Arts & Entertainment

What Was Whoopi Thinking?

/ Jack Marshall / 17 Comments

Or was she thinking? Or can she think any more? To be fair, having to be on “The View” and deal with that panel of idiots might drive anyone crazy. Still, this was a gratuitous, self-inflicted wound, and there will be consequences. Good.

Goldberg celebrated her 69th birthday on “The View” this week, and told her fellow panelists and viewers that her order for several dozen Charlotte Russe cup cakes at an unnamed bakery was initially refused because, she surmised, they objected to her politics. Goldberg didn’t mention the name of the bakery, taking defamation off the table, particularly since the Staten Island bakery in question, Holtermann’s, a 146-year-old institution in Great Kills on Staten Island, went on the offensive. The owner denied refusing the pre-order because of politics, explaining that she was dealing with a broken boiler and couldn’t commit to the large advance order.

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Most Insincere Apology Of The Month: “Snow White” Star Rachel Zegler

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

This over-opinionated actress even looks like a smug jerk, doesn’t she? And she is! But not so smug that she is willing to accept the consequences of what she says when it jeopardizes her career. Like so many jerks on the Left, Zegler had to vent her poisoned spleen at everyone who didn’t vote her way—guess which!—on November 5. She took to Instagram and wrote,

“I find myself speechless in the midst of this. another four years of hatred, leaning us towards a world i do not want to live in. I shouldn’t be this shocked. but i am. i am heartbroken for my friends who awoke [in] fear this morning. and i am here with you. to cry, to yell, to hug. to wax poetic on how the left continues to fail us in forging a new path forward. this loss should not have been. and it certainly should not have been by so many votes. May Trump supporters and Trump voters and Trump himself never know peace. Another four years of hatred, leaning us towards a world I do not want to live in. Leaning us towards a world that will be hard to raise my daughter in.”

She didn’t stop there. In subsequent Instagram posts, she added that added there is a “deep, deep sickness” in the United States because so many citizens voted for a “man who threatens our democracy.” Harris’s loss, the keen political analyst wrote, was “one that should not have been… and it certainly should not have been by so many votes,”  Later she wrote, “It is terrifying the number of people who stand behind what this man preaches. it is a foolish subscription to a false sense of security, of masculinity, of intelligence, of patriotism, and of humanity. there is no help, no counsel, in any of them. i could go on. i won’t. i feel sad. you probably do, too. fuck this.”

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A Ballad For Veterans Day

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

I saw Marlene sing that song, which always ended her concerts, in her penultimate performance in the U.S. That time, she shouted out “Gone to graveyards every one!” I have never felt such a jolt of emotion in any live performance I have ever attended. A woman near me broke into tears. It was particular effective because of Dietrich’s personal history, and her work for the Allies, some of it covert, during World War II.

We will never see her like again.

The Final Scene in “Michael Clayton” As a Metaphor For the 2024 Election And A Lesson For Democrats Which They May Be Incapable Of Learning…

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

In the scene above, which has already made it onto many lists of American cinema’s best ending scenes, Michael Clayton, a law firm fixer who has survived a murder attempt paid for by the general counsel of a chemical company that presents its products as boons to civilization but which is really covering up a massive pollution scandal, confronts the general counsel with his survival, knowledge of her and her company’s crimes. Unknown to her Clayton is wearing a wire, and her incriminating responses to the confrontation will bring down the company. Arthur, Clayton’s friend whom he refers to, was the whistle-blowing lawyer that the general counsel had murdered to prevent him from revealing the smoking gun company document Clayton is holding, evidence of the company’s knowing contamination that harmed or killed millions.

It is ironic that George Clooney, in what is easily his best movie and best performance, played a central role in the failed Democratic Party palace coup that resulted in the disastrous campaign and defeat of Kamala Harris. The unhinged and folish reactions of the now re-loading “resistance,” Democrats and their corrupt media allies (“The Axis of Unethical Conduct” in Ethics Alarms parlance) brought this scene to mind. You should show it to your deranged Facebook friends and relatives, but here’s a guide for you to use if they are incapable of grasping the lessons it holds…

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Obama’s Clever Fake Magnanimity

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

I’m sorry, but to those who are saluting the allegedly classiness of our 44th President, I say “Fool me once, shame on him, fool me 2,576 times, he can bite me.”

Now make no mistake: Obama know how to fake virtues he doesn’t have, and that’s an important leadership skill. Most Americans probably think he really was trying to be a “President for all Americans,” when he was in fact one most disastrously divisive Presidents in our history. He knew how to act Presidential: if only Donald Trump had that skill (or wanted to have it), he might be far more effective. On the other hand, enough people figured out Obama’s act (and Hillary’s, and Biden’s, and Bill Clinton’s, and Joe Biden’s, and Kamala Harris’s…) that they decided that an open vulgarian that didn’t pretend to be something he isn’t (like nice, kind, respectful, dignified, civil, even-tempered…well, ethical, frankly).

There are several tells in the statement, which, of course, is being fawned over as if Michelle and BO didn’t attack Trump personally when they played cavalry to Kamala’s ill-fated metaphorical wagon train to the White House. Obama suggested that Trump was senile, which takes quite a bit of gall for any Democrat, considering that they pretended that Joe Biden was solving Rubik’s Cube blindfolded for years when he really belonged in a home with a drool cup. I don’t call that “good faith and grace.”

But my favorites were the words he used on Kamala and her pathetic campaign.

In the theater world, a constant ethical dilemma is what to say when you go to a friend’s show and the show, or the friend’s performance, stinks on ice. Books have been written about this problem. “I’ve never seen you better!” is a classic response; pure deceit, of course, but effective. “That was memorable!” is another. Obama chooses his words carefully, and the carefully chosen deceitful word he used for Harris’s disastrous campaign was “remarkable.” It was remarkable all right: remarkably inept and ineffective. Before that, Obama calls Knucklehead and Harris “extraordinary.” Same trick. Actually, in theater circles, using more than one of these deliberately two-edged superlatives is considered risky, but I don’t think Obama cares: he has plausible deniability.

Finally, he says, “he couldn’t be more proud.” That one’s a version of the theater classic, “I couldn’t have enjoyed the show/your performance more!” (My personal favorite variation, “I’ve never seen you better!”)

Oh yeah, this guy’s good.

Dear Patty LuPone: Please, PLEASE Tell Kecia Lewis “Oh, Bite Me!”

/ Jack Marshall / 16 Comments

Does this outrageous story of contrived race-baiting on Broadway relate to tomorrow’s election? Sure it does. I’ll explain after you finish gagging following the facts of the incident.

Kecia Lewis  is a talented black Broadway actress. She won a Tony for her performance in “Hell’s Kitchen,” a 2024 jukebox musical (that means the show has no original music and uses previous pop hits to try to tell a story). The show, about the life and career of Alicia Keys, shares a wall with another Broadway theater and creates a problem that actors, directors and producers have complained about for decades: the amplified sound in “Hell’s Kitchen” can be heard by the audience of the show next door. (You know when you’re in a multi-screen “cineplex” watching an intimate drama and the movie showing in the next theater is “Pearl Harbor”? It’s like that.)

The show next door to “Hell’s Kitchen” is “The Roommate,” a quiet, two-actor drama starring Mia Farrow and Broadway legend Patti LuPone of “Evita” fame. LuPone sent a polite note to the “Hell’s Kitchen” producers asking them to turn down the volume at two points in the sound design that were loud enough to interfere with her show. They did. LuPone, in gratitude, sent a thank-you note to the producers and flowers to the stage management and sound staff.

In a normal world, that would be the end of it. I’m certain this exact scenario has played out many times over the years as simple professional courtesy and consideration. Ethics!

But no. Kecia Lewis decided to be offended. She posted a video on Instagram reprimanding LuPone for engaging in “microagressions.” She complained,  

 “After our sound design was adjusted, [you] sent flowers to our sound and stage management team thanking them”… “I want to explain what a microaggression is – These are subtle, unintentional comments or actions that convey stereotypes, biases or negative assumptions about someone based on their race. Microaggressions can seem harmless or minor, but can accumulate and cause significant stress or discomfort for the recipient. Examples include calling a Black show loud in a way that dismisses it. In our industry, language holds power and shapes perception, often in ways that we may not immediately realize. Referring to a predominantly Black Broadway show as loud can unintentionally reinforce harmful stereotypes, and it also feels dismissive of the artistry and the voices that are being celebrated on stage. Comments like these can be seen as racial microaggressions, which have a real impact on both artists and audiences. While gestures like sending thank you flowers may appear courteous, it was dismissive and out of touch, especially following a formal complaint that you made that resulted in the changes that impacted our entire production, primarily the people who have to go out on stage and perform.” 

Yes, she really says that. She does. I’m not making it up! This insufferable actress not only felt that was a reasonable response to a request, a thank-you, and flowers, but decided to issue her complaint publicly rather than having the guts to tell LuPone that she’s a racist to her face.

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The 2024 Election Ethics Train Wreck Births the “Puerto Rico Is An Island of Garbage” Caboose

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

So it’s come to this.

The 2024 election is its own, massive ethics train wreck, as the tag will show you. It officially began with Democrats (and the news media, but I repeat myself) spending too long lying to the public about Joe Biden’s deteriorating mental state and deciding to select a Presidential nominee Soviet-style bypassing all democratic norms and processes. The party broke all previous campaign records for hypocrisy by taking this course while already making the dangerous claim that Republicans are the threats to democracy, and that Donald Trump as President would never allow another free election again. Amazingly, the campaign has gone downhill ethically since that point.

Just as tornadoes sometimes spin off little baby cyclones that still are deadly enough to kill people, the big Ethics Train Wrecks (or ETWs) as designated by Ethics Alarms, like the 2016 Post Election Ethics Train Wreck, the Trayvon Martin-George Zimmerman Ethics Train Wreck and the Wuhan Virus Ethics Train Wreck (which spawned the Biden Presidency Ethics Train Wreck), often generate related ethics train wrecks that cause a lot of their own damage.

But I did not foresee that a Don Rickles-style “roast comic’s” jab at an ongoing news story would or could, even in the Age of the Great Stupid, turn into a controversy dominating headlines when the election is so near and serious matters should be the public’s focus.

I’ll summarize the events as efficiently as possible to get to the main point:

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Ethics Hero: Jon Stewart

/ Jack Marshall / 22 Comments

There hasn’t been a Jon Stewart sighting at Ethics Alarms for a while, but he has a thick dossier here, mostly negative and deservedly so. He has also been an Ethics Hero twice before, but long, long ago before Stewart got full of himself and spawned the metastasizing of almost all cable and network news satire shows into progressive and Democratic propaganda tools.

Nonetheless, Stewart recently bucked his mostly Trump-Deranged audience by defending comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s sometimes racially and ethnically provocative stand-up routine at Donald Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally—you know, the one the ironically-named Axis of Unethical Conduct says was modeled on a 1938 Nazi rally.

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Fooled Again! I Really Believed All of the Feminist and Media WNBA Hype

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

Because, you see, much as I try to present myself as otherwise, I’m a sap. All year I’ve been reading about how the WNBA’s players are discriminated against because they don’t get anywhere near the money that their male counterparts do, that pro women’s basketball was surging in popularity, that finally it was sinking in that women were just as good at the game and fun to watch as the NBA’s freaks, and that social justice had arrived at last.

Nah. The WNBA lost 40 million dollars this past season, and that with its player earning what they skills were worth based on the demand to see them. Feminists and social justice trolls have been trying the same scam as they worked with some success in soccer, claiming that the higher men’s compensation was based on discrimination. No, it was based on reality: supply and demand, popularity, and biology.

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Here’s Another Futile Boycott, But I Don’t Care: I’m Not Watching Another Dick Wolf Show Again…

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

To hell with Wolf and all his shows— “Law and Order,” the “FBI” series, “Chicago Med,” “…Fire,” “…P.D.” I could take, barely, the perpetual sympathy for illegal immigrants and appeal to open-border sentiment, but now I am convinced Wolf is a malign force, not just an active member of the Axis of Unethical Conduct but an unscrupulous agent of personal destruction.

Yeah, I know: it won’t make any difference, and I can’t change anything. But at least I’ll be able to look at myself in the mirror.

I just watched “The Long Arm of the Witness” episode 6 from “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” on season 22 (2021). It was an hour-long assault on Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, putting his public victimization by a politically motivated accuser from his distant past in a damning and malicious who conveniently had a recovered memory of a sexual assault that had no witnesses, at a party she couldn’t identify, in order to discredit a distinguished judge because the Left didn’t want another conservative on the Court.

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