August 2009 Archives

 A marriage-proposal is so fraught with risk that it's hard to imagine why anyone would want to introduce even more risk to the enterprise.  That's just me. 

Yet I know that some people want to make this special event even more special.  That's why we have people proposing underwater and jumping out of airplanes. 

Jon Cardin, a member of the Maryland House of Delegates, got caught up in a marriage-proposal stunt that went badly. 

But his apology is first rate.

Cardin's idea was to propose to his girl friend on a boat in the Baltimore Inner Harbor.  A boat is always good.  He should have stopped there.  Instead, Cardin arranged for some Baltimore police officers to board the boat and pretend they were searching for contraband.  He arranged for a police helicopter to buzz the boat.  Perhaps the cops were to find something "suspicious," like an engagement ring.  Then, amidst all the tension, Cardin could pop the question and reveal that it was all an elaborate joke and the boat's company could have a big laugh and a lasting memory.    

It didn't work out that way.  Once the word got out, Cardin came under criticism for everything from bad taste to the misuse of police resources in a city struggling with violent crime. 

To his credit, Cardin got it.  He quickly realized his folly and offered apologies to the mayor and other officials.  He issued this written apology on his website:

I would like to apologize for my actions surrounding my marriage proposal, any confusion that my absence on a previously scheduled vacation may have contributed, and the embarrassing attention that it has engendered. What should have been a joyous time of my life became one that was instead marked by errors in judgment.

I take full responsibility for initiating this incident. I should have been sensitive enough to realize that these are extraordinarily difficult times in Baltimore, both financially and from a public safety perspective. In that context, I realize how inappropriate my request was.

I love Baltimore, it's my hometown, and I would never intentionally jeopardize our great city's reputation or resources. I certainly hope that the blame for this is placed on me, and none of it is given to any of the brave officers of the Baltimore City Police Department.

In response to my lapse in judgment, I have personally apologized to the mayor, the police commissioner, and the Marine Police Unit. I have fully reimbursed the city for its expenses. I have also made a personal contribution to the city's venerable mounted police unit to help it weather the financial crisis that is now threatening its existence.

Finally, I hope that my fiancée will be able to forgive the fact that I brought this unexpected and undesired public attention to what should have been a special moment in our lives.

I pledge to you that, with your trust in me, I will take this opportunity to learn from my errors. I will not let this mistake deflect from my continued efforts for the 11th District and to improve and develop policies concerning smart energy, health, finance and the environment at large.  

There's a lot to admire about this apology.  He recognizes exactly what he did.  He personally reaches out to everyone his offense touched.  He accepts full responsibility without a hint of evasion.  He hoards the blame, making a special plea that the police officers he recruited be spared any discipline.  Unlike many apologies, this one is keenly sensitive to restitution.  Cardin not only paid the city of Baltimore $300 for the police costs he incurred, he also made a separate contribution to the city's mounted police unit.  He promises to learn from the incident. 

To me, this is a satisfying apology and because of it, I believe the incident should not do lasting damage to Cardin's career.  People understand that leaders make mistakes.  It's not what we do that counts in the long run, it's what we do about what we do.  And on that count, Cardin demonstrates the confidence to confront his mistake and repair it. 

About the only thing I'd suggest Cardin do differently is to be specific about his donation to the mounted police unit.  The donation is a very nice touch.  If his constituents knew the amount of his donation, they would have another data point to judge the generosity of the apology.  As it is, the lack of transparency detracts from an otherwise pitch perfect apology.    

Oh, and as for the outcome of his marriage-proposal?  Miss Megan Homer of Rockville accepted his proposal.  As a former resident of Maryland, I wish Del. Cardin and his fiancée the very best. 

Evaluation:

Recognition:  A

Responsibility:  A

Remorse:  A

Restitution:  A

Repetition:  A

Overall Score:  A

Swiss apology to Libya criticized

An apology can certainly be effective or ineffective.  It can be deserved or underserved.  But can an apology be illegal? 

I don't think so.

The president of Switzerland recently apologized for an incident in which the son of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi was detained in Geneva.  The detention of Hannibal Gadhafi and his pregnant wife was in connection with allegations of mistreating two domestic servants.  The allegations were withdrawn and the two were allowed to leave.

But the incident prompted Libya to retaliate.  Libya ended bilateral co-operation programs, placed restrictions on the operation of Swiss companies in the country, cut oil supplies to Switzerland and withdraw assets from Swiss banks.  Libya also detained two Swiss engineers. 

Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz apologized for the detention:

We are apologizing for what happened to Hannibal Gadhafi and the two sides agreed to form a committee to discuss the matter.  The Swiss government is sorry for the unjust arrest of Libyan diplomats by Geneva police.

As a result of the apology, the Libyan government has re-established political and economic ties with Switzerland.  The two Swiss engineers were released.  The apology did everything an effective apology is meant to do.

But that didn't stop leaders in Switzerland from criticizing Merz for providing an "illegal" apology. 

Swiss Justice Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpft accused Merz of overstepping his bounds.  Under Switzerland's federalist system, cantonal regional governments are given wide-ranging powers including policing and it doesn't appear the Swiss government can legally apologize in the case, she said.  Constitutional lawyer Thomas Fleiner told the Swiss News Agency the agreement appears to undermine Swiss law.

The critics say that the Swiss president's apology was illegal.  But what they appear to mean is that it was unwise or undeserved.  Maybe it was unwise or undeserved.  I don't know.  But it certainly was not illegal. 

Merz's critics would have a better claim of discrediting the apology by saying it was illegitimate.  In other words, that Merz had no standing to apologize for the activities of the Geneva police department. 

In any event, what's the alternative to apology?  To allow a minor diplomatic squabble to become an international incident with retribution and escalation.  In my view, President Merz showed leadership.  His apology was a sign of confidence, not weakness or appeasement as his critics suggested.  Every nation makes mistakes.  Switzerland is a country with a tradition of secrecy.  It's difficult for a culture of apology to take root in such a tradition, but history shows that secrecy can and has been abused.  The transparency afforded by the occasional apology may be just the counterbalance to secrecy that Switzerland needs.

Chuck Schwab, whose brokerage is being sued by the Attorney General of New York for misrepresentations its salespeople made to clients about the liquidity and risks of auction-rate securities, is on familiar ground.

Once again Schwab clients are upset and the business is in trouble because of the completely predictable excesses of salespeople. 

Schwab knows that it's in the nature of salespeople to misrepresent.  Schwab knows that salespeople tend to steer clients to whatever product pays the best commissions rather than what is best for the investor.  That's why the principle of "no selling" was a founding principle of the company.  For many years, this principle was enforced and Schwab avoided scandal after scandal.  On the occasions when the "no selling" rule was violated, Schwab generally came to regret it.

The situation in New York appears to be another example of this same dynamic.

The question is, how will Chuck Schwab respond?  He has two basic choices.  Plan A is to fight the suit in the courts and on the op-ed pages.  Plan B is to admit violations of Schwab's own policies, accept responsibility, apologize, and make restitution.  It appears that Chuck prefers Plan A.  It's a mistake he will come to regret. 

A little background.  Schwab brokers are accused of repeatedly misrepresenting auction rate securities as liquid, short-term investments without disclosing the risks to clients whose profiles made then inappropriate candidates for such investments.  The Attorney General claims that it has recordings of Schwab brokers comparing the securities with money-market funds or certificates of deposit.  The claims are totally believable. 

The problem was revealed when the market for auction rate securities seized up in February 2008.  Since there were no buyers, there was no way for the clients to sell their investments.  Even though Schwab's clients didn't lose money, they were angry that they couldn't get their money, in spite of Schwab's representations that it was as easy to get out of the investments as it was to get in. 

Other brokerages such as TD Ameritrade have agreed to settle the matter by buying the securities it sold to its clients.  Schwab has indicated that it will fight the suit.  In fact, it asserts principled grounds for doing so.  Schwab published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal laying out the reasons why it's right to oppose settling. 

"Whine-Fest"

Initial reactions were not generous.  Schwab had the bad luck to come out with an op-ed piece on the same news cycle as Warren Buffett.  Schwab's efforts did not compare well.  A Bloomberg headline "Buffett Informs, Schwab Whines on Op-Ed Pages" tells it all. 

Two money titans hit the op-ed trail this week. One of them, Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Chief Executive Officer Warren Buffett, offered constructive talk in the New York Times about why Congress must pay attention to the budget deficit once the U.S. economy gets back on its feet. The other, Charles R. Schwab, emoted in a whine-fest in the Wall Street Journal about regulators who are picking on the brokerage firm he founded.

 "With his latest oeuvre, Schwab uses his business-guy celebrity to duck responsibility for customer losses and fudge the facts," writes Bloomberg News Correspondent Susan Antilla. "Under the headline 'Brokers Aren't Responsible for Bad Bets' -- he could just as easily have deleted the last three words -- Schwab offered up his version of the reason that Schwab customers are stuck with auction-rate securities that they can't cash in."

The Power of Taking Responsibility

Chuck would be a lot better off going with Plan B.  If Schwab's investigations reveal that its brokers did indeed misrepresent the securities, he should say so, accept responsibility for not training and supervising them properly, apologize to the clients it served poorly, provide restitution by buying back the securities, and paying the fine.  Then Chuck should write an op-ed piece on what lessons the company learned from this experience, what steps it is taking to present it from happening again, and reasserting the principles that have served Schwab well for so many years. 

Chuck has the stature to hold his own with Warren Buffett.  All it takes is a willingness to do the right thing, admit mistakes and apologize.

Bloomberg ended its article by quoting me on the power of apology.  

John Kador, who wrote a book about Schwab, says the firm has veered from its original mission of serving self-directed investors, yet clings to the do-it-yourself image even as it sells products and gives advice. Schwab would be better served to apologize, admit its mistakes and move on, says Kador, whose most recent book "Effective Apology" might not be a bad addition for the Schwab chairman's end-of-summer reading list.

The ball is now in Schwab's court.  There is still time for him to seize the high road, do right by his clients, and reassert the ethical standards that have typified the company.  In the past he has acted on the principles of accountability, trnasparency, and humility.  He can have all three by apologizing.  

Apologizing won't be cost-free.  It never is.  It's just less costly than the alternatives. 

Four decades ago a man did something he came to regret, started running from himself, and has been running ever since.  In August 2009, he finally stopped running.  He apologized. 

William Calley, the former Army lieutenant who ordered the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War, apologized for his actions: 

There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened that day in My Lai.  I feel remorse for the Vietnamese who were killed, for their families, for the American soldiers involved and their families. I am very sorry.

Forty years after the events in Vietnam, speaking in a soft, pained voice, the only U.S. Army officer convicted in the 1968 slayings of Vietnamese civilians at My Lai made an extraordinary public apology while speaking to a Kiwanis Club near the military base where he was court-martialed.

Calley, now 66, was a young Army lieutenant when a court-martial at nearby Fort Benning convicted him of murder in 1971 for killing 22 civilians during the infamous massacre of 500 men, women and children in Vietnam.  Though sentenced to life in prison, Calley ended up serving three years under house arrest after President Richard Nixon later reduced his sentence.  Over the years, Calley repeatedly declined invitations to talk about the issue.  He finally broke his silence to speak at a meeting of the Kiwanis Club of Greater Columbus, Georgia. 

Speaking to about 50 people, Calley's apology came at the beginning of some brief remarks before he began taking questions.  "You could've heard a pin drop," said Al Fleming, who befriended Calley about 25 years ago and invited him to speak. "The members were just slack-jawed that they were hearing this from him for the first time in nearly 40 years."  At the conclusion of his address, Calley received a sustained standing ovation. 

Such is the power of apology both for the offender and the greater community.  I hope this step brings Calley some peace.  I know it will add an important milestone in this country's continuing efforts to heal the ongoing wounds left by the war in Vietnam. 

I appreciate Calley's apology just as I appreciate his service to the United States.  Both the apology and the service respond to fundamental and admirable qualities of citizens.  Both are conditioned by moral principles that are community-based.  The apology that Calley offered may have been for the benefit of 50 or so citizens of Columbus, Georgia, but his words will resonate across the globe, for apology, like murder, isn't confined by a statute of limitations. 

This series has already considered one example of coerced apology with A Fish Called Wanda.  Today we consider another forced apology scene from The Prince of Tides

The Prince of Tides, based on the novel of the same name by Pat Conroy,  tells the story of Tom Wingo (Nick Nolte) , a teacher and football coach from South Carolina who falls in love with his twin sister's New York City psychiatrist Susan Lowenstein (Barbra Streisand, who also directed).  Lowenstein is unhappily married to a Herbert (Jeroen Krabbé), a professional violinst and an arrogant bully.

Midway through the movie, Herbert invites Tom to a dinner party at his Park Avenue apartment.  The scene opens with Herbert entertaining the guests by playing his Stradivarius violin.   But soon we come to see that the main entertainment for the evening is Herbert mercilessly humiliating Tom for his southern background.  In the process, Herbert humiliates his wife and mortifies all his guests. 

Susan demands an apology.  Herbert dismisses his wife.  "Darling, where's your sense of humor?"  he replies.  Herbert really does need to apologize, but as Susan notes, her husband has never apologized to anyone in his life. This we can believe.  Tom gets up from the dinner table.  From the living room, he picks up the Stradivarius violin and calls to the guests from the balcony.  Video clip is available on EVt1.

TOM (in an exaggerated Southern accent):  Herbie!  Southern boy has got a hold of your fiddle.  [dangling the Stradivarius eight floors above Fifth Avenue]  Better hurry now, it's getting heavy!

HERBERT:  What do you think you're doing? 

Tom (imitating Herbert):  Darling, where's your sense of humor?

Herbert:  That Stradivarius is worth over a million dollars.

Tom:  Well if I drop it, it won't be worth shit.  Apologize to your wife!

Herbert:  You're bluffing.

Tom:  I may be, but it's a powerful bluff, isn't it asshole? 

Herbert:  I'm sorry, Susan.

Tom:  Sincerity becomes you, Herbie.  Now apologize to me for your unforgivable breach of etiquette at the dinner table tonight, you possum-breathed cock sucker.

Herbert (defeated):  I'm sorry, Tom.

Tom (tossing the violin to Herbert and walking out):  You all sure know how to give a party up here in New York City. 

It's a delicious scene. 

Of course, a coerced apology is never an effective apology, but it is satisfying to see a blowhard and bully such as Herbert brought low.    

It is telling of the screenwriters to have Tom repeat the line, "Darling, where's your sense of humor?" in response to Susan's request for an apology. 

Such a response is characteristic of a bully who frames the situation not in terms of his own offense but in the sensibilities of the victim. 

Herbert's response is a variation of the statement, "I apologize for anything I may have done that you feel was over the line."  It suggests the offense may not have happened, and even if it did, the problem lies not with the offender's conduct, but the victim's excess sensitivities or inability to take a joke.  Such a statement is infuriating for the victim for whom the offense is very real. 

In August 2009, Typhoon Morakot hit the island nation of Taiwan, bringing heavy downpours and triggering devastating mudslides.  The official casualty toll now stands at 124 dead, 53 missing and 45 injured, but most experts expect the death toll to top 500. 

In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast of the United States, bringing heavy winds and downpours, triggering devastating floods.  The official casualty toll stands at 1,836 dead and 705 missing.  Katrina was the most destructive and expensive hurricane in U.S. history. 

In both countries, the response of the governments to the disaster was flawed. 

How did the leaders of the two countries respond?

On August 18, 2009 Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou bowed to the nation to apologize and "accept responsibility as national leader" for all errors made during government rescue efforts in the wake of Typhoon Morakot. 

As national leader, I must accept responsibility for all of the mistakes made by the government during disaster rescue work.  At this time, I wish to express my deepest apology to all the people, especially to persons whose relatives died or disappeared.

President Ma joined the four most senior members of his administration--Vice President Vincent Siew, Vice Premier Chiu Cheng-hsiung, Defense Minister Chen Chao-ming and Transportation Minister Mao Chih-kuo--in a deep bow of apology for 30 seconds. 

Katrina occurred during the administration of former President George W. Bush.  How did he respond?  On May 22, 2007, Bush addressed the nation at a news conference. 

Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government.  And to the extent that the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility.

The contrasts between the responses of the two presidents to a natural disaster on their watch are telling.  President Ma accepted immediate responsibility and, flanked by the most senior officials of the government, apologized both verbally and ritually.  But even by Asian standards of contrition, a group bow of 30 seconds is extraordinary.  Try it.  Imagine you are being televised.  Now stand and bow your head for a count of 30 seconds.  It feels like an eternity and packs quite a punch. 

President Bush accepted full responsibility. The statement came 20 months after Katrina.  Bush never apologized.  In subsequent years, he continued to express deep regret about his administration's response but never did manage an apology.      

My take is that what we have here is a difference in culture as well as temperament.