When a large company is getting clobbered by news stories
and pundits, the damage-control response often includes packing
full-page newspaper ads with solemn reassurances. That's what the
Arthur Andersen accounting firm has been doing lately to wash
some of the mud off its name as the outfit that assisted with
Enron's phony bookkeeping.
Andersen is "committed to making fundamental changes in its
business as a result of the issues raised by the Enron matter,"
says one of the big-type advertisements -- headlined "An Open
Letter from Joe Berardino, Managing Partner and CEO, Andersen."
The ad explains that changes "already taking place ... are major
steps toward reforming our U.S. audit practice and transforming
our firm."
Such ads are carefully crafted by PR agencies that
specialize in blending tones of repentance, wisdom and
resilience. The aim is to make headway with investors, Wall
Street analysts, journalists and the general public. So, a
contrite Andersen ad pledges that "we will be accountable for our
actions, will learn from the experience, and will become a better
firm as a result." Theoretically, those kinds of ads are prudent.
But most readers can probably recognize the cloying
phraseology as self-serving. Full-page ad statements might be
more convincing if they went a bit heavier on the honesty.
Andersen would really seem to be turning over a new
corporate leaf if it gambled on candor. For instance: "We made
huge profits by helping Enron with its shell game. Now the game
is over, and we're ready to repent. We've suffered consequences
of getting caught, so we figure that in the future we'll be more
trustworthy than other accounting firms."
But people like Berardino and Enron's Kenneth Lay aren't the
only high-profile professionals facing significant media-image
problems. These days, some prominent American journalists might
want to consider taking out a few full-page ads themselves.
Facts have recently emerged about several journalists who
quietly pocketed sizeable checks from Enron. Now, maybe I can be
helpful. In a collegial spirit, I'd like to provide -- at no
charge -- some wording that they could use in their own full-page
ads.
Bill Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard, has reluctantly
admitted that he received $100,000 for a two-year stint on an
Enron "advisory board" that didn't do much of anything.
An Open Letter from Bill Kristol: "Members of the vast
left-wing conspiracy are trying to make a big deal out of a
hundred grand. That's less than our magazine's annual martini
budget! Let's get real -- I can't be bought for that kind of
money. Besides, if you don't want capitalism with a rapacious
edge to it, you've got the alternative of soul-murdering
Communist tyranny..."
New York Times op-ed columnist Paul Krugman got $50,000 from
Enron to serve on the company's phantom-like advisory board in
1999, before he joined the newspaper.
An Open Letter from Paul Krugman: "The people I condemn in
my columns have ripped off millions, even billions. I'm not in
their league. They are demagogues and robber barons. I am an
entrepreneurial member of the affluent middle class..."
Republican wordsmith Peggy Noonan, who writes purportedly
visionary commentaries for The Wall Street Journal, has said that
she was paid between $25,000 and $50,000 for assisting Enron's
Lay with a speech and annual report.
An Open Letter from Peggy Noonan: "Are we to become a land
of mediocrity or meritocracy? I see a shining city on a hill. May
the spirit of America, with its free enterprise and hard-working
God-fearing citizens, lift our hearts to rejoice in our nation's
triumph over the slow suffocation of envying freedom's apostles.
Yet some wish to tarnish the legacy of saintly Ronald Reagan,
while disparaging me in the process. Forever is the memory of one
spring morning when I met with President Reagan in the Oval
Office, and I gazed into his eyes, crystalline windows of his
spiritual magnificence..."
The current need to refurbish media reputations is extending
far beyond the perimeters of the Enron scandal, however. Last
fall, Geraldo Rivera joined the staff of Fox News Channel so he
could rush off to Afghanistan -- where he quickly gained
attention for claiming to be situated where he actually wasn't,
all the while posturing as an intrepid correspondent on the front
lines.
An Open Letter from Geraldo Rivera: "Due to my idealism, I
allowed myself to get carried away. But a war was on, and as long
as Rupert Murdoch pays enough, why shouldn't I shoulder arms in
the Fox army? There's no such thing as being too patriotic or too
ambitious. So what if I made stuff up? I was waving the flag --
you got a problem with that? Gimme a break..."
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Note to readers: You can access free audio and video of Norman
Solomon's recent one-hour appearance on C-SPAN's "Washington
Journal" by going to
www.c-span.org and typing in his name at
"SEARCH C-SPAN.org." The program aired live on Feb. 10; it will
be on the website until about Feb. 25.
