In busy news week, New York’s governor says he won’t resign despite controversy over allegations of abuse of office; there’s speculation that embattled Rep. Charles Rangel may not seek reelection; Western New York congressman will resign rather than face ethics probe; ethics missing from debate on economic crisis, according to Reuters analysis; watchdog groups weigh on the current state of congressional ethics

VARIOUS DATELINES

Ethical angles were components of the top news from U.S. politics last week. Among the stories:

• Embattled New York governor David Paterson said he has no intention of resigning and vowed to clear his name while remaining in office. ABC News reports that Paterson’s declaration came on the same day that a poll indicated that less than half of New Yorkers say he should finish out his term. Paterson is facing two ethics scandals: charges that he helped cover up a domestic violence claim involving one of his aides as well as allegations that he lied about accepting free World Series tickets.

• Supporters are urging New York congressman Charles Rangel to seek re-election this fall, reports the New York Daily News, but many are not sure that Rangel, who was forced to give up his high-profile Ways and Means Committee chairmanship because of an ethics scandal, will be content to return as a rank-and-file member of Congress. Among Rangel’s other challenges, reports the News, is that he is paying several lawyers to defend him from the ethics charges, and his fundraising clout has been diminished since losing his chairmanship.

• Western New York freshman Rep. Eric Massa, under pressure from other House Democrats, last week announced his pending resignation in the wake of a sexual harassment accusation from a staffer. Massa cited a reoccurrence of cancer as the reason for his resignation, but acknowledged that an ethics investigation also is part of the cause, reports TIME magazine. Massa denies the harassment claim, saying instead that his “salty language” may have offended the staffer.

• The debate over the world economic crisis seems to be overlooking the ethical angle, according to an analysis from the Reuters news agency. Politicians seem unable to come up with a plan to reflect voters’ moral unease, claims a group that is, according to the Reuters report, trying to jumpstart an ethics debate. “People have strong emotions about right and wrong — that sense of justice is hard-wired into the way we view the world,” says Madeleine Bunting, one of three founders of the Citizen Ethics Network, which launched in London last week. “Our politics have lost the capacity to connect with that kind of emotion…. Politics has become very technocratic and managerial, all about who’s going to deliver more economic growth.” Political leaders in Britain were quick to endorse the project, with Conservative opposition leader David Cameron commenting that politicians have shied away from moral questions for “fear of seeming judgmental,” noting that it is “vital we find a way of talking about these issues without people feeling preached at.”

• Several watchdog groups are calling for a reworking of congressional ethics rules after a House ethics panel cleared more than a dozen lawmakers in two separate investigations, according to a report from USA Today. Some of the controversy centers on the independent Office of Congressional Ethics, which vets complaints before sending them on to the House Ethics Committee. Critics say the independent office is ineffective and lacks subpoena power. And, say watchdog group spokesmen interviewed by the paper, when complaints do reach the full ethics committee, they often are dismissed. “It is stunning to us that the ethics committee is blatantly closing cases when the OCE has raised the red flag,” Mary Boyle of Common Cause told USA Today. Boyle’s remarks came after the ethics committee cleared seven lawmakers of wrongdoing in an investigation of their relationship with a now-defunct lobbying group, according to the report.
• Reacting to the current spate of scandals in congressional politics, House speaker Nancy Pelosi defended the Democratic Party’s record on ethics and said she has taken strong steps to clean up the House of Representatives, according to a report from McClatchy Newspapers. McClatchy’s William Douglas and David Lightman write: “Watchdog groups say, however, that Pelosi’s actions have fallen woefully short of House Democrats’ promise to ‘drain the swamp’ of unethical behavior, a vow they emphasized when they won control of the House in 2006 after Republican corruption scandals centered on disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Now Republicans see an important campaign issue emerging for November’s congressional elections.”

Sources: ABC News, Mar. 5 — Time, Mar. 5 — New York Daily News, Mar. 5 — Reuters, Mar. 4 — USA Today, Mar. 4 — McClatchy, Mar. 4.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Mar. 1 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 1 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 11 — Related Newsline Commentary, Oct. 12, 2009.

Guatemala stunned by arrest of top law enforcement officials on charges of stealing cocaine; Uganda’s newly discovered oil reserves may turn into a curse rather than a blessing if corruption continues, says World Bank official; Jordan cracks down on alleged bribery

VARIOUS DATELINES

Allegations of graft dominated headlines in stories from several nations last week. Among the coverage:

• Guatemala is reeling from a corruption scandal that has prompted the Obama administration to hold the nation up as an example of how graft can subvert the rule of law. According to the Associated Press, Guatemala’s chief drug enforcement official and police chief were arrested last week and charged with stealing cocaine from traffickers. U.S. officials said the events show how a country with weak institutions and safeguards can be overtaken by the world’s multibillion-dollar drug industry. U.S. secretary of State Hillary Clinton added that “a number” of Latin American nations are “not taking strong enough stands against the erosion of law because of the pressure from drug traffickers,” according to the AP.

• Widespread corruption could turn Uganda’s recently discovered oil reserves into a curse, says the country’s World Bank representative. The Bank’s Kundhavi Kadiresan said that graft, which currently costs the government hundreds of millions of dollars a year, must be addressed before the country joins the league of African oil producers, reports the Wall Street Journal. Kadiresan warns that if the world community does not have confidence in the government, oil purchases and international donors may steer clear of the country and its products.

• A tribunal last week ordered the arrest of four Jordanians, including a former finance minister, on bribery charges, according to the Agence France-Presse. Public prosecution of cases involving corruption charges are relatively rare in Jordan, but prosecuting graft has become a part of the platform of the new government of prime minister Samir Rifai, reports the AFP.

Sources: Wall Street Journal, Mar. 4 — AP, Mar. 4 — AFP, Mar. 4.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Mar. 1 — Related Newsline story, Sep. 8, 2009 — Related Newsline story, June 22, 2009 — Related Newsline story, July 2, 2001 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 1, 1999.

Airport scanners continue to cause controversy; local governments in Britain are raising eyebrows with microchips installed in trashcans; Facebook ads that draw on personal information are characterized as “creepy and off-putting” by some

VARIOUS DATELINES

The intersection of ethics and technology continued to be fertile ground for news stories last week. Among the coverage:

• Boston’s Logan Airport became the first of 11 U.S. airports to receive full-body scanning devices purchased with federal recovery funds, reports PCWorld. Privacy advocates continued to express reservations about the scanners, saying the revealing images, which have been likened by critics to “a virtual strip search,” are intrusive. Airport officials told the Globe that travelers who object to the scans have the option of submitting to a traditional pat down and metal-detector pass-through. But alternate options were not available to two women who refused to submit to a scanner at London’s Heathrow, reports the Times of London. One woman, a Muslim, claimed religious objections based on the revealing nature of the scan, and another said she feared health effects. The Muslim woman forfeited her ticket to Pakistan, reports the Times.

• Britain, characterized by some critics as a “nanny state” because of its purported high level of social control and surveillance, is in the midst of another controversy involving monitoring of garbage cans, reports Sky News. Many local governments have been installing monitoring chips in municipally distributed trash bins. The chips match cans with owners and can be used to track the weight of the bins, leading opponents to fear that Britain eventually will move to a pay-as-you go system, which they claim will discriminate against large families. Various local authorities interviewed by Sky News say the chips eventually will be used to give incentives to those who don’t throw away much trash rather than fining those who do. So far, reports Sky News, most municipalities have not activated the chips, apparently fearing public backlash.

• Advertisers are walking a fine line separating appropriate content from the overly intrusive on Facebook, according to an analysis from the New York Times. Reporter Brad Stone notes that while the social networking service offers what usually are plain-vanilla ads from big companies, the “site’s pages are also home to countless ads from smaller companies that can be funny, weird or just plain creepy — those suggesting you are, say, eligible to get a free iPad because you are exactly 26 years old, or entreaties to see what your offspring would look like if you had a child with a celebrity.” Stone reports that ads using scraps of information about you can, if the strategy is carried too far, become, in the words of a marketer interviewed for the article, “not only creepy but off-putting.”

Sources: PCWorld, Mar. 6 — Sky News, Mar. 5 — Times of London, Mar. 4 — New York Times, Mar 4.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 8 — Related Newsline Commentary, Feb. 1 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 1 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 11.

Also from the business ethics file: Two congressmen want more data from Toyota, and Supreme Court seems sympathetic to Enron exec’s claim that he didn’t have a fair trial because of outrage among potential jurors

VARIOUS DATELINES

• Ethics featured in several top news stories about business last week. Among the coverage: Goldman-Sachs officially admitted that widespread public anger over lavish pay packages for its executives poses a “risk factor” for its ability to transact business, according to a report in the London-based Guardian. In its annual report, the firm includes “negative publicity” about executive compensation in a list of potential liabilities, alongside more traditional factors such as market volatility and regulatory uncertainty.
• Two powerful members of Congress last week pressed Toyota for more transparency, calling for the company to release more information on electronic components and any possible link to sudden acceleration, the Christian Science Monitor reports. Henry Waxman, chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and Bart Stupak, the head of the subcommittee on oversight, say they want more details on which cars will get a fix on the system that cuts power when the brake is pressed, and whatever “black box” data is stored on electronic devices that, in a similar manner to flight recorders on airplanes, record data on the cars’ performance.
• U.S. Supreme Court justices, hearing matters related to the appeal of former Enron executive Jeff Skilling, last week expressed concern about the selection process for the Houston jury that eventually sent Skilling to prison. Part of Skilling’s appeal argues that it was impossible to find an impartial jury in Houston following the spectacular crash of the firm, reports the Houston Chronicle. Several justices said they were troubled by the jury selection, but according to the Chronicle report, appeals based on venue problems face a high hurdle since the High Court has been reluctant to make decisions that impinge on trial judges’ discretion regarding where and how to try cases. The court is not expected to rule on the matter until midsummer.

Sources: Christian Science Monitor, Mar. 6 — Houston Chronicle, Mar. 4 — Guardian, Mar. 4.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Mar. 1 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 22 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 22 — Related Newsline story, Sep. 10, 2007 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 13, 2006.

As the automaker’s reputation continues to take a pummeling, it’s expected to lose significant market share

WASHINGTON and DETROIT

Toyota’s reputation took another blow last Friday when a congressional committee chairman charged that the company withheld documents that should have been turned over to plaintiffs in liability lawsuits.

Edolphus Towns (D-NY), chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which heard testimony earlier in the week from top Toyota officials, said in a statement that the documents, obtained from a whistle-blower, indicate “a systematic disregard for the law and routine violation of discovery orders in litigation,” the Washington Post reports.

Toyota did not immediately comment on Towns’s charges, the Reuters news agency reports.

At Wednesday’s hearing before Congress, Toyota president Akio Toyoda apologized to customers and said the company had confused its priorities by trying to expand too quickly and weakening its emphasis on safety, according to USA Today.

But Toyoda denied knowing about any problem with unintended acceleration until late last year, following the first two major recalls of his company’s vehicles.

Toyota’s massive recall and quality-driven PR disaster is likely to lower the company’s share of the U.S. auto market to about 12 percent, reports the Detroit Free Press. That would be the lowest level of domestic share in nearly five years.

Sources: Washington Post, Feb. 27 — Detroit Free Press, Feb. 27 — Reuters, Feb. 26 — USA Today, Feb. 25 — USA Today, Feb. 24.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 22 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 22 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 15 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 8 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 8.

Graft is consistently the number one grievance cited in public opinion polls and is openly acknowledged to be the biggest threat to Communist Party control

BEIJING

China’s Communist Party has issued a new ethics code to fight corruption, which leaders view as one of the biggest long-term threats to the nation’s survival.

The Agence France-Presse reports that the code outlaws 52 specific actions on the part of government officials at all levels, including accepting gifts and using their influence to benefit friends and family.

Provisions of the new code also prohibit officials from establishing for-profit enterprises, profiting from shady property transfers, or registering companies outside of the Chinese mainland, according to the official state agency Xinhua.

Corruption has become endemic in China, and according to the BBC’s Quentin Sommerville, the evidence is readily apparent.

“Some of the most senior party officials in China have been on the take — property speculation has been particularly popular,” Sommerville writes. “The richer the country gets, the bigger the sums involved…. In some provinces, party and government headquarters are indistinguishable from plush five star hotels. The latest luxury sedans are often used to ferry around officials.”

The Times of London’s Beijing bureau reports that corruption is the main grievance aired in public opinion polls conducted in China, and the party openly admits that graft poses the greatest threat to its hold on political power.

Sources: Times of London, Feb. 25 — BBC, Feb. 24 — AFP, Feb. 24 — Xinhua, Feb. 23.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 22 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 25 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Oct. 19, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Sep. 8, 2009.

Prosecutors say suppliers paid off purchasing managers so they would accept substandard goods

SACRAMENTO

Federal investigators say they have uncovered a vein of widespread corruption in the food industry.

The New York Times reports that in recent months and years, executives at Kraft, Frito-Lay, Safeway, and B&G Foods have pleaded guilty to taking bribes from suppliers — in some cases, to accept tomatoes with high levels of mold or other defects.

No one was harmed as a result of consuming the tomatoes, which were not a health risk, according to prosecutors interviewed by the Times.

In the case’s most recent development, the former owner of a food supply firm allegedly involved in the scheme was indicted on federal racketeering and six other corruption counts, the Los Angeles Times reports. Frederick Scott Salyer, former owner of SK Foods, allegedly led a conspiracy to use bribes to shut out rival suppliers and sell his tomato products, some of which were substandard and mislabeled, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Salyer has pleaded not guilty, ABC News reports.

Prosecutors contend that the bribery schemes ran from 1990 to 2008, reports Bloomberg.

Sources: New York Times,Feb. 25 — Los Angeles Times, Feb. 19 — ABC News, Feb. 19 — Bloomberg, Feb. 18.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 11 — Related Newsline story, Aug. 10, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Mar. 23, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 9, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 10, 2008.

Schools across U.S. disavow remotely activated web-cam software after Pennsylvania scandal; EU wants Google to comply with more restrictions on Street View photography; and ruling in Italian court case worries some free-expression advocates

VARIOUS DATELINES

Privacy was at the center of several ethics controversies highlighted by the world press last week. Among the stories:

• Following the revelation that a Philadelphia-area school allegedly spied on students using laptop webcams issued to students, schools across the United States now are disavowing the use of remote-access software that can activate the cameras. The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that the row, which has attracted international attention, stemmed from activation of what is ostensibly a security feature in the laptops — allowing the webcams built into the computers to be activated if a computer is lost or stolen. A student claims that he was spied on in the course of everyday life, a charge that the Lower Merion School District denies. Officials of many school districts interviewed by the Inquirer say they generally don’t let students take school-issued laptops home or have refused to use remote-access software because of privacy concerns.

• The European Union says Google should warn people before it sends out camera-equipped vehicles to take photos of neighborhoods for the popular Street View mapping service, reports the technology network CNET. EU privacy regulators also want the company to shorten the time it keeps photos from a year to six months. Google says that it does post information about photo plans on its website, blurs faces and license plate numbers, and will remove specific images if requested. Google also argues that it needs to keep the data for a year in order to use it for mapping and correcting mistakes.

• Online activists are denouncing a verdict in Italy that found Google executives guilty on privacy charges for not blocking a video that made fun of a child with Down’s syndrome, according to a report from Wired. Leslie Harris, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Democracy and Technology, tells Wired that the ruling would be used by authoritarian regimes to justify their own web censorship. “Today’s stunning verdict sets an extremely dangerous precedent that threatens free expression and chills innovation on the global Internet,” Harris said. “Most troubling, what happened in Italy is unlikely to stay in Italy. The Italian court’s actions today will surely embolden authoritarian regimes and be used to justify their own efforts to suppress Internet freedom.”

Sources: CNET, Feb. 27 — Wired, Feb. 25 — Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 25.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 22 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 8 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 25 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 11.

Federal education officials and unions square off as all of the teachers in an underperforming school are let go

CENTRAL FALLS, R.I.

The en masse firing of every teacher at an underperforming Rhode Island school has focused attention on the balance of ends versus means in dealing with public education reform.

The New England Cable News network reports that a total of 93 teachers, principals, administrators, and assistants were let go from Central Falls High School in Rhode Island.

According to the Christian Science Monitor, the move is part of a turnaround plan proposed by the district superintendent and was approved by the state educational commissioner.

Advocates of the all-at-once firing, called a turnaround, contend that it is an efficient way to remove bad teachers and clean up a culture that makes it difficult for teachers to perform well by allowing a clean sweep with the possibility of hiring back some of the good apples.

Under federal regulations, up to half of the staff can be rehired.

Turnaround firings may trend upward because new federal guidelines require that in order to remain eligible for a portion of financial aid, poorly performing schools must either come up with a viable strategy to improve teaching staff or start from scratch, reports CBS News.

U.S. Education secretary Arne Duncan praised the Central Falls firing, saying officials there are “showing courage and doing the right thing for kids,” according to the CBS report.

Union officials say the move is unjust.

“This is immoral, illegal, unjust, irresponsible, disgraceful, and disrespectful,” said George Nee, president of the Rhode Island AFL-CIO, reports the Providence Journal.

Speaking to a crowd of more than 500, including busloads of teachers from across the state, Nee said, “What is happening here tonight is the wrong thing … and we’re not going to put up with it.”

Teachers and staff have vowed to appeal the firing.

Sources: Christian Science Monitor, Feb. 25 — Providence Journal, Feb. 24 — CBS, Feb. 24 — New England Cable News, Feb. 24.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 22 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 15 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 25 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 4.

Another dilemma: What to do with the animal, which likely cannot live in the wild but would suffer if kept in total isolation

ORLANDO

The death of an aquatic animal trainer who was dragged and battered by a killer whale at a Florida theme park has raised a host of moral questions.

Reports the San Diego Tribune’s Mike Lee: “SeaWorld San Diego shut down its killer whale show after an orca at its sister facility in Orlando, Fla., fatally dragged and thrashed a trainer Wednesday. The incident cast a pall over marine-themed parks and raised old questions about the ethics — and dangers — of keeping large ocean predators in captivity.”

The whale at the Florida park grabbed the ponytail of trainer Dawn Brancheau and dragged her underwater.

According to the Tribune, there is a decades-long history of trainers being injured by killer whales, leading some observers to contend that marine mammals should not be kept in captivity.

CNN quotes marine biologist Nancy Black of Monterey Bay Wildlife Watch as saying that putting such an enormous animal in a tank causes it to become very “stressed out.”

Another expert interviewed by CNN claimed that the claustrophobic environment in theme parks makes the animals “neurotic” and likely to engage in violent behavior they would not typically exhibit in the wild.

According to a report from MSNBC, the whale who killed Brancheau, named Tilikum, has been involved in the deaths of two other humans.

Now, reports MSNBC, SeaWorld is confronted with the question of what to do with the animal.

There are few good options: Experts quoted by the London Telegraph say that a killer whale raised in captivity, like Tilikum, would be unable to survive if released back to the wild, but would be traumatized if kept in total isolation.

Sources: MSNBC, Feb. 25 — CNN, Feb. 25 — Telegraph, Feb. 25 — San Diego Union Tribune, Feb. 24.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Dec. 21, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Oct. 12, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Mar. 3, 2008 — Related Newsline story, Mar. 26, 2007 — Related Newsline story, May 24, 2004.

New York governor drops out of race in wake of scandal; House committee says Rangel broke ethics rules; Wyoming may adopt “Cowboy Ethics” as state law

VARIOUS DATELINES

A number of stories from the week’s political file involved ethics. Among them:

• New York State Gov. David Paterson, swept up in a scandal involving allegations that he covered up for one of his top aides implicated in a domestic-abuse scandal, last week announced that he would not seek reelection. The New York Daily News reports that Paterson denied any impropriety, but said that it had become “increasingly clear to me in the last few days that I cannot run for office and try to manage the state’s business at the same time.” Paterson said he welcomes the outcome of an investigation into the scandal, which is being led by New York State attorney general Andrew Cuomo, who is expected to run for the governor’s spot, according to the Daily News.

• A House committee has concluded that Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) broke ethics rules by traveling to the Caribbean on trips funded by corporate interests, UPI reports. But Rangel, who has been under pressure to relinquish his powerful Ways and Means Committee chairmanship, denies any impropriety on his part, saying the problem resulted from a mistake by his staff.

• The Wyoming legislature may adopt “Cowboy Ethics” as its official state code, reports the Associated Press. The list comes from a book titled Cowboy Ethics and includes such admonitions as “live each day with courage” and “take pride in your work.” The sponsor of the measure tells the AP that such old-fashioned values will encourage better ethical practices in business and society.

Sources: New York Times, Feb. 27 — New York Times, Feb. 26 — New York Daily News, Feb. 26 — UPI, Feb. 25 — AP, Feb. 25.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 15 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 1 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 16, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Oct. 26, 2009.

Observers weigh in on the role of an apology in public life — and the impact on the social fabric of trust

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla.
The ethics of redemption fixated much of the viewing public in the U.S. and worldwide last week, as Tiger Woods attempted to revive his image after a grotesque scandal that saw him admit to multiple affairs and enter a clinic for treatment of  so-called sex addiction.

ABC News reports that Woods’ public apology was a highly orchestrated event in which most reporters were kept out of the room and no questions were taken. The spectacle nevertheless galvanized the public.

Writes ABC’s Christine Brozyna: “In homes, offices and anywhere there was a TV, people crowded around screens to watch Woods’ first public appearance since the Thanksgiving week incident that left Tiger’s car wrecked and his public persona in tatters.”

Journalists quickly began to attempt to gauge whether Woods’ apology was sincere, if it was actually required, and whether it will buff the tarnish from his image.

CNN interviewed a variety of communication and business ethics experts, some of whom said that an apology delayed is a violation of apology etiquette.

“If you have to take time to say ’sorry,’ you’re not being authentic,” Glenn Llopis, the founder of the Center for Innovation & Humanity, a California-based think tank, told CNN. “We don’t need extra time to rationalize whether we’re sorry or not.”

But business ethicist Lauren Bloom, author of The Art of the Apology, says, “It’s never too late to say ‘I’m sorry.’”

“But saying ‘I’m sorry’ in a tightly controlled environment,” Bloom told CNN, “makes it look more and more like an exercise in ‘let’s check the box and do what my PR people tell me to do.’”

Another ethics angle emerged from the apology: Woods promised a return to the teachings of Buddhism, which he said had guided him since his childhood, CBS News reports.

While he plans to continue therapy, Woods said he also has learned the importance of examining his spiritual life and balance it with his professional life. “I need to regain my balance and be centered, so I can see the things that are most important to me: My marriage and my children.”

CBS notes: “The foundation of Buddhist philosophy is ethics, James Shaheen, editor and publisher of the Buddhist magazine Tricycle, told the Associated Press: ‘An ethical life leads to a life of less suffering.’”

The New York Times quotes the Rev. Gary Dorrien, a professor of social ethics at Union Theological Seminary, who noted: “Public trust is built on an assumption that public officials, and respected public figures, can be believed — that you can trust that they are who they say they are.”

“When public figures are revealed to be other than who they claimed — and follow up with apologies that betray them as having immature personalities, unfamiliar with the rigors of honest self-assessment — the fabric of social trust suffers,” paraphrases the Times.

Sources: New York Times, Feb. 19 — CBS News, Feb. 19 — CNN, Feb. 19 — ABC, Feb. 19.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 21, 2009 — Related Newsline Commentary, Dec. 14, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 14, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 7, 2009.

Olympic officials say track is safe after the death of Georgian competitor

VANCOUVER
The death of a competitor in the luge competition at the Vancouver Olympics has sparked a controversy over whether profit trumped safety in the design of the controversial track.

Planners, motivated in part to locate the luge and bobsled track in a high-traffic tourist area, chose a site that was steeper and narrower than the sites of previous Olympic tracks, reports the Wall Street Journal.

CTV reports that the track’s designer said the original planned location was on terrain that would have allowed a shallower, more traditional course lacking the extraordinary speeds at the current site.

But Mark Adams, a spokesman for the International Olympic Committee, rejected claims that safety was compromised, the Toronto Star reports.

“We emphasized time and again this was a track that was safe,” Adams said, “not just in our opinion but in the opinion of the federation people who do the sport day in and day out and in the opinion of the vast majority of athletes.”

Tim Gayda, vice president of the Vancouver Olympics organizing committee, said that safety was the top priority but added that perfect safety cannot be assured.

“To make it 100 percent safe you would need to put the track in a tube, and that’s really not what this sport is about,” he said, according to the Agence France-Presse.

Olympic officials have blamed the death of 21-year-old Nodar Kumaritashvili on human error.

Sources: Wall Street Journal, Feb. 20 — AFP, Feb. 21 — Toronto Star, Feb. 19 — CTV, Feb. 17.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 8 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline commentary, Nov. 23, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 2, 2009.

Testimony invokes debate over ethics and responsibilities of leadership

WASHINGTON
Toyota’s president ended weeks of speculation and controversy and agreed to testify before the U.S. Congress about safety defects in the company’s vehicles.

Some analysts predict that the appearance of Akio Toyoda, grandson of the company’s founder, could help repair the company’s image, reports the Los Angeles Times.

“This is essential.” Jeremy Anwyl, chief executive of auto industry data compiler Edmunds.com, told the Times. “Even if he wasn’t going to testify, he needed to make an appearance. Consumers in the United States expect the guy running the company to take responsibility.”

A major component of the ethical controversy surrounding Toyota’s massive recalls is what top management knew about the defects and when they knew it. Late last week, State Farm Insurance Company revised earlier reports to indicate that it first notified the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in 2004 about safety-related claims involving Toyota vehicles, MarketWatch reports. State Farm originally said it first noted the claims in 2007.

Toyoda’s planned appearance, after his initial refusal and delegation of the testimony to a subordinate, prompted debate in various columns and editorial pages about the ethics of leadership and responsibility.

An opinion piece in the Times of London counters that Toyoda’s subordinate was the best person to handle the inquiry.

For one thing, contends the Times’s Leo Lewis, Toyoda’s stumbling English may lead him to say things subject to misinterpretation.

Second, Lewis says the invitation from Rep. Edolphus Towns “betrays an uglier agenda behind the hearings. There is revenge, schadenfreude and protectionism in the mix and those feelings were never going to be satisfied by the appearance of a mere deputy. This is about utterly humiliating a company that grew bigger than General Motors and about giving Americans — whether or not they even own a Toyota — their A Few Good Men moment where the big man is brought down…. By leaving the door open for Mr. Towns to invite him to Washington, Mr. Toyoda has exposed the hearings for a political game where punishment trumps practicality.”

Sources: MarketWatch, Feb. 20 — Los Angeles Times, Feb. 19 — Forbes, Feb. 19 — Times of London, Feb. 19.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 15 — Related Newsline Commentary, Feb. 8 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 8 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 1 — Related Newsline story, Mar. 27, 2000.

School district under fire for remotely activating webcams in school-issued laptops; cyber attacks on Google reportedly traced back to Chinese schools; new website says it points out dangers of social media that show locations of users — by advertising which homes are good targets for burglars

VARIOUS DATELINES
Ethics and technology intersected in several stories last week. Among the coverage:

• A Pennsylvania school district is facing criticism for allegedly spying on students using school-issued laptops. According to PCWorld, the student’s laptop webcam was activated remotely, capturing the student engaging in activity that school officials described only as “improper” and “at home.” Remote activation of the laptops’ webcams is supposed to be strictly confined to theft-prevention measures, according to the Lower Merion School District. The Philadelphia Daily News says the student in question maintains that he was eating candy that was mistaken for pills. The school district tells the News it has activated the cameras 42 times in an attempt to recover stolen or missing laptops, but never to spy on students. Law enforcement officials are investigating whether any laws were broken, reports the News. An invasion of privacy civil suit also is planned.
• Cyber attacks on Google have been traced to computers at two Chinese schools, reports UPI. Investigators say sources who spoke under condition of anonymity allegedly named Shanghai Jiaotong University and Lanxiang Vocational School. It is unclear, say intelligence officials, if the Chinese government ultimately is responsible for the hacking or if it is related to intelligence operations run by a third country. China has denied the report. The issue assumed major ethical proportions because the alleged intrusion into Google’s databases, purportedly in search of records on human-rights activities, prompted a threat from Google to abandon its government-censored search engine operations in China.
• There’s a two-pronged ethics argument over the fact that various online services that announce where you are at any minute may erode personal security, and whether a new website called Please Rob Me — ostensibly in order to alert people to the dangers of geo-positioning social media — is justified in broadcasting such information. The Christian Science Monitor reports that the home page of Please Rob Me contends: “The danger is publicly telling people where you are…. This is because it leaves one place you’re definitely not … home. So here we are; on one end we’re leaving lights on when we’re going on a holiday, and on the other we’re telling everybody on the Internet we’re not home.” The Monitor reports that a poll on a tech blog revealed that only 24 percent of respondents thought the site was unethical.

Sources: Philadelphia Daily News, Feb. 20 — Christian Science Monitor, Feb. 17 — UPI, Feb. 19 — PCWorld, Feb. 19.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Feb. 1 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 19 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 11 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 21, 2009.

In other political news, DC council may censure Marion Barry over corruption accusation, and ethics officer in Chicago claims his suspension was due to retaliation

VARIOUS DATELINES
Several stories topped the week’s news in political ethics. Among them:

• State lawmakers now are officially prohibited from running private businesses out of their government offices — an effort to close the “Bruno Gap,” reports radio station WNYC. The appellation refers to former Senate majority leader Joseph Bruno, who was convicted recently on felony charges, some of them centered on private business activities conducted within his state office. The “Bruno Gap” measure is one part of a larger package of ethics-reform measures still at issue in New York State, where the governor recently vetoed other reform bills he said did not go far enough, notes WNYC.
• The Washington DC Council may censure council member and former mayor Marion Barry if he cannot exonerate himself of public corruption allegations, the Washington Post reports. A report submitted to the council accuses Barry of benefiting from a contract he secured for a former girlfriend, taking a $15,000 cut, and using city earmarks to reward friends and supporters. Barry has denied the accusations and promises a thorough rebuttal. The Post reports that while Barry has been in good standing among his colleagues on the council, there are signs that his troubles are causing him to lose support.
• Chicago mayor Richard Daley’s ethics chief last week sued Daley for suspending him, reports the Chicago Tribune. Daley suspended Anthony Boswell for 30 days after the city’s inspector general concluded Boswell mishandled a sexual harassment complaint against an emergency services supervisor. Boswell also sued inspector general Joseph Ferguson. Boswell claims that top city leaders trumped up issues leading to his suspension in retaliation for his disclosure of improper hiring practices, according to the Tribune. Daley denies that the suspension was retaliatory, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

Sources: Chicago Sun-Times, Feb. 20 — Chicago Tribune, Feb. 18 — Washington Post, Feb. 17 — WNYC, Feb. 12.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 23, 2009 — Related Newsline story, July 28, 2009 — Related Newsline story, July 24, 2006 — Related Newsline story, July 25, 2005.

The actors say they were told they were participating in a mock trial, conducted via telephone; their roles were uncovered after researcher was cleared and subsequently sued for damage to his reputation

BUFFALO, N.Y.
Prosecutors in New York are examining what must rank among the more unusual academic-ethics cases in recent memory: A former researcher at the State University of New York at Buffalo is accused not only of falsifying data but of hiring professional actors to impersonate subjects during a hearing about the data.

William Fals-Stewart stands accused of paying three actors to testify by phone during a misconduct hearing in 2007, the Associated Press reports.

The plot continued to thicken, reports the Buffalo News, when Fals-Stewart was acquitted of the charges — apparently with the aid of the false testimony — and then sued the state and the university for $4 million in damages.

Fals-Stewart was accused of scientific misconduct for allegedly fabricating data in federally funded studies conducted by the University of Buffalo and the Research Institute on Addictions, reports education journal Inside Higher Ed.

Buffalo television station WKBW reports that the state attorney general’s office alleges that three ersatz witnesses testified by telephone because they purportedly were out of town.

The actors, according to prosecutors, were told they would be performing in a mock trial training exercise and did not know they were impersonating real people or testifying in a real administrative hearing.

According to the WKBW report, it was Fals-Stewart’s suit for damage to his reputation that led to the discovery of the actors, because the attorney general’s office was also in charge of conducting an investigation to defend the university.

Fals-Stewart now is charged with attempted grand larceny and fraud-related counts.

Sources: Insider Higher Ed, Feb. 20 — AP, Feb. 17 — WKBW, Feb. 16 — Buffalo News, Feb. 16.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Nov. 23, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Aug. 3, 2009 — Related Newsline Commentary, Apr. 30, 2007 — Related Newsline story, Apr. 2, 2007 — Related Newsline story, Nov. 27, 2006.

The troubled automaker also is under scrutiny for hiring ex-regulators to deal with federal authorities; meanwhile, Congress wants to know who knew what and when and may issue subpoenas to find out

WASHINGTON
Toyota’s ethical, legal, and financial problems resulting from quality-control problems continued to roar head on toward the troubled automaker last week. Among the developments:

• An analysis by the Los Angeles Times indicates that the massive recalls for acceleration and braking problems may be devastating not only for the company but for owners as well. An avalanche of lawsuits could prove extraordinarily expensive for the firm if plaintiffs prove that Toyota was aware of problems but failed to fix them. For their part, drivers could have to pay portions of any damages from an accident resulting from a known safety defect that they failed to fix promptly, according to a product-liability lawyer interviewed by the Times. To add to their problems, the drop in Toyota resale values could prompt insurers to lower what they pay for Toyotas damaged in a crash.
• Former government regulators hired by Toyota helped halt investigations into incidents involving unintended acceleration in recent years, Bloomberg reports. According to court and government records obtained by Bloomberg, Christopher Tinto and Christopher Santucci joined Toyota directly from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and later convinced that agency to end probes involving Camrys and Solaras. While all automakers have employees to handle NHTSA issues, Bloomberg reports, Toyota appears to be unique among car companies in hiring former agency staffers to perform those duties. Spokesmen for Chrysler, Ford, GM, and Honda told Bloomberg that they had no former NHTSA staffers who deal directly with the agency on potential defect problems. Toyota said in an emailed statement that it followed all proper disclosure procedures, and that the actions of the two “have been consistent with our efforts to maintain the highest professional and ethical standards in all of our legal and regulatory practices. Their paramount concern was for the safety of every single owner of one of our vehicles.”
• Toyota head Akio Toyoda is planning a trip to Washington in March, but company officials have not yet confirmed if he will attend congressional hearings into the safety recalls, according to USA Today. Reuters reports that some in Congress are saying they will support a subpoena if Toyoda does not appear voluntarily. Darrell Issa, the ranking Republican on the House Oversight and Government Committee, wrote in a letter to the committee chair: “Whether it is for a microprocessor engineer or the top executive, we have a duty to determine what Toyota knew, when they knew it and if they met their full obligation of disclosure to U.S. regulators and the American people.”

Sources: Los Angeles Times, Feb. 11 — Bloomberg, Feb. 11 — Reuters, Feb. 11 — USA Today, Feb. 11.

For more information, see: Related Newsline Commentary, Feb. 8 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 8 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 1 — Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Aug. 31, 2009.

Allegations of bribes have shadowed the firm for nearly a decade

LONDON
Aerospace giant BAE, a firm that has been the target of various bribery and corruption allegations in the past decade, will have to submit to the supervision of an “ethics monitor” under terms of a plea agreement.

According to London Daily Mail economics editor Dan Atkinson, the monitor will have veto power over the hiring of sales personnel anywhere in the world. While the monitor will be a British national, the appointment will have to be approved by U.S. authorities.

“Given the sensitivity of much of BAE’s defense work and the fact that it is forced to compete against America’s most powerful contractors for the large U.S. contracts that now make up a majority of its business,” Atkinson writes, “the appointment [of the monitor] is highly controversial.”

Other provisions of the settlement, reports the Wall Street Journal, will require BAE to pay nearly $500 million to resolve the corruption allegations that have centered on alleged illegal payments BAE made to officials in several nations in order to secure contracts.

The longstanding allegations have cast a shadow over BAE’s operations for nearly a decade, according to the Journal.

A major focus of the British arm of the probe was BAE’s sale of a radar system to Tanzania. That deal, company president Dick Olver admitted, involved “commission payments to a marketing adviser” that the company “failed to accurately record,” notes the London Independent.

U.S. authorities are investigating arms sales in Saudi Arabia and payments made to an unidentified Saudi official, along with subsequent failures to put in place adequate anti-bribery safeguards despite assurances given to U.S. officials, according to the Independent.

Sky News reports that some watchdog groups are upset with the settlement, arguing that the public interest would be better served by continuing the investigations into BAE’s activities.

Sources: Wall Street Journal, Feb. 6 — Sky News, Feb. 6 — Daily Mail, Feb. 6 — Independent, Feb. 6.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Oct. 5, 2009 — Related Newsline story, May 18, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Feb. 2. 2009 — Related Newsline story, Sep. 29, 2008 — Related Newsline story, Aug. 4, 2008.

She faced 10 years if convicted on abuse of power statute; whistle-blower advocates had feared chilling effect

ANDREWS, Texas
In what some observers are hailing as a victory for whistle-blowers, a Texas nurse last week was acquitted of criminal charges after anonymously reporting a doctor she claimed practiced shoddy medicine.

Anne Mitchell was charged with “misuse of information” after she filed a complaint with a state medical board claiming that she had witnessed a doctor improperly encouraging patients to buy herbal medicines and planning inappropriate procedures at patients’ homes, reported the Houston Chronicle.

The doctor named in the complaint reported Mitchell to the local sheriff, a former patient and admirer of the doctor, according to ABC News. The sheriff seized Mitchell’s computer, found the letter on the hard drive, and charged Mitchell with “misuse of official information,” a felony under a Texas abuse-of-power statute.

The doctor claimed that the complaint was the fruit of a personal vendetta and that patients’ privacy rights had been violated, although the records forwarded to the medical board contained no names, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Nurses, other medical professionals, and whistle-blower advocates have been watching the case closely, reports National Public Radio, because they feared that it could have a chilling effect on those who could and should report bad medicine.

Dozens of nurses attended the trial, reports NPR, and many wept when the verdict was announced.

For her part, Mitchell said she would continue to report doctors if she believes they are not providing proper care. “I still have to do those things for patients,” said Mitchell, according to the NPR report. “My duty’s never changed.”

Sources: ABC, Feb. 12 — NPR, Feb. 11 — Houston Chronicle, Feb. 11 — Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Feb. 11.

For more information, see: Related Newsline story, Jan. 4 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 21, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Dec. 7, 2009 — Related Newsline Commentary, Oct. 19, 2009 — Related Newsline story, Sep. 8, 2009.