Unethical Quote Of The Day: Bill O’Reilly

July 22, 2015July 22, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 39 Comments

That’s Bill, under the engine…

“The media despises Donald Trump and here’s why. He has no fear. He could not care less about censoring himself and the press does not intimidate him. So because of that approach the media believe they must punish Trump for being disrespectful and not cowering before them. Plus, they don’t like his politics, generally speaking. The press is a very powerful force in America given special privilege by the Founding Fathers. And, if the press deems someone unworthy they will try to destroy that person. That’s where Donald Trump finds himself today.”

–—Bill O’Reilly on Fox’s “The Factor”

Donald Trump is a human ethics train wreck.

Now boarding is Bill O’Reilly, who followed the equally rash and misguided Rush Limbaugh into being fooled by that sneaky ol’ cognitive dissonance scale. They both detest the left-biased news media so much that the fact that it is properly pointing out Trump’s numerous flaws seems like proof of Trump’s virtue to them. After all, the same people attacking Trump attack Rush and Bill, too.

Gotcha! They fell right into the media’s trap! Standing up for Trump himself, as opposed to defending the occasional instances when he, like the proverbial blind squirrel, stumbles upon the nut of a valid point, marks any defender as an ethics dunce, and a real dunce too. This is terrific for the unethically slanted media, because then it can then discount the justified criticism from Rush and O’Reilly—and others foolish enough to board this wreck—of mainstream journalism’s outrageous bias as just typical right wing delusion.

But, boy, O’Reilly’s rant is idiotic: Continue reading →

Ethics Hero: CBS’ Major Garrett

July 16, 2015July 16, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 44 Comments

During President Obama‘s Iran deal press conference, CBS’ Major Garrett broke ranks with his softball lobbing colleagues by asking, “Why you are content with all the fanfare around this deal to leave the conscience of this nation, the strength of this nation unaccounted for in relation to these four Americans?”

President Obama flared, reprimanding the reporter by snarling, “That’s nonsense, and you should know better.”

Garret was immediately criticized for being disrespectful. CNN’s Dana Bash criticized her colleague, opining that “There’s a fine line between asking a tough question and maybe crossing that line a little bit and being disrespectful, and I think that happened here.” Bill Maher ran to fetch the typical weapon of last (first?) resort employed by Obama apologists since January, 2009: the race card. “Major Garrett is a huge asshole,” he tweeted. “If U wanna “strike a nerve” with POTUS, why not just scream the N word? That should get his attention.” Garrett has been unapologetic.

No doubt: it was a hostile question. A decade or more ago, I might have thought it crossed a line. But the issue Garrett raised was an important and obvious one in the context of the President once again cockily taking a victory lap over a dubious achievement, and for this citizen, at least, it gave me hope that the mainstream media’s days of serving as a virtual Pravda to a leader’s every move might be slowly coming to an end. The media’s deference to this President has been disgraceful and has undermined our democracy, public discourse, trust in the press and the right to know what our government is doing. CBS’s Steve Kroft actually admiited—proudly!—that his “60 Minutes” was a favored venue for Obama because he knew that he would be treated with kid gloves. Continue reading →

Incompetent Elected Official Of The Week: New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito

July 15, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito is pushing a plan to decriminalize public urination, turnstile-jumping and public drinking. This is a superb example of ideology trumping the lessons of history, anthropology, law, psychology and common sense. Liberals have never forgiven Rudy Giuliani for adopting the lessons of the “broken windows” theory to clean up Times Square, thus showing why it is important, effective and responsible for government to insist on ethical conduct and have its laws reflect those values.

Using the tragic death of Eric Garner in an arrest for a petty crime as her justification, Mark-Viverito appears to believe that criminalizing minor crimes like public urination leads to pretext police stops, arrests and searches. What she stubbornly refuses to understand is that the government declaring that certain conduct is unacceptable is essential to ensuring that such conduct, and eventually, worse conduct, isn’t accepted, and that enforcement of laws with meaningful penalties is crucial to limiting the spread of unhealthy, ugly, harmful or uncivilized behavior. If the City Council wants human excrement and waste to be a regular component of the New York experience, this is one way to guarantee it—by sending the message that “It’s rude, but it’s not that wrong and we’re not going to make a big deal out of it.” The message of allowing turnstile cheats to get away with a citation—which they will never pay, of course—is that small thefts don’t matter either. Cheats and crooks can reliably be expected to see how much they can get away with stealing without real punishment, and the Mark-Viveritos in our various governments can be counted on to keep letting the standards slide.

Oh yes, she is not the only one. They are legion.

The amazing thing is that we all saw where her approach led in the Seventies. New York City became filthy and dangerous, tourists and business started to stay away, crime exploded and people died. It will lead there again, too. This is the inevitable result when elected officials regard their primary duty as serving the interests of law-breakers and the habitually unethical rather than honest, fair, responsible citizens.

________________________________

Pointer: Res Ipsa Loquitur

Facts: New York Post

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

29 Reasons Why “81 Things Mike Huckabee Has Denounced” Should Be Denounced

July 7, 2015July 8, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 7 Comments

Political reporter—not humorist, not feature-writer, but reporter—David Farenthold of the Washington Post wrote a long feature (it is a hit piece, disguised) called “81 Things Mike Huckabee has denounced.” It doesn’t matter to me which politician this kind of junk is written to trash: Huckabee’s as deserving a target as anyone. On my rapidly growing list of candidates I would take a hacksaw to my neck before voting for, he is filed somewhere among Rand Paul, Bobby Jindal and The Donald. Farenthold’s article itself would be unethical if it was written about The Green River Killer. It is in that horrible abuse of journalism category known here as “Making Readers Dumber and Less Ethically Astute Than They Already Are.

Here are the 29 reasons why I am denouncing “81 Things Mike Huckabee has denounced.”

Reasons #1-7 It is dishonest.

It’s pretty obvious what the post is about, but the author doesn’t have the guts or the honesty to admit it. The real title should be, “Mike Huckabee opposes gay marriage, so it’s okay for me to trash him about everything I can think of whether it’s fair or not.” After correctly noting in his reasons 3 (“Same-sex marriage”) and 4. (“The Supreme Court decision that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.”) that Huckabee is not a fan of gay marriages, Farenthold also devotes 68 though 79, plus 81, on his list of his “things” directly to this, and in deceitful fashion places the last 13 of them at the end of his list. Many are misleading in the context of his stated purpose, giving me seven reasons to denounce his list:

#68. claims that Huckabee “denounced” “Homosexuality, in general” when he referred to it as “a sin” 41 years ago in a Baptist newspaper advice column. That’s not a denunciation. To a Baptist, that’s a statement of fact. (Reason #1 )

In #70, Farenthold says that Huckabee denounced “Homosexuality, in general” is this quote: “I’ve had people who are gay that worked on my staff. It’s not like I’m some homophobe. If you ask me is it the normal pathway? I don’t think so.” “I don’t think homosexuality is a normal pathway” is a “denunciation”? No, it’s an opinion, and not even an inflammatory one. Gays comprise less than 10% of the population: that alone is sufficient to justify “not normal.” (Reason #1)

In #71. Farenthold accuses the Republican of “denouncing” gay parents by saying, “The children…really cannot, get critical early-life lessons in how a heterosexual family functions successfully.” OK, maybe, and so what? And adopted boys raised by a lesbian couple can’t get critical early-life lessons in how to use a urinal. (Reason #3 )

For his 72nd item, Farenthold calls this statement…

“Of the seventy-three sex scenes shown that week…two involved male homosexual couples.”

…a denunciation of “Same-sex couples in TV shows.” Pointing out a statistic is now “denunciation”? (Reason #4)

#74 alleges that “It actually became easier to get out of a marriage than to get out of a contract for the purchase of a used car!” is a denunciation of “Allowing heterosexual couples an easy path to divorce. ” In fact, he was talking about divorces generally, in a book about strengthening families, marriage, and commitment. (Reason #5)

The stretching gets absurd in #75. Huckabee declared that citizens should engage in civil disobedience after the Supreme Court’s decision declaring same sex marriage a right. He did not, in any way, denounce “States allowing same-sex couples to marry, after the Supreme Court said they could.” He said that he would do something else. (Reason #6 )

For his last “denunciation,” the Post’s Congressional beat reporter cites this question—“Do you want a president who follows? Or do you want a president who leads?” as one encompassing “President Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton, for changing their minds and embracing same-sex marriage.”I could make this one about three reasons for an ethical denunciation , so dishonest is it, but I’ll be kind. Farenthold is spinning. Everyone in D.C., and most out of it, know that both Clinton and Obama based their public views on gay marriage on the polls and the opinions of the Democratic base, and didn’t have sudden epiphanies. Huckabee was quite accurately and fairly criticizing political cowardice and a lack of integrity on the parts of both Democrats, not the fact that they “changed their minds.” Just because a political reporter is playing in the sandbox of the Post “Style” section doesn’t mean that his blatant display of partisan bias is any less disturbing, or that it implicates his trustworthiness as a journalist any less. (Reason #7 )

We get it, Dave. You really, really dislike politicians who don’t support gay marriage and believe it should not be made a right. You could make that point legitimately rather than grossly mischaracterizing the nature of the arguments of one of them who disagrees with you. Continue reading →

A Jumbo For Sulu

July 3, 2015July 4, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 36 Comments

George Takei, the Japanese-America actor permanently enshrined in pop culture history for his role of Sulu in the original “Star Trek” TV series. He has essentially lived off that one felicitous part for forty years, recently acquiring less moldy, non-sci-fi following by being a gay rights advocate.

Takei recently skimmed, or just didn’t comprehend, Clarence Thomas’s audacious dissent to the Supreme Court’s Obergefell ruling and Justice Kennedy’s majority opinion declaring same-sex marriage to be a fundamental right protected by the Constitution. Apparently he also does not comprehend that Supreme Court dissents are both stimulating and useful to legal scholars as well as those, unlike Mr. Sulu, possessing an open and curious mind.

Thomas made the unusual but provocative argument that human dignity is innate:

Human dignity has long been understood in this country to be innate. When the Framers proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal” and “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,” they referred to a vision of mankind in which all humans are created in the image of God and therefore of inherent worth. That vision is the foundation upon which
this Nation was built.

The corollary of that principle is that human dignity cannot be taken away by the government. Slaves did not lose their dignity (any more than they lost their humanity) because the government allowed them to be enslaved. Those held in internment camps did not lose their dignity because the government confined them. And those denied governmental benefits certainly do not lose their dignity because the government denies them those benefits. The government cannot bestow dignity, and it cannot take it away.

Thomas was expressing his disagreement with the majority that the government withholding the right to marry from gays robbed them of human dignity. I think it is a rather pedantic argument that has more validity in the abstract than in reality, but the position that rights come from creation rather than the government is a core concept in the Declaration of Independence, and one that statists, as in “modern Democrats,” like to ignore. If individuals are born with rights, they cannot be truly taken away. If citizens must look to the government to have their rights granted to them, then government is granted too much power in exchange. Thomas’s philosophical argument is classic conservatism. Naturally, that means, in Takei’s intolerant and partyist world view, that he deserves abuse. Continue reading →

Independence Day Ethics Dunce: Sports Illustrated Illustrates How Too Many Americans Regard The Nation’s Veterans

July 3, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 43 Comments

Sports Illustrated tweeted out the above image and message that linked to a story by “Extra Mustard.” That masterpiece noted that

Senator John McCain attended Tuesday night’s Dodgers–Diamondbacks game and had a chance to grab a souvenir in the seventh inning.Dodgers’ shortstop Jimmy Rollins fouled a ball over the backstop that went bouncing into the lap of the senior senator from Arizona, but McCain couldn’t get his hands on the ball. But McCain deserves a break from critics: As you can see the ball was approaching from a very awkward angle. Still, this photo from Dodgers photographer Jon SooHoo does not make the former presidential candidate look particularly athletic.

Apparently neither the reporter nor any of his/her/its editors were aware that McCain has extremely limited use of his arms as a result of being tortured as a North Vietnam prisoner of war. Both arms were broken by his captors and left untreated for so long that he was permanently handicapped, as anyone who watched even a little bit of his 2008 campaign for President could hardly fail to notice. McCain is also 78 years old, not that respect for seniors who have spent their lives in public service could be expected to be a factor in SI’s commentary.

Would any of the magazine’s staff attending a game dare to openly mock a disabled serviceman who didn’t catch a foul ball? Probably not, since the likelihood of some fans of the National Pastime taking offense and throwing a beer in their smug, ignorant faces would be a real risk. Ah, but from the safety of an office in New York City and hiding behind a pseudonym—of course, Extra Mustard might be the jerk’s real name, I suppose—it’s easy to insult an elderly U.S. Senator, military veteran and war hero for the consequences of the wounds he sustained in the service of his nation.

Eventually SI was tipped off to its error, and it quietly removed the last sentence. No apology, of course. Such is the historical, cultural, political and ethical ignorance of a substantial portion of our national media.

_____________________

Pointer: Newsbusters

“Everyday Feminism,” Trigger Warnings, And The Duty Not To Be Stupid

June 27, 2015June 27, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 30 Comments

TRIGGER WARNING!!!

I have long posited the idea that we have a duty to be competent in the act of living, since incompetent members of society make the rest of us miserable. This means not rising beyond your own ability to be competent: an idiot who aspires to be Senator and who achieves his goal is not inspiring, but unethical.

Of course, people who don’t know they are stupid should be exempt from an unethical label: ironically, you can’t be an ethics dunce if you are truly a dunce. We also have a duty not to make our children, family members, friends, associates, fellow citizens and the culture dumber by reckless dissemination of idiocy.

Which brings us to this, from the earnest, apparently certifiably insane blog, Everyday Feminism. Trigger warnings, the recent progressive invention designed to shield overly sensitive members of our species from any idea, word, concept, thought, memory or theory that troubles them in any way lies right on the cusp of unethical, as it is at the threshold to censorship and thought control, as well as to stupidity itself. Everyday Feminism, however, charges over that line with hilarious excess. This could have easily been published by The Onion, but Everyday Feminism apparently means it.

The article was about triggering, so it had to have this warning:

This article discusses triggering in detail and mentions common topics of triggering (sexual assault, anxiety, health anxiety, depression, death, non-specific fears and phobias).

But the blog felt warning itself needed a trigger warning, and so it began with this:

Like this phenomenal article, Everyday Feminism definitely believes in giving people a heads up about material that might provoke our reader’s trauma. However, we use the phrase “content warning” instead of “trigger warning,” as the word “trigger” relies on and evokes violent weaponry imagery. This could be re-traumatizing for folks who have suffered military, police, and other forms of violence. So, while warnings are so necessary and the points in this article are right on, we strongly encourage the term “content warning” instead of “trigger warning.”

Continue reading →

Unethical Quote of the Month: Justice Antonin Scalia

June 26, 2015June 26, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 41 Comments

“If, even as the price to be paid for a fifth vote, I ever joined an opinion for the Court that began: ‘The Constitution promises liberty to all within its reach, a liberty that includes certain specific rights that allow persons, within a lawful realm, to define and express their identity,’ I would hide my head in a bag. The Supreme Court of the United States has descended from the disciplined legal reasoning of John Marshall and Joseph Story to the mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie.”

——U.S. Supreme Court Justice Scalia, excoriating his colleague, Justice Kennedy, who was the fifth vote in the majority of SCOTUS’s ruling today, authored by Kennedy, that same-sex marriage was a Constitutional right no state could deny. Scalia filed an angry and intemperate dissent, low-lighted by this comment in a footnote.

Wrote Prof. Stephen Gillers, legal ethicist:

“How after this can Kennedy work with him? Scalia has himself “descended” from the manner of argument found in opinions of John Marshall and Joseph Story to the invective and mockery of the Internet. Lawyers have been chastised for less derisive comments in briefs. Yet here we have it from our Supreme Court. Scalia sets a bad example that will harm civility in lower courts and at the bar.”

Exactly.

The rest of Scalia’s dissent is hardly more restrained, either.

You can read the opinion and dissents in Obergefell v. Hodges here.

UPDATE: Here’s a screenshot of another selection, courtesy of Slate:

Arguing with the majority’s wisdom and legal analysis is one thing, mocking a Justice’s writing style is quite another—unprofessional, uncollegial and below-the belt. Yes, Nino is a much better writer than Kennedy, but belittling his efforts shows neither proper judicial temperament nor appropriate respect for the Court itself. Some commenters excuse this because they disagree with the ruling: Irrelevant. Check your rationalizations, especially #2. The “They’re Just as Bad” Excuse, or “They had it coming.”

The Case Of The Trash-Talking Doctors, And The Price Of Trust

June 26, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 66 Comments

So, did you hear the one about why surgeons wear those masks?

When I first heard about this case, I thought the jury award of $500,000 was ridiculous. The more I think about it, the more I begin to think it was appropriate.

Before his colonoscopy, a Vienna, Virginia patient pressed record on his smartphone, not intending to record everything that was said but ending up with the entire proceedings anyway. That was a half-million dollar stroke of luck for him, and the confirmation of dark suspicions for the rest of us. The resulting recording revealed that the surgical team amused itself by insulting and demeaning the semi-conscious anesthetized man throughout the procedure.

The anesthesiologist, Tiffany M. Ingham, was the ringleader and the primary offender. Among her inspired bon mots… Continue reading →

Ethics Observations On A Nashville Police Arrest Video

June 17, 2015 / Jack Marshall / 42 Comments

I encountered this video on CNN this morning:

Observations:

1. No police officers should have to work under these conditions. This requires courage and tolerance above what any professional should have to muster on a regular basis.

2. Every urban mayor, district attorney, police chief, civil rights advocate and journalist should be asked to comment on the video regarding the principles of respect, civic responsibility, and citizenship.

3. If the question is asked why crime rates are rising in several cities due to a cessation of proactive law-enforcement, this video is a nearly complete answer.

4. What prominent U.S. African American officials, leaders and celebrities are condemning this conduct by the friends of the individual being arrested, and conduct like it all over the nation? I haven’t seen or heard a single one.

5. Allowing this phenomenon to continue without addressing it directly is community malpractice, irresponsible, destructive, and almost certain to be deadly.

6. When such a situation escalates to violence, as this one easily could, who will be responsible, and who should be held responsible?

Discuss.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: