Back to the keyboard after a summer hiatus and it took just 45 minutes with Tuesday's New York Times to make it happen. Whatever page I turned to there was example after example of questionable, even unethical decisions by people and organizations. One news cycle produced some of the worst examples of bad citizen brands I've ever seen. Consider just a few of them:
In 2005, corporate America received huge tax breaks to bring home their offshore profits and create jobs in America. Drug makers were the biggest winners bringing home $100 billion while paying only six percent taxes instead of the 35 percent they would have paid prior to the '05 legislation. Any new jobs created? Hardly. Instead tens of thousands of people have been laid off by drug companies in the past two years.
Without even leaving the front page, we see that New York Governor Eliot Spitzer has himself in a bit of a sticky wicket. The man who used to make Wall Street titans tremble finds himself on the defense after a couple of long time aides decided to use the New York State Police for a little political tomfoolery. Seems the Governor's nemesis - State Senator Joe Bruno used some police helicopters for trips from Albany to New York City. Turned out not to be a problem, but the Governor's helpers saw an opportunity and solicited the acting Superintendent of the State Police to help them make a case against Bruno. By the way, the acting Superintendent is vying for a permanent appointment so he did what any good public servant should do - he helped try to make the case. Anyway, given Spitzer came into office seven months ago pledging to clean up New York state government, it seems apparent he will need to start with his own staff.
Of course the sports pages these days read more like bad reality television shows. From Michael Vick and fighting dogs to the critical question of whether or not baseball Commissioner Bud Selig will be in the stands for Barry Bonds' record home run it's amazing that sports writers still find time to report scores of games.
The perfect sports commissioner, David Stern of the National Basketball Association , has a small gambling problem. He doesn't wager himself, but seems he has a referee who got in over his head with some betting debts and began to make some interesting calls that turned a game or two or ten. A good betting scandal is needed every ten years or so just to purge the rookie gamblers out of the system.
And then there is poor Sergio Garcia . I love golf and I truly love the Open Championship. It looked like Sergio was finally going to win his first major. He was 0 for 35 coming into the British Open. He is now 0 for 36. Unfortunately his major drought is apparently starting to eat away at him. He was not the shining example of a gracious loser in the press room at Carnoustie on Sunday. He blamed bad breaks and other golfers in front of him for losing a four stroke lead in the last 14 holes in the final round. Golf is one sport where no one else has anything to do with the way you play the game.
A handful of news stories in one newspaper in one news cycle. All examples of either a lack of common sense, common decency or ethical behavior. And proof that it's time to crank up Citizen Brand again and look for some good examples. I know they are out there.
Good to be back.
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