Returned to the Recommended list — Steven D
Appearing at The Blogging Curmudgeon, My Left Wing, and the Independent Bloggers’ Alliance.
Well now I’ve seen everything. Prominently placed on The Huffington Post is one of the most sickening bits of apologia I’ve ever read. Ari Emanuel pleads the case of the freshly fired CEO of HBO, Chris Albrecht. Sure he beat up his girlfriend, but he’s a really good at spotting talent!
Writes Emanuel:
Chris Albrecht, like the rest of us, is not a perfect person. But he is a brilliant executive who helped turn HBO from a place to watch movies, stand-up comedy, and boxing into the home for some of the most creative and challenging original programming in the history of television. He has an amazing eye for talent, the ability to nurture that talent, and the patience to let outside-the-box shows find their audience. Without him, we wouldn’t have had The Sopranos, Sex and the City, Six Feet Under, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Entourage, or Everyone Loves Raymond (which HBO produced).
The Sopranos?! I love that show. Well, ok then! What’s a little assault and battery?
Officers at the site of the Oscar De La Hoya-Floyd Mayweather Jr. boxing match came running when they spotted a man later identified as Albrecht grabbing a woman by the throat with both hands and dragging her toward the valet parking station at the MGM Grand.
Police said Albrecht was unsteady on his feet, reeked of alcohol and said of the woman, “She pissed me off.”
So who is this sad apologist for thoroughly indefensible behavior? Rahm Emanuel’s brother. That’s who.
Ari Emanuel, founder of the Endeavor Agency and agent for Larry David, Michael Moore, Sacha Baron Cohen, etc., etc. (and brother of Dem big-shot Rahm Emanuel) is ticked off about how the press has treated his friend and now-former head of HBO, Chris Albrecht. He’s especially bothered by what turned out to be the smoking gun: HBO’s 1991 settlement involving a subordinate and love interest of Albrecht’s who alleged that he had shoved and choked her in her office. Emanuel says the press “dug up a 16 year old incident, dusted off the cobwebs covering it, and suddenly created ‘a pattern’ of behavior that required the delivery of Chris’ head on a platter.”
Yes. Not surprisingly, Albrecht has a history of grabbing his girlfriends around the neck and throwing them on the ground. It must be because he’s “a creative genius given to emotional tirades.” As reported in the Los Angeles Times a previous incident had been effectively buried by a hefty settlement.
In 1991, Time Warner Inc.’s HBO paid a settlement of at least $400,000 to a female subordinate with whom Albrecht was romantically involved after she alleged that he shoved and choked her, according to four people with knowledge of the matter who declined to be named because the payment was confidential….
[Sasha] Emerson, who had joined HBO in 1986, was senior vice president at HBO Independent Productions and reported directly to Albrecht.
By 1990, the two had become romantically involved. Both were married at the time. The affair broke up Emerson’s first marriage, according to one person close to her.
By the time the incident occurred, Emerson and Albrecht had ended their trysts. Albrecht allegedly assaulted Emerson in her office in Century City when she told him she had been dating someone else, said one person close to Emerson. Albrecht allegedly threw her from her chair to the ground, the person said.
But, says Emanuel, Albrecht has expressed “deep regret” about knocking his new girlfriend around. From the Washington Post:
Albrecht said he was “deeply sorry for what occurred in Las Vegas this weekend and for any embarrassment it caused my family, the company I love, and myself.”
Who’s missing from this public apology… Oh, I know! The girlfriend he beat the crap out of!
This is just so bloody typical. Domestic violence affects approximately 1.5 million women and 845,000 men per year, with far more abused women than men suffering severe injuries. (This isn’t hard to figure out. Men tend to be substantially stronger than women.) And the excuses for this brutality seem endless. One of the biggest comes into play in the case of Mr. Albrecht. ‘Twas the drink that made him do it. So saith Ari Emanuel:
He is an alcoholic who fell off the wagon and made a terrible mistake.
Like so many high profile celebrities who fuck up royally, Albrecht is will seek treatment for his alcoholism.
In a statement sent to HBO staff members and released publicly Tuesday, Albrecht said he had been a “sober member” of Alcoholics Anonymous for 13 years.
“Two years ago, I decided that I could handle drinking again. Clearly, I was wrong. Given that truth, I have committed myself to sobriety. I intend to take a temporary leave of absence from HBO effective today, in order to go back to working with AA.”
Yes, alcholism is a cunning, baffling, powerful disease. It is not, however, a cause or an excuse for domestic violence.
The belief that alcoholism causes domestic violence evolves both from a lack of information about the nature of this abuse and from adherence to the “disinhibition theory.” This theory suggests that the physiological effects of alcohol include a state of lowered inhibitions in which an individual can no longer control his behavior. Research conducted within the alcoholism field, however, suggests that the most significant determinant of behavior after drinking is not the physiological effect of the alcohol itself, but the expectation that individuals place on the drinking experience (Marlatt & Rohsenow, 1980). When cultural norms and expectations about male behavior after drinking include boisterous or aggressive behaviors, for example, research shows that individual men are more likely to engage in such behaviors when under the influence than when sober.
Despite the research findings, the belief that alcohol lowers inhibitions persists and along with it, a historical tradition of holding people who commit crimes while under the influence of alcohol or other drugs less accountable than those who commit crimes in a sober state (MacAndrew & Edgerton, 1969). Batterers, who have not been held accountable for their abusive behavior in general, find themselves even less accountable for battering perpetrated when they are under the influence of alcohol. The alcohol provides a ready and socially acceptable excuse for their violence.
Evolving from the belief that alcohol or substance abuse causes domestic violence is the belief that treatment for the chemical dependency will stop the violence. Battered women with drug-dependent partners, however, consistently report that during recovery the abuse not only continues, but often escalates, creating greater levels of danger than existed prior to their partners’ abstinence. In the cases in which battered women report that the level of physical abuse decreases, they often report a corresponding increase in other forms of coercive control and abuse–the threats, manipulation and isolation intensify (Minnesota Coalition for Battered Women, 1992).
But don’t count on little things like facts to stop good old boys like Ari Emanuel from spouting canards in defense of those really great guys who just happen to beat women.
SO MAD!!!
Very well done, Curmudgette. Wish I could work as quickly and effectively.
Let’s hope that together we can make sure the age of rule by brute strength and wealth is over.
Someone should tell Arianna Huffington we don’t need to give platforms to people who enable violence against women.
I wouldn’t care if this asshole had won the Nobel prize for peace. To assist one of his friends to mount a public relations/damage control campaign on his behalf is disgusting and dead wrong. That’s what the Washington Post is for.
You know Steven, I’m a real fan of divergent voices, but I was shocked to see this. Huff Po, of which I am a major fan, is a little heavy on Hollywood insider shit, and this was no exception. I’ve read plenty on that site that I disagreed with, but this blew my mind. Thanks for the bump, btw.
You’re welcome.
That’s the question.
That’s my only objection to this whole scenario: I don’t think HBO should be able to fire Mr. Albrecht for something that didn’t happen at work.
I’ve outlined my reasoning in a much longer comment downthread.
They apparently saw this sort of behavior as both work-related and expensive:
The settlement is reported to have be $400,000 or more.
I’m too upset to go to Huffington Post right now. Please tell me that someone challenged Emanuel’s apologia.
I looked through a number of the comments. Really a mixed bag. From my quick scan, the comments calling bullshit on this were in the minority. Some of them were great, but they were in the minority. This, of course, only added to my outrage. I haven’t looked since, and the comment section has nearly doubled. I just don’t think my stomach can take more back-slapping endorsements for this sad defense of a batterer. It really brought home for me, once again, how much tolerance society has for violence against women.
Wow. How can anyone condone such behavior? That is beyond upsetting in and of itself. It not only lets abusers off the hook, but it has a really deleterious effect on the psyche of victims. If society is not enraged that a woman gets beat up, it sends a message that she has no value. This woman was physically assaulted by this “great guy” and then emotionally assaulted by by Emanuel and the others.
They have no clue as to how destructive they are being.
on her book about Picasso’s treatment of women in his life.
in other news, I’ve heard Yoko Ono is going to be a character witness for Phil Spector in his trial.
It’s ok if you’re a celebrity.
I have no words.
She is a character.
well at any rate, the general social progress with respect to women is astounding–no more “barefoot and pregnant”…it’s “battered and pregnant” now.
we won shoes due to great role models like Imelda Marcos and condi.
well said
if this weren’t on the front page I would give it a recommend.
You can still give it a recommend. After it scrolls off the front page I’ll return it to the diaries bar so it can still appear as a recommended diary.
This is just a very public case with wealthy, famous people but of course this goes on behind a million doors every day. People think ‘yeah I don’t think it’s cool to beat up women, but my friend coworker brother neighbor is a really great guy and he must have had a good reason’ ….until every single act of domestic violence is met with nothing but scorn and condemnation from every single man in the abuser’s life (and of course from women too, but members of the ‘brotherhood’ are especially powerful peers)domestic violence will continue to be met with a wink and a slap on the wrist.
I don’t think it’s so much that “he must have had a good reason…” — unless the friend/relative actually witnessed the incident, it’s more likely to be “He’s such a great guy, I just can’t believe he would do something like that.” They just can’t reconcile the idea of this successful guy, this popular or highly respected guy, with that of someone who uses violence against women; in fact, they find it hard to believe even if they DO witness it; there’s a tendency to dismiss it as a ‘one time’ incident, or blame it on alcohol or temporary state of stress. He can’t be “like that…” he must have just “had a bad day.”
There seems to be a widely-held (but inaccurate) stereotype about men who abuse women as being poor, uneducated or unemployed, lower-class…. ie, not successful, intelligent, or admirable in any way. “Great guys” just don’t do things like that — so the tendency is (especially among other men who are his peers) to dismiss accusations that don’t seem to match the image they’ve formed of him, based (of course) on his treatment of THEM. Or to find excuses, like alcoholism or being under excessive stress… or to put the blame on the woman somehow, even accusing her of inventing the whole thing. (Certainly the abuser is quick to put the blame for his behavior on any available excuse, including blaming the victim for “making him” lose control.)
We have such a long way to go….
Would folks be jumping to his defense if he had been strangling, say, a black man? “He pissed me off.” Doubtful at best…but it’s his girlfriend so that’s okay, she must’ve done something wrong to deserve it… (growling)
Exactly. This is what drives me bat-shit crazy. “Women are the niggers of the world.” — John Lennon
Is it ok to fire someone for something they did in their personal lives?
Hm, slippery, meet slope.
Before we go any further:
Nobody is defending Mr. Albrecht’s abuse of his girlfriend, nor of any other women. Certainly not me.
However…
…I’m troubled that HBO has fired Mr. Albrecht for something he did in his personal life, and not at work.
What if my employer is a strict Mormon who thinks that smoking, drinking, and adultery is wrong–and I’m a smoking, drinking philanderer? Should he have the right to fire me? Those things are not illegal, but many thing they are sinful, immoral.
What Mr. Albrecht did was both immoral and illegal (and I wonder why he’s not in jail), but he didn’t do it at work.
Don Imus, as we all recall, got sacked for comments he made on the air, while he was getting paid by MSNBC.
There are certain job categories, such as police officer, airline pilot, politician, and teacher, to name a few, that are positions of trust and authority, and what happens in your personal life can get you fired. A police officer, for example, who is convicted of domestic battery may lose his right to carry a firearm, which means he will get fired from his job because a cop without a gun is, well, a crossing guard.
As a teacher, I have a “morals clause” in my contract that basically says my school board can fire me if I do something that is immoral, but not necessarily illegal.
However, weren’t we all upset not so many years ago that the Republicans wanted to impeach Clinton over a blowjob (and lying about getting a blowjob)? “His private life didn’t affect his job performance and is none of our business” was the mantra at the time. Has that changed? Were the Republicans right and we were wrong?
If we are going to claim that employers not only have the right but the duty to fire employees who do things wrong in their personal lives, where does this right and duty end? Already, courts have upheld that employers have the right to forbid employees to drink or smoke off the job.
Employers in most states are free to fire people for being homosexual, which is wrongly deemed “immoral behavior” (and is often illegal, since there are laws against sodomy).
We also have over 90 million Americans being forced to submit to urine tests to screen for drug and alcohol abuse before they can be employed–not for jobs that involve safety (like bus drivers or airline pilots), but for jobs in which safety is not a primary issue (I don’t really care if the cashier at Barnes and Noble likes to light up a joint in his free time).
So back to the Albrecht Dilemma:
If I’m an excellent computer programmer or welder, but I’m also an asshole who beats my wife, does my employer have a right and/or duty to fire me?
What I see being endorsed in this diary troubles me–not because it affects Mr. Albrecht–because what is being endorsed is an employer’s ability to reach into an employee’s private life and use that to determine whether someone should be hired or fired.
(And yes, I got the larger point that being an alcholic is not an excuse for bad behavior. That was Mel Gibson’s excuse for his anti-Semitic remarks, and the appropriate response then was, “A drunk man’s words are a sober man’s thoughts.” Alcohol might loosen your inhibitions, but if you beat women when drunk, then you either do it sober or else want to do it when you’re sober. I also got the point that rich white people get away with bad deeds that would put poor people in jail…not exactly a brand-new revelation for any of us, I’m sure.)
By the way, here’s what the ACLU endorses (I’m a long-standing member and we’ve had lots of discussions in our local chapter about this) regarding much-needed changes to the employment-at-will standard that allows HBO to fire Mr. Albrecht. It’s the Principle of Just Cause:
What I am saying is this: I am not defending Mr. Albrecht but a principle–the principle that someone can only be fired for “just cause”, which is defined as on-the-job behavior, not behavior in one’s personal life (except in certain public safety jobs). If you cannot defend a principle that would help the worst of us, then you are not interested in defending that principle at all. The principle of free speech allows Ann Coulter to speak as much as you or I; this is a different principle, but it either applies to everyone or no one.
He wasn’t ‘an employee’. He was the CEO. Somehow, I think there is a difference and I would suppose that the morality type clauses you point to for say a police officer are probably equally applicable to those of the CEO of a publicly held corporation (of course, we are never going to see his contract). Employees of course don’t have employment contracts.
If the above doesn’t justify his firing then consider…
If 1 person cancels their subscription to HBO because of the bad behavior by their CEO is the board justified in terminating his contract?
How about 100 cancellations? 1,000? 100,000?
And, more importantly, do over 100 million Americans have that right?
Unless you belong to a labor union, or are a public employee, you have NO rights in the workplace.
This isn’t about Mr. Albrecht, really. He’s a rich guy with important, rich friends who are making excuses for his bad behavior.
This IS about a principle.
As a teacher, I am tenured but I can still be fired–however, there’s a process that has to be followed to make sure that my rights to employment aren’t trampled on.
Perhaps after a fair and impartial hearing, HBO would have determined that Mr. Albrecht’s actions HAD negatively affected his ability to continue as CEO of the company. We’ll never know, because there was no impartial process.
I am concerned about the principle of “Just Cause” for firing someone, rather than the specifics of Mr. Albrecht’s case. But in his case, I would say that Mr. Albrecht was fired from his job for something he did in his personal, not his work, life.
And if you don’t defend rights for assholes, then you don’t defend rights for anybody. Everybody has rights or nobody has rights. You can’t just give rights to people who are nice people or people you like. It just doesn’t work that way.
By the way, your point about a boycott of HBO is a bit weak, because as far as I know, no one has organized a boycot of HBO. As far as extending a teacher’s “morals clause” to a corporate executive–well, should an executive be fired if he has a mistress, even if his job performance is great?
Mr. Albrecht was a GREAT head of HBO–but a total asshole in his personal life. Does that mean that he doesn’t get to keep his job? Where do we draw the line? As you yourself said, does HBO gain the right to fire Albrecht if there’s a boycott (if one ever materialized)? By that logic, HBO has no right to fire Mr. Albrecht if, say, HBO’s ratings and stock go up in the wake of this incidence, because then his private actions have NOT negatively affected the company.
I don’t expect to win the argument–but I’m deeply troubled by the endorsement of the same principle that Republicans used to impeach Clinton.
Clinton was impeached over something in his private life–lying about an extramarital affair–and if that was wrong then, this is wrong now.
NO – he had an employment contract which I am quite certain had morality requirements…if not, I’m quite certain he will sue HBO for wrongful termination.
You’re “quite certain” Albrecht had a contract with “morality requirements”?
You’ve seen the contract?
If he had a contract, then he had more rights than 100 million other Americans.
Once again, this isn’t about Albrecht–it’s about a principle of “just cause”.
Is private behavior “just cause” to be fired from your work? If so, there are a LOT of Americans who are in trouble, because there are lots of people who use illegal drugs and have extramarital affairs on their own time. These activities don’t affect their work, but if we appoint our employers the guardians of our morals, with power to mete out “punishment” for private behavior, then basically the Constitution doesn’t really apply. We are “on the job” 24/7. If I get in an argument with my neighbor, Bob, and call him an “asshole”, and my employer finds out, should he be able to fire me? Maybe my employer is a prudish sort who doesn’t like profanity and feels deeply offended by its use.
By your logic, it doesn’t matter if I used the language away from work, on my property, on my own time. Because “me” doesn’t exist apart from work–everything I say or do comes under the scrutiny of my employer.
This isn’t about Albrecht, it’s about all of us.
It seems that you want to ignore the realities simply because they don’t pertain to the point you are trying to make – and it’s not that I am in disagreement with your point…which obviously is that it is unfair to dismiss employees for their non-work related behavior.
This wasn’t an employee…this was the CEO of a publicly held corporation and it would seem impossible that he would have that position without a contract. As I have already stated, if his contract didn’t specify any personal morality expectations, then his attorney will no doubt make that issue clear.
I am quite certain that Curmudgette was specifically referring to Albrecht and wage slaves like me but please feel free to do your own diary on the broader implications. Since you choose to ignore that this isn’t a normal employee but rather the CEO with a contract, you should probably expect some flack on your attempts to draw inferences of this situation to that of the common working man/woman.
I’m still waiting for the time when the common working man/woman gets a contract with stock options, multi-million dollar bonuses, golden parachutes, etc. and at that point, being terminated for ‘private’ behavior is probably a violation of their employment contract.
s/b NOT wage slaves like me
Wage slaves are almost always terminated for actual and appearances of impropriety. Most companies have it as a condition of employment. Certainly it must be the same for a CEO?
It was not non-work related. It occurred at a professional event at the MGM Grand. The previous incident, which was buried with a hefty settlement, happened in a company office. She worked for him. This private behavior discussion is a red herring. There was nothing private about it. He committed felony assault in a work environment. Committing a crime is a firing offense in most jobs.
Thanks for the clarification – you’re right…HBO made a large investiment (24/7 and replay rights Saturday night) and it was definitely work related.
…the same?
Yes, it is the same.
You make no distinction between work-related behavior and private behavior.
Albrecht should be punished by his employer whether his attack on the woman occurred within a work context or in his private life.
It’s the last four words of the preceding sentence–in his private life–that I find disturbing.
Trust me.
Major corporate executives (and even not so major executives) almost always have a specific employment contract which runs to many pages. I know, because in my former life as an attorney I’ve certainly seen enough of them.
White n Az has seen the contract.
I’m reasonably certain Albrecht had an employment contract.
As I’ve not read it, I’m not certain of its contents at all.
That phrase, “quite certain”, implies a degree of surety that is not valid.
I’m prone to winging opinions…I thought that was the point of opinions.
I’m less prone to respond with sarcasm because I tend to feel that sarcasm is the way a bully tries to win a point without making the effort of a solid logical argument.
Feel free to continue to ridicule my opinion that the CEO of HBO would always have an employment contract but I don’t see you offering any evidence to prove your point.
…if Albrecht wasn’t fired?
Would that destroy your argument that HBO had to fire him because he was “bad for the company”?
Corporations are all about making money, yes?
If subscriptions went up because of Albrecht’s abuse of his date/girlfriend, then yes, it would be considered mismanagement by the corporate board for firing him…but the horse is already out of the barn.
I happen to be of the insipid variety of liberal that actually appreciates corporate responsibility which sometimes runs counter to profits.
If HBO’s profits went up after Albrecht attacked this woman–not because he attacked her, but they went up because Albrecht’s a highly capable CEO–then according to your argument, “it would be considered mismanagement by the corporate board for firing him.”
Uh…you do realize you’ve just proven the invalidity of your own logic, right?
(By the way, I happen to agree that modern corporations should have a required responsibility to society at large, rather than just their shareholders, but I don’t think they have the right to punish their employees for private behavior).
You have an interesting way of looking at things.
You propose an absurd rhetorical question and I agree with you in the spirit that yeah, if that which is impossible (he has already been terminated), becomes miraculously possible, then an argument could be made that firing him would be the wrong thing to do.
The bigger question is…why do you want to waste your time arguing absurd rhetorical questions?
the bigger question is…why do you want to waste your time arguing absurd rhetorical questions?
really! lol! when the curmudgeon wrote
i was tempted to write
…when one of us water buffalo runs AGAINST the herd.
You get trampled. Now, why didn’t I know that?
I think you are over-reacting much as you over reached with the point you were trying to make.
This however wasn’t nasty at all and I recognize that nastiness seems to be part of some sites (i.e. DK & MLW which is why I won’t post there anymore).
I wish that you would have started your own diary on the topic rather than take Curmudgette’s diary (which was quite good if I failed to acknowledge that previously) and bend it to make a point that simply doesn’t apply.
There was nothing personal, nothing nasty and you have a point…just not when it pertains to the CEO of a highly successful public corporation.
Most companies and corporations have standards of employment that include being fired for participation in or perpetrating illegal acts regardless of whether they are done at the work place or have anything to do with the work place. It is a “Reflects negatively on the company’s image” thing.
It certainly applies to the underlings at these companies, I see no reason it should not apply to the big boys too.
If anything the big boys get cut a lot more slack. Remember, HBO previously ate one hefty loss over Albrecht that we know of — the settlement with his previous assault victim that they paid. There are rumors of at least two other “problems” that they made go away. Payments like that are chump change to companies like that, but clearly this incident was too public to make quietly disappear. Albrecht became too substantial a liability. So they were well within their rights to make him take a walk.
Figures.
It’s also hard to equate the same thing happening the other way around since it’s less rare for a female to batter a male (but it does happen) and it is more likely for a female to intimidate or fire a subordinate rather than beat them.
The bottom line is that being drunk and abusive is a rather ugly combination but the two things seem to go hand in hand – witness the number of professional athletes doing the same thing and it isn’t being tolerated there either. I am from Phoenix and saw Jason Kidd get railroaded out of town for beating his wife because Jerry Colangelo thought it was unacceptable. This was a big deal since the Suns traded off Steve Nash to get him and got little in return from New Jersey when they shipped him off. Likewise, Bobby Chacon from the Diamondbacks was shipped off to Colorado.
Bottom line, there are some who do find this to be unacceptable.
This is one of those “correlation doesn’t prove causation” things. I don’t know if that was your implication, but it’s a point, I should perhaps have made even more strenuously. Abusers don’t stop abusing just because they stop drinking, and it is too often used as an excuse for execrable behavior. This attitude helps no one, including the battering alcoholic. Unless an alcoholic takes responsibility for his/her wrongs and “defects of character” the chances of recovery are not so good. And the abuse issue requires intensive therapy. Most abusers were abused in some form. Take a look at Lonnie Athens material on violentization. Violence is largely enculturated in family systems, and if someone is fully violentized, there really is no treatment. They’re violent fucks until they die.
There definitely are female batterers. A social worker friend of mine told me about an Hispanic male client who was battered by his Asian wife. If that doesn’t fly in the face of every social stereotype and assumption, I don’t know what does. However, it’s statistically much rarer and far less likely to result in serious injury, because, again, women are physically at a substantial disadvantage in a physical confrontation with a man. Which is why men who beat women are quite fairly despised. It’s on a par with beating children and animals. There’s just something so uncool about physically attacking those who can’t adequately defend themselves.
As for your comment about female employers, I’m assuming that’s an anecdotal observation. I’ve certainly encountered female bosses who were emotionally abusive, but I’ve also encountered plenty of male bosses who emotionally manipulative and used their power to intimidate. I think it’s just seen as more normal. When women either use or abuse power, it tends to upset people’s notions of femininity and makes them lightening rods.
Anyhoo, thanks for your feedback and kind words about this diary.
is it ok to fire somebody for what they did on their personal time?
if what they did on their personal time is (a) against the law and (b) reflects poorly on the corporation, you bet your ass it’s ok!
also, california is an “at will” employment state. you work for somebody “at their will.” if they don’t like you, they can fire you, unless you can prove discrimination.
i doubt if he’s going to say hbo is discriminating against domestic abusers.
You should save your ire for Albrecht who clearly deserves it. I also agree with your assertion that alcohol explains/rationalizes absolutely nothing.
Ari Emmanuel was speaking out as a friend, an insider and somewhat has a point but his public ‘enabling’ of his friend’s behavior is of no consequence.
If you love the Sopranos, you should stick around afterwards because ‘Entourage’ gives you a much better insight into the mentality of the players that you are speaking of here (and I have wondered who Ari Stone’s character is supposed to be if not Ari Emmanuel)
Anyway, it’s clear that Albrecht was entirely over the line, people got involved and punishment was meted out rather quickly (criminal charges of course pending). Perhaps you should wonder who hires him next because they would hire him knowing his baggage.
Does an employer have a RIGHT and/or DUTY to “punish” an employee for something he did in his private life?
This was a reply to Curmudgette’s diary and not at all addressed to your point.
You might want to check for the answer in my reply to your reply to my original reply to your comment
Not the first time a miscommunication has happened and certainly not the last.
It is usually a “condition of employment.” Anything legal or illegal that reflects negatively on the company or corporation. I would be shocked if this corporation does not have such a condition.