Ethics Train Wrecks

“The Great Stupid” Meets Trump Derangement: Two Quotes

/ Jack Marshall / 27 Comments

[Just thought I would re-post a past example of the “logic” and level of analogies being embraced by I.C.E. protesters…]

Quote #1:

“Why did you have real bullets?!”

—Becca Good, the wife of dead activist Renee Nicole Good, after witnessing her wife’s shooting death by an I.C.E. officer.

This has to be one of the stupidest quotes Ethics Alarms has ever covered. It demonstrates how estranged from reality so many of the anti-I.C.E. and Trump Deranged protesters, demonstrators and activists are. On MS-Now, the pro-multiple sclerosis news channel, a bizarre anti-gun nut deemed worthy of a position on a televised panel discussion said this…

Yes, why do law enforcement officers carry guns (with real bullets!)?

The real questions should be…

1) “Why do crazed progressives think that it is reasonable, justifiable, ethical or safe to interfere with lawful law enforcement activity?”

2) “How did American citizens, some of them of above average intelligence, get the bonkers idea that interfering with I.C.E. operations wasn’t a crime?“

3) “When will CNN, MSNBC and other news outlets stop giving a platform to “experts” and elected officials who tell their audiences that Rachel Good was “murdered”?” That position is completely contrary to known facts, as well as court decisions. This morning I heard some asshole saying that on CNN with no contradiction or push-back from the host whatsoever. The host even said “Thank-you.” Thank-you for misleading our dim-witted audience members and helping to put both Federal officers and stupid protesters (who might not expect them to use real bullets) in jeopardy!

Quote #2: (the letters in parentheses are mine, to be referenced in my commentary)…

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A Confederacy of Dunces at the Golden Globes

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

The sock drawer isn’t small enough not to keep me from watching the annual Golden Globes broadcast, the parade of awards from people I don’t know or respect to performers I’ve barely heard of for shows I haven’t seen. Nonetheless, Hollywood (and others) managed to disgrace itself once again, reminding us that the artists who make our mass entertainment have the critical thinking skills of paper clips.

Once again the “Hollywood progs” (the name used by critics too genteel to call them “Hollywood assholes”) promoted the misguided latest woke cause. Last year it was the anti-Israel position insisting that nation should stop fighting Hamas and let the terrorists re-stock for the next massacre. This year, stars were wearing the fatuous anti-ICE pin, “Be Good.” Yeah, let’s all demand open borders, interfere with law enforcement, use our cars to block I.C.E operations, resist arrest, nearly run down and officer and get shot! Oh-oh, Sidney Wang is demanding a word…

Yeah, we know, Inspector.

We also know now that the late neighborhood open-borders fan was not good, as she was a contributor to Black Lives Matter, signature significance for someone who supports anti-white racism, lies (Michael Brown was murdered, you know!), riots, anti-law enforcement violence, dishonest news and scammers.

But never mind! The ACLU, among other principle-free organizations including communist groups, funded the creation and distribution of that tiny salute to idiocy. Talk about minds: the ACLU has genuinely lost theirs, along with any claim to respectability and credibility. The organization used to stand for free speech. Now it is deliberately using its reputation and resources to mislead the public into thinking Good was engaging in it by blocking law enforcement and defying the law.

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Right Into The Res Ipsa Loquitur Files: The Dumbest Anti-I.C.E. Meme Yet…

/ Jack Marshall / 25 Comments

What else is there to say?

A Facebook Communist friend posted that, and I know he believes it. What kind of indoctrination, propaganda, and unethical social bubble makes an intelligent man think that bigoted analysis is true, fair, reasonable or responsible?

And I guarantee that no one will criticize or argue with that asinine post.

It’s Reassuring To Know I’m Not The Only One With Hopelessly Trump Deranged Facebook Friends…

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

One of Ethics Alarms’ five commenters, indeed one whom I have had the pleasure to meet in person, took the plunge I will not take and wrote a Facebook post focusing on the Minneapolis I.C.E. shooting, noting that so many critics of the agent involved are displaying ignorance regarding the kinds of instant decisions “first-responders” must make in unpredictable and dangerous situations.

Since his was, typical of his contributions here, persuasive, measured, articulate and non-confrontational, one might assume that the responses to his post might reflect thoughtful consideration. In most cases, one would be wrong in that assumption.

One bright commenter wondered why the agent who fired on I.C.E.-defying protester Good didn’t “shoot out a tire” as her car came at him. Another analogized the Good scenario to this: “So when a masked man with no identification breaks down your door in the wrong house, brandishing a gun and yells at your terrified wife to drop to the ground and it takes her 5 seconds to understand the situation as she is frozen in fear, then turns to run it is perfectly fine for her to get 3 headshots because she might have had a weapon?”

I don’t know how it is possible to respond to someone who thinks that is a valid argument, except with the “Cheers” classic. “What color is the sky on your planet?”

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Comment of the Day: On the I.C.E. Shooting Ethics Train Wreck ( “Friday Open Forum, Depicated To Major Tipton”)

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

Ace EA commenter Ryan Harkins, as he often does, flags the ethics conflict in the current escalating controversy over President Trump’s mass deportations, a.k.a, “Enforcing the immigration laws after a rogue Presidency refused to do so for four years.” The point he raises is not only a valid one but an important one, not just regarding this issue but others. I’m going to append a fairly long addition to Ryan’s excellent work, but first of all, here is his Comment of the Day from “Friday Open Forum, Dedicated To Major Tipton…”:

***

Here’s my concern about the situation we’re in. I would liken it to inconsistently disciplining your children. If you only irregularly discipline your child for a particular infraction, the child learns that most of the time, he can get away with that infraction. When that infraction is then punished, the child reactions disproportionately because he’s used to getting away with the infraction, and he believes that if he makes noncompliance painful enough, it will discourage further disciplinary action.

That seems to be the case we’re in with illegal immigrants. We’ve been very poor at enforcing our immigration laws, and so many said illegals and the communities around them grew complacent about the laws not being enforced. When the laws are enforced, it comes as a great shock, and the immediate reaction is to scream about how unfair it is. And to a certain extent, I do agree that it is unfair. It is unfair to cultivate the expectation that a law won’t be enforced, only to turn around and enforce it. But it is unfair because of cultivating that expectation, not because of the subsequent enforcement.

The significant problem is the whiplash effect of enforcement/non-enforcement depending upon who is in charge. We’ve run the gamut of no enforcement (even inviting in illegals), to soft enforcement, to promises of citizenship, to harsh enforcement. To anyone watching from outside the country, it is like dealing with a schizophrenic or someone suffering from multiple personality disorder. Worse, because we keep seesawing back and forth, the expectation right now is that by keeping up a defiant stance against the current administration, illegals and their allies can simply wait for the winds to change and go back to their lives as they’ve been.

I know this aspect of the situation glosses over the deliberate effort of radicals to the destabilize the nation, the outrage over the money spigots that are being closed, the efforts to import in reliable Democratic voters, and the genuine concerns over destabilizing families that had, admittedly against the law, put down roots and became productive members of their communities. But it is a serious problem that we seem to be lurching one direction, and then back the opposite way, with every swing of political power. This has been exacerbated by most policy changes coming from executive orders, which are easily undone, rather than congressional legislation, which is much harder to walk back.

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Just Because She Can’t Be Sued For It Doesn’t Make Hillary’s Latest Shameless Lie Less Damning

/ Jack Marshall / 16 Comments

My sympathy for Hillary Clinton has finally run out.

For a long time, I have wanted to give Clinton every bit of leeway imaginable since her fluky, statistical anomaly Electoral College loss to Donald Trump in 2016. It’s an ethicist thing; the Golden Rule is strong here. What must it feel like to be that close to achieving your dream and to have it yanked from your grasp at the last moment? Oh-oh…I’m making Hillary sound like Moonlight Graham.

Still, I can understand why she has been so bitter and angry ever since. On the other hand, to go from “Field of Dreams” to “The Godfather”: this is the life she has chosen. “Politics ain’t beanbag.” It’s been 10 years. Time to grow the hell up.

Hillary’s latest outburst of Trump Hate—always wrongly placed because her own ineptitude, corruption and foolishness lost her that 2016 election—-came on the anniversary of Teddy Roosevelt’s death—wait, no, that was the worst thing that ever happened on a January 6th, but Hillary was using the date to misrepresent the stupid January 6, 2021 riot at the Capitol. Clinton posted a comment on X, declaring, “Five years ago today, Donald Trump urged his supporters to attack Congress and the Capitol over a proven lie.”

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Further Ethics Observations On the I.C.E. Shooting In Minneapolis…#1: The Right and Wrong Isn’t In Question [Updated and Corrected]

/ Jack Marshall / 56 Comments

The Trump Administration, I.C.E., and those standing for the enforcement of the law are in the right, with the ethics of this incident and its context entirely on their side. The pro-open borders Left, including the “resistance,” radical progressives (but I repeat myself…) and the Democrats as well as the leadership of sanctuary states and cities, are entirely wrong in theory, practice and conduct. The group in the wrong, which includes much of the news media, is primarily responsible for the tragic death of Renee Nicole Good. However, she was part of that group herself, and bears some of the responsibility for her own death.

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It’s Time To Play That Exciting Game Show, “Worth Confronting or Too Trivial To Bitch About?”!

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

Hello everybody! I’m your ethics game show host Wink Smarmy, and welcome to “Worth Confronting or Too Trivial To Bitch About?”,” the popular ethics game show where our contestants try to decide whether clearly unethical conduct is worth only a shrug and a giggle, or is serious enough to try to stop.

Here’s our special guest, Touchy McCrankface, with the problem he encountered recently…

“Hello, panel. My name is is Touchy McCrankface. For some reason I am still a Facebook user despite that platform banning my favorite blog Ethics Alarms for almost two years because one of their censors decided that it was racist to even discuss the topic of blackface’s appearance in some classic movies. When a Facebook friend  I actually care about has allowed his or her birthday to be announced on Facebook, I will sometimes, as I am prompted, wish that friend a “Happy Birthday.”

“I do not use the stupid and juvenile pre-programmed emojis Facebook tries to stick on my message, the little cakes, candles and party hats. Recently I sent just such a birthday message to an old friend. Let’s call him “Mike.”

After I sent my “Happy Birthday”,  Facebook sent me the equivalent of a receipt. I have no idea why. Maybe it has always done this, but I’ve never noticed one before, or if I have, I never bothered to read one. The message to me read,

“You wished Michael XXXXX a happy birthday on their profile.”

This, frankly, ticked me off. First of all, I knew that. But most of all, I don’t use the pronouns “they” and “their” for single individuals, as in “non-conjoined twins.” If you seem to be male to me, I will use the pronouns “You/he/him. If you seem to be female, I will use “You/she/her.” If I can’t tell, I won’t use any pronoun, constructing a sentence so that “misgendering” isn’t necessary, since men and boys don’t typically like being mistaken for women and girls, and vice-versa. If someone informs me that “he” wants to be refereed to as “she,” that’s fine: I aim to please. Similarly with 250 pound bearded bald guys who want to be called “she.” I’ll call you a pangolin or an Archaeopteryx if that’s what you want, as long as you don’t try to make me eat insects or worms with you. (Archaeopteryx is described as an “early bird,” and as we all know, the early bird catches the worm.)

But I will NOT agree to utter a grammatical monstrosity by using a plural pronoun in reference to one individual. And if you tell me you haven’t decided on your gender, or that it switches back and forth without warning, I will respond, most politely, “Please let me know when you make up your mind or get psychiatric help. Until then, you’ll be “him” or “her” to me.

But back to Facebook….My friend Mike has been married trice, has two grown kids and is as male and heterosexual, as well as unambiguously so, as anyone I have ever met. Who or what is Facebook to impose a plural pronoun on him, or to suggest that it is appropriate to do so in either his case or anyone’s case? 

I view this as subtle cultural indoctrination regarding a societal practice that is at best a stupid fad and at worst ‘grooming’.” 

Thanks, Touchy! Before I throw the challenge over to you, contestants, let me ask our resident ethicist, Jack Marshall, about Touchy’s dilemma. Jack, is this worth bitching about?

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On Maduro’s Arrest, the Ethics Dunces and Villains Are All In Agreement: What Does This Tell Us? [Part 2] [Updated]

/ Jack Marshall / 58 Comments

Part 1 is here.

I assumed that headline was a misstatement, because the jokes write themselves (Hamas is condemning an abduction?). But I checked some Arab world sources, and indeed, all of the terrorist organizations are big mad over President Trump nabbing Maduro. From an Arabic news agency:

Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah has condemned the US aggression against Venezuela as a blatant and unprecedented violation of international law…Hezbollah movement, in a statement, condemned the U.S. aggression against Venezuela and the targeting of the country’s vital facilities, civilians, and residential buildings, describing it as a blatant and unprecedented violation of international law….It added that the military aggression shows disregard for global stability and security, and aimed at entrenching the “law of the jungle” in order to dismantle the remnants of the international system and strip it of any substance that could serve as a safeguard for nations and peoples.

The Palestinian movement, Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, denounced what it called an “imperialist American aggression” on Venezuela, including airstrikes and missile attacks on Caracas and civilian, residential, and military sites, casting it as a new episode of ‘organized American terrorism” against sovereign states….

Palestinian Islamic Jihad described the US assault on Venezuela as an escalating campaign, from blockade to direct strikes, aimed at domination, occupation, and plunder, and a flagrant breach of sovereignty and international law. It said Venezuela is targeted for its steadfast support for Palestine and regional resistance forces, describing the struggle as part of a shared anti-imperialist battle.

Hamas, for its part, denounced the military aggression on Caracas and the kidnapping of President Maduro and his wife, calling it a grave violation of international law and the sovereignty of an independent state. The movement cast the assault as an extension of unjust U.S. interventions driven by imperial ambition that have destabilized multiple countries and threatened international peace. Hamas urged the UN, especially the Security Council, to take measures to stop the attack immediately.

I have to say, I find this mordantly funny. Could there be a more villainous, despicable group of critics for Democrats to find common cause with? Any minute now, I’m expecting a statement from the Seven Princes of Hell, Lucifer, Beelzebub, Asmodeus, Leviathan, Mammon, Belphegor,, and Satan, joined by demons Astaroth, Belial, and Azazel, declaring the U.S.’s dazzling Venezuelan operation to be a violation of international law.

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On Maduro’s Arrest, the Ethics Dunces and Villains Are All In Agreement: What Does This Tell Us? [PART I]

/ Jack Marshall / 29 Comments

The headline is a rhetorical question.

Every now and then—the last was the assassination of Charlie Kirk—all the masks come off and anyone capable of objectivity can see exactly who the unethical, untrustworthy and dishonest among us are. Unfortunately, most people are not capable of objectivity, because bias makes you stupid. One would think, however, that at least those who present themselves to the public as skilled and independent analysts would take some care not to expose their double standards, lack of integrity and hypocrisy for all to see. One would be wrong to think that, as the video compilation above vividly demonstrates.

But why, oh why, do otherwise intelligent people continue to trust these hacks?

Well, you can decide whether that is a rhetorical question or not.

Meanwhile, here is the first part of an incomplete collection of telling reactions to the U.S.’s perfectly executed incursion into Venezuela to remove an illegitimate ruler and his wife who were both under U.S. indictment.

1. Two lawyer bloggers, Ann Althouse and Jonathan Turley, who I respect and often reference here, made it clear—Turley a bit more expressly than Ann—that the U.S. action was legal and justified. Althouse went back over her previous comments on Maduro—gee, why didn’t Jen Psaki do that?—to find her expressing sympathy with the plight of Venezuelans and the absence of U.S. action, as in her discovery of a post from 2019:

When Trump was pleading with the Venezuelan military to support Juan Guaido, I wrote: “I was surprised that on the channel I was watching — Fox News — the analysis after the speech was about the 2020 presidential campaign…. People in Venezuela are suffering. They’re starving. We need to help. I thought Trump was trying to get something done, but the news folk rush to talk about the damned campaign, as if that’s what sophisticated, savvy people do. I found it offensive.”

Turley has posted twice already explaining that the action was legally justified, with some other useful analysis today, including a pointed reference to Axis hypocrisy:

…Some of us had written that Trump had a winning legal argument by focusing on the operation as the seizure of two indicted individuals in reliance on past judicial rulings, including the decisions in the case of former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and General Dan Caine stayed on script and reinforced this narrative. Both repeatedly noted that this was an operation intended to bring two individuals to justice and that law enforcement personnel were part of the extraction team to place them into legal custody. Rubio was, again, particularly effective in emphasizing that Maduro was not the head of state but a criminal dictator who took control after losing democratic elections.

However, while noting the purpose of the capture, President Trump proceeded to declare that the United States would engage in nation-building to achieve lasting regime change. He stated that they would be running Venezuela to ensure a friendly government and the repayment of seized U.S. property dating back to the government of Hugo Chávez.

… [Trump]is the most transparent president in my lifetime with prolonged (at times excruciatingly long) press conferences and a brutal frankness about his motivations. Second, he is unabashedly and undeniably transactional in most of his dealings. He is not ashamed to state what he wants the country to get out of the deal.

In Venezuela, he wants a stable partner, and he wants oil.

Chávez and Maduro had implemented moronic socialist policies that reduced one of the most prosperous nations to an economic basket case. They brought in Cuban security thugs to help keep the population under repressive conditions, as a third fled to the United States and other countries.

After an extraordinary operation to capture Maduro, Trump was faced with socialist Maduro allies on every level of the government. He is not willing to allow those same regressive elements to reassert themselves.

The problem is that, if the purpose was regime change, this attack was an act of war, which is why Rubio struggled to bring the presser back to the law enforcement purpose. I have long criticized the erosion of the war declaration powers of Congress, including my representation of members of Congress in opposition to Obama’s Libyan war effort.

The fact, however, is that we lost that case. Trump knows that. Courts have routinely dismissed challenges to undeclared military offensives against other nations. In fairness to Trump, most Democrats were as quiet as church mice when Obama and Hillary Clinton attacked Libya’s capital and military sites to achieve regime change without any authorization from Congress. They were also silent when Obama vaporized an American under this “kill list” policy without even a criminal charge. So please spare me the outrage now.

My strong preferences for congressional authorization and consultation are immaterial. The question I am asked as a legal analyst is whether this operation would be viewed as lawful. The answer remains yes.

A couple items in that analysis warrant special attention, like…

  • “[Trump]is the most transparent president in my lifetime.” That is absolutely true, yet the narrative being pushed by the unscrupulous Axis is that he is a habitual liar of epic proportions.
  • “….most Democrats were as quiet as church mice when Obama and Hillary Clinton attacked Libya’s capital and military sites to achieve regime change without any authorization from Congress.” Indeed, this is the gold standard of double standards that should be shaken in the faces of the reflex Trump-haters like a terrier shakes a rat.

2. 2024’s Ethics Hero of the Year Elon Musk called the elimination of Maduro “a win for the world.” Well, the Good Guys of the world, anyway. Russia, China, Iran and Cuba, as well as neighboring South American leftist states like Columbia and Brazil and drug cartel-run states like Mexico, condemned Trump’s action. Gee, wouldn’t that collection provide the Mad Left a big clue regarding the distribution of bad Guys and Good Guys on this issue? No, because to the Trump Deranged and the anti-Americans, wherever Trump is automatically is the House Where Evil Dwells.

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