cynicism

What Was Right and Wrong With Glenn Beck’s “Restoring Honor” Rally

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

The pundits of the airwaves, newsprint and blogosphere have issued their assessments of the Glenn Beck rally at the Lincoln Memorial with predictable results: those who admired Beck before the rally liked it, and those who detest him ridiculed it. The New York Times, in its inimitable fashion, showed contempt for the proceedings by relegating its account to page 15, even though every past D.C. rally and march of equivalent or lesser size (especially those advocating social or political positions popular with the Times staff) received more prominent coverage. To Times columnist Frank Rich, Beck’s rally was part of a racist conspiracy hatched by billionaires—yes, Frank, sure it was. John Avlon, who long ago branded Beck as a wingnut, reasonably pointed out that it was a wee bit hypocritical for Beck to preach against divisiveness when his own cable show is one of the most polarizing, even by Fox news standards. And John Batchelor, who may be the most serious, erudite, and balanced public affairs radio talk show host in captivity, dismissed the rally as harmless and Beck as a clown:

“I think of him now and again as Quasimodo Lite, a deaf bell-ringer swinging from the Notre Dame of Fox, a man who is eager to confess his own unsightly warts—“I’ve screwed up most of my life”—and who is also heroically delighted to be our slightly stooped “Pope of Fools,” because this accidental role, in this Festival of Fools called 2010, wins the cheers of the crowd.”

Even less charitable was the Baltimore Sun’s TV critic, who accused Beck of “stealing Martin Luther King’s moral authority.” Less charitable still was MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, who seems to have been driven a little mad—or at least a little unprofessional, perhaps— by the fact that Beck had the audacity to hold his rally on the anniversary of King’s iconic “I have a dream” speech. Matthews’s hyperbole was, well, Beck-like:

“Can we imagine if King were physically here tomorrow, today, were he to reappear tomorrow on the very steps of the Lincoln Memorial? “I have a nightmare that one day a right wing talk show host will come to this spot, his people`s lips dripping with the words ‘interposition’ and ‘nullification.’ Little right wing boys and little right wing girls joining hands and singing their praise for Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin. I have a nightmare!”

Was Beck’s bash really a nightmare? Political biases aside (Chris), the question for Ethics Alarms is what was right and wrong about the “Restoring Honor” rally. Continue reading →

Ethics Dunce or Hero? The Paradox of “The Amex Angel”

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

You probably heard the story. About three weeks ago in Manhattan,  ad executive Merrie Harris was approached by a homeless man who asked her for some spare change. Harris told the man, Jay Valentine, that she had no change, but offered to lend him her American Express Platinum Card if he would promise to return it. Valentine assured her he was trustworthy, and, incredibly, Harris gave him the card. He returned the card a short time later after a modest shipping spree that added twenty-five dollars to her bill. The New York media sang the praises of both Harris and Valentine, dubbing Harris “the Amex Angel” and calling the episode “a shining act of generosity, trust and honesty.”

I almost designated Wilson an Ethics Hero at the time, but something stopped me. I have been considering the implications of the strange story ever since. It may have been that shining act, but I’m not convinced it was even ethical. Is that possible? How can an act of generosity, trust, and kindness not be ethical?  Continue reading →

Staten Island Ethics Quote of the Week: Hate—Bad; Greed, Disrespect and Envy—Meh

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

“I don’t think it’s a hate crime, it’s just a recession out there.”

—A Staten Island neighbor of 17-year-old Yashua Plair, who has been arrested and charged with a hate crime for shouting anti-Latino epithets while attacking a 15-year-old Mexican boy to take his i-Pod.

Oh. Well, I guess it’s OK then. Continue reading →

DeLay and Blagojevich: Not Vindicated, Not Innocent, and Not Ethical

/ Jack Marshall / Leave a comment

Both Rod Blagojevich and Tom DeLay were taking victory laps this week, Blago because a jury failed to come to an agreement on his trial for selling political favors, DeLay because the Justice Department dropped its prosecution of  him. In the minds of both of these corrupt and shameless politicians, they were indeed vindicated, because both operate under the delusion that if one’s conduct manages to avoid breaking laws to the point where one could be found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, then that conduct is “ethical.” This same delusion has been shared by many other human blights on American society and ethical corrupters in business and politics, including Presidents Richard Nixon, and Bill Clinton, Ken Lay, the executives at Goldman Sachs and AIG, Marion Barry, Maxine Waters, and too many others to mention. It is still a delusion. Continue reading →

Congressional Ethics and Race: A Quiz

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

QUESTION ONE: If you are the House Ethics Committee, and you find that investigations of two prominent House members have resulted in convincing evidence of serious wrongdoing and ethics violations, and they both are African-American, the most ethical course is to: Continue reading →

The Arizona Statute Injunction Ethics Verdict: Judge—Right; Arizona—Right; Federal Government—Unethical

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

I was waiting at a long line in a local CVS, with no clerk in sight. It was late at night; a couple of my fellow customers actually shouted for assistance. We had been there with no service for more than ten minutes, and not a single employee was in evidence. Finally, I stepped out of line—past a police officer, who was also waiting, grabbed the microphone on the counter, turned it on, and announced in stentorian tones: “There is a long line at the check-out counter! Will a CVS employee please report to the front of the store? Thank you!”

The line of people applauded. The police officer smiled and gave me a thumbs up. The clerk, full of apologies, arrived and began taking our money.

Did I have a legal right to use the microphone? No, I did not. But I still did the right thing, and I would do it again.

This is, I believe, the proper way to think about the federal judge’s decision today to block the key provisions in the Arizona anti-illegal immigration law until further examination by the courts. Continue reading →

Sunday Ethics Round-Up: Cynical Fines, Drunk Norwegians, Lazy Newsmen and Pitiful Ballplayers

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

Here are some ethics issues to ponder from the recent news and around the Web:

  • Who says it pays to be ethical? The astounding insistence, under oath, by Goldman Sachs executives that they had done nothing wrong in selling admittedly “crummy” investment products to clients while using the company’s own money to bet that the same products would fail will not be sufficiently punished or contradicted by the S.E.C.’s cynical cash settlement of its suit against the firm. For a $500 million penalty, Goldman Sachs is off the hook for the equivalent of four days’ income, as the Obama Administration claims to the unsophisticated public (“Isn’t $500 million a lot of money?”) that it is “getting tough” with Wall Street. The fact is that Goldman Sachs’ unethical maneuvers paid off handsomely, and nothing has happened that will discourage it from finding loopholes in another set of regulations and making another killing while deceiving investors legally and, by the Bizarro World ethics of the investment world, “ethically.” You can read a perceptive analysis here. Continue reading →

Obama’s Unethical Gift to the Trial Lawyers

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

After January 1, 2011, when you begin to process all the new taxes coming your way and all the deductions you can no longer take, think about this:

The nation’s largest trial lawyer trade group, the American Association for Justice, has announced it was informed by Obama Administration officials that the U.S. Department of Treasury will give its members (and all tort lawyers) a tax break on contingency fee lawsuits. The new provision is expected to mirror proposed legislation by Sen. Arlen Specter, himself a lawyer, that was previously rejected by Congress last year. That bill would have allowed attorneys to deduct up-front costs in contingency fee lawsuits. Continue reading →

The Unethical Culture of the Congressional Black Caucus

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments

Ethics does not appear to be a priority for the Congressional Black Caucus. Instead, the C.B.C. regards ethical rules and standards as a nuisance, and, like law enforcement, color-blind college admissions and merit-based promotions, a tool of racism. In what A.E.I. government ethics scholar Norman Ornstein correctly dubbed “a pretty good working definition of chutzpah,” the Caucus is calling for restrictions on the new Office of Congressional Ethics, because it is interfering with the dubious, sometimes illegal and often profitable habits of a lot of  C.B.C. members.

In an ethical organization, a responsible one dedicated to good government and public service over protecting its members from appropriate ethics oversight, the response to the spate of ethics allegations against Congressional Black Caucus members would be, “All right, we better work on cleaning up our act.” This, however, is the group that thought former member Rep. William Jefferson, now a convicted felon, was unfairly suspected of wrongdoing after $90,000 of bribe money turned up in his office freezer. Continue reading →

Rep. Bart Stupak: Double-Reverse Ethics Dunce

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

Michigan Democrat Bart Stupak has been wrong in so many ways lately it is hard to keep count. If you are going to be wrong, however, the ethical way is to have integrity and at least be consistent in your wrongness. He couldn’t even do that right. He did manage to become Ethics Alarms’ first Double-Reverse Ethics Dunce. That’s something.

First, Stupak staged a revolt in the House to insist that the original House health care reform bill didn’t wouldn’t mandate the use of taxpayer funds for abortions.

What was wrong with this?  Oh, only everything…. Continue reading →