When I removed the inside mold­ings around a window in our house, 1 found six old pennies. Since the house had once served as a kinder­garten, I supposed that playful kids had pushed the coins into the space, making a kind of time capsule for me to discover so many years later. It was fun to notice that one of the pennies was zinc, minted in the years of copper shortage of World War II suggest­ing a time for the kids’ game. The copper cents were greenish with age.

Then a thought occurred to me. I wondered if the Washington bu­reaucrats still counted the six cents as part of our national debt. Does every old house harbor hid­den pennies, hidden national debt.

There must be billions of hidden pennies, and it is possible that our national debt is far greater than admitted to us by our leaders.

The thought depressed me. After all, pennies are a product of the mechanical age. They were and still are the product of a relatively primitive technology: the minting machine. Even the fastest coinage press is limited in its production to the laws of mechanics, and can only make one coin with each stamping. Such laws held for and still rule the printing presses, which make our paper money.

My gloom deepened because I knew well that we have left the mechanical age and are now in the age of the electron and its familiar partner, the computer. Therefore, the units of debt are no longer pennies or dollars or any physical­ly expressible unit, which might actually be mechanically pro­duced. Rather, the true units of debt are tied to the ever-increasing speed of information transfer by electronic device. Expressed in nano-seconds, debt has become liability for electronic information
The flip side of this coin says that wealth is no longer expressed phys­ically, as it once was, in bars of gold. At this moment in time, wealth resides in the possession of Information, encoded in electronic form. The National Debt may therefore be assumed to be spread as electronic information in com­puters throughout the world. The information moves at an awesome rate. The owner of this dollar de­nominated information is the mod­ern parallel to the bondholder of more primitive times.

On the other hand, if kids could hide pennies in the mechanical age, can electronic in­formation he wandering around un­known to those who calculate the debt? Is it possible that, some­where in the computer-modem-sat­ellite network of information, there is an electronic pirate, who has the electronic age equivalent of great chests of pirate loot?
Even more sepulchral: If a counterfeiter, in the last stages of the mechanical age, sim­ply printed hundred dollar bills on his color Xerox, why couldn’t the counterfeiter of the electronic age merely hack Into the computers of the banking system and transfer dollars to his off-shore accounts?

So the final recipe for electronic terrorism becomes clear. The medium of terror is no longer the bomb. Terror now resides in the electron. In the future, wild-eyed terrorists will purchase Cray Re­search Mega Computers and spread disaster by hacking into the worldwide electronic net of infor­mation about money and injecting errors into the system. The Reign of Terror will not be symbolized by the guillotine, but by the mega-bite of false information about money.

I cannot expect those in the fed­eral bureaus to understand my concerns, and that is why I am writing this. I have become con­vinced that the major problem for the United States, and perhaps for the entire world, Is that we have an aging bureaucracy which does not comprehend the nature of the In­formation age and its impact on economic decisions at all levels.

One simple example will make my point. In the Federal Reserve System, decisions about the amount of money to create, elec­tronically, by simply adding digits to the consumable reserves in the computers of the banking system, are made on the basis of the “mon­ey supply” counted in several ways. But, as I have said, the count is seriously flawed, because much of the electronically encoded infor­mation about dollars is circulating in computers whose information is unavailable to the counters.

To stay with my metaphor of kids and pennies, many electrons are snoozing quietly in the Swiss Alps, on the placid islets of the Caribbean and in nooks and crannies far beyond the eyes of the Fed. When the central bank adds, re­serves based on its spurious count, we may confidently assume that a good bit of each addition joins the electrons already in hiding.
But, do our aging bureaucrats show signs of comprehending such huge changes? I do not think so.

Here is a test to put to all that work in government offices, which make financial decisions:

1. What is index arbitrage, when done in the foreign exchange markets?
2. How might one put on a butter­fly spread in Swiss Francs versus the dollar?
3. Is it legal for an American citizen to send a personal check to a foreign bank, which has no branch in the United States, and not report the transfer?
4. Name one form of hedge used by American grain exporters in which the cost of the hedge leaves this country.
5. What impact will the North American Free Trade Treaty have on the ability of the Vancouver Stock Exchange and Mexican Bolsa to sell direct, to American citizens, without registration?

Here is a bonus question for those who answer three of the above questions correctly:
6. What contribution to the costs of the American bureaucracies do foreign workers make, when their products are imported into the United States without tariffs?

Dick DeBold
email: rcdebold@mindspring,

Born July 20,1927, New York, NY Married, September 27, 1957, to Marjorie Cope Warren. I son, William John DeBold. Education, The Stuyvesant High School, NYC, 1945, Arista The New York state Maritime Academy, 1947. Ensign, USNR Ships Officer 1947-50 Various ships and steamship companies Licensed as Master, expired due to injury. Naval Officer, Korean War 1950-1953 (Now Lieut. SG., ret.) BA, University of California Berkeley, 1957. Phi Beta Kappa, Highest Honors. Major Psychology. MS, Psychology, Yale University, 1958 Ph.D., Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, 1963. University Teaching Fellow. Teaching Experience: Wesleyan University, Asst, Assoc. Professor 63 67 Harvard University, Visiting Assoc. Professor 1966 Hobart College, Dean of the College 1967 68 Long Island University, Professor 1969 84 Long Island University, Professor Emeritus 1984 pres.

At the time that Paul Wolfowitz was appointed as president of the World Bank in 2005 I wondered how the Deputy Secretary of Defense would handle a position that required a smidgen of knowledge of economic and finance matters. One would think. Reading his background on wikipedia it is even more obvious that he was not entirely the correct choice for this high-powered position. His academic studies covered mathematics and politics. He wrote his doctorate on the dangers posed by nuclear proliferation in the Middle East and his work experience is mostly in the Department of Defense.

Of course, it is apparent that Bush, in order to save some face, had to get rid of both the Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz. As architects of the war on Iraq, which is not going that well, they needed to be put out to pasture. due to the mess these two instigated in Iraq. Not that Bush didn’t have final say of course, but who is counting. Rumsfeld appears to have retired. But Wolfowitz was thrown the job at the World Bank. As the United States has the most power at the World Bank, they have the right to appoint the President of the Bank. So, with some opposition, it was Wolfowitz who took over the main job at the bank. Wolfowitz had no experience in banking, economics or development issues. He knew all about the Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq though, which so far nobody has found.

A report in the archives of the BBC talks about a proposed crack down by Wolfowitz on corruption perpetrated by governments and officials in developing world nations where the bank operates. He said at the time in February 2006, that he was withholding funds to Kenya because of a high-level scandal there at the time. Besides this he was also said to have promised to examine any irregularities within the bank itself. During this particular 90 minute staff meeting being reported by the BBC, he further discussed concerns about internal corruption and fraud problems at the bank. He was also forced to justify the appointment of senior staff over which he had received criticism by World Bank staff. His period at the World Bank was therefore not a case of smooth sailing.

What has come to light now are accusations of irregularities in the handling of the salary awarded to Wolfowitz’ partner who at the time of his appointment to the World Bank was a staff member of the Bank and had to be moved elsewhere as her continued stay would have conflicted with the Bank’s policy of partners working together. The concerns are that Wolfowitz authorised salary increases for her beyond what was regular and without proper consultation and ignoring proper protocol. The board of the World Bank is meeting to discuss the issue. Wolfowitz says that he will abide by their decision. Doesn’t have much choice does he, on this matter. What he should really do, is resign. If you are such a loud advocate against corruption and you are found out to be corrupt yourself, surely the ethical thing to do would be to resign?

Anja Merret lives in Brighton, UK. She has recently started a blog and writes on issues that interest her from self-improvement, wealth generation, motivational thinking and anything else that amuses her. You are invited to follow her journey on http://www.anjamerret.com

She now looks after the business interests of her daughter who is a Flash and Accessibility expert at http://www.niquimerret.com

Oedipus President

“The Iraqi people are looking at America and are saying

are we going to cut and run again? We’re not going to cut

and run if I’m in the Oval Office. We will do our job,”

President George W. Bush Jr.

Although George. W. Bush’s statement was meant to show America’s resolve to stay the course in Iraq, it also showed something else - an extraordinary insight into a son’s oedipal struggle to prove his father wrong.

George Jr.’s statement, “are we going to cut and run again? We’re not going to cut and run if I’m in the Oval Office.” was a direct slap at his father, former President George Bush, Sr.; because, if George Jr. is to be believed, Bush Sr. cut and ran in Iraq when he was President one decade before.

It was previously thought that George Jr.’s invasion of Iraq was motivated, in part, to avenge a failed assassination attempt on his father by Saddam’s secret police. It now appears George Jr.’s motive may be far different and much less benign.

It is said Bush Sr. favored George Jr.’s younger brother, Jeb, and hoped that Jeb, not George Jr., would follow in his political footsteps. If so, George Jr. has decided to make his father pay for his misplaced favoritism.

Peter and Rochelle Schweizer wrote in their book, “The Bushes, Portrait of a Dynasty”, that in 1994 when Jeb lost the governor’s race in Florida and George Jr. won in Texas, George Jr. talked to his father on the phone and afterward complained: ”It sounds like Dad’s only heard that Jeb lost. Not that I’ve won.’’

But George Jr., a willful man, is not one to be so easily denied his father’s love. Not only did he become the son that would become, as his father, President of the United States, he decided also he would be a better President.

Some believed George Sr. had made a fatal mistake by not removing Saddam from power when he had the chance. So, when George Jr. became President, he surrounded himself with the very men– Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz - who believed his father had erred.

George Jr., as President, would not make the mistake his father made. Instead, like the son he is, he made the mistake his father consciously chose not to make. George Jr. instead unleashed the ungodly forces of Muslim fundamentalism that his father’s advisers adamantly counseled George Sr. to keep contained by not removing Saddam from power.

It now appears George Sr. and his advisers may have been right and Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz wrong when George Sr. chose to let Saddam stay in power. This is not to say that George Sr. did not make any mistakes. In retrospect, I think we all wish George Sr. had hugged George Jr. a lot more when he was a child.

Unfortunately,George Junior’s reaction to his father’s favoritism was not to be confined to foreign policy. Bush Junior’s profligate spending flies in the face of his father’s principles. Unfortunately, all of us, including our children and our childrens’ children, will pay the price.

A day of economic reckoning set in motion by George Bush Jr. is about to descend on us; and if you are to survive the crisis, you had better be prepared.

Darryl Robert Schoon
http://www.survivethecrisis.com
“How To Survive The Crisis And Profit In The Process”
“Time of the Vulture Investment Module”

So, you’re wondering about an African-American becoming president in 2009, right? Well, let me simply say this: Our beloved country, formed on the foundations of liberty, freedom, and prosperity, is long overdue for a different kind of leadership. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. will, indeed, make a great president, his intense convictions being only one faultless example.

Throughout the course of the entire 20th century and to this otherwise promising day, it has been known that the black experience has accomplished much, and has much left to accomplish. Although African-Americans have made substantial progress in obtaining equal rights, it is still left to be seen as to how far equal opportunities will come soon. There are millions, if not billions, of people of African heritage around this increasingly globalized world who still do not have access to food, affordable and physically and emotionally comfortable shelter, steady employment, and to a solid educational foundation. The children are our future, so we all say. What Obama will do is always make it his top priority to put the poorest of the poor first. The AIDS rate will drop drastically across the ruthlessly vulnerable nation of Africa. Teenagers on the meanest streets of New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and other major American cities will begin to take away their guns and drugs and start a refreshingly American Dreamseque suburban life anew. There may even be no more hate crimes to deal with. How does this all sound?

Let us not forget about universal health care. It’s not hard to believe that African-American citizens make up a gargantuan percentage of those who are uninsured. It is without question that Obama will use all his multicultural might to make sure almost every person on the face of this deeply cynical earth, especially blacks, has what they need to live a truthfully happy and healthy existence. You might as well say goodbye to pork-laden government spending on matters that don’t even matter to us!

As we all know, the Iraq War seems to have no foreseeable end in sight. But there is hope. Obama will immediately cut already mirthless funding for the war effort once Bush leaves on that monumentally wonderful day of January 20, 2009. The troops will come before you even know it. There may even be greater hopes for the embattled Islamic country to finally come to grips with what it means to have a full-blossomed democracy instead of a terrorist-ravaged, sect-cleansed entity. The women and children of Baghdad will finally have the chance to walk outside and smell exotic Arabic roses once again. But how can you imagine this all being done by a “domesticated” Obama? Well, it’s simpler than you might ever imagine. The ultra-charismatic, mixed-race leader will begin to access the profoundest flaws of the Bush administration and decide to correct those flaws for a brighter and saner future not just for Iraq, but for a war-weary America as well.

It’s time for a change now. Don’t you think?

To Find Out More about Obama Mania, go to:

http://obama.senate.gov

http://www.barackobama.com

http://www.myspace.com/barackobama

Despite the unexplainable bitter World War II has far-long ended, its negative effects are still prevalent, if I am not wrong, to a very few world states. To be precise, China and Japan are probably the two most obsessive with the abuses and legacies of the war.

The two Asian powers do possess two completely different visions, resulted from the World War II: China detests World-War-II Japanese soldiers, who disgustingly abused China and the Chinese; especially taking Chinese girls and women as comfort ladies. On the contrary, Japan is of the opinion that their World War II soldiers are their great heroes and so worth be subject to annual homage. It has now come to the point that the Chinese always bitterly protest against annual pilgrimage of the Japanese prime ministers for paying homage to his World War II ancestors. Whose action is wrong?

Firstly, from the international aspect, the Chinese is interfering into Japanese sovereignty. There are no any international laws or provisions that prohibit the leader of one country from respecting his/her ancestors or heroes. Japan and China has not entered into any agreement that each country’s leaders should not pay homage to one’s ancestors at all.

The Japanese prime minister or the Japanese as the whole is not wrong in being grateful to their ancestors. The bad deeds of the Japanese ancestors would not deprive them of ancestor-ship. The Japanese never care about what their ancestors did in the past, but they just pay homage to them in the present time. Japan and China has the very similar culture in being close to one’s family; consequently you should understand and forgive each other in this respect.

Secondly, history is history, individual Japanese is not all the Japanese. China should think that only the World War II Japanese soldiers that were wrong, but not the present Japanese. One bad Japanese does not mean all the Japanese are bad.

Finally, if Japanese be not allowed to pay homage to their heroes or ancestors, then the world should follow: America and UK should stop paying homage to their soldiers, who killed civilian Iraqis. The same story should be applied to every country of the world, not just Japan alone.

In my last word, I even endorse Japan not to say sorry to the world about the atrocity that its soldiers committed during the World War II. The ones who did wrong were the World-War-II Japanese soldiers, so it would be them to say sorry, not the present Japanese. And if the present Japanese are obligated to say sorry to China or the world; then everyone should do the same.

Lay Vicheka is a Content Manager of Search Newspaper and Manager-General of Cambopedia Translation Co. Ltd.Any question concerning Cambodian laws, politics and issues are welcomed.

Personal: No. 221H Street 93, Tuol Sangke, Russey Keo, Phnom Penh, vichekalay@yahoo.com. Tel: (855) 11 268 445.

The attacks on Iraqi people are increasing in intensity. Today an explosion hit a cafeteria at the Iraqi parliament, killing at least two MPs and injuring many. What is probably a little more disturbing about this particular attack is that it happened in the so-called Green Zone. This is a particularly heavily barricaded and secured region which houses foreign embassies, headquarters of the occupying forces plus the Iraqi parliament amongst other agencies. This zone was supposed to be impregnably secure with umpteen searches, sniffer dogs etc protecting those hiding away from what is really going on in the rest of Iraq.

I deplore the deaths and injuries. But, one could perhaps hope of a positive result from this tragedy that if the Green Zone can be breached the powers that be could find it in themselves to admit the horrific mistake that is the occupation of Iraq and withdraw troops. There is no visible success here, just continuing hardships and deaths of loved ones to the ordinary Iraqi people. In any case, what would success actually mean? Less terrorism in the world? What is the point actually of what is going on in Iraq. Does anybody remember what the whole thing is about. Originally it was about Weapons of Mass Destruction which were never found. What became the next reason? The end of terrorism? What has actually happened is that terrorism has become more visible, effective and more hard core in Iraq.

It is pathetic to hear Blair for instance voice his ’sympathy’ and ‘outrage’ for the families and friends of killed British soldiers as recently four further British troops were killed in a road side ambush operation. These four young people died because of him. He and a few supporters are the reason why troops and civilians are dying in Iraq. Is nobody accountable anymore? The Australian prime minister was in the media this week saying that he was sending more Australian troops to Afghanistan and Iraq to combat terrorism.

Politicians will tell us that to leave now, would be to leave the country in total chaos. What an admission to make. Do they actually see the irony of that statement, I wonder. What is the situation in Iraq now then, not chaos? What would happen if the American and British, and other minor supporters, forces withdrew? There would be some further blood shed while the various so called religious factions fought it out for power. In all probability the country would be carved up to accommodate the religious parties and people would have to relocate into the areas serving their religions. None of this would be a good solution. But it would be better than what is happening now. And remember eventually the western armies will withdraw, they cannot possibly stay in Iraq for ever, and the inevitable will happen, religious parties fighting for power. Nothing can possibly be gained by staying there.

In a way the rest of the world is at fault here as well. The EU, Africa, Asia have not put sufficient pressure on the States and the UK. They have condoned this kind of aggression and bullying on a fairly defenseless oil producing country by not taking any action. Oil producing? Is that the clue here? Sanctions against the States and the UK, by for instance barring products from these countries would have brought on a totally different outcome. But it’s not too late. Put pressure. Get them out of there already.

Anja Merret lives in Brighton, UK. She has recently started a blog and writes on issues that interest her from self-improvement, wealth generation, motivational thinking and anything else that amuses her. You are invited to follow her journey on http://www.anjamerret.com

She now looks after the business interests of her daughter who is a Flash and Accessibility expert at http://www.niquimerret.com

National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell recently circulated a draft bill that would grant the NSA authority to monitor foreigners without obtaining FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) court approval and grant immunity to telecommunications firms currently facing possible civil litigation over their role in such surveillance that culminated in the U.S. District Court’s overturning President Bush’s domestic surveillance program. McConnell’s draft legislation would permit the monitoring of foreigners by such tactics as phone taps and the monitoring of U.S. e-mail accounts outside the FISA process. Although McConnell is likely to argue that the realities of the post-9/11 world require such a program, the costs in terms of eroded Fourth Amendment protections and elevated risk of abuses would likely outweigh any incremental benefits that might result from the dramatic broadening of the government’s domestic surveillance authority.

Currently, the FISA framework is sufficiently robust and flexible to handle the challenges presented by the post-9/11 world. Under FISA, the government can petition a secret court for approval to monitor a person if there is probable cause to believe that such a person is working for a foreign power against the United States. The same holds true with respect to members of international terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda. In short, the FISA process already permits the monitoring of suspected terrorists, but such monitoring requires FISA court consent based on the existence of probable cause. The existing approval process merely offers a checkpoint to ensure greater accountability and an evidentiary standard to ensure that there is reasonable basis for such monitoring.

All said, the draft bill would not, for the first time, create a mechanism for monitoring suspected terrorists. That mechanism already exists and should be actively employed. Instead, the bill would eliminate the framework for accountability that is built into existing law and overturn the reasonable evidentiary standard that must be met in order to carry out such monitoring. Such legal protection is essential to securing the Constitutional foundation on which U.S. society rests.

In the wake of the American Revolution, the experience of excessive searches and seizures under King George III loomed large in the memory of the new nation’s people and leaders. In the years leading up to the American Revolution, the issuance of general warrants and writs of assistance was pervasive. As early as 1765, a court expressed concern over the practice of issuing such warrants that were aimed at stamping out “seditious libel.” Today, one could readily substitute “terrorism” for “seditious libel,” but the concern would remain as valid as it was more than two centuries ago.

Then, Lord Camden warned that if such tactics were found acceptable, “the secret cabinets and bureaus of every subject in this kingdom will be thrown open to the search and inspection of a messenger, whenever the secretary of state shall think fit to charge, or even to suspect, a person to be the author, printer, or publisher of a seditious libel.” The ratification of the Fourth Amendment was intended to preclude those and similar abuses. Since then, courts have regularly reaffirmed the Fourth Amendment’s protection against “searches conducted outside the judicial process without prior approval” by a judge as “unreasonable” but have allowed “a few specifically established and well-delineated exceptions.”

If FISA protection were eliminated, historical precedent strongly suggests that abuses could be expected. Leading up to the enactment of legislation that created FISA, the Church Committee revealed in 1976 that every President from 1946 to the time of its investigation had engaged in “warrantless wiretaps” on national security grounds and that there had been “numerous political abuses.” The Church Commission proclaimed:

Too many people have been spied upon by too many Government agencies and too much information has been collected… The Government, operating primarily through secret informants, but also using other intrusive techniques such as wiretaps, microphone “bugs”, surreptitious mail opening, and break-ins, has swept in vast amounts of information about the personal lives, views, and associations of American citizens.

That experience was not an isolated exception. On April 11, 2007, The Washington Post reported, “[T]he Justice Department and FBI have been sharply rebuked for bad bookkeeping and other mistakes involving their powers under the USA Patriot Act to secretly demand Americans’ e-mail, financial and other personal records through…national security letters.”

Invocations of national security do not offer sufficient basis to overturn long-established and specific Constitutional protections. The domestic surveillance abuses cited by the Church Committee occurred, on occasion, precisely when statutory prohibitions “were intentionally disregarded in the belief that because the programs served the ‘national security’ the law did not apply.” Neither are arguments that the terrorists exploit the U.S. legal system, while seeking to undermine U.S. national security, any more persuasive. “On some occasions when agency officials did assume, or were told, that a program was illegal, they still permitted it to continue,” the Church Committee revealed, adding, “They justified their conduct in some cases on the ground that the failure of ‘the enemy’ to play by the rules granted them the right to do likewise, and in other cases on the ground that the ‘national security’ permitted programs that would otherwise be illegal.” A culture in which the most fundamental rules are trampled is especially hospitable for the rise of tyranny.

Considering that the McConnell legislation would eliminate the accountability that is provided by the FISA process, as well as the evidentiary standard of probable cause, it could facilitate the kind of abuses the Church Committee addressed some three decades ago. That Committee found, “The overwhelming number of excesses continuing over a prolonged period of time were due in large measure to the fact that the system of checks and balances—created in our Constitution to limit abuse of Governmental power—was seldom applied to the intelligence community.”

In addition to rejecting the McConnell draft, Congress should be prepared to take such additional measures as might be required to shore up the nation’s Constitutional protections. “It is during our most challenging and uncertain moments that our Nation’s commitment to due process is most severely tested; and it is in those times that we must preserve our commitment at home to the principles for which we fight abroad,” former U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor explained in the war on terrorism-related Hamdi v. Rumsfeld decision.

In the end, Congress has no higher duty than to safeguard the integrity of the U.S. Constitution in which the Nation’s most cherished freedoms are enshrined into law. Constitutional prohibitions against unreasonable searches and seizures were established for good reason based on the early historical experience. More than two centuries of U.S. history and jurisprudence have validated those protections time and again. Rather than advocating legislative changes that would have the genuine potential to undermine crucial Fourth Amendment protections and lead to the kind of abuses that FISA was established to prevent, Mr. McConnell would do better to rebuild the Intelligence Community’s human intelligence capabilities and to direct its agents to make active efforts to directly or indirectly penetrate Al Qaeda and other State or non-State actors that threaten U.S. national security.

Don Sutherland has researched and written on a wide range of geopolitical issues.

Jawaharlal Nehru once said - “You can tell the condition of a nation by looking at the status of its women”.

Women in India face many hurdles in the fight for equality and justice. Assaults on women’s rights begin even before birth. Gender-selective abortions have resulted in a phenomena best described as female infanticide.

Domestic violence is a major problem in India, some of it related to dowries. Despite the existence of the Dowry Prohibition Act, enforcement of its provisions has been slack. There are believed to be thousands of dowry related killings every year. The problem of abuse impacts children also. A recent government commissioned survey estimates that 53% of children in India are subject to sexual abuse..

The illiteracy rate is high for women because families have traditionally placed a priority on educating male children. There is also the expectation that girls should be available to help in the home.

In the workplace there are challenges related to equal pay and fair treatment. However few women employed by the Indian Civil Service anticipated a highly unorthodox request that arguably infringes on their right to privacy. New rules require them to reveal intimate details of their menstrual cycles.

They are expected to provide details in printed form about their “menstrual history”, including the “history” of their LMP (last menstrual period). In addition they are expected to provide information about their last “confinement” (maternity leave).

Needless to say a lot of female civil servants are up in arms about this.

The controversial questions show up in new appraisal forms for 2007 issued by the Ministry for Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions. Nobody from the Ministry was available for a media interview although a bureaucrat is quoted in the Hindustan Times as saying that the info gathering was based on advice from health officials.

A number of female employees have refused to divulge their intimate details, and some are planning a letter of protest.

This requirement says a lot about the latitude Indian authorities grant themselves when dealing with female workers. It is not unlike the permission a parent might take when dealing with a child. The presumption that women will meekly comply has clearly been part of the official experience. So it’s good to see that this time around the women are saying “here, wait a minute!”.

Aidan Maconachy resides in Ontario, Canada. He has a BA Hons and a BEd. He taught in the UK and Canada, and has been a contributor to a variety of magazines and newspapers over the years. You can visit his blog at http://aidanmaconachyblog.blogspot.com/

AT A GLANCE:
The World Bank Group has a new strategy to scale up assistance to improve governance and fight corruption in client countries. The strategy was unanimously endorsed by the Board on March 20, 2007.

The Bank helps strengthen governance and address corruption through projects and programs that: improve transparency in public financial management; strengthen tax and customs administration; enhance civil service performance; support legal and judicial reform; combat corruption; and enable local and central governments to deliver services and regulate the economy more effectively.

In Fiscal Year 2006 (July 2005 – June 2006), almost half of the new lending operations included support for strengthening governance, amounting to a total support of $4.5 billion, or 19.2 percent of the Bank’s new lending for the year.

The Bank is a leader in the development and application of governance diagnostics, such as Doing Business reports, Investment Climate surveys, Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability (PEFA) indicators, World Bank Institute’s (WBI’s) Governance and Anticorruption country diagnostics, and WBI Governance Indicators.

The Department of Institutional Integrity investigates allegations of fraud and corruption in Bank-financed projects – inside and outside the Bank – and refers its findings the Bank’s Sanctions Committee.

Since 2001, the Integrity Department has handled more than 2,400 cases of alleged fraud, corruption, or other wrongdoing, resulting in the public sanctioning of more than 330 companies and individuals

Overview

The World Bank’s assistance to improving governance and combating corruption is aimed at helping countries deliver basic services better to the poor and create growth and employment opportunities by encouraging private investment—both means of lifting people out of poverty. The Bank also has a fiduciary responsibility to its stakeholders to ensure that development funds are used for the purpose intended, rather than jeopardized by corruption

World Bank Initiatives at Country Level

Helping countries strengthen governance is an element of the Bank’s Country Assistance Strategies (CASs) in many countries, and in some countries such as Albania, Bangladesh, and Indonesia, forms a central element of the CAS. In regions such as Africa, support for governance reform is also central to the Bank’s strategy, using a mix of lending, grant, analytical and advisory instruments.

Governance and anticorruption are addressed in projects across the Bank’s portfolio, including in public sector reform, infrastructure, health, extractive industries, financial sector, and others. At the country level, the Bank’s approach is to help state institutions become more efficient, accountable, and transparent. For instance:

Support for better and more transparent management of public finances ensure more accountable policymaking and narrows the scope of financial mismanagement or leakages;
Support for civil service wage reform and codes of conduct creates enables better delivery of services to citizens and lessens incentives for corruption;
Assistance to strengthen local governments enables them to be more responsive and accountable; and
Support for legal and judicial reform and parliamentary capacity strengthens checks and balances to executive power and enables better delivery of justice.
In FY06, almost half of new lending projects included governance and rule of law components, with 19.2 percent of total new lending, or $4.5 billion, dedicated to supporting this area.

Emmanuel Ayomide Praise
Emmanuel Ayomide Praise is a world leading internet entreprenuer and investor. Some of his areas of interest include sport management,merchandise,ownership,internet entreprenuership,investments, media and writing amongst others.
Business URL: http://www.emmapraise.blogspot.com,

http://www.nigeriasoccer.blogspot.com,

Once upon a time, John McCain might have been a great president of these United States. But his time has come and gone. It’s all over for the Straight Talk Express.

The only one who doesn’t seem to realize this is John McCain, senator from Arizona. McCain has become an embarrassment to our proud state and to his constituents here. His latest gaffe — staging a transparently phony photo op in a Baghdad market — only reinforces the growing public perception that McCain has gone loony tunes.

The old “war candidate” trudges on, his poll numbers sinking every day, his cash flow drying up. The media ridicule him. The public pities him. And so I send out a call to the old (former) maverick:

John McCain, please come home!

You see, Sen. McCain owns a ranch in Page Springs, Arizona, just 7.5 miles from my home in Sedona. Some in the media have said that McCain lives in Sedona, which is patently untrue, because Page Springs is no Sedona, senator.

Page Springs is a backwater village — an unincorporated little patch of rocky land, barely on the map — which contains three wineries, a few homes and not much else. McCain’s retreat is off a rough road marked with a cluster of tumble-down mailboxes that resemble something out of rural Oklahoma. There is no “McCain” name on any of the mailboxes.

So if you are thinking you would like to find John and his wealthy heiress wife Cindy at home in Page Springs, and perhaps join them for high tea and a lively discussion about Iraq — just forget it. Actually, I want John McCain all to myself.

Come back, John, come back! Drop your presidential aspirations and just hang out at your ranch, writing poetry and war memoirs and hunting those lovable wild boar-like creatures we call javelin a. Take a daily dip in the cool waters of Oak Creek, which runs through your property.

Meet me in Sedona at Starbucks in the Hyatt shops, and bring Cindy! We’ll go shopping in one of those super-expensive dress shops, and we’ll cruise the art galleries too! Later we’ll have dinner at the super-expensive L’Auberge restaurant, and you can pick up the tab with your unspent campaign contributions from Big Oil.

Forget running the world, John, forget about sending more of our young people to die in Iraq, you old war candidate you! Forget about buttering up those scripture-spouting creeps like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. Give me a call and we’ll go for a hike in fabulous Red Rock Country. I know all the great trails.

Just think: Two 70-year-old he-men, you and me — although I never went to Vietnam, only the reserves — hiking up to Coffee Pot rock together, swapping lies and debating the acting skills of Ronald Reagan. Just think, John, if you were to be elected Prez, you would be the oldest man ever elected to the most powerful position in the world, older even than Reagan was, and you know what happened to his mind those last few years….

So I call to you again: Come home, John McCain, come home! Drop this presidential nonsense and start enjoying your golden years! Call me when you get back to Page Springs; I’m in the book.

Call on Thunder Mountain Productions for top-quality writing for any purpose, on any project, on any subject. Creative Director Marv Lincoln has years of experience as a writer, reporter, columnist, advertising and PR executive, and book editor. His work has appeared in many national periodicals. Visit http://www.sedonapr.com/ for more information.