RSS/XML |
|
Essays |
Main Page |
Disclaimer |
|
|
Essays |
Main Page |
Disclaimer |
|
That’s Hugh Hewitt’s advice to the spin doctors at PepsiCo. He says that he didn’t think he’d get a lot of feedback but,
I was wrong. Lots and lots of outrage pouring in, and I will open the radio show with a discussion. Seems a lot of people who dug deep for tsunami relief and who have watched hundreds of their country’s soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines die to bring the January 31 elections to Iraq don’t want to be lectured on how America is too often seen as “scratching our nose and sending a far different signal” to the world.
The amount of feedback in both comments and email I have been getting since my critique of Indra Nooyi’s commencement address Columbia University has been very high, including texts of letters or emails sent to PepsiCo by both consumers and shareholders.
Time is running out, says Hugh.
[D]Well, definitely don’t wait. Get the CEO, Stephen Reinemund, on Nightline, O’Reilly, any show that asks, and especially on talk radio. The blunder is the corporate equivalent of Marburg’s, and it needs to be contained. Abject apology followed by abject apology. Decide right now whether Indra Nooyi matters more than a lasting black eye. Think about how P&G is still dealing with the satan nonsense. Think about the brand.
Two hours ago I asked my producer to call PepsiCo and see who would come on. My guess is that they declined the interview, but who knows, they might have someone who sees the pulse.
Hugh also cogently observes,
The graduates certainly got a commencement lesson worth remembering: When you represent a consumer products company, it is best not to insult the largest market in the world, not to mention your home team.
Yep. When you make $5 million per year in direct compensation - making you one of the 12 highest-paid CFOs in America - you’re supposed to be able to craft your words carefully enough not to have to do damage control by insisting you were “miscontrued.” And you can’t pretend you can leave your professional position behind to give a speech. She may as well have “Pepsi” tatooed on her forehead, for if it’s true that “the personal is political,” it’s also true at Ms. Nooyi’s rarefied altitude that the personal is the corporate.
Comments policy
16 queries. 0.427 seconds
May 19th, 2005 at 6:25 pm
Actually, I think there is an excellent commencement lesson in Ms. Nooyi’s speech - viz., that we are all of us, in some way or another, deeply parochial. It is unlikely that anyone who rises to CFO of a major multinational corporation is not a highly educated, cosmopolitan individual - and yet for all that, we get from her a public address amazing for its sheer oblivious silliness and tone-deafness.
I’d like to be charitable and note that the invitation to speak at a graduation must draw out, in the best of us, the vices of pomposity and condescension, and the delusion that painfully labored analogies are terribly clever. However, judging from the her response, I don’t think she really gets why she offended, any more than those stereoptypical “ugly Americans” she described ever will. Instead, I sadly infer, from her homing in on the word “unpatriotic” as the sole descriptor of the criticism directed at her, that she is comfortably dismissing it as proceeding from, well, you know, those sorts of people who just can’t tolerate any constructive criticism of our country. I don’t think she’ll ever quite grasp that it was the great galumphing inappropriateness of the remarks, to the occassion and to the audience, that offended. (So let that be a salutary warning to you, leaders of the future!)
May 19th, 2005 at 7:24 pm
…and yet a commencement speech that was merely bad — dull, pompous, ending on a low note — wouldn’t be enough to inspire Donald Sensing to blog or boycott. Dozens of lousy commencement addresses came and went last week, without prompting a pile-on from the guardians of good public speaking; the only reason this particular speech has been brought to your attention is because the radical right can use it as a smokescreen.
While you’re distracted by the question of whether to boycott Pepsi or not, the extremists are preparing to strike down the very last remaining check that prevents an outright tyranny of the majority in the U.S. Senate. If the filibuster goes, there’s nothing left standing to prevent Chief Justice Roy Moore and a government that tells you how and what you’re going to worship — but, hey, lookie lookie, somebody somewhere made a commencement speech that didn’t sound patriotic enough! Let’s get her!
May 19th, 2005 at 9:24 pm
Well, Scott, if you think Donald Sensing is radical right, you may be beyond human help. Sensing’s blog is centrist enough that if you would ever like your preferred candidates to win elections again, you would to well to pay close attention to the message of blogs such as this one.
May 19th, 2005 at 9:51 pm
Donald, I’d like to try to add a note of charity to all the attacks on Ms. Nooyi. Imagine yourself being taken out of context so that blog swarm develops, and then when you provide the context, showing that you didn’t say what you were accused of, the blog swarm just gets worse.
Can I get you to read my post on this? And please don’t take the criticism personally, but I do think you have gotten a bit carried away.
http://docrampage.blogspot.com/2005_05_15_docrampage_archive.html#111655285446959301
May 19th, 2005 at 10:04 pm
Oh come on Doc R. Ms. Nooyi was not taken out of context. She is very clear in what she is saying in her commencement address. America bad, bad stuff in the world is America’s fault. The flight nurse Rev. Sensing describes is more to the point. We collectively give more to the world than is ever appreciated. And I really like Taco Bell, but I guess I shan’t eat there for awhile.
May 19th, 2005 at 11:19 pm
Scott Forbes makes a point that if the filibuster is taken away then people like judge Moore would be filling the courts. This might make more sense if the person who basically stopped judge Moore was not being held up by the democrats.
May 19th, 2005 at 11:23 pm
I took the time to read her speech. Except for the clumsy hand-finger analogy, she was dead-on. I would have suggested something else, like “giving the world the back of our hand”.
If there is one thing we as Americans doing business in the world have achieved, it is a remarkable ability to dismiss even the hint of an idea that we might be perceived as arrogant or conveying a superior attitude. The fact is that by now we have spread our productive infrastructure so widely around the globe that we are actually quite vulnerable. Additionally, it doesn’t help that our political leaders have demonstrated an almost effortless ability to confront and alienate.
Sometimes, a little introspection can be a good thing.
May 19th, 2005 at 11:26 pm
A man who voted for Alan Keyes is definitely not in the mainsteam, MitM, so I have to wonder what it is you’re in the middle of.
I think Donald Sensing’s views are center-right, on most issues; in fact there are many things we agree on. But I do think our gracious host occasionally takes a long, deep drink of that tasty wingnut Kool-Aid… and this would be one of those times. I think the Republic will survive Ms. Nooyi’s speech, and that acting on an impulse to punish her — especially by using a bully pulpit to call the mob to their pitchforks — shows a lack of confidence in our nation. You’re elevating her speech to a level it doesn’t deserve.
I also think that if you really want to defend the nation against tyranny, you’ll be writing or calling your Senator (your Tennessee Senator, I might add) to oppose the GOP’s latest power grab. Breaking the rules of the Senate for short-term gain sets a bad, bad, dangerous precedent; no self-respecting “conservative” should be willing to even consider it.
May 19th, 2005 at 11:32 pm
p.s.-I haven’t seen anything of this on any of the TV networks, including Fox. I suspect that nobody wants to do too much damage to one of our most prominent companies, and a major sponsor of a lot of programming.
PepsiCo should sit this one out, and in the future should make sure that such speeches are vetted. After all, look how well it works for Mr. Bush- and he even routinely gets credit as if he wrote what he reads.
May 19th, 2005 at 11:43 pm
the extremists are preparing to
strike down the very last remaining
check that prevents an outright tyranny
of the majority in the U.S. Senate.
If the filibuster goes, there’s nothing left standing
***************************************************
Why is it so terrible for the Republicans to
change the rule of cloture, when it was not
terrible for the Democrats to do it twice???
May 20th, 2005 at 1:11 am
Indra Nooyi: Meet the USS Pueblo and Digitus Impudicus
So what’s all the fuss about Indra Nooyi’s Columbia speech. . . and the digitus impudicus? Images are important. Symbolism is powerful. Look to the story about the USS Pueblo and the crew’s defiant use of the “impudent finger.” Captured…
May 20th, 2005 at 2:35 am
Scott, it’s very amusing to see the Democrats feverishly defending the filibuster, when they have changed the Senate rules FOUR times in the past to lower the number of votes required to end a filibuster. “Tyranny of the majority in the U.S. Senate?” Get real! The Republicans have been winning elections because a majority of the people want them to govern. That includes the right to name judges. If the Democrats don’t like it, perhaps they should try winning a few more elections.
May 20th, 2005 at 9:17 am
Don’t buy Product, buy 1 share of stock. That will give us all the right to personally attend the shareholders meetings. Now where do I get a hold of one of those pie throwing students?
May 20th, 2005 at 9:23 am
If the GOP wants to change the rules of the Senate, they can follow the rules and win a two-thirds vote — just like the Democrats did. The issue here isn’t the sanctity of the filibuster, although when you’ve eliminated all the other checks and balances that would give 49.9% of Americans any say whatsoever in appointing our nation’s judiciary, the filibuster does start to grow in importance.
No, the issue here is whether the GOP is going to play this game by the rules — “this game” being the system of government we’ve been using for the past 217 years. If 51 Senators can rewrite a rule that (until now) required a two-thirds majority to change, then the rules of the Senate aren’t worth the paper they’re written on — and once the government stops following its own rules, it’s very hard to make it start obeying them again. Very hard.
May 20th, 2005 at 4:24 pm
Pepsi Tastes Good
There has been a lot of big, angry talk at some conservative blogs (1, 2) about boycotting Pepsi-Co based on a commencement speech given at the Columbia Business School by its CFO. One of these bloggers hadn’t even read the…
May 20th, 2005 at 6:07 pm
I can’t say I’m to suprised by this speech. Here in silly valley I’ve met quite a few indian woman from certain casts that hold exactly the same attitude about America. Of course I also have to get lectured about how much better India is, but for some reason they are still here.
Personally I don’t get it.
Mike
May 20th, 2005 at 6:26 pm
The topic of the gentlemen in China is something we should all be aware of, although the middle finger analogy was a poorly veiled atempt to hide and simultaneously expose her true feelings for the country.
We do have a propensity to utter strange and damaging things when we’re overseas which detract from our great country, this is true. It’s also true that most other countries take the time and effor to learn the English language while we more often than not don’t choose to learn theirs.
Now for the real truth. Ms. Indra Nooyi’s comments are inappropriate in the way she phrased them. The story about the business men WAS appropriate as the miltary always taught us that we are ambassadors of the US when deployed overseas.
The middle finger analogy revealed her true feelings for this country and I’m sure have many Indian’s, Iranians, Iragis, North Korean’s and ALL of this country’s Leftist praising her intelect. Another worthless display of diversity in action and our spineless coporate culture will ship another 20,000 jobs to India in response.
May 20th, 2005 at 10:36 pm
Jeff,
This sort of attack on our Republican Captain’s of Industry is better made on some Left Wing Blog.
Further reflect on you accusation “our spineless coporate (sic) culture” and consider how this same culture when faced with the onslaught of foreign autos fearlessly soldier on producing real American cars despite the problems with gas consumption, roll overs and weak roofs.
May 23rd, 2005 at 9:13 am
Talk about drinking the kool-aid…
This will end up being (perhaps one of the first) major wins for Republicans. For 70 years, Dems ruled the House and Senate— by times at dizzying majorities. (go check your history books) Lately, the Republicans have managed the narrowest of majorities. They can hardly get anything through cause of all the ‘kool-aid’ complaints that stream from a narrow majority through the MSM amplifier. But this may be the beginning of a turning of the tide, where finally Republicans will start earning and getting respect in Washington. This filibuster thing is a simple act and those who take the highest risks end up with the biggest rewards. Its a risky move, but when all the dust settles an even greater majority will know that the Republican position was the correct one. When people learn all the facts, such as who these judges really are, what Dems have done in the past, etc- it will be obvious to enough people.