conflict of interest

U.S. Attorney General Ethics, Rule #1: Remember What Your Job Is

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

"I am acting based on the expressed instructions of my client, who is, unfortunately, a moron."

How does the nation’s highest ranking lawyer forget what a lawyer’s job is? If I had to guess, I would say it could happen when the U.S. Attorney general in question is thinking about politics more that the law, and has been under such continuous fire from the public and the media for repeated bungles that he no longer knows who he’s working for.

But that would just be speculation on my part.

We know for certain, however, that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder delivered a statement announcing that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his four co-conspirators would be tried by a military tribunal at Guantanamo, and not in civilian trials in the U.S. as the Obama Administration had preferred. In the middle of this statement, Holder says, Continue reading →

Lara Logan’s Cairo Ordeal Starts An Ethics Train Wreck

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

A female CBS correspondent gets cut off from her security while doing live coverage of the demonstrations in Cairo, is surrounded by a group of Egyptians in the crowd, attacked, and sexually assaulted. She is rescued by Egyptian police and flown back to the U.S., where she is hospitalized.

This what happened to “60 Minutes” Correspondent Lara Logan, and you wouldn’t think such an unambiguous example of brutality and criminal conduct would raise any ethical controversies. But the already nasty incident has metastasized into a full-fledged Ethics Train Wreck, with both the Left and the Right taking turns disgracing themselves.

And the media, of course. Continue reading →

Eroding Public Trust: Obama and General Electric’s “Appearance of Impropriety”

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

The fact that an official act appears to be sensible and fair does not necessarily mean that it is ethical.

Consider the EPA’s waiver of the new global warming regulations for a stalled power plant project in California. Officials reviewed EPA policies and decided it was appropriate to “grandfather” projects such as the Avenal Power Center, a proposed 600-megawatt power plant in the San Joaquin Valley, and thus exempt them from new federal limits on greenhouse gases and conventional air pollution. The Avenal Energy project, explains Environment and Energy News, is a combined-cycle generating plant consisting of two natural gas-fired General Electric 7FA Gas Turbines with Heat Recovery Steam Generators (HRSG) and one General Electric Steam Turbine.

Translation: It is a huge G.E. contract.

Hmmmm. Continue reading →

Dear ESPN: I Know She’s Hot, But Fire Erin Andrews

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

…or at least suspend her. Show us that a male-dominated sports network can have a modicum of journalistic ethics, and won’t behave like a drooling traffic cop giving a buxom babe a pass for running a red light because she bats her eyes and flashes some cleavage.

You did the right thing in early January, when one of your broadcasters abused a female colleague in a sexist manner; some would say—certainly the fired Ron Franklin—that you reacted a little precipitously, but you are clearly taking a strong stand against gender bias in the workplace, and that’s commendable. Still, don’t you know that what your pin-up, “Dancing With the Stars” reporter Andrews did was far worse? Continue reading →

On the Road With “The Biking Vogels”: What the Kids Are Learning

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

When we last visited the Vogels, they were in the middle of a two and a half-year quest to get their twins the Guinness Record for the youngest boys to spend their childhood on bikes, or something like that. The Vogels are a couple that has taken their twin boys on a biking odyssey (actually two)  through the Americas, requiring them to abandon a normal childhood to be part of their parents’ chosen lifestyle. It is being funded by the presumption that this is a novel and healthy experiment in home-schooling. Fans of the Vogels, including a fawning American media, pronounce the effort a wonderful educational opportunity for Daryl and Davy, now 12, and the adventure of a lifetime. Critics, such as Ethics Alarms, express concern that the boys are being exploited by their parents at the cost of the children’s comfort, safety, health, and socialization.

Our only information about how the boys are faring and what they are learning on their forced march comes from their own journals. This is Daryl Vogel’s entry on September 25: Continue reading →

It’s Not Unethical…It Just Seems That Way

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

Rodney King is marrying one of the jurors who awarded him $3.8 million in his civil suit against Los Angeles.

If your ethics alarm is ringing, turn it off. This would be a conflict of interest if his bride-to-be were TV’s Allison DuBois, who can see the future, or if the betrothed had a top-of-the-line crystal ball. But she doesn’t—-or, at least, we don’t know that she does—so as much as this feels like self-enrichment, it’s not. This is the Ick Factor. It feels wrong, but it is perfectly ethical.

Child Exploitation or Great Adventure: What We Need To Know About “The Biking Vogels”

/ Jack Marshall / 94 Comments

America was just introduced to the biking Vogel family, as they embark on a charm offensive seemingly with a potential reality show in their sights. They appeared on ABC’s “Good Morning America” on Labor Day, and expect to get a boost in publicity thanks to a typical softball interview by a beaming stand-in for George Stephanopoulos. (Video taken and selected by the Vogels themselves accompanied the interview, further allowing them to present their trip in the most favorable light.) It would be have been both responsible and right, however, if the Vogels had been asked more pointed questions, probing the serious issue of whether John and Nancy Vogel may be exploiting and even abusing their children in pursuit of fame, fortune, and  an “Easy Rider” life-style that being parents of young children ought to preclude. Continue reading →

Ethics Hero: The New York Times

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

The most transparent and open presidency in history, or so we were once promised, just shattered that illusion further by inviting a dozen White House reporters to a lunch with President Obama. The New York Times, to its credit, did the ethical thing and declined.

You see, the reporters were required to promise that anything they saw and heard at the lunch would be “off the record,” even, presumably, information that the “public has a right to know.” Continue reading →

Unethical Website of the Month: dontvoteformydad.com

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

http://www.donotvoteformydad.com raises interesting questions about the ethical  duties of families versus the ethical duties of citizens, bias, conflict of interest, and the difficulty of distinguishing ethical from unethical or non-ethical motives. Continue reading →