Remember, Mr. Bennett, disclosure is a virtue

Following pundit payola has become quite the cottage industry of late, from Armstrong Williams, to Maggie Gallagher, to Michael McManus, to word from Howard Kurtz today that Eric Wesson, a columnist for an African American newspaper in Kansas City, got paid by a Dem House candidate.

I have my own submission to the list.

Bill Bennett, the moralist and best-selling compiler, has been on Fox News Channel’s Hannity & Colmes five times in less than three months, the last appearance coming just six days ago. In each instance, Bennett was on as a conservative pundit, offering viewers a defense of Bush, his administration, and its policies.

In three of the appearances, Bennett was introduced as the host of the “Morning in America” radio show; in the other two he was introduced as the former Secretary of Education. At no point during any of Bennett’s appearances were viewers told that Bennett has received several million dollars from the Bush administration.

Money from a federal program intended to expand public school choice has instead been used to prop up a scheme cooked up by William J. Bennett to boost home schoolers in Arkansas, Education Week has reported.

Newspaper staffers David J. Hoff and Michelle R. Davis report that a for-profit firm called K12, Inc., run by former Education Secretary and “drug czar” Bennett, has received $4.1 million from the U.S. Department of Education. Bennett’s outfit received the tax funding under a provision in the “No Child Left Behind” education bill that is designed to expand options in public school choice.

Granted, this is not completely analogous to, say, the Armstrong Williams scandal. Williams received public money for the express purpose of public relations. He was paid to plug Bush’s education program. Bill Bennett, meanwhile, received far more money than Williams, but for a dubious curriculum program, not p.r. In fact, Bennett didn’t talk about education policy on Fox News at all.

The problem, however, remains one of disclosure. Bennett is on the administration’s payroll while appearing on TV as a pundit offering commentary about the same administration. A minimum standard of journalistic ethics requires news outlets to alert viewers to a pundit’s potential conflict of interest.

Bill Bennett seems to believe he can secure a lucrative Bush administration contract — under suspicious circumstances — one day, then turn around and offer “independent” analysis of the administration as a political pundit the next. As long as viewers are none the wiser, Bennett figures, there’s no conflict.

I guess there’s no chapter in the Book of Virtues on the value of “disclosure.”