honesty

Ethics Dunce and Unethical Quote of the Day: Jon Dawson

/ Jack Marshall / 28 Comments

“OH, you mean the one with the word “Column” at the beginning?”

—-Jon Dawson, alleged columnist for the Kinston Free Press, in snotty response to my query regarding his fake story that prompted my recent post, “Ethics Train Wreck in a Little Tea Pot.” I asked if his story was a hoax.

Yeah, you’re right…if I had seen the photo first, I might have been more suspicious….

I guess his answer means yes. I also guess somebody ought to tell all the other local news and city beat columnists around the country that the heading “column” by their names is supposed to be understood as “Don’t believe a thing I say.” Someone should also let national writers like E.J. Dionne, Robert Samuelson, Kathleen Parker, John Avlon, Andrew Sullivan…anyone with a column, really…that their brand of punditry and journalism is supposed to be assumed to be satirical and tongue-in-cheek, because “column” gives proper notice that the “facts” the column contains are likely to be hooey.

Back when I lived in Boston, there was a city beat columnist I enjoyed and read often. He was clever and funny, and his specialty was local Boston stories. His name is Mike Barnacle. He’s not in Boston any more: they ran him out of town for making up stories or embellishing them with phony facts. (He is now seen on MSNBC, where facts are beside the point.) I thought they were a bit rough on Mike in Boston, and I wonder why he didn’t inform his paper that the fact that he wrote a “column” gave him leave to test the gullibility of his readers every day. Continue reading →

Ethics Hero: Anderson Cooper

/ Jack Marshall / 38 Comments

It was not exactly a surprise, but CNN anchor Anderson Cooper announced today that indeed he is gay.

This is far from the career death sentence that it would have been just a few years ago, but Cooper’s announcement took great courage nonetheless. It is difficult for gay children and teens to develop confidence and self-esteem when gay adults who have achieved success, fame and respect in their fields remain closeted out of fear and uncertainty. If there is nothing wrong with being gay, they think, then why are prominent gays hiding it?

Well, we do know the answer, and that the societal problem isn’t gays, but bigotry. That is why Cooper’s actions are so important. His openness about his sexual orientation challenges both the fear and the bigotry, and gives young gays a mainstream role model of substance and character.

Bravo.

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Source: The Daily Beast

Graphic: Media Bistro

Ethics Alarms attempts to give proper attribution and credit to all sources of facts, analysis and other assistance that go into its blog posts. If you are aware of one I missed, or believe your own work was used in any way without proper attribution, please contact me, Jack Marshall, at  jamproethics@verizon.net.

Carolyn Hax Tackles An Ethics Classic

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

What do you do when you find out that the husband or boyfriend of one of your friends is cheating on her with another one of your friends?

This perennial advice column ethics teaser has been botched in more columns than I can count, so it was a pleasure to read the response to the dilemma by Carolyn Hax, the syndicated relationship advice columnist whose ethical instincts are invariably superb. Here was the substance of her answer:

“…to the husband or husband-poacher (whoever’s the closer friend), say something akin to: “I’ve heard this is happening, which means others have, too. That’s Issue 1. Issue 2: I want no part of this — I don’t even want to know what I already know. Issue 3: If Wife asks me something, I won’t lie. As someone who stands to lose friends in this mess, I hope you’ll clean it up.” Then butt out, knowing that if someone forces your hand, your next move has been declared in advance — and if your friend finds out that you knew, you can say: “I’m sorry. I did what I felt I could.” Continue reading →

Dishonest Headline of the Week: The Blaze

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

“Whatever You Do, Do Not Watch This Video of a Stomach-Turning Track Injury!”

Res ipsa loquitur!

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Source: The Blaze

The Ethics Of Getting Fired: Ann Curry’s Today Show Exit

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

“We love you, Ann!” “I hate you, Matt!”

I was going to make Ann Curry’s method of leaving the Today Show’s anchor chair an Ethics Quiz, but decided that there weren’t sufficiently compelling arguments for more than one conclusion: her farewell drama yesterday morning was unprofessional, and in her job and her industry, but also many others, professional obligations trump candor.

I will admit up front that I never liked Ann Curry, either as a news reader nor as Matt Lauer’s partner after Meridith Viera left the show. Her open-faced demeanor, which made it crystal clear with every story and interview where her own sympathies lay, was the antithesis of objective and fair reporting, regardless of the steadily increasing number of similar practitioners, like CNN’s eye-rolling, squinting, smirking morning tag-team of Soledad O’Brien and Carol Costello. Thus it was no surprise that having received the gift of being able to have an on-air good-bye and the trust of her NBC bosses to handle her farewell properly, Curry chose instead to (or perhaps it is fairer to say “couldn’t control herself sufficiently not to..”) make it obvious to viewers that she had been dumped, that she was hurt and angry about it, and that she blamed Matt Lauer, her co-host, who was widely reported to have made her ouster a condition of his new contract. The emotions Curry was wearing on her sleeve were especially glaring while Lauer was making the traditional speech about how much Curry would be missed and ended by trying to give her a show-biz hug and kiss. Curry refused to look at Lauer while he was talking, and ducked his kiss, looking for all the world like she was hugging Jerry Sandusky or someone similarly appealing. As we say in the theater in such situations: “Nice cover, Ann!” Continue reading →

The Congressional Black Caucus Walkout: Racial Bias, and Nothing But

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

Of course, they would also be staging a walk-out if a white AG was being held in contempt.

The Congressional Black Caucus  plotted to walk out of Thursday’s contempt of Congress vote regarding Attorney General Eric Holder’s stonewalling regarding legitimate oversight of the deadly Fast and Furious fiasco, and did, taking most of the other Democrats along. In so doing, the CBC, as if there was any doubt, unequivocally demonstrated its virulent racial bias, which interferes with its ability to discharge its duties in a fair, honest and legitimate matter.

The CBC had circulated a letter explaining its supposed rationale, which oddly manages never to mention that Eric Holder is African American. Yet it is unimaginable that the Congressional Black Caucus would stage a walk-out if Holder was the white Attorney General appointed by a white President. This is politics, but it is also dishonesty and naked tribalism. It should not be, pardon the expression, whitewashed, or allowed to proceed without calling it what it is—racial bias in the halls of Congress, where none belongs.

Here is the offensive and disingenuous letter being circulated by the CBC—with some commentary by me in brackets: Continue reading →

Jay Carney: How to Destroy Your Credibility Pointlessly

/ Jack Marshall / 6 Comments

I have great sympathy for White House spokespeople like Jay Carney. It is almost impossible to avoid coming off as a weasel. You have to face the press and fend off questions, never revealing more than the White House chooses to reveal, seldom being fully candid, always being governed by talking points. Of course, being in such a role for an Administration that promised, in the person of its leader, to be transparent above all others shouldn’t be quite so hard, but we all know that this promise lies molding in the Trash Heap of Cynicism, buried by Guantanamo Bay, the  waivers of conflicts for lobbyists, the Obama Super-Pac, and especially the recent assertion of executive privilege. Eventually all Presidential spokesmen reach the point where they are barely believed and no longer trusted, which is all the more reason not to rush the process and savage one’s credibility by uttering stupid and pointless lies that are both unbelievable but also easily disproved. Continue reading →

Comment of the Day: “Fast and Furious: An Open Letter To Columnist Colbert King”

/ Jack Marshall / 3 Comments

Glenn Logan scores the Comment of the Day with his answer to the questions I posed in my open letter to Colbert King, the anti-corruption Washington Post columnist who nonetheless regards Congress’s inquiry into a possible Fast and Furious cover-up as trivial. He also penned a worthy candidate for ethics quote of the week: watch for the last sentence, which I bolded. Love it, Glenn!

I’ll have some additions to Glenn’s thoughts at the end; meanwhile, here is his Comment of the Day on the post, “Fast and Furious: An Open Letter To Columnist Colbert King.” Continue reading →

Fast and Furious: An Open Letter To Columnist Colbert King

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

Dear Colbert King…

Dear Mr. King:

I am writing to see if you can help me understand your attitude toward the Fast and Furious scandal, as laid out in your recent weekly column in the Washington Post.

I can’t bring myself to make you an Ethics Dunce, because few journalists in any community have led such a relentless and powerful crusade against unethical government and corrupt public officials. Your columns have eloquently condemned the culture of corruption that has crippled the District of Columbia, and rallied the indignation and activism of citizens against the legacy of Marion Barry and the tolerance of public betrayal that he sowed and nurtured. You have cataloged, in shocking detail, the ethical rot that has infested the nation’s Capital, marked by lawlessness, cronyism, incompetence and greed. I respect you. I trust you. I think of you as the most credible and objective media advocate for good government that I know.

So I need to understand why you think it is fair and appropriate to call Rep. Issa a “devil” for insisting on transparency, honesty, accountability, and transparency from Attorney General Holder regarding the Fast and Furious fiasco, which left one American and untold Mexicans dead. It is the duty of Congress to exercise oversight over the U.S. government, and if there was ever an episode demanding oversight, this was it. The U.S. Department of Justice allowed the law to be broken, permitted dangerous automatic weapons to cross the border into Mexico and arm the most dangerous thugs in that country (without receiving the permission of Mexico or informing it), and then lost control of both the scheme and the weapons, with fatal results. You always write about maintaining the trust of the public in Washington, D. C. What is more fatal to trust than a law enforcement agency that intentionally allows laws to be broken without accountability? Don’t you believe that public trust in a nation’s Justice Department, its agents, policymakers and leadership is as important as public trust in the D.C. City Council? If you do, why is Issa, in your words, “engaging in cheap political opportunism” by insisting, along with others, such as the scrupulously fair Sen. Grassley, that Holder explain what happened, who was responsible, and what measures have been taken to make sure such an outrageous operation never happens again—beginning with, <gasp!>, firing somebody? Continue reading →

Comment of the Day: “Comment of the Day on ‘Young, Gullible, Lazy, Unimaginative and Unbelievable: I Wonder Why This Lawyer Has Trouble Finding A Job?'”

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

I couldn’t resist this one.

The thread on my post about an Occupy Wall Street protester who apparently was a law school grad and who held a hand-lettered sign blaming his failure to find work, not on the fact that he was standing around in a park holding a sign, but on his law school, has uncovered some unpleasant truths, such as…

  • Law schools are giving degrees to a lot of people who don’t know what to do with them
  • A lot of law school grads have not acquired some of the basic skills, like unbiased analysis, that their training was supposed to convey
  • A striking number of law school graduates identify with whiny unemployed 20-lear-olds holding signs
  • Too many people want to be lawyers for the money, rather than to serve a higher social function
  • Personal accountability is on the wane in America
  • People will believe the damnedest things if it will prevent them from accepting responsibility for their own plight, and
  • Confirmation bias is a frightening phenomenon.

Embodying many of these qualities was the recent post of someone with the apparently ethnic name of Iwantoremainanonymous-–Indian, perhaps?—who  had many observations typical of the thread that I unfortunately cannot permit to be posted, because he not only defied  the Ethics Alarms no anonymous comments rule, but, in his wealth of legal knowledge, disputes that I even have the right to make such rules.

Here is his jaw-dropping, incomplete Comment of the Day on “Comment of the Day on ‘Young, Gullible, Lazy, Unimaginative and Unbelievable: I Wonder Why This Lawyer Has Trouble Finding A Job?'”: Continue reading →