Author: Jack Marshall

“And Now, The Rest of the Story!” MLB Bans Those Two Assholes For Life…

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

Hey, maybe Major League Baseball reads Ethics Alarms!

In this post in October, EA reported that in the bottom of the first inning in Game 4 of the World Series with the Yankees losing 2-0, NY lead-off hitter Gleyber Torres “hit a high pop-up into right field foul territory. Dodgers right fielder Betts caught the ball with his glove, but” Asshole #1 grabbed Betts’ glove with both hands, opened it, reached inside with his right hand and knocked the ball back onto the field, as Asshole #2 assisted him. It was on national television for all to see, so the umpires, thank goodness, got the call right and ruled fan interference. Torres was called out. I ruled it the most egregious example ever of fans deliberately trying to interfere with a player’s efforts during a baseball game, and called for Austin Capobianco (Asshole #1) and John P. Hansen (Asshole #2) to be banned from attending baseball games for life.

It took three months for some absurd reason, but Major League Baseball finally has banned them from attending games at big league ballparks, probably forever. Good.

The league sent a letter to A1 and A2 this week informing them of the decision.

“On Oct. 29, 2024, during Game 4 of the World Series at Yankee Stadium, you interfered with play by intentionally and forcefully grabbing a player. Your conduct posed a serious risk to the health and safety of the player and went far over the line of acceptable fan behavior,” said the letter, released today. “Based on your conduct, Major League Baseball is banning you indefinitely from all MLB stadiums, offices, and other facilities,” the letter continues. “You are also hereby banned indefinitely from attending any events sponsored by or associated with MLB. Please be advised that if you are discovered at any MLB property or event, you will be removed from the premises and subject to arrest for trespass.”

There is justice in the universe. I would have preferred to see the letter end with a promise that if either miscreant is discovered at any MLB property or event or even so much as wearing baseball cap, he will be summarily wrapped in unwashed jock straps and have his eyelids stapled open while he is forced to watch the execrable film, “The Babe Ruth Story” starring William Bendix (which Ted Williams called “the worst movie I ever saw,” though he never saw “The Exorcist II”) on an endless loop until he can’t stop screaming and begs to have his eyes gouged out. But that’s just me.

I can live with this resolution.

The Vatican Insults The World’s Intelligence for Some Cheap Virtue Signaling

/ Jack Marshall / 41 Comments

I suppose that anyone who remains a devout Catholic after the Church’s child predator scandal will swallow anything…sorry, poor choice of words.

The Vatican approved new guidelines for Italy holding that an applicant for the seminary cannot be rejected simply because he is gay, as long as he remains celibate.

How can this cynical, openly obtuse “liberalizing” of standards for the priesthood be received with anything but mockery? The Church already has gay priests, lots of them, and has since Peter was hearing cocks crow. I can name three in my limited experience with the Church. When I worked at Georgetown, the priest who was then President had a young male companion who followed him around like a puppy.

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Snow Day Ethics Warm-Up, 1/11/25

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

It’s another snow day in Northern Virginia, but that isn’t stopping climate change hysterics and progressive public policy incompetence apologists from blaming California’s latest wildfire catastrophe on global warming—not L.A.’s incompetent mayor, not the inadequate fire department budget, not the arsonists who may have started the fires, and not LA’s DEI water head, who left a crucial reservoir disconnected, resulting in fire hydrants not functioning.

Department of Water and Power (LADWP) CEO Janisse Quiñones was hired at a $750,000 salary in May, double that of her predecessor. To be fair, she had a background in California fires: she was previously a top executive at electricity company PG&E, a senior vice president at Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) from 2021 to 2023. That’s the company with the power lines that sparked responsible for the second-largest wildfire in California history, Dixie, in 2021. Before that, the company’s involvement in the 2018 Camp Fire resulted in PG&E paying a $13.5 billion legal settlement, although its liability for causing fires was estimated at $30 billion when the company filed for bankruptcy in 2018. It exited bankruptcy in 2020, just in time to hire Quiñones. Hey, but it’s all climate change!….Meanwhile, the discussion over at the Friday Forum (again, sorry for posting it late) about pet peeves and my late wife’s particular objection to using “that” when “who” is correct reminded me of a brilliant limerick that I had almost forgotten.

My strange friends back in Arlington, Mass. used to play a limerick game in which one of us would come up with a first line, the next would add the second line, the third would complete the third and fourth lines that have to rhyme, and my dear, brilliant, witty friend Jay Sylva would always come up with the final line, because he was so good at it. I specialized in first lines, and this time offered, “The man who had eaten my face…” (it wouldn’t have scanned with “that’). The subsequent additions left us with…

The man who had eaten my face…”
Had the nerve to come back to my place.
I said, “Stay a while!
If you’ll cough up my smile…

To which Jay immediately added, to applause and his eternal glory,

I’ll forgive you for not saying grace!”

On to today’s early list…

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Late Friday Forum!

/ Jack Marshall / 28 Comments

Here’s a pet peeve: when I forget what day it is. Since I work every day of the week and most evenings and no longer have anyone living with me in this huge house, I frequently lose track. Today was an example.

Steven Mintz, “the Ethics Sage,” has a post on his blog listing his “pet peeves.” Boy, he isn’t annoyed by nearly as many things as I am, and all most none of them are particularly momentous. Here’s his list:

10. Leaving the toilet seat up [a shout out to women].

9. Turning without signaling. [what’s the turn signal for?].

8. Walking up a flight of stairs while using one’s cell phones; being oblivious to others [this can cause them to run into us].

7. Talking during movies or using one’s cell phones. [even though there is a message from the theater not to do so].

6. Looking at one’s cell phone while someone is talking [inconsiderate].

5. Cutting people off while driving [stupid; you can cause a serious accident],

4.  Failing to share the arm rest on an airplane [thoughtless]. Taking one’s shoes (and socks!) off in an airplane [yuck].

3. Taking one’s shoe’s (and socks!) off in an airplane.

2. Being interrupted by another person while talking [rude! rude! behavior].

1. Using the catchphrase “with all due respect” [a subtle disrespect].

He writes in part, “I’ve been thinking a lot about them lately because I have experienced that increasingly people are inconsiderate; they don’t seem to be cognizant that even the little things can annoy others. I decided to write a blog on this subject because of my commitment to ethical behavior in our personal as well as professional lives. Being considerate of others is an ethical value because it shows caring and concern for the well-being of others. It moves us away from the constant pursuit of self-interest regardless of how it affects others.”

I can top that list with ease, including his #1: My least favorite catch phrase is a tie between “Everything happens for a reason” and “There are no coincidences.”

Another pet peeve is not getting many contribution to the open forums, but I can hardly complain when I open one 8 hours late.

Incompetent Elected Official of the Month: Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

This one is too easy.

If anyone really wants to know why the United States has yet to elect a female President, all that is required is to look at the talent pool. Members of Congress who have no executive experience are usually unqualified to take on the toughest leadership job in the world, so women with a background at least theoretically justifying a run for the White House must have shined as a state governor or a big city mayor unless their entire case for being elected consists of “I’m a woman.” When Gretchen Whitmer is the only female governor ever mentioned in the same breath as “President,” that tells you how deep the state house talent pool is…and then we have the female big city mayors. London Breed in San Francisco, a slow motion car wreck. Uber-woke mayor of Boston Michelle Wu. The Black Lives Matter worshiping mayor of Washington, D.C., Muriel Bowser. Lori Lightfoot was so inept and obnoxious in her term as mayor of Chicago that she was defeated in a landslide by a Marxist.

But the mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, makes all of those look like Fiorello La Guardia in a pants suit. In a classic of bad timing, Bass cut her city’s fire department budget for this fiscal year by more than $17.5 million. Then, the National Weather Service warned that Los Angeles would be in peril in the next few days with this announcement:

“..LIFE THREATENING, DESTRUCTIVE, WIDESPREAD WINDSTORM TUESDAY AFTERNOON THROUGH WEDNESDAY MORNING FOR PORTIONS OF LOS ANGELES AND EASTERN VENTURA COUNTIES– WITH LONG DURATION OF RED FLAG CONDITIONS INTO THURSDAY– POSSIBLY EXTENDING INTO FRIDAY… …RED FLAG WARNINGS IN EFFECT FOR LOS ANGELES COUNTY AND MUCH OF VENTURA COUNTY—SEE TIMINGS IN HEADLINES BELOW… ……Offshore winds are now expected to develop rapidly early Tuesday morning, leading to an earlier start time of the Red Flag Warning for many areas. Confidence is high for a life threatening, destructive, widespread windstorm with dangerous fire weather conditions Tuesday afternoon through Wednesday morning, especially focused on the San Gabriel mountains and foothills, San Gabriel Valley, San Fernando Valley, Hollywood/Beverly Hills, coastal areas adjacent to the Sepulveda Pass, Simi Valley, and Santa Monica mountains into Malibu. Strong mountain wave wind activity will likely impact many of these areas, resulting in very strong, erratic, and damaging wind gusts, capable of widespread downed trees/powerlines, as well as widespread power outages. This windstorm will likely be as destructive as the 2011 windstorm that impacted Pasadena and nearby San Gabriel Valley foothills. This is a high end Red Flag event. Any new fires will have a high risk for very rapid fire spread and large fire growth, extreme fire behavior, and long range spotting.“

So, forwarned, the next day, Bass took off for Ghana as part of a Presidential junket. When the fires started raging, it took her more than 24 hours to return to do her job. (Ghana has exactly no relationship to being mayor of L.A. at all.) By the time she arrived, more than 5,000 homes were burned or burning, as fire hydrants ran dry because water demand was so high it drained the city’s reserve tanks. She returned to face pointed questions about her leadership, or lack of it as the crisis loomed. Bass chose to shift into political BS boilerplate, saying,

“Let me just say first and foremost, my number one focus—and I think the focus of all of us here—with one voice is that we have to protect lives, we have to save lives and we have to save homes.”

Asked about Bass’s performance, Christian Grose, a political scientist at the University of Southern California, explained that Bass’ specialty is building legislative consensus behind closed doors “Her skills are building coalitions and working with people,” Grose said of Bass, who is in her first term. “This moment demands a true executive who will stand up and say, ‘this is what we’re going to do.’” Yeah, it’s that thingy called “leadership.” Building consensus is a stereotypical form of female management, but it’s not enough. if the stereotypical male leadership style of taking change and giving everyone confidence that there is someone in charge who knows what to do is too confrontational and icky for female mayors, the White House is going to be a loooong way off.

After she crashed and burned in interviews when she finally arrived on the smoky scene, Bass said, “When the fires are out, we will do a deep dive. We will look at what worked, we will look at what didn’t work, and we will let you know. Until then, my focus is on the TV screens behind you that are showing devastation that has continued. Thank you.”

The tone deafness and absence of leadership instincts that such a statement represents is mind boggling. “Don’t worry! After everything has burned down we will do a thorough analysis!” Just what citizens whose houses are in flames want to hear….

Stop Making Me Defend David Muir!

/ Jack Marshall / 20 Comments

ABC New Anchor David Muir should be relegated to journalism infamy after his disgusting efforts to drag Kamala Harris to the Presidency when he moderated the Trump-Harris debate last September. He and co-moderator Lindsay Davis, as I wrote at the time, “made the Harris-Trump debate a three-against-one affair,” showing their unethical alliance with Harris at every turn and in every way possible, including facial expressions, body language and tone of voice. Muir elevated his Ethics Villain status by “factchecking” Trump with false facts, and never challenging Harris at all even when she was lying outright.

An ethical news organization would have fired Muir, but ABC (Disney) employs George Stephanopoulos too, so obviously conflicts of interest and fair journalism don’t interest them. Muir would symbolize the Axis media‘s desperate and anti-democratic (they are the enemy of the people, after all) efforts to topple Trump in 2024, except that there was so much competition.

But the conservative media has him on its hit list just as Trump was on his. if Muir “so much as spits on the sidewalk” as Dirty Harry would promise when he was determined to bag a bad guy, it is waiting to pounce. In this case, the metaphorical spit was two clothespins Muir had fastened to the back of his jacket when he was on camera reporting on the California wildfires.

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Funeral Ethics

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

Jimmy Carter’s funeral was revealing regarding the character and professionalism of the various guests, which included all of the living former and current Presidents, First Ladies and VPs. I wish I could embed videos of all of the interesting interactions among these figures, but WordPress won’t let me. I also wish a single video had the right angles and sufficient length to capture what went on, but if there is such a video, I can’t find it. I will have to make do with links. The revelations…

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Ethics Dunces: Whoever Decided That “Imagine” Was An Appropriate Song To Sing At Jimmy Carter’s Funeral

/ Jack Marshall / 24 Comments

Ugh. Three friends, knowing my opinion of John Lennon’s most fatuous, annoying, stupid song (and he had others), called to tell me that Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood were singing “Imagine” at our 39th President’s funeral. My friends apparently like making my head explode.

The song has no business being played or sung anywhere except at a “Bad Pop Music” festival, and thinking that it is profound is, I am quite certain, signature significance for an idiot. Lennon once admitted in an interview that even he wasn’t sure what the song was saying. However, featuring this nihilistic, anarchist tripe at any President’s funeral (“Imagine there’s no countries”—it’s there ARE no countries, you illiterate dolt!) but especially one so overtly religious (“and no religion, too”) as Jimmy Carter is offensive.

I wonder if whoever was responsible actually read the lyrics. It’s also a dim-witted communist/world government screed: Imagine no possessions, nobody goes hungry, the world as one, all the people sharing in the world. Just bite me, John. Why didn’t you and Yoko just give all of your millions to the citizens of Chad or Haiti? I know why: you didn’t believe what you wrote for a second. John was, however, quite certain that were enough ignorant saps out there who would think his drivel was inspiring. There still are.

I suppose the plus side of today’s latest genuflection to this moronic anthem to imaginary idealism is that it’s the perfect musical accompaniment to the nation’s dawning realization that so much of progressivism is based on lies, posturing, fantasy and delusions. Maybe “Imagine” should be officially named the anthem of The Great Stupid. I can’t think of a better one.

“Too White A Christmas”: Additional Ethics Observations

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

As promised, I am adding some of my own concerns to Curmie’s post two days ago on the controversy regarding the lack of “diversity” among the ensemble in a Sacramento production of the meh Broadway musical, “Elf.” I know many out there in EA Reader Land don’t give a rip about casting ethics. Ethics Alarms has posted on it often, because I believe, as with a lot of ethics issues in particular industries and areas of the culture, it has larger significance than only where the controversy arose.

Curmie covered most of the ethical issues in this kerfuffle well, as he always does, but I have some pointed conclusions that I think bear emphasis.

The whole episode illustrates what’s fatally wrong with DEI in general and the Left’s obsession with it. It has become an ideology unmoored to the real world. The mission of a theater director or producer must be, first and beyond all else, to put on the best production possible. We can argue about other priorities, but not that. Putting on the best production possible means, without exception, casting and staffing the production with the most talented, experienced, reliable professionals the production can afford. The entire discussion Curmie explores among four theater professional reveals the crippling mission confusion and ideological fanaticism that has infected if not most of the entertainment business, far too much of it.

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Who Had “Trump Turning Into James K. Polk” On Their 2025 Bingo Card? [Corrected]

/ Jack Marshall / 24 Comments

This is the kind of thing that even die-hard Trump true believers should find, if nothing else, odd.

Although it was barely discussed during the campaign, President-Elect Trump is sparking head-explosions and headlines by talking about expanding American geography and territories. He says he wants to take the Panama Canal back; he says he wants Denmark to hand over Greenland, and he also wants to make Canada a state.

The U.S. hasn’t added any significant geography to its dominion since the Spanish American War, and gave up the Canal Zone to Panama during the Carter Administration. James K. Polk, the Democratic President who came into office as the herald of “Manifest Destiny,” had well-publicized designs on the Oregon territory as well as Mexican holdings from the start of his administration, and was threatening both Great Britain and Mexico to get his way. In the end, Polk got most of the Oregon territory in a compromise deal the English, and although it took a war with Mexico to do it, snatched California and the New Mexico territory. Then Polk retired and promptly died, his mission complete. Whether one ranks him as one of our most successful Presidents depends on how one feels about American imperialism, or perhaps whether one believes that, upon reflection, acquiring California was a mistake.

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