (Strike that.) It sounded like a great idea: one simple blood test that required a single finger prick would give “everyday Americans unlimited control over their health,” The New York Times writes (Mar. 15). The key promise Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes made to investors and potential clients: “that drawing a tiny amount of blood...
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March 16, 2018
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The “Magnificent” Shkreli
There’s a moment during the first act of Orson Welles’s classic film, The Magnificent Ambersons – a period story about the rise and fall of a local family – where Welles, as narrator, points out what a terror young, self-centered George Amberson Minafer is to all the local citizens. “Someday,” a neighbor angrily remarks, “that boy is going to get...
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March 14, 2018
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It’s Not the Bots. It’s Us!
“A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on.”  – Winston Churchill* While most Americans have a wide variety of factual information – literally at their fingertips – when it comes to political tribalism, facts seem to go out the window. According to a study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology...
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March 12, 2018
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Darkest Hour
“We are masters of the unsaid words, but slaves of those we let slip out.” – Winston Churchill No, this is not about the Oscar-winning movie examining Winston Churchill’s hard choices that helped save the world. It’s about the darkest choices ever made by a U.S. president. Last week, National Security Agency Chief Admiral Mike Rogers told the Senate Armed...
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March 5, 2018
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More Than Just Thoughts and Prayers
Two weeks ago, I wrote about H.R. 38, The Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017, (This is Who We’ve Become), which, if passed by the Senate, would effectively make it legal to carry a concealed weapon from state to state much like a driver’s license. In a statement from his office, California Congressman Salud Carbajal told me: “This shameful bill...
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March 2, 2018

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