I got this via email yesterday, and gee, I hope the media covers this one (.pdf link to application for media credentials). Because there are all kinds of implications: Does the Catholic Church get to decide that, government health insurance will pay for the indefinite maintenance of someone in a persistent vegetative state because they've suddenly decided to up the ante?

And do Catholic hospital officials intend to override advance directives or medical powers of attorney? Remember, many people live in a community that has only a Catholic hospital. (While my father was dying from excruciatingly painful pancreatic cancer, he was denied a morphine drip by his Catholic pro-life doctor. The Saint said it might make dad might die a few hours sooner than he was "supposed" to, so this is more than a theoretical issue to me.)

I'd just like to remind everyone that the Catholic Church continues to make disapproving noises about unjust war and the death penalty, but I never see any public denouncements of the politicians who support them them. Instead, they throw their weight behind issues like this.

What would Jesus do? I'm guessing not this.

WASHINGTON-The full body of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) will take into account the most recent Catholic teaching on care for the chronically ill and dying when they vote on a proposed revision of the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services at their November 16-19 general assembly in Baltimore. The proposed revision states more definitively the moral obligation to provide medically assisted nutrition and hydration to patients in a "persistent vegetative state."

[...] "It would be useful to update the Ethical and Religious Directives by inclusion of references to these authoritative documents as well as byincorporation of some of their language and distinctions," said Bishop William Lori of Bridgeport, Connecticut, Chairman of the U.S. bishops' Committee on Doctrine. "It is particularly appropriate to do so since the recent clarifications by the Holy See have rendered untenable certain positions that have been defended by some Catholic ethicists."

The current Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services says, "There should be a presumption in favor of providing nutrition and hydration to all patients, including patients who require medically assisted nutrition and hydration, as long as this is of sufficient benefit to outweigh the burdens involved to the patient."

Along with other changes, the proposed revision says, "As a general rule, there is an obligation to provide patients with food and water, including medically assisted nutrition and hydration for those who cannot take food orally. This obligation extends to patients in chronic conditions (e.g., the 'persistent vegetative state') who can reasonably be expected to live indefinitely if given such care."

To be adopted, the proposed revision must be approved by a majority of bishops present and voting at the November meeting.

Ben Stein was axed by the New York Times last year for ethics violations when he appeared in a commercial for a bait and switch credit report scam. The ad claimed that consumers could get a free credit report, but in reality, they had to pay to see the real numbers.

Well, the FTC is now getting into the act and going after similar companies with some catchy commercials intended to emulate those of a popular advertising campaign by a similar bait and switch scam:

AnnualCreditReport.com is the ONLY authorized source to get your free annual credit report under federal law. The Fair Credit Reporting Act guarantees you access to a free credit report from each of the three nationwide reporting agencies — Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion — every twelve months. The Federal Trade Commission has received complaints from consumers who thought they were ordering their free annual credit report, but instead paid hidden fees or agreed to unwanted services. Don’t be fooled by TV ads, email offers, or online search results. Go to the authorized source when you request your free report. Read on...

Ok, so the ad is a little hokey, but the message is clear. I'm all for steering people to better alternatives and pointing out hackery when I can.

The Democrats are so strangely self-destructive at times, I have to say this: Please tell me they're not only investigating Democrats, but Republicans, too. Because that would just be stupid. I mean, we didn't bother going after Republican war criminals - so why single out Democrats?

House ethics investigators have scrutinized the activities of more than 30 lawmakers and several aides in inquiries about issues including defense lobbying and corporate influence peddling, according to a confidential House ethics committee report prepared in July.

The report, disclosed on a publicly accessible computer network, was made available to The Washington Post by a source familiar with such networks.

The ethics committee is one of the most secretive panels in Congress, and its members and staff members sign oaths not to disclose any activities related to its past or present investigations. Watchdog groups have accused the committee of not actively pursuing inquiries; the newly disclosed document indicates the panel is conducting far more investigations than it had revealed.

Shortly after 6 p.m. Thursday, the committee chairman, Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), interrupted a series of House votes to alert lawmakers about the breach. She cautioned that some of the panel's activities are preliminary and not a conclusive sign of inappropriate behavior.

"No inference should be made as to any member," she said.

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Amy Goodman interviews Stacie Ritter, whose twin daughters are being denied coverage by CIGNA for the followup care they need from the side-effects of cancer treatment:

STACIE RITTER: Hi. Thank you, Amy. Thanks for having me.

AMY GOODMAN: Hi, Stacie. Tell us your story.

STACIE RITTER: Well, it’s a rather long one, so I’ll try to make it as brief as I can.

Our issues with insurance companies have been going on now for quite a while. It didn’t start with CIGNA, though, until April Fool’s Day of 2008. That’s when my husband’s employer switched insurers to CIGNA, which, again, as far as healthcare is concerned, you don’t have a choice. When your employer switches insurers, you get what they give you. And unfortunately, we were given CIGNA.

My girls are cancer survivors. They had pituitary and hypothalamus gland damage as a result of chemo and total body radiation to treat their cancer as part of the stem cell transplant that they had when they were four years old. And a lot of times when a child has that issue, they end up on growth hormone. Many years later, once the oncologist notices a—like a plateau in their growth, which mine did back in 2005, so she referred us to an endocrinologist at Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia, and he monitored them. And they didn’t start growth hormone until 2007. So that was two years of monitoring to make sure, you know, that it wasn’t just a little lax in their growth and that it was really a damaged pituitary and hypothalamus.

And once they started the growth hormone under our previous insurer, which was Aetna, they did very, very well. And so, our doctors said, well, then, that’s—their positive response to the medication is proof that it was damaged, then, the hypothalamus and the pituitary gland. So that was great, so we’ll continue to do this until their bones start to fuse and they no longer need growth hormone.

But unfortunately, CIGNA does not feel the same way that our previous insurer and our world-renowned expert doctor felt. So they claim to have had two endocrinologists look at our case, and both of their endocrinologists deemed that my girls just suffer from idiopathic short stature, which means short stature of unknown origin. But quite to the contrary, we know the origin. We have lots of documentation and proof of the origin.

AMY GOODMAN: And that was—you say that was the radiation that they were exposed to to deal with their rare cancer.

STACIE RITTER: Yes. And chemotherapies, too, are very toxic, and also depends on the child’s age at the time, and even the sex has a lot to do with it. So, the younger the child, especially under five, which mine were—they were four at the time—and the sex—females tend to suffer more damage than males for some reason from the total body radiation. Not all children with cancer have these kind of late-term effects. It’s only children who have had radiation to the brain area, which mine did.

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So now we know who the real death panelists are!

After the mortgage business imploded last year, Wall Street investment banks began searching for another big idea to make money. They think they may have found one.

The bankers plan to buy “life settlements,” life insurance policies that ill and elderly people sell for cash — $400,000 for a $1 million policy, say, depending on the life expectancy of the insured person. Then they plan to “securitize” these policies, in Wall Street jargon, by packaging hundreds or thousands together into bonds. They will then resell those bonds to investors, like big pension funds, who will receive the payouts when people with the insurance die.

The earlier the policyholder dies, the bigger the return — though if people live longer than expected, investors could get poor returns or even lose money.

And really, who could possibly have a problem with that? Why would we think that enormously powerful financial interests would want to, you know, protect their investments by making sure our health care is less than optimal?

The citizens of Alaska must grow more embarrassed by the day:

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Another ethics complaint was filed against Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin on Monday – less than a week before her resignation – alleging she failed to submit complete gift disclosure forms in a timely manner.

The complaint filed with the attorney general is the 19th ethics grievance against Palin, who responded via Twitter postings that the filings came from a "serial complainer" intent on abusing the political process.

And now an independent investigator finds Palin may have broken ethics laws by taking big bucks from her GOP buddies to pay for legal bills:

The report obtained by The Associated Press says Palin is securing unwarranted benefits and receiving improper gifts through the Alaska Fund Trust, set up by supporters.

An investigator for the state Personnel Board says in his July 14 report that there is probable cause to believe Palin used or attempted to use her official position for personal gain because she authorized the creation of the trust as the "official" legal defense fund. Read on...

Continuing her bid to be the biggest political joke in U.S. history, soon-to-be ex-Alaska Governor Sarah Palin chose to whine about the charges on Twitter, accusing her accuser of violating ethics laws:

"In violation of Ethics Act more allegations were filed today by serial complainer; gave to press be4 we could respond; ridiculous, wasteful..." Palin wrote in the first of a string of postings on the social networking site Twitter. Read on...

As our Jon Perr notes, Palin could have raised a lot more money and gotten a lot more help from the GOP faithful had she adopted the Scooter Libby 3-step defense method.

It is curious that this AP article left out one giant aspect of the UBS scandal -- the role former GOP Senator Phil Gramm may have played in their illegal activity.

MIAMI – Swiss bank UBS AG "systematically and deliberately" violated U.S. law by dispatching private bankers to recruit wealthy Americans interested in evading taxes and must be forced to reveal the identities of 52,000 of those clients, the Justice Department said in a court filing Tuesday.

The filing, which comes amid several published reports that the case may be near settlement, urges U.S. District Judge Alan S. Gold to hold UBS accountable for conducting years of illegal business on U.S. soil — business that earned the bank more than $100 million in fees but cost the U.S. hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid taxes.

"It is time for UBS to face the consequences that it has brought upon itself," said Justice Department tax attorney Stuart Gibson in the 55-page filing. "The United States has proven its case for enforcement."

As Jon Perr wrote earlier this year, Gramm was instrumental in handcuffing the IRS while he was in the Senate, and may have paved the way for UBS to commit their crimes once he became their Vice Chairman in 2002.

Never let it be said that lobbyists are too dumb to figure out a way around any rule we pass to keep them from paying off politicians:

WASHINGTON — On a mild evening last September, Citigroup lobbyists mingled with South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn at a rooftop reception — complete with miniature putting greens — as the company hosted a party to honor the third most powerful Democrat in the House and raise money for one of his favorite golf charities.

Health insurers and hospitals, meanwhile, are donating millions to help build an institute in Boston to celebrate the career of Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., who is attempting to overhaul the nation's health care system.

Despite a ban on gifts to lawmakers and limits on campaign contributions, lobbyists and groups that employ them can spend unlimited money to honor members of Congress or donate to non-profits connected to them or their relatives. The public — until now — had little insight into the scope of this largely hidden world of special-interest influence.

Under ethics rules passed in 2007, lobbyists for the first time last year had to report any payment made for an event or to a group connected to a lawmaker and other top federal officials.

USA TODAY undertook the first comprehensive analysis of the lobbying reports and found 2,759 payments, totaling $35.8 million, were made in 2008. The money went to honor 534 current and former lawmakers, almost 250 other federal officials and more than 100 groups, many of which count lawmakers among their members.

The total cost is roughly equivalent to what the U.S. government spends to operate Yellowstone National Park each year.

Most of the money — about $28 million — went to non-profit groups, some with direct ties to members of Congress. In two cases, USA TODAY found, the donations to non-profits associated with a member of Congress came in response to a personal appeal for funds from the lawmaker.

"It's another example of the many pockets of a politician's coat," says Ellen Miller of the Sunlight Foundation, a watchdog group. The spending amounts to an "end-run" around campaign-finance laws "that are designed to limit the appearance of undue influence," she says.

The money came from companies, trade associations and labor groups that lobby Congress and the government on a range of issues, from seeking a share of last year's $700 billion financial bailout package to trying to shape the debate on climate change.

The donations cover various activities — from a golf tournament that raises money for a lawmaker's non-profit to gifts to the alma mater of a powerful House committee chairman.

"You can still have a gala or something or the other for a charity and earn some favor with members of Congress, which is what the gift ban was put in place to avoid," says Dan Danner, CEO of the National Federation of Independent Business and a veteran Washington lobbyist.

This whole incestuous mess just gets worse and worse, doesn't it? It appears the foxes are dining quite well while working as henhouse security guards:

Last month, a little-known company where [Larry] Summers served on the board of directors received a $42 million investment from a group of investors, including three banks that Summers, Obama’s effective “economy czar,” has been doling out billions in bailout money to: Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, and Morgan Stanley. The banks invested into the small startup company, Revolution Money, right at the time when Summers was administering the “stress test” to these same banks.

A month after they invested in Summers’ former company, all three banks came out of the stress test much better than anyone expected -- thanks to the fact that the banks themselves were allowed to help decide how bad their problems were (Citigroup “negotiated” down its financial hole from $35 billion to $5.5 billion.)

The fact that the banks invested in the company just a few months after Summers resigned suggests the appearance of corruption, because it suggests to other firms that if you hire Larry Summers onto your board, large banks will want to invest as a favor to a politically-connected director.

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It's getting even more difficult to find good news these days, but I thought this was worth a mention. I don't know how much of a difference it will make, but I hope it does. Businesses would do well to seek out those graduates and hire them:

When a new crop of future business leaders graduates from the Harvard Business School next week, many of them will be taking a new oath that says, in effect, greed is not good.

Nearly 20 percent of the graduating class have signed “The M.B.A. Oath,” a voluntary student-led pledge that the goal of a business manager is to “serve the greater good.” It promises that Harvard M.B.A.’s will act responsibly, ethically and refrain from advancing their “own narrow ambitions” at the expense of others.

Only 20 percent? Oh well, at least 1 in 5 has scruples!

What happened to making money?

That, of course, is still at the heart of the Harvard curriculum. But at Harvard and other top business schools, there has been an explosion of interest in ethics courses and in student activities — clubs, lectures, conferences — about personal and corporate responsibility and on how to view business as more than a money-making enterprise, but part of a large social community.

“We want to stand up and recite something out loud with our class,” said Teal Carlock, who is graduating from Harvard and has accepted a job at Genentech. “Fingers are now pointed at M.B.A.’s and we, as a class, have a real opportunity to come together and set a standard as business leaders.”

At Columbia Business School, all students must pledge to an honor code: “As a lifelong member of the Columbia Business School community, I adhere to the principles of truth, integrity, and respect. I will not lie, cheat, steal, or tolerate those who do.” The code has been in place for about three years and came about after discussions between students and faculty.

In the post-Enron and post-Madoff era, the issue of ethics and corporate social responsibility has taken on greater urgency among students about to graduate. While this might easily be dismissed as a passing fancy — or simply a defensive reaction to the current business environment — business school professors say that is not the case. Rather, they say, they are seeing a generational shift away from viewing an M.B.A. as simply an on-ramp to the road to riches.

Those graduating today, they say, are far more concerned about how corporations affect the community, the lives of its workers and the environment. And business schools are responding with more courses, new centers specializing in business ethics and, in the case of Harvard, student-lead efforts to bring about a professional code of conduct for M.B.A.’s, not unlike oaths that are taken by lawyers and doctors.

“I don’t see this as something that will fade away,” said Diana C. Robertson, a professor of business ethics at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. “It’s coming from the students. I don’t know that we’ve seen such a surge in this activism since the 1960s. This activism is different, but, like that time, it is student-driven.”

It's kind of ironic, in light of Harvard's present financial crisis.

Isn't it great, how our SEC is such an ardent watchdog of Wall Street's wrongdoing?

CBS News has learned that two attorneys at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) are under "active" criminal investigation by the FBI for trading stocks based on inside information.

Accusations against the two lawyers - a man and a woman whose names have not been released - are detailed in a report by the SEC inspector general obtained exclusively by CBS News.

The report, based on a review and analysis of "more than two years of e-mail and brokerage records," puts increased pressure on a commission that has come under fire lately for failing to detect the $60 billion Bernard L. Madoff Ponzi scheme, and turning a blind eye to the Wall Street financial crisis.

"We ought to be outraged if there is one insider trading information that’s leading to personal profit," Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, told CBS News.

In response to the IG report, Grassley sent a letter to SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro expressing that outrage and requesting detailed information about the stock holdings and trading practices of all SEC employees.

"It’s hard to imagine a more serious violation of the public trust than for the agency responsible for protecting investors to allow its employees to profit from non-public information about its enforcement activities," Grassley said in his letter to Schapiro.

According to the report, the male attorney under investigation by the FBI works in the Office of the SEC's Chief Counsel and "has access to a tremendous amount of nonpublic information."

The report alleges both the male attorney and female attorney - who works in the enforcement division - "traded in the stock of a large financial services company" despite being told by another SEC employee of ongoing "investigations of that company." The report calls this is a direct violation of SEC rules.

This is so much worse than your typical conflict-of-interest case. This guy pushed a less-effective drug because he was the manufacturer's minion? I wonder how those Iraq veterans with the busted-up legs feel about this. I hope a few of them track this guy down and let him know what they think of him.

But let's not ignore the manufacturer in all this. After all, it was probably their idea:

A former surgeon at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, who is a paid consultant for a medical company, published a study that made false claims and overstated the benefits of the company’s product in treating soldiers severely injured in Iraq, the hospital’s commander said Tuesday.

An investigation by Walter Reed found that the study cited higher numbers of patients and injuries than the hospital could account for, said the commander, Col. Norvell V. Coots.

“It’s like a ghost population that were reported in the article as having been treated that we have no record of ever having existed,” Colonel Coots said in a telephone interview on Tuesday. “So this really was all falsified information.”

The former Army surgeon, Dr. Timothy R. Kuklo, reported that a bone-growth product sold by Medtronic Inc. had much higher success in healing the shattered legs of wounded soldiers at Walter Reed than other doctors there had experienced, according to Colonel Coots and a summary of an Army investigation of the matter.

Dr. Kuklo, 48, now an associate professor at the Washington University medical school in St. Louis, did not respond to numerous e-mail messages and telephone calls to his office and home seeking comment over the last two weeks. Walter Reed officials say he did not respond to their inquiries during their investigation.

Army investigators found that Dr. Kuklo forged the signatures of four Walter Reed doctors on the article before submitting it last year to a British medical journal, falsely claiming them as co-authors. He also did not obtain the Army’s required permission to conduct the study.

“This was a real letdown for us to have one of our former members do something like this,” one of those doctors, Lt. Col. Romney C. Andersen, wrote in an e-mail message Tuesday. Dr. Andersen, now posted at a combat hospital in Baghdad, said he could not comment further without the permission of his commanders.

It was Dr. Andersen who brought the problem to the Army’s attention last year, prompting the inquiry. In its March edition, at the Army’s request, the journal retracted the article — something that has gone largely unnoticed outside orthopedic circles.

I meant to get to this earlier in the week. It's so illustrative of the problems with our corporate media that the guy who wins a Pulitzer prize for investigative reporting is ignored - because he was investigating the corporate media for stacking the deck with paid sources to support the Iraq war:

On the April 20 edition of NBC's Nightly News, reporting on the awarding of the 2009 Pulitzer Prizes earlier that day, anchor Brian Williams stated that "The New York Times led the way with five, including awards for breaking news and international reporting." But Williams did not note that the Times' David Barstow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting that day "for his tenacious reporting that revealed how some retired generals, working as radio and television analysts, had been co-opted by the Pentagon to make its case for the war in Iraq, and how many of them also had undisclosed ties to companies that benefited from policies they defended." Media Matters for America has repeatedly documented the unwillingness of the major broadcast networks, including NBC, to report on Barstow's April 20, 2008, Times article. Moreover, NBC joined ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC in reportedly declining to participate in a segment based on Barstow's article that aired on the April 24, 2008, edition of PBS' NewsHour.

In an April 29 post on his MSNBC.com blog, Williams responded to Barstow's April 20 article, describing NBC News analyst military analyst Barry R. McCaffrey and Wayne Downing, who died in July 2007, as "honest brokers" and writing that McCaffrey and Downing were "warriors-turned-analysts, not lobbyists or politicians":

All I can say is this: these two guys never gave what I considered to be the party line. They were tough, honest critics of the U.S. military effort in Iraq. If you've had any exposure to retired officers of that rank (and we've not had any five-star Generals in the modern era) then you know: these men are passionate patriots. In my dealings with them, they were also honest brokers. I knew full well whenever either man went on a fact-finding mission or went for high-level briefings. They never came back spun, and never attempted a conversion. They are warriors-turned-analysts, not lobbyists or politicians.

Glenn Greenwald has more:

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Scott Horton says indictments against Gonzales and several associates are very likely this week:

Spanish prosecutors have decided to press forward with a criminal investigation targeting former U.S. attorney general Alberto Gonzales and five top associates over their role in the torture of five Spanish citizens held at Guantánamo, several reliable sources close to the investigation have told The Daily Beast. Their decision is expected to be announced on Tuesday before the Spanish central criminal court, the Audencia Nacional, in Madrid. But the decision is likely to raise concerns with the human rights community on other points: they will seek to have the case referred to a different judge.

Both Washington and Madrid appear determined not to allow the pending criminal investigation to get in the way of improved relations.

The six defendants—in addition to Gonzales, Federal Appeals Court Judge and former Assistant Attorney General Jay Bybee, University of California law professor and former Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo, former Defense Department general counsel and current Chevron lawyer William J. Haynes II, Vice President Cheney’s former chief of staff David Addington and former Under-Secretary of Defense Douglas J. Feith—are accused of having given the green light to the torture and mistreatment of prisoners held in U.S. detention in “the war on terror.”

The case arises in the context of a pending proceeding before the court involving terrorism charges against five Spaniards formerly held at Guantánamo. A group of human rights lawyers originally filed a criminal complaint asking the court to look at the possibility of charges against the six American lawyers. Baltasar Garzón Real, the investigating judge, accepted the complaint and referred it to Spanish prosecutors for a view as to whether they would accept the case and press it forward. “The evidence provided was more than sufficient to justify a more comprehensive investigation,” one of the lawyers associated with the prosecution stated.

But prosecutors will also ask that Judge Garzón, an internationally known figure due to his management of the case against former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and other high profile cases, step aside. The case originally came to Garzón because he presided over efforts to bring terrorism charges against the five Spaniards previously held at Guantánamo. Spanish prosecutors consider it “awkward” for the same judge to have both the case against former U.S. officials based on the possible torture of the five Spaniards at Guantanamo and the case against those very same Spaniards. A source close to the prosecution also noted that there was concern about the reaction to the case in some parts of the U.S. media, where it had been viewed, incorrectly, as a sort of personal frolic of Judge Garzón.

Instead the prosecutors will ask Garzón to transfer the case to Judge Ismail Moreno, who is currently handling an investigation into kidnapping charges surrounding the CIA’s use of facilities as a safe harbor in connection with the seizure of Khalid el-Masri, a German greengrocer who was seized and held at various CIA blacksites for about half a year as a result of mistaken identity. The decision on the transfer will be up to Judge Garzón in the first instance, and he is expected to make a quick ruling. If he denies the request, it may be appealed.

These people should lose their licenses:

MIAMI (Reuters) - Health workers violated medical ethics when they helped interrogate terrorism suspects who were tortured at secret CIA prisons overseas, the International Committee of the Red Cross said.

The medical workers, thought to be doctors and psychologists, monitored prisoners while they were mistreated at CIA prisons and advised interrogators whether to continue, adjust or halt the abuse, the ICRC said in a report based on interviews with 14 prisoners in 2007.

One prisoner alleged that medical personnel monitored his blood oxygen levels while he was subjected to waterboarding, a simulated drowning designed to induce panic and widely considered to be torture, the ICRC said.

Other prisoners said that as they stood shackled with their arms chained above their heads, a doctor regularly measured the swelling in their legs and signaled when they should be allowed to sit down.