“Where do I go to get my reputation back?” Ray Donovan, President Reagan’s Labor Secretary, poignantly asked that question when, after the media had adjudged him guilty, he was acquitted in court of corruption charges. Michael Brown, head of FEMA might ask the same question. While Brown was doing everything humanly possible to help the victims of the largest natural disaster in American history, America ‘s media served as accuser, prosecutor, judge and jury to convict him as today’s bête noir .

The story is an old one. A government official becomes a target. Reporters nose around. People from the person’s past come out of the woodwork with stories, innuendo, and out-and-out lies.

While trying to do the job, the official responds. The first fire gets quenched, but another starts, then another, and then another.

The media start quoting themselves, as if the original false report is gospel. Then,reporters hear the bugle call ? “Questions have been raised.” That’s the death knell. Once “questions have been raised,” the truth doesn’t matter. Now the official has “attracted controversy,” and must go.

Michael Brown, my long time friend, is the latest victim. It’s not right; it’s not fair; but it’s happened. To show this, let’s take a look at what FEMA is and what it does. Then, let’s review what happened.

By federal government standards, FEMA is tiny. According to its web site, FEMA has only about 2,600 full time employees.

Many believe that FEMA is responsible for rescuing people, serving as “first responders,” taking charge of recovery efforts, even calling out the National Guard. Not so. Those jobs belong primarily to state and local officials.

In fact, many disasters don’t involve FEMA. “FEMA is only brought in after the governor of the state requests a federal disaster designation from the President.”

What does FEMA do? Generally, it helps the states, those primarily responsible for disaster relief, conduct their business. FEMA funnels federal funds, essentially an effort to distribute the cost of emergencies throughout the country. And it acts as a federal umbrella for state disaster agencies.

What happened here? The disaster was enormous. The relief effort appeared slow. Someone had to pay. Several days passed when, as the New York Times put it, Brown had the audacity to “display[] striking candor.” Apparently, telling the truth is considered “boneheaded.”

The sharks smelled blood. It was time to dig up dirt. The blogosphere came to the rescue.

Suddenly, a swirl of stories appeared that Brown had been forced out of his last job. Who broke the story? Not the major media. It was a web site, aptly named horsesass.org. The story was false. But the media kept repeating it.

Brown had served as the first Commissioner of the International Arabian Horse Association. A major part of his job was to prosecute wrongdoing by IAHA judges; some were among the world’s leading trainers of these highly prized, highly priced animals. Tom Connelly, IAHA president when Brown resigned, put it well when he said that Brown “was unpopular, if the person he was investigating was your trainer.”

I know the facts of Brown’s tenure with the IAHA. I was his lawyer. I was there. The story the media portrayed is untrue. Brown had done his job with distinction. He had been attacked both publicly and in court by people with lots of money. He stood in the breach. He did his job despite the attacks. And he prevailed. He left IAHA on his own terms. He was not forced out.

Yet the truth might get in the way of a good story. In any event, repeating the stories made Brown “controversial.”

Once “questions have been raised,” anything is fair game. The next step ? smear Brown, and smear anything in his past. The New Republic got the jump.

Paul Campos, a Colorado University law professor, wrote that Brown is “a failed former lawyer?a man with a 20-year old degree from a semi-accredited law school who hadn’t attempted to practice law in a serious way in nearly 15 years and who had just been forced out of his job in the wake of charges of impropriety.” The professor writes well: in one sentence, he skewered Brown with at least six falsehoods (that count omits the numerous others throughout the article).

To get to Brown, Campos smeared Oklahoma City University School of Law as “to put it charitably, [not] a well-known institution,” citing, as if it mattered, his own ignorance of it. His article, dripping with snobbery, may play well with certain sectors. Apparently, TNR thinks so.

I’m surprised, though, that the professor didn’t complain when President Clinton nominated Robert Henry, then the Dean of the same “semi-accredited” law school, to serve on the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. That’s the federal circuit that covers both Oklahoma and Colorado , where Prof. Campos teaches. Judge Henry has served with distinction for over a decade.

The TNR piece was just the start. The top hatchet job came just over a day later, from Time . Filled with lies, the Time article did the trick. A few hours after it was posted, Brown was asked to return to Washington .

Time ‘s indictment: Brown’s resumé says he was an “assistant city manager” in Edmond , Oklahoma , when in actuality he was an “assistant to the manager.” Having been heavily involved with municipal government in Oklahoma for 23 years, including representing the City of Edmond itself, that strikes me as a distinction without a difference. To make it significant, Time twisted Edmond city spokesperson Claudia Deakin’s comments to fit what Time wanted. Deakins has complained about Time ‘s inaccuracies; Time hasn’t bothered to retract its article.

Had Time sought the truth, it could have talked with current Edmond Mayor Saundra Naifeh, former Mayor Carl Reherman, or former City Attorney Mary Ann Karns, who served with Brown. They could have confirmed the accuracy of Brown’s resumé.

Time claimed that Brown’s resumé falsely states that he was an adjunct professor. So did several others, all citing Time. Having been a guest lecturer for Brown one day back in 1988 when he was an Adjunct Professor at Oklahoma City University law school, I was surprised to hear this too was “controversial.”

Time ended its piece with a statement from Stephen Jones, Brown’s first boss after law school. Jones, who faced widespread criticism for his handling of Timothy McVeigh’s defense, claimed that Mike’s work at the firm was “not serious and somewhat shallow.” Interesting. Too bad Time didn’t bother to look at the written reviews Jones gave Brown at the time. There, Jones called Brown “an asset to the firm” and described Brown’s work as “excellent,” “first rate,” and “outstanding.”

Neither Time nor most of the other major media let facts deter them. In the midst of America ‘s worst natural disaster, they shamelessly repeated false stories told by people with ancient personal grudges.

Regardless of the facts, it’s now conventional wisdom that the man who successfully headed up the national response to over 150 presidentially declared disasters, including some of the largest in history, didn’t have sufficient experience.

The Washington personal destruction machine claims another victim. Michael Brown becomes another name in the pantheon of chewed up, spit out public servants. The media and politicians move on, worrying not a bit about what’s right or true.

The Michael Brown I’ve known for 23 years is a good, honest, compassionate, competent leader. He will endure. He’s not the first to be put through the Washington wringer. I pray, though, that he is the last.

 

Guest columns do not necessarily reflect the views of Accuracy in Media or its staff.

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