Arts & Entertainment

I’m Not Forgetting The Alamo This Year, and Other Concerns…

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

That is one of several plaques around San Antonio that memorializes William Barrett Travis’s desperate but inspiring letter on this date in 1836 calling for assistance as the fortress Travis commanded found itself under siege by the Mexican army. Last year at this time, I’m ashamed to say, I was too preoccupied to write about the Alamo, its defenders and its importance in American history and lore. I’m just as preoccupied now, frankly, but also determined not to neglect my duty to give proper respect and acknowledgement to 220 or so volunteers who, by their courage, comradery and dedication to a cause, displayed the best of the American spirit. Travis, Bowie, Crockett, Bonham and the rest would have really gotten a kick out of Trump’s post-assassination attempt theater.

Meanwhile,

1. I won’t be using the History Channel’s daily history prompts from now on. It seriously hacked me off, first by insisting that I consent to an A&E “Consumer Agreement” and not making a way to consent to it evident, but worse, presenting me with this monster (skip to the end; for God’s sake don’t try to read it!)

I have lectured and written abut this before. No ethical lawyer should prepare such a thing which they know with 100% certainty that literally no one can or will read. That’s not informed consent. That’s chicanery. Nor should a consumers have to pay lawyers to explain what what they are agreeing to. If I were asked to advise a client about the propriety of inflicting such a document on anyone, I would a) end up charging them several thousand dollars for my time and b) tell them that if they couldn’t cut the agreement down to three pages while defining every legal term in it, I would regard it as signature significance for an untrustworthy company. Give consumers a video to listen to that explains what the document covers in simple English. Something…anything but that mess. This is how Disney ended up using the agreement to sign up for a free trial on Disney+ to try to dodge a negligence suit at EPCOT. Over the past year, as I have been digging out from a financial disaster, I’ve become really good at saying, “You know what? I don’t want or need this service enough to tolerate the way you manipulate and mistreat customers. Screw you.”

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Regarding That Tom Hanks SNL Skit…

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

I just knew that there would be some part of last week’s “Saturday Night Live” 50th Anniversary special that sparked a controversy, and there was. As promised here, I didn’t watch the thing and, I am proud to say, know few people who did, at least not all the way through. Still, I was directed to watch two clips: Paul McCartney (with his band) performing the last part of the “Abbey Road” musical collage from “Once There Was a Way” through to “The End” (When the general reaction to an iconic singer’s performance is “He sounds pretty good for 82!,” it’s time to retire…), and the reprise of an old “Jeopardy!” skit, in which Tom Hanks, as a Southern contestant wearing a MAGA cap, jumped away from the black MC offering his hand as if it was a rattlesnake. Nice.

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Ethics Hero: “Landman” Creator and Writer Taylor Sheridan

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

The Billy Bob Thornton star vehicle “Landman,” following the stressful life of a West Texas “landman” and operational executive for an independent oil company in West Texas, has a lot going for it, mostly Thornton, who is one of our most interesting and versatile actors. The Paramount streaming series is already better, in my view, then the last two oil dramas I watched, the over-rated “Giant” and the relentlessly unpleasant “There Will Be Blood,” in great part because as with all of his roles, Thornton brings a great deal of humor to the proceedings.

I have not finished the series’ first season (I sure hope there is a second), but I was struck by the long scene above in which Tommy Norris (that’s Billy Bob) gives a quick primer to his company’s attorney on the facile conventional wisdom of the anti-fossil fuel lobby. The rant begins (at the 57 second mark), as Tommy denies the “cleanness” of wind power, and he takes off from there. It was an instant classic that quickly went viral on social media: as soon as I heard it I knew I could find the speech on YouTube and resolved to post it today.

There are also a lot of rebuttals to the speech on line, and that’s great: the ethics point is that for once Hollywood isn’t stuffing smug 21st Century woke politics into its audience’s brains, but is presenting a dissenting analysis. More more amazing yet, this one comes from a series’ protagonist and an appealing one at that.

Taylor Sheridan, who created “Landman,” cast Thornton and wrote and directed the speech deserves thanks and credit for packaging a provocative point of view that is sure to spark debate. Debate is ethical. What isn’t ethical is cultural indoctrination, which is how Hollywood has mostly been approaching the oil issue for decades.

Not surprisingly, the Wikipedia entry linked above states that the series contains “misinformation about renewable energy… “exposed as common propaganda tropes by Big Oil.” This is why Wikipedia should be considered a member in excellent standing with the Axis of Unethical Conduct. If Democrats had won another term in the White House, we would probably see “Landman” forced to include a disclaimer on Tommy’s speech.

I Don’t Understand the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington

/ Jack Marshall / 17 Comments

My woke Facebook friends have been fulminating about evil President Trump causing the cancellation of a “Pride” performance at the Kennedy Center by the D.C. Gay Men’s Chorus because he fired most of the D.C. venue’s woke board and assumed the post of chairman himself. It turned out that the performance had been cancelled before the President turned his sites on the Center, which, as I noted here earlier, asked for its slap-down after its partisan and disrespectful treatment of Trump during his first term.

Never mind: some talking heads on CNN and MSNBC have been trying to blame that Toronto air crash on Trump, so this kerfuffle is just more Trump Derangement in action.

The Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, D.C, reacted to the cancellation by saying in a statement: “We believe in the power of music to educate and uplift, to foster love, understanding, and community, and we regret that this opportunity has been taken away. While we are saddened by the decision, we are committed to this work and to our mission of raising our voices for equality for all. We will continue to advocate for artistic expression that reflects the depth and diversity of our community and country. We will continue to sing and raise our voices for equality.”

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Ethics Alarms Is Ethically Estopped From Criticizing the Casting of Cynthia Erivo as Jesus in “Jesus Christ Superstar”

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

Yes, that’s “Jesus Christ” in the upcoming Hollywood Bowl production of Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s “Jesus Christ Superstar.” Needless to say (I hope!) Jesus was not black, female or lesbian. Moreover, the character’s songs were not written for a female voice, but rather a powerful rock tenor.

Never mind, though. This is stunt casting, maybe even D.E.I casting. It’s not fair to the work, the music, and for audience members who are Christians, it may seem just a teeny bit irreverent. But Erivo is currently hot, Oscar nominated for a (I thought) rather single-note portrayal of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, in the exhausting film version of “Wicked.”

The story and a lot of the book of “Superstar” is taken right from the Bible, but even the original stage production was attacked as blasphemous when it premiered in 1971. The “rock opera” had begun its cultural life, like The Who’s “Tommy” a bit later, as a recording. Director Tom O’Horgan put it on stage with such innovations as a King Herod who pranced around as a flaming transvestite and Jesus and Judas blasting into microphones. The film version had still more anachronisms. Jesus and the disciples encounter tanks rolling across the Sinai Desert, for example.

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Ethics Quote of the Week: Christian Toto

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

“‘SNL’ became hyper-partisan and abandoned bipartisan satire. ‘SNL,’ like the legacy media, mostly ignored President Joe Biden’s obvious mental decline, the most stark example of its liberal bias. Show founder Lorne Michaels pretends the show remains nonpartisan. Reality says otherwise. Screams it, to be precise.”

—“Hollywood in Toto” blogger Christian Toto as tonight’s much hyped “SNL50: The Anniversary Special” looms.

My sock drawer organization is in true crisis, so I had programmed my schedule to handle that task tonight long before I knew of the special. Otherwise, I would have certainly wa…oh, who am I kidding? No I wouldn’t have watched the show if my Roku was malfunctioning and the only alternatives were re-runs of “Rosanne” and “Hart to Hart.” As Toto correctly explains, the show betrayed its mission, its origins, its original fans (like me), the culture, and the tradition of political humor, satire and comedy itself.

Toto points out that “Saturday Night Live” had the power, influence and ability to be at the forefront of a counter-culture revolution. In doing so, it would have been a national unifying force, holding the excesses—and it has been almost all excesses—of the extreme progressive capture of the Democratic Party to the public ridicule and derisive finger-pointing it deserved and needed. James Carville recently ranted that “It’s like, there’s a plant somewhere in quote–progressive—unquote America, that just to seize how many jackass, stupid things that they can embrace. It’s stunningly stupid.”

But apparently not stupid enough to be funny.

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And Now, By Request, A Brief Musical Interlude…[Updated]

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

A good friend who is a legal, ethics and theatrical colleague of long standing was discussing his skepticism about Elon Musk’s DOGE mission. He reminded me that in 1982, my musical political and legal satire performing group “The Music Lobby” was hired to handle the entertainment for a Washington trade association’s convention during the 1982 mid-term campaign, when Ronald Reagan was urging voters to “stay the course” as he tried to reign in spending.

The opening number I wrote was a parody of the Four Aces’ most famous hit (I love the Four Aces), “Love is a Many-Splendored Thing,” from the sappy William Holden-Jennifer Jones movie of the same name. My friend, who is one of the rare vocalists who can approach that group’s astounding tenor ( the great Al Alberts) in range and blast, was part of the quartet that night (as was I), and we killed.

He told me today that it wouldn’t take much to update my lyrics to the present day. It didn’t. So here is the 2025 version of “Love is a Cut in Spending Thing.” Play the video above and sing along. And repeat…

Love is a cut in spending thing!
The elusive rose that voters chose
Donald Trump to bring…

It’s the engine of destruction
Of waste, fraud and corruption
To give back the economy its zing!

Fighting with passion, guts and will,
There is Elon Musk, from dawn to dusk
Finding scams to kill…

Once those wasted billions stabbed my heart,
But now it wants to sing!
For true love’s a cut in spending thing!

Of Signs, Flags and Art…

/ Jack Marshall / 24 Comments

Two controversies raise issues of ethical line-drawing in state and local laws.

1. Sign or Art? Leavitt’s Country Bakery in Conway, a community of more than 10,000 people in New Hampshire, erected a colorful mural over the store in 2022. It was the creation of local high school art students showing sunbeams shining down on a mountain range made of sprinkle-covered chocolate and strawberry doughnuts, a blueberry muffin, a cinnamon roll and other pastries. The muralwas popular with everyone but the local zoning board, which ruled that the painting was not art but advertising. This meant it was a sign, and at about 90 square feet, four times bigger than the local sign ordinance allows. Lawyers for Conway insist that “restricting the size of signs serves the significant government interest of preserving the town’s aesthetics, promoting safety, and ensuring equal enforcement.” The store’s owner sued the town in federal court in 2023, saying his freedom of speech rights were being violated. He’s seeking a symbolic single dollar in damages.

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“The Meat Axe”

/ Jack Marshall / 16 Comments

I had some amusing bloody meat-axe graphics all ready to go for this post, but it is really about flat learning curves: the Democratic Party’s, the Axis news media’s, and maybe, frighteningly, the public’s.

Yes, once again we have a looming test of just how stupid the public really is. Democrats are betting their very existence on the public being as dumb as a box of Joe Bidens, and the biased, anti-Trump news media, having already been completely exposed as the enemies of the people Donald Trump said they are, have predominantly fallen back to the same tactics that served them so well in Trump 1.0. The unethical “advocacy journalists” are gambling that propaganda will prevail, and that the 2024 election was just a blip because the Democrats ran a babbling fool—but a historic one!—for President.

Trump’s tsunami of executive orders along with the relentless DOGE assault has the Axis searching for a magic bullet or two. They settled on two old unethical stand-bys: ad hominem attacks, aka. “kill the messenger,” and “It’s a constitutional crisis!” Trump being elected at all was a constitutional crisis for the Angry Left, and the phony “He’s breaching traditional democratic norms!” trope was core to both impeachments and the “Trump is Hitler” campaign refrain.

Elon Musk is being vilified by using classic Democrat class warfare tactics: he’s been successful and is rich, so obviously he’s only helping Trump cut spending because he greedy and he’ll make money from it somehow. How dumb does someone have to be to buy that logic? If there is anyone in the world who can be trusted not to be serving his country for the money, it’s Musk. I heard some mouth-foaming contributor on CNN screaming this morning that “Trump is a liar and criminal” and “Musk wasn’t even born here!,” an odd argument from a defender of illegal immigrants.

But the EA “Flat Learning Curve” graphic is up there because I heard Chuck Schumer—is he really an idiot or does he just play one on TV?—say that sure, everyone agrees that there is too much waste in government spending, but “this is a meat-axe!” Yup, it sure is, Chuck, and if you don’t know by now that the only way to seriously address systemic corruption, waste, incompetence, dishonesty and obstruction is with a meat-axe (or blow-torch, or metaphorical nuclear bomb), you’ve never successfully managed anything.

Experienced managers know this, and both Musk and Trump are experienced managers as well as successful ones. Good leaders know it too. Heck, I know it.

What Schumer is really saying is, “We don’t want to solve this problem, we want to look like we want to solve this problem, and we are confident that you out there listening are so uneducated, inexperienced, naive and gullible that you’ll fall for it…again.”

When a system is broken, corrupt and incorrigible, and because of its dysfunction causing constant harm, the technique of carefully trying to extract the jewels buried in the shit pile never works. It takes too long. Every inch of the shit will have advocates claiming that it isn’t really shit. Paring down the bureaucracy gets delegated to the bureaucracy, and improvement is minimal if you are lucky. Most of the time, the inefficiency, waste and corruption just gets worse. Nobody can deny that this is the futile path the United States government has been treading.

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Unethical TV Commercial In Oh So Many Ways: 2024 Hyundai Tuscon SEL

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

Here’s now sinister this ad is: I must have watched it six or seven times before I thought, “Hey…wait a minute!”

The male “bad date” in the ad is so disgusting a viewer is half-hoping the woman pulls out a .44 and shoots him right between the eyes. This is masterful manipulation at work…he begins with an insult framed as blame causing him disappointment: “You’re too short.” Asshole. Then he reveals his narcicissm and boastfulness, showing the selfie “by the dumbbells.” Giant asshole! Next the air-drumming comment…UNBELIEVABLE asshole! When he gets to the bit about forgetting his wallet and “Sugarmamma,” the viewer is seeing red, and feeling that the victim of this toxic creep is being noble by just sneaking out rather than setting him on fire.

But she isn’t. She’s being an asshole too, just a slightly better one. Leaving the table on false pretenses to escape is cowardly and indefensible. Moreover, someone who misbehaves as outrageously as the “bad date” needs to be told just clearly how unacceptable his conduct is and why, since he obviously doesn’t know. His next victim will at least partially be the runaway date’s fault.

The commercial also showed an anti-female bias by making the bad date a male and his victim female. A genders switched version would inspire at least a substantial reaction from viewers of “What a weenie! The jerk doesn’t have the guts to confront that jerk!” But teh woman in the ad is also a weenie—it’s just that the Hyundai marketers are calculating that running away from confrontations and unpleasant situations is a girl thing, and socially acceptable.

No, it really isn’t. This is not only a stereotype, it’s a damaging one. Why haven’t we elected a female President yet? Accumulated cultural poison like this commercial is one of the reasons.

Incidentally, I hope that actor who plays the asshole was well paid for his performance, because he may end up dying single and alone as a result.