I’ve just heard back from New York Times reporter Andrew Ross Sorkin by phone and email. In a prepared statement, he walked back his comments on MSNBC considerably. “Boy did I touch the third rail! My off-handed comment was admittedly flip. I apologize for that. It was meant to provoke a conversation.”
I did not mean to suggest that there are literally no successful companies that employ union workers. Of course there are! Your readers have provided a good list (though I might quibble with some of the names.)
I made the unscripted comment with my financial columnist hat on in the context of the problems at GM. That’s what the discussion was about on the program. And when you look at some of the once great iconic American industries that have faltered — automobiles, airlines, steel, apparel, etc — there is a fair question worth asking about whether those industries were helped or hurt by their unions. But let’s leave that debate for another day.
Not sure if that will placate his critics, who were pretty livid about the whole episode, but I guess we’ll see.
Regarding the similarity between the question he posed the hosts of Morning Joe and a question former General Electric CEO Jack Welch posed to economist Joseph Stiglitz during a panel discussion Sorkin moderated, he said, “I’m afraid to say I hadn’t remembered it until you sent me your post.”
Sorkin said he hadn’t expected such a strong response and even suggested he was sympathetic to the very people who were most upset by his words.
