Recent Ethics Commentaries

Featured image for “Clear and Present Danger”
Clear and Present Danger
Over the last few months, I have deliberately scaled back commentaries about our current president: his narcissism; his ego; his blatant dishonesty; his more than 2,000 conflicts of interest; his insistence that he knows more than anyone else; his obsessively cozy relationship with Russia’s Vladimir Putin; his “love” letters from North Korea’s Kim Jung- un; his “firings” of administration officials...
Read More
September 11, 2019
Featured image for “T.G.I.V.”
T.G.I.V.
Thank God It’s Vacation time! While the media continues to give this President the attention he craves, I’m unplugging from it all. In the meantime, I’ve selected some of the most popular commentaries. From the Philippines to Saudi Arabia; from the Netherlands to the United States, all continue to receive strong interest. I’ll return after Labor Day. The Mueller Report,...
Read More
July 26, 2019
Featured image for “Here We Go”
Here We Go
Well, it’s the bottom of the ninth, two outs. Time to bring in the top gun! For roughly five hours, all media will be consumed by the testimony of Robert Mueller sitting before two House committees. Here’s what the president said yesterday about former federal prosecutor/FBI chief Robert Mueller and his report. “There’s a lot of conflicts, he’s got. He...
Read More
July 24, 2019
Featured image for “Republicans are Lost”
Republicans are Lost
At best, the presidency of Donald Trump is bad soap opera. At worst, it undermines everything the country stands for. Lately, that’s constitutional oversight and the rule of law. Republicans in Washington are, for the most part, lost. A majority don’t work for the people they represent. They work for their own political interests. On the soap opera side, Trump’s...
Read More
May 24, 2019
Featured image for “The Mueller Report, Part 1”
The Mueller Report, Part 1
“There is in every one of us, even those who seem to be most moderate, a type of desire that is terrible, wild, and lawless.” ― Plato, The Republic Republican Senator Mitt Romney summarizes my disposition after reading the Mueller report: “I am sickened at the extent and pervasiveness of dishonesty and misdirection by individuals in the highest office of...
Read More
April 26, 2019
Featured image for “The Trouble with Barr”
The Trouble with Barr
“Ethics is knowing the difference between what you have right to do and what is right to do.” – U.S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart When Attorney General William Barr issued a four-page summary of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report, the first thought I had was, “why not just release the report and let Congress and the public read it...
Read More
April 24, 2019
Featured image for “Why We Should All See the Mueller Report”
Why We Should All See the Mueller Report
Due to the release of the Mueller Report to U.S. Attorney General William Barr, I am re-posting this commentary which originally appeared on March 6. After almost two years of investigative work examining “any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump; and any matters that arose or may arise directly...
Read More
March 23, 2019
Featured image for “The Haves v. The Have-Nots”
The Haves v. The Have-Nots
When federal prosecutors charged more than two dozen wealthy parents with bribery, and fraud for using substitute test-takers and false athletic records to gain their kids’ admissions to top colleges, many in the media were not surprised. “This large-scale grift,” Willa Paskin writes in Slate (Mar. 12), “is a window into the ethical and moral rot of our supposedly meritocratic...
Read More
March 20, 2019
Featured image for “The “Magnificent” Trumps”
The “Magnificent” Trumps
(With apologies to Booth Tarkington) The ‘magnificence’ of the Trumps began with Frederick Christ ‘Fred’ Trump, who acquired his wealth by building and selling housing to soldiers who returned from World War II and their families. Their gilded splendor lasted throughout all the years that son Donald took over his father’s company, later renamed The Trump Organization. The younger Trump...
Read More
January 4, 2019
Featured image for “Remembering Who We Are”
Remembering Who We Are
“As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words but to live by them.” – John F. Kennedy Today marks the 45th anniversary of the assassination of President John Kennedy. Perhaps the most vivid memory of Kennedy I have comes from January 20, 1961 when my seventh-grade teacher wheeled a big,...
Read More
November 22, 2018

Read Some of the Most Recent Articles
The Latest... And Often Greatest
The Supreme Court is Broken. How Do We Fix It?
As distilled from an email update from Michael Waldman, President and CEO of the Brennan Center for Justice. On Wednesday, the Supreme Court struck down...
Leadership as a Moral Act
Britain’s King Charles III spoke to a chamber that, for a moment, set aside party labels—Democrat and Republican—and listened not as factions, but as participants...
Unity is Not a Declaration. It’s a Discipline.
How does a country move from argument to action? The shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is not an isolated event. It is part...
When the Line No Longer Holds
There are moments when events reveal more than they intend. What unfolded Saturday at the Washington Hilton was not simply an isolated act. It was...
How High Can Leadership Rise?
What is power accountable to when it no longer accepts limits? We have seen what happens when power turns inward—when it begins to believe it...
The Burden of Command
What does leadership require when decisions send others into harm’s way, and uncertainty is shared not just by those in command, but by the nation...