Good morning!
Since this is an ethics blog, I guess I’ll have to confess that it’s really a lousy morning, since I was up until 1 AM watching the Red Sox lose to Oakland 1-0…
1. From the “Why do I bother?” Files. I’ve been complaining (too much, but it makes me feel better) about the precipitous fall in Ethics Alarms traffic since the Trump Deranged fled the objective discussions here and Facebook decided to make it impossible to post anything I write. Yesterday, I returned to the periodic theme of teachers facing termination when their naked forms pop up on the web, including the controversial photo in question. Because of that post, and not any of the important Ethics Alarms commentary over the past 12 months that were significant and useful, the blog had its highest traffic total in more than a year. None of the visitors had anything to say or constructive to offer, of course.
This is undoubtedly why Tucker Carlson’s website routinely includes tabloid style cheesecake features, like—let’s see what it is today—Ah! “Celebrate Amanda Bynes’ Birthday With Her Hottest Looks”! Bynes is a fallen ex-child and teen star who has been out of show-business for years because of emotional illness and drug problems.
Stay classy, Tucker.
2. How constant political correctness immersion rots even superior brains: A case study. One of the smartest, sharpest, BS intolerant people I have ever known or ever will know just posted this approvingly on Facebook:
I am depressed. These directives from a Montgomery County, MD sponsored community groups are largely idiotic, and like all word policing, efforts at thought and language control. My friend is a parent of two teens, but I would expect her, of all people, to send them the lesson that they should never capitulate to this kind of sinister conditioning, which is what it is: “The Collective will tell you what you can and cannot say without sanction! Await further instructions.” Almost all of these are awkward, meaningless distinctions of the ” ‘colored people’ BAD, ‘people of color’ GOOD” variety.
In related news, Major League Baseball changed the decades old name of it’s “Disabled list,” where injured players go to free up space on team rosters, to “injured list,” because disability activist groups lobbied for it. In this case, the new name happens to be more accurate, but that’s irrelevant. This was a victory for the Word and Thought Police, and they are not the friends of democracy or liberty.
3. There is hope. Rachel Maddow’s ratings have cratered in the wake of the Mueller investigation final report, as substantial numbers of viewers appear to have finally figured out that she was lying to them for three years.
Good.
4. Lesson: Vicious smears work, at least for the cognitively damaged and ethically inert: George Mason University students in a “survivors” group and the College Democrats group are demanding that the university fire U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh from his recently established post as a distinguished visiting law professor. A petition created by “Mason 4 Survivors” (Survivors of what, exactly? the intrusion of democratic processes on doctrinaire cant?) demands that the university “terminate AND void ALL contracts and affiliation with Brett Kavanaugh at George Mason University.” 2,000 ignorant students have signed it. Incredibly, two professors are supportive of this nonsense, Professor Bethany Letiecq, and Professor, Ahsan Butt, who tweeted that he believes GMU thought to themselves, “Let’s hire a rapist who repeatedly lied to Congress to teach law.” That statement is libelous, in my opinion. But this is what Democrats, including several declared Presidential candidates, did to a jurist with an unblemished record of good character in order to satisfy pro-abortion zealots.
Students who could seriously connect the newest Supreme Court Justice to alleged mishandling of campus incidents of sexual assault are demonstrating that they are dangerously deficient in critical thinking skills and the ability to process information fairly. What is George Mason’s accountability for that? Anyone whose connection to logic and reality is that tenuous will be significantly handicapped (ooo, can I say that, Montgomery County?) going through life, not to mention being a perpetual pain in the ass, which has its disadvantages. I speak from experience.
5. Today’s Joe Biden/ mainstream media bias/MSNBC hackery note (take your pick): “Morning Joe’s” Mika Brzezinski has been at the forefront of the media hypocrites trying to figure out some way to save Joe Biden from the consequences of an ingrained sexual harassment habit. Though she saw no reason to raise the political biases of Prof. Blasey-Ford when she showed up to testify about a three decades old, discovered memory to try to derail the nomination of a Supreme Court justice her party opposed. Mika asked, regarding Joe’s first accuser, Lucy Flores,
“A lot of folks will say that women need to be believed and heard, and I believe they should be heard. But are we allowed to bring up that Lucy Flores is a huge Bernie person? And she has political connections that might be counter to Biden’s goals? … Is it okay to bring up this could be politically motivated? Or are we just supposed to take all the words and the fact she said she was violated at face value? Are we supposed to just leave it there and have this sort of attack on his credibility and his honor? Just sit there, or are we allowed to talk about it?”
Sure, you are Mika, as long as you apply the exact same standards to other accusers when the accused is someone you don’t support. But you don’t do that, because you are a based hack with no integrity, and are not even smart enough to cover your tracks.
Responded her huggy-bear, Joe Scarborough, whose inappropriate secret romance with the woman who was posing as his ideological adversary during broadcasts makes him an expert of sorts in questionable sexual advances:
“The conversation has to be had. It has to be an open conversation, as you’ve been saying and as other people have been saying, the argument all women must be believed, period… That was the argument when Al Franken was run out of town, out of Washington D.C., when what Donald Trump has done is so much more abhorrent. That conversation seems to have been moving along. Women need to be believed, women need to be heard, but there has to be due process out there.”
What is THAT supposed to mean? If women need to be believed, then due process is a sham: the idea behind due process is that an accuser is NOT automatically believed. And what exactly is it that President Trump “has done” that is “so much more abhorrent”? Enlighten us on your understanding of “comparative sexual assault and sexual harassment, Joe. Is the theory that if another public figure has gotten away with worse, then a lesser harasser is in the clear? [Pointer: Other Bill]
Ethics Alarms 
Its only April 3. Please don’t make it any closer to tax day…
Sorry. Fixed.
Double standards are the only road to survival for so many in politics and the media. As I have noted here before, the do as I say not as I do standard has far reaching biased tentacles. Hence, if you’re a leftist, contortions will be made to excuse you. If you are to the right of AOC, you’re doomed to demonization, being ostracized and, if you don’t shut up, ruined. The drumbeat of biased insanity goes on. The deafness and blindness to their totalitarian lie telling and propaganda is stunning.
Oh, how I long for the, now almost laughable, days of picking on Dan Quayle and POTATO(E).
Dur process is out the window (in this case, for sexual harassment). Language is being censored. Students are not being educated, but indoctrinated instead. How Stalinesque! I would pull out some of my favorite Stalin quotes, but I’ve used them before, and anyone can Google them. Meantime, I’ll just sit here trembling, wondering when the thought police will come for you. And I do think you should sue Facebook.
4. With their clear disdain for due process, clearly GMU students have been taught little about their school’s namesake. How sad.
But it also illustrates something that I argued during the whole, “We’re not destroying his life” phase where arguments such as, “No one has the right to be a Supreme Court Justice” and “He’s just interviewing for a promotion” were commonplace.
Would these anti-Brett Kavanaugh fanatics have really been okay with him being denied the Supreme Court and staying on the Circuit Court? It was something that jumped out at me with Dr. Blasey-Ford’s comments that she’d kept her mouth shut for years after he became a judge, but had expressed concerns about him ever being put on the Supreme Court.
In other words, the only thing that bothered her about Kavanaugh being on the bench was that he might make it to the highest court?
Because that’s what her comments imply and that’s what all the bogus arguments about being denied a promotion or not having a right to one boil down to: We’re okay with this guy being a judge so long as it’s not on the politically-charged Supreme Court.
Which then leads to the inevitable conclusion that this was, indeed, all about his position on abortion (and other liberal wedge issues).
Their arguments make no sense any other way. Because, if they’re not alright with Kavanaugh or any other accused retaining their current job after being denied the upgrade, then they really are, despite their protestations to the contrary, working to ruin that person’s life by kicking them out of their chosen career.
I’m sure they know George Mason was a SLAVEHOLDER! What else matters??
5. Auntie Nan hath spoken. We need not discuss Uncle Joe any more.
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/04/02/pelosi-says-biden-allegations-are-not-disqualifying-1247827
Well that settles it.
Can you blame her? Look at the rest of the Democratic field. The best they’ve got besides Biden is the egg-headed mayor of South Bend with a funny name.
Who is gay—not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it will be a while before we elect a gay President— and more radical than most of the other socialists.
You’re right, of course. And his unfortunate surname would only make it worked for him.
Worse, not worked. Sigh.
Since I do not visit the website I do not know what goes on there.
Yet, Tucker Carlson is a very important figure and is one who is definitely helping to awaken Whites and white consciousness. This is what it comes down to. Though he always keep it within bounds, he seems aware of the issues at stake and, within his means, is helping the growing cause that will, eventually, result in a white nationalist consciousness. There is nothing else like him in any MSM that I am aware of.
All it takes is the willingness to cease being cowardly and, also, recognize what is at stake.
Someday, I hope that day will come soon, there will be open conversations in the Media on the important issues of the day, not just ‘veiled references’. Let the idea-wars really begin.
Here Tim Murdock lays the situation open for a more realist consideration:
[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ciPlfbn4Ug ]
1. Click bait
Tragically, a fact of the modern Internet where monetization is necessary. In effect, it is indistinguishable from Donald Trump is in serious legal jeopardy from [fill in the blank] for an article that goes on to speculate what might happen. The website knows by stating Trump’s legal jeopardy as a fact it will draw a lot of click throughs.
Playing to people’s biases, along with sexual themes, never fails to draw eyeballs.
2. Political correctness
The only way to stop this is to reject it utterly and use the “disapproved” words and phrases deliberately, and to take up argument with anyone who objects.
3. Maddow
Don’t be too happy. Tucker Carlson’s have surged. The never-ending see-saw.
Perhaps cable news is nearer to a zero-sum game than any of us could’ve imagined.
4. Vicious smears
I think almost all colleges have become a source of brain damage for their students, and should be shunned until they figure out just exactly how messed up they are.
5. The Daily Biden
Shh. You’re engaging in logic, critical thinking and rationality again. We all know that’s no longer the right way to analyze anything, and some say it’s soon to be banned along with “colored people” and “disabled person.”
Now, if we apply our feelz, we can get right to Joe’s position. Trump offends our feelz, therefore orange man BAD. Joe Biden makes our feelz happy, therefore accusations against him have to be evaluated in light of our feelz. The woman accusing Joe makes our feelz less happy, so we have to be skeptical.
Bret Kavanaugh makes our feelz bad, so we don’t have to apply that test to Cristine Blasey-Ford. Plus, she has a hyphenated last name, like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, which always makes good feelz. So we must believe her and disbelieve Kavanaugh.
Analysis complete. Get with the program, man!
Are you implying that, when Joe touches a women, she feelz good?
Evidently. Some, at least. He’s got that “magic touch.” 🙂
Either that, or the touching is inevitable (“It’s just Joe”) so the harassed woman should just lay back and enjoy it.
Yeah, I went there.
Bonus points to the first one who can identify where I went.
Cultural literacy, and all that jazz…
I ID the line with Bobby Knight, but it’s older than that. One source (falsely) gives credit to Confucius.
I was thinking of Clayton Williams, but full points for deeper references.
Regarding item #2: I’m at a loss to understand how replacing “non-verbal” with a longer phrase that is literally the dictionary definition of “non-verbal” is somehow less offensive. Most of the others are pretty dumb, too, but at least some of them have some kind of semantic argument behind them. But just replacing a word with the definition of that word is kind of counter to the reason we have so many words in the first place, isn’t it? Why not replace “blind” with “lacking or deficient in visual sensory capability” while we’re at it?
I guess we should be thankful they aren’t trying to get us to say “person who is differently-abled.”
.”….substantial numbers of viewers appear to have finally figured out that she (Rachel Maddow) was lying to them for three years.”
Jack, I don’t think you can substantiate this, particularly given your own clarification of what lying is and isn’t ‘lying’ re Trump. It simply isn’t credible to accuse Maddow of knowingly misleading her audience over three years. It is of course blindingly obvious you have many dsagreements with her, and view her as unprofessional.
She implied that Russia had a foothold in the US government. I’ll give Maddow this much: she’s too smart to believe most of what she has been claiming. And she is saying it to deceive—still is. Her conspiracy claims are exactly as knowingly false as Alex Jones’s lies. And lies they are. Using the device of insinuating a non-fact is true with a question and a raised eyebrow is a sneaky way to mislead, but it’s still misrepresentaton. It is an interesting issue: is asking, “Could it be that the Jewish Senator is taking orders from Tel Aviv?” a lie or just dishonest? A statement that implies a fact that isn’t a fact is still a lie.
Re: item #2 person first language . . . Don’t know if folks here picked up on the story last week at Amherst College where their office of diversity and inclusion issued a full report on similar “common language” recommendations. This report was issued without any formal approval from the college, and President Biddy Martin had to disavow the report and walk it back. Here’s the Boston Herald piece on it: https://www.bostonherald.com/2019/03/21/amherst-college-backs-down-on-pc-language-guide/
Thanks. I think the Herald, just yesterday, went to a paywall.
Didn’t know that, sorry about that. It’s been reported in most of the usual places, Martin’s announcement about it is quite good. Here’s the Powerline blog’s post on it: https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/04/amherst-flirts-with-orwellian-language-guide.php
Thanks. I’m just bitter because the Herald has been my deault source for Red Sox news, and now both Boston papers are behind paywalls.
You’re not the only ones mourning the Red Sox loss. Over on the good side of the Bay, my Giants are going into their third year looking up, far up from way down. They are rebuilding: that’ll take awhile. Meanwhile, San Francisco thinks the newbies can make the game “interesting” while it plays it way back up. Here’s what one sports reporter thinks (channeling Mickey Rooney rallying the toupers): “If you’ll kindly remember, the Giants have won three titles this decade and they have a beautiful ballpark and great announcers and some fun players so let’s all put on our happy faces and take what is likely to be a disappointing 2019 season wins-and-losses-wise on the chin like champs.” It’s just that it would have helped start off the season if Boston had run over Oakland and flattened them. If we can’t have the cake, we don’t want to have to watch the neighbors eating it this Fall.
Sorry you had to stay up so late, Jack (I was shown a petition the other day to have the whole country, including Alaska and Hawaii, go on CST and stay there. That made me think of The New Green Spiel grounding airplanes, so naturally, one of those involuntary snorting laughs busted out… all over the petition.) Meanwhile, back at the ballpark, let’s make it interesting:
YEAH!
Yeah, it stinks about the Red Sox. By contrast, the Twins won a game they should have lost yesterday. They are off to a great start.
But, let’s put things in perspective: the Twins control their destiny; their Magic Number is 156. I think Baltimore’s Magic Number is 157. It’s a long season. It may suck today (and tomorrow), but it takes the whole season to whittle teams down.
-Jut
Here’s a comment that got itself sent to Hell: “Re your comments on morning joe staff. You’re a right wing hack, making you an idiot.”
Defend sexual harassment, you’re right wing. Oppose it, and if the miscreant is a Democrat, you’re right wing. Naturally, this guy has no argument to make or rebuttal, just an insult.
You would not believe how many comments I get like this.