Huh. I Wonder Why There Are No “Trump-Vance” Signs Anywhere In My Neighborhood?

/ Jack Marshall / 35 Comments

Virginia is a so-called “purple state,” and even though Northern Virginia is Woke Central (Remember my neighbor who had a giant “Black Lives Matter” display in front of her house for almost three years?), there are plenty of Republican, conservatives and Trump supporters. And yet I have driven my car and walked Spuds all over the area, and I see only Harris-Walz signs. Why is that?

I think it is because Republicans have been intimidated. Professing fealty to the Leftist totalitarians who propped up a puppet President and covered up his disability, then appointed his successor while blathering on about how they were protecting Democracy, is considered proof of virtue. Expressing a contrary view risks being Dershowitzed and cancelled. I see the same phenomenon on Facebook. The vast, vast majority of my friends write the most fatuous, absurd pro-Harris propaganda imaginable, but the conservatives I know are posting pictures of their dogs and talk about movies and TV.

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Ethics Villain: Former NYC Pandemic Lockdown Czar Dr. Jay Varma

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

We can now add this shameless creep to the list of powerful state and municipal hypocrites—they are too many to list, but EA spotlighted some of them— who violated their own excessive pandemic restrictions because, after all, they are better than the little people, and because they could. I’m filing all of them with the health officials who announced that letting Black Lives Matter disrupt cities and government functions while doing millions of dollars in damage made the racist, Marxist group immune from the restrictions on church gatherings, funeral and family gatherings.

Jay Varma, however, is special.

Dr. Jay Varma was the senior advisor for public health in New York City under Mayor Bill de Blasio, another ethics villain. Varma imposed extraordinary restrictions on public outings, gatherings, and personal activities. But a video has been released showing Varma admitting that he ignored his own policies to attend sex parties. A spokesman for Varma told CBS News New York he and his wife held two sex parties in a hotel with friends after he had banned such gatherings; Varma also admitted participating in a dance party with about 200 people underneath a Wall Street bank in June of 2021.

Varma was fired as executive vice president and chief medical officer at SIGA Technologies after confirming the reports about the video. Good. But it’s not enough. There have not been adequate consequences for any of these power abusing, elitist totalitarians and liars.

Surprise ! Open Forum!

/ Jack Marshall / 64 Comments

September and October 2024 are going down in the ProEthics annals as the busiest months since the pandemic freakout and among the busiest months of ethics consulting I’ve had ever. What this means, I do not know, but today, once again, I have legal training session that will occupy my attentions this morning. Thus I am opening the weekly free-for-all a day early.

The big news, but with no details yet, is that New York City Mayor Eric Adams is about to be indicted. I expected this, not necessarily with Adams but with one or more of the horrible crop of arrogant, autocratic Democrat mayors who run so many of our major cities. They have a collective chip on their shoulders the size of El Capitan, most of them are “of color” and determined to make up for lost time and opportunity. I expect more of this: the Democratic Party has spawned a culture of corruption that is dangerous and increasingly difficult to hide.

Speaking of a culture of corruption, Paul Pelosi once again read tea leaves or something and guessed what the Feds were about to do to Visa, so he dumped $500,000 in the company’s stock two months before the company was sued for anti-competitive business practices. He has done a lot of this investment management magic since his wife has been a power in Congress. The X account “Nancy Pelosi Stock Tracker” flagged the trade when the Department of Justice filed its lawsuit against Visa, alleging that the company maintained an illegal monopoly over the U.S. debit card market.

Nothing to see here, move along…

But I digress. The ethics topics are up to you.

A Visit to Football’s Bizarro World

/ Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

Sure, I guess in a crazy system where universities pay students to play football for them, this story makes sense, sort of.

The star starting quarterback for UNLV, Matthew Sluka is quitting the team after UNLV’s first 3-0 start in 40 years. He says he will sit out the rest of the season because the school hasn’t ponied up the $100,000 he says he was promised by an assistant coach before committing to the school this offseason.

Ah, remember those quaint old days when college football heroes devoted their passion and athletic talents to winning for team, the school, and fellow students? Today instead of “Win one for the Gipper,” it’s “Show me the money.” Tell me again why we let educational institutions run professional football and basketball teams stocked with phony students who usually graduate, if they graduate, having learned nothing but how to talk to their accountants?

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Ethics Dunce: Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-NY)

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

Would it be unfair of me to write, “Now there’s a face you can trust!”? Sure it would, but I don’t care. He is exactly the kind of unethical politician that Congress has way, way too many of. He upsets me so much, I ended a sentence with a preposition.

Shortly after taking the oath of office following his election to Congress in 2022, D’Esposito hired his fiancée’s daughter to work as a “special assistant” in his district office at a salary that eventually reached $3,800 a month. Then D’Esposito hired a woman with whom he was having an affair. Devin Faas collected $2,000 a month for a part-time job in the same district office as his fiancée’s daughter. (Uh, this is not the smartest way to cheat on your beloved.) When D’Esposito’s fiancée discovered the affair with Faas in July of 2023, she broke up with him, and both of the dubious hires had to find other employment.

Apparently the lovebirds are back together again. That’s nice.

She’s an idiot.

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This Is So Stupid I Can’t Even Come Up With A Headline That Does It Justice…

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

However, I did summon George Costanza…

CTV News in Calvary, Canada blithely reported this as if it made perfect sense…

“Calgary police have released a photo of a suspect wanted in connection with a fire in the community of Riverbend that damaged multiple homes. Emergency crews were called to a home in the 100 block of Riverglen Crescent S.E. at 12:40 a.m. on Thursday, Aug. 22 for reports of a blaze. The fire gutted a garage and caused damage to two homes. No injuries were reported.”

And here’s the photo police posted:

Yup, it was that infamous Dick Tracy villain, Blur-Face! “Because police think the suspect is a teen, they blurred the face in the photo that was released,” the CTV says. Oh. Makes perfect sense—in Canada, maybe. “The identity of young offenders is protected under the Youth Criminal Justice Act,” we are told.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but if young offenders’ identities are protected, why are police asking people to identify this one? Officers are hoping someone may recognize the teen’s clothing, you see. My brain hurts: so they can publicize aspects of a “young offender’s identity” as long as it’s…what, not sufficient to be likely to identify him?

How does it advance respect for law enforcement to have police do something this pointless without out their appearing to acknowledge it’s probably futile? How does news media justify reporting the senseless as if it makes perfect sense?

Ethics Quiz: The Offensive… Wristband?

/ Jack Marshall / 21 Comments

Apparently a biological male who “identifies as female” plays on the Plymouth Regional High School girls’ soccer team in New Hampshire. When the team played its regional rival Bow High School, some Bow parents, protesting the presence of the player whom they regarded as a danger to the born-female players on the Bow team, wore wristbands like the ones above as a silent protest. The Bow High athletic director had told concerned parents before the contest that “in the wake of a federal judge’s ruling that the term ‘girl’ includes males who identify as female,” he felt he was powerless. (He’s a weenie. If he agreed with the parents, he could simply have his team refuse to play the Plymouth team, accept the consequences, and raise the issue.)

When the parents’ “XX” bands appeared at the game, school officials stopped the soccer match, ordered the parents to remove the wristbands, and even “issued [a] police-enforced ‘No Trespassing order’” against two parents who refused.

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Unethical Quote of the Week: President Joe Biden

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

“Some things are more important than staying in power.”

—-President Biden at the U.N., stumbling through his speech on world affairs even with the assistance of his teleprompter.

Even though our President is demented, deluded, habitually dishonest and without shame, I am still astounded that he would have the gall to say that at the United Nations. I guess he thinks the delegates are as stupid and gullible as his party evidently thinks the U.S. public is.

No, the context of that head-exploding statement doesn’t make it less nauseating:

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Oh Yeah, This Is a Great System….

/ Jack Marshall / 25 Comments

I guess it’s a bit ungrateful to post this after being paid to do an ethics training for a federal agency, but still: anyone who expects governments to solve more problems than they create just isn’t paying attention. The problem, or course, isn’t the nature of government itself, but rather the human beings that operate them. And the brains that operate the human beings.

I present for your edification Craig Adams’ nightmare…

Adams recently learned that his 8,300-square-foot Raleigh, North Carolina home where he lives with his wife is no longer registered in his name. Oh, his mortgage and property taxes are up to date, but never mind—the deed to his home is now belongs to a stranger. Adams said one day he learned that a woman and probable grifter named Dawn Magnum had the deed to his home transferred into a trust she managed. He only learned about this when the property management company for his HOA asked him if he had sold his home after Mangum contacted it to get access to the private gated community where Adams’ property is.

Magnum initially said she thought Adams’ property was in foreclosure so she managed to get the deed to the home into her trust. “She filed a false warranty claim deed against this house and basically tried to steal it,” Adams told the news media.

Dawn Mangum has been arrested and charged with is obtaining property by false pretense.

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Assorted Ethics-Related 2024 Election Notes…

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

I’m cramming for a legal ethics presentation for a federal agency that must remain nameless, so posts are going to be delayed a bit. I have time, almost, to post a few quick items, as well as this one that has nothing to do with the election: We’re finally having a memorial event in Arlington, Virginia for Grace, my wife of 43 years, best friend, business partner and mots reliable ally, on October 12. A good freind is organizing it for me; I’m going to have a tough time even attending. Commenting on the laborious process of letting friends, clients and distant relatives know about it, my friend said, “You can pretend to care, but you can’t pretend to come.”

Meanwhile:

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