Top advocacy and lobbying stories from this week's National Journal: (subscription)

• "Health Insurers Find Themselves Under Fire": From insider player to whipping boy, America's Health Insurance Plans has been facing lots of heat in Washington since issuing a report critical of aspects of health care reform legislation.
• "Gas Group Is Late But Loaded With Cash": A new association of natural-gas producers, called America's Natural Gas Alliance, is playing catch up as it lobbies Congress on climate change legislation.
• "Corporate America's Enlightened Disclosure": With prodding by Bruce Freed, head of the Center for Political Accountability, top companies are lining up to show how much money they are spending in Washington and on whom.
• From Inside Washington: Few governors have as many friends on K Street as Mississippi's Haley Barbour. In recent months several of the former lobbyist's old buddies have been meeting occasionally with the smooth-talking Southerner when he comes to town to chat about a possible run for the White House in 2012. "Haley is being approached by many people inquiring about his intentions and encouraging him to run," says one lobbyist who attended an informal dinner with Barbour over the summer. Another old friend on K Street adds that Barbour "hasn't closed the door, but it's not very wide open.
• From Congressional Insider's poll: Republicans think their leaders are doing more to police congressional enforcement than do Democrats, our congressional insiders said this week: 81 percent of GOP members think their leaders are doing a good job on ethics, while only 62 percent of Democrats think so.
• From On The Move: George Meyers, who has joined Cassidy & Associates as vice president in the federal marketing group. Meyers, 46, arrives at Cassidy from Lockheed Martin, where he was a business development director; Scott E. Stewart, 41, has joined Patton Boggs as a partner after spending eight years as a litigator in the Justice Department's Environment and Natural Resources Division.