And this kind of thing is why I stopped watching Sunday Morning public events shows more than a decade ago. The disgraceful exchange, on “Meet the Press,” which has fallen apart in chunks since its glory days with Tim Russert:
U.S. Society
States Are Running Unethical Numbers Rackets That Take From The Poor, Legalized Casino Gambling Is Spreading Gambling Addictions Across The Land, Legalized Online “Gaming” Threatens The Integrity Of Our Sports, And What Do Democrats Want To Ban?
Betting on elections!
Brilliant.
U.S. Reps. Andrea Salinas (D-Oregon) and the reliably absurd Jamie Raskin, (D-Md), introduced a bill in Congress last month mirroring a bill introduced by Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), earlier in 2024, to prohibit election wagering. It’s called the “Ban Gambling on Elections Act.”
“Betting on elections degrades them from an investment in leadership to a profit-maximizing game,” Merkley said in a statement. “In addition, this practice is corrupt since those betting can influence the outcome by funding late-cycle smear campaigns. It’s like betting on a baseball game when you control the umpire. It’s a great step forward to have House leaders like Rep. Raskin and Congresswoman Salinas take on this fight.”
No, it’s moronic. One can hardly get addicted to election wagering: first, the pay-offs aren’t very big, and second, big elections only come along every two years. Unlike any other form of gambling, the election wagering actually conveys useful information: due to the “wisdom of crowds,” the betting tends to be more accurate in predicting outcomes than polls. The idea that anyone would spend money to fund a “smear campaign” to win an election bet is so bonkers it doesn’t even warrant a rebuttal.
In contrast, banning state lotteries would do some real good; finding ways to dial back casino gambling and online gambling would also save families and marriages from ruin. Slot machines are licenses to steal. So, of course, these three Democrats choose the least harmful and sinister of all gambling platforms to grandstand over. I can’t figure out what motivated this nonsense. Are the Democrats mad at the betting sites because they predicted Trump’s win?
I’m betting their bill rolls snake-eyes.
Happy First Open Forum of 2025!
Terrorism? A zombie in the White House? More chaos from Republicans in Congress? A Presidential honor for…Liz Cheney? Stupid headlines like “Harris Heads To D.C. To Swear in Senators Who Won’t Evven Say Her Name Right” and “Why Murdering a CEO Won’t Fix Healthcare Costs…“?
And why is someone pissing on 2025 already? There are a lot of events and issues you can debate here so I can write about other things…
Ponder, Now: The Guy Who Issued This Rant Was the Top News Anchor For a Supposedly Legitimate News Organization And Made About 8 Million a Year
Here was now “independent journalist” Don Lemon last night on Lemon LIVE at 5. …
“Now, let me just say this. I said something in reference to– I was responding to the MAGA folks who were being racist in relation in regards to the gentleman that Donald Trump nominated to be the head of AI. They were on the Internet. Look it up yourself, being very racist and very vitriolic about Donald Trump appointing this person. And Vivek Ramaswamy got involved and then he insulted, according to them, the MAGA people. Okay. So, as always, everybody gets all butthurt! I’m not referring to all Trump supporters. I’m talking to the MAGA-brained people who will say and do anything to make excuses for any behavior that Donald Trump does, any bad behavior that the MAGA movement does. So yes, I stand by my words! And if you don’t like what I said, then too F-ing bad, I don’t care! And let me just let me point the hypocrisy out to you, because you guys always say “We are not electing. We are not voting for what? A pastor in chief. I. Sometimes I have an issue with some of the things that he says. It’s true. I don’t like how he says it, but it’s true.”. So you have to have the same standards for other people that you have for your guy, some of you, the cult leader. You guys have a higher– this is this is how messed up you are. You have a higher expectation of me. An independent journalist, a former cable news host, than you do for the person who sits in the Oval Office. Because he. His mouth is worse than mine. He calls everybody dumb. He calls black women dumb. He’s called me dumb. He calls people stupid. He’s called Kamala Harris stupid. He’s called her names. And he’s used profanity against athletes. He called them sons of bitches. He calls people out of their names all the time. And you love it. But when someone says the truth about you, you get all butthurt! And you get all in your feelings! So what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. What’s good for the Donald is good for the Don.”
Well said, Cicero! One bit of clarification: when Donald Trump, or anyone, calls you dumb, it isn’t because you are black, it’s because you are dumb, and that attack of high school drop-out-caliber logorrhea that you apparently think is worth broadcasting in public proves it.
As for the fact that a news organization would pay millions to a news reporter whose level of thought and analysis results in emotional belches like that—Is this a great country or what?
Initial 2025 Ethics Musings…[Broken Link Fixed!]
1. It will be in interesting to see if Scott Jennings, the articulate, gutsy token conservative who distinguished himself during the Presidential campaign by cutting through CNN propaganda and spin like a hot knife through Crisco, can make any progress in rehabilitating the corrupt and rotting shell of Ted Turner’s creating. Above is his timely take-down of the Jimmy Carter eulogists. The argument made by an opposing panel member that Carter’s work building houses and helping to end diseases in Africa out-balance his borderline treasonous efforts to undermine U.S. foreign policy and dissuade foreign nations from supporting the second Iraq war is truly head-exploding, and Jennings makes short work of it.
2. I wonder if the horrific truck slaughter on Bourban Street last night will prompt President Biden’s puppeteers to call for “commonsense” truck safety legislation. Probably not…
Ethics Hero: Me, Dammit!
I’m not happy about this, but there it is.
Back in October I wrote this post about how the boobs at Safeway managed to give me over $300 in food for my wife’s memorial event without charging me for it. I ruefully observed that as an ethicist I was obligated to go to the store and pay what I owed them despite the fact that the Safewayers were none the wiser: it was a classic example of “ethics is what you do when nobody’s watching.”
An Eternally Troubling Ethics Conundrum—at Least to Me
Adam Grant, an organizational psychologist who teaches at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, has authored a guest column for the New York Times that opens up, for the umpteenth time, an ethics topic that makes me uncomfortable. His subject is the cultural delusion shared by many in American society that rewarding effort is just as important as rewarding success, and perhaps moreso. He writes in part:
“….we’ve taken the practice of celebrating industriousness too far. We’ve gone from commending effort to treating it as an end in itself. We’ve taught a generation of kids that their worth is defined primarily by their work ethic. We’ve failed to remind them that working hard doesn’t guarantee doing a good job (let alone being a good person)…..[W]hat worries me most about valuing perseverance above all else: It can motivate people to stick with bad strategies instead of developing better ones…What counts is not sheer effort but the progress and performance that result. Motivation is only one of multiple variables in the achievement equation. Ability, opportunity and luck count, too. Yes, you can get better at anything, but you can’t be great at everything.”
Ethics Observations on President Biden’s and President-Elect Donald Trump’s “Christmas Messages”
That’s nice.
After taking to Truth Social on Christmas Day to be sarcastic about China and Panama ( “Merry Christmas to all, including to the wonderful soldiers of China, who are lovingly, but illegally, operating the Panama Canal (where we lost 38,000 people in its building 110 years ago), always making certain that the United States puts in Billions of Dollars in ‘repair’ money, but will have absolutely nothing to say about ‘anything,'”), troll Canada (“…Also, to Governor Justin Trudeau of Canada, whose Citizens’ Taxes are far too high, but if Canada was to become our 51st State, their Taxes would be cut by more than 60%, their businesses would immediately double in size, and they would be militarily protected like no other Country anywhere in the World. Likewise, to the people of Greenland, which is needed by the United States for National Security purposes and, who want the U.S. to be there, and we will!”), the President-Elect concluded with this:
That’s nice too.
Naturally, the Axis media contrasted Trump’s bluster with the official Christmas message from, supposedly, Joe and Jill. President Biden narrated a video tour of the White House that was posted on YouTube late on Christmas Eve. He urged Americans to set aside “all the noise and everything that divides us.” “We’re here on this Earth to care for one another, to love one another,” Biden says in a voiceover while the camera pans past the White House. Christmas decorations. “Too often we see each other as enemies, not as neighbors, not as fellow Americans,” he said. He urged Americans to find a moment of “quiet reflection” to remind themselves to treat each other with dignity and respect, to “live in the light” and remember there was more to unite than divide Americans. “We’re truly blessed to live in this nation,” he said.
Observations:
1. President Biden has some gall spouting a hypocritical message like that after calling Trump supporters “garbage” and heading the most intentionally divisive Presidential term in history culminating in the darkest Presidential campaign in history, in which one party called the other’s candidate the equivalent of Hitler and warned that he would end democracy. Too often “we” see each other as enemies? Wait, who was this guy?
Biden’s message is standard, insincere politician BS, and stinks of it. A chatbot could have written that stuff. Maybe a chatbot did. No one could hear such cliched pablum and think anything but “Yada yada, ramalama-ding-dong.”
2. It is Presidential, however. Dishonest, insulting, fatuous, infuriating, but still Presidential.
3. Trump’s message is not Presidential. It is gratuitously nasty, self-indulgent and inappropriate for a national leader’s message at Christmas. Does it have to be said that “Go to Hell” does not belong in a Christmas message not authored by the Babylon Bee or Ebenezer Scrooge?
4. Both messages are unethical. Trump’s message is inexcusable.
5. This does not bode well.
This New Law Won’t Help Joe’s Case Any…[Corrected]
From the Daily Beast : “President Joe Biden signed 50 new bills into law in a Christmas Eve signing spree as he wraps his last month in office. Among the new laws includes legislation to fight child abuse at residential treatment facilities, fight hazing on college campuses, and a measure that finally designates the bald eagle as the national bird. Many of the bills signed by the outgoing Democratic president on Tuesday were bipartisan efforts—including the bill finally acknowledging the bald eagle. Although the iconic bird of prey is featured prominently on symbols, including the government’s official seal adopted in 1782, the U.S. did not have an official national bird. The efforts to make the bald eagle official were spearheaded by Preston Cook, the co-chair of the National Eagle Center in Minnesota, who first discovered that the country did not have a national bird, according to a Washington Post profile.”
Gee, thank God for President Biden! This might just be the little extra he needs to avoid being named the Worst President Ever in the upcoming Ethics Alarms resolution of its long inquiry into the question.
“Biden” also engaged in some hyper-partisanship when he vetoed the JUDGES Act, bipartisan legislation to create additional district court judgeships. The Senate passed the bill unanimously in August, and a bipartisan House majority finally did so as well in November. It would have created desperately needed 66 new district court seats over the next decade, based upon the recommendations of the Judicial Conference. The bill was endorsed by the Federal Bar Association and the Federal Judges Association. The White House issued a statement that translated means nothing more rational than “we don’t want new judges appointed by Donald Trump, so there.“
“S. 4199 would create new judgeships in States where Senators have sought to hold open existing judicial vacancies. Those efforts to hold open vacancies suggest that concerns about judicial economy and caseload are not the true motivating force behind passage of this bill now,” the veto message stated in part. So nobody denies that the U.S. needs new judges, but Biden’s dark masters want the new positions to be created for the right motives. This is a slap at the Republican states that tried to slow down Biden’s waves of DEI appointments over the last six months.
But back to the phony national bird issue: if everyone knew the bald eagle was the de facto national bird since it was obviously the national symbol, being on the seal, on money, on flagpoles and ubiquitous for a couple of centuries, why does the species have to be the official national bird via Congress, the President, and brand new law? So many matters of real importance to try to accomplish before the end of the year: one would think that all is well.
Elon Musk’s “Wokepedia” Complaint Is Valid
Above is pie chart reflecting the Wikipedia Foundation’s own report on how it spent its money over the past year. This arrives while every Wikipedia search is afflicted with drop-down pleas for contributions. In the categories listed above, the only ones that should be active concerns of the online search service are infrastructure and effectiveness. Equity and Inclusion are irrelevant to what people are seeking when they use Wikipedia; I’m not even sure what “safety” refers to. 29% of the budget was devoted to these dubious, discriminatory—but woke!—objectives.
Elon Musk has been issuing critical tweets about these priorities, with good reason. Wikipedia is both essential and inherently flawed and unreliable because of its vulnerability to bias and manipulation. To be a trustworthy source of information for online research, it must be closely monitored to identify agenda-driven entries and misleading statements motivated by partisan and ideological objectives. Quite simply, an organization that devoted to DEI cant cannot be trusted in this regard.
No one interested in improving Wikipedia’s accuracy and competence should give a single dollar in response to its constant pleas for money as long as almost a third of that dollar will be spend on dubious programs that, if anything, are likely to impair the service’s effectiveness rather than enhance it.
Ethics Alarms 