Government & Politics

What Was Right and Wrong With Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor” Rally

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

The pundits of the airwaves, newsprint and blogosphere have issued their assessments of the Glenn Beck rally at the Lincoln Memorial with predictable results: those who admired Beck before the rally liked it, and those who detest him ridiculed it. The New York Times, in its inimitable fashion, showed contempt for the proceedings by relegating its account to page 15, even though every past D.C. rally and march of equivalent or lesser size (especially those advocating social or political positions popular with the Times staff) received more prominent coverage. To Times columnist Frank Rich, Beck’s rally was part of a racist conspiracy hatched by billionaires—yes, Frank, sure it was. John Avlon, who long ago branded Beck as a wingnut, reasonably pointed out that it was a wee bit hypocritical for Beck to preach against divisiveness when his own cable show is one of the most polarizing, even by Fox news standards. And John Batchelor, who may be the most serious, erudite, and balanced public affairs radio talk show host in captivity, dismissed the rally as harmless and Beck as a clown:

“I think of him now and again as Quasimodo Lite, a deaf bell-ringer swinging from the Notre Dame of Fox, a man who is eager to confess his own unsightly warts—“I’ve screwed up most of my life”—and who is also heroically delighted to be our slightly stooped “Pope of Fools,” because this accidental role, in this Festival of Fools called 2010, wins the cheers of the crowd.”

Even less charitable was the Baltimore Sun’s TV critic, who accused Beck of “stealing Martin Luther King’s moral authority.” Less charitable still was MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, who seems to have been driven a little mad—or at least a little unprofessional, perhaps— by the fact that Beck had the audacity to hold his rally on the anniversary of King’s iconic “I have a dream” speech. Matthews’s hyperbole was, well, Beck-like:

“Can we imagine if King were physically here tomorrow, today, were he to reappear tomorrow on the very steps of the Lincoln Memorial? “I have a nightmare that one day a right wing talk show host will come to this spot, his people`s lips dripping with the words ‘interposition’ and ‘nullification.’ Little right wing boys and little right wing girls joining hands and singing their praise for Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin. I have a nightmare!”

Was Beck’s bash really a nightmare? Political biases aside (Chris), the question for Ethics Alarms is what was right and wrong about the “Restoring Honor” rally. Continue reading →

The Bell Salary Scandal and the Victims’ Breach of Duty

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

In most respects, this months horror story about the incredibly corrupt officials of Bell, California doesn’t require any ethics commentary. The verdict is obvious. Robert Rizzo, Bell’s city manager, was collecting an $800,000 a year salary to run a dirt-poor town of  40,000 residents. Part-time city council members took home almost $100,000 annually, mostly by paying themselves to serve on municipal boards and commissions. Rizzo stood to collect a $600,000-a-year pension, and police chief Randy Adams, who was paid more than most big city police chiefs, had arranged for a $411,300-a-year pension. The city officials of Bell were predators, using their positions to steal money from the cities citizens. To pay for all the rich salaries and pensions, Bell’s crooked officials passed unconscionable property taxes, levied on a city population that averaged income less than $25,000 per capita . Even Charlie Rangel wouldn’t argue that this is politics as usual.

Nevertheless, this is a republic, and citizens, even citizens of small towns, have an obligation to pay attention to what their elected officials are doing. Continue reading →

Ethics Quote of the Week: Alessandra Stanley

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

“The rule that newer shows need a break should be bent in one case: Conan O’Brien’s ill-fated stint as the host of “The Tonight Show” wasn’t the best of the year, by a long shot. His nomination for outstanding variety, music or comedy series is a little like President Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize — political, premature and meant mostly as an affront to his predecessor.”

—New York Times TV critic Alessandra Stanley, properly tweaking the Emmys for nominating “The Conan O’Brien Show” for reasons that have nothing to do with its quality, which was spotty at best. Continue reading →

BREAKING NEWS! Blago’s An Unethical Lawyer, Too!

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

A librarian at Northwestern University found confidential attorney-client files in eighteen boxes of files belonging to Rod Blagojevich. The librarian purchased them at in an auction held by a moving and storage company that sold Blagojevich’s stored possessions after he stiffed the company on his storage bills. The files date from the ex-Illinois governor and current criminal defendant’s days as a prosecutor. Even though Blago no longer practices law (his bar status is inactive), his duty to protect prior client confidences is sacred and perpetual. The relevant Illinois Rule, 1.6, says:

(a) Except when required under Rule 1.6(b) or permitted under Rule 1.6(c), a lawyer shall not, during or after termination of the professional relationship with the client, use or reveal a confidence or secret of the client known to the lawyer unless the client consents after disclosure.

That means that leaving boxes of former client secrets statements, records and confidences in boxes stored in a facility where you’re not paying your bills is recklessly risking the privacy of those documents, and making it possible for them to fall into untrustworthy hands—not that Rod Blagojevich meets the minimal level of trustworthiness either.

Blago told the AP that he had no idea what was in the boxes. Wrong answer: he has a duty to know where his client files are and that they are secure. He also said that he didn’t know he was in arrears at the storage facility. Also wrong: staying current with the bills was his responsibility as part of his duty to protect his clients’ confidences.

That a man who ignored his duty to the public, and tried to use his power to appoint a U.S. Senator for personal gain, was also cavalier with his ethical duties to former clients should come as no surprise.  People who are unethical in one job are likely to be unethical in others.  And Rod…well, I think it’s fair to say that Rod Blagojevich is likely to be unethical no matter what he does, including eating and sleeping.

Defining Fiscal Irresponsibility Down and the $578M School

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

The shocking thing about the new $578 million school complex recently unveiled in Los Angeles, other than its obscene price tag, is that it was a one-day news story, and a minor one at that. There are no demonstrations; Fox News isn’t screaming about it. One education blog blandly asked, “Some view the school and its deluxe amenities as a showpiece for the community, while others view it as a waste of taxpayer money. What do you think?”

“What do you think???” WHAT DO YOU THINK???

The Robert F. Kennedy Community School is a showpiece for the community, all right: it shows that the community is run by irresponsible, incompetent officials, and that the community’s taxpayers are the human equivalent of sheep. Continue reading →

Primary Ethics: Good and Bad Results for Civic Diligence

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

The tendency of American voters to hand over the reins of power to the sons, daughters, and wives of popular or successful leaders simply because they shared a last name, a bed or some DNA has always been an embarrassment, proof of the most unfortunate aspects of democracy when it is driven by civic laziness rather than diligence. Beneficiaries of this generations-long deficit in seriousness and responsibility include presidents (Adams, Bush); U.S. Senators (Kennedy, Gore, Clinton, Bayh,**), representatives (Kennedy, Bono, Jackson…), and governors (Bush, Bush…). Some have performed well, some not so well, but all of them were initially elected because voters knew their names, and illogically ascribed to them whatever it was that they admired about their family members, regardless of experience, qualifications, or evidence of governing skill.

In Tuesday’s primaries, voters rectified one especially egregious example of this phenomenon, and committed a new one. Continue reading →

Ethics Dunce: Sen. Max Baucus

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

Sen. Max Baucus, the Montana Democrat who, along with Majority Leader Harry Reid, was the prime mover of Obamacare through to passage by the U.S. Senate, attended a citizens forum in Libby, Montana regarding health care reform and other issues, along with HHS Secretary Kathleen Sibelius.

One attendee, Judy Matott, asked Baucus  and Sebelius, “if either of you read the health care bill before it was passed and if not, that is the most despicable, irresponsible thing.”

Baucus replied that he “essentially” wrote the Senate health care bill, but didn’t actually read it. Continue reading →

The Legal Rape, and the Limits of Cultural Tolerance and Religious Freedom

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

Sometimes conduct is just wrong, and a culture should be able to reject and condemn it confidently without engaging in navel-gazing over cultural tolerance and diversity. The position, unfortunately popular, that all cultural determinations of right and wrong are equally valid is both lazy and insidious, though it has wormed its way into the minds of some who would cal themselves “progressive,” but who are more appropriately called “confused.”

In this category is a New Jersey Court judge, who refused to find a Muslim defendant guilty of sexual assault despite undisputed evidence that he raped his wife multiple times, (immediately prior to their divorce), saying at one point,

“You are my wife, I can do anything to you. The woman, she should submit and do anything I ask her to do.” Continue reading →

Ethics Hero: Shirley Sherrod, Striking a Blow for Accountability

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

The Department of Agriculture, in a desperate effort at damage control (and to make amends for its unprofessional and unfair treatment of her), offered Shirley Sherrod another job. She has turned it down, saying, “I know [DOA Secretary Tom Vilsack] apologized, and I accept that. And a new process is in place, and I hope that it works. I don’t want to be the one that tests it.”

Excellent.  Brava! Continue reading →

Politics, Ethics, and the Idiot Problem

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

Kim Lehman, who is one of Iowa’s two national Republican Committee members, responded to Politico’s report last week about the large and, oddly, increasing number of Americans who believe that President Obama is a Muslim, with this tweet:

“@politico You’re funny. They must pay you a lot to protect Obama. BTW, he personally told the muslims that he is a muslim. Read his lips.”

When Lehman was asked by the Des Moines Register what speech she was referring to, she cited an Obama speech in Cairo last summer in which he reached out to Muslims “to seek a new beginning.” In that speech, Obama made no comment about being Muslim. In fact, he said he was a  a Christian, saying,

“…Now part of this conviction is rooted in my own experience. I’m a Christian, but my father came from a Kenyan family that includes generations of Muslims. As a boy, I spent several years in Indonesia and heard the call of the azaan at the break of dawn and at the fall of dusk. As a young man, I worked in Chicago communities where many found dignity and peace in their Muslim faith. As a student of history, I also know civilization’s debt to Islam.”

Never mind that, Lehman said; the speech still “just had the appearance that he was aligning himself with the Muslims.” Continue reading →