Etiquette and manners

A Few Notes About Banned Commenters…

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

1. Good, I’m glad they are gone.

2. The latest bannee, “Jude” managed to get me to respond to a couple of unauthorized comments post-banning. (This is because he wasn’t around long enough for me to remember his name.) In the unauthorized comments, since sent to spam hell, he illustrated the basis for his banishment by stating, with absolute certainly, that the experience I described here was triggered by a scam, and that I made a dumb mistake by calling both the collection agency (a law firm) and the company that had mistakenly charged me. I had been phished, Jude the Obscure Asshole insisted. No, I replied, I had not been phished, and I have sufficient experience with such things to have checked. Jude just arrogantly insisted that he was right and I was wrong, without any of the information I had that he did not.

I just received an email from AfterPay USA. It reads,

“Hi Jack, Thank you for your patience regarding your ID Theft Claim – Disputed Liability with respect to Afterpay account 10082791185.
Afterpay has concluded our investigation and your ID Theft claim has been accepted. You will not be held liable for Afterpay account 10082791185 or any debt incurred from this account.

What does this mean?

  • Afterpay Account 10082791185 has now been closed. 

Thank you,

Vivien
Global Fraud Senior Specialist

I was right. Jude was wrong. So Jude can bite me.

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How Another Hour Of My Life Was Just Consumed By A Conspiracy of Incompetence…

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

I wonder if I can create a mass tort claim against the people responsible for episodes like this. Behold:

1. On March 28, I received a threatening letter from First Source, LLC, a debt collector. It alleged that I had an account with something called AfterPay U.S., which I have never heard of, for $750, that I never spent, for something that I still have no idea what it was. The letter also said that I now only owed $590.64, since I had paid $187.50, which I have not. My bank doesn’t thinks so either.

2. I called First Source, which …Hallelujah!…has an automated system that got me to a human being almost immediately. That human being was Rhea. She was cordial and professional, and did not constantly read from a script. She heard me out, and said that she would initiate a fraud investigation. I didn’t have to do anything more.

3. Yesterday I received two cheerful emails from AfterPay. Both involved alerting me that I had changed my email associated with my imaginary account. I hadn’t done anything regarding AfterPay, because I still don’t know what the hell it does other than charge people for stuff they never bought, and my email has been the same for 20 years. “Please log into your AfterPay account to view these changes. If this information is incorrect, please update so we have the most up to date information for you,” “Shiara” of Customer Support informed me. “Have a great day.”

Bite me, Shaira.

4. This morning I called FirstSource back to ask what’s going on. But instead of Rhea, I reached Michael, who appeared to be an idiot. As I tried to explain what had happened, he kept reading disclaimers and asking me for the same information I had already given to Rhea and that was already in my file, since it was repeated in the letter FirstSource had sent me. I told him, “I have a simple question you need to answer,” and he replied, “I can’t answer it because you keep interrupting me!” “No,” I said, “I keep asking you to stop reading a script that I have heard already, and to talk to me like a human being, and listen to what I am trying to tell you.” He hung up.

5. I called back and got Michael again. He acted as if we hadn’t just spoken second earlier. He read the same script, an asked me for the same information: my full name, my date of birth, my mailing address, and my “reference number.” It was literally de ja vu: a near exact replay of our previous conversation. This time, he said, “We have closed your account, so you will have to contact AfterPay.” Progress! He then gave me a phone number.

6. I called it. It didn’t work.

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Divisive?

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

The Great Stupid’s warped values have made the term “divisive” particularly problematical regarding societal ethics. If, for example, a sign condemning sex with children is deemed to be divisive to some sick SOBs, my reaction is, “Good. Live with it. You’re wrong and normal people are right. We don’t care if you feel denigrated. You should be denigrated. And shunned.”

Then we have the divisive appeal for funds I highlighted earlier today. I firmly believe that an appeal for charitable assistance for one “tribe” or group to the exclusion of others who have exactly the same claim to charity, empathy, humanitarian aid and generosity is divisive, destructive, and wrong.

Two examples of controversies involving art and messaging also came across my ethics metaphorical radar screen today….

I. The mural honoring murdered refugee Iryna Zarutska in Providence, Rhode Island. The last moments of the innocent young woman slaughtered for no reason in particular by a deranged criminal repeatedly released to prey on an unsuspecting public is on the left, the now condemned mural in her honor is on the right. Mayor Brett Smiley (D, of course) ordered the unfinished mural, largely funded by Elon Musk, taken down. “The murder of the individual depicted in this mural was a devastating tragedy, but the misguided, isolating intent of those funding murals like this across the country is divisive and does not represent Providence,” he said in a statement. “I continue to encourage our community to support local artists whose work brings us closer together rather than further divides us.” Smiley’s Democrat primary challenger, Rhode Island state Rep. David Morales, said, “We’re seeing a right-wing movement that is exploiting the death of the refugee for the purposes of trying to spread division. Ultimately, we want to make sure that every community member that calls Providence home feels safe … and we can both agree that this mural behind us does not reflect Providence’s values.”

That’s interesting. What values do the honoring of a young woman who died because of elected officials, judges and law enforcement officials determination not to punish criminals and wrong doers “not reflect”? The fact that Iryna Zarutska was a Ukranian refugee is irrelevant, isn’t it? A young woman named Ann Jones, or a young man named Bill Shaw, or an old fart named, oh, say, Jack Marshall, being murdered while using public transportation would be equally worthy of public anger, wouldn’t it? Is dividing people who care about law abiding citizens being murdered because of irresponsible policies from those who shrug such horrors off as “collateral damage” a bad thing? What kind of people is Mayor Smiley and David Morales standing up for? Killers? Maniacs? Is the mural divisive because this particular maniac was black and his victim was white? I think the message of the mural is “Shame on you!” to all of the progressives, “restorative justice,” “defund the police” activists whose hands are stained with the blood of victims like Iryna Zarutska. Why should that message be suppressed or discouraged?

In its groveling statement sucking up to the woke and offended by justice, the owners of the building where the mural appeared mewled “We heard you [Providence]. We are deeply and sincerely sorry for everything that has taken place over the past week. After reflecting and learning, we have made the decision to discontinue this project and will move forward with removal as soon as possible. We remain committed to fostering unity, safety, and care for all members of our community, and we will continue to listen, learn, and act with those values at the forefront.”

Sure, you foster safety by supporting the removal of a strong statement against pandering to criminals. Got it. You’re disgusting.

[Pointer: JutGory]

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Ethics Verdict: It Is Unethical For President Trump To Attend The SCOTUS Oral Argument On Birthright Citizenship

/ Jack Marshall / 40 Comments

As I write this, the Supreme Court is hearing a case challenging the tradition that nearly all children born in the United States, whoever their parents may be and how they came to be here, are automatically citizens.

On the first day of his second term, President Trump signed an executive order stating that babies born on U.S. soil to illegal immigrants and temporary foreign visitors were ineligible for birthright citizenship. That was an obvious shot across the bow of the U.S. Supreme Court as it challenged an interpretation of the 14th Amendment that has stood for over a century. The President knew his EO would be also challenged, and would eventually end up on the Supreme Court docket.

Because this is an important question that would, if SCOTUS agreed with the President’s interpretation of the Constitutional intent (there were no such things as “illegal immigrants” when the Constitution was written) have massive consequences in many areas, the oral argument is attracting blow-by-blow analysis. That is not my purpose here.

The issue for Ethics Alarms is President Trump’s decision to attend the oral argument. No previous President has done this, although nothing prevents the President from attending. Trump’s predecessors all avoided the option, though there have been many, many cases over the years that the President knew would have a major effect on his policies as well and the matters he had to deal with. President Pierce did not attend the Dred Scott oral arguments. To be fair, he was barely engaged at any time in his miserable four years in the White House. But FDR didn’t sit in while the Court was determining the fates of his many New Deal programs. Nixon didn’t listen to the Pentagon Papers arguments.

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Morning Ethics Nausea: Four Offenses

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

1. The Great Stupid won’t go down with out a fight! Especially in California. The University of Southern California canceled a debate among candidates for governor less than 24 hours before it was supposed to take place this week. The reason was that there weren’t any non-white candidates. I kept seeing that in headlines and couldn’t believe it. I just assumed it was right-wing spin, and really dumb spin at that.

Nope. Eight Democrats and two Republicans are currently leading a typically huge field running in the Golden State June 2 primary. The debate was scheduled to include the six candidates who were leading in the polls, plus an extra Democrat, the Mayor of San Jose, who has been raising a lot of money for his campaign lately. If he had been black or Latino, that may have saved the debate, but he’s just another white guy. Students objected, and the school, being run by cowards and woke weenies like most universities today, chickened out.

The controversies over who got a place on the stage “have created a significant distraction from the issues that matter to voters,” the university said. And so rather than hold a debate that would help voters distinguish between the candidates who currently have a chance to win and maybe teach students something, the fact that none of the candidates are “of color” means that there won’t be a debate at all.

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Boy, That Double Standard Became A Thing So Fast I Didn’t Even Notice…

/ Jack Marshall / 20 Comments

During the #MeToo phase of “The Great Stupid” and even before, the Woke and Wonderful were lecturing men that to take any pro-active romantic action that involved touching required express consent, otherwise a mere impulsive kiss would constitute sexual assault. So now Clark Gable, Richard Gere, John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart and the rest are sexual predators because they didn’t say “please.”

I am watching the (excellent) series “The Madison,” and, as I had noticed in another Taylor Sheridan vehicle “Landman,” in an awkward moment of sexual tension between a man and a woman who were virtual strangers, it was the woman who instigated the surprise, passionate kiss.

That’s all right, see. If a man kisses the woman, it’s assault and battery, but the other way around it’s exciting, romantic and natural.

Got it.

Assholes.

Sen. Paul: Allow Me To Introduce You To The Concept Of “Professionalism”…Perhaps You Are Unfamiliar With It [Corrected]

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

Yecchh.

Senate Homeland Security Chair Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky) angrily confronted President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Homeland Security Department based on Sen. Markwayne Mullin’s insulting Paul in the past.

Uh-uh. Wrong. Bad. Unethical! Paul’s job is to assess whether Mullin is qualified for the important job he needs Senate approval to step into, not to settle old scores. The confirmation process is not supposed to be personal, because those engaged in it are allegedly professionals. Professionals, as I have been reminding people a lot lately, are worthy of the public trust because they do not let personal grievances and non-ethical instincts like anger, revenge, hate and retribution enter into their decision-making process.

Clearly, Paul does not agree. He began the hearing saying that the Oklahoma Senator might not qualify for the role of Homeland Security Secretary because last month Mullin called Paul a “freaking snake” for trying to block the passage of a funding bill. Worse, Mullin had said he understood why a neighbor attacked Paul in 2017, when he sustained broken ribs and a punctured lung.

“Tell it to my face, tell the world why you believe I deserved to be assaulted from behind, have six ribs broken and a damaged lung!” Paul said in his reserved, dignified, fair and decorous opening statement. “And while you’re at it, explain to the American public why they should trust a man with anger issues” to be head of Homeland Security, Paul added.

“In fact, let’s duke it out right here if you’re man enough, dick-head!” he contin…Okay, I’m kidding; he didn’t go that far.

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Ethics Dunce: President Trump. Again.

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

He’s the President of the United States, and thus, I have determined, must be disqualified as a beneficiary of “The Julie Principle.” (“Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly, Trump’s gonna say stupid and self-destructive things by and by…”) What an infuriating, unteachable, incorrigible man he is!

From the New York Times, just reporting facts for once:

“President Trump claimed on Monday that a former president told him privately that ‘I wish I did what you did” in attacking Iran and killing its supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

“Speaking to reporters at the White House, Mr. Trump would not identify which of the four living predecessors he was referring to.

“He said, ‘I wish I did what you did,’” Mr. Trump said. “I don’t want to get into ‘who,’ I don’t want to get him into trouble.”

A reporter asked if it was President George W. Bush, the only Republican on the list, but Mr. Trump said no.

What an asshole…but I repeat myself. If it wasn’t Bush, and of course it wasn’t because the Bushes all hate Trump, and we know it wasn’t Obama, whose approach to Iran was to give back billions of dollars and “trust” it the untrustworthy, Machiavellian Islamic nation. We know it wasn’t Biden either. who, if he tried to talk to Trump would only be able to get out “Bvuh?” or something similar.

That only leaves Bill Clinton, who in fact might have shared such a confidence with Trump. Naturally all the speculation on which Ex-POTUS confessed his regrets has fallen on Bubba. Also naturally, Clinton denied that he said anything of the sort.

Of course he did! We know Clinton: he would deny it if he didn’t say it, and he would deny it if he did. He’s like those competing tribes in the old conundrum, where the members of one tribe always lie and the members of the other always tell the truth. If you ask the members of either tribe “Will you lie to me?” both will give the same answer: “No!”

So there are two alternatives, both of which are unflattering to Trump. Either Clinton confessed his regrets in confidence, and Trump betrayed that confidence, or Trump is lying.

Well done, Mr. President.

Jerk.

Stay Classy, Megyn! Unethical Quote Of The Week: Megyn Kelly

/ Jack Marshall / 24 Comments

I hearby withdraw my sympathy for Megyn Kelly when Trump, after she ambushed him in the first GOP candidates debate in 2015 by calling him a misogynist, implied that she was addled because she was having her period. That was vulgar and literally below the belt, but Megyn just burrowed under Trump by calling pundit Mark Levin, a smarter, more credentialed lawyer than Kelly, a “micropenis.”

Nice.

Kelly’s excuse was that Levin has savaged her for her obnoxious, ignorant, borderline anti-Semitic claim that the U.S. is fighting for Jews rather than Americans by attacking Iran. “He tweets about me obsessively in the crudest, nastiest terms possible,” Kelly tweeted. “Literally more than some stalkers I’ve had arrested. He doesn’t like it when women like me fight back. Bc of his micropenis.” Kelly went to law school and that is the best she can do in a policy debate? “Oh yeah? Well you have a little dick!”

To her probable horror, Megyn was quickly defended by certifiable Dunning-Krueger victim and vulgarian Margery Taylor Greene, who wrote, “I wholeheartedly support Megyn Kelly telling the world that Mark Levin has a micropenis. It’s the most deserved insult, and I don’t care if it’s vulgar,” Greene wrote in her own post on X. “And Trump’s gigantic defense of Levin only enraged the base more. People are DONE. MAGA destroyed by micropenis Mark Levin.”

I stopped listening to Levin because of his habit of using sophomoric insults and name-calling to appeal to his lower IQ listeners (How many times can anyone find “New York Slimes” funny?), but his expressed contempt for Greene has been, if anything, understated.

After getting support from the likes of Greene, Megyn must be looking back on her life to assess where she took the wrong turn that brought her to such a desperate state.

Unethical Quote Of The Day: MSNOW Talking-Head Antonia Hylton

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

“The other piece of this that I found really disturbing in the messaging around the war recently…is some of the language in the description of their opponent. “Sort of the way they seem to create this image of the Iranians and all of their sort of proxies or allies, the sort of imagery that they conjure up,. And I think that it takes a certain amount of arrogance and I’m also going to say it, a bit of racism, to constantly talk about people like they are savages. That is a word that we have heard Hegseth use.” 

—MSNOW hostess Antonia Hylton, during Saturday’s broadcast of “The Weekend: Primetime.”

Apparently all you have to do to justify being made a co-host of a show on MSNOW is to demonstrate enmity to one’s own country’s leaders and support for its enemies. Oh, before I forget, “enemy” is the proper term for a nation your country is currently at war with, not “opponent.”

Furthermore, calling Iran’s leaders “savages” is not racism but a fair and accurate diagnosis. Savage as a noun means one who is vicious and uncivilized. Iran is currently a brutal, murderous and ruthless regime that murdered many thousands of its own citizens for daring to protest their harsh treatment from their government. Since the Islamic takeover in 1979, 258 Americans were killed in a suicide bombing at the U.S. Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, and a truck bombing in the same city in 1983. The Iran-backed terrorist group Hezbollah killed 19 U.S. Airmen in Saudi Arabia at the Khobar Towers in 1996. It is estimated that Iranian proxies have killed nearly 700 Americans between the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nearly 50 Americans were killed by Iranian-backed Hamas terrorists during the attack on Israel that took place October 7, 2023, and that attack was as savage as one could be even if one ignores American casualties and only focuses on the Israeli civilians killed, raped and taken as hostages

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