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To: Richnorth who wrote (83636)	3/22/2002 1:47:11 PM
From: long-gone	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116764

<<scandals, corruption, coverups, etc., etc., have been dogging the financial and political landscapes of America!:: Really not just the US, the greatest fraud I believe happend in currency trading out of Hong Kong branch of UK Multinational.

To: Richnorth who wrote (83636)	3/22/2002 2:20:32 PM
From: long-gone	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116764

Yes, I recall now, it was Barings, it was killed as a company by Nick Leeson. I don't believe, though, you can say any monster multi-national firm is "American" or "UK" or "German" any more. The most basic search yeilds piles: "A new report by the European Commission's anti-fraud unit says the European Union lost a billion dollars last year through crime and corruption." news.bbc.co.uk europarl.tory.org.uk & inside the EU quasi government: "EU fraud spiralling out of control There is a black cloud hanging over the European Union today. For all the rhetoric about more efficient administration, getting closer to the citizen and helping the needy, the EU and its top-heavy institutions are proving utterly inept at managing their own programmes in an accountable manner. The number of financial scandals that have been reported over the past year are too numerous to mention here. But there are some that frankly beggar belief and I will now report them with a grave eye on the political future of the EU, especially the role of its executive, the European Commission. Take a recent scandal affecting the Commission. Over Ecu 765 million ($885 million) destined for some of the world's poorest and hungriest citizens between 1993 and 1995 cannot be accounted for. An investigation into the affair by the Commission's own anti-fraud unit, Uclaf, discloses evidence of misappropriation of funds earmarked for war-torn regions in central Africa and the former Yugoslavia. This was part of the budget of the European Community Humanitarian Office (Echo). Legal authorities in Luxembourg regard this as so serious that they indicate criminal proceedings may ensue. Commission president Jacques Santer and his minions also get a grilling in the report of a special investigation by the EU's financial watchdog, the European Court of Auditors, published in November. The document reveals how another Ecu 118 million ($136 million) allocated to improve safety at nuclear power stations in Russia and central and eastern Europe has gone missing, too. The Commission is clueless about where the money has gone Though obsessed with paperwork, the Commission and the consultants it hired showed a careless and haphazard approach to bookkeeping, says the auditors' report. No evaluations were undertaken, for example, into work on Russian plants until mid-1996 - six years after much of the funding was agreed and three years after many of the projects started. Answers are still not forthcoming about what happened to the missing millions. The Court of Auditors report does not just reveal a complete lack of financial accountability dealing with old Soviet reactors, but a negligence bordering on the suicidal vis-à-vis the safety of their decommissioning and the management of nuclear waste at the plants, information about which has largely been ignored. To make matters worse, new allegations are now emerging about the Commission's human rights programme. Following adverse publicity about how its budget has been spent, Santer and his crew have just about had the time to haul back Ecu 90 million ($103 million), basically because they could not be sure in whose pockets the money would eventually end up. In fact, the Commission is now generally in the situation where it has more budgets on ice than fish in a frozen food depot. The Mediterranean region Another thorny issue is how Ecu 70 million ($80 million) was spent on aid for the Mediterranean region and in the Middle East. We can tell you how it was (mis) spent: by the flouting of normal tendering processes. How can the Commission explain why nearly two-thirds of 600 contracts went to one company, the Agency for Trans-Mediterranean Networks? Well, from our information, it appears clear what happened. Two of the agency's senior members were also employed to advise commission officials on who should be awarded contracts for projects undertaken under the scheme. A European Parliament report sums up the problem with uncharacteristic concision: "Thanks to their dual role, [it was possible for them] to be involved in the negotiation of contracts with themselves." What is going on? Do they take us for fools? These scandals, and as I said earlier there are many more, indicate how the lack of democratic accountability in the Brussels institutions is spiralling out of control. It would be churlish of me not to welcome Santer's recent decision that there should be more stringent monitoring of how taxpayers' money is spent, but it would seem the malaise is so deep that even such surgery will struggle to make any substantial difference. It should also be borne in mind that while the worst examples of financial mismanagement have implicated unelected officials, neither are those stalwart guardians of democracy in the European Parliament blameless. Can you trust the MEPs? Once again they decided recently not to reform their contentious travel allowance system - under which MEPs (Members of the European Parliament) from many EU countries can claim up to five times the amount they spend on travelling to Brussels and Strasbourg. Ordinary people are quite right to be sceptical of recent promises to purge the institutions of fraud and incompetence. And people power is what makes the European Commission so often afraid of participatory democracy. The sensible thing for the EU to do is, first, to separate Uclaf from the European Commission. How can an anti-fraud department be based in the institution it most regularly has to investigate for fraud? Uclaf also has a chronic shortage of staff. Last year, its 50 staff had 5,000 cases to deal with - that is 100 per person. Compare that with journalists (as I only can) and even the best investigative journalist will only complete between five and ten investigations per year. At the end of the day, you have to ask yourself, is the European taxpayer getting value for money? That's the bottom line. And if the Commission continues to ignore this maxim with such wanton abandon, there simply won't be a Commission in ten years' time. We will be happy to have closed it down. " european-digest.com

To: Richnorth who wrote (83636)	3/22/2002 11:49:29 PM
From: d:oug	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 116764

Richnorth, "root cause [is] the absolute power syndrome:" Yes, but if one can back-track to how past events allowed what was an United States to represent the opposite of a few people in their government to govern without any controls that would prevent abuse, then one can follow the thought process of American citizens that in effect allowed others of not good intentions to gain control of the people's minds. For example its a Catch-22 to ask a specific person on this thread to comment on the above since that person has already allowed himself to be controlled by Powers that Be, and any reply of so called insight obtained by him would follow the guidelines already placed upon him so that he would be unable to realize that he is being in control. Its quite simple really, all one has to do is create a structure or process where a person can unlease his anger and outrage towards what he sees as unacceptable behavior in the system, this while being unaware that everything he does to take action, walk his talk, has been set up by those very people he wishes to direct his actions towards, so change can be made. The more he speaks out and writes letters and posts articles after articles so others can "see" what he sees as wrong doings, well, it takes his time and energy doing this with thoughts that "he is making a difference" all the while those he is angry at are laughing and smiling knowing that they trapped all this time and energy of this "action" person into a place they created where "its for nothing" or a place where they control its impact. Actually it worst than it seems above since this person gives others the impression that "something is being done" so that they can continue to do nothing and wait to see results of that change for the better. Not only will change not happen, but others get the message that all that activity was empty and did not get the job done for change, thusly why try or join the effort. The Powers that Be just laugh and smile more and more and hope for their survival that this person continues doing the same more and more, and sadly this person does once he in error things that more of the same is needed to get that result not yet obtained. And then [Edit deleted] While this happens it become not only easy, but like honey to a honeybadger, those of the [Edit deleted] Conclusion is that yes, they will fight until they defeat themselves. [Edit deleted] why the WWF World Wrestling Foundation of Circus Acts using humans as dummies is really food for thought for [edit delete] golly it really sucks to type in lots and then delete lots ak