Jack_Abramoff

Casino Jack and the United States of Money Lobbyists have played such powerful roles in American politic, but many people were not aware of how deep and pernicious their influence truly was until Jack Abramoff became the heart of a massive corruption scandal that ties to several leading members of the Republican Party and even the White House. “Casino Jack and the United States of Money” by Alex Gibney chronicles the rise and fall of Jack Abramoff and how his political and financial ambitions have taken him into the 2006 corruption scandal that led to the conviction of himself of fraud, conspiracy, tax evasion and trading expensive gifts, meals, and sport trips in exchange for political favors. Jack Abramoff and his allies were so good at creating phony grass-roots campaigns to hide big corporate money and the old-fashioned flimflam, playing one client against another. They persuaded Christian activists to fund anti-gambling campaigns against Indian tribes, who then paid Abramoff to muster congressional support in defense of their casinos. Jack Abramoff first violated Kantian moral theory, which has the golden rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. From his point of view, Jack who deceives and inflicts pain on others on purposes might cheerfully say that he would have others do unto him as he is doing unto them. Secondly, he used people as mere means by deceiving them, for instance, mail fraud to his clients, by coercing to harm people’s reputation if they do not cooperate with him, and by providing inciting offers. It is clearly to say deception and coercion were important mechanisms whereby Jack’s using takes place. Last but not least, Jack Abramoff ethnically degraded a race by calling them “ monkey morons”. This is a mistake on the ground of virtue ethics: a person does not have the right to treat others as something less than a person.