usmbguest5318
Gold Member
Karma. Kismet. Call it what you want. It's real.
In April 2016, Stephen Miller (the guy who is little but the male version of K. Conway) ridiculed Hillary Clinton for not taking the ethics training offered to her and her staff. (Three of her nine immediate staff members are known to have taken the training.) Miller cited RNC documents as the basis for his charge. Moreover, in attempting to draw a contrast between Mrs. Clinton and Trump, Miller remarked, "Mr. Trump has proposed new ethics reforms to restore honor to our government."
Those were the Trump campaign's accusations; however, they didn't have any corroborating documentation from the Dept. of State (DoS). Indeed, the DoS stated that the Privacy Act prevents them from confirming if employees completed training. They say the lack of records does not necessarily mean employees did not take the training, just that the department track whether they did.
One could not ask for a more palpably literal illustration of the fact that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. We all know, after all, that such arguments are overwhelmingly fallacious; it's called, unsurprisingly given that it's a common conservative line of argument, and it's got a long tradition in the Republican party in particular. It's emblematic of the general malaise of anti-intellectualism in the GOP and the argument form itself is fittingly called "argumentum ad ignorantiam", argument from ignorance. And it's not just liberals who see the cognitive opacity among conservatives. Daniel McCarthy, writing for the American Conservative, remarked that "conservative" now "signifies a partisan tendency that would prefer not to have intellectual overtones."
The inanity, inexperience, intransigence and indolence of the Trump does not stop there. They too skipped ethics training. "Unlike the staffers serving under Presidents Bush and Obama, White House officials working for President Trump were not treated to an ethics course that could have helped them avoid some of the upheaval in the first month of Trump’s presidency." Trump's Administration have implied, moreover, that they did the training in-house rather than availing themselves of the insights of ethics experts.
Really? REALLY??? Who with the sense the sense God gave a goose would think that the organization led by a man who pretended to be his own publicist, a man who barges into ladies' dressing rooms, a man who brags about sexually assaulting women, a man fined for falsifying his charitable contributions, a man who rivals Aesop for telling tall tales on matters of all degrees of importance, a man for whom "transparency" is a dirty word, a man who refuses to take responsibility for his own decisions, a man who berated the parents of a fallen soldier, a man who didn't serve in the military yet doesn't like John McCain because he was captured in Vietnam....the list goes on and on and on....who would think a team led by such a man should demure when offered ethics training?
No group of individuals has ever more needed that particular kind of training. Who among the top staffers has prior governmental executive level experience? Chief of Staff Priebus? No. Advisors Conway or Bannon? No. Trump? No. Press Secretary Spicer? No. Trump's children? No. Just how far down into the ranks of WH staff must one look before finding someone well versed with the standards of ethics applicable to the WH's leadership? Furthermore, is there any reason to think that if they raised ethical concerns, Trump would heed their advice? I don't think so. Hell, people can't even get him not to tweet or say stupid shit. How are they to stop him from doing stupid shit?
The fact of the matter is that the Trump Administration is, from top to bottom, teams with ethically turpitudinous people. No ethical foundation at all, and a leader who is the definitional opposite of ethical. And they are who's going to "drain the swamp?"
Thread Topic/Questions:
In April 2016, Stephen Miller (the guy who is little but the male version of K. Conway) ridiculed Hillary Clinton for not taking the ethics training offered to her and her staff. (Three of her nine immediate staff members are known to have taken the training.) Miller cited RNC documents as the basis for his charge. Moreover, in attempting to draw a contrast between Mrs. Clinton and Trump, Miller remarked, "Mr. Trump has proposed new ethics reforms to restore honor to our government."
Those were the Trump campaign's accusations; however, they didn't have any corroborating documentation from the Dept. of State (DoS). Indeed, the DoS stated that the Privacy Act prevents them from confirming if employees completed training. They say the lack of records does not necessarily mean employees did not take the training, just that the department track whether they did.
One could not ask for a more palpably literal illustration of the fact that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. We all know, after all, that such arguments are overwhelmingly fallacious; it's called, unsurprisingly given that it's a common conservative line of argument, and it's got a long tradition in the Republican party in particular. It's emblematic of the general malaise of anti-intellectualism in the GOP and the argument form itself is fittingly called "argumentum ad ignorantiam", argument from ignorance. And it's not just liberals who see the cognitive opacity among conservatives. Daniel McCarthy, writing for the American Conservative, remarked that "conservative" now "signifies a partisan tendency that would prefer not to have intellectual overtones."
The inanity, inexperience, intransigence and indolence of the Trump does not stop there. They too skipped ethics training. "Unlike the staffers serving under Presidents Bush and Obama, White House officials working for President Trump were not treated to an ethics course that could have helped them avoid some of the upheaval in the first month of Trump’s presidency." Trump's Administration have implied, moreover, that they did the training in-house rather than availing themselves of the insights of ethics experts.
Really? REALLY??? Who with the sense the sense God gave a goose would think that the organization led by a man who pretended to be his own publicist, a man who barges into ladies' dressing rooms, a man who brags about sexually assaulting women, a man fined for falsifying his charitable contributions, a man who rivals Aesop for telling tall tales on matters of all degrees of importance, a man for whom "transparency" is a dirty word, a man who refuses to take responsibility for his own decisions, a man who berated the parents of a fallen soldier, a man who didn't serve in the military yet doesn't like John McCain because he was captured in Vietnam....the list goes on and on and on....who would think a team led by such a man should demure when offered ethics training?
No group of individuals has ever more needed that particular kind of training. Who among the top staffers has prior governmental executive level experience? Chief of Staff Priebus? No. Advisors Conway or Bannon? No. Trump? No. Press Secretary Spicer? No. Trump's children? No. Just how far down into the ranks of WH staff must one look before finding someone well versed with the standards of ethics applicable to the WH's leadership? Furthermore, is there any reason to think that if they raised ethical concerns, Trump would heed their advice? I don't think so. Hell, people can't even get him not to tweet or say stupid shit. How are they to stop him from doing stupid shit?
The fact of the matter is that the Trump Administration is, from top to bottom, teams with ethically turpitudinous people. No ethical foundation at all, and a leader who is the definitional opposite of ethical. And they are who's going to "drain the swamp?"
Thread Topic/Questions:
- Examples of the Trump Administration's ethical or unethical behavior:
- What manifestations of ethical behavior have you seen from high ranking members of the Trump Administration? (provide references)
- What manifestations of unethical behavior have you seen from high ranking members of the Trump Administration? (provide references)
- Trump Administration's and your understanding of the meaning of the term "appearance of impropriety"
- Should the Trump White House team have participated in the ethics training that the GAO offered to them? Why?
- What evidence is there indicating the Trump team could have themselves matched the quality of the ethics training the GAO offered to them?