Month: November 2016

Ethics Dunce: Mediaite

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

feldman

Mediaite is a frequent source here. The news and opinion website actively strives for balance by maintaining a stable of ideologically diverse reporters. It also received a big boost in credibility recently by finally dumping the embarrassing Tommie Christopher, whose left-wing bias was so extreme that it bordered on parody.

However, the site grossly abandoned ethics and accountability this time.

Yesterday I cited a Mediaite story about how Twitter dolts thought they saw a KKK sign in the stands during the World Series, a mistake caused by a bad hybrid of race-obsessed derangement and utter ignorance of the National pastime. What I did not know, because Mediaite was engaged in a cover-up, was that reporter Josh Feldman had filed the original post in which HE accused Cleveland fans of promoting the Klan. As you can see above, the original Mediaite story was not about Twitter morons mistaking the cards representing three strikeouts for Cleveland starter Corey Kluber, but a “scoop” by an ignorant and irresponsible reporter who made that mistake.

After Feldman was quickly schooled  on Twitter, Mediaite cleaned up the embarrassing story, removed Feldman’s byline, and turned it into a “Boy are some people stupid!” post. Feldman restricted his apology to Twitter, writing, “Apologies for the fuckup. Need to do more reading up on sportsing things.”

No, need to show some responsibility on reportsing things, Josh. Mediaite’s handling of this botch was unethical, and seriously implicates their trustworthiness. In the revamped post, a note was added saying,

UPDATE- This post has been updated to reflect the fact that it was NOT a KKK sign, it was signifying the number of strikeouts,”

Yes, and it was also updated to remove the name of the guilty reporter. Josh Feldman should been named as the one responsible, he should have apologized to Mediaite readers , not Twitter followers, for false reporting, and Mediaite had an obligation to apologize as well for its poor oversight. Instead, the site chose to cover for its reporter.Ethics Verdict: No transparency, no accountability, and an effort to deceive readers rather than admit to incompetent and careless reporting.

How can anyone trust a website that would do that?

___________________________

Pointer and Facts: Daily Caller

Presenting The First Ethics Alarms Readers’ Challenge!

/ Jack Marshall / 25 Comments

loved

The Atlantic has published a jaw-dropping puff-piece on Hillary Clinton with the astounding title, “Why is Hillary Clinton so widely loved?”

I read the thing (for a thing it is), and was salivating over the chance to eviscerate it, but I’m feeling a little nauseous, and I’ve been indulging my disgust with Hillary and her apologists and minions a bit much lately. Thus I have decided to offer the task to you, dear readers. This is the first Ethics Alarms Readers’ Challenge, and the challenge is to write the most thorough, fair, well-argued and entertaining analysis. I will publish the best of the submissions in a separate post. Yes, submissions that defend the article and attempt to validate its position are welcome, and I would venture that any piece that successfully explains why it isn’t complete, intellectually and ethically indefensible crap would be a strong candidate for the prize.

Entries will be judged by the quality of their ethical analysis, the number of fallacious arguments identified, the number of rationalizations flagged, and the quality of the rebuttals, if any.

The winner will be published on the morning of November 6.

Good luck, and have fun!

 

‘It Profits A Law Firm Nothing To Give Its Soul For The Whole World … But For Hillary, Thornton?’

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

Once again, a memorable line from the best ethics film of them all, “A Man For All Seasons,” came rushing back to me as I observed another example of professionals abandoning their ethical principles to assist the most demonstrably corrupt Presidential candidate in U.S. history, Hillary Clinton.

Not just her, however, to be fair. The Thornton Law Firm in Boston has used an illegal and unethical maneuver to circumvent election laws and give millions of dollars to the Democratic Party and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Sen. Harry Reid, President Obama and, of course, Hillary, among others.  The scheme was revealed by the Center for Responsive Politics and the Spotlight investigative team at the Boston Globe.

The firm has just ten partners, but is one of the nation’s biggest political donors. A whistle-blower sent firm documents showing that firm members have been making large donations to Democrats, only to be reimbursed by the firm days or even hours later with bonuses matching the amounts donated exactly.

Federal law limits partnerships–law firms are almost all partnerships—to maximum donations of $2,700 per candidate. This was what is called a “straw donor” plot. “Straw donor reimbursement systems are something both the FEC and the Department of Justice take very seriously, and people have gone to jail for this,” Center for Responsive Politics editorial director Viveca Novak told CBS. Continue reading →

Latest Ethics Notes On The Hillary Clinton E-Mail Scandal Ethics Train Wreck, Part 3

/ Jack Marshall / 32 Comments

denial

Continuing from Part 1 and 2…

9. Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign circulated a draft letter critical of James Comey to former federal prosecutors, implicitly inviting them to comment publicly.  (This is an implied but unenforceable quid pro quo. These people are good...) Eric Holder, naturally, former US attorney general Michael Mukasey and poor, disgraced former Bush AG Alberto Gonzalez heeded the dog whistle, all disgracing themselves in the process.

Not one of them are privy to the evidence involved, and for these men to be using their positions and reputations to level charges and accusations at a high-placed law enforcement official based on speculation and partisan warfare is unethical. It is unfair, and  undermines the public trust. This is always something that former officials should avoid, as a near absolute. The Golden Rule also applies. These men know how hard these jobs are, and what they would have thought about  ex-officials criticizing them. Basic professional ethics principles discourage this.

Holder, of course, is a proven Clinton hack. Gonzalez might even make Comey look better by criticizing him, so thoroughly discredited is he. (My guess is that he’s desperately attempting to fashion a new pubic image.)

Mukasey’s comments may have been the worst of all. He took the opportunity of the current controversy to attack Comey again for his decision not to recommend that Clinton be indicted. (Meanwhile, CNN used his name in a misleading headline implying that he was criticizing Comey for his letter to Congress. It initially fooled me.) Speaking of the earlier Coney statement, he said,

“This wasn’t Comey’s call. It is not his function as director of the FBI to decide who gets charges and doesn’t. It’s his function to gather evidence. And he didn’t fulfill that function very well. But it’s certainly not his function to get up and pronounce on whether charges should be brought or whether a reasonable prosecutor would ever bring them.I don’t think he should have been this fix. I don’t think he should have put either himself or the bureau or the Justice Department in this fix.”

Wrong (1): it was Comey’s call, because Loretta Lynch told the public that Justice would accept the recommendation of the FBI regarding Clinton’s possible prosecution. Did Mukasey follow the story? I guess not.

Wrong (2): Comey’s extensive public statement in July was necessary to ensure transparency and trust after Loretta Lynch stupidly allowed Bill Clinton to appear to be brokering a deal with her. Presumably Mukasey wouldn’t have done that.

Wrong (3): So Comey did not “put either himself or the bureau or the Justice Department in this fix.” Obama put them in this fix, by allowing his Secretary of State to skirt security policies. Holder put them in this fix, by operating such a blatantly partisan and political Justice Department that public trust in a fair investigation of the presumptive Democratic Party presidential candidate was impossible. Lynch put them in this fix, by not resigning.

To his credit, Mukasey did dismiss Harry Reid’s and Richard Painter’s Hatch Act nonsense with appropriate disdain, saying, “That’s baloney. I mean, you know, it’s sort of an amusing talking point for three and a half seconds, but it’s not serious.”

10. The issue is not whether Donald Trump is as corrupt and dishonest as Hilary Clinton, or even more so. In trying to shift focus to Trump to allow Clinton, as usual, to wiggle out of the well-earned consequences of her own wrongdoing by distraction, confusion, and diversion, Clinton’s corrupted allies are throwing every accusation and innuendo at Trump that they can concoct or dig up. It-Doesn’t-Matter. Trump is horrible, the bottom of the barrel, UNDER the barrel, at the bottom of a long, narrow pit under the barrel. Understood. That still doesn’t make Hillary less corrupt, less untrustworthy, and less dishonest. Nor less ruthless, cynical, manipulative, venal and totalitarian.

Continue reading →

World Series Ethics: No, You Morons, That Wasn’t A “KKK Sign”!

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

kkk-world-series

The divided, confused, betrayed American public owes a debt of gratitude to the National Pastime this morning, and not for the first time. The stirring World Series win by the Chicago Cubs in Cleveland, and the joyous celebration afterwards, is exactly what this besieged and angry republic needed.

Well, that and a competent and respectable Presidential candidate to vote for, but you can’t have everything.

On social media, however, one was reminded why we have such miserable options to lead the country: ignoramuses. For during the game, multiple social justice warriors, doubtless confused because no players protested the National Anthem during the game, took to Twitter to exclaim that there was a Klu Klux Klan sign at the World Series!

Morons.

Some thoughts: Continue reading →

Unethical Quote Of The Week: Barack Obama [UPDATE: He’s Quoting Himself!]

/ Jack Marshall / 99 Comments

Queen of Clubs

“Hillary Clinton is consistently treated differently than just about any other candidate I see out there. There’s a reason we haven’t had a woman president.”

—-President Obama, playing the gender card, since the race card isn’t applicable, in a campaign speech in Columbus, Ohio.

How disgraceful is this? I know it’s a campaign speech and some hyperbole is expected, but there are limits. The statement is dishonest, insulting, divisive and stupid.

Hillary Clinton is treated differently “than just about any other candidate”? Does he mean Trump? That’s the only other candidate running for President, and sure, he’s treated differently: he’s routinely demonized in the news media, from which he received almost nothing but sneering, negative coverage, and called the equivalent of Hitler by members of Obama’s party. Nobody ever blames the bad press he gets on sexism. I guess she is treated differently.

Of course, Hillary is also the only allegedly feminist Presidential candidate who rose to power on the coattails of her more successful and powerful husband, whose rise she assisted by threatening the victims of his sexual advances into fearful silence, whose claim to being a Wall Street reformer is undercut by the huge speaking fees-as-access gifts she received from big financial firms, and who violated both ethical principles and her oath before Congress by shaking down foreign powers for gifts to her family foundation, aka slush fund, while Secretary of State.

She’s one of two candidates repeatedly caught in substantive and trivial lies, but the only one who secretly violated both her own Department’s policies and basic principles of competence by using an unauthorized e-mail system, exposing classified information to acquisition by hostile powers, destroyed potential evidence she knew would be subpoenaed, and lied to the press and the public about it for over a year. As a result of this and more, only 43% of women find Clinton trustworthy.

SEXISTS!

Oh, wait…

Those 43%, by the way, can only find Clinton trustworthy because they are gender-biased or pathetically gullible, because she is so clearly untrustworthy. Sexism is the only reason she has as much support as she does! Continue reading →

Ethics And Sports: Maybe It’s Confirmation Bias, But The TV Ratings Give Me Hope

/ Jack Marshall / 31 Comments

And these days, when the goal is a more ethical society, I’ll take hope anywhere I can find it.

The big story in the NFL right now is that for the first time ever, its TV ratings are dropping. Through the first seven weeks of the season, ratings were down for every prime-time NFL show: “Sunday Night Football” by 19 percent, “Monday Night Football” by 24 percent and the Thursday night game by 18 percent. For the season as whole, ratings are off in regional games too. The NFL is doing what it always does with bad news: obfuscating and lying. It has blamed the drop on the Presidential race, as if anyone wouldn’t do anything to escape that, and the generational abandonment of network TV and even cable for the internet. Various polling results, however, show that a big factor is the league’s increasingly obvious lack of values.

The concussion issue-–finally—is hurting interest in football, especially as parents try to steer their children toward less risky sports. A recent study that researchers took pains to insist was only troubling, not conclusive, found brain chemistry changes in children who had played one season of junior football. I don’t know about anyone else, but if there is any evidence that a sport might reduce my kid to a brain-damaged invalid by the time he’s 60, that’s plenty for me to limit his recreation choices. The public is also finally reacting to the NFL’s evident cover-up of its responsibility for ex-players who have perished as a consequence of CTE, a brain disease caused by repeated head trauma. I wish this was the main reason that fans are turning off pro-football games, but at least it’s a factor. Continue reading →

For The Sixth Straight Year, Jimmy Kimmel Reminds Us That Child Abuse Is Hilarious

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

I know I’ve already condemned Jimmy Kimmel, TV’s  most revolting and  successful fick , this year, and I wish that was enough. I don’t like even thinking about the man; it depresses me profoundly that a major network pays millions to such a miserable human being to be such a miserable human being. Jimmy is a proud ethics corrupter, an advocate of parents making their children cry so they can get a sliver of fame—infamy, really—on YouTube and Jimmy’s late night show on ABC. Disney owns ABC. Disney. Disney pays this smug, cruel man to urge parents to make their children miserable for big laughs.

Think about it.

I have to revisit this asshole-blight on the culture, however, because this morning I watched supposedly lovable News Babe Robin Meade on HLN this morning as she showed some of the segments from the video above and laughed hysterically, along with everyone in her studio. The idea, Jimmy’s idea, after he decided to scotch the concept of asking parents to punk their toddlers by telling them that grandma was dead (just speculating here), is for parents to tell their beloved children that Mom and Dad had eaten all of their Halloween candy, and record their reactions. It’s sooooo funny! The little kids wail! They weep! They fall on the ground in abject grief! Robin couldn’t stop laughing. Child abuse is so hilarious.

Jimmy has proven that.

He’s also proven that a shocking number of  parents and ABC viewers have the ethical instincts of the Marquis De Sade. Continue reading →

Latest Ethics Notes On The Hillary Clinton E-Mail Scandal Ethics Train Wreck, Part 2

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

Continuing from Part 1…

I swear, I didn't pick this photo to make James Carville look crazy or nasty. This is really what he looked like today...

I swear, I didn’t pick this photo to make James Carville look crazy or nasty. This is really what he looked like today…

5. The uproar over Clinton’s private server use and possible security breaches being investigated further with FBI inquiries into the newly uncovered Huma Abedin e-mails seems oddly out of proportion to its substance, at this point. The violent reaction of Democrats and Clinton’s campaign is more suspicious than the information itself. The immediate default to accusations of political and professional misconduct is itself unfair and unethical, and reminds those who are open to being reminded of the Clinton habit of bullying and threatening adversaries, including honorable ones. Just as Trump cannot seem to help himself from lashing out disproportionately at every affront real or imagined, the current over-reaction is itself disturbing. There are too many bullies and thugs in the Clinton camp.

6. Next to Harry Reid, the most publicized accuser of Comey has been Richard Painter, a law professor at the University of Minnesota and the chief ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush White House from 2005 to 2007. He has filed a Hatch Act complaint against Comey with the federal Office of Special Counsel and Office of Government Ethics. As with Reid’s accusation, his is unjustified. Unlike Reid, Painter is intelligent, informed and honorable, and I can only speculate why he has jumped the rails like this. Painter argued in a New York Times op-ed on Sunday that Comey’s intent can be inferred from the absence of a good reason for sending the letter.

Huh? He had a good reason, and as a lawyer and ethics expert, it should be obvious. He didn’t want to be accused of lying to Congress, or to believe that he was lying to Congress. That’s an excellent reason. There are others. “Absent extraordinary circumstances that might justify it, a public communication about a pending F.B.I. investigation involving a candidate that is made on the eve of an election is . . . very likely to be a violation of the Hatch Act and a misuse of an official position,” Painter claims. Okay, but there were extraordinary circumstances. Public distrust of law enforcement institutions is at a dangerous, all-time high. Every decision is attacked as corrupt or politically motivated by one party or the other. The particularly volatile  situation of a Presidential candidate being investigated by the FBI was greatly exacerbated by the Attorney General allowing herself to be pulled into an inappropriate and improper meeting with the husband of the candidate under investigation shortly before a decision whether to prosecute was due–I’d call that an “extraordinary circumstance.” Comey has been trying to restore the integrity of the Justice Department, which Holder and Lynch, along with President Obama, has allowed to be seriously soiled. He may or may not have made the right choice, but for Painter to file a complaint alleging intentional political bias based on his actions alone is irresponsible. Writes Jonathan Turley, also a law professor of note, and one who does a better job avoid partisan bias than Painter does:

“Comey was between the horns of a dilemma. He could be accused of acts of commission in making the disclosure or omission in withholding the disclosure in an election year. Quite frankly, I found Painter’s justification for his filing remarkably speculative. He admits that he has no evidence to suggest that Comey wants to influence the election or favors either candidate. Intent is key under the Hatch investigations.  You can disagree with the timing of Comey’s disclosure, but that is not a matter for the Hatch Act or even an ethical charge in my view.”

“Or even an ethical charge.” Bingo. And those are harsh words from the usually excessively mild Turley.

I’m not sure what’s going on with Painter, whose opinions I have followed for years. I have followed him, and even argued with him occasionally, on the excellent legal ethics blog, the Legal Ethics Forum, where he is a contributor. If he is a Republican, he’s either a disillusioned one or a strange sub-species. Most of his posts tilt leftward, and they are almost all political in nature, in sharp contrast to everyone else. He obviously has no respect for the Republicans in Congress, and is as vehemently anti-Trump as I am. Unlike me, apparently, he seems to have allowed his rational contempt for Trump lead him to a damaging bias in favor of Hillary Clinton. Ethics complaints should not be used as a political weapon. Continue reading →

From The Double Standard Files: I Just Watched Ellen Degeneris Sexually Harass Jake Gyllenhaal On TV…Why Is That OK?

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

jake-gyllenhaal-ellen

That was a rhetorical question. It isn’t okay. It’s sexual harassment. It’s a double standard. And it’s wrong.

I must admit, I’m kind of ticked off about it.

Jake Gyllenhaal is a marvelous and attractive young actor, currently starring on Broadway in the revival of Sondheim’s “Sunday in the Park With George.” He’s also a favorite guest of Ellen Degeneris, America’s favorite openly gay TV talk show host. I don’t usually watch “Ellen,” but I was in a dentist’s chair getting SIX cavities filled (Remember Dudley Moore in “10”? Like that.) and that was on the telly while I was suffering.

Ellen spent easily five minutes nagging Jake to take off his shirt. Well, it’s possible it was less: time seems to pass slowly when you are watching a famous and beloved Hillary Clinton supporter engage in unethical sexual conduct that is far, far more substantive than anything Billy Bush did when he was caught on tape with Donald Trump, and there are drills, rubber devices, cotton and random finger in your mouth.

Try it some time. You’ll see. Continue reading →