Ethics for Dummies

eth·ics[eth-iks], plural noun 

1.a system of moral principles: the ethics of a culture. 

2. the rules of conduct recognized in respect to a 
particular class of human actions or a particular group, 
culture, etc.: medical ethics; Christian ethics. 

3.moral principles, as of an individual

    
4.That branch of philosophy dealing with values 
relating to human conduct, with respect to the
 rightness and wrongness of certain actions    
and to the goodness and badness 
of the motives and ends of such actions 
--Dictionary.com
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Doing mop up after General Petraeus got busted last year for putting his John Thomas somewhere he oughtn't have (being the Good Calvinists that we, in the United States, are), Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called for an ethics training review by the Joint Chiefs of Staff for General Officers.

Doesn't it appear a teeny wienie bit too late to wait until a person reaches General Officer rank before they get ethics training?  I mean, once wee willie is out of the barn, what is the use in shutting the fly trap door?

It also seems somewhat hypocritical that a former Central Intelligence Agency Chief espouses this ethics review when his agency oversaw illegal renditions, secret prions and torture, none of which fall under the rubric "ethical". Further, why not ethics training for civilian Department of Defense appointees, to include their shill well-paid loyal attorneys?

How about ethics training for our political leaders and the folks over at State Department and Homeland Security (DHS)?  What about the Department of Justice (DoJ)?  The National Security Counsel (NSC) and the National Security Agency (NSA)?  Treasury Department?

Who cares about ethics today?  Who questioned the legality of elective and aggressive preemptive invasions, and the ethics of Long Wars?  What has happened to the people who have questioned the incarceration and detainment of people snatched up during these illegal, protracted aggressions? Hint:  They did not get the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Marital infidelity ain't good, but it may pale next to transgressions of the murderous sort.  Message: No fuck whores, but fucking nations is o.k.  This belated consideration of ethics -- the latest installation of ass-covering as an art-form -- indicts our entire structure of education and military training, including our conception of liberal thought and what constitutes humanistic behavior.

We need more than a remediation course on ethics.

Terms of Endearment

--Government Gone Wild

who needs answers when you got words
--Plan B
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Flash: Secret Service Scandal Not Isolated Event . . . or so went the headline in yesterday's Democrat.

A Senate committee found, among 64 allegations of sexual misconduct by Secret Service employees over five years, "(t)hree cases involved inappropriate relationships with foreign nationals, and one was a complaint of non-consensual sexual intercourse. In addition, a Secret Service agent was fired in 2008 after soliciting an undercover police officer in a prostitution sting."

Isn't "non-consensual sex" rape? Why does it get hidden behind pretty words? No means "no", except not for the Secret Service.

On Thursday's "Fresh Air" on PRI, commentator Terry Gross said of a character in a recent movie, "He had an affair with the wrong woman." Is there a "right woman" with whom one should have an affair? (Certainly Bill Clinton or John Edwards would not be the right men to advise on this topic.)

When an otherwise precise and astute social observer like Gross says something like that, it seems we have had a comedown in our national mores.

--Lisa and Jim

The King is Dead; Long Live the King

Black velvet and that little boy smile
Black velvet with that slow southern style
A new religion that'll bring you to your knees
Black velvet if you please
--Black Velvet, Alannah Myles

The only correct actions are those
that demand no explanation and no apology
--Red Auerbach

You do not wake up one morning a bad person.
It happens by a thousand tiny surrenders
of self-respect to self-interest
--Robert Brault
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Ladies and Gentlemen,
Elvis has left the building

Osama bin Laden is still dead, but not forgotten.

Take the Haqqani net, one-time U.S. ally against the Soviet Union, now BFF (kinda) with Afghanistan and the Taliban against the new invaders, the U.S. Still crazy after all these years and still conducting significant operations signifying their position as top warlords.

President Obama et. al are loathe to call the Haqqani's terrorists, preferring the kinder and gentler islamist, militarist and anti-goverment fighter. The Haqqanis are also hit men, war profiteers (cheek by jowl along with the U.S. contractors), pirates and a protection racket. Considering the robust entrenchment of the Haqqanis, one must arrive at the following:

• -- The PWOT is NOT Counterinsurgency

• -- The PWOT IS a civil war

• -- There is never a shortage of volunteers for combat duty in Afghanistan

The Haqqani network has been trained in Madrassas in Afghanistan and (primarily) Pakistan for at least 35 years. This means that old grads are now the fathers and possibly grandfathers of the youngest inductees. These members don't even need a G.I. Bill to motivate them, for their ardor arises from the project of ejecting the colonialists and establishing strict Muslim law.

Accepting the three points above, what benefit then killing OBL? Did killing Jesus put a stop to the new religion of Christianity? Killing bad men may be what good men believe to be good, but that moral issue should not be the barometer of the success of U.S. military actions.