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Archive for the 'World' Category
Development Aid: The Investment Banks of the Humanitarian Sector
We had some discussions during the last weeks and a few times we ended up with the same question:
Are there institutions / instruments in the Humanitarian / Non-Profit sector that could be compared to the mess in the banking sector specifically with the Investment banks - a species which in that habitat by today got almost extinct.
And yes we found them.
Created during the last decade on the back of the MDG, many have been installed with targets like deregulation of development funding (yes this did happen – aka budgetary aid aka the thin line along institutionalized corruption), avoidance of regulatory frameworks (e.g. via PPPs), avoidance of multi-national oversight across geo-political blocks (to go around the UN) or to just create the illusion of acting / transparency.
And these organizations share many properties with private sector Investment banks:
Fancy names – most of them answer to names like global, facility, fund, emergency plan. They are almost completely unregulated and their activities are at best opaque…
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Video: Interview – Naomi Wolf – Give Me Liberty
A must see 27 minute interview with Naomi Wolf – with the seemingly relaxing of rule for deploying military troops in the U.S. and other western countries (we just heard the same about Germany today) against their own citizens, we soon will all be terrorist (if not warranted otherwise) and she is warning that martial law is just around the corner.
She is also mentioning that members of congress have been threatened with Martial law if they would not pass the so-called “Bailout” plan.
Also mentioned is the change of oath of the U.S. armed forces that…
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Press: Naomi Wolf on S.Palin
Naomi Wolf, who also writes for Huffington Post, has published an interesting opinion piece at AlterNet (link below). If you like her point of view or not, this is definitely worth reading…
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Humor: The true story behind the U.S. 700 Billion Bail-out plan
Much has been said this week about the so-called USD 700 Billion bail-out plan for banks by the current U.S. administration and finally the right question was asked in congress yesterday – How did you arrive at that USD 700 billion number…
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Corruption: At least USD 13 Billion Iraq Aid wasted or stolen
The Washington Post today (link below) has a very interesting report on fraud, corruption and waste surrounding the U.S. Iraq reconstruction program.
Salam Adhoob, the former chief investigator of the Iraq’s Commission on Public Integrity (the equivalent to the U.S. FBI) estimated in a hearing of the Senate Democratic Policy Committee yesterday, that out of the about USD 50 Billion U.S. taxpayer money that has so far been disbursed to the Iraq reconstruction program, at least USD 13 Billion have been wasted or stolen through various fraud schemes.
The former chief investigator and head of a 200 strong auditors team was one of three Iraqis testifying before the committee yesterday – all providing evidence of widespread corruption and waste up to the point, as one of them said, that Iraqi government officials are financing al-Qaeda terrorists through some of these schemes.
An additional USD 9 Billion were estimated…
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Quote of the day: Different minds
Great minds discuss ideas; Average minds discuss events; Small minds discuss people.
Anna Eleanor Roosevelt, 1884 – 1962, First Lady of the United States
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