I recall when Nixon was said to be outraged at the leaks that were occurring in his administration -- and that, of course, resulted in the creation of the Plumbers unit, which resulted in Watergate, which resulted in Nixon getting a lot more free time. I always think it's humorous when politicians complain about leaks, but lately, it seems, it's more of a problem. For example, from three separate articles about the VC25 flyby yesterday in New York --
The director, Marc Mugnos, was formally reprimanded for failing to notify his superiors, said a senior city official, who was given anonymity because this was a personnel matter.
When told of the flight, President Barack Obama was furious, a White House official said on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.
The photo op was combined with a training exercise to save money, according to another administration official who also spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to speak publicly about the behind-the-scenes discussions about the flight.
One company that I used to work for said that if we were ever contacted by news media, we should refuse to comment, and instead point them to the office responsible for that sort of thing. We always thought that we'd talk, but not give out our names, because , hell, who says only they get to talk about the company? Not to mention, they'd just put out sanitized information, not the sort of thing that we'd want to know if we were reading about it.
In the same company, a data center manager grew visibly angry when, after giving a cute code name to refer to a new customer ("New Shoes", but don't tell them I said so), our staff started trying to figure out who it was. I'll tell you when I think you should know, he fumed, not realizing, or caring, that such interest had been sparked by the name. Belatedly, he said that we shouldn't tell people, but by then, it was too late.
People with secrets don't understand what it's like to be the ones without them - or the ability to gain a brief moment of notoriety by disclosing them.
4 comments:
Already getting pushed under the rug, and nobody is claiming responsibility. Can you imagine being just one of those people in New york reliving this fear all over again, running through the streets in sheer panic for a stupid photo I could have done myself on Photoshop.
We should be really angry.
One guy (Louis Caldera) did admit responsibility, but I find it hard to believe that he came up with this on his own, without any one else getting to vote on it.
On one has that much power up there, or maybe they do, but this is clearly abuse of power. He should be held accountable.
After all look at all the loss of production and the trauma it caused. We haven't even heard about all repercussions of the insensitive and stupid act.
To me, it was a classic act by someone who didn't understand the effects. I agree, there needs to be accountability. I've seen recommendations that the guy should quit -- not sure about that. But a stern reprimand seems too weak, too.
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