Happy weird mid-week day before a holiday when almost nobody seems to be working…and remember Pickett’s Charge, July 3, 1863.
But ethics never takes a break…
1. Oops! Did we miss the real holiday? On this date in 1776, John Adams wrote to Abigail that the day before, July 2, 1776, the Continental Congress had voted to declare American independence from the British Empire. Adams predicted that July 2 would eventually be celebrated by every generation of Americans with parades, speeches, songs and fireworks, which Adams called “illuminations.” Why did he turn out to be wrong? Oh, because history is messy, mistakes don’t get corrected, and tradition becomes more important than facts. (Once again, “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence” rule applies: “When legend becomes fact, print the legend!” )
What happened on July 4th? The unsigned but ratified Declaration was sent to the printer on that date, and the printer dutifully marked his prints with “July 4, 1776”. The delegates didn’t start signing the document until August 2, and all the signatures weren’t down on parchment until November. The dramatic depiction of the signing taking place on July 4 in the musical and movie “1776” is fake history. It’s not all Broadway’s and Hollywood’s fault: the iconic painting “Declaration of Independence,” by John Trumbull, a version of which hangs in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington and which the actors are staged to re-enact in “1776” is often captioned “July 4, 1776.”
Trumbull’s artwork actually shows the moment on June 28 when the Declaration drafting committee officially presented its work to the chairman of Continental Congress. John Hancock, There never was a signing ceremony.
Nonetheless, July 4 has, for some reason, been an unusually felicitous and significant day in U.S. history. It would be difficult to pick another that carried so much history, even without being the chosen date to honor the nation’s founding. Three of the first five U.S. presidents died on July 4, with John Adams and Thomas Jefferson famously dying on that date within hours of each other in 1826, fifty years after….the Declaration was sent to the printer.
But July 4, 1803, was the day word arrived from Paris that the Louisiana Purchase was complete, having been signed by Napoleon. Without it, the United States would have been a very different country, and a much weaker and poorer one.
July 4, 1863 also was the date Robert E. Lee acknowledged his defeat at Gettysburg after his desperate, risky, massed attack on the Union line across a fence-strewn field and up a grade into artillery fire failed. That defeat probably sealed the fate of the Confederacy, and meant that this unique nation would, despite a bloody close call, have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. Continue reading →
1. Talk about a newspaper column that is exactly the opposite of the truth! The Times had an essay in its “Review” section this Sunday with a title that gave me a shock: “Want to Be Less Racist? Move to Hawaii”
The headline would have been more accurate if it read, “Want to live in the only state with lawful and open racial discrimination? Move to Hawaii!” Hawaii gives special benefits to residents with full or partial Native Hawaiian ancestry. There is a special Hawaiian registry program which verifies an individual’s Native Hawaiian ancestry, so the favored race can receive such goodies that are unavailable to other racial groups as buying land for a home at only $1 a year, low-interest loans, and admission for their children to the elite Kamehameha Schools.
Anecdotally, I can also state that the only time in my life that I felt I was the target of racial epithets was in college, when the Hawaiian contingent frequently derided me and my white room mates as “howlies,” a disparaging Island term reserved for anyone who is not a native Hawaiian. I will always remember my 6’5″ roommate Dave ending the practice by saying to the two main offenders, “If I ever hear that word from any of you again, I promise that I will shove you, Howie, directly up Reggie’s ass, head first. Are we clear on that?”
Dave never bluffed, and seldom joked. That was the last time we were called “howlies.”
2. Nike is not just scum, but cowardly, sniveling scum. Nike Inc. cancelled a U.S.A.-themed sneaker featuring the Betsy Ross American flag because Head NFL Kneeler Colin Kaepernick, a Nike endorser, told company officials that he and others felt that the historic flag is an offensive symbol because of its connection to an era of slavery.
The Air Max 1 USA had been designed for release in celebration of the July Fourth holiday, and scheduled to go on sale this week. The heel of the shoe featured a U.S. flag with 13 white stars in a circle, the original flag created during the American Revolution and known as the Betsy Ross flag.
This is yet another story among many exposing the ugliness at the heart of the “resistance” and the increasingly fascist American Left…and, as the night follows day, another story that the mainstream news media is attempting to minimize.
Andy Ngo, a conservative journalist and pundit with the emerging online opinion and news website Quillette, attended a Portland, Oregon “Him Too” rally over the weekend. “Him Too” is a counter #MeToo movement that focuses on false rape and sexual assault allegations. It was a small rally, with only a few dozen attending; heck, there are probably only a few dozen non knee-jerk progressives in Portland. The left-wing/Anfifa/Trump Hate mob that showed up as a counter-protest (aka. “organized effort to constrain free speech by intimidation”), however, was much larger.
That group generated masked thugs who attacked Ngo, a recognized anti-Muslim critic, a hate-crime skeptic and a foe of the Antifa itself. Proving his assessment correct, the Antifa beat him and threw what the news media is calling “milkshakes” at him, a description that is literally a lie designed to trivialize what occurred. Several of the missiles were cups full of quick-setting cement, not dairy products. Bloody and battered, Ngo began livestreaming on his phone after the attacks, and could be heard asking a police officer, “Where the hell were all of you?” He was admitted to a local hospital for treatment, and at last report, was still there.
While this was occurring, Portland’s finest did nothing to intervene; the police just watched, even as some of them were struck by eggs thrown by the Antifa and the Left’s counter-protesters threw trash cans, newspaper stands, and patio furniture into the streets. . Portland’s mayor, Ted Wheeler, is also the police commissioner, so media accounts that he cannot be said to have encouraged this dereliction of duty are also partisan, misleading spin.
Wheeler avoided commenting on his police force’s disgraceful performance until yesterday, when he tweeted some insulting boilerplate:
But “we” didn’tstand against the violence, not when a journalist whose political positions are anathema to the hard left views of Wheeler’s city was in the process of being beaten. Note also that the Mayor slyly blames the victim, who, like the group that dared to rally against a popular progressive cause, “incited violence.”
The last two tweets concluded,
How hard is the “real time” decision to stop a mob from beating up a journalist? Continue reading →
In case you missed the facts of this instant ethics train wreck a legal case, here they are:
Marshae Jones, 27-years old, was five months pregnant when she attacked female co-worker, Ebony Jemison, 23, in the parking lot of a Dollar Store. The two had a long-standing and bitter rivalry over their romantic designs regarding a man who worked at the same company and who is apparently the father of the unborn child. Jones had Jemison pinned in her car while punching her repeatedly. In self defense, Jemison grabbed her gun and fired point blank at Marshae’s stomach. The car taking Jones to the hospital broke down, delaying a medical response. Paramedics eventually arrived, but the unborn child had been struck by the bullet, and died.
A grand juryindicted Jones for “initiating a fight knowing she was five months pregnant,” but chose not to indict Ebony Jemison, who fired the shot. Despite the confusing and incompetent reporting on the case, it is still not certain that prosecutors in Pleasant Grove, Alabama will ultimately prosecute Jones, who according to all reports wanted her baby. I doubt that they will. Lynneice Washington, the district attorney for part of Jefferson County, said last week that no decision had yet been made about whether to go to trial, file lesser charges against Jones, or dismiss the case altogether.
“Foremost, it should be stated that this is a truly tragic case,” her statement said. “We feel sympathy for the families involved, including Ms. Jones, who lost her unborn child.”
Observations:
1. The fact that Jemison was not charged should surprise no one, nor does it reasonably affect the ethical and legal issues at issue here. She was attacked. The law of self-defense almost universally allows the use of deadly force when the alternative is sustaining a serious beating. If one is attacked by a pregnant woman, the response to the attack does not have to be moderated because of the possible consequences to an unborn child. The responsibility for any adverse result to the fetus is completely the expectant mother’s.
3. Alabama law declares a fetus to have the rights of a person from the moment of conception. There is nothing unethical or unreasonable about such a law, whether or not you agree with it. The reverse law, that a fetus/embryo/unborn child has no rights until birth is also ethically and legally defensible. Both cause practical problems and ethical conflicts and dilemmas, as do any compromise positions.
4. As long as a jurisdiction allows abortions within Supreme Court guidelines, there is nothing unethical about the jurisdiction prosecuting someone other than the mother who kills a fetus, intentionally or through negligence. 38 states have laws that classify fetuses as victims in homicide or assault, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. In Alabama, a “person” includes embryos and fetuses at any stage of development, and the state leads the nation in such prosecutions. Last year, Jessica Lindsey, 29, was sentenced to 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to chemical endangerment for using heroin while pregnant. Raven West, a heroin addict who gave birth to a stillborn baby, received a five-year suspended sentence last year. And Alexandra Laird, who gave birth to two children who tested positive for heroin, received two suspended 10-year sentences and access to a treatment program, according to court records.
Regarding those three results: Good…Good…Good. I have no problem with them.
4. The question is, how different is a pregnant woman who starts a parking lot fist fight that precipitates sufficient violence to kill her unborn child from a woman who knowingly ingests toxic substances that harm or kill a fetus? I don’t see a material difference. If not, then why is it unreasonable to prosecute Jones?
5. It is amazing how deftly the same progressive advocates can turn on a dime and go from “Think of the children!” to “DON’T think of the children!” depending on what’s expedient at the time.
6. Although Alabama is currently challenging Roe v. Wade, this case has nothing to do with its defiant anti-abortion law. I see no reason to believe that Jones wouldn’t be charged under the same criminal statute a year ago or five years ago. This episode has just given pro-abortion advocates an opportunity to attack the state and make Jones into a martyr, though she was not seeking an abortion. At about 20 weeks pregnant, Jones was within the range where she could have had an abortion before the new law, so the feminist argument is, I guess, that if you can legally abort an unborn baby, you should also be able to get it shot without any consequences.
Nice.
7. The callousness with which the news media tries to spin stories related to the unborn is striking. Here’s the Washington Post:
“The 27-year-old was five months pregnant when she was involved in a fight that, authorities say, prompted a woman to fire a gun in self-defense. The bullet tore through Jones’s abdomen and caused a miscarriage.”
No, the bullet struck the unborn child and killed it. That’s not a “miscarriage.”
8. Whatever the outcome, Jones caused the death of her unborn child through outrageous, violent and uncivilized behavior, and warrants no sympathy whatsoever.
As always in such stories, her family says that Jones is a saint. Her mother calls her “a fun-loving mom, churchgoing, a hard-working lady,” insisting, “My child just doesn’t bother anybody.” Except, that is, a woman trying to make time with the father of Jones’ unborn child, in a parking lot, where she engages in a fist fight. Yeah, that Marshae is a responsible, model citizen! How could this happen to her?
9. Her lawyers say, absurdly,
“This young mother was shot in the stomach while five months pregnant and lost her baby as a result. She lost her home to a fire and lost her job. Now, for reasons that defy imagination, she faces an unprecedented legal action that subjects this victim of violence to further distress and harm.”
I know lawyers must defend their client’s zealously, but this is legal demagoguery. She was shot because of her own criminal actions. She was fired because she attacked a co-worker. She was a “victim of violence” necessitated by her own attack. I don’t know what the fire has to do with anything; the statement just as well might have said, “And she faces painful root canal work due to chronic tooth decay.” Talk about throwing in everything but the kitchen sink!
1. Any ideas about what was going on here? I’m stumped. This is New Orleans public defender—that is, former New Orleans public defender—Ashley Crawford:
She began working for the Orleans Public Defenders last October, and since that time apparently handled over a hundred cases without having ever acquired a license to practice law. The Orleans Public Defenders said the bar certificate of good standing she presented to the office last fall when she was employed had been falsified, and Ashley used the bar number of another attorney. She’s fired now, and facing charges.
Crawford graduated from the Loyola University New Orleans College of Law in 2016, then clerked for a New Orleans judge beginning that fall. Judicial clerks are not required to pass the bar exam, though many do.
Why would she—would anyone—do this? Now she is facing criminal penalties, and will never be able to practice law legally. It should be far easier to pass the bar exam and be admitted properly than to fake having a law license. She also has caused havoc for the judicial system: any defendant convicted while being represented by Crawford has an automatic right to a new trial.
There’s a lesson, a tragedy, a made-for-TV movie here; I just wish I knew what the lesson is. Continue reading →
We haven’t had an Unethical Website Of The Month here since 2018! Once upon a time, I had at least one desiganted every month, over at the currently-down-but -will-get-back-on-line-as-soon-as-I fight-with-the-cheap-hosts Ethics Scoreboard. This is an area where reader tips would help a great deal.
The home page you see above is that of Joe Biden.info, the most trafficked Biden website on the web. Despite the glowing text and cheery photo, however, it is not a pro-Biden project, but a Biden attack site, concocted by Patrick Mauldin, a Republican political consultant and who makes videos and other digital content for President Trump’s re-election campaign. With his brother Ryan, Mauldin, he runs the Vici Media Group, a conservative consulting firm in Austin, Texas. (Mauldin has also set up parody campaign websites for at least three other Democratic candidates: “Millionaire Bernie,” “Elizabeth Warren for Chief,”and “Kamala Harris for Arresting the People.” These, however are different in kind, for nobody except an idiot would confuse them with actual campaign sites.)
Now, I read through the site, and you may well ask, “What’s unethical about it?” The answer is very basic: taking a domain name designed to fool people into thinking the site is something it is not is unethical, that’s all. It is also unethical—though legal—to take another individual’s or organization’s name to make a deceptive URL. In my view, this should be illegal, or treated like a copyright infringement: Joe should be able to send a letter demanding that website using his name in a deceptive fashion be taken down.
Under current law however, the site is legal though unethical. It is more transparent, in fact, than most parody sites. At the bottom of the first screen, and not buried deep in the site, we can see,
This site is political commentary and parody of Joe Biden’s Presidential campaign website. This is not Joe Biden’s actual website. It is intended for entertainment and political commentary only and is therefore protected under fair use. It is not paid for by any candidate, committee, organization, or PAC. It is a project BY AN American citizen FOR American citizens. Self-Funded.
And I’m not even referring to the Yankees beating the Red Sox 17-13 in the first MLB game ever played in Europe.
Also, much thanks to the many readers who sent their condolences to me and my family. It helped.
1. Keepin’ a-goin’! Believe it or not, having to say farewell to our sweet, vocal and witty Jack Russell terrier was not necessarily the worst part of our Saturday. This makes today another ethics challenge, that being the theme of the intentionally simple-minded poem used by comic actor Henry Gibson on “Laugh-In,” “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” and later as a country music song in Robert Altman’s “Nashville.”
The ditty was “Keep A-Goin,” and Gibson, unethically, left the impression that he had written it. He hadn’t: the poem was written Frank Lebby Stanton (1857-1927), now forgotten, and Henry (who died in 2009) bears some of the responsibility for that, though the poem was ripe for stealing since the copyright expired long ago.. The “Nashville” credits claim Gibson was the author of the song. Wrong. Here it is:
Ef you strike a thorn or rose, Keep a-goin’! Ef it hails, or ef it snows, Keep a-goin! ‘Taint no use to sit an’ whine, When the fish ain’t on yer line; Bait yer hook an’ keep a-tryin’— Keep a-goin’!
When the weather kills yer crop, Keep a-goin’! When you tumble from the top, Keep a-goin’! S’pose you’re out of every dime, Bein’ so ain’t any crime; Tell the world you’re feelin’ prime— Keep a-goin’!
When it looks like all is up, Keep a-goin’! Drain the sweetness from the cup, Keep a-goin’! See the wild birds on the wing, Hear the bells that sweetly ring, When you feel like sighin’ sing— Keep a-goin’!
Since around 4:30 pm yesterday, I have felt like doing absolutely nothing other than grieving and helping the rest of my family deal with the sadness that engulfs us. But, as another poet memorably said, I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep.
In my one lucky private audience with genius and futurist Herman Kahn, he mused about how societies periodically forget important lessons of conduct that had been that absorbed by the culture over decades or even centuries. The result, he said, can be disastrous, even fatal to a civilization.
At the time he was talking about the Sixties-sparked cultural amnesia about the reasons sexual promiscuity and having children out of marriage were societal poison–forgetting THAT has worked out well, don’t you think? Yet I have thought about Kahn’s observation a lot lately, as for the second time in my life the nation I live in appears to be suffering from a cultural nervous breakdown.
As toxic as it is, the embrace of historical airbrushing is far from the most dangerous of the examples of this phenomenon that threaten the U.S. today, but it is one of the flagrant. Not for the first time, San Francisco is giving us a vivid demonstration of what happens when, as Herman put it, “whole cultures go stupid.” If the right lesson are learned before it is too late, maybe the ultimate effects will be positive.
I am not optimistic. After all, San Francisco’s peculiar version of social justice has led to a city culture that regards human feces on sidewalks and public places as acceptable. Continue reading →
I tried so hard to get to the office and the keyboard last night to complete the Warm-Up, but video shooting, exhaustion and sick dog complications made it impossible. I don’t know if slow and steady win anything, but they do make progress…
1. Racist comments poll results: I’m surprised. The overwhelming majority—about 92%— is anti-racist comment censorship. Let’s read the one in question, and tell me if it makes you rethink your vote. How much stuff like this do you want to read?
but ethics..?…in general, doesn’t the word, ‘ethics’ pertain to – things that are helpful or things that are helps or a thing or things that help and/or are helpful ? You can call me a racist, if you like but I don’t hate niggers because of the color of their skin – isn’t that what a racist is ? oh no, no, no, no, no, contraire mon frere…l hate niggers like I hate stepping in shit, as I’m apt to slip and fall and hurt myself. I would have to strongly disagree about your terming of chimpmania and other similar sites as being, ‘unethical’ – chimpmania – specifically, helped me to make my decision, in regards to staying as far and wide and clear and away from niggers, as I possibly can. Whether you can comprehend or not : I’ve seen enough – visually, first-hand to know better than to have anything to do with them. I don’t hate niggers because they’re black, l hate niggers because they’re niggers – my daddy didn’t teach me to hate niggers – niggers taught me to hate niggers. And let me clue you in on the simplest of FACTS about niggers…they come in all shapes and sizes and colors and disguises.
I live in a city that’s 89% White and 4% black and the rest ? – whatever the hell else. Now, which do you think the ethnic group or racial group is that supplies the greatest number of niggers in this city – blacks ? nope… …you figure it out and yes I AM a WhytAy !
What do you learn from this?
Is it fruitful or worth the time to rebut it?
Does a comment like this contribute anything to public discourse or comprehension of relevant issues?
Do you want someone capable of writing this to be participating in other discussions?
2. Ethics Dunce: Jimmy Carter. Yes, the former President decided to choose now to announce that Presient Trump would not have been elected without Russian interference. “There’s no doubt that the Russians did interfere in the election, and I think the interference, although not yet quantified, if fully investigated, would show that Trump didn’t actually win the election in 2016,” Jimmy said. Jimmy is and has always been something of an arrogant jerk. “Although not yet questioned” is a euphemism for ” there is no evidence of this whatsoever, but I believe it anyway.” It is exactly as valid a statement as the President’s statement that illegal immigrant votes cost him the popular vote, which is to say that it has no validity at all. Yet look at all my Facebook friends and yours, citing the failed President as proof that Big Lie #2, “Trump is not a legitimate President” isn’t a lie after all.
This is not just appeal to authority, a logical fallacy, but appeal to a proven-unreliable authority, a stupid logical fallacy. Jimmy’s various fact-free pronouncements since his ejection from the white House by Ronald Reagan have been marked by their fealty to confirmation bias. My favorite was his conclusion that he has been the most accomplished ex-President in U.S. history. William Howard Taft (who went on to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court), John Quincy Adams (who had brilliant career in the House of Representatives after he lost to Jackson), and Herbert Hoover, whose humanitarian accomplishments post-Presidency dwarfed Carter’s, would beg to differ. Continue reading →
1. Eric Swalwell literally pressed the ageist position, using the tired cliche of “pass the torch.” The old Democrats like Sanders, Biden and Warren LOOK so old it is hardly necessary to point it out; Swalwell’s harping on “the new generation” reeks of bigotry. What has Swalwell done, other than to be younger than dirt, to justify anyone trusting him with executive power? Let’s see: he’s been an assistant DA and a House member. He’s never run anything in his life.
2. Every candidate on-stage raised their hands to indicate they are in favor of U.S. health care covering illegal immigrants. All but one want illegal immigration to be only a civil offense. The “Think of the Children!” lies about “children in cages” and evil ICE were treated as fact all night. Biden endorsed the fatuous position that only illegal immigrants who commit ‘major crimes” should be deported. KABOOM.
So anyone can illegally come here, especially if they are dragging a kid or three, and force Americans to pay for their health care. Under what ethical system other than free-floating altruism is that a fair or responsible position? The Democratic Party wants open borders, and worse, wants to achieve it while denying that this is its position.
3. Pete Buttigieg unethically and cravenly threw his own police officer to the wolves under the bus by essentially pronouncing South Bend Sergeant Ryan O’Neill guilty of shooting Eric Logan out of racist animus. Buttigieg said that he tried to eliminate racial bias—aka bigotry—by police but couldn’t, and blathered, “I am determined to bring about a day when a black person driving a vehicle and a white person driving a vehicle, when they see a police officer approaching, feels the exact same thing: a feeling not of fear, but of safety.” The problem is that the investigation of the shooting has not been completed, or even begun.
South Bend Sergeant Ryan O’Neill responded to the Central High School Apartments parking lot around 3:30 a.m. on Sunday, June 16, investigating a tip that someone with a flashlight was breaking into parked vehicles. O’Neill was alone when he pulled into the parking lot; six vehicles had been broken into and had items stolen.
The officer said he saw Eric Logan with his legs sticking out of a vehicle, and that Logan stepped out of the car holding a knife and refused to drop it when O’Neill repeatedly ordered him to do so. The officer claimed Logan lunged at him with the knife, and in response, fearing for his life, O’Neill fired two shots, fatally striking Logan in the abdomen.
Logan’s family says O’Neill’s version is inconsistent with Logan’s personality—you know, like Michael Brown was a “gentle giant.” Logan did not have a violent criminal history, he had only previously served time in prison for drug distribution and had a prior conviction for carrying a handgun without a license—a model citizen, in other words.
The white officer is being convicted of racism and murder on the basis of his occupation and color, and the Mayor of South Bend is helping. Continue reading →
