The song “I’m a Woman,” by famed songwriting duo Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, was written in 1962 and was once considered a standard. Is it politically incorrect today, since the entire definition of “woman” has been thrown into ambiguity and disrepute? I would say that it can’t be performed today. Is that reversible? Should it be?
The opening “girl-talk” between Welch and Cher is truly cringey. It’s hard to imagine U.S.culture returning to a point where that would be considered cute, except as satire. Both Raquel (who died this year) and Cher were famously capable and tough pros–maybe they were engaging in satire at the time…satire that reinforced sexist stereotypes while mocking them.
Brava to Cher for being willing to appear in that costume next to Welch. That’s generous performing and the mark of an ethical (and confident) host. She was willing to highlight her guest’s assets even they overshadowed her own. Many divas then and now would never tolerate such an unflattering comparison.
The Citizen Free Press, which dug up this clip today, fatuously introduced it by asking “Does Raquel have a better voice than Cher?” Morons. Talk about no good deed going unpunished: This is what Cher gets for picking a number for the two to perform that has a tiny range right in Welch’s vocal wheelhouse. Again, Cher was letting her guest shine at her own expense. No, Raquel Welch did not have a better voice than Cher, or one that was nearly as good. However, the video shows that she was capable of filling more than the sex symbol pigeon-hole she was stuck into by Hollywood for most of her career.
She could dance, too. (Cher could not.) This clip of Raquel giving her all to entertain the troops in Vietnam is a reminder that she too could be generous:
I know, I know…designating Donald Trump an Ethics Dunce again is in the “dog bites man”category. Nonetheless, I couldn’t let this pass.
Presumably as part of his advance PR as he seeks the Republican presidential nomination, thus ensuring the ugliest campaign since 1860 and maybe ever, the Once and Future POTUS is about to unveil “Letters to Trump,” a book revealing 150 private letters sent to him by celebrities and VIPs, among them Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Princess Diana, Ted Kennedy, Mario Cuomo, Arnold Palmer, Regis Philbin and more; those are the dead ones. Tradition and law holds that that they have no privacy rights now, so I can’t find fault with the inclusion of their letters in the book, which will also include Trump’s comments about the letters and their authors.
However, the book will also include letters from the living, like Bill and Hillary Clinton, Jay Leno, Liza Minnelli and Oprah Winfrey. I think its fair to assume, since Hillary is on the list, that Trump did not ask for or receive permission to publish their letters. He doesn’t have to, of course: once they are mailed, they are his to do what he wants with them. Nonetheless, common respect and courtesy demands that sharing such communications presumed to be private at the time they were sent—you know, just like President Trump expected that communications he had with advisors, Cabinet members and others during his presidency would be treated as confidential. What about the Golden R..oh, never mind. Continue reading →
There are a lot of really unethical people saying some astounding things lately. Such as…
1. Incompetent Elected Official Of the MonthRep. Sylvia Garcia (D-TX), who completely beclowned herself in the The House Weaponization Subcommittee examination of Twitter Files heralds Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger. She was determined to discredit them for daring to reveal the efforts by her party and its allies to bury the Hunter Biden laptop story and censor critics, and apparently did no research into te topic of the hearings at all, announcing that she didn’t know what “a substack” was and showing complete ignorance regarding Bari Weiss. (Ah, if only she read Ethics Alarms!) Meanwhile, all of a sudden Democrats oppose journalists’ desire to protect their sources.
2. Not included in the video above was an offensive question by serial unethical House hack Debbie Wasserman Schulz, the former DNC chair who rigged the 2016 primaries for Hillary Clinton. She accused Matt Taibbi of profiting from authoring the “Twitter Files” reports, implying that he was motivated by persoanl profit, saying: “After the ‘Twitter Files,’ your followers doubled … I imagine your Substack readership … increased significantly because of the work that you did for Elon Musk.”
These people really lash out when they’re exposed, don’t they?
3. Over to the Republican side: Jenna Ellis, one of President Trump’s lawyers in the post-election push to have the results examined, admitted in Colorado Bar disciplinary proceedings that she deliberately engaged in the following misrepresentations “for selfish reasons”:
I took three Tylenol, thought happy thoughts, and subjected myself to Tucker Carlson’s “opening statement”—I find the use of the term by a non-lawyer in a non-trial context precious and pompous, but then that’s Tucker—last night via YouTube this morning.
Observations:
When you are making a distinction between liars and yourself, you should probably eschew gross generalities like “people who get angry and wave their arms around are lying.” Tucker, meanwhile, remained calm, which is his style while lying. Yesterday we saw some of his email exchanges while he and the rest of the Fox News crew was giving support to then-President Trump’s claims that the 2020 election was fraudulent, like ,
“We are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can’t wait…. I hate him passionately.” (Jan. 4, 2021), and “Trump has two weeks left. Once he’s out, he becomes incalculably less powerful, even in the minds of his supporters….He’s a demonic force, a destroyer. But he’s not going to destroy us. I’ve been thinking about this every day for four years.” (Jan. 7, 2021)
Of course, the New York Times article that revealed these (and others) also described the Jan. 6 riot as an”insurrection.” Continue reading →
I was very pleased that the post on personality testing triggered the lively discussion it did. The topic is a long-time source of irritation to me. Reducing the infinite variety and complexity of human character to any test should obviously set off ethics alarms, and making life-changing decisions based on such lazy short-cuts to assessing character is a bright-line Golden Rule breach. Anyone who wants to start understanding my character should read all of the posts on Ethics Alarms, and even then should prepare to be surprised.
Before I get to Sarah B.’s Comment of the Day, let me relay the link to Extradimensional Cephalopod‘s website and its basic mindsets section in his Foundational Toolbox for Life.
I know a manager who believes strongly in personality testing, and focuses heavily on the Clifton Strengths profile. He has convinced everyone that it is the way to go and has every one of his employees list their five strengths in order on their work emails, just like some places want preferred pronouns. Everyone I have talked to about this seems totally bought into it. I volunteer here, and thus don’t have to have my Clifton profile done, but when I was introduced to my supervisor (T), he introduced himself as a strategist, which means that he knows how to get from point A to point B in the best possible way, but has a weakness with communication, so we should just all do what he says without question, because he knows better than we do and he doesn’t have time to communicate. If you want someone who is good at communicating, talk to person H. Another of my supervisors (D), introduced herself with her main strength, the ability to think out her problems very well, but as a down side, she must have time to think, so don’t bring her a problem and expect a solution that week. She needs quiet time to work it out.
This is not a way to introduce yourselves, in my opinion. Frankly, I’d rather be known for who I am and let you determine what you think my strengths and weaknesses are, rather than a self reported test that gives me, however accurately, an assessment of those things I am strong at and tells me to make them stronger. I’d rather work to be a well rounded person. I’d also rather think of myself, not as a combination of personality traits, but as a whole person, a person who may have strengths and weaknesses, but who can work to overcome weaknesses and may let certain strengths founder as a choice.
Even if strengths are good things to have, we have to work on our weaknesses too. Frankly, T lets his “strength” in strategizing be an excuse for acting like a controlling jackass. If something doesn’t work perfectly, he blames it all on others, and says we didn’t listen enough. He cannot handle changing conditions, because they throw off his plan, so he gets stressed and pushes people badly. I have nearly quit because of him, but am too stubborn and want the experience for later in life. D uses her “strength” as an excuse to not organize or prepare for anything, all with the excuse that she didn’t have adequate time to think through the problem. If a problem arises needing a quick solution, she shuts down totally, claiming that there is nothing to be done, and won’t accept anyone else’s solution to the problem. We go from about to do our work to completely cancelling our work in moments.
For the second time this week I find myself grafting substantial sections of an archived Ethics Alarms post to a new one. (I promise not to make a habit of it.) The occasion is the appearance on one of my Alexandria, Virginia neighbors’ lawn the idiotic sign above. Once again I was seized with the desire to ring the house’s doorbell and cross examine the residents. Can they explain and justify what’s on that sign? I am almost certain that they cannot, just as my other neighbor who STILL displays a medieval suit of armor next to a 5 x 4 hand-made, painted wooden sign reading BLACK LIVES MATTER in block letters could not justify that obnoxious lawn ornament, since it is, after all, more indefensible than ever now that the movement it stands for has been exposed as cynical hustle.
In 2021, New York Times’ woke propaganda agent Amanda Hess was given a rare slot on her paper’s front page to opine on the sign above, which was apparently the beginning of the the viral Announce to your neighbors that you’re a smug, simple-minded idiot!” epidemic. Ethics Alarms has had several posts about similar signs, but I did not realize that I had missed Patient Zero.
Hess’s analysis by turns informed readers that the sign has “curious power” (to make me detest the homeowner?); that the mottoes are “progressive maxims” (so progressives really are that facile and shallow!), that “Donald Trump is out of office…But nevertheless, this sign has persisted” (Oh! It’s all Trump’s fault?), that the sign is “directed at the adults in the room, reminding them of their own mission” (Really? Open borders? Man-boy love? Anti-white discrimination? Marxism? Why is a sign aimed at adults so naive and childish? ), that it is “the epitome of virtue signaling: an actual sign enumerating the owner’s virtues. There is something refreshing, actually, about the straightforwardness of that.” (There is something refreshing about smug idiots placing signs on their laws that say, “I am a smug idiot”?).
I regard the siege of the Alamo one of the signature ethics events in U.S. history, both for what it was and what it came to represent. There have been many posts on the subject as well as many references to the Alamo in other posts, all of which are accessible here.
Today, March 6, marks the fall of the converted mission. Ethics Alarms has two pieces from its archives to present:
I.Last year, Texan and Ethics Alarms stalwart Michael West’s provided Ethics Alarms readers with a day by day account of the Alamo’s the final days, March 5 and March 6. Here it is:
March 5, 1836
After the previous day’s war council (on March 4), Santa Anna was content that his glorious assault would occur. But evidently, according to several reliable Mexican sources, a civilian woman from the town, who had retreated to the Alamo with the Texans, made it out of the Alamo during the night and gave dire information to the Mexicans. Evidently the Texan garrison was increasingly despondent. According to the lady who escaped, Travis and the garrison had discussed their options and one of the more forceful arguments made was that they should consider surrender.
Santa Anna wanted none of this, and accelerated his assault time-table (which he hadn’t necessarily meant for the 6th of March but for the 7th or even the 8th).
The Mexican soldiers would have received their orders in the morning and spent the rest of the day making preparations. There was little physically they had to do other than check the locks of their muskets, ensure they had the requisite number of extra flints (which would occasionally break in battle – testing the coolness of even the most experienced soldier), or assist in the production of several ladders Santa Anna had commanded each battalion to have prepared.
No, most of the preparation would have been mental. A deeply Catholic people, the Mexican soldiers would have spent their energies on prayer and confession. New soldiers would have been nervous about how they would perform under fire, simultaneously trying to hide their nerves from the experienced soldiers, who would have recognized the unique challenge before them. Almost none had been asked to climb tall walls after traversing several hundred yards under fire against an enemy who had, in the previous 12 days, proven that their rifled muskets out-ranged the standard Mexican issue musket by nearly 300%Some of Santa Anna’s soldiers were eager to get into the fight – to uphold the honor of the Mexican nation against, not only rebels, but rebels seemingly motivated by pro-American attitudes. Some of Santa Anna’s soldiers had been farmers pressed into service only months before, who would have had a partially begrudging attitude and were mostly leaning towards “let’s get this over with so I can get home.” Some of the dictator’s soldiers were convicts for whom the upcoming bloodshed was just one more act of brutality to endure in an already brutal and brutalized life. For a large number of the soldiers, for whom soldiering was life, this would be a terror that they knew would be expected of them. Regardless of their motivations, there would be no getting out of the upcoming ordeal and every single one of them would be in the same peril when a Texan cannon roared out at their formation.
Set to wake up at midnight to begin movements to their attack positions, the few soldiers could fall asleep would have tried to do so by twilight.
Inside the Alamo, evening would draw a miserable day to a close. Earlier that day, according to Enrique Esparza, aged 8 (who’s father, Gregorio, was fighting with the Texans), the faeful courier entered the Alamo with news that despite all the hopeful reports, no immediate help was on its way. Travis would have discussed with the men their options – a break-out attempt in case of a successful assault would be their best recourse. A break out during the day would be impossible and one at night would be extremely risky. Whatever was said, it appears all but perhaps one of the men decided to stay
For the Texans, sleep would come quickly that evening. For the first time in 12 days, Santa Anna’s cannons didn’t create chaos inside the compound. It was silent. There could be no doubt that the defenders knew what this meant, but they were exhausted. They would have kept watch and pure anxiety might have boosted their necessary alertness. Nonetheless, they began succumbing to sleep deprivation and may have been deep in dreams of life after the war – or perhaps of life before the war.
Before collapsing in whatever position suited rest, most would have reviewed their plans in their minds of how to get out once they’d done what they could to slow or halt the Mexican advance. No shame in that: when a battle is clearly lost and standing your position doesn’t buy anyone else on the battlefield any opportunity to turn the tide, there’s no principle of warfare that requires that a soldier die on principle.
Most would have recognized that with San Antonio immediately to the west, and several Mexican artillery batteries to the north and south, the east would be the best direction to break out for should the situation so demand. That was also where the gathering Texan army could be found, eventually.
Right after dusk, Travis dispatched the final courier on yet another appeal for assistance. Then, as in each night during the siege , Travis assigned several men outpost duty beyond the walls of the Alamo to provide an early warning before turning the watch over to another officer.
Rep. Andrew Ogles (R-Tenn.) acknowledged yesterday that he “misstated” the degree he had received from Middle Tennessee State University when he told voters that he received a degree in international relations. Ogles said his degree was actually for “liberal studies,” a general education degree typically for those who cannot settle on a major. He claims that the mistake was inadvertent, and he just forgot his major.
Sure, Andy.
That baloney might be palatable if he hadn’t been shown to have falsified so many other aspects of his résumé. For example…
After a post and a Comment of the Day on San Diego Padres third baseman Manny Machado’s announcement that he would be opting out of his 10 year, 300 million dollar contract after next season to seek more money that he won’t even notice, it has been reported that Machado has agreed to a contract upgrade that will now pay him $35 million a year for eleven years.
Whew! Now he’ll finally be able to afford those custom-built, nuclear powered, gold-plated android models of the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame’s 342 members that he covets, and still have enough pin money to buy the Bolshoi Ballet.
So Manny’s announcement that he would opt out—he wasn’t ambiguous about it, he said that was a fact—was just a bargaining ploy. A lie. I said I detested this guy. I should have known.
When someone has tried such tactics on me, they learned that my response always is, “Fine, it’s settled then. Bye!” Eventually the word gets around, and nobody tries it any more. That’s what the Padres should have done. People keep using unethical tactics because their victims let them, and so they work.
Congratulations, Manny! You have your extra 5 million a year. May you choke on it.
This isn’t so much about baseball ethics as values, and how our sports “heroes” corrupt ours.
I suppose I am obligated to confess that I detest Manny Machado. I haven’t watched him much since he moved to San Diego, but when he was with the Baltimore Orioles, he was one of the dirtiest players I’ve ever seen. He also wrecked the career of Dustin Pedroia, the star Red Sox second baseman whose values are the direct opposite of Machado’s, with an illegal slide.
Machado just announced that he plans on opting out of the remainder of his contract following the 2023 season, as the terms of his current deal allows. When Machado signed his current 10-year, $300 million agreement with San Diego ahead of the 2019 season, it was among the top three player contracts in MLB history. Now, however, 30 million dollars a year isn’t enough for Manny. You see, a few high-profile free agents have signed for more this off season, so this means, according to player agents’ Bizarro World logic, that Manny is being underpaid.
Ethics Alarms 