New York Times: On the Other Hand...

He didn't call them on it explicitly, so he probably didn't violate decorum. But the NYT's Andrew Ross Sorkin sure seems to be distancing himself from his colleagues' contention nine days ago that Stan O'Neal's phone call to Wachovia was "a major breach of corporate protocol."

There has, of course, been plenty of side-debate about whether O'Neal's phone call to Wachovia was a clear wrong-doing, a borderline act with bad timing, or a purely artificial slight exploited by opponents. In all of that debate, however, Jack Flack saw no reference to the fact that the chairman of the Merrill board had been completely informed of the call. That's because, of course, O'Neal himself was the chairman.

The absurdity of CEO O'Neal giving Chairman O'Neal a heads-up only further highlights why governance activists hate the dual role. But if you were O'Neal last weekend, it would have been impossible to resist reminding the unhappy directors of your chairmanship.