“The request came in by e-mail around 2 in the afternoon. It was from a previous customer, and she had urgent business. ‘You did me business ethics propsal for me I need propsal got approved pls can you will write me paper?’ “I’ve gotten pretty good at interpreting this kind of correspondence. The client had attached a document from her...

Several years ago I was in Philadelphia speaking to about 400 administrators and trustees of a large teacher pension fund. At the end of the talk, I left the group with a story that asks, in essence, if we all had to make decisions with our families looking over our shoulder, would we be comfortable, proudeven, of the decisions we make?...

Last month, Gawker.com posted a story about how Delaware Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell allegedly spent a randy Halloween night several years ago with a man she had just met. The site’s owner acknowledged that it paid the anonymous source $4,000 for his first-person account. Several other major news sites picked up the story. Deadspin.com paid about $12,000 for voicemails and photos of quarterback...

“Sparky”… now that’s a name that could only be tagged to a baseball player, except he didn’t play the game, he managed it. Anderson died last week at 76. “Sparky was, by far, the best manager I ever played for,” saidCincinnati Reds Pete Rose. “He understood people better than anyone I ever met. His players loved him, he loved his players,...

In my Honesty and Trust report (Aug. 2006), The Center for Cultural Studies and Analysis wrote, “The survey reflects a growing perception of a large gap between the values of corporations and government institutions and the values of the American middle class. Values gaps are always perceived as threatening, and a perceived threat to the middle class inevitably leads to social action as it...

Once upon a time, in a country wide and beautiful, there was a very audacious and flamboyant financier who liked to wear very nice clothes. (Here he is in his gold tie and pinstripe finery.) One day, this very daring man saw a need in the housing market, and lo, with a skill for salesmanship and the help of the...

I don’t know about you, but I am sick and tired of the current process used to elect public officials. Local, state, national, it makes no difference. The process is far too long, uses questionable “facts,” relies on negative campaigning and wastes too damn much money. How much?  According to the U.K.s Guardian, the Obama presidential campaign, including the transition and...

  This just may be the most explosive story of the last… 8 minutes! Men, right now, as I write this, my pants, you’re pants could be lying to you! “Come on, Jim. You’ve lost it, this time!” That’s right. You heard me correctly. You’re favorite ol’ blue jeans, Dockers, Calvin Kleins and others could very well be brought up on ethics charges.  » Read more about:...

Baseball is a game obsessed with the number nine: nine players on each team; nine innings; ninety feet between the bases; and if you’re a pitcher with “stuff,” three strikes against three batters total nine and you’re out of the inning. Think of the players that wore the number 9: Roger Maris, Bill Mazeroski, Minnie Minoso, Enos Slaughter, Reggie Jackson...

The first ethics talk I gave was in September 1995 before 400 California teachers. I remember checking into the hotel about five hours before I was due to speak. I don’t know how other speakers prepare, but I am constantly writing and rewriting – sometimes just before I go on – all in an effort to include the most current news stories....