integrity

Albert Pujols, Stan the Man, and the Shameless Jeremy Lin Censors

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

THIS is "El Hombre." Stan's Polish, by the way. Do you care? Does the Asian American Journalists Association?

If you don’t know who Albert Pujols is, you should: he’s probably the best hitter in baseball, a slugging first baseman whose career so far has already guaranteed him a spot in baseball’s Hall of Fame. Over the winter he left his original team and the city that worshiped him, St. Louis and its Cardinals, because, though the team he professed to “owe everything” offered him a deal that would guarantee that his great-grand children could be beach bums all their lives, a team in Southern California, the Angels, offered him even more, so he can light his cigars with C-notes and pave his driveway with gold.. I think elevating money over every other value to that extent is an unethical and culturally corrupting choice, and said so at the time.

Now Albert has re-endeared himself to me  by publicly objecting to the Angels’ pre-season promotional campaign calling him “El Hombre.” “What?” you say. “I thought you have been condemning political correctness in the discussion of athletes with ethnic identities! Don’t you think it’s ridiculous for Pujols, who is of Hispanic descent, to object to a nickname that plays on his heritage?” Indeed I have been condemning such political correctness and over-sentivity, and still do. But that isn’t why Albert is objecting.

Back in St. Louis, you see, they also tried to call Pujols “El Hombre,” in a deliberate evocation of the city’s most famous and celebrated slugger, the great Stan “The Man” Musial, one of the best and most admirable players in baseball history. Pujols put a stop to it. There was only one player in the city who could carry the title “The Man”, he said, and that was Musial, who is alive and in his 90’s. Just saying “the Man” in a different language didn’t change the fact that the honor was Musial’s, and shouldn’t be taken  away. Stan Musial was and is “the Man;” Pujols respected that, and defended it Continue reading →

The Broadcast Media’s Golden Rule: “Do Unto Others What You Will Use Cronyism To Stop Others From Doing Unto You”

/ Jack Marshall / 14 Comments

Two Denver TV stations are feuding, and why? Because one of them refused to allow the other to suppress news footage that was embarrassing to a news anchor.

On February 8, KUSA-Channel 9 news anchor Kyle Dyer was interviewing the owner of Max, an 85-pound Argentine Mastiff, and the firefighter who had rescued the dog from an icy pond. I saw the video. Dyer had me wincing throughout the interview, showing herself to be the most dangerous kind of dog lover, someone who is fond of animals but naive and ignorant about their behavior.  She kept rubbing the dog’s ears and face during the interview, and the mastiff was obviously stoic but stressed by the strange environment, the cameras, and this women talking and running her hands all over him.  Mastiffs are gentle dogs, but very shy;  it was clear to me that Dyer was not according sufficient respect and caution to a powerful creature. As the interview ended, she suddenly moved in to kiss the dog on the muzzle, and the dog reacted defensively, biting her on the face and taking off part of her lip. She was seriously injured, and she had to have 75 stitches. Continue reading →

Reflections On President’s Day, 2012: A United States Diminished in Power, Influence and Ideals

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Rep. Ron Paul is fond of saying that the United States shouldn’t be the world’s policeman, and thanks to irresponsible stewardship of America’s resources and horrific maintenance of its ideals, his wish has already come true. One result is a world that has no functioning opposition to evil, a world at the mercy of chaos with no champion or guiding inspiration in sight. The other result is a United States that no longer stands for its own founding principles.

For proof, we have only to look as far as Syria, where a brutal dictator is killing his own people at an accelerating rate. Although his people have tired of his tyranny, Hafez al-Assad, like Gaddafi before him, seems determined to kill as many of his own countrymen as he has to in order to stay in power. Our President, Barack Obama, has delivered stern admonitions and disapprovals, which is this President’s style and approximately as effective as tossing water balloons. The Secretary of State, Mrs. Clinton, expresses frustration, for all the good that does. The killing, of course, goes on.

If you think I’m going to advocate U.S. action in Syria, you are wrong. Quite simply, we can’t afford it—not with a Congress and an Administration that appear unwilling and unable to confront rising budget deficits and crushing debt with sensible tax reform and unavoidable entitlement reductions. Yesterday Congress and the President passed yet another government hand-out of money it doesn’t have and refuses to raise elsewhere, among other things continuing to turn unemployment insurance, once a short-term cushion for job-seekers, into long-term government compensation for the unemployed. Part of the reckless debt escalation was caused by the last President unconscionably engaging in overseas combat in multiple theaters without having the courage or sense  to insist that the public pay for it, and the current administration is incapable of grasping that real money, not just borrowed funds, needs to pay for anything. The needle is well into the red zone on debt; we don’t have the resources for any discretionary military action.

Ron Paul thinks that’s a good thing, as do his libertarian supporters. President Obama, it seems, thinks similarly. They are tragically wrong. Though it is a popular position likely to be supported by the fantasists who think war can just be wished away, the narrowly selfish who think the U.S. should be an island fortress, and those to whom any expenditure that isn’t used to expand  cradle-to-grave government care is a betrayal of human rights, the abandonment of America’s long-standing world leadership in fighting totalitarianism, oppression, murder and genocide is a catastrophe for both the world and us. Continue reading →

Comment of the Day: “Ethics Quote of the Week: Yu Jie”

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

Michael, fortunately, focuses attention back on the actual meaning of the quote from the Chinese dissident, Yu Jie, that I had posted as an Ethics Quote of the Week. I then confused the issue by expanding my commentary to the dangers (or, as commenter properly corrected me, theoretical dangers) of  U.S. indebtedness to China. My error, and I am grateful to Michael both for returning to the issue and his thoughtful comments.

Here is his Comment of the Day on the post, Ethics Quote of the Week: Yu Jie:

“…No matter how craven our federal government has been, why are the Universities allowing themselves to be censored by the Chinese? There are two reasons: Continue reading →

American Idol Ethics, Group Day, 2012

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Johnny Keyser

American Idol’s Group Day is the one stretch of the show that is more reality show than competition, and it usually delivers the best ethics dramas of the season. Last year, for example, the Group Day chaos—all the Idol wannabes have to form combos and rehearse an a capella number in harmony, often fighting, crying or collapsing in the process—produced a moment of courage and character when Scotty McCreery, the eventual winning Idol, stepped up and took full responsibility for the rotten conduct of his group, which had tossed out another young man at the last minute to take McCreery in.

This year there were ethics heroes and dunces, but mostly dunces. A real gem was the awful stage mother of competitor Brielle Von Hugel, who was filmed in rehearsals complaining how weak a singer her daughter’s fellow group member Kyle Crews was. After Crews crashed and burned in the performance, and was the only member of the group cut, Mrs. Von Hugel was shown insincerely telling him what a “good voice” he had. Kudos to Idol’s director for immediately re-running her backstage slamming of the kid’s voice in the previous episode. Continue reading →

Ethics Quote of the Week: Yu Jie

/ Jack Marshall / 23 Comments

“I arrived in the United States a month ago, thinking I had escaped the reach of Beijing, only to realize that the Chinese government’s shadow continues to be omnipresent. Several U.S. universities that I have contacted dare not invite me for a lecture, as they cooperate with China on many projects. If you are a scholar of Chinese studies who has criticized the Communist Party, it would be impossible for you to be involved in research projects with the Chinese-funded Confucius Institute, and you may even be denied a Chinese visa. Conversely, if you praise the Communist Party, not only would you receive ample research funding but you might also be invited to visit China and even received by high-level officials. Western academic freedom has been distorted by invisible hands.”

—Yu Jie, Chinese dissident and author recently relocated to the U.S., in an op-ed column in the Washington Post, exposing how America’s dependence on China for trade and financing has not only made the nation vulnerable, but is also eroding its integrity and values.

Every budget cycle that the United States permits to expand its debt makes the nation more indebted to China, and places more power in the hands of its leaders to exert influence over American policies. Yu Jie’s disturbing article shows how our values are being undermined as well. China’s is a repressive, undemocratic and often brutal regime that the United States has foolishly allowed itself to become dependent upon. What will the consequences of this be? How can the United States lead the free world while being under the thumb of the Chinese? Corruption is inevitable. Yu Jie writes, Continue reading →

Comment of the Day: “The Legal Profession’s Muddled Standard For ‘Fitness To Practice’”

/ Jack Marshall / 1 Comment

...and that's why they wear masks!

Interested Blogger, or “IB,” makes some interesting observations about professional ethics enforcement generally and medical ethics in particular in the Comment of the Day, responding to the post, The Legal Profession’s Muddled Standard For “Fitness To Practice.” Her insight regarding the reasons why professionals are so reluctant to pull the licenses of misbehaving colleagues is astute, I think.  Lawyers and doctors are hesitant to punish individuals for doing something they could imagine themselves doing, though the Golden Rule is  being misapplied. It’s a disturbing thought, but an illuminating one: perhaps John Edwards keeps his law license because other male lawyers think, “Boy, that could happen to me: get smitten by some hot babe in the office, we fool around, she sandbags me on birth control…heck, I might panic. I might try a crazy scheme to cover it up, especially if it was all going to be played up in the tabloids. Poor guy! How can we disbar him?”

Here is IB’s “Comment of the Day”: Continue reading →

In The Catholic Institutions vs Obamacare Showdown, Law and Ethics Trump Morality…And Should

/ Jack Marshall / 118 Comments

The Christian Soldiers are on the wrong side of this argument.

A controversial rule, announced last month as part of President Obama’s health-care overhaul, requires religiously affiliated colleges and hospitals to provide female employees the full range of contraceptive coverage, including contraceptives, the “morning-after pill” and sterilization services. The measure has  Catholic Church-run institutions up in arms over a system that would force them would  to offer plans that contradict their teachings. Catholic bishops have been leading the growing criticism of the rule,  distributing letters and other materials for distribution to millions of worshipers. Talk radio is abuzz with talk of Obama’s escalating “war on religion.” Even the Washington Post editorial staff criticized the move.

Naturally, the Republican-run Congress announced, via Speaker Boehner, that it would protect Freedom of Religion and block the measure with legislation. All in all, it is a spectacular collision of law, morality and ethics the likes of which we seldom see.

As for simple-minded me, I don’t think this is an especially difficult problem from an ethical point of view. Politics? Practicalities? Culture wars? Yes, those are all extremely difficult considerations in this argument, but they are also not my proper realm. The ethics are clear.

President Obama is right. Continue reading →

The Susan G. Komen Foundation-Planned Parenthood Ethics Train Wreck

/ Jack Marshall / 53 Comments

Unlike the 26 U.S. Senators who are unethically abusing their positions by presuming to demand that an independent non profit organization expend its funds according to their interests, I am not going to tell the board of the Susan G. Komen Foundation how to pursue its mission…because as with the Senators, it is none of my business. Ethics is my business, and the full-blown ethics train wreck surrounding the Foundation’s decision to end its substantial financial support of Planned Parenthood has been created by dishonesty, misrepresentation and a lack of fairness from all directions.

Here are some unpopular ethics truths in this fiasco. Continue reading →

As News Media Sinks To New Ethics Lows, Some Friendly—And Urgent— Advice

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

One of many news story warning labels devised by Tom Scott (http://www.tomscott.com/warnings/)

The profession of journalism has now sunk to a point of incompetence and untrustworthiness that constitutes a serious threat, not only to itself, but also to the United States, which must have honest and reliable news sources to function and thrive. As currently constructed, the profession of journalism does not possess the tools or the will to address its crisis. Two recent examples should suffice.

The Saturday before Joe Paterno died, a tweet from a Penn State student-run website erroneously announced that Paterno was already dead. The tweet was immediately picked up by CBS Sports, and subsequently by the news web sites The Daily Beast and the Huffington Post. Howard Kurtz, supposedly the preeminent  media ethics watchdog, re-tweeted the false news himself. Many other journalists did the same. But it was all based on a hoax.  Paterno was still alive. Continue reading →