US President Harry S. Truman took the principle of personal responsibility so seriously that he famously installed a sign saying "The buck stops here" on his desk in the Oval Office. Sad to say, that honourable principle has taken a hell of a battering over the past week.
Here in the UK, we have been treated to the nauseating spectacle of a failed public servant, Sharon Shoesmith, gloating at her supposed legal "vindication" in the matter of her firing by her employer, the London Borough of Haringey. Ms Shoesmith was Haringey's head of children's services for part of the past decade. This was a period in which a number of well-reported cases of child abuse took place in the borough, which the social services people (latterly under Ms Shoesmith's "management") seemed incapable of preventing. After the brutal and tragic death in 2007 of "Baby P" (later identified as 17-month-old Peter Connelly), a public outcry led Ed Balls, then in the Labour Cabinet, to order Haringey to fire Ms Shoesmith.
There's no doubt that Ed Balls and Haringey Council breached due process here, and this is the "vindication" that the appalling Ms Shoesmith is now claiming. What does not seem to be in any doubt is that the Haringey Children's Services department failed Baby P and others to a shocking extent. Three individuals in the department resigned in response at the time of the tragedy, as did two elected officials. In other words, those directly above and below Ms Shoesmith in the chain of command tried to act honourably. And Ms Shoesmith herself? She "doesn't do blame", apparently, and is set to demand as much as £1 million in compensation, even as she protests that this is all about justice and not (perish the very idea) money.
I could go on about this, but I couldn't do any better than Libby Purves, who has today delivered a brilliant tirade of barely controlled rage against Ms Shoesmith in The Times. It's behind the Murdoch paywall, unfortunately, but well worth reading if you have access to it.
Someone else who apparently "doesn't do blame" is Sepp Blatter, the President of FIFA. This past weekend, FIFA's ethics committee suspended two senior members of the organisation's Executive Committee, pending an independent investigation of bribery allegations. The Committee decided that Blatter himself had no case to answer, on grounds that give a whole new dimension to the concept of a legal technicality. Blatter admits that he knew that the two officials in question, Mohammad bin Hammam and Jack Warner, were planning to offer bribes in connection with the World Cup, but he claims he didn't know about the actual offence, so he's in the clear!
This episode would be bizarre and reprehensible enough in itself, but it's barely the tip of the iceberg at FIFA. Almost half of FIFA's 24 Executive Committee members are currently caught up in one corruption scandal or another, and one might think that the head of the organisation (Blatter) would take some responsibility for that. Instead, Blatter is more than likely to be elected unopposed as FIFA President this week, to serve another four-year term, since his only opponent -- bin Hammam -- has been neatly pushed aside.
And guess who's set to take a leaf out of the Shoesmith-Blatter playbook? Step forward, Ratko Mladic. Apparently his defence against charges relating to the massacre of civilians at Srebrenica will be that it was done by others, "behind his back". You wouldn't think that could possibly work, but as Sharon and Sepp can tell you, you can get a long way by just being brazen.
UPDATE, 31 May: The English FA's decision today to call for the postponement of the FIFA election is welcome but way too late to have much chance of success. Much more hopeful is the evidence of serious unrest among the sponsors. Coca Cola, Emirates and adidas have all expressed their concerns today. If the money starts to melt away, Blatter and his co-conspirators are toast.
And meanwhile in Belgrade, a court has cleared the way for Mladic's extradition to The Hague. A new line of defence in relation to Srebrenica has also emerged. Supposedly the number of people killed under Ratko's direction was really only 2,500 or so, not the 8,000 usually claimed. So he only slaughtered 2,500 unarmed civilians? Well, I guess that's all right then.
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