Don Lemon

Seeking Accountability For Giving Anti-White, Anti-American Talking Heads Broadcast Platforms

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

The recent head-exploding statement by (finally) fired MSNBC racist Joy Reid would be an Unethical Quote of the Day if it were spewed out of the mouth of most people. Reid constantly said such disgusting things and I reflexively put her racist comments in the Julie Principle files long ago. But what she said in a conversation with fellow racist Ta-Nehisi Coates at a program at Xavier University in New Orleans raises another, broader ethics issue.

Reid said, “When my mother came from Guyana, she realized it is not a land of opportunity for people like us.” That claim, coming from someone with the American experience Joy Reid has enjoyed, is beyond insulting and false on its face: it is also incredibly stupid, even for Reid. When she was finally let go, Reid was making $3 million a year, and had been pulling down a seven figure salary for at least a decade. Her life is powerful evidence that the U.S. is a “land of opportunity” for people like her, meaning, as she did, black people. (It is also obviously a land of opportunity for America-hating, anti-white bigots who will make self-evidently false claims designed to divide the country.)

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Ethics Quote of the Week: Megyn Kelly

/ Jack Marshall / 4 Comments

“Like maybe don’t say the laptop can’t be verified when it can,” she said, referring to Stahl’s response to the Hunter Biden laptop. How are you a journalist if you don’t want to follow up on that story? And then when your own organization verifies it, come out and do a mea culpa and admit you embarrassed yourself. Maybe don’t stealth edit the presidential candidate interview with ’60 Minutes,’ your flagship program that you’re an anchor of, without telling us, and then when it becomes a controversy, refuse to release the transcript because you’re more interested in running cover for the Dems than you are in honest reporting. Maybe don’t host a vice-presidential debate where you fact-check only one side. And then when your fact-check gets fact-checked by the vice-presidential candidate on the Republican side, you cut his mic…”

—Megyn Kelly, who has become considerably more quotable since abandoning news broadcasting for her podcast, responding to Leslie Stahl’s lamenting that “legacy media” media may be dying, that it’s all Donald Trump’s fault, and that she doesn’t know what to do about it. “I have some suggestions,” Kelly began.

Megyn was just riffing off the top of her head, of course. She could have gone on and on, as could I.

What do you call the insistence of Axis media defenders that while they may make “mistakes” (doesn’t everyone?) our journalists are noble, hard-working, objective truth-tellers who deserve our trust and respect? What is that? Denial? Delusion? Gaslighting? Outright lying? Insanity? Blindness? Stupidity? What?

What is the difference in effect between a state-run press, which is what the Founders devised the freedom of the press to prevent, and news media that voluntarily aligns itself with a single party and ideology and abuses its special status to manipulate the public, society, and elections?

Answer: There isn’t any.

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Who Do You Trust, CNN Or Don Lemon? (Hint: It’s A Trick Question)

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Here is how Don Lemon announced his firing from CNN on Twitter…

Here was CNN’s response:

Lemon is an incorrigibly unprofessional and biased pseudo-journalist who has one of the most damning and extensive Ethics Alarms dossiers extant. he’s thrown tantrums, made up fake history, lied, peddled fake news and appeared drunk on the air. I think my favorite inexcusable babbling self-indulgence by Don was this, but I easily could have missed one, or dozens. Anyone that believes anything Don Lemon says, writes, publishes or tweets is dangerously gullible.

CNN, meanwhile, kept Lemon on the air in a high-profile, prime-time slot despite his lack of integrity and journalism competence, because it viewed him as an attractive messenger for its steady diet of biased, slanted and occasionally fabricated news stories serving its management’s partisan objectives. CNN is a little less trustworthy than Fox News, and a little more trustworthy than MSNBC, or, to be brief, completely untrustworthy.

The answer to the question posed in the headline is “Neither.”

More “Good Racism” OK’ed By Network News

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

I want to read or hear a reasonable, intelligent defense of this phenomenon, which is occurring fairly regularly, especially since the George Floyd Freakout, DEI Madness and the Great Stupid descended over the land like the Seven Plagues of Egypt.

Above you see approximately the moment when CNN’s dumb, sexist, racist, biased—but cute!—morning anchor Don Lemon said to Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, because he couldn’t think of a real argument,

“When you are in black skin, and you live in this country, then you can disagree with me.”

You can read the context of Lemon’s remark, but I don’t believe it matters. There is no context in which that statement is anything but racially biased (not to mention un-American and really, really stupid.) For the record, Lemon was claiming that black Americans don’t have the same rights in the U.S. that whites do, a particularly audacious contention from a guy who 1) hardly rose to his position at CNN from the ghetto or the cotton fields, 2) only has and keeps his multi-million dollar a year job because he is black (though being gay helps) and 3) was debating with another “BIPOC,” but apparently there is a hierarchy in that privileged group in which African American beats Indian American, like rock beats scissors.

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CNN’s Desperate, Unethical And Insulting Don Lemon Retention Strategy

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

CNN Morning anchor Don Lemon returned to the show today, after CNN CEO Chris Licht told staff in a memo that the cute, black, gay incompetent has agreed to submit to “training” in exchange for his return.

To “cut to the chase,” Lemon is an ongoing and acute embarrassment to CNN, broadcast news, and journalism. His record of bad journalism and misadventures are documented on Ethics Alarms, and since I would rather have my toes transplanted to my forehead than watch the guy no matter what show he’s showboating in, I know that Ethics Alarms has only scratched the surface of Lemon’s bias, narcissism, lack of professionalism and incompetence. He should have been fired many times over, but since his worst displays have been squarely in service of progressive cant, anti-white bias and Democratic politics, it was only his most recent gaffe, openly signalling his sexism while revealing how well he performs basic research, that seriously jeopardized his continued employment.

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CNN Hasn’t Fired Don Lemon For Being Dishonest, Incompetent, Arrogant, Biased And Drunk. Will Lemon Being Stupidly Sexist Be Any Different?

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

What an idiot. But we knew that. I’m sure CNN even knew that, but Don is cute, black and gay, so he routinely gets a special version of “The King’s Pass” (Rationalization #11). Nonetheless, his latest outburst is special, even for Don, who suffers from the Dunning-Kruger Effect. Apparently Don associates a woman’s “prime” with her child-bearing years, which is the height of sexism: women are primarily breeders, right, Don? The same sources Lemon is evidently besotted with designate the male “prime” at around 19-years-old, if you measure men by erections and their level of arousal.

Can you imagine what Don and the CNN “Get Trump!” posse would have said if Trump told Hillary Clinton in 2016 that she had left her prime—as a woman—behind in her forties? Actually, Lemon’s argument sounds like something Trump might say. He has always been a sexist, but he’s not so much of a compulsive sexist to say something that stupid about women on TV.

We also learned how Don educates himself. It’s on the internet, so it must be true! “Don’t kill the messenger!”

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Observations On The Latest Don Lemon New Years Eve Drunk Act

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

Once again, CNN’s Don Lemon indulged his inner high school jerk by getting drunk during New Years Eve festivities. As he has before, Lemon still went before the cameras smashed as a CNN special rang in 2022. This time, however, he had more to say than just singing “Melancholy Baby” or whatever it is drunks sing now.

As CNN hosts Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper were reporting on the action in Times Square, Lemon was in New Orleans with fellow CNN anchor Alisyn Camerota and comedian Dulce Sloan, Lemon, his tongue loosened by liquor so much that it nearly fell onto the floor, decided to get some things off his chest. Beginning by denying that he was pickled and claiming it was an “act” (Riiiight: see above screenshot] Lemon ranted,

“I don’t give a — what you think about me, what do you think about that,” he said. “I don’t care, I’m a grown-ass man, and I don’t care what you think about me, I don’t lie. I am who I am. I am a grown, successful black man who a lot of people hate because they’re not used to seeing me and people like me in the position I am to be able to share my point of view on television and it freaks people out and you know what? You can kiss my behind, I do not care. I don’t care. … I have one life. It is who I am, and I feel very … blessed and honored to be in this position, to be able to do this, for all of the hate I get, it’s motivation to me. Bring it. I don’t care.”

Naturally, the video has “gone viral.”

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Remember Cooper vs. Cooper, The Racist Dog Owner Against The Black Birdwatcher In Central Park? Well, Our Crack Journalists Finally Got All The Facts Nailed Down 15 Months Later…

/ Jack Marshall / 17 Comments

Amy Cooper

…but not before Amy Cooper had to flee the country and go into hiding.

To refresh your memory about this Ethics Train Wreck that has been silently rolling all this time, review the posts about on Ethics Alarms here (describing the episode, or at least as we told about it), here, about a month later, commenting on New York City District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.’s unethical decision to prosecute Amy Cooper (which he partially justified based on the the intervening George Floyd Freakout), and finally here, from March, when I discussed Amy having to agree to endure state-mandate brainwashing in order to have Vance’s persecution dropped. The short version—but read the posts—is that White Amy Cooper walking her dog off-leash in Central Park was confronted by Black Christian Cooper, a birdwatching enthusiast, who demanded that she leash her dog and filmed her reactions as she demanded that he stop, then called 911. His video showed her telling authorities with increasing agitation that “An African-American man” was threatening her. Black Cooper’s sister then posted the video on line,White Amy became the personification of a racist “Karen,” and the story nicely set the stage for the George Floyd mess, which, through contrived logic and unscrupulous hype, it was linked to.

I must confess that I am proud of Ethics Alarms for its coverage of this case. Even before I had the additional facts (because nobody did), I correctly discerned that both Amy and Christian Cooper, the black bird-watcher whom she called the cops on,

—behaved like jerks,

—that the fury Christian brought down on Amy’s head was disproportionate to her conduct,

—that Don Lemon and others making what was a minor local tiff into a national controversy was unconscionable, and

—that Amy did not deserve to lose her job, career, dog and reputation, plus be prosecuted and get a lifetime ban from using Central Park,

….because, in essence, she was white and behaved like an asshole. (Some readers seemed to think that the fact that Amy eventually got her dog back was sufficient mitigation.) I wrote in the first post, “Proportion is an ethical value. It appears to be completely absent from this fiasco, on all sides.” Truer words I have seldom published, and that was before the recent revelations.

Bari Weiss, the New York Times rebel and exile I wrote about here, has a podcast, and in her most recent release reveals what some non-mainstream media reporters discovered when they dug deeper than their mainstream counterparts bothered to do. Amy Cooper, now living abroad to escape the constant harassment and abuse she endured in the wake of the incident, also is interviewed.

We learn that…

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As The Chauvin Jury Finds The Defendant Guilty As They Were Ordered To Do, The President And Rep. Waters Deny That They Said What They Said

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

But when Yogi Berra denied that he said what he said, it was funny..

In Minneapolis, the jury found Derek Chauvin guilty of unintentional second-degree murder, third-degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter in his role in the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020.

It would be a defensible verdict if he had received a fair trial, and the jury didn’t fear that they would spark national riots, property destruction and death if they found reasonable doubt. It would have been more defensible if the otherwise competent judge hadn’t botched his obligation to sequester the jury when another Minnesota police officer shot a black man, and riots did occur, with more on the horizon.

It is not a fair trial when a nationally known Congresswoman and the President of the United States publicly declare that, in the words of the Congresswoman, a defendant is “guilty, guilty guilty!”

So now, after polluting the trial and the verdict, both the President and the Congresswoman are engaging in a wretched display of “I didn’t really say what I obviously said and meant to say.”

Yogi Berra this ain’t.

First, here’s Maxine’s hilarious “translation” of what she meant when she told some potential rioters, ““We’ve got to stay in the streets, and we’ve got to demand justice,” Waters said. “I am hopeful that we will get a verdict that says, ‘guilty, guilty, guilty,’ and if we don’t, we cannot go away. We’ve got to get more confrontational. We’ve got to make sure that they know that we mean business.”

“I wanted to be there kind of as Auntie Maxine, to show them that not only do I love them and I support them, but they can count on me to be there with them at this terrible time in all of our lives,” Waters said in her own defense. But she is not their aunt. She is an elected official of the United States of America, and is sworn to uphold the Constitution, which means, among other things, not using her position to urge members of the public to break the law, and not using her influence to deny an American citizen a fair trial.

In another interview, she tried rationalizations instead of masquerade:

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Comment Of The Day: “Ethics Exclamation Points, 3/16/21: Duh! Whoa! Yay! Gag! Asshole!” (Item #1)

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

AngryJudge

The following Comment of the Day by long, LONG time commenter Michael West is especially welcome: there’s nothing I like better than a long, erudite COTD when I feel terrible and every moment not seeping is an ordeal. For a lot of reasons, I was way behind on my usual dental care last year, and the piper must ne paid: I have two toothaches, a related sinus infection and headache, and now face three extractions next week that wish could be in the next minute. My situation is just one more fun benefit of the lockdown, drastic, sot-in-the-dark precaution that had still unmeasurable benefits and many, many costs that have still not been quantified.

But I digress. People citing the Bible as authority for dubious ethical principles or, in the case sparking the COTD, unethical conduct has always been a pet peeve of mine even before I started thinking about such matters as a career. The example abused by Don Lemon was even on the Rationalization List: #6, The Biblical Rationalizations.

As a special treat, Michael ends by taking on “Walk a mile in another man’s shoes.”

Here is his erudite Comment of the Day on the first item in the post, “Ethics Exclamation Points, 3/16/21: Duh! Whoa! Yay! Gag! Asshole!”

***

Oh look, someone who hasn’t cracked open a Bible in decades hopes to lecture Christians or Jews on Judeo-Christianity!

Here’s the whole passage from Matthew-

“Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye. Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you. Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few. Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.”

This comes from the famous Sermon on the Mount.

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