Category Archives: Ethics

American Pharoah Flogged To Victory

Environmentalism & Animal Rights, Ethics, Sport

They’re both superb specimen. The one, however, is whipped into victory. American Pharoah, a beautiful and brave racehorse, won the Belmont Stakes on Saturday. American Pharoah’s jockey, Victor Espinoza, is a demonic dwarf who is known for breaking the horse’s skin.

I imagine this deformed tormentor will be celebrated as a big money maker, and the real workhorse will not get so much as a sugar lump.

The other exceptional specimen is, of course, Serena Williams. Serena won the French Open, also on Saturday, “and claimed a landmark 20th grand slam title and third in Paris.”

Serena is a human being, so she isn’t ridden to victory; or beaten into championship. Should American Pharoah suffer indignities because he is a horse? How about it?

UPDATED (6/7/2017) Political Pimps Feathering Their Nest On The Public Dime

Democrats, Ethics, Politics, Republicans, Ron Paul

UPDATE (6/7/017):

The Post below is from 2015, but the problem is ongoing and undetected. Politicians arrive in DC and right away begin feathering the nest and flogging products, on the taxpayer’s dime. Conservatives detect nothing unethical. Sen Mike Lee is selling a book. AGAIN.

*******************
What do you know? Senators Rand Paul and Mike Lee were on Fox New today to flog their books, among other things. The problematic Patriot Act and its impending renewal seemed incidental to the job of promoting their products on our dime. So lax are the ethical standards that bind these politicians that they can move seamlessly between their roles as politicians, authors and all-round eternal self-promoters.

It sticks in one’s craw that we pay them to feather their nests. Ron Paul also used his celebrity to sell stuff (although I forgave him because of his outstanding service to liberty). To be honest, I’ve never read a book of his. He’s not a particularly good writer. I am sure the former congressman did not improve on Murray Rothbard when it comes to thinking about the Federal Reserve’s workings. I’ll stick with Rothbard. I have his books.

Savoring #Hillary’s Vow Of Silence

Classical Liberalism, Ethics, Hillary Clinton, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Taxation

“Savoring Hillary’s Vow Of Silence” is the current column, now on WND. An excerpt:

The national media are sulking. Hillary Clinton won’t speak to them. But what is it about this power-hungry dirigista that the media don’t already know?

Prior to taking a vow of silence, Mrs. Clinton promised to make President Obama’s legislation by executive action with respect to immigration seem like child’s play; a “DREAMers” delight, if you will.

Where’s the mystery there?

Big Media know full-well about—and have just about forgiven—Madam Secretary’s habit of conducting state affairs via private server, later scrubbed clean of unflattering or incriminating communications.

The same press corps knows that the Clinton Foundation, in which Mrs. Clinton is mired, is awash in funds from foreign governments and likely beholden to these patrons. Those so inclined can check out Charity Navigator. For all its billions, the Clinton Foundation doesn’t rate a mention by the eminent Charity rating service. “In 2013, a measly 9 percent of the money went to charity!” “Repulsive,” avers John Stossel.

Making community college “free” was another of Hillary’s brain infarcts, voiced in Monticello, Iowa, in March this year. “There’s something deeply wrong about students and their families needing to go into debt to finance a college education” were Mrs. Clinton’s semantic strokes of genius, disgorged during her first meet-and-greet, with members of the press (mainly).

What’s there to miss?

Didn’t we have The Same Talk (in the same place) back in April of 2012, about America’s next financial bubble in search of a pin, the $1 trillion student-loan debt? Campaigning in Iowa, Obama promised America’s miseducated Millennials to keep the student-loan bubble from bursting. During his State of the Union address of January 2012, Barry Soetoro Frankenstein vowed to mandate yet more loans at fixed prices.

When it comes, will the media react with wonderment at Hillary’s “fresh” take on educational central planning and price fixing?

Not content with acquiring wealth through the dishonest, predatory process of politics (to contrast with the honest, productive, economic means of earning a living)—Hillary Clinton and husband have protected their ill-gotten gains from the taxman through trusts …

… Read the rest. “Savoring Hillary’s Vow Of Silence” is the current column, now on WND.

Cyril Wecht On Freddie Gray’s Likely Cause of Death

Criminal Injustice, Ethics, Race, Reason, Science

Forensic pathologist Cyril Wecht has been around the block a few times. Two minutes and 31 seconds into this typically tedious, CNN broadcast, Dr. Wecht ventures the following with conviction, about the Freddie Gray murder. I paraphrase:

Legs shackled and hands cuffed, placed in a prone position, face down—a position that has been banned for decades, claims Wecht—how, pray tell, did Freddie Gray run around, banging himself against the van’s interior?

The victim is yelling and screaming for help. His body is inert and the van is moving. Right there is the velocity needed to create the force for the injuries! Those injuries are not spontaneous pathological fractures; the injuries came as the body flapped back and forth, breaking the vertebrae in the neck and eventually severing the spinal cord.

Indubitably, the injuries were sustained by the police by their stopping Gray. Gray did not sustain those spontaneously. Also quite possible, says Wecht, and as I’ve hypothesized, the initial injuries were produced when police compressed and leaned into Gray’s back, to be aggravated by the flopping around in the van.