TULSA, Okla. (AP) - The Oklahoma Ethics Commission has voted unanimously to name a former U.S. attorney as the agency's chairman. John Raley is an outspoken critic of the state Legislature's failure to adequately fund the commission, a watchdog department that keeps an eye on politicians' campaigns.

Recently, Google has taken what appears to be a distinctly less transparent and open approach to their news distribution search engine. Matthew Lee maintains a small blog/website called http://www.innercitypress.com/ and has a reputation for hounding the UN - specifically the UNDP about what he considers corruption. Recently though, google announced a partnership with the UNDP and here is what happened next:

(it seems that) "... someone at the UNDP had pressured Google into "de-listing" him from Google News — essentially preventing Inner City Press from being classified on Google News as a legitimate news source and from having its stories pop up when someone conducts a Google News search."

The Ethics Resource Center in Washington DC has released an interesting document for anyone active in the Ethics & Compliance Officer field - see the quotes below which give a taste of the subject of the document:

[quote=The Ethics Resource Center (See: http://www.ethics.org/CECO/)]"This paper responds to a problem expressed by many professionals tasked with leading the ethics and compliance efforts in their organizations: most CECOs do not believe they have been given sufficient authority and resources to accomplish their missions. Even further, they struggle to raise the discussion with executives and directors."[/quote]

In a very interesting step recently, the "Zionsville Town Council approved 5-0 Monday, Dec. 3, an expanded conflict of interest policy that includes a clause urging council members to recuse themselves from any vote involving a campaign contributor."

In this article published in the Orlando Sentinel, the "Consultant" referred to was Carla Miller, of CityEthics, in a workshop presented in the spring of 2007.

From: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/opinion/views/orl-ethics1707dec17,0,...

Richard Foglesong | Special To The Sentinel   (Orlando)

December 17, 2007

The Jacksonville Daily Record today published a story covering the first ethics training since the new code revisions were ratified by Council on Tuesday last week.
"Miller instructed the Council staff not to get too bogged down in the technicalities of the law, but to adopt an overall ethical mind set to help guide their decision-making."

Global warming battle goes local as city mayors launch green initiatives
See: www.NewsTarget.com/022261.html
Quote: "Mayors from around the world presented plans to reduce their cities' greenhouse gas emissions at an international conference of mayors in New York City earlier this year. "Unfortunately, it has fallen to the mayors to do it because at the federal level in this country and other countries, they seem to be tied up," said Michael Bloomberg, mayor of New York."

See: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/12/071203-AP-aus-kyoto.html
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd signed the instrument of ratification in his first act after being sworn in this morning.
The ratification will come into force in 90 days.

Found this site today:
http://www.governmentdocs.org/
Their Description: www.governmentdocs.org was created to advance the values of open and accountable government. This site gives the public an unprecedented level of access to government documents by allowing users to browse, search, and review hundreds of thousands of pages acquired through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and other public disclosure, or “sunshine,” laws."

If you have any documents that you would like to be available, you can register with the site, and submit your FOIA documents...
http://governmentdocs.org/ is associated with CREW: http://www.citizensforethics.org/ - doing a great job to open up transparency of (mostly federal) government.