I went to bed last night having decided that the first post here today would be about President Trump’s blunt, characteristic, in-your-face reaction to the death of Robert Mueller, who led the cynical and destructive Axis of Unethical Conduct effort to cripple Trump’s first term with a contrived, partisan plot based on false accusations that he and his campaign “colluded” with Russia to defeat Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. The quote, an ethics quote because of the natural debate it fosters, an unethical quote because it intentionally breaches societal norms that dictate being respectful of the dead in the immediate aftermath of their deaths and a President should always model the best behavior for the public, and an ethical quote because it is true, was..
“Robert Mueller just died. Good, I’m glad he’s dead. He can no longer hurt innocent people!”
It’s not a close call whether this was an ethical thing to state in public, which Trump did on Truth Social. It wasn’t, and isn’t for many reasons. It is gratuitously cruel to Mueller’s family for POTUS to say such a thing immediately after their loved one’s death. It accomplishes nothing but relieve Trump of some of his apparently inexhaustable back-up of bile. It makes the Trump Deranged hate him even more than they already do, which qualifies as deliberately being divisive, something else leaders should never do. And it accomplishes nothing positive. Such an act does, however, take another step in making this Ethics Alarms 2015 post look as wise and prophetic as it was.
“See? I’m smart! I’m not dumb like everybody says!”
Before I sat down to compose a post that would have essentially said what I did in far fewer words above, I decided to check whether Ann Althouse, the red-pilled Madison Wisconsin retired law professor/bloggress had posted on the quote for her followers. She had, briefly. But what did I discover in the comments to her post was that the topic had provoked none other than our own Steve Witherspoon into not only doing battle with the vocal Trump Deranged and Mueller defenders (in truth defenders of the anti-Trump plot Mueller knowingly participated in) but being allowed to do so by Althouse!
Ann carefully moderates her commenters, and seldom allows an extended back-and-forth between commenters, a policy that Ethics Alarms, obviously, does not embrace. Steve (who was frequently derided on EA along with Steve-O-in NJ by self-banned Ethics Alarms troll “A Friend”) was measured, fair, polite, balanced, ethical and relentless as he was swarmed by Trump-Deranged attackers like the “The Birds” going after Tippy Hedren in the attic. Unlike Tippy however, Steve knew what he was getting into.
He was courageous, and he was right. Meanwhile, his adversaries’ comments were weak and illogical; the main defense of Mueller was that he was a decorated Vietnam veteran. This is rationalization #21, Ethics Accounting, or “I’ve earned this”/ “I made up for that,” as regular readers here know.
Here’s the full transcript of Steve’s interactions regarding Trump’s quote. I will have occasional asides in brackets.
Ethics Alarms 
Thanks for supplying the blow-by-blow in its entirety.
Steve sent me the link earlier, but bailed early on because I believed AllAmericanJock’s moronic imbecility might be contagious.
PWS
Will add that this isn’t anything I haven’t seen before.
I’ve enjoyed Steve meticulously vivisecting unsuspecting local Lefties for over a decade; they never know what hit ’em!
PWS
I see very little use in debating those hard left zombies whose minds have been completely made up. How do you handle screaming toddlers? The answer is that you handle this type of intransigence with stern discipline. Steve’s exchange proofs the wisdom of not engaging with trolls, combined with stern moderation.
I wonder if you view Abby Martin as a “hard Left zombie”? I agree that in American discourse and in the comment sections under blogs and YouTube channels that the partisan battles are raging and (ridiculously) everyone takes a side and dies on their cherished hills, but do you really reduce the moral and ethical concerns of the day down to such totally reduced terms?
The weird thing about participating in this Blog (speaking for myself personally) is not that my right-tending opinions are strengthened, but rather that I observe a chorus of people who only seem to bolster and support each other in digging down into established positions. It is (as someone say) an “echo-chamber”.
The minute you say something contrary I get the sense that the mechanism begins to get into convulsions.
Things cannot be so reduced to black and white, right and left.
[So with that said I guess I will have to join the rebels in the Putumayo. But what about my little girls?!?]
How do you remember public figures who led lives that are ethically complicated?
Mueller’s life was ethically complicated. As a Marine platoon leader in Vietnam, Mueller was shot and later returned to lead his platoon after his recovery. He received a Bronze Star for valor, a Purple Heart, 2 Navy/Marine Commendation medals, Republican of Vietnam Cross of Valor, and numerous other medals. After serving his country as FBI Director he was appointed by the DOJ as Special Council overseeing the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential elections, and became a participant in a clown show that greatly hurt his reputation and overshadowed his previous career and service to the country.
Trump’s reaction to his death was honest and truthful, but lacked class. I like Charles de Gaulle’s reaction to the death of Marshall Pétain a lot better by declaring that his life was “successively banal, then glorious, then deplorable, but never mediocre”. Marshall Pétain was a man with a complicated life; he was one of the great heroes in World War I, but he collaborated with the Nazis in World War II, after which he was spared the death penalty and was sentenced to life in prison.
One of the left’s heroes, Cesar Chavez, had an ethically complicated life as we found out last week. Left wing city and state governments waste no time in removing all references to Cesar Chavez from the public space by removing statues, and renaming streets. Somehow I believe that this reaction has more to do with his anti-illegal immigration stance than the allegations of sexual abuse.
Charlie Kirk’s death created strong and opposite reactions. He is lionized by Christian conservatives the MAGA right because of his political and moral stance, and reviled by the left who cheered on his death and destroyed impromptu memorials erected in his honor. To the hard left nothing is complicated; if you are not with them you are as evil as Adolf Hitler, and no positive memory is allowed to you.
There is a saying “Don’t speak ill of the dead”. This rule has the benefit of respecting the feelings of the deceased’s relatives and close friends. However it also has been said that the biggest lies are told during eulogies. All our lives are ethically complicated. Nobody is perfect. All have sinned. Honesty requires that we remember the good but also mention the bad. And that is where I think Trump fails, as he only mentions the bad; Trump is a man with narcissist tendencies who is unable to forgive and look past his own personal experiences.
The most charitable interpretation was that he was a senile patsy used as a figurehead.
Second. To what extent was he complicit in his being so used. This may be the Meuller family’s fault, much as the Joe Biden’s Four Years at Bernie’s fiasco was Dr. Jill’s and the rest of the Biden family’s fault. Why do Democrats deploy the demented?
Ironically, evidently the crazy left is happy Mueller is dead as well. He wasn’t as crazy as Jack Smith and Letitia James and Fani Willis and all the rest:
Robert Mueller never should have been a liberal hero
Hilarious.
This whole exchange reminds me why I am really glad you moderate comments, even if it sometimes costs you views and engagement. Your blog is one of the cleanest I’ve ever found while also still being interesting.
I went in all in with a Facebook “friend” on this and asked him why he was so put off by this comment by was virtually silent about all kinds of other issues, such as the abuse of people in Iran or transing kids or any other issue. Usually I back off if I feel like I am pushing someone too far, but I stood my ground this time. He deleted me, predictably. Before he deleted me, someone brought up that Trump was a pedo. It’s probably good he deleted me before I responded.
People let their personal dislike of Trump flavor everything. It feels like a divorce where one spouse will put the most negative interpretation on every single thing the other does. There comes a point where someone is so biased they almost descend into lunacy, kind of likes James Carville did with wanting to hate Trump more. It’s weird at this point.
For me, it’s not always that the TDS folks don’t sometimes have a point. My “friend” had a legitimate point about the tone of Trump’s comments, and I even agreed with him before making my argument, but it didn’t matter.
Attacking Trump makes people feel good about themselves or something. I don’t know.
The whole thing just reminds me of a former Facebook debate I had with my old boss. He refused to admit that he would prefer to live in a Christian majority country over a Muslim majority one, and he is gay. This was before Trump, but the same mentality seems to drive it all.
Jack,
Thanks for posting all that and for your kind words.
As for AllAmericanJock, the saga hasn’t ended yet; AllAmericanJock chose to keep digging.
I had a brief Facebook conversation about the cherry picking being done to Trump’s by the political left striping it of its context and the Facebook friend (a distant member of my family) chose to edit her original cherry picked post to include the context that she had omitted. Since almost all of the left leaning media that I had looked at at that time had cherry picked Trump’s comment, I don’t honestly know if my friend had intentionally cherry picked the comment or not, but I “liked” her notice that she edited it and told her it was the right thing to do. Here’s that brief conversation…
As for engaging with those that appear to be indoctrinated and brainwashed by the political left’s propaganda…
We all have our “that’s all I can stands, I can’t stands no more” Popeye moments and I’ve truly had my fill of them.
The intentional cherry picking has got to stop!
Being that you are retired and have time available on your hands, have you considered offering services to the USA-Iran negotiation efforts? Given your success with AllAmericanJock (obviously indoctrinated to ridiculous degrees) it seems that if the Iranians were subject to those armaments that they might realize the futility of operations against Divine Order and choose to allow America to open Walmarts in Tehran, give up the uranium, uncover their women, etc. (?)
Yes I know your comment was basically facetious in nature, but…
Alizia Tyler wrote, “Given your success with AllAmericanJock…”
Related to your off-topic topic of negotiation efforts, exactly what success did I have with AllAmericanJock?
None!
If I had been negotiating, I was a complete failure. 😉
It was glorious failure though! 🌞
Who the hell uses the pseudonym “AllAmericanJock”, anyway? …Biff Tannen?
Willem Reese wrote, “Who the hell uses the pseudonym “AllAmericanJock”, anyway? …Biff Tannen?”
A genuine narcissistic moron, that’s who.
He’s really easy to look up using Google, and I’ve got to say that “a narcissistic moron” seems to fit the personality of this guy perfectly.
Overall, I think he’s a cowardly moronic troll hiding behind a psydonyme.
I wrote above…
After I submitted what I planned to be my last comment yesterday and Ann finally posted it this afternoon, I guessing he’ll be cyber stalking me on the Althouse blog. After looking up this moron and learning more about him, I chose to end my last comment by calling the narcissistic moron a coward and explained why, that should send him straight over the edge.
The narcissistic moron AllAmericanJock made his bed.
Well, that’s clear evidence of the difference between my commenting moderation policies and Ann’s. I would have banned your nemesis after a warning (maybe) and definitely after that last comment. You will recall that I banned the legendary Chris after he responded to a good faith reply of mine with “HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” I know I have made mistakes by being over-tolerant of ad hominem insults an by some regular commenters here, notably Ablative Meatshield, whose trademark vulgarity I allowed in misplaced fealty to free speech while giving him margins for many perceptive posts.
Commenters like that soil the field. Ann should dump him.
Unfortunately, Google Blogger doesn’t allow bloggers to ban specific commenters like WordPress does. You have to moderate their comments out of threads and report their abuse to Google, which so far appears not to do anything beyond telling the reporter that they got the report.
I also hate the complete lack of comment nesting so it’s damn near impossible for traders to follow a conversation that is spread out all over the place.
Great job, Steve!
The EA Commentariat is extremely fortunate to have Steve and Paul Schlecht on the ground in 77 Square Miles Surrounded by Reality. I admire Steve’s doggedness.
By the way, Ann seems to have become almost completely involved with arcane, obscure topics. I find her hardly worth checking anymore, which is unfortunate.
“The EA Commentariat is extremely fortunate to have Steve and Paul Schlecht on the ground in 77 Square Miles Surrounded by Reality.”
Our cross to bear.
“I admire Steve’s doggedness.”
Well put!
PWS
Amen to that!!
While I admire Steve’s persistence in the face of repeated hateful comments, I am reminded of the concept that there is no point in arguing with idiots or true believers.
Fact checkers I peruse now and then often say, ‘lacks context’. So, to add missing context, i.e. a more complete recitation of Trump’s statement, is a step in the right direction. But, where is the context that shows Mueller actually did harm innocent people. I know there were prosecutions not directly related to Russian collusion, and those, as for most prosecutions, were opposed. But were innocent people harmed by Mueller? Who? When? How? Context is needed.
If “hurt innocent people” was just a Trump add-on to make himself sound reasonable, then the criticisms portrayed as mere TDS are valid criticisms. On the other hand, if Mueller’s investigation did hurt innocent people, then let’s put forth, not just Trump’s claim, but also the details that support that claim.
Provocative comment and good observations, but “hurt innocent people” is an easy one. Evidence is strong the Mueller, or, if he was too far gone to care, his deputies, knew early on that this was a contrived issue and a wasteful investigation. They forced Americans to hire lawyers and undergo interrogation. They harmed reputations. The farce crippled the Trump administration, wasted time and resources, deliberately caused distrust of the government and law enforcement as well as the judiciary with ramifications we still suffer from today.
Not quite the details I was looking for, but I understand that being specific is a challenge, especially when ethics issues are numerous and time is limited.
Go Steve!
On top of everything, AllAmericanJock = A last word goof
Too bad Althouse doesn’t have an upvote feature in her blog. Reading through, it looks like more comments supported Steve’s take on the issue rather than “AllAmericanJock’s”.
There continues to be this odd script on the left. It begins with “How could you possibly vote for Trump?”, continues with some variation of “since you did, you are a fat uneducated turd”. Then they wonder why those same people don’t vote for the left, because Trump hasn’t done anything for them.
Newsflash. People don’t like being called dumb deplorables by the folks supposedly representing them. All the name calling Trump does? Yes, it’s over the top and childish and old and but it’s a bit satisfying to see them sputter. I still say it was their election to lose with Hillary Clinton and to a lesser extent with Kamala. They made their bed of vitriol and now they can stew in it.
https://www.cracked.com/blog/6-reasons-trumps-rise-that-no-one-talks-about