I would guess that the difference in opinion comes from the fact that the general population doesn't like corporate executives and will answer each question while subconsciously adding their distaste. In the first example, they want to blame the executive, but in the second, they don't want to give him credit. Given the opportunity to blame someone for the problem, the general population will blame the executive and not doubt their biased judgment. Whereas objectively speaking, the answer is no to each question, because the executive simply doesn't care about the environment.

For more on Eugene Mirman, see the humor round table I conducted with him, along with comics from The Daily Show, The Onion, and madTV, and The Flight of the Conchords.

The President was informed by the VP of a profit making strategy. The Executive only chose to use the information of making money by saying Yes to it. He negated the other information as unimportant to him but just because he defaulted to only making money - he did not care in either case to use the information about the environment. What indicts him in responsibility is that "he knew" the information.