Victor Henderson's Blog

Ethics Class - February 25, 2009 Installment

2009-02-25T16:47:00.000-08:00

Ah, its ethics class again. You can never have a bad class, I mean the conversations are great, they get a little rambunctious at times, and at times a little off the topic of ethics, but I digress. Let's talk about tonight's class.

We started conversation with looking at the issue of the recently newsworthly woman, the Octopulet mother. Was it ethical for her to go and have those embryos implanted into her? hey its life, i am all for being pro-life, and her getting those embryos implanted in her was not an ethical issue, at least not for her. The class did bring up the doctor in the conversations, but also referred to her as an ethical question. Keep in mind this woman already had six kids and is on food stamps. I would say this borders on a legal issue, or at least a sanity issue for her. Here's my take. Is it legal for this woman to have these embryos implanted in her or is she sane to have these embryos implanted? Is it really a legal issue? Maybe not, but maybe it should be. It's not an ethical violation for her, but she just brought 8 kids into the world, when she is already on food stamps, has 6 kids, and has no job. This borders on the issue of child neglect and child welfare. That makes it a legal issue. Is she sane? No, we should definitely be questioning that, but nonetheless, is it our place to tell her NO. No, its not. However, the doctor needs to be checked and his medical license stripped from him breaking rules on implanting so many embryos into one woman. The issue of Roe v. Wade came up in the class, but hey, I am not going to go into the government telling people if they can have kids or not, we have hit that issue hard before and everyone can tell by other notes how I feel on the issue.

Burris was the next issue in the class. He was the Senator appointed to fill Obama's seat by the now impeached, convicted, and removed from office, Governor Blago of Illinois. People are demanding that he resign? Look man, he's in there, he doesn't have to resign, get over it. The FBI has interviewed him and such and has said that there is no wrongdoing on his part. So he failed to disclose that someone had contacted him about campaign donations. Did he give campaign donations? Thats the big thing, if he did then we have an issue, an ethical and legal issue, but he didn't. We need to get over it, and give this man a chance as Senator, even though I am sure he won't be the type of Senator that I would want, but I digress. Ah and then branching off from the discussion we talked about Clinton, and his infidelity while in office. The issue wasn't about his infidelity, the issue when he was in office was about his obstruction of justice and perjury and stuff. Let's talk about ethics here. He broke the law, he should have been impeached and convicted, and given jail or fines just as any other citizen gets.

And then with all that, we got onto the topic of our Anne Arundel County Executive. He was said to be in a car having sex in a mall parking lot. The police that responded never went up to the car. People began saying that they didn't care if he was having sex in the car, and quite frankly, either do i, BUT that is not the issue for an ethics class. Were the police giving him special privileges because he was the County Executive, that was the question. Now, obviously on the issue of County Executive Leopold and this alleged act, I am not going to go on because of my political appointment from him and my political connections to him, though I could go on for pages and hours about my thoughts on this topic.

Yet, what I will speak about is the topic a class member brought up. They said they don't care about some County Executive having sex in his car, and its not a topic that needs to be discussed, but a topic that would need to be discussed is something like the United States Government knowing about 9/11 before it happened. That was way off topic, but since it was brought up, let me talk about it for a second. Yes, the US Government knew about it, well, at least had information on it, but hey, then again we had information on millions of other possible attacks too, and those millions of pieces of information and tapes were being sifted through by a few individuals in comparison to all of the material that needed to be checked. I mean come on, could you really have prevented 9/11? No, at least not the US Government. Maybe the state governments could have prevented 9/11 by stopping people who were not US Citizens from getting their licenses, but I can't discuss that either... And what if we really did know all of the details about 9/11? Are you just going to ground all airplanes on that day? It would just happen the next day, and imagine the thousands of people flying that day that would be so upset if all planes were grounded because of some possible attack, that has been threatened before. And again, if we did know about it, would the government just start shooting down passenger airlines? NO! Imagine the backlash! I mean come on folks!

And lastly, profitting from tragedy? Chief Moose was the topic starter. Again they brought up things like 9/11. Chief Moose was not the only one profitting from the tragedy, the locations that were involved got a lot of attention, were showed in high regard for acting in a professional manner, and that is what we want! People profit from tragedy everyday, but we have to turn and look at the brighter sides, like the good that can come from it.

America Becoming a Dictatorship?

2009-01-30T16:05:00.000-08:00

Today Vice President Biden said that any Executive that accepted a multi-million dollar bonus and those that gave them the bonus should be locked in jail. And Barack Obama said that the private companies would NOT BE ALLOWED to give those big of bonuses. I agree that the bonuses are rather high, and very disturbing, definitely as they are laying off workers, BUT in the end they are private companies.

Unless something happened that I didn't know we live in the United States. In the United States we have freedom to do what we want, our private companies have always had the freedom to run their own companies without the government getting involved. When the government gets involved they begin running the companies themselves, and therefore becoming a dictatorship. You most certainly can not tell a company executive that you are going to throw them in jail because they accepted something that was perfectly legal for their company to give them, and the company had every right to do. We need to stay out of the business of the private companies.

We need to make sure that America stays free...

Legal and Ethical Environments of Public Administration

2009-01-28T15:40:00.000-08:00

Oh this class is going to be lots of fun! I can see that I am not part of the majority in my political leanings just by the way class discussion went this night. But hey, we got out early, and the teacher is cool, so that makes class great.

But let's see, we talked about the difference between what is ethical and legal. What was brought up:

Death Penalty: Who or what gives the Government the authority to kill someone?
Answer: hey folks, the government is the final answer when it comes to punishment for crimes. We have laws for a reason. It is illegal to kill, and you must be penalized if you break that law. Now, yes, the government is killing, but there is a difference between murder, and killing. The government is killing a human being that took another life. It is to prevent more life from being taken by that person, and to show people exactly what happens when you kill someone. We should not be gentle to those people. The saying that goes that there should be an "eye for an eye" and therefore a "life for life."

Guantanamo Bay: Is it legal and/or ethical to be open?
Yes! I agree those people should have been tried already, and that no torture should have taken place, but it is much better to have war criminals and terrorists on foreign soil. Sorry, just my opinion. After 9/11 I would rather terrorists be on foreign soil. President Bush certainly didn't handle it right, but hey we weren't attacked since 9/11 were we?

Mayor Dixon: Was what she did wrong?
It was ethically wrong what she did! Most people agree with that. Should she be Mayor, probably not! but what she did, was it technically illegal, that is very debatable. The class kind of agreed on this.

Oh wait! There was this girl next to me in our discussion group talking about conspiracy theories. You know, the one where supposedly Mexico, Canada, and the United States are coming together because we are falling to the Euro. Oh come on! then she was calling the Real ID program a conspiracy to track our every move. The Real ID program is to be implemented to make us safer, and more knowledgable about our surroundings and people. the United States does not have the staff to track every person, every moment of the day. The talk about conspiracy theories was getting a little out of hand, but hey it made it interesting.

There were many more things. But yea, it was certain things that made me think this class will be a lot of fun. There can be a lot of debate in this class. And debate excites me! Definitely if it is on topics like this, and politics. Oh, we are ready to get this party started!

Biden Mocks Chief Justice Roberts... have we forgotten?

2009-01-28T13:43:00.000-08:00

Vice President Joe Biden apologized for mocking Chief Justice John Roberts about his flubbing of the Oath of Office for President Barack Obama. He said it was joke gone bad. Let's see, for the flubbing of the Oath of Office by Chief Justice John Roberts, hey it happens. People make mistakes. John Roberts made it better when he apologized to Barack Obama for messing up ONE WORD in the oath of office. He then to make certain Barack Obama was the legal and legimate President of the United States came to the White House the next day and swore him in again. It was John Roberts first inauguration to swear in the President of the United States. I am sure he was slightly nervous. It is time to get over it.

Joe Biden doesn't seem to think it is time to get over it. Well Mr. Vice President, America has seemingly got over your plagiarism of speeches, and it wasn't even really brought up during the campaign season, though maybe it should have. Get over it. We got over your misdeeds, even though yours were a lot worse.

I am glad to see that Joe Biden apologized, but maybe he should have thought about what he was saying before he spoke, and put himself in John Roberts shoes, or even his own awhile back. What an idiot he is. And we elected him to be our Vice President, yay!

Coach Charged In Heat-Releated Death

2009-01-27T12:47:00.000-08:00

As a coach of high school sports myself I was saddened to see a story today on WJZ, and then read about it as well. A coach was has been criminally charged in the death of a high school athlete because that child died of a heat-related death. Please don't get me wrong, I feel for the family and friends of that child. Having some one you love taken from you is such a hard thing to deal with. But, charging the coach? Come on! I understand thoroughly that a coach is responsible and is liable if anything happens to one of their athlete's at a practice. This charge against the coach is a little extreme though.

We have a teenager, who is in high school and very capable of knowing what his health needs are, a high school football team, and water for the players to drink. What went wrong? Did the teenager not want to go get water? It's obvious that the coach wasn't stopping anyone, no one else died or was hospitalized. This person had a good head on their shoulders. What stopped them from getting the water that they know they needed. It's not rocket science to have to do this.

Either way, enough of attacking the logic here. Can a coach tell what is going on in the mind of their athletes? No! How was this coach supposed to know anything was wrong when this kid had the chance to get water like everyone else, and wasn't. The coach is there for health and safety, but is not there to be a parent. High School sports along with too many other things in our childrens lives have become baby sitting services. Coaches, teachers, mentors, and many more are not the parents, and if the parents show up and watch their child practice or play in a game then they can watch them every second of the time and harrass them to drink water. Ultimately in the end, all the coach can do is provide the water, and if he or she feels they need to they can suggest that you drink some water. It is your choice as the athlete in the end whether or not to do so.

The charges need to be dropped against this coach, or if not dropped then he must be acquitted, or we are going down a slippery slope that we shouldn't be.

Please read the story at: http://wjz.com/national/kentucky.coach.15.2.917866.html

Obama and Abortion Overseas

2009-01-22T17:34:00.000-08:00

Obama is now the 44th President of the United States. Congratulations Barack. I wish him the best of luck in getting this nation back on track with respect to our economy.

But now to the idea of the blog. When I looked at the news today I was quite upset. The first thing I saw was that foreign organizations that provide abortions will again be allowed to receive funding for those abortions that they provide. This is something that President Bush had stopped, and I thank him very much for that. It's a real problem that he will support organizations that provide abortions overseas. It is not our problem, and even if it was, it is not the job of the government to be funding the mass killing of innocent individuals.

Today being the anniversary of Roe v. Wade it is sad that it was all released today. Many millions of innocent unborn babies have been murdered by abortions since it was allowed in by Roe v. Wade. It saddens me that we have reduced the sanctity of life this far, and now we have a President in office that is fine with the mass killing of the unborn. They our human, and deserve the chance that each and everyone of us have gotten.

It is time to stand up for life, and against Barack Obama on this issue. Stand up for life.