Pubdate: Thu, 13 Jan 2005 Source: Dallas Morning News (TX) Copyright: 2005 The Dallas Morning News Contact: http://www.dallasnews.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/117 TAKES TWO TO TANGO: EDUCATION DEPARTMENT, WILLIAMS SHARE BLAME Conservative commentator Armstrong Williams abused public trust by turning his television show into a clandestine paid advertisement for the administration's No Child Left Behind initiative. It's another embarrassing moment for journalists, but the Department of Education shouldn't escape its share of the shame for complicity in this latest erosion of public trust. Mr. Williams' arrangement with the department required him to produce radio and television spots with Education Secretary Rod Paige. Mr. Williams also was expected to lobby black journalists to support No Child Left Behind. Make no mistake, Mr. Williams deserves the intense criticism he is receiving for his ethical lapse. He became a covert paid spokesman for government policy, an arrangement that corrupts the arm's-length relationship that should exist between media and government. And if this was somehow conceived as an outreach to African-Americans, paying for black support is mocking, insulting and counterproductive. Moreover, the arrangement may violate a law designed to prevent public officials from using tax dollars in overt self-promotion. Department officials insist the contract was a "permissible use of taxpayer funds under legal government-contracting procedures." We'll leave it up to lawyers to determine whether that's true, but there's a bigger ethical issue at stake. The White House's drug-control policy office previously sent local television stations packaged reports on a government campaign to curb drug abuse. The problem is that the "reports" looked like an actual independently produced newscast and featured a former Washington journalist hired by the government. None of that was disclosed. The Government Accountability Office denounced the administration's anti-drug campaign and, in a separate case, criticized other slick "reports" in support of the president's Medicare drug benefit as misuses of taxpayer money. The Bush administration is not alone in playing this opinion manipulation game. During the Clinton years, drug chief Barry McCaffrey secretly paid television networks to promote an anti-drug message in the scripts of television shows. It's understandable and necessary that government's message is heard. But it's corrupting, not informing, to disingenuously wrap its message in sheep's clothing. - --- MAP posted-by: Beth