Tag Archives: legal

Balloon Family Attorney: Dizzy or Well-spun?

HandcuffsRecent news stories, most notably those in The New York Times and on NBC’s Today Show, have taken particular note of the comments of David Lane, the attorney representing Richard Heene (Balloon Dad) regarding the upcoming, perhaps inevitable, arrest of Mr. Heene and potentially his wife (who is being represented by a different attorney).

Mr. Lane’s comments are best summarized by one of his talking points (because that’s what it is, let’s not kid ourselves) in his interview with the Today Show — “Do not do the perp walk for media consumption and arrest these people in full view of their children. That’s child abuse.” Continue reading

Ethics…you mean there are ethics?

ms. Campbell, who was kind enough to grace me with her xomapny at dinner last week along w/ ms. Vallejo and ms sena, recently brought us this blog post addressing ethics in our chosen profession — the great world of public relations in it’s various forms.
as in many other fields there are some bright lines that we dare nit cross. then there are those ethically grey areas. yes(!) — there can be ethically grey areas, not evwrythjng is black or white. these usually pop up when our own ethical rules for various areas of our life come into conflict and we must step up and make that decision of what/which is most important to us.
first let’s understand that ethics is diferejt than morality and differnt than legality. that could be (and is likely) the topic of thousands of blog posts (an dissertations). but for the purpose of separating the issues consider a physician in a state that does not permit assisted suicide.  certainly the doxtor’s priority is healing the sick, but in circumstances where that is a lost cause where does the physician’s duty lie — to his science to continue treating the untreatable or to end the suffering of his patient in any way he can.
certainly our own issues are rarely this dire but on a near daily basis we can potentilly confronted with issues where our various duties lie in conflict.
I do work with accounkng firms. not infrequently they’re called upon to present expert pinion on relevant topics.

This one’s in response (expansion) to a post from the lovely Ms. Campbell (@prsoapbox), who was kind enough to grace me with her company at dinner last week along with Ms. Vallejo and Ms. Sena. She recently brought us this blog post addressing the ethics in our chosen profession—the great world of public relations in its various forms.

As in many other fields, there are some bright lines that we dare not cross. Then there are those ethically grey areas.  Yes (!)—there can be ethically grey areas, not everything is easily placed on a black or white square. These usually pop up when our own ethical rules for various areas of our life (personal and professional) come into conflict and we must step up and make the decision of what/which is most important to us.

Continue reading