Ethics Train Wrecks

Ethics Tip (To the Biden Administration): You Can’t Resolve an Ethical Conflict By Taking Contradictory Actions Simultaneously

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

I would think that would be obvious to mature, competent, experienced and responsible policy-makers. But perhaps that’s not relevant here…

I awoke today to the news that the United States has air-dropped “humanitarian aid” into Gaza. Three US C-130s dropped 66 palettes of food, 22 from each aircraft. Biden complained last week about the slow pace of assistance flowing into Gaza, the Israeli campaign against which the United States is supporting with its funds. Wars against enemies are designed to make the populace under attack less well-off, eventually to the point where their government says “Enough!” and surrenders. Aid to a population under attack is intended to make the population under attack better off. Simultaneously funding an attack on a region and sending aid to that region isn’t ethical. It is offensively cynical, not merely refusing to make a decision, but making contradictory decisions to appeal to groups with diametrically opposing interests. Sending aid of any kind to the enemy of the nation we are supporting in a war can accomplish little more than extending that war. The most ethical way to engage in the unethical practice of warfare is to end it as quickly as possible.

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I LOVE This Lawsuit! It Might Be the Best “Great Stupid” Lawsuit Yet!

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

Mohammad Yusuf, a 43-year-old Chicago police officer, has filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the city because it refuses to allow him to change his race from “white” to “of color,” or something. The Chicago police department allows cops to change their gender identity according to whim, and he argues that this is a double standard.

Yusuf “currently identifies as Egyptian and African American.” When he first joined the force in 2004, the Great Stupid had not yet spread darkness over the land, and he only had a few race option to choose from, he says. Now he believes Caucasian is inaccurate, and besides, despite the woke Chicago police department claiming to have a race-neutral and merit-based promotion system, Yusuf claims he has been “repeatedly bypassed” for promotions in favor of less qualified black officers.

No, really? I don’t think Chicago would ever be a party to something like that, do you? Well, if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em, as the saying goes.

Did I mention how much I love this lawsuit?

Yusuf even provided his 23andMe genetic testing results to prove he is mixed race and it all depends on which he chooses to identify as when it comes to tribal designations and their DEI rewards. Still, the police department obstinately refuses to allow him to be black. It’s strange, his lawyers argue, that other officers can change their genders on official records, since no genetic test would back that up. That Y chromosome is there for life. Is this not a double standard?

“While other CPD officers are afforded the opportunity to have their gender identity corrected to match their lived experience, Officer Yusuf and others in similar positions are barred from obtaining accurate racial designations that align with their racial identity,” the suit says.

Isn’t this great?

Biden-Supporters Are Officially Ethically Estopped From Complaining That Trump Lies

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

President Biden went on Seth Myers’s late night show this week to bask in a fawning interview by a partisan supporter who wouldn’t ask him any questions harder than “What’s your favorite flavor of ice cream?,” and still managed to screw up.

After the show’s taping, Biden was confronted by reporters while licking an ice-cream cone and asked when a Gaza ceasefire might occur. “I hope by… the end of the weekend,” Biden answered. “My national security advisor tells me we’re close. We’re close. It’s not done yet. My hope is by next Monday, we’ll have a ceasefire,” Biden said. That was great news for anti-Israel progressives, and right before the Michigan primary, where Biden was likely to face Arab protest votes against his re-nomination.

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Regarding THIS…

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

Apparently, as I have noted before, the Biden Administration doesn’t believe in firing anyone—well, anyone who doesn’t behave like this clown—which is itself a form of incompetence and avoidance of responsibility. A competent President who wasn’t more concerned with avoiding conflicts with the loosely-allied progressive tribes in his party than with upholding standards of conduct, ethics, and performance under his authority would fire everyone behind that screed above.

All right, he would do it immediately after giving Merrick Garland, Pete Buttigieg, Anthony Blinken, Lloyd Austin, Dr. Miguel Cardona, Alejandro Mayorkas, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, and Karine Jean-Pierre their well-earned pink slips.

No executive in any organization has to tolerate public dissent like this regarding his or her leadership. For a President, such open defiance is divisive, confusing to the public, disloyal and disrespectful. It also erodes trust. The proper way for any staff member in any pursuit at any level to express his or her disagreement with the organization’s policies and actions is to do so privately, through proper channels, or publicly after resigning. Those are the only ethical options, and the latter course has severe ethical limitations based on confidentiality and mutual trust.

Having a staff express disagreement with a President and his administration as the letter jaw-dropping above does is unprecedented, and it had better not become institutionalized, because no government—indeed, no organization—can function effectively and with the full confidence of its constituency and stake-holders that permits such rebellions.

Moreover, even if such grandstanding could be justified—there must be an exception out there somewhere—this surely wouldn’t be an acceptable precedent. The letter above absurdly supports an act of self-terrorism by a mentally-disturbed fool, thus aligning themselves with the radical agent of chaos who issued this tweet…

Brilliant. This New York-based writer and apologist for terrorism lumps protesting peacefully, dissent, marching and heckling politicians in the same category as suicide, rioting and law-breaking. Yet even he has a better grasp on reality than “the Staffers for Ceasefire.” In a related tweet, he suggests to these fools, “The best eulogy you can offer Bushnell is resigning en masse.”

Exactly. By all means, honor that pathetic would-be martyr.

Theirs isn’t even smart dissent, persuasive dissent, or patriotic dissent. The letter represents a group of people who are making policy recommendations above their pay-grade, literally, and displaying their biases and ignorance while doing so.

Biden should fire each and every one of them. That he doesn’t and won’t would be proof of his unfitness to lead and incompetence as a Chief Executive even if he could sing ” I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General General” backwards in 12 languages, including Urdu.

Another “Nah, There’s No Mainstream Media Bias!” Smoking Gun: Trying to Pretend That Another Murder by an Illegal Immigrant Isn’t Blood on Biden’s Hands

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

On today’s CNN’s “AC360,” host Anderson Cooper described the “horrifying” details of student Laken Hope Riley’s murder on the University of Georgia campus last week, then quickly pivoted to spinning that “the revelation the suspect was in this country unlawfully” had caused the murder to be “politicized.” Earlier, CNN’s Jake Tapper similarly adopted the “Republicans pounce!” tactic, saying “They’re seizing on this as an example of Biden’s failure to protect the American people and secure the border.”

Damn right, because that’s what it is. This death should be politicized: it’s Willie Horton all over again, except that Biden and the open-borders Democrats didn’t just goof by releasing one dangerous criminal to prey on the public, they have released many, and are releasing many more. Trump on Truth Social said the obvious, that Riley’s murder should’ve ‘never happened.’” Of course it should never have happened. Illegal immigrants shouldn’t be allowed to roam free, and this one had already been arrested more than once.

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A Relatively Minor Incident That Explains Why Nobody Can Trust Anybody in Politics, and Shouldn’t.

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

A robo call supposedly featuring President Biden urging New Hampshire Democrats not to vote in the state’s presidential primary was immediately used by the news media to accuse Republicans of suppressing votes, because, you know, that’s what they do. The media reported that two Texas companies were the source of the calls: Life Corporation and Lingo Telecom, and that the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) had issued cease-and-desist letters to both companies. Texas companies—well, we all know what THAT means.

Surprise! The deep-fake recording was not the work of those racist Republicans, but of a Democratic consultant who worked for Democrat Dean Phillips’s quixotic Presidential campaign. Phillips has the ethical mission of giving his party’s voters the opportunity to show that they would prefer not to have a rapidly declining dementia sufferer carry the Democratic banner in November.

Paul Carpenter, a New Orleans magician—that’s him doing street magic above— came forward to admit that he was hired to use artificial intelligence to impersonate President Joe Biden for the robocalls. Carpenter explained that he was hired in January by veteran Democratic consultant Steve Kramer, who has been advising Phillips. “I created the audio used in the robocall. I did not distribute it,” Carpenter said. “I was in a situation where someone offered me some money to do something, and I did it. There was no malicious intent. I didn’t know how it was going to be distributed.” He says he was paid $150.

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Helpful Ethics Alarms Tip For Girls’ and Women’s Athletes and Sports Team: Refuse to Compete Against Biological Males BEFORE Someone Gets Hurt

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

The KIPP Academy girls high school basketball team includes a (“transitioning”…or not, reports are unclear) a male player who “identifies” as female, which is all that the increasing wokeness-crippled Bay State requires. Section 43.3.1 of the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association handbook states that “a student shall not be excluded from participation on a gender-specific sports team that is consistent with the student’s bona fide gender identity.”

And what, you may ask, is “bona fide gender identity”? The player in question is six-feet tall, appears to have facial hair more consistent with a teenage male, and is much stronger than the average drum majorette. The Daily Item reported that “KIPP officials refused to confirm the player’s gender identification,” but if she (he?) is playing on the girls team, presumably he (she?) identifies as female. Now, the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association also says a student like that one can’t be included on a roster “solely for the purpose of gaining an unfair advantage.” The key word there is “solely,” a weasel word all lawyers are familiar with. It literally means that having a boy who will seem like a superstar in a girl’s sport on a team supposedly for females will be acceptable no matter how unfair it is and no matter how much of an advantage it gives that team if there is any other reason for letting him (her?) change locker rooms. Maybe the newly minted female needs a boost in confidence!

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Incompetent Elected Official of the Month: North Las Vegas Mayor Pamela Goynes-Brown

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

Why do communities keep electing officials who are ignorant of the law, history, and the U.S. Constitution?

Three days ago, North Las Vegas Mayor Pamela Goynes-Brown, (Guess which party!) announced on social media that her city would host a Black-owned business fair this coming weekend at the conclusion of Black History Month. The fest would feature local black vendors, community resources, an art corner and an area for children. Food trucks and live entertainment would enliven the proceedings. It would be a fun day of promotion for all participating—black-owned only!—businesses.

Who could have a problem with that?

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Biden Scores Yet Another “Bottomless Pinocchio,” But I Guess It Doesn’t Count.

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

President’s Day on Ethics Alarms continues with another Biden Presidency Whopper. Once again, Biden, his mouthpieces at the White House, and VP Kamala Harris have stated in public that “Gun violence is the leading cause of death of children.” It isn’t. They keep saying this and it keeps being repeated by the mainstream news media, but the stat is as much of a lie as other hoary progressive myth narratives, my favorite being that women only earn 70 cents for every dollar men earn for the same jobs.

The reason for the fake gun stat is almost too obvious: it feeds neatly into “Think of the children!” hysteria and the media fearmongering narrative that every child is risking his or her life by going to school. It is an example of the tried-and-true fallacy the appeal to emotion. By all means, lets gut individual rights of self-defense, because if it only saves one child’s life….!!!

Washington Post “Fact Checker” Glenn Kessler, as I’ve noted before, seems to really want to be a fair and objective commentator but somehow can’t quite manage it. That’s Kessler’s
“Bottomless Pinocchio” above—if you can’t see it, it’s because WordPress’s image embedding feature stopped working a few minutes ago. If you recall, it shows a pile of little Pinocchio heads, which Kessler uses to denote a lie that the same public figure uses no matter how many times it’s proven false. The device was created for Donald Trump. In contrast, Biden’s repeated lies are seldom flagged by Kessler or anyone else. As Kessler has explained it, Trump lies, but “Biden loves to retell certain stories. Some aren’t credible” .

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Yes Indeed, Most Presidents Have Had Emotional, Mental or Serious Physical Problems, But That Doesn’t Make Joe Biden Fit to Be One

/ Jack Marshall / 16 Comments

I’ve been holding on to this post for a while now, waiting for Presidents Day. An old “Psychology Today” article has been dredged up lately by various pundits desperately seeking a way to deny what is now undeniable. President Biden is in the throes of serious mental decline, and allowing him to run again, at an advanced age and when his memory, stamina, and cognitive health are rapidly receding into the fog, is irresponsible—which doesn’t mean that the Axis won’t do it anyway. The argument being mounted to justify such a desperate and stupid course is a version of the #1 rationalization on the list, “Everybody does it!” Joe’s problems are no big deal, you see, because, as Dr. Guy Winch wrote in 2016: “a study by Jonathan Davidson of the Duke University Medical Center and colleagues, who reviewed biographical sources for the first 37 presidents (1776-1974), half of those men had been afflicted by mental illness—and 27% met those criteria while in office, something that could have clearly affected their ability to perform their jobs.”

Whew! Well, that’s a relief!

I hadn’t seen the study, but it was heartwarming, since its findings echoed those of my American Government honors thesis, now deep in the stacks of Widener Library. I hypothesized that being outside the norm emotionally, mentally and physically was among the factors that selected out the extraordinary individuals who become Presidents of the United States. Leaders, to give an even shorter version, are not normal by definition.

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