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A lie to protect oneself or to mislead others in one's own interest is as bald a conflict of interest as there can be. But since it usually involves no money, and since it is hard to prove the difference between a lie and a mistake in knowledge or interpretation (which is why the word "lie" is never used; "misrepresentation" and "false statement" are preferred terms), a lie is almost never a violation of a government ethics code. In addition, most people don't seem to think lying is such a bad...

There are many ways for elected officials to undermine democracy, but trying to scare people away from registering to vote is among the most insidious.

This is what Jeffrey M. Frederick, member of the Virginia House of Delegates (legislature) and chair of the Virginia Republican Party (RPV), is doing. According to the RPV's own press release, "Even more troubling, Frederick said, was the opportunity for identity...

A miscellany of interesting conflict of interest stories that don't merit their own blog entries:

Click here to read the rest of this blog entry.

Money may be the root of all evil, but it's a nice way to spice up ethics training.

Take the Ethics Rock! program, designed for lawyers who have lots of money to spend on CLE credits. Ethics case studies are done to the tunes of such songs as "American Pie" and "A Day in the Life." The songs are performed by a professional singer-guitarist, on tour.

Local government ethics case study songs come to...

The actual and perceived independence of an ethics commission is one of the most important aspects of a government ethics program.

The U.S. House of Representatives finally decided to be overseen by an independent Office of Congressional Ethics. Hallelujah!

And so who did the House appoint? The three Democrats are former Reps. David Skaggs (D-Colo.), Yvonne Brathwaite Burke (D-Calif.) and Karen English (D-Ariz.). The three Republicans are former Rep. Peter Goss (R-Fla...

The New York State Commission on Public Integrity released a report yesterday on the allegations relating to the Spitzer Administration's attempts to gather and make public the travel abuses of the Senate Majority Leader, in order to tarnish his reputation. See the New York Times article.

There are two issues I...