“I spent some time… further improving my analysis on why Madoff Investment Securities LLC is likely a Ponzi Scheme… The entire report ties in to Fairfield Sentry Ltd., a third party hedge fund that has over $5 billion invested in Madoff Investment Securities, LLC.” – Extract of email sent to the SEC by Harry Markopolos, Nov. 7, 2005 “The staff has found...

“I am in this race to tell the corporate lobbyists that their days of setting the agenda in Washington are over. I have done more than any other candidate in this race to take on lobbyists — and won. They have not funded my campaign, they will not run my White House, and they will not drown out the voices...

What will it take for some people to get the message? In the case of Illinois Democratic Governor Rod Blagojevich when U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald (he’s the guy that succeeded in convicting former Vice-Presidential aid “Scooter” Libby) comes knocking on your door, the news can’t be good. Blagojevich’s first response:  “You’re joking, right?” What isn’t a joke is how the Illinois governor...

Digging deeper into the write-in responses from the Capps/Zogby Poll entitled, What Americans Expect from the Next President and Congress, I was struck by the direct, sometimes blunt language and emotion from Americans. In response to what qualities the country needs most from the next president, most offered a list of traits, many more took the time to put forth their own...

On November 13, a 17-year-old grocery bagger, found a brown, canvas money bag in the bathroom of the supermarket where he works.  When he opened it, he found $10,000 in cash. According to McClatchy Newspapers, the bag was “Stuffed with 50- and hundred-dollar bills… the life savings of a Vancouver, Washington man who accidentally left it in the men’s bathroom at...

One of my earliest memories of school days was reading and working on reports from the World Book Encyclopedia. These hard-bound, red-covered books came in a 19-volume set produced by the Quarrie Corporation.  The copyright on my edition is 1941, but the copyright dates back to 1917! These highly-readable, illustrated books were the primary source for any and all questions and reports...

The Gallup organization’s annual Honesty and Ethics poll gave nurses the highest ranking out of twenty-one professions for the seventh straight year! “Eighty-four percent of Americans,” Gallup reported, “call their honesty and ethical standards either ‘high’ or ‘very high.’…” This speaks directly to the issue of trust.  Clearly patients, doctors, administrators and others believe that nurses have the highest level...

Working with the Walter H. Capps Center for the Study of Ethics, Religion and Public Life, and the help of pollster John Zogby, we put a three question, post-election survey into the field on November 5th and 6th: 1.  What one or two qualities do you think the country needs most from the new president? 2.  What one or two actions...

Everyone and their brother is giving advice to President-elect Barack Obama these days.  (Mine was put forth in a letter addressed to both candidates the day before the election.) Listening to NPR’s “Morning Edition” yesterday, correspondent Steve Inskeep reported that Phyllis Palmer’s kindergarten class (not pictured) in Essex Junction, Vermont wrote their own memo to President-elect Obama. Here’s the advice the Vermont kindergarteners had for...

Continuing my conversation with Rabbi Rami Shapiro. How do you get people to look for the deeper, ethical insight in their beliefs? “I usually pull up all the stuff in the Bible that makes no sense, ethically. “A lot of people like to talk about Joshua at the battle of Jericho, where they knock the walls down, and there’s this great miracle...