Hatchet Job Up For Journalism Award!

I thought I had long since heard the last of “The Insurance Hoax,” a pure hatchet job in the September 2007 issue of “Bloomberg Markets” that indicted the entire insurance industry for its claims-handling practices. But much to my astonishment, the skewed diatribe has been chosen as a finalist for a prestigious journalism award. Stop the presses!

Thank goodness, the authors of the controversial piece–Gary Cohn, David Dietz and Darrell Preston–were not nominated for a Pulitzer Prize! But their article was picked with two others for a possible Daniel Pearl Award for Investigative Reporting, given out by the New York City Deadline Club–an affiliate of The Society Of Professional Journalists.

As a member of the club (although no longer active) and a proud member of the journalism profession, I am appalled that this article is actually up for an award. (To read the piece, click here. And to read my original blog on the controversy it generated, click here.)

The idea that such a one-sided story is seriously being considered for an award–given in the name of a heroic reporter who was killed while courageously investigating terrorism abroad–is really a disgrace, in my humble opinion.

I've been a screening judge many times, including a stint for the Deadline Club, so I know the drill. A piece comes in chock full of dramatic headlines, sexy quotes and damning infographics, and it stands out in a crowd of thick (and often mind-numbing) investigative tomes.

For a layman unfamiliar with the insurance industry and its critics, this article must've positively sizzled with its black and white, good guys versus bad guys, Perry Mason-like narrative.

Unfortunately, the article was so heavily skewed that it's almost cartoonish in its depiction of an industry that obviously has its faults, but is not as blatantly or broadly predatory as this piece makes it out to be. To argue otherwise would be like saying that just because (then) New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer caught a few selected brokers rigging bids, that all placements are crooked.

The facts are otherwise. The article ignores the tens of billions of dollars the industry quickly paid to satisfy the overwhelming majority of claims for two intense hurricane seasons and, of course, for 9/11, not to mentionn the billions paid out for routine claims every year.

Indeed, if you come right down to it, dishonest policyholders are more likely to try to scam their insurer with a fraudulent claim than any insurer is to rip off their honest customers.

Insurance Information Institute President Robert P. Hartwig also pointed out a plethora of factual errors, as well as faulty logic, in a long letter sent to the magazine that got no exposure in the offending magazine. He also didn't get any satisfaction in a face-to-face meeting with the reporters and editors involved. So much for objective journalism.

I'll be sending this complaint along to the Deadline Club, but I expect to be dismissed as an industry shill, since that's how most in the so-called Mainstream Media perceive those of us in the business-to-business press. (It's why I am far more active in American Business Media and the American Society of Business Publication Editors.)

Of course, those of you who know me out there in Insurancedom are well aware that I am no apologist for this business. If anything, I consider myself a pretty tough critic, as many of you who have been at the receiving end of one of my scathing blog or column critiques can attest.

But I don't bash the industry out of reflex, like many of its critics, but because after 26-plus years, I respect the thousands of readers who work so hard every day to help make sure their clients are properly covered, and that legitimate claims are quickly paid. I hold this industry's players to a high standard, and never hesitate to speak out when I believe someone or some company has come up short.

But Bloomberg took insurance industry bashing to a whole other level with its “Hoax” cover story. If they should win an award for their one-sided assault, it would only encourage others to take their best shots, regardless of fairness. Just being nominated is a sham and a shame.

I said in my blog at the time the article appeared that I wished insurers had put up a more vigorous defense, but most played “rope-a-dope,” retreating into their shells and waiting for the hub-bub to subside. It did for awhile, but if this article wins an award, it will validate everything that was reported, will it not???

So if you did not speak out back then, make your voices heard now! Contact the Deadline Club at info@deadlineclub.org to complain.

As they say at weddings, if anyone has an objection, speak up now, or forever hold your peace!