Conservative pundit Armstrong Williams, who's been busy promoting the Education Department's "No Child Left Behind" policy on his own talk show as well as CNN and Fox, forgot to mention he was being paid $241,000 to sell the Bush education agenda.
Williams is a television and newspaper commentator and initially claimed he'd done nothing wrong by failing to disclose that he was being paid to promote the policy under the guise of being an independent and impartial observer who strongly supported the federal program.
After being grilled by CNN and MSNBC, along with print criticism, Armstrong retracted his earlier stance and apologized for not disclosing the financial relationship, saying that the public holds him to journalistic standards and he should not have accepted the money and wouldn't do it again. Unfortunately, perhaps a little too late for Williams. His reputation as a commentator who speaks for himself is now tarnished. There's a major difference between journalists and promoters. Community journalists attempt to limit they're bias and public relations folks often must admit to bias when communicating. Williams was perceived more like a journalist, at least up until now.
Two questions emerge from this incident, frankly, bigger than Armstrong Williams' role in it.
1. Is it ethical for a person to be paid to promote an idea?
Famous people are paid to promote products, services and ideas all the time. What's a key difference? We know they're being paid. Let the audience determine the validity of communication that's coming from a paid source. Williams didn't let his audience know the checks were rolling in. Information that comes from an informed and supposedly unbiased source is often perceived as more credible by the audience. THAT'S WHY WILLIAMS DIDN'T TELL!
For the record, the PRSA Code of Ethics clearly states that it is unethical for a public relations effort to communicate information in which the source isn't identified. No front groups allowed. No secret payments to people as spokespersons without disclosure.
Here's the more interesting question to pose:
2. Should the government use our tax dollars to pay people to promote its programs? Before you answer, how about this? DOES the government do this? Yes. Is it legal? Yes, as long as the government TELLS US the information is promotion and not objective journalism. Think about all the advertising and public relations efforts to promote the post office, military, and IRS. The voter has long determined that government should be allowed to have hired communicators to educate and inform citizens because of the complexity and mass impact of government policy.
However, the Bush administration is stretching "information" into "promotion" by twice producing promotional efforts relating to drug policy and medicare without disclosing they were paying for it.
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According to an article in yesterday's Washington Post, PR firms, fearful of losing multi-million dollar government contracts, are now trying to "spin" the Armstrong Williams story. Citing industry codes that are designed to prevent this sort of thing from happening, PR executives would like the public to think that this in an anomaly and that news, advertisements, and public relations messages are clearly defined and differentiated. But like the convergence of media content made possible by the digitization of media programs and channels, blurred lines are now the norm. PR firms are hired to craft news releases and video packages that newspapers and TV stations are more than happy to “repackage” and deliver to their unsuspecting audiences. Don’t be surprised to see a lot more revelations of impropriety in coming days and weeks. Tip to consumers…follow the money.
Disclosure statement: I have received no compensation for the views expressed in this blog comment! :-)
I'm not convinced that audiences are as unsuspecting as we may think. Perhaps the tendency these days, especially in light of the recent ethical breaches in once-reputable media outlets (see previous blog on CBS), is to take everything seen, heard or read with a grain of salt.
Perhaps one of our responsibilities as professional communicators and as educators of future professional communicators is to convey the idea that it is important now, more than ever, to seek out multiple sources of information before broadcasting or printing anything as fact ... and before believing anything that is broadcast or print as fact.
Thankfully we live in a society and an era where these multiple sources are accessible. We just need to resist the temptation to be lazy and use them.
Another journalist paid by the Bush Administration to secretly promote its agenda?
Conservative op-ed journalist and self-described "marriage expert", Maggie Gallagher, has admitted that she was paid $21,500 by the Bush administration's department of HHS in 2002 to "strengthen marriage." She had to admit this because Washington Post columnist Howard Kurtz called her up and asked about it.
She initially suggests in her column of Jan. 27 in the Pueblo Chieftain that she's done nothing wrong, suggesting she's no different than an academic who's paid to work and publish on research projects.
My response is it's a big difference. She's a paid opinion-oriented journalist who gets money to talk about her opinions on marriage and society, supposedly from her own independent perspective, not as a paid advocate for the Bush administration.
I wonder if writing columns on the topic was part of her contract with HHS? In essence, was some of the $21,500 paid for her column topics?
PR folks get paid by the government to advocate its views. Citizens should know who they are, and usually do. We may not like the promotion from the IRS, Post Office, Military, or candidates, but we usually know where's its coming from.
Journalists are a different breed that must maintain an independent relationship from the issues, organizations, and people they choose to cover, write about, defend, or criticize.
Maggie Gallagher got caught, she admitted it, and she apologized for not telling her readers.
How many other journalists are being paid by this administration to use their precious 1st Amendment right to free speech, who aren't telling their readers they're being paid for their views?
-Jennifer Mullen
An important PR principle related to organizations managing their issues, is "do voluntarily what you don't want the government to regulate". If an organization's activities rise to the level of an "issue" defined as a public policy dispute, unhappy audiences often turn to the government for redress.
In this case, it's the government that has created the issue by paying journalists to promote Bush Administration programs covertly.
Well, the citizens and Congress have responded.
H.R. 373, the "Federal Propaganda Prohibition Act of 2005" if passed will require government agencies to notify Congress no later than 30 days after entering into a public relations or advertising contract to promote government policies and/or programs.
Many government agencies work with public relations and advertising firms to help promote programs. Examples might be Health and Human Service agencies wanting to promote anti-domestic violence programs, or anti-drug abuse programs. Perhaps the Transportation Department wants to promote safe driving with seatbelt usage. Or the Department of Criminal Justice wants to promote no drinking under 21 years of age.
Government has often created specialized public education programs. And we always knew the information was coming from the "Dept of Criminal Justice".
Because of the Bush Administration failure to come clean about using paid promotion of the Bush agenda, now every government department that wants to promote a government program must have Congress review the contract.
I'm all for transparency with government money. Taxpayers would likely be surprised at the millions of taxpayer dollars used to promote government programs. But at least they'd know. Having to ask Congress' "permission" everytime a government agency wants to do business with a PR or advertising firm is micro-management of government programs.
The President's budget each year must be approved by Congress. Each specific spending category is not individually reviewed each time before a government contract is created. This is the kind of bureaucracy that citizens question.
Be open about what programs are being promoted, both in terms of agencies, government agencies, and dollars. But don't ask Congress to approved every single contract that's created.
This bill is a knee-jerk response to the Bush Administration creating an unethical promotional strategy. The entire system isn't broken, let's not create another government regulation to fix what amounts to very bad judgement on some government agencies and journalists.
-Jennifer Mullen
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