Hey, Maybe My Suggestion To Have Parties Trade Out Their Worst and Dumbest Can Work After All!

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

Yesterday, both slimeball Democrat Eric Swalwell and scumbucket GOP Rep. Tony Gonzales resigned from Congress as they were about to be investigated for serious sexual misconduct. This was a net win for both parties, Congress, democracy, the public trust and the United States of America.

A few times in the past I have expressed longing for an arrangement that allowed Democrats and Republicans to purge their parties of the worst of the worst by engineering similar trades: “We’ll join you in voting to expel this incompetent asshole if you’ll join us in voting to expel one of yours whom you know is just as bad!”

Matched pairs..

  • Rep. Lauren Bobert and Rep. Ted Lieu
  • Rep. Nancy Mace and Rep. Jamie Raskin
  • Sen. Mitch McConnell and Sen. Dick Durbin
  • Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Sen. Adam Schiff
  • Sen. Tommy Tuberville and, of course, Sen. Mazie Hirono

You get the idea. The problem is that such a system would take a Constitutional amendment, and that’s not happening, each party would try to get rid of its moderates (Democrats would love to trade away Sen. Fetterman), and, as I see it, horrible Democrats outnumber horrible Republicans right now by about 4-1. Yes, and it’s a slippery slope that both parties would try to manipulate for their own narrow advantage.

It’s not happening. But I can dream, can’t I? Meanwhile, getting rid of both Gonzalez and Swalwell is good for everyone, and we should just enjoy our good fortune.

PS. An AI bias note: I asked Google to identify the dumbest and worst GOP members of Congress, and a list popped right up from Google’s bot. When I asked the exact same question but replaced GOP with Democratic Party, the reply began, “Determining the “dumbest” members of Congress is subjective, as such labels are often based on political opinions, gaffes, or partisan criticism rather than objective measures of intelligence.”

It Looks Like The Biden Administration May Have Killed My Wife…

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

I feel like Mrs. Kintner in “Jaws.”

A Senate investigation confirms that Biden administration officials at the FDA and CDC knew about a significant stroke risk tied to Pfizer’s bivalent Wuhan virus booster in people over 65. They decided not to let the public know about it….might make them hesitant to get the shot, after all. Can’t have that!

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), chairman of the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, sent a formal notification letter to HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. along with about 2,000 pages of federal documents. “I am sharing my preliminary findings to provide HHS and the public with even more evidence of the Biden administration’s unsupported and unyielding devotion to a harmful vaccine at the expense of the public’s health,” Rep. Johnson begins.

The letter goes on to described how as early as Nov. 2022, the vaccine safety surveillance systems operated by Biden health officials began detecting statistically significant evidence of “ischemic stroke among individuals age 65 and older following injections of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 bivalent booster.” They did not issue a formal warning to the public. Instead, the Biden White House and HHS pushed to “increase uptake of the booster” for people 65 years and older. In Jan. 2023, a draft Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) “communications plan” emphasized the Biden administration’s intention to “increase uptake of the booster.” White House edits buried the significance of the safety signal, for example, changing a sentence that stated that the “signal is moderately elevated” to the “signal is slightly elevated.”

Even as a safety surveillance system continued to detect a statistically significant safety signal for ischemic stroke, Biden health officials posted on the FDA website that “no change is recommended in COVID-19 vaccination practice.”  While Biden health officials continued to let the public believe the vaccine was safe, they initiated multiple studies and statistical analyses including a “Stroke Project” to investigate whether the vaccines really were safe for the population at risk, and the investigations continued through at least September 2025. 

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Some Ethics Comments on “Exit Taxes”

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

1. Neither Tony nor Fox News had the wit or knowledge to point out what should be obvious. They are not reporting adequately by doing so, which requires they explain that…

2. …a tax on leaving a state is unequivocally, undeniably, spectacularly unconstitutional. There is no counter argument.

3. Why, then, are ten states reportedly considering such taxes, which infringe of the right to travel as well as the rights to liberty and the pursuit of happiness? Because they are all Democratic Party dominated states, and that party doesn’t believe in the Constitution or the Declaration of Interdependence.

4. I know I’m repeating myself, but this is the party that claimed to be protecting democracy in 2024. No party that really believes in democracy would ever even consider an “exit tax.” The Left unmasks itself with proposals like this.

Why can’t everyone see….

….the ugliness beneath?

This Is What I Have To Put Up With On The National Legal Ethics Lawyers’ Listserv…

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

What does that tell us? Look: this was posted today on the Association for Professional Responsibility Lawyers’ listserv:

“I am being objective here, so please no backlash. I am wondering if a lawyer would get in trouble for urging others to oust a President who acts extremely erratically.  I am speaking specifically about Trump posting a picture of himself as Jesus and then saying he was doing it as a “doctor.” Even if the President was a Democrat this would appear to be behavior that might indicate dementia. The political party is unimportant.  Would it be “frivilous” under the Rules – the President is still showing up for work. His doctors say he is fine. But that is early Alzheimer’s behavior, isn’t it?  If this is going to make people angry because I asked then forgive me as that is not my intent.”

The writer is a law school professor and practicing lawyer as well as an author of several legal ethics textbooks. The author of that post is also on two current high commissions to review and reform the rules governing lawyer conduct.

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Briefly Noted….

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Note: Every one of them is a moron.

It is a breach of civic duty to be this ignorant of history and reality and to spout off on social media while cheering on the anti-Semitic and anti-Israel news media. In other words, unethical and inexcusable.

Today’s “Nah, There’s No Mainstream Media Bias” Headline…

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

“Analysis: Failed peace talks leave Trump with few options to end Iran conflict“

That’s CNN.

Note the emphasis. This is Trump’s failure. The near universal framing of the Iran campaign is that the United States is losing, somehow, and it is Iran that has the U.S. at its mercy—you know, like the iconic Black Knight above from “Monty Python and the Holy Grail who insists that he is winning despite losing his arms and legs.

You see, the side that is being throttled in a war is the one with “few options,” and the collapse of peace talks are primarily a problem for the side that is losing. Ending the war is primarily in the best interests of Iran and its people. The anti-U.S., anti-Trump propaganda being spewed by the Axis news media in their reporting on the Iran war may be the most flagrant and unforgivable yet: it isn’t just Trump that they are hurting, or Republicans. They are deliberately harming our nation while giving Iran motivation to stall as long as possible.

Next, we will be reading “Poor Iranians” essays like the Times lament for Gazans. Our news media’s objective appears to be national euthanasia.

Ugh…So The President Attacks The Pope! The Two Diagrams Trump Doesn’t Understand…

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

This is ridiculous.

The President took to social media again yesterday to announce that he doesn’t like the Pope:

What an irredeemably stupid thing to do.

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A Few Notes About Banned Commenters…

/ Jack Marshall / 20 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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Ethics Villains: Yes, The New York Times Again…And Its Biased, Ignorant, Pro-Terrorism Readers

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

The gift link to the NYT article at issue is here.


I’m not going to quote it or summarize it. I will characterize it: the opinion piece, Gaza’s Rubble Is the Grave of Our Future, by Ghada Abdulfattah, “a writer who lives in Gaza,” is anti-Israel, pro-Hamas propaganda that the Times has handed a large amount of space to promote. This is a “poor Gazans being victims of genocide by those inhuman, cruel Jews” essay. The writer never comes right out and says that, but her chronicling of the devastation in Gaza since the Israeli assault began three years ago is definitely aimed at conveying that misleading message.

All right, I will offer a quote:

“It isn’t just the sadness of what was demolished. Seeing endless piles of concrete brings a second layer of violence — the violence of being forced to live with destruction. Rubble doesn’t just destroy the past; it erases the future. It forces your mind to stop imagining, to stop thinking, to stop dreaming about life after today.”

Gee, I guess launching a sneak terror attack on civilians in your neighboring state, killing over 1200 people, including infants, raping woman and taking 250 hostages isn’t such a good idea, eh? Huh. Who knew?

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Does Anyone Really Have To Ask This Question?

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

Ann Althouse, who for some strange reason is obsessed with AI in general and Grok in particular, asked her favorite bot, “Which U.S. First Ladies have received the cruelest treatment in the press (and in public conversation)? Especially which ones were disrespected as, essentially, whores?”

Anyone who doesn’t know the answer and the runner-up is both politically and historically ignorant. Obviously Grok informed Ann that Melania Trump is the “winner” and that it isn’t even close, telling the bloggress in part (my comments interspersed in bold),,

“Melania Trump stands out among actual U.S. First Ladies for receiving some of the most explicit, sexualized public disrespect in the modern era—being directly called a “hooker,” “whore,” or accused of having been a prostitute/escort. This came from tabloid stories, a New York Times reporter (who was reprimanded after a model publicly called out the comment), social media, and partisan commentary tied to her pre-White House modeling career and alleged links to escort services. She filed (and later settled or pursued) defamation suits, including a $150 million claim against the Daily Mail over “elite escort” allegations, which the paper retracted. Media and online discourse frequently framed her as ornamental, aloof, or unworthy in ways that veered into slut-shaming, far more personal and vicious than typical policy or style critiques faced by others. Some contemporary observers (across outlets) described her overall press treatment as among the worst for any modern First Lady.”
SOME? There’s no contest! Melania is first, second, third…American First Ladies have always, always, been treated with respect by the news media, though there have been partisan critics of some First Ladies like “Lemonade Lucy” Hayes, Bess Truman, Mamie Eisenhower, Nancy Reagan and Michelle Obama, but nothing close to the venom heaped on Malania. Back to Grok…
“No other serving First Lady matches this level of direct “whore/prostitute” framing in the historical record… The single most brutal sexual character assassination of a presidential spouse involved Rachel Jackson (wife of Andrew Jackson) during the 1828 campaign. Opponents dredged up her first marriage’s messy divorce and her subsequent union with Jackson, labeling her a bigamist, adulteress, “whore,” “harlot,” and woman of “open and notorious lewdness” in newspapers and pamphlets. She was devastated, withdrew from public life, and died of a heart attack shortly after the election (before inauguration). Andrew Jackson blamed the “slander” for her death and had “A being so gentle and so virtuous, slander might wound, but could never dishonor” inscribed on her tombstone. 
Note to Grok (and Ann): It wasn’t a “messy divorce,” it was a legally invalid divorce, so technically Rachel was a bigamist.
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