Health and Medicine

Unwrapped Ethics, Christmas, 2020, Because Ethics Never Takes a Holiday [Corrected]

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

christmas-hero-H

I hope everyone manages to have the best, most love-filled, happy Christmas possible. Everyone but me and the dog are sick, depressed are both in my household, but I’m making it work. It will be a “Christmas Story”-style Chinese food Christmas, though, the way it’s shaking out.

1. Now THIS is an unethical home Christmas decoration…

0002-Kmart-Sign

…except that according to the story, the neighbors don’t mind. At great expense, Jason Pieper erected this 900 pound thing after purchasing it at an auction for over $2,000. He then decorated surrounding trees with blue and white lights to follow the theme: remember those blue light specials? To me, this would seem to be a bit out of whack with the spirit of the holiday, but perhaps no more than the giant Christmas Imperial Walker, the 20 foot inflatable penguin and some of the monstrosities in my neighborhood.

2. Workplace ethics. Jeffrey Toobin should feel too bad. An L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy had his radio mic open while he was in flagrante delicto. His sex partner was moaning over his panting as the dispatcher from the Sheriff’s station tried to get her deputy’s attention without success. “The deputy was immediately relieved of duty,” the Sheriff’s office informed the media.

Americans are becoming such prudes.

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Ethics Dunce, Rogue And Fool To Be Held Up As An Example Forever More: Dr. Anthony Fauci

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

Fauci

From the New York Times:

“In the pandemic’s early days, Dr. Fauci tended to cite the same 60 to 70 percent estimate that most experts did. About a month ago, he began saying “70, 75 percent” in television interviews. And last week, in an interview with CNBC News, he said “75, 80, 85 percent” and “75 to 80-plus percent….In a telephone interview the next day, Dr. Fauci acknowledged that he had slowly but deliberately been moving the goal posts. He is doing so, he said, partly based on new science, and partly on his gut feeling that the country is finally ready to hear what he really thinks. Hard as it may be to hear, he said, he believes that it may take close to 90 percent immunity to bring the virus to a halt — almost as much as is needed to stop a measles outbreak.“

No, what is hard to hear, though at this point hardly a shock to anyone with a functioning brain, is that Fauci now admits he’s been lying….you know, “for our own good.”

Don’t heed the spin, the double-talk and the euphemisms: when someone tells you something other than what he or she knows to be true or believes to be true, that individual is deliberately attempting to deceive you by communicating what they believe to be untrue as true. That’s lying. No debate. No defense. That’s what it is, by definition. “I did it for your own good” is a rationalization.

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Unethical Quote Of The Day: Dr. Deborah Birx

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

Gag me with a spoon

“I will have to say, this experience has been a bit overwhelming.It has been very difficult on my family.I think what was done in the past week to my family — you know, they didn’t choose this for me. They’ve tried to be supportive, but to drag my family into this..”

Dr. Deborah Birx, the Trump administration’s Wuhan virus response coordinator, in the course of announcing her retirement, apparently out of pique for being justly hammered in the media and social media for violating her own guidelines over the holidays.

As the “Saved by the Bell” girls were indicating above, gag me with a spoon. It took everything in my power not to headline this post “Dr. Birx is an asshole.” I’m still sorely tempted.

She is the one who directly and arrogantly did exactly what she cautioned “the little people” not to do, as I wrote about here (item #4). How dare the woman play the victim, and especially how dare she play the “leave my family out of it!” card when it was she who involved her family by joining them in doing exactly what she said everyone else’s family—well, everyone but elected officials— couldn’t do. To make her family whining worse, it was her own family member that blew the whistle on her!

Birx went on to say,

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Christmas Week Ethics Warm-Up, 12/21/2020: Clogging, Lying And Spinning

/ Jack Marshall / 31 Comments

fireplace Xmas

Has anyone come up with a convincing theory about why there are more outside home decorations and Christmas lights than we have seen in a long while, if ever? Another trend, at least in my neighborhood: a welcome return to multi-colored lights after the (cold, boring) white lights appeared to take over years ago.

1. I finally figured out what’s been bothering me about that GEICO “clogging” ad. It’s racist. (In addition to being, you know, stupid.) I guess GEICO thinks that as long as it sticks an inter-racial couple in their ads, nobody will notice (Though according to Madison Avenue, almost every couple in America is inter-racial.)

Here’s the ad, if somehow you’ve missed it:

Ah, those weird white people and their weird activities! Now imagine if the noisy family upstairs was an African-American clan practicing their break-dancing. Or doing authentic African tribal dances.

2. Boy, those college administrators are quick. CNN was reporting this morning that a handful of colleges are finally reducing tuition. “A Princeton spokesperson said that the Covid conditions have “diminished the college experience.” Really? Not being on or near a campus, being isolated from classmates, not participating in clubs, social activities and late night “bull sessions,” not to mention only seeing one’s professors through a screen, isn’t as valuable as actually attending college?

I’m only speaking for myself, but I would have regarded my own college experience as little better than a correspondence course under today’s conditions. All colleges were ethically obligated to cut tuition substantially. They got away with not doing so because they are selling degrees, not education or personal growth.

3. With all the legitimate questions being raised about Hunter Biden, his apparent influence peddling abroad, and what his father’s role was, the Biden team allows him to be interviewed by…Stephen Colbert. Are even the most impenetrable Biden supporters not troubled by this? If not, do they even have ethics alarms any more? Even with a journalistic establishment filled with shameless pro-Democrat hacks, the toughest interview the President Elect was allowed to brave was by a comedian?

And not just any comedian, but a comedian who dedicated himself to anti-Trump, anti-Republican propganda for four years. Thus here is the type of question Joe had to answer—one that was phrased with the assumption that the Hunter Biden laptop matter was just another conservative conspiracy theory:

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Pre-Christmas Panic Ethics Warm-Up, 12/18/2020: “The Virus Made Me Do It!!”

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

I have to give Harry a callout: his Christmas classic is the only recording on the Sirius-XM Christmas Traditions channel sung by a still-living singer. Harry’s 93 now and the clock is ticking. His voice is shot, and he has become progressively more radical, angry and bitter over the years. But ah, what a great and transformative talent he was!

I also note that just this week, YouTube has slapped ads on all its songs and movie clips. Of course it has.

Why am I panicked? Oh, the tree’s not up, its a pine and too soft to hold about 40% of our cherished ornaments,we’re behind on other decorations, no shopping has been done, and “there’s plenty of time” suddenly mutated into “Holy crap! There’s only a week left!” At least Christmas decorations around the neighborhood are at an all-time high. I’ve been walking Spuds around to see them: boy, those huge inflatable lawn things are horrible. What does an Imperial Walker have to do with Christmas? Spuds tried to kill a giant inflatable Nutcracker Prince. I was proud of him…

1. This is, in short, a lie. “COVID-19 is now the leading cause of death in the U.S.” says an editorial published Thursday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. This false and intentionally fear-mongering conclusion is in part based on the U.S. practice of calling every death of someone who was diagnosed with the illness a death caused by the illness. That’s ridiculous. Three researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University, cite current daily mortality rates to show that COVID-19 has now surpassed heart disease and cancer as the leading daily cause of death in the U.S. “It’s been a long time since an infectious disease was the leading cause of death for the whole country,” said lead author Steven Woolf, M.D., director emeritus of VCU’s Center on Society and Health. “And it’s a tragic milestone we could’ve prevented.” As for that last statement, prove it, without a time machine. Meanwhile, it appears that Wuhan virus-“caused” deaths also include deaths from other causes that killed people because they put off getting medical treatment.

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Ethics Dunces: Cavan van Ulft And Lindsay Noad, And By The Way, Where Is Child Services?

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Rory van

The tale of Rory van Ulft, the seven-year-old competitive weight-lifter, puts me in mind of Samuel Johnson’s famous quip about a dog walking on its hind legs: “It’s not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.” According to one gushing profile, “Rory, who is just four feet tall, started training just after her fifth birthday after she was scouted at a gymnastics class. Fast forward to last week and she was crowned USA weightlifting under-11 and under-13s Youth National Champion in the 30kg weight class. She is the youngest US youth national champion in history and is the best pound-for-pound under-11s lifter in the US.”

Here’s another:

 

I think, like the twin boys of “The Biking Vogels,” Abbie Sunderland, tiny gymnasts and skaters, child actors dragged to auditions and all the other children manipulated, exploited and ultimately endangered or harmed by their parents, Rory needs some responsible adult to step in and rescue her.

She has an Instagram account, managed by her parents [ Cavan and Lindsay] where the videos of her incredible feats are shared. Take a look at one such clip and prepare to get stunned….“I like getting stronger. Being stronger lets me do more and get better at everything I try. I don’t think about what came before, or what will come after. I don’t think about anything. I just clear my mind and do it,” she [said]….“Based on her current Sinclair total, Rory is not only the strongest seven-year-old in the world. She is likely also the strongest seven-year-old girl or boy who has ever lived, for whom there are verifiable competition results,” Rory’s dad told LadBible….

What do you think of this amazing girl?

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Saturday Ethics Nightcap,12/12/2020: Bad Journalism, Bad Governors, Bad Santas

/ Jack Marshall / 29 Comments

nightcap

That’s just ginger ale, in case you’re wondering…

1. “Nah, there’s no outrageous, flagrant, shameless mainstream media bias!” April Ryan, arguably the worst, most unethical, most biased and most unprofessional of CNN’s reporters (but it’s such a lively competition), attacked the confidential sources responsible for leaking a recording of Joe Biden making weaselly comments about his stance toward the “defund the police” movement. Ryan demanded to know who was responsible for allowing the embarrassing comments to be made public, because, as we all should know by now, the job of the media isn’t to report the facts, but to empower and protect Democrats. (She didn’t come out and say the last part, but after her performance over the last four years, she doesn’t have to.) Jonathan Turley appropriately nailed this one:

The fact is that Ryan was just stating what has become the approach of many in the media. As we recently discussed, we are moving dangerously close to a de facto state media with the cooperation of Big Tech companies.  Ryan believes that it is outrageous to rely on unapproved material if it is critical of Joe Biden (despite her use of such material for the last four years against Trump)…CNN has not expressed any disagreement with Ryan’s view of the new journalism.

2. Santa Claus Ethics: If you can’t do any better than these Santas, you shouldn’t even try. But they do provide one reason to be grateful for social distancing. I think my favorite is this one…

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Afternoon Ethics Breather, 12/11/2020: Train Wreck Free Zone, Because I Need A Break

/ Jack Marshall / 19 Comments

Dog-vacation

1. Sorry, but there was and is no excuse.. The New Yorker reports that Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA) is in serious cognitive decline:

[M]any others familiar with Feinstein’s situation describe her as seriously struggling, and say it has been evident for several years. Speaking on background, and with respect for her accomplished career, they say her short-term memory has grown so poor that she often forgets she has been briefed on a topic, accusing her staff of failing to do so just after they have. They describe Feinstein as forgetting what she has said and getting upset when she can’t keep up. One aide to another senator described what he called a “Kabuki” meeting in which Feinstein’s staff tried to steer her through a proposed piece of legislation that she protested was “just words” which “make no sense.” Feinstein’s staff has said that sometimes she seems herself, and other times unreachable. “The staff is in such a bad position,” a former Senate aide who still has business in Congress said. “They have to defend her and make her seem normal.”

Well gee, what a surprise. Ethics Alarms criticized the Senator for having the hubris and not showing proper responsible conduct in 2018, when she ran for re-election and another 6 year term at the age of 85. That was ridiculous, and it was foolish for her constituents to vote for her. Now they are stuck with a Senator who can’t do the job, and it is their fault, plus that of the Democratic Party and Feinstein herself. They all deserve what they get.

Particularly nauseating in the New Yorker story is this section:

“Some former Feinstein aides insist that rumors of her cognitive decline have been exaggerated, and that video clips taken out of context can make almost anyone look foolish. They also bridle at singling out her condition, because declining male senators, including Strom Thurmond, of South Carolina, and Robert Byrd, of West Virginia, were widely known by the end of their careers to be non-compos mentis. “For his last ten years, Strom Thurmond didn’t know if he was on foot or on horseback,” one former Senate aide told me.”

Is this the quality of thought on Capitol Hill? A single idiot making such an argument is too many: “Hey, don’t criticize us for having walking vegetables weilding the power of U.S. Senators:we should be able to do it becaise Republicans did it!”

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Ethics Observations On The VA’s Racial Discrimination Policy In Vaccine Priorities

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

vaccine

This isn’t a “comspiracy theory.” This real.

From “Stars and Stripes”:

Black, Hispanic and Native American veterans will be given priority for receiving coronavirus vaccines once they become available, according to a document published Tuesday by the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Race and ethnicity, as well as veterans’ ages and existing health conditions, will be taken into consideration by the VA when determining who should be vaccinated first. According to VA data, Black, Hispanic and Native American veterans are disproportionately affected by the virus, reflecting trends across the broader population.

Ethics Observations:

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Comment Of The Day: “These Are The “Experts” Your Present And Future Masters Rely Upon”

/ Jack Marshall / 17 Comments

Benjamin-Franklin-Quotes

For your Wuhan virus pleasure today, here is Glenn Logan’s Comment of the Day on the post, “These Are The ‘Experts’ Your Present And Future Masters Rely Upon”:

Jack said: “I’m not going to wear a mask inside my home, nor in my car, nor outside while playing with my dog, and I’m going to regard anyone who follows this edict with a “please” attached as an enemy of my future liberty as an American.“

As a person who has taken college classes in both epidemiology and virology as part of my course of study, I can tell you that yours is a sane response. I don’t style myself any kind of an expert, but I do know plenty about both subjects. The SARS-CoV-2 virus appears to require a minimum viral load to produce symptomatic disease, and that load is nearly impossible to achieve outside without being in crowded close quarters due to natural air currents.This is one likely explanation why there are so many asymptomatic infections. Viruses producing the common cold display this same characteristic, and coronavidae is one of the cold-producing families of virus. As far as wearing a mask in a car, this is unnecessary unless you have high-risk potentially exposed people other than you moving in and out of it all the time, and don’t follow basic sanitation rules. Even then, the risk of dangerous viral concentrations in a single-person car are very small.

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