Ethics

News

Martial Law Now a Reality in Michigan

by Jennifer Page — April 18, 2011 - 11:21am
  • Topics: Right Wing, Ethics, Politics

    • The week of April 10-16 saw the layoff of every public school teacher in Detroit, and the initial fruition of the highly-contested bill that allows emergency financial managers to have unconditional control over a city in a financial emergency. The city of Benton Harbor, Michigan, declared to be in a financial emergency by Governor Rick Snyder, now knows that, according the Snyder, the voter's voice doesn't really matter anymore.

    Joseph Harris, the city's new Emergency Financial Manager (EFM), dismantled the entire government, only allowing city boards and commissions to call a meeting to order, approve of meeting minutes and adjourn a meeting.

    The law that allows Harris to "exercise any power or authority of any office, employee, department, board, commission, or similar entity of the City, whether elected or appointed," was passed in March after the urging of Governor Snyder, and despite thousands of protesters who came to the Lansing capitol throughout February and March.

    Op-Ed

    A Prize for Simply Doing What's Right

    by Wendell Potter — April 14, 2011 - 11:31am
  • Topics: Activism, Corporations, Ethics

    • This week I received a Ridenhour Prize for my book, Deadly Spin. I'm honored to receive the award, especially in light of my fellow recipients: former Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin; the producers of a film called Budrus, about attempts to find non-violent solutions to the strife in the Middle East, and Thomas Drake, an National Security Agency contractor who blew the whistle on what he believed were corrupt practices. Past honorees have included Bill Moyers and Bob Herbert. Elite company.

    It is always nice to be recognized for one's work. The prizes are supposed to honor those "who speak truth to power." But the honor is also ironically unfortunate. The need to write the book at all, to illustrate how selfish profit motives too frequently take precedence over the health care needs of real people, remains a tragedy. And sadly, that continues to be the case, even after so much has been revealed about the inner workings of insurance giants and even after a bruising political battle has been waged to change how health care is delivered in America. The fact is, I shouldn't have had to write the book. There shouldn't have to be an award for people who simply do what is simply right.

    News

    Robert Greenwald on the Koch Brothers?

    by PRW Staff — March 31, 2011 - 11:11am
  • Topics: Ethics, Politics, Wisconsin Protests

    • We want your vote on the worst thing the Koch brothers have done to date! Is it oil spills, anti-worker, anti-healthcare, anti-immigration, or maybe you’ve got a better one? Write it in at Koch Brothers Exposed.

    The Huffington Post: Five Worst Things the Koch Brothers Have Done. Vote!

    Robert Greenwald
    Filmmaker, Brave New Films

    News

    Reviewing the Legal Battle Surrounding WI's Union-Busting Bill

    by Brendan Fischer — March 30, 2011 - 1:22pm
  • Topics: Right Wing, Democracy, Ethics, Wisconsin Protests

    • Judge MaryAnn Sumi has once again ordered a halt to further implementation of Governor Walker's union-busting bill, but did not declare whether the Legislative Reference Bureau "publishing" the bill on Friday made it law,* or whether any party is in contempt by arguably violating Sumi's first order. How did we get here, and where are we going?

    Indiana Prosecutor's Email to Walker Encouraged Wisconsin Violence

    by Anne Landman — March 25, 2011 - 1:15pm

    Johnson County, Indiana deputy prosecutor and Republican activist Carlos Lam resigned from his job after the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism discovered an email he sent to Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker suggesting the governor have an "associate" make a fake, violent attack to discredit union protesters and influence media coverage of the protests. Lam resigned shortly before the Center published a story containing excerpts of the email sent from Lam's account on February 19 praising Walker for standing up to unions and suggesting a "false flag" attack on Walker. Lam wrote,

    ...I think that the situation in Wisconsin presents a good opportunity for what's called a 'false flag' operation. If you could employ an associate who pretends to be sympathetic to the unions' cause to physically attack you (or even use a firearm against you), you could discredit the public unions. ... Employing a false flag operation would assist in undercutting any support the media may be creating in favor of the unions. God bless, Carlos F. Lam.

    Lam denies writing the email, saying his email account was hacked. It would have been easy to verify whether his email account had been hacked by examining information that could be obtained from Hotmail and his Internet service provider, but Lam declined to reveal the provider's name to the Center so they could check out the hacking claim. This news follows an earlier admission by Governor Walker to a prank caller pretending to be David Koch of Koch Industries that he and his team had considered placing troublemakers in the crowd, but Walker claims to have rejected the idea for political considerations.

    Main Source: 
    WisconsinWatch.org (Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism), March 24, 2011
    News

    Wendell Potter Wins the Ridenhour Book Prize

    by Anne Landman — March 24, 2011 - 12:55pm
  • Topics: Activism, Corporations, Ethics

    • The Center for Media and Democracy's Senior Fellow Wendell Potter has been awarded the 2011 Ridenhour Book Prize for his work, Deadly Spin: An Insurance Company Insider Speaks Out on How Corporate PR is Killing Healthcare and Deceiving Americans.

    In 2007, Wendell was the head of Public Relations and Corporate Communications for CIGNA when the insurer denied a life-saving liver transplant to Nataline Sarkisyan, a 17 year old California girl who suffered from leukemia. Desperate to save their daughter's life, Nataline's parents organized protests and demonstrations against CIGNA. The company eventually yielded to public pressure and reversed its decision -- but too late. Nataline died just two hours after CIGNA approved the operation.

    Nataline's case profoundly effected Wendell. He gradually felt that he had "sold his soul" by being "part of a industry that would do whatever it took to perpetuate its extraordinarily profitable existence." Wendell quit the insurance industry and started working tirelessly to make the public aware of the industry's widepsread unethical practices and PR techniques, and the harm these practices cause Americans.

    Op-Ed

    Death Panels: Fact and Fiction

    by Wendell Potter — March 21, 2011 - 12:28pm
  • Topics: Corporations, Ethics, Health

    • "Death panels" are back in the news and Congress is turning its attention to them once again. The problem is, lawmakers are looking in all the wrong places.

    The proposed provision would have allowed Medicare to pay doctors to counsel patients about their end-of-life medical wishes. That idea originally had bipartisan support, but when the provision was brought to Sarah Palin's attention, she accused Democrats of wanting to create "death panels" that would decide when to pull the plug on granny and grandpa. The House Energy and Commerce Committee, now headed by Republicans, sent a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius last week demanding to know how a controversial provision that was excised from last year's health reform bill wound up -- briefly -- in a government "rule" on physician reimbursement.

    News

    Consider the Source: MacIver News Service

    by Anne Landman — March 15, 2011 - 6:51am
  • Topics: Right Wing, Ethics, Politics, Wisconsin Protests

    • The MacIver Institute, also known as the John K. MacIver Institute for Public Policy, is a Wisconsin-based, free-market think tank formed in 2009 which also acts as a "news service," supplying videos and reports to media outlets, like newspapers and television broadcasters. But just who is the MacIver Institute?

    Fox News' "Madison Protest" Footage Aims to Deceive

    by Anne Landman — March 3, 2011 - 10:38am

    On February 28, the O'Reilly Factor aired a video news segment by Fox Channel reporter Mike Tobin, who was shown reporting from inside the state capitol building in Madison, Wisconsin. "News" footage aired during his broadcast of goings-on outside the capitol depicts an angry, out-of-control, crowd of pro-union protesters yelling and pushing people around. But the protesters in the video are wearing shirtsleeves and standing on a street lined with tall palm trees and other green, leafy foliage -- and that is absolutely not February in Madison, where no palm trees live outside of greenhouses and where temperatures have been well below freezing for most of the winter. Fox clearly used out-of-town footage to depict the "violence" it is hyping as happening in Madison. The segment is two minutes, nine seconds long, and the palm tree footage occurs at the 1:42 mark, as wording on the screen says "Union Protests."

    Main Source: 
    Milwaukee, Wisconsin Journal-Sentinel, March 2, 2011

    Officials Seek More Than Spin From Walker About "Troublemakers" Statements

    by Anne Landman — March 2, 2011 - 12:16pm

    Embattled Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's confession that he talked with political allies about potentially hiring "troublemakers" to disrupt the peaceful protests in Madison have drawn more questions from lawyers, police, Wisconsin state legislators and the mayor of Madison -- and a lot of spin by Walker. Through a spokesman, Walker has said that throughout the prank call he accepted with a fake "David Koch" that he "maintained his appreciation for and commitment to civil discourse." He continues to insist that the budget repair bill is about the budget, and that people other than him suggested using troublemakers to disrupt the crowd. Walker also maintains that he says the same thing in private as he does in public. But despite these responses, questions continue. Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz sent a letter to Walker asking him who made the suggestion to disrupt the protests, what was the nature of the suggestion, and asking what was Walker's immediate response to the proposal. The mayor also asked Walker why he rejected the "troublemakers" proposal due to political considerations rather than on legal and moral grounds. Walker has so far failed to publicly answer the growing number of questions about his statements, and public interest groups have been forced to file Freedom of Information Act requests to obtain the details of Walker's conversations about stirring up violence.

    Main Source: 
    The Cap Times (editorial), March 2, 2011
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