trustworthiness

Is It Fair that Manti Te’o’s Dead Girlfriend Hoax Might Make Him A Less Attractive Draft Choice?

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments

Don’t be silly. Of course it is.

You'd think the green skin would have tipped him off....

The non-existent girlfriend. You’d think the green skin would have tipped him off….

If you are not aware of the particulars of this weird and confusing tale, read the extensive account here, and good luck to you. From an ethics perspective, all that matters is:

  • Somebody perpetrated a web hoax, creating an imaginary online girlfriend for Notre Dame football star Manti Te’o.
  • The young man told the media a touching story about how his grandmother and girlfriend had died the same day.
  • Without checking any aspect of the story, outlet after outlet repeated and embellished the tale, despite the fact that the girlfriend never existed.
  • In his comments to the press, Manti Te’o never revealed that he had not, in fact, ever met the woman face to face. Indeed, many of his comments suggested otherwise.
  • As of this writing, no one is certain who created the fake girlfriend, or whether Manti Te’o was in on the deception. Continue reading →

Is Ronald Miller An Ethics Dunce? How Unethical Is Really, Really Stupid?

/ Jack Marshall / 51 Comments
Is stupidity a defense for unethical conduct?

Is stupidity a defense for unethical conduct?

The news report from Texas about a father posing as an armed intruder to test the security of his son’s school once again raises the thorny problem of how to distinguish ethically obtuse and dumb as a brick. From U.S. News and NBC:

Officials say Ronald Miller was unarmed Wednesday when he told a school greeter outside Celina (Texas) Elementary School that he had a gun… The greeter froze in panic when Miller said he was a gunman and his target was inside, Celina Independent School District Superintendent Donny O’Dell told NBCDFW.com. Miller was then able to walk into the school and entered the office. “He told them that he is a shooter and ‘you’re dead, and you’re dead,'” O’Dell [said.] Never showing a weapon, Miller then reportedly revealed his stunt was a test of school safety and he wanted to talk to the principal. School staffers knew Miller, who was a father of a student, and police were not called until he left the school, The Dallas Morning News reported. He was arrested Wednesday evening and is being held in lieu of $75,000 bail…”

Is Miller so stupid he doesn’t know why this is wrong? It is “the ends justifies the means” thinking personified: he was willing to risk a panic, scare school workers sick, possibly set off a violent incident (what if, as the NRA fervently wishes were the case in all schools, someone in the principal’s office was carrying a gun and decided the safest thing was to shoot Miller before he started his rampage?), and undermine what little rational trust there is left in schools these days, all to prove absolutely nothing, other than the fact that parents aren’t high on the list of suspected school shooters, since no parent has ever been one. Continue reading →

Why Professionalism Is Essential: TSA Edition

/ Jack Marshall / 5 Comments
The man behind the curtain is pointing and laughing....

The man behind the curtain is pointing and laughing….

Taking Sense Away is a fascinating blog operated by a former TSA screener. It is essential reading for air travelers, libertarians, critics of the TSA and anyone else interested in the strange, often infuriating  airport security procedures that have evolved since the events of 9/11/2001. His perspectives are not universally accurate in all cases (he reminds us frequently), but it can’t make air travelers happy to read the following, which he recently revealed as part of his answer to an inquiry from a reader about the unseen aspects of screening:

“Now, the I.O. Room (the image operator room, where your nude images are viewed at airports that still use the backscatter x-ray full body scanners), that, my friend, is a whole different story. In the image analysis room, no one is permitted to leave or enter without ample warning (part of TSA’s promise to the public that officers “would never see the passenger whose nude image they just viewed,” although I did occasionally witness this being violated, see Confession #1) and, like the private screening room, recording devices of any kind are prohibited. So in summation: what you have are one to two to three TSA officers locked in a room, viewing nude passenger images, with a guarantee that no one can barge in on them, and that no surveillance cameras can legally be present.

“Just use your imagination on the stories among TSA officers of what has gone on in the I.O. room. Personally, in the I.O. room, I witnessed light sexual play among officers, a lot of e-cigarette vaping, and a whole lot of officers laughing and clowning in regard to some of your nude images,  dear passengers.  Things like this are what happens (at the very least) when you put people who are often fresh out of high school or a GED program (although there are actually a few TSA screeners with PhDs, which I guess is sad on so, so many levels) with minimal training and even less professionalism, into the position of being in charge of analyzing nude images of people in a hermetically sealed room.”

Nice, huh? Continue reading →

Incompetent Elected Official of the Month: Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio)

/ Jack Marshall / 15 Comments
Ah, yes, those old football injuries that tighten up and cause you to walk like you're drunk after going to a wedding where nobody drank to excess. Who hasn't been in that situation?

Ah, yes, those old football injuries that tighten up and cause you to walk like you’re drunk after going to a wedding where nobody drank to excess. Who hasn’t been in that situation?

Let’s be clear, now: Rep. Ryan is not politically incompetent, no sireee! He’s no fool; he knew that an arrest for public intoxication in August might be a high hurdle on the route to his re-election, especially since the matter wouldn’t be resolved until after the November 7. So when the rising star of a congressman, seeking election, now safely accomplished, to his sixth term, was arrested in Virginia, Ryan’s staff managed to keep the embarrassing incident out of the papers, cable news broadcasts and political junkie blogs. He had been  stopped by a police officer who observed him staggering along the sidewalk, and Ryan refused to take a Breathalyzer alcohol test as the officer requested, precipitating his arrest. The incident, after all, might have been misunderstood. Can’t have that. Continue reading →

NOW You Tell Us? Rep. Scott DesJarlais (R-Tenn) Is Not What What He Appeared To Be

/ Jack Marshall / 16 Comments

Unconfirmed photo of Tennessee Rep. Scott DesJarlais caught out of his man suit.

In 2010, physician Scott DesJarnais ran to represent Tennessee’s Fourth Congressional District on a pro-life, anti-abortion platform, and won. He also ran as an honest, trustworthy, honorable individual, as all members of the U.S. House of Representatives ought to be.  He is an MD; integrity, intelligence and professional standards of conduct should be assumed. Little more than week after he was re-elected by Tennessee’s voters this year, however, the court records of his 2001 divorce were released. The Democratic Party in the state had fought to have them released before the election with the support of his ex-wife, but DesJarnais successfully persuaded a judge to wait—after all, why spoil a good surprise? When the transcripts were finally revealed, Tennesseans learned that their re-elected, pro-family Representative:

  • Supported his ex-wife’s two abortions before they were wed
  • Helped arrange abortions for a mistress and a patient he impregnated after they were married.
  • Had multiple sexual affairs with co-workers, subordinates and patients
  • Prescribed recreational pills for at least one of his sex partners
  • At one point, put a pistol barrel in his mouth for two hours and threatened suicide
  • Engaged in multiple actions that are violations of medical ethics, workplace ethics, and laws. Continue reading →

Meet the Grants!

/ Jack Marshall / 9 Comments

Hmmm…I wonder who’ll play Jennifer in the Lifetime movie?

If this developing story from Seattle was a Lifetime Network movie, I would regard it as proof positive that LMN was running out of plausible plots. Since it appears to be real, I regard it as proof positive that life is running out of plausible plots.

Meet the Grants. They make fun couple David Petraeus and Paula Broadwell look like Mike and Carol Brady.  Described as a Seattle “power couple”, he’s a successful lawyer, and she’s city prosecutor. He’s also an accused serial rapist.

Dan Grant faces seven charges of raping Chinese women working as massage therapists, and another charge for first-degree burglary. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges. The chances that there is sufficient evidence to charge a Seattle lawyer as a serial rapist and that the evidence is nonetheless erroneous are slim, as are the chances that the police would charge the husband of a prosecutor without an air-tight case. Still, the word alleged needs to be attached to all of this. This isn’t just alleged, however: a recently released search warrant shows that prosecutor Jennifer Grant moved her husband’s SUV from in front of the massage parlor where he allegedly raped one of the Chinese women to a location far away from both the parlor and the Grants’ home. Gee, thanks, honey! Now why would she do that? The Good Wife Prosecutor swears that she took no evidence from the SUV except a garage key card, but a search warrant affidavit indicates that police believed that the vehicle contained a knife, condom wrappers, phony police ID and DNA. Continue reading →

CREW vs. Issa: Biased Accuser, Guilty Accused

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

Unethical for Rep. Issa to make it, and unethical that CREW didn’t

The Center for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington does almost half a great job in its stated role as a government ethics watchdog. The supposedly non-partisan group is obviously partisan, since it goes after unethical Republican officials with frequency and relish while targeting unethical Democrats with infrequency and reluctance. CREW’s complaints, however, are almost always well-supported and legitimate. Why almost half a great job? CREW can’t be as effective in its efforts to expose unethical Republican conduct as it needs to be because its obvious bias makes the organization’s motives and judgment less trustworthy and more vulnerable to attack.

We have a perfect example in the news. “The Hill” reports that CREW….

“…has asked the Office of Congressional Ethics to investigate whether Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) violated rules by producing a video that attacks President Obama. Continue reading →

Ethics Check: Sen. Bob Menendez’s Dominican Republic Sex Scandal

/ Jack Marshall / 8 Comments

“…and how could you see him with that gray thing covering your face?”

The Daily Caller is breathlessly promoting this as a sex scandal, so I should let it speak for itself:

“Two women from the Dominican Republic told The Daily Caller that Democratic New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez paid them for sex earlier this year.
In interviews, the two women said they met Menendez around Easter at Casa de Campo, an expensive 7,000 acre resort in the Dominican Republic. They claimed Menendez agreed to pay them $500 for sex acts, but in the end they each received only $100.”

Assuming that the story is accurate, which we cannot know at this point (if ever), what does it signify regarding Menendez’s fitness to be a U.S. Senator? Well, he didn’t break any laws: prostitution is legal in the Dominican Republic. The Senator wasn’t betraying his wife: he is divorced.

The incident reflects badly upon his character if, as the women allege, he agreed to pay them one fee and stiffed them (poor choice of words, sorry) cheated them by paying them less, with a “take it or leave it, I’m a U.S. Senator” brush-off. That’s truly unethical and mean behavior, and would demonstrate actual contempt for women (as opposed to much of what Menendez’s party has been labeling as such this election season) as well as a penchant for abusing power and breaking his word.

However, the Senator could also be a victim of some women seeking a pay-off after a commercial dispute, or a failed shakedown. Given the uncertainty, I don’t believe it’s fair for this incident to hurt Sen. Menendez’s standing with his constituents or the public, and The Daily Caller was wrong to publicize it.
_____________________________

Facts: Daily Caller

Graphic: Daily Caller

Jury Summation: 20 Conclusions Regarding Elizabeth Warren’s Law License Controversy

/ Jack Marshall / 13 Comments

1. Elizabeth Warren may have engaged in the unauthorized practice of law in Massachusetts at various times.

2. It is not as clear that she has done so as her primary accuser, Prof. Jacobson, appears to believe, nor is it as certain that she has not done so as her reflexive defenders assert.

3. If she did practice Massachusetts law without a license, it is very unlikely that she did so intentionally.

4. It is also likely that at this moment, she herself is unsure whether she did or not.

5. I very much doubt that if she did as Prof. Jacobson asserts,  that would lead to discipline by the Massachusetts Bar. The discussion of the issues surrounding Warren’s situation make it clear that a) the whole area of unauthorized practice when it involves state and Federal law is relatively unresolved and murky, with even  legal ethics experts in disagreement, b) it would be impossible to separate the professional regulation of the matter from its political content, and 3) any time members of the disciplinary committee slap their foreheads and say, “Damned if I know!” when the discussion turns to what the rules require, discipline is unlikely, and properly so.

6. The fact that Warren may have blundered into UPL between the varying requirements of her two bar memberships and her intermittent practice in Massachusetts does not make her unfit to practice law.

7. It may, combined with her unwillingness to candidly and thoroughly reveal all documents that bear on the issue, call into question her fitness to be a U.S. Senator, especially one running on the proposition that regulations on another profession (the financial sector) need to be strictly followed and tightly enforced. It definitely is worth exploring and explaining to voters, which the mainstream media clearly does not intend to do. Continue reading →

As Dean Wormer* Would Say To Bryan Craig: “Sex-Obsessed, Promiscuous and Stupid Is No Way To Be A High School Guidance Counselor, Son…”

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

The Rich Central High principal suspected something was amiss with the girls’ basketball coach when the team members began to act strangely…

A provocative variation on the “naked teacher” scenario has surfaced in Chicago suburb Olympia Fields. Bryan Craig was a guidance counselor and girls’ basketball coach at Rich Central High School until his self-published book “It’s Her Fault” came to the attention of parents and school administrators. Then he was placed on administrative leave, and finally, fired.  The book is for mature audiences only, and based on reports (I haven’t read it and have no intention of doing so) includes pick-up advice, analysis of female body types (including a discussion of the varying colors and temperature levels of the vaginas of various races, apparently the book’s highlight) and Craig’s insight into how women think, a perspective that appears to be muddled at best and sexist at worst. Here is a passage from the book (in an Amazon reader’s review—a favorable one, and from a teenage stripper):

“In some cases, strippers and dancers show the overall dominance a woman can have over a man. Not to say that stripping is what has to be done to truly establish dominance, but these women’s mind-set is in the right place in order to meet the true potential of the point of this book.” Continue reading →