Education

Observations on an Anti-Trump Meme That Will Be Posted By One Of My Trump-Deranged Facebook Friends Any Second Now…[Corrected]

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

Typical, desperate, ignorant and stupid.

Right now I’m placing bets on which of my Stage 5 Trump-Deranged friends or relatives will bite first. Let’s see..

1. This logic is like that of the man who kills his parents and wants sympathy from the judge because he’s a orphan. Trump was impeached twice by Democrats in the House, in both cases without thorough hearings and with contrived accusations and dubious evidence. He was also acquitted in the Senate, and correctly so.

2. The “34 felony convictions” have been effectively vacated. Though the convictions have not been overturned yet, no conviction is final until appeals have been exhausted. The fraud case in question was always pure lawfare, designed by New York Democrats and a partisan AG to “get Trump,” as that Attorney General campaigned on: she promised to “get Trump.” After all, he was threatening to win the White House. Those convictions were also for a single act that all authorities agree harmed no one, was standard business practice, and would never have prompted legal action had not Donald Trump been involved.

3. My favorite fallacy here, however, is that academic credentials have any relevance to leadership ability or successful Presidencies at all. For that matter, presumed intellectual ability hasn’t correlated with Presidential success either. To take the obvious example, Abraham Lincoln had no academic credentials. Harry Truman, an average intellect at best, proved to be a far better President than many with advanced degrees (or Harvard educations), such as John Adams, William Howard Taft, Jimmy Carter, and Barack Obama.

4. Best of all comparisons with Trump is this one, authored by social media wit David Burge in response to that meme above:

He’s referring, of course, to the Second Worst President Ever, Woodrow Wilson.

The Left’s Catch-22! [Expanded]

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

I have already mentioned here once today the public’s growing discomfort with the Trump Administration’s determined crack-down on illegal immigration, extending to mass deportations. That is one example of the very effective Catch-22 tactic the political Left regularly uses to ratchet policies, society and culture in an extreme direction with the assumption that undoing the damage will be practically impossible, making a very dubious development a fait accompli.

Another example of this phenomenon–it’s certainly clever and effective, just destructive and unethical—has been the Democrat’s deliberate expansion the federal government, the federal workforce and unaccountable bureaucracies. When the incoming Trump administration, via DOGE, began dismantling large swathes of the bloat, the standard scream was that the process was going too fast, cutting too much, and not following established process. The critics knew, of course, based on history, experience, political reality and human nature, that anything but rapid, meat-axe cuts across the board would result in no meaningful reductions at all. Expansion of the Federal government is a leftist strategy that diminishes personal liberty and government accountability—and it is also usually a fait accompli. Again, to his credit, President Trump has refused to play along with the game.

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From the Res Ipsa Loquitur Files: A Democratic House Member Says White Children Should Be Taught To Feel Guilty About Their Skin Color

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

What this says about her party and its ideological moorings is obvious. So is what it tells us about anyone who would vote for someone like this to have any power or influence over our society. We have had the “gotcha!” privilege debate here extensively in the 20-teens, and it was insufficiently slapped down to prevent the DEI and “presumed racism” pathogens.

The ethics mystery is why anyone white swallows this crap? I can see the advantages to minorities, since they can, by accepting it, absolve themselves of all failures, misdeeds and shortcomings. However, whites (and men) who fall for this argument are agreeing to be metaphorically hobbled, like Kunta Kinte in “Roots.” Worse, they are endorsing the hobbling of their children too.

I get why extreme, ruthless, unethical progressives push such garbage: it’s a means to an end, and the end is power. I do not understand why anyone privileged with a functioning brain and critical thinking skills tolerates officials like Stalker, never mind actually voting for her.

Pearl Harbor Day, 2025

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Remember.

I have nothing unique to add about the attack by the Japanese on Pearl Harbor on this date in 1941, except to note that the lack of mention of it in the news media today is disheartening and, I believe, inexcusable. I’m estopped from complaining too much however: to my amazement and shame, Ethics Alarms has never devoted an entire post to the event since I began writing it 16 years ago. I’ll begin my amends now.

Here is the History Channel’s article on the attack, one of the rare, epochal  events of which it can be said without dispute changed everything….

On December 7, 1941, at 7:55 a.m. Hawaii time, a Japanese dive bomber bearing the red symbol of the Rising Sun of Japan on its wings appears out of the clouds above the island of Oahu. A swarm of 360 Japanese warplanes followed, descending on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor in a ferocious assault. The surprise attack struck a critical blow against the U.S. Pacific fleet and drew the United States irrevocably into World War II.

With diplomatic negotiations with Japan breaking down, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his advisers knew that an imminent Japanese attack was probable, but nothing had been done to increase security at the important naval base at Pearl Harbor. It was Sunday morning, and many military personnel had been given passes to attend religious services off base. At 7:02 a.m., two radar operators spotted large groups of aircraft in flight toward the island from the north, but, with a flight of B-17s expected from the United States at the time, they were told to sound no alarm. Thus, the Japanese air assault came as a devastating surprise to the naval base.

Much of the Pacific fleet was rendered useless: Five of eight battleships, three destroyers, and seven other ships were sunk or severely damaged, and more than 200 aircraft were destroyed. A total of 2,400 Americans were killed and 1,200 were wounded, many while valiantly attempting to repulse the attack. Japan’s losses were some 30 planes, five midget submarines, and fewer than 100 men. Fortunately for the United States, all three Pacific fleet carriers were out at sea on training maneuvers. These giant aircraft carriers would have their revenge against Japan six months later at the Battle of Midway, reversing the tide against the previously invincible Japanese navy in a spectacular victory.

The day after Pearl Harbor was bombed, President Roosevelt appeared before a joint session of Congress and declared, “Yesterday, December 7, 1941—a date which will live in infamy—the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.” After a brief and forceful speech, he asked Congress to approve a resolution recognizing the state of war between the United States and Japan. The Senate voted for war against Japan by 82 to 0, and the House of Representatives approved the resolution by a vote of 388 to 1. The sole dissenter was Representative Jeannette Rankin of Montana, a devout pacifist who had also cast a dissenting vote against the U.S. entrance into World War I. Three days later, Germany and Italy declared war against the United States, and the U.S. government responded in kind.

Why Are People Like This Teaching In Colleges…or Anyplace?

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

Like all holiday movies, “Planes, Trains and Automobiles” has ethics at the core of its metaphorical heart, though not to the extent of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “White Christmas” or “Miracle on 34th Street,” the objects of the three Ethics Alarms holiday ethics companions. (Is there another film I should add to the series?) But it really takes effort—and pernicious bias—to claim that the John Hughes classic contains a “dangerous” pro-capitalist message, as SUNY Purchase College Professor Mtume Gant claimed on the insane leftist podcast “Millennials are Killing Capitalism” with host Jared Ware. 

The podcast describes itself as a “platform for communists, anti-imperialists, Black Liberation movements, ancoms, left libertarians, LBGTQ activists, feminists, immigration activists, and abolitionists to discuss radical politics, radical organizing and share their visions for a better world.” Great. And it has to dig so deep for topics that it stoops to searching for sinister messages in a formulaic holiday movie?

Steve Martin plays an up-tight ad exec whose asshole tendencies emerge regularly when he gets involved in holiday travel hell as most of us have. He is desperately trying to get home to spend Thanksgiving with his family because it’s what you do, that’s all: he’s also especially sentimental about it. But circumstances conspire to force him to battle his way from Manhattan to Chicago with a gregarious shower-ring salesman (John Candy) who is his emotional and intellectual opposite.

It’s “The Odd Couple” crossed with “A Christmas Carol,” as Martin learns the values of empathy, kindness and good will by the end of the movie, while Candy, who has no family, is embraced by Martin’s in the misty-eyed finale.

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I Know There Are More Important Ethics Issues Today, But Harvard Is an Ethics Dunce (Again) and It Ticks Me Off…

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

Bias makes us stupid, and being disgusted with one’s alma mater makes one likely to prioritize kicking it in the metaphorical nuts when it screws up more than one should, “one” in this case being me.

Harvard grad student Elom Tettey-Tamaklo (above) faced criminal charges for assaulting an Israeli classmate during an anti-Israel “die-in” protest at the university. He had been caught on camera accosting a first-year Israeli student during a 2023 “die-in” protest held outside of Harvard Business School. Tettey-Tamaklo was removed from his position as a proctor overseeing a freshmen dorm in Harvard Yard after the incident, and he received a misdemeanor assault and battery charge last May. A Suffolk County judge ordered the student to take an anger management class and perform 80 hours of community service as his punishment for the assault.

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Ethics Quiz: HBO’s “John Adams”

/ Jack Marshall / 19 Comments

I just have to boycott Ken Burns’ new documentary on the Revolutionary War (that all of my friends are watching). Burns has become so partisan and his editorializing so blatant in his recent production that i won’t trust him any more. Instead, I decided to view HBO’s acclaimed “John Adams” series, which originally watched in 2019. At the time I wrote here,

“I watched this seven part HBO series for the first time since it premiered. I’d love to know how many public school students are shown the series in class, or at all. It is an superb civics lesson, despite some historical liberties. Come to think or it, I wonder if any of the “Squad” has seen it; or any of the Parkland anti-gun shills, or, for that matter, President Trump. The series vividly shows what a miracle the creation of the United States was, the ethical values that formed its philosophical foundation, and the brilliance of the Founders that by the sheerest moral luck, the infant nation, happened to be in the right place at the right time, over and over again. Now, 240 years later, lesser patriots with inferior minds think it is wise to undo their unique and fortunate creation.”

I pretty much hold the same opinion today after seeing the series again last week. But have some new doubts about the showing of the series in public schools. It still is inspiring and justly so; the acting (and casting) is impeccable, and the personalities of the Founders portrayed are vivid and generally accurate. Among other contributions to historic literacy, the series demonstrates how remarkable Adams’ wife and advisor Abigail Adams was, and how essential she was to his success. In historian Joseph Ellis’s book “Founding Brothers,” he includes Abigail as a Founder, so influential was she on Adams, his public speeches and his writings.

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We Now Know Scientific Pronouncements Are Frequently Garbage, So We Also Should Know “The ’60s Parenting Practices We Now Know Were Terrible For Kids’ Brains” Is Mostly Crap…

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

Being raised in the Sixties, I was naturally curious about the article in Media Feed titled “The ’60s parenting practices we now know were terrible for kids’ brains.” What I discovered, as one usually will with social science essays with an agenda, is carefully cherry-picked research being used to support an author’s already pre-determined position. You know, “Science!”

“Science” has been so thoroughly polluted by the political left to justify its objectives and claim absolute authority for propositions that are far from determined (or determinable) that the public should be conditioned to doubt any claim that begins, as this one does, “This article explores a dozen once-standard practices and uses modern research to explain why they were tough on a child’s developing brain, emotional health, and long-term well-being.” Here is what modern research as revealed in recent years: it can’t be trusted. It can’t be trusted because researchers and scientists can’t be trusted, and interlocutors like Kaitlyn Farley, the gullible (or dishonest) author, don’t know enough about science to interpret studies with appropriate skepticism. (I just checked: Kaitlyn claims to be, among other things, an AI trainer who specializes in “content creation.” That explains a lot about the article.)

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Gee, I Wonder Why People Don’t Think College Is Worth the Time and Money Any More?

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

Maybe the President’s assault on partisan colleges and universities is having the desired (and necessary) effect.

A new NBC News poll claims that only 33% of American agree that a four-year college degree is “worth the cost.” 63% believe that it’s “not worth the cost” because “people often graduate without specific job skills and with a large amount of debt to pay off.”

Four per cent don’t know what college is, are too dumb to compose any answer, or answered “Fish!” or something.

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University Presidents Say That Higher Ed Has “Lost The Trust” of the Public—Gee, Ya THINK?

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

When it takes universities and colleges this long to figure out what was already obvious for years, no wonder the public has lost trust in them.

“We Lost Our Mission’: Three University Leaders on the Future of Higher Ed” is the latest “Breaking: Water is Wet!” media headline, this one at the New York Times[gift link]. Sian Beilock, president of Dartmouth College, Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University, and Jennifer Mnookin, chancellor of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, spoke with Times’ opinion editor Ariel Kaminer. Despite the headline, it is not an encouraging discussion.

The gist of the three presidents’ “confession” is the same as that of the Biden Administration’s response to the public’s gradual realization that its policies were a disaster. “We need better messaging!” Translation: “We need to get better at fooling people into thinking we are doing what we are not.”

The three university presidents criticized the Trump administration’s efforts to reform higher education’s conversion from educating to indoctrinating while saying they must work to regain the trust of the American people and emphasize viewpoint diversity. “I don’t believe a compact with a Republican or Democratic-led White House is the right way to effect change in higher ed,” Beilock said. Funny though: the three wouldn’t be making having this discussion if the Trump administration wasn’t throwing a spotlight on their bias and failure. “The Trump administration is cracking down, artificial intelligence is ramping up, varsity athletes are getting paid and a college education is losing its status as the presumptive choice of ambitious high school seniors,” the article begins. Yes, that’s a fair summary of where higher education is right now, with no improvement in sight.

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