The failure to be open and transparent during a crisis.
@DoctorDarryl Podcast 360
14 March 2021
What do Andrew Cuomo, Ted Cruz, and Joe Biden have in common?
If you answered, they are all politicians; you would be right.
However, all three men also have lost the public’s trust and faith in them as leaders because of their inappropriate behavior.
How does this happen, and why?
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening wherever you maybe I’m Darryl Armstrong, and this is Podcast 360.
As recently as January this year, Governor Andrew Cuomo was a renowned crisis manager and a media darling. Hey, the guy had written a book on leadership during the middle of a pandemic; go figure! By the way, I’m pretty sure Andrew did little of the writing.
Now, less than 90-days later, he is fighting to survive in the court of public opinion, and I predict soon may be in the court of law unless he forks over money to those he has aggrieved.
Hiding data on his nursing home scandal and the 15,000 deaths caused by his policies is horrible in itself, and you would think the media would be all over that investigation. However, sex trumps death in the mainstream media.
The senseless and tragic deaths and the FBI investigation into them are now second in interest to the NY Attorney General’s investigation into Cuomo’s #metoo scandal. Seven women allege inappropriate sexual advances and behavior by the once prominent Democrat, who wanted to run for a fourth term as Governor.
Cuomo and his brother at CNN yucked it up while our elders died on his watch. Chris, a word to the want to be reporter Journalism 101 tells us that no reporter should ever interview a family member. Did you skip that class?
Of course, many of us don’t believe Chris Cuomo is anything other than a hack opinion reader of a teleprompter and off-the-cuff political commentator. My opinion.
Andrew Cuomo creates his crisis through inappropriate behaviors.
Let us be fair and balanced here. US Senator Ted Cruz, the senior Senator from Texas and a Republican, didn’t demonstrate much good thinking or appropriate behavior as we say here in the South when he packed bags to take his daughter to Cancun during Texas’ energy and weather crisis.
You can bet a BBQ sandwich at the Salt Lick that his next opponent will run the video of him walking the aisle to the plane pulling his roller bag behind him. Campaign poster headlines will read, and video voice-overs will say, is this the type of leadership you expect from elected officials?
To make matters worse, members of his DC staff lied about the trip. Although Cruz returned promptly once caught to try and smooth over the controversy, his inappropriate behavior is unacceptable, and he got caught. How couldn’t you get caught?
As one of my colleagues once said, “Don’t do anything if you are a public official unless you want to see headlines and commentators that take you to the task.
Then you have newly-elected President Joe Biden, who calls for unity while claiming the flood of immigrants crossing the border is nothing more than a challenging situation. Interesting because when he was Vice President under Obama, their Director of Homeland Security called a thousand immigrants a day a crisis. With many times that number being pushed across by cartels to overwhelm the system, the President and his men and Press Secretary see it only as a challenge. By the way, the media understands the importance of words and perception. Remember that under President Trump, children were being held in cages; well, those are the same “cages” that Obama and Biden built and are now being used once again as reception centers.
Lo, the poor press secretary who has to PR the situation and circle back on her answers, I genuinely feel sorry for her.
All behavior has consequences. All three men created their crisis. Openness and transparency during a crisis are essential. All three men and their PR spokespeople fail in being direct, open, transparent, and forthright about the situations.
I’m Darryl Armstrong, and that is my 360 for the day.
L. Darryl Armstrong Ph.D. 