By Posted on Posted in Ethics-International, Media Ethics

This is a doozy, from China.

The photographer of an award-winning photo that advanced the Chinese government’s aims and allayed fears of environmentalists who had protested a high-speed China-Tibet rail link has admitted faking his widely published photo of a herd of rare-species chiru antelope placidly grazing underneath the train tracks, while a train zooms by.

It is two photos spliced together. Liu Weiqing, a man who claimed on his blog, “One man, one car, one year…and a campaign to protect Tibetan antelope,” has now resigned in disgrace along with his editor, his reward revoked.

But…as the Wall Street Journal notes,

Other photographs that took home awards that night included “Facing a harmonious future,” a picture of Chinese President Hu posing with world leaders, and a “A trip to apologize,” a picture of a Japanese monk apologizing to China for Japanese atrocities in World War II. CCTV didn’t reply to inquiries about its criteria for photo awards.

In other words, this award seems to follow a trail that dovetail’s nicely with Chinese government policies and propaganda.

Which makes me–and the Journal’s writers Jane Spencer and Juliet Ye–wonder if Liu was merely the fall guy, if he was asked or ordered to come up with a photo like this:

His friends say he was dedicated to his job and determined to raise the profile of the embattled antelope. “He was a good guy,” says Zhou Zhuogang, an environmental activist from Shenzhen in southern China who met Mr. Liu in the summer of 2006 when the two men were at a volunteer station on the Tibetan plateau. “He loved photography, and he loved the antelope. I don’t know what pushed him to do this.”

Some suspect pressure to create the photo came from above. “When everybody points a finger to the photographer, we actually missed the real core problem here,” says Wang Yangbo, editor of Wen Wei Pao, a Hong Kong Daily. The photographers “are nobodies in the scheme of things here,” she adds.

Remember:

  • China invaded Tibet in the 1950s, has behaved with the worst kind of imperialistic colonialism since then, and continues to repress Tibetans and their independence movement
  • China has been roundly criticized on a number of environmental grounds, from flooding a huge and magnificent area with the Three Gorges Dam to contributing to rapid climate change through its unbridled (and largely un-pollution controlled) consumption of fossil fuels
  • Environmentalists tried to block this train’s construction precisely because of worries about this antelope species

    • Hmmmm.

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    By Posted on Posted in Ethics in Government, Politics

    Straight from the horse’s mouth:

    “The crucial issue here is John McCain’s integrity. John McCain poses as a reformer but seems to think reforms apply to everyone but him,” said Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean. “He used taxpayer money to guarantee a loan so he could raise money from lobbyists and special interests – it’s the height of hypocrisy. This is just the latest example of his do as I say, not as I do double standard, and it’s unlikely to be the last. McCain financially benefited from this legally binding contract – he got free ballot access, saving him millions of dollars, and he secured a $4 million line of credit to keep his campaign afloat by using public financing as collateral. He should follow the law.”

    This is from a Democratic National Committee press release sent today.

    Ironic, isn’t it. “Straight shooter” McCain doesn’t seem to be shooting very straight these days. This is the lead sponsor of the rather mild McCain-Feingold campaign finance law.

    Added to the questions the New York Times raised last week (see my previous blog post)…it does make you wonder. This is their ethics guy???

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    By Posted on Posted in Ethics in Government, Media Ethics, Politics

    To me, the biggest news of the highly critical New York Times story on John McCain is that a man whose entire campaign for the presidency is based on being “Mr. Straight Shooter” is caught in an obvious, blatant, easy-to-check, and dare-I-say spectacular lie. And it’s not about whether or not he slept with this lobbyist (he and she both deny it, and from what I’ve read it appears that staff were getting nervous that the affair might happen not that it was happening.

    Anyway, the New York Times ran a long profile about a number of instances of questionable judgment on John McCain’s part–and McCain’s office issued this rebuttal:

    It is a shame that The New York Times has lowered its standards to engage in a hit-and-run smear campaign. John McCain has a 24-year record of serving our country with honor and integrity. He has never violated the public trust, never done favors for special interests or lobbyists, and he will not allow a smear campaign to distract from the issues at stake in this election.

    (emphasis added).

    And that is the lie. McCain was one of the infamous Keating Five. Here’s the Keating Five section of his hometown newspaper the Arizona Republic’s bio of McCain.

    In fact it was his brush with ethics censure over Keating that led McCain into campaign finance reform, a place where he’s had a bipartisan leadership role. Yet it seems like

    Meanwhile, Kelly McBride and others at the journalism/ethics think tank Poynter Institute took the Times to task both for the timing of the article, and for leading with the allegations about the inappropriately close relationship with this lobbyist, Vicki Iseman (an attractive blonde over 30 years his junior).

    Says the Times,

    Mr. McCain promised, for example, never to fly directly from Washington to Phoenix, his hometown, to avoid the impression of self-interest because he sponsored a law that opened the route nearly a decade ago. But like other lawmakers, he often flew on the corporate jets of business executives seeking his support, including the media moguls Rupert Murdoch, Michael R. Bloomberg and Lowell W. Paxson, Ms. Iseman’s client. (Last year he voted to end the practice.)

    Says Bob Steele of Poynter:

    The New York Times had the obligation to apply rigorous, exacting, substantive standards of reporting, editing and ethics on the McCain story. Times’ editors clearly believed this story was important, given its strong play and length. The Times could have and should have given readers more information about why and how they developed, reported, vetted and edited this story. They should have revealed proactively the story behind the story. They should have better explained the decision to use some unnamed sources, better explained the timing of the publication.

    Says I, however,

    Actually, to me the timing makes a lot of sense. It’s part of a series by the Times profiling the major presidential candidates still left standing. And it’s early enough that if McCain becomes an untouchable from the fallout, there’s plenty of time for someone else to ride in on a white horse. Though it would be ironic indeed if it turned out to be the smarmy flip-flopper Mitt Romney, who seems to focus on the politics of expedience.

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    By Posted on Posted in Peace and War, Politics

    Dylan Loewe argues persuasively in Huffington Post that Hillary Clinton’s series of strategic errors have cost her the nomination.

    I agree with his analysis, but it misses a crucial point: Hillary’s slide started long before the Iowa caucuses. With a record of not just support but cheerleading for the Iraq war, support for the Patriot Act, and even some enthusiasm about the possibility of spreading the war cancer into Iran–Hillary does not inspire support, let alone warm fuzzy feelings, among progressives.

    Meanwhile, the Right has a special passion for hating and vilifying her. I’ve never understood why they are so ardent in their hatred–but they are. So if she were the nominee, she’d be at a serious disadvantage: the right will come out in droves and vote against her, and the Left will stay home or vote 3rd party.

    Even as far back as March, 2006–when she was the undisputed frontrunner–an ABC News poll showed her very weak against McCain. Now that he’s been tested in real elections, Obama of course is much stronger. Latest polls from Zogby/Reuters, AP, Time, ABC, CNN, USA Today, Cook, Rasmussen, Fox all show Obama beating McCain handily in the general election, in some cases by up to 8 points; only NPR shows McCain narrowly winning. But in a McCain-Clinton matchup, Clinton only wins in the AP and CNN polls, ties in Time’s poll, and loses in the other six–by as much as 12 points in the Zogby poll!

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    By Posted on Posted in Peace and War, Social and Economic Justice

    For many months, I’ve seen articles in alternative media sources about the construction of large detention camps, even about boxcars outfitted with shackles for transporting prisoners.

    And my response has always been that I want to see coverage in mainstream media, that it’s too easy to buy into the hysteria and paranoia that can afflict movements of both the left and right.

    Well, here it is: a large and detailed op-ed in the San Francisco Chronicle outlining the detention camps, the no-bid contracts with Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown and Root, the involvement of at least one member of Congress–and the series of post-9/11 laws that give life to this grim scenario. Yes the article entions boxcars with shackles.

    On the other hand, the article notes that this project began in 1999–when Bill Clinton was president. And long before all that enabling legislation.

    Civil libertarians: we need to keep our eyes on this. Be afraid–but don’t be paralyzed by fear.

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    By Posted on Posted in Business Ethics, Marketing Techniques and Philosophies, Marketing Trends/News, People Helping People, Web 2.0/Social Media

    Yeah, I know–viral marketing and all that. And I actually love referral marketing, but not like this.

    But am I the only one offended when someone gives me a tell-your-friends page before I even see the product? It’s happening more and more lately. These unfortunates happened to be the ones to push me into ranting about this trend, but it could have been any number of others.

    At least these guys were smart enough to do a “no, thank you” link where I could still get the download. But I value my reputation and I’m not in the habit of sharing e-mails of my friends with strangers who send bulk mail. Had the only way to get the report been to fill in e-mails, I’d have either given phony names or bailed out.

    Maybe this is one of the factors contributing to the growth of social media at the expense of e-mail. Successful marketers can still be clueless when it comes to human relationships.

    In fact, when I get to all those petition sites (and I confess, I sign a lot of political petitions), the thank-you page invariably asks for addresses of my friends. I never give them. Instead, if I find the petition worthy enough to send, I’ll forward the e-mail, bcc, to my politics list.

    And at least there, I’ve had a chance to see the text, decide if it’s something I want, and pass it on. Why marketers think I’m going to feed their mailing-list fish tank before even seeing the fish… Yuck!

    If you like this rant and want more about how to run and market an ethical, successful business, you may have a look at my award-winning sixth book, Principled Profit: Marketing That Puts People First. You can get the first few chapters as a no-charge download, and you don’t have to fill in a squeeze page OR a tell-a-friend page to get it. So there.

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    By Posted on Posted in Business Ethics, Energy & Sustainability, Ethics in Government

    Lest you think collusion between corrupt government and dubious business interests happens only in the US–read this article on the firing of Linda Keen, until recently the head of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

    Keen was fired for having the temerity to insist that the 50-year-old Chalk river nuke in Ontario stay closed until safety concerns were fully addressed.

    Now, let me disclose my biases. I’ve been studying about nuclear power going back to a college report I did in 1974–and my first book, in 1980, was an expose of the nuclear power industry. In my mind,

  • there is no such thing as a safe nuke (and a wide swatch of the Ukraine is still uninhabitable, more than two decades after the accident at Chernobyl)
  • waste storage will cause problems for thousands of years
  • counting the entire fuel cycle, nukes are a net consumer of energy–so we’re not actually gaining anything by using them
  • solar, wind, and other nonpolluting, renewable technologies make a lot more sense

    • Why was the plant ordered to stay shut?

    In the inspection process, the CPSC regulators found something at the 50-year-old reactor that was terrifying:

    …the reactor had been operating for 17 months without two cooling pumps hooked up to an additional emergency back-up power system capable of withstanding a severe earthquake.

    And yes, there have been earthquakes in the vicinity. And this plant is only two hours from Ottawa, Canada’s capital city.

    But still…here is a woman who was fired because she didn’t want this ancient and probably crumbling nuke to have an accident! Best of luck, Linda in your wrongful termination court case. And thanks for doing what’s right.

    (my thanks to The Weekly Spin for alerting me to this story).
    Business and government ethics violations that directly put life and property at risk are more than just crooked collusion. They are criminal acts.

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    By Posted on Posted in Politics

    Arianna Huffington is consistently a pleasure to read. she’s smart, well-informed, and a wonderful writer.

    Arianna was once a fan of John McCain–in years past, when he still remembered he had a spine. The “new, improved” pander-to-the-far-right candidate, however, brings out the full thrust of her sharp wit as she calls for the media and independent voters to break off the love affair with McCain.

    If any of your friends still think McCain is the moderate he once claimed to be, send them this link, where they can read such comments as

    The old John McCain once stood tall as a fearless leader on immigration, co-sponsoring a humane, bipartisan reform bill with Ted Kennedy. The new John McCain, when asked during a recent GOP debate whether he would support his own proposal, replied: “No, I would not.” In other words, he was for his core beliefs before he was against them.

    What’s the opposite of a “maverick?”

    So McCain has backed an amendment that would limit the right to habeas corpus, has endorsed an Arizona constitutional amendment that would not only ban gay marriage but deny benefits to unmarried couples of any kind (lest those pesky gay people find some kind of loophole), and has discovered a newfound support for teaching “intelligent design” in schools.

    The old John McCain once tried to take the mantle of true conservatism away from George W. Bush. The new John McCain is now essentially running to give America a third Bush term – and, indeed, will even out-Bush Bush when it comes to staying the disastrous course we’re on in Iraq.

    And you should hear what she has to say about McCain’s cozy relationships with GWB and Karl Rove, and a wonderful comparison with a certain scene in “The Godfather.” Click on over and have a look.

    And then, later in the week, she says McCain’s vote in favor of waterboarding torture“should drive a stake through the heart of the McCain-as-straight-talker meme once and for all.”

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    By Posted on Posted in Arts & Entertainment, Marketing Techniques and Philosophies, Marketing Trends/News, Politics, Web 2.0/Social Media

    Copywriter Drayton Bird recently talked about the element of surprise. Here are two brilliant ads that harness that principle.

    First, Shirley Golub, who is a progressive candidate challenging House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the Democratic Party nomination for Congress. Watch her video here (scroll down about half a screen).

    This is an example of how to be extremely effective on basically zero budget. One camera, one talking head, no special effects, I’m guessing a single take–and twisting a metaphor of Pelosi’s in an unforgettable way. And then spreading it through the power of social networks like the People’s Email Network, which put up that page and notified its thousands of activists.

    If I were directing the shoot, the only advice I’d give Golub is to not look down so much–put the script somewhere you can see it while appearing to look at the camera.

    On to the other ad: a slick, commercially produced, expensive (large cast), quite salacious and extremely funny bit that’s rapidly making its way around the Net. And boy does it ever harness the element of surprise (Yes, I have some issues with the politics of the surprise but to say more would spoil it–suffice it to say I recognize and criticize the issue). Don’t watch this one if you wouldn’t see an R-rated movie.

    The surprise is there, all right, and it will get tons of viral exposure–I got the whole huge Youtube video e-mailed to me, and I’m betting it’s making the rounds on MySpace, Facebook, etc. But I wonder how many people will remember the product 24 hours later. In other words, was it a good investment for the manufacturer?

    Bet someone does some research on this, eventually.

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    By Posted on Posted in Politics, Social and Economic Justice

    I’ve been waiting for people to start tossing around the word “liberal” as if it’s some kind of curse, and applying it to one or both of the Democratic front-runners.

    Today for the first time, I saw hint of it, directed against Obama–by someone who seems to be a supporter, Joan Vennnochi, writing in the Boston Globe:

    Other questions, just for the sake of political argument: Do endorsements from the liberal Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts and from the ultra-liberal political action organization, MoveOn.org, come with a downside in the general election? The National Journal just released a listing that ranked Obama as the most liberal senator in 2007. Have the old labels truly lost their ability to zing?

    And why, you ask, have I been so eagerly waiting for this? Very simple: it gives me the excuse to give Barack Obama my very best advice:

    Barack, stand strong, don’t back down, and don’t be ashamed to be liberal. You were voted the most liberal Senator; make the most of it, and wear it as a badge of honor.

    I want to hear you say these words, or something similar:

    You say I’m a liberal as if it’s some sort of dirty word. Liberals shortened the work day from 12 hours to 8. Liberals made it possible for all of us to still breathe the air and drink the water, by passing the Clean Air an Clean Water Acts. Liberals brought us universal public education, the civil rights movement the idea that discrimination is wrong no matter who its target. I’m proud to be a liberal, John. In the next four years, liberals will bring us universal health care, will get us out of a war we had no business entering in the first place, will reverse the Bush Administration assault on civil liberties, and will restore our standing as a leader among nations that it had before the very unliberal Bush administration took over. John McCain, aren’t you ashamed that you’re so adamantly not a liberal?

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