Nope, no bias to see here.

I was in Hartford, Connecticut over the weekend, and in my hotel room was a magazine for tourists that detailed a number of restaurants, sites to see and other things to help tourists. It was a monthly magazine, and this was the August issue. Inexplicably, they also had a column called "Ask the Ethics Guy". Umm, OK, that seems odd for a publication like this. The only connection I could find was that it was written by Samuel L. Schrager, a professor at the local business school.

The first question was from someone who was in a public location and two women started chatting in Korean, which the person (who presumably didn't look remotely Korean) actually understood, and the person moved so as not to be able to hear the personal conversation. The person asked under what situations someone would be obligated to divulge that he/she could understand the foreign language being spoken.

The gist of Mr. Schrager's answer seemed to make sense to me - you're in a public location, and anyone who has a conversation in a public location, no matter what language they might be speaking, has to know that they might be overheard by someone else.

However, in the course of his answer, he rephrased the question as "is eavesdropping unethical" and initially responded with "The Bush administration would answer with a resounding 'NO'" and later goes on to say that if you use special listening devices like wiretaps without a warrant or permission, then that's completely unethical.

Ummm, excuse me? Did I miss a question? Was the original question edited so much between what was presented to him and what made it to print that his answer now references issues that are never presented nor even hinted at in the original question? What in the hell does being in a public place and having people talking nearby have anything to do with wiretapping and the Bush administration? Oh, I see, this must be one of those non-existent liberal biases rearing its ugly head that no ones seems to cop to. Because of course two people talking within earshot of you is *exactly* the same as the government using a clandestine listening device.

I am not a fan of Rosie O'Donnell. However, if there was a discussion of starving children going on, and someone were to say, "Well, you know Rosie O'Donnell was never a starving child because she's so fat, but I'll bet she starves those kids she adopted because she eats all their food," I would be equally as appalled even though I don't care for her. It doesn't matter whether or not I like the person - I am still capable of seeing when a reference is entirely inappropriate.

Nice to know that this Mr. Schrager is teaching business ethics to students.