Recent Accountability Commentaries

Featured image for “What Should Charlie Do?”
What Should Charlie Do?
New York’s Democratic Representative Charles B. Rangel, chairman of the powerful Ways and Means Committee, has a bit of an ethical issue. The House Ethics Committee has expanded their investigation into Mr. Rangel’s failure to “…report hundreds of thousands of dollars in income and assets from 2002 through 2006,” The New York Times wrote (Oct. 9). The good news:  Last Wednesday, House Democrats blocked efforts...
Read More
October 12, 2009
Featured image for “No Brainer”
No Brainer
When it comes to apologia, creative people have the edge on most of us regarding imaginative rationalizations.  However, sometimes the more creative they are, the more cockamamie the reasoning. Thirty-one years after he fled the United States after pleading guilty to having had sex with a 13-year-old girl, Roman Polanski has been arrested in Switzerland and is being held for...
Read More
October 2, 2009
Featured image for “Keeping Me Honest”
Keeping Me Honest
After posting this commentary, I learned that Susan Atkins had died late last night. On September 4, I offered an ethical scenario. How Would You Decide? asked readers on both my own Web site and Huffington Post to put themselves in the place of parole commissioners for the state of California and decide whether to release Manson follower and convicted murderer Susan Atkins...
Read More
September 25, 2009
Featured image for “Speaking of Accountability”
Speaking of Accountability
One of the best examples of corporate responsibility came from a conversation I had with former Johnson & Johnson Chairman James E. Burke. In the fall of 1982, Burke was confronted with a nightmare scenario. Seven people in the Chicago area had died after ingesting Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules that were laced with cyanide. His decision-making process, leading to the recall of all forms...
Read More
September 18, 2009
Featured image for “Accountability”
Accountability
This is one judge you never want to face. If you’re an executive at the Securities and Exchange Commission and Bank of America, Judge Jed S. Rakoff is one court official you don’t want to mess with. During the takeover of troubled financial giant Merrill Lynch by Bank of America in 2008, the S.E.C. gave its blessing to the deal.   » Read more about: Accountability  »...
Read More
September 16, 2009
Featured image for “Atonement”
Atonement
“It’s wrong, man… I feel tremendous hurt behind what happened… I should’ve took the initiative to stop it all… I didn’t step up. I wasn’t a leader.” That was former Atlanta Falcons football star Michael Vick on 60 Minutes apologizing for participating in a dog fighting operation on his property. “There is not a day that goes by that I...
Read More
August 26, 2009
Featured image for “Hate Speech”
Hate Speech
“The summer of 2009 has not been our finest hour.” So wrote Newsweek editor Jon Meacham (Aug. 24) in response to those individuals who have brought Hitler and Nazism into the debate on health care. There’s political commentary and there’s hate speech and I’m sick and tired of hate speech passing for commentary. Earlier this month, conservative radio talk host Rush Limbaugh...
Read More
August 19, 2009
Featured image for “The Case of the Frozen Assets”
The Case of the Frozen Assets
“They can beg and they can plead But they can’t see the light, that’s right Cause the boy with the cold hard cash Is always mister right…” – Madonna, “Material Girl,” 1984 That’s it, right next to the Boca Burgers.  That’s the $90,000, in cash, the FBI found in former Representative William Jefferson’s freezer. Wednesday afternoon the Democratic Representative from Louisiana...
Read More
August 7, 2009
Featured image for “The Learnable Moment”
The Learnable Moment
I was in the midst of writing a piece on President Obama’s initial remarks made last Wednesday concerning the arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates by Cambridge Police Sgt. James Crowley when news came Friday of Mr. Obama making a new statement to “recalibrate” his language. More accurately, he was recalibrating his judgment. When I first heard the news that Mr....
Read More
July 27, 2009
Featured image for “Decanting the Truth”
Decanting the Truth
In a press interview regarding the Iraq war, Vice-President Dick Cheney was once asked “Over 70 percent of Americans disagree with this war, what is your response?” “So.” It was a chilling moment of arrogance not easily forgotten by most Americans.  It was the same when events were disclosed surrounding the “legal” wrangling that took place at the Justice Department...
Read More
May 26, 2009