corruption (k-rpshn)

NOUN:

1. 1. The act or process of corrupting.
   2. The state of being corrupt.
2. Decay; rot.

Radio Capital 96.7 FM, owned by Lima's RPP group, was out and about early Monday morning on the Limean streets of Surco to probe the public opinion on the hot topic of "Corruption" which is at the heart of the latest political scandal rocking the Andean nation.

The public sentiment on the streets was unanimous, the Peruvian population is hot under the collar and fed up with politics as usual! A 96.7 FM reporter asked pedestrians as they navigated the streets early Monday morning what their thoughts were on the latest corruption charges. Here's a sample of how Lima's denizens responded:

• "All the corrupted [ones] are inside the government."

• "The people that have the most, rob the most; they rob from those that are in need."

• "Corruption has existed in this country since the beginning; it's not something that's now just happening."

The same thoughts and opinions were repetitious throughout the responses. Peruvians for a long time have known that their country suffers from a gross case of corruption and those that are accused of being the most corruptible are the government functionaries themselves.

Truth is, corruption is present in all levels of Peruvian society. It's not a condition exclusive to the central government. One Peruvian man interviewed on the streets noted: "There is no emphasis on the [corporate] corruptionists." He went on to explain that it was normally the individuals in government that were fingered for their involvement, yet the individual executives of corporations were often overlooked for their participation.

When asked what contributes to the practice of corruption in government Peruvians responded by saying:

• "Corruption occurs, because there are persons that do not have experience for their position."

• "Each person should work in their area [of specialty.] For example, I believe the Minister of Health is an economist, why not a doctor? The Minister of Justice should be a lawyer and so on."

Madame Chiang Kai-Shek, former First Lady of the Republic of China (while exiled in Taiwan) said:

"Every clique is a refuge for incompetence. It fosters and disloyalty, it begets cowardice, and consequently is a burden upon and a drawback to the progress of the country. Its instincts and actions are those of the pack.”

The plague of elitist cliques is universal. Peru is a country where the motto "It's not what you know, but who you know" reverberates loud and true. Most cabinet positions or corporate ranks are obtained through association. This mantra is what fosters corruption in all levels of society and often puts unqualified individuals at the helm of key government positions.

Peru's history of inept characters managing the top ranks of government has in the past resulted in hyperinflation, domestic terrorism, poverty, antiquated infrastructure, a dirty war, national strikes, and a tale of money, lies and videotapes. The smoking gun in the recent government shaking scandal involved money and audiotapes.

So how do Peruvians propose to eradicate corruption in government? A caller to 96.7 FM Radio Capital suggested to "send them [the guilty parties] to the selva (jungle) where they will be far away from the amenities of Lima."

Another caller suggested that "all of congress should be dissolved," probably alluding to the 1990's administration of Alberto Fujimori who, in a historic move, dissolved congress.

In this case Cabinet ministers offered their resignations to avoid censorship from Peru's unicameral congress.

The real travesty lies within the fact that justice is often evaded in Peru and never administered fairly and with a blind eye. The accused parties in the present scandal only face up to 15 years of incarceration; which in Peru can be and often is suspended on the grounds of frivolity. This is what irritates Peruvians the most.

Some Peruvians were pessimistic and said that corruption would never change in Peru. I happen to partially agree. Corruption will always be present, but it will evolve as new methods are introduced to combat it.

In a 2008 survey conducted by Transparency International, Peru ranked #72 for perceived levels of corruption; Denmark was ranked #1 for having the least corruption.

So how can Peru at least reduce corruption? It's as simple as its citizens and residents refusing to participate in it and taking a firm stance to say "No" to the temptations of corrupt practices ranging from the seemingly innocent police bribe to steering major government bids.

But as Phillip Butters, the radio host on 96.7 FM Radio Capital, said "Peru is a country of agnostics" when it comes to reforming government to eliminate corruption. Referring to government officials he continued, "They live in ethical and emotional poverty."

For a 2006 Country Report on Corruption in Peru click here.

In an interview with the paper, Odierno said Iran was working publicly and covertly to undermine the status-of-forces agreement that the US and Iraq are about to conclude and that must be ratified by the Iraqi parliament.

"Clearly, this is one they're having a 'full court press' on to try to ensure there's never any bilateral agreement between the United States and Iraq," the paper quoted him as saying, using a basketball expression.

"We know that there are many relationships with people here for many years going back to when Saddam was in charge, and I think they're utilizing those contacts to attempt to influence the outcome of the potential vote in the council of representatives," the general continued.

Odierno said, however, he had no definitive proof of the bribes, but added that "there are many intelligence reports" that suggest Iranians are "coming in to pay off people to vote against it," The Post reported.

The status-of-forces afteement is designed to replace a UN resolution that sanctions the presence of US troops in Iraq. This resolution expires at the end of the year.

Read the rest:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081013/wl_mideast_a
|fp/usiraqiranmilitary_081013115336

The cry comes from a second term President that was once himself a fugitive from corruption charges after his first disastrous administration in the mid 1980's permitted Shining Path terrorists to rise to power and propagated the economy to plummet to epic proportions, leaving its citizens reeling in the pain of hyperinflation and domestic conflict; and Garcia accused of accepting illegal bribes. Garcia would be exiled from 1992 until 2001 when the Peruvian courts dropped the decade's old charges.

Corruption in Peru is present in all levels of society and organizations; both public and private. The latest scandal comes as no surprise to Peruvians, but rather elicits an annoyance with the frequency of such activities.

“It is a public scandal that offends; to sin in secret is no sin at all.” - Moliere

It seems however that Peru is on the war path this year to attract more foreign investment through Free Trade Agreements (FTA) and International Tourism projects. Various laws have been passed to streamline bureaucratic processes and create more transparency in government.

Despite their efforts, the Peruvian government has become wildly unpopular with its constituents and in September of 2008 Reuters reported that Garcia's approval ratings dropped to a dismal 19%; an all time low for the President. For comparison purposes, U.S. President George W. Bush's approval ratings in September of the same year beat Garcia's by 7 points.

Peru's congress didn't fall far behind Alan Garcia's approval ratings. According to a survey conducted by the University of Lima, only 18.2% of Peruvians interviewed approved of the unicameral congress' performance.

It would be October's political scandal that would be the straw that broke the camel's back and Peruvians' waning confidence in their government.

Norwegian oil company, Discover Petroleum came out of the gates fending off allegations of involvment in the political scandal. The company alleges that they were victims of seedy Peruvian advisers and is voluntarily offering itself to the subjective scopes of The Norwegian National Authority for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime and Transparency International to clear their organization of any wrong doings.

It was under the unyielding pressure of opposition leaders that President Garcia called for a change in his government and accepted the resignation of his cabinet members, including his most loyal Prime Minister, Jorge del Castillo who left his position with the gratitude of Peruvian Intellectuals, politicians and businessmen alike.

Only less than a handful of the original cabinet members remain at the insistence of incoming Prime Minister Yehude Simon, governor of Peru's Lambayeque department.

The Ministers of Alan Garcia's cabinet that will remain are the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Antonio García Belaunde, the Minister of Tourism, Mercedes Aráoz, and the Minister of Economy, Luis Valdivieso.

Presumptive Prime Minister Simon stated that these Ministers were vital elements in ongoing negotiations, such as the Free Trade Agreement Peru has pending with China as well as helping steer Peru through the global financial crisis that is presently consuming international markets.

Yehude Simon is himself of a shady past, having spent 8 1/2 consecutive years of a 20 year prison sentence for alleged ties to terrorists of the Peruvian Tupac Amaru movement.  In 2000 Simon would receive a pardon from the Minister of Justice during Peru's transitory government. Since 2003 Yehude Simon has served as governor of Peru's Northern Lambayeque department home to the Lord of Sipan and the growing city and coastal tourist destination of Chiclayo.

Skeletons aside, Simon is promising to include an anti-corruption campaign to his political agenda and one of his first official duties will be to sit down to an open dialogue with all political parties involved in government.

This certainly isn't the first time that Peru has seen political shake-ups and restructuring of its government, but with promises to rid the country of corruption, is this a case of the devil exorcising the devil?

For the complete story involving the oil scandal & cabinet shake up click here.

My friends, tell me who you thought won tonight's debate and I will reward you with the above CD.

The idea that the Democrats are going to be great stewards of the worlds largest economy seems rather naive.  Take for instance the State in which I live. It has been ruled by Democrats for quite some time (including the new addition of the inept "Republican" action star at the top). It is the worlds eighth largest economy boasting a GSP of over $1.8 trillion. An estimated $111 billion in income, sales, and property taxes is collected each year by the state, more revenues are collected through various other means. It is on the verge of bankruptcy, more so than the Federal level, as the states bonds were lowered to near junk status in 2003. It now faces an approximately $16 billion budget shortfall and is hoping to get in on the bailout band-wagon due to the credit crunch.

Every time the legislature is confronted with reducing its chronic over spending it balks. The Democratic controlled Assembly and Senate continue to push for higher spending every year regardless of a continuously shrinking tax base as companies relocate to more friendly environments to do business.

In addition to not being a friendly business climate California is taking the biggest hit when it comes to the housing downturn. Houses here have dropped in value of about 30% or more. Since the state has a law which prevents reassessment of property value, properties owners are only left to pay taxes on the price of purchase for the duration of their ownership.  This provision has huge pluses for the lower income people who manage to purchase a house, so long as they purchased with a fixed rate mortgage. Many did. Nearly 20% of mortgage defaults in California are a result of real estate speculators. Real estate speculators do not live in the homes they purchase. They have found it easier to walk away from a house than to attempt to sell and take a loss.

Defaults are on the rise in most parts of the country, but it should be recognized that it is not always the case of a homeowner losing his or her home but is often the case of an investor gambling on a continued increase in home values and losing that gamble.
—Doug Duncan, the Mortgage Bankers Association's chief economist

Foreclosures are a blight on a neighborhood as the tend to drag down surrounding home prices. Simply look at Detroit's situation. It is unfortunate that California has come to this. The resolution requires responsible governing. It requires making tough choices. It requires leadership and a sober reassessment of the states budgeting. Instead California received bloated spending, more debt, and prolonged economic crisis as the Democratic control legislature refused to make the tough calls needed to keep the state solvent.

But this is what happens, as seen at the Federal level as well, when politicians do not take responsible steps to curb spending in times of economic downturns. It is as Mr. McCain said in the debates: "We Republicans came to power to change government, and government changed us."  To think that this corruption will only infect the Repulicans is to miss the temptations of single party rule. Even in a time when Democrats weren't in total control, they still managed to get in on the kick backs.

Spending restraint is needed in congress going forward, but the Democrats seem unable to fathom this responsibility. This was highlighted by Mr. Biden's and Mr. Obama's inability to name any course of action to adjust their domestic spending agenda for the now spent $700 billion on the bailout during the debates. And also by the Democratic Congresswoman from Michigan who recently attached a rider to the omnibus spending measure the government passes every year. The rider was a $25 billion bailout for the auto industry.

The names change but the results may stay the same. I hope not. For the sake of the country.

I think ours is the only University without corruption using money as a source of it, but I’ve heard about sexual corruption here, when girls get A+ for being with a lecturer couple times.  Fortunately, Kazakhstan politics let foreign professors come and teach here!

I heard that there are some corruption here.  Some securities helping to students for money to enter the teacher’s office.  And the students grabbing their exams even they can log on their computers to find information about exam.  I think students who are doing this are doing nothing good for themselves.

There was one situation when I first entered our university, I asked is it possible to pay to a teacher so he will get you A+, somebody told me that if you want A+ you should buy a teacher a car!!! And after that I didn’t even think about it.

Today, I didn’t see that someone is trying to “buy a teacher.” But there is a group of people that help students.  For example, made different assignments for us.  Sometimes it is very comfortable.  If you have many subjects and you haven’t time to do assignments, you can ask this group to do it instead of you.  Of course, it is not fair and you don’t learn the main points that your university teachers gives to you!

I have never met corruption at our university and I’m really happy with this, this place is the only university, where there is no corruption in Almaty (in suburban areas situation is even worse).  I think the only reason why corruption still exists is teachers’ small salaries and I think that they are not guilty, this is the government’s fault.  Teachers and doctors are the main professions and their salaries are less than accountants or manager’s, that I think is simply not fair!  Ours is a private institution, that is why it pays good salaries and is independent.  It does not depend on government payments, that is why there is no corruption here.

Taking into account the level of corruption that we have here in KZ (According to the list of most corrupted countries, we are in the top list, definitely top 50 ;-) However, our university is considered as non-corrupted, but to tell the truth, you can compare our place with the U.S. where common people do not give or receive bribes but very few people in power do.

I heard very few stories of bribing teachers, usually they are some local teachers, almost none are foreign.  It is understandable that people who are educated, and intelligent and if they earn enough money, they will not get involved with things like bribery. 

On the other hand, teachers in state universities of KZ are also educated and intelligent but they earn almost 5 times less than our university teachers.

Most cases of bribery we may witness at the higher level (like administration), people are merged in groups and lobby interest of each other, relatives work together and things like that happen.

As tolerance of our people is pretty high, I can say that corruption will still exist until new generation comes to power.

Actually, I haven’t heard or seen any cases of corruption here because our institution is private.  I don’t know how it is supported by politics but I know that the President [Nazarbayev] helped it a lot at the early stage of growing when it was only opening.  This place is financed completely form its students.

Honestly, I never heard anything about corruption here at our university.  I didn’t have any professor or staff asking me for a bribe.  There are many professors who come from other countries and I think they think it is not normal to ask a bribe from students in order for them to get a better grade.  However, here we have many professors who are from Kazakhstan and I still didn’t hear anything about corruption because in my opinion they value their job and they make a decent amount of money.  In contrast, I know that in many other universities in Kazakhstan, bribery is a normal thing.  For instance, students can buy the grade that they want.

I don’t know a lot about Kazakhstan’s politics because there are so many things happening in the world.  However, our President [Nazarbayev] visited our campus’ new building this summer.  It was shown everywhere, on TV, newspapers.  My thought is that it was some kind of advertisement for our school.  Our President is very good at International Relationship matters.  Globalization is happening so we need people who can speak English and know about other countries.

I believe teachers at our university do not take any bribes.  But there was a story, last year when we were preparing for our final exams, my friend came to me and said: “Oh, you’re preparing for an exam? Stupid you are.  Here are the answer keys, take it.”  It shocked me.  When the exam day came, I saw that the answers were the same as in the answer key that she gave me.  I got angry.  I think that it is dishonest.  Then I asked her: “Where did you get this answer key?”  She said, “From security.” This answer made me calm, I was happy there was no bribe among teachers.

And what about politics in Kazakhstan, I think it helps the future of our university because in the Ministry of Education of KZ, they made some correctnesses [sic] in the constitution of education and some rules are changed, I think it will help for the future of our school.

I’ve never been a witness of corruption in our university.  Nevertheless, it’s rumored that some students buy answers to the exam.  To be more clear, it’s necessary to say they steal them.  Main tool for doing this dishonest action are the securities.  But in my point of view, that’s not true.  Firstly, most of professors are foreigners.  And second reason is that teachers wouldn’t leave exams in the cabinets.  Even if they do, there are lots of cameras nearly everywhere.

Kazakhstan politics helps our university directly by inviting professors from abroad.  It’s unusual for them to take bribes.  And the exchange programs help a lot, our students are punished in another country and would not like to experience the same feelings coming back in Kazakhstan.

I’ve not heard so many kinds of corruption but a little where people who I’ve heard from said that it is very dangerous and mostly impossible.  Firstly, I heard to buy a diploma from our university and to be finished here (but I don’t know what mark and GPA you will have) it costs about $15,000, but it depends on your mark and GPA that you want, (this is my point of view).  Secondly, I’ve heard that two semesters mark you can get for $6,000.  So Kazakhstan’s politics helps to stop corruption in our university but I don’t think you can stop corruption, not even in 50 years because it is now like a normal thing.

I am getting so tired of this whole charade that she is actually a viable VP candidate. She isn't even a good Governor. It is pretty obvious that she isn't even a good person (not that being a good person is a prereq for leading, obviously it isn't.)

While we were sleeping, Palin was not

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WASHINGTON (AP) -- The House, responding to growing public demand for more domestic energy, voted Wednesday to end a quarter-century ban on oil and natural gas drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, giving Republicans a major victory on energy policy.

An extension of the ban for another year was left off a $630 billion-plus stopgap government spending bill that President Bush had threatened to veto - possibly shutting down the government - if the anti-drilling measure were included.

The bill was approved 370-58 and now goes to the Senate, where it is likely to be approved within the next few days, also without the drilling ban.

WWL - AM870 • FM105.3 | News • Talk • Sports | OnDemand@1350 - AP - content.

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My guess is that if Obama is elected, we'll probably see a bit of a drawback on thiis one.  If McCain/Plain are elected, it will be expanded.

Opening up drilling doesn't do much for now, but might help a tiny bit in the future.  If we structure the deals right, we could make some money, but without real pressure, expect to get raped like we were before.

WASHINGTON — As Congress prepares to debate expansion of drilling in taxpayer-owned coastal waters, the Interior Department agency that collects oil and gas royalties has been caught up in a wide-ranging ethics scandal — including allegations of financial self-dealing, accepting gifts from energy companies, cocaine use and sexual misconduct.

[full story]

What this group did was collect money on the oil and gas we are already letting be "drill, baby, drilled".  This office was rife with corruption as the profits involved in the gas business, and the payments tied to them, have skyrocketed in recent years.  What Big Oil realized was that by boozing and blowing certain humans that represented the government, they could avoid paying any extra taxes on those record profits.

This was one of the tactics in their strategy to maximize shareholder value.  And is something that would be multiplied a couple-fold by allowing more drilling (it's really not going to change the equation that much).

In 2005 John McCain wrote a law and introduced it in the Senate to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

As one of his early acts as a Senator, and to prove his claims of bipartisanship cooperation are false, Barack Obama voted against McCain’s reform law.

Fannie Mae gave Obama $165,000.

After Obama got the money, he lied and said he wanted to reform Fannie Mae.

The Senate has no record of Obama ever introducing any such law.

Barack Hussein Obama practices the Muslim principle of lying to your enemies, which seems to include the American voters.

In 2005 John McCain wrote new laws to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Barack Obama voted against McCain's reform law.

Fannie Mae gave Obama $165,000.

After Obama got the money, he lied and said he told Bush to reform Fannie Mae.

As if Bush talks to the schmuck.

That is as believable as Obama saying that he went to Rev. Wright's church for 20 years and never heard anything crazy.

Just remember, if you do accept the money, you need to do what is asked of you.  They will always collect.  

On a side note, I'm in such financial peril right now that I'm finding that I can easily be bribed.  Don't judge.  You know you do it too. 

I certainly will be more reluctant to purchase any type of food item that has been made in China. Currently, as I live in the United States I don't believe that will be a problem. I have yet to see food products made in China.

However, having been in other countries where I have had the opportunity to shop for groceries, I definitely have seen products made in China which are sold in grocery stores. Actually, I have purchased peanut butter that was made in China. Honestly, I really like that peanut butter that I had purchased many times.

Having had purchased and ate a food product that was made in China, it's sort of a gets me to feel a little uneasy about what was in the food I purchased. I am assuming that in most cases the food will be okay but I have to admit to myself that the controls for producing and selling food in China will not be as stringent as those put in place inside the United States.

Furthermore, it has been continuously shown in TV shows I've watched that the Chinese business culture has a strong bent towards doing things in a corrupt way. I guess what I am trying to say is that many people accept bribes to get around the system. The system apparently allows for many instances of cheating. Too many people accept that bribes will happen on a continuous basis so they just look at it as acceptable. As they come to accept it, they soon take part in order to get ahead. It starts to become an “everyone for himself” kind of thing. Eventually, rules and specific protocols for doing things don't mean too much.

Who said working for the government was boring? Not the employees at the Interior Department’s Mineral Management Service. A $5.3 million dollar investigation, spanning the years between 2002 and 2006, uncovered that as many as 19 staff members who were supposed to oversee the energy industry had waaaay too much fun. They had sex with oil representatives, smoked pot, used cocaine, and took bribes. Attempts to hide all this shady business fell flat when an internal whistle blower had had enough.

Interior Department employees "received combined gifts and gratuities on at least 135 occasions from four major oil and gas companies with whom they were doing business -- a textbook example of improperly receiving gifts from prohibited sources," Inspector General Earl Devaney says in a letter to Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne accompanying the report.(Source: CNN)

According to government officials, the truth has taken this long to come out because Chevron, one of the companies involved, was refusing to cooperate. Chevron, of course, denies the accusation and says it provided the government with what they needed months ago.

So now what? Well, now nothing. Many of those investigated have already retired, others have changed jobs; authorities say “some administrative action” may be taken.

 In short, they’ll get away with it. Guess not everybody's crying at the pump. Is it November yet?

The Church of Scientology is even better than Prince at getting stuff taken off the web that they don't like. Scientology is a bullshit cult founded by a half-rate hack. Dianetics is a sham and Battlefield Earth is even worse than the stuff Ayn Rand wrote. If you are a Scientologist, please come to your senses. 'All Hail Xenu' t-shirts are still for sale:

 Great post over at Port Awesome. The Office is terrific. Miss Mayweather also made me aware of this, which if you are a BSG fan, you should appreciate.

Surely you knew your privacy was illusory. No, really.

Here's a whole bunch of stuff you missed.

Uppity? WTF? This was days ago!

As you can tell from the pictures, I have a little monkey on my hands. She loves to climb, jump, flip, somersault, and basically do any type of daredevil stunt she can come up with. So, I thought Madeline would enjoy taking some gymnastics classes.

She is signed up for class twice a week. She had her first class last Wednesday, which is a parent/child class. No, the parents do not do the gymnastics (thankfully), we are just there to supervise and help the kids along. Madeline was very excited when we got to the gym...so much that when we entered the gym she took off running like a crazy child and would not sit still to listen to the instructions.

After having to drag her back to the circle kicking and screaming one too many times we had to have a little conversation (mostly a threatening pep talk from me) about how we would have to go home if she would not listen to the teacher. That was all it took and after that she was very happy to do the obstacle course, swing on the rope, jump on the trampoline, play in the foam pit, run, hang, etc.

Today Madeline had her second class. This one I was a little more nervous about. She has been going through some separation anxiety lately (I'm thinking this is what is causing a lot of our bedtime drama), and this class was for kids only...no parents helping out. I was more than happy not to have to supervise her, but I was envisioning peeling her screaming, crying little body off of my legs while trying to convince her to do the class without me.

One great thing, though, is that she has 2 friends who are taking the class with her. I was hoping that by having familiar people she would be okay with the situation. Well, all that worrying was pointless, because she marched right into the gym with her friends without a single tear. For the sake of full disclosure, though, I should mention that I had a sucker in my pocket that I showed her when we arrived at the gym and told her she could have if she could be "sweet" for her class. As you can imagine the first word out of her mouth when class was over was "sucker." Yeah, I bribe my child...and it works beautifully!

Anyway, I was very happy to be able to sit and chat with friends while spying on Madeline through a window up above the gym. She was a little apprehensive at first, but eventually she was participating in the activities. This particular class incorporates stories and songs into the gymnastics, so they read books, played instruments, and sang songs in between their gym activities. From what I could tell Madeline loved it, and like I said before I was very happy to not have to participate and to get some grown-up time in with friends!

I should also mention that the woman who teaches that class has to be a saint, because she was wrangling about six 2-3 year old little girls who at times were crying, and running away from the activities. She just bounced around, singing, and smiling while holding the crying children and wrangling the escapees. I'm so glad she was down there doing it and not me!

Apparently Madeline's gymnastics classes are not a total outlet for her gymnast tendencies, because I have still been finding her climbing all over everything in the house, jumping off of everything she can get on top of, and doing random somersaults around the house.

Rice Visits Morocco to End Africa Tour

Rice arrived in staunch US ally Morocco late on Saturday after visiting Algeria and Tunisia and holding a historic meeting with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in Tripoli.

Rice's visit is her first as secretary of state to this region of increasing strategic importance in terms of oil resources, emigration and terrorism.

Rice on final leg of Maghreb tour

"All international and regional issues will be discussed," a Moroccan government official said.

The US so-called "war on terror" is likely to be on the agenda, as are the issues of the conflict in Western Sahara and the Arab Maghreb Union, a pan-Arab trade agreement that has struggled for years to get off the ground due to regional rivalries.

Earlier on Saturday Rice met Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, the Tunisian president, in Tunis and later in the day met Abedelaziz Bouteflika, Algeria's president, in Algiers.

It is curious that Cheney went to Eastern Europe and Rice went to North Africa.  Why does this smell of racism?  These are Republicans, after all. Rice has been tasked to make the last ditch effort to sell the AFRICOM concept to hard line skeptics. To enlarge US Military presence on that continent, with the promise of humanitarian improvement, is really a checkmate to other countries seeking to exploit Africa's natural resources.  Africans can see through this tactic, they have been there and experienced that for hundreds of years.  Being exploited victims is ingrained in their blood.  Dictators are all over this continent, because foreign money has bought them, set them up and used them since the 1600s. Thanks to modern communications, the population of Africa has another idea.  They refuse to willingly repeat the past.  Granted, there are compelling examples that Africa can still be bought and coerced.  Media has exposed Africa's tragedies over and over.  As these tragedies continue to unfold, AFRICOM does not appear to be the solution by offering clean up work for the victims.  Short of imposing "Martial Law" onto the continent, AFRICOM is there to protect American interests and agenda.  As always, its NOT about Africa at all ...

She ignored the fifth Maghreb nation of Mauritania, amid US refusal to recognise the legitimacy of its leaders after a military coup there in August.

Rice Threatened:

Rice's route within Algeria was the subject of heightened security precautions, after the website of one armed Islamic group urged the north African branch of al-Qaeda to assassinate her during her tour.

Rice's visit is her first to the Maghreb region as secretary of state. The region has become of increasing strategic importance in terms of oil resources, illegal-emigration and the so-called "war on terror".

This assasination threat is probably genuine.  It does, however, play into the North African terrorist mark"

Rice was pressed on a history of north African detainees at Guantanamo Bay seeking asylum in the US or elsewhere based on fears over their safety upon repatriation, with court judgments invariably required.

Her reaction to reports by rights organizations who say terror suspects at the US naval base in Cuba have been known to disappear upon their return, was also a theme in earlier visits to Libya and Tunisia, and was due to be reprised in Morocco.

"We believe this is okay," Rice stated. "You know that our goal is to work with the right security provisions and the right human rights protection for the people. Our goal is to return as many people to their country of origin as possible."

Rice did not indicate if the pair discussed the disputed Western Sahara territory.

When the United States is confronted with it's own Human Rights abuses, Condi says "Its Okay".  What does THAT mean?  What kind of Foreign Policy is THAT?  America has been called on the carpet for so many hypocritical actions by other nations, that the past eight years have sealed world opinion that we are just bullies, to be humored.  The world is VERY tired of humoring the American "forked tongue" behavior. As much as I like McCain, he is a lost soul.  The devil in the Bush has devoured McCain's last vestige of humanity.  He will now say anything to prove he is not another sock puppet on the hand of the PNC vision of world domination.

Condi is paving the way for THIS!

<-------------- WHAT?

With all of the picking and twisting, I'm sure everybody wants to know where all of this data is being stored and tabulated.  Go to:

http://public.me.com/michael.gault

and you will see "2008 Football Pool."  Everybody in the pool was at one point in their lives an aspiring or legitimate businessman, so I'm sure the complexity of the document will be appreciated.

Answer: Inappropriate is putting it mildly. Dazzled as he may have been by the prospect of the sabbatical, the teacher should have realized how corrupting it is to accept a gift of that magnitude - a gift that, everyone’s honorable intentions notwithstanding, has all the earmarks of a bribe. After all, no matter how hard he tries to be fair, how can this teacher not give the gift givers’ children the benefit of every doubt when he’s grading their work, writing their college recommendations or simply deciding whom to call on in class?

Shame too on those parents for compromising a good teacher. Even had they waited for their children to graduate, their gesture would have been misguided, signaling as it does that rewards await the teacher who wins favor with the rich.

You need to right these parents’ wrong by bringing their actions to the school’s attention. If you fear this could make trouble for your daughter, do it anonymously. But do it. As fine a man as he may otherwise be, this teacher should be censured and the parents reprimanded. Indeed, the principal needs to make certain that everyone in the school community understands that there’s no place for payola in the classroom.

Questions? Email Money Magazine’s ethicists – authors of “Isn’t It Their Turn to Pick Up the Check?” (Free Press) – at FlemingandSchwarz@right-thing.net.