Posts Tagged ‘Apologies’

What’s next for plagiarizer Fareed Zakaria?

August 12, 2012

 

Fareed Zakaria is one of the great thinkers on American foreign policy and on America itself. He’s a trusted senior editor and columnist for Time, and host of an influential weekly show on CNN.

Or was, until yesterday, when he was suspended by both Time and CNN for plagıarısm. Zakaria tweeted an apology:

“Media reporters have pointed out that paragraphs in my Time column on gun control, which was also a topic of conversation on this blog, bear close similarities to paragraphs in Jill Lepore’s essay in the April 23rd issue of The New Yorker. They are right. I made a terrible mistake. It is a serious lapse and one that is entirely my fault. I apologize unreservedly to her, to my editors at Time and CNN, and to my readers and viewers everywhere.”

What is one to make of this sad affair? Zakaria didn’t gain his prominence through plagiarism (more…)

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Posted in Apologies, Ethics-general, Media, Plagiarism | 7 Comments »

MSNBC and White House go crazy over Mark Halperin’s small slip, MSNBC fires him

June 30, 2011

On MSNBC’s Morning Joe this morning best-selling author and Time editor at large Mark Halperin was asked his opinion of President Obama’s behavior at yesterday’s press conference. Before giving it he asked if there was a seven-second delay and was assured by host Joe Scarborough that there was. Co-host Mika Brzezinski urged him on:

“Go for it, we’ll see what happens.”

Scarborough reassured Halperin:

“You fall down I’m going to catch you.”

Halperin gave his opinion:

“I thought he was kind of a dick yesterday.”

The hosts dissolved in giggles—shocked giggles when they learned that there had been no delay, “dick” had gone out on cable at (more…)

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Posted in Apologies, Ethics-general, Government, Media | 3 Comments »

Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) admits all, apologizes to everybody, including Andrew Breitbart

June 6, 2011

At a circus of a press conference, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) admitted tweeting a photo of his brief-covered crotch to a 21-year old college student, then panicking and lying to cover it up. What ethics rule did Weiner break?

The Golden Rule, for one. He hurt a lot of people, starting with his wife, his loyal Congressional staff, the people who believed in him, and apparently, even Andrew Breitbart, the scurrilous right wing defamer and doctorer of videos.

The nearly universal rule against lying, for another. If we lie to each other society crumbles.

The rule that says do what’s expected of you. The voters who sent Weiner to Congress expected –reasonably—different of him.

In addition to the ethics violations Weiner violated the First Law of Washington Scandal: the cover-up is worse than the crime.  In this respect he is forcing his admirers (including me, as of last week) to question his sanity: What in the world was he thinking when he made up those pathetically lame, unbelievable lies. Nobody, no matter their politics, not even Chris Mathews, believed he was telling the truth.

To Weiner’s credit, and there’s not much in this to his credit, he set the standard for apologizing. No “I’m sorry if you thought…” or “I was under the influence of a new allergy prescription,” or (more…)

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Posted in Apologies, Ethics-general, Government, Media, Politics | Leave a Comment »

The three types of apologies and Illinois Senate Candidate Mark Kirk (R)

June 30, 2010

Apologies fall into three categories. Category 1 is the defiant apology: “I’m sorry if you think I did something wrong.”

Category 2 is the evasive apology: “I may have made an innocent mistake, and I’m sorry for it—if I actually did it.”

And there’s Category 3, the apology that’s so rare in politics it doesn’t yet have a name: “I did something wrong, and I’m sorry for it.” This used to be just called an apology, but the other types of apology make the old name inadequate. Just as technology made us replace “phone” with “dial phone,” and mail with “snail mail,” politics makes us put an adjective in front of “apology.” Call it the real apology.

Republican Senate candidate Mark Kirk of Illinois had a lot to apologize for. A month ago he apologized to the Chicago Tribune for a pile of whoppers about his 21-year record as a Navy Reserve intelligence officer: He had not come under fire in Iraq as claimed; had not participated in Operation Desert Storm; had not won the Navy’s award for intelligence officer of the year; had not commanded the Pentagon war room, and had not served in Operation Iraqi Freedom, the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

His apology was Category 2: “I am sorry, absolutely. You should speak with utter precision. You should stand on the documented military record. In public discourse, for high office, you should make sure that there is a degree of complete rigorous precession.” (more…)

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Posted in Ethics-general, Politics | Leave a Comment »