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Politics : Proof that John Kerry is Unfit for Command -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Wayners who wrote (25124)	1/30/2005 10:04:54 PM
From: TideGlider	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 27181

Thanks! That is some article!! Everyone should read it. I suppose you could advertise for nude models all day long and just say they weren't right for the jobafter a good interview. Very bad situation. If you don't take a job as a prostitute, we can stop your benefits' By Clare Chapman (Filed: 30/01/2005) A 25-year-old waitress who turned down a job providing "sexual services'' at a brothel in Berlin faces possible cuts to her unemployment benefit under laws introduced this year. Prostitution was legalised in Germany just over two years ago and brothel owners – who must pay tax and employee health insurance – were granted access to official databases of jobseekers. The waitress, an unemployed information technology professional, had said that she was willing to work in a bar at night and had worked in a cafe. She received a letter from the job centre telling her that an employer was interested in her "profile'' and that she should ring them. Only on doing so did the woman, who has not been identified for legal reasons, realise that she was calling a brothel. Under Germany's welfare reforms, any woman under 55 who has been out of work for more than a year can be forced to take an available job – including in the sex industry – or lose her unemployment benefit. Last month German unemployment rose for the 11th consecutive month to 4.5 million, taking the number out of work to its highest since reunification in 1990. The government had considered making brothels an exception on moral grounds, but decided that it would be too difficult to distinguish them from bars. As a result, job centres must treat employers looking for a prostitute in the same way as those looking for a dental nurse. When the waitress looked into suing the job centre, she found out that it had not broken the law. Job centres that refuse to penalise people who turn down a job by cutting their benefits face legal action from the potential employer. "There is now nothing in the law to stop women from being sent into the sex industry," said Merchthild Garweg, a lawyer from Hamburg who specialises in such cases. "The new regulations say that working in the sex industry is not immoral any more, and so jobs cannot be turned down without a risk to benefits." Miss Garweg said that women who had worked in call centres had been offered jobs on telephone sex lines. At one job centre in the city of Gotha, a 23-year-old woman was told that she had to attend an interview as a "nude model", and should report back on the meeting. Employers in the sex industry can also advertise in job centres, a move that came into force this month. A job centre that refuses to accept the advertisement can be sued. Tatiana Ulyanova, who owns a brothel in central Berlin, has been searching the online database of her local job centre for recruits. "Why shouldn't I look for employees through the job centre when I pay my taxes just like anybody else?" said Miss Ulyanova. Ulrich Kueperkoch wanted to open a brothel in Goerlitz, in former East Germany, but his local job centre withdrew his advertisement for 12 prostitutes, saying it would be impossible to find them. Mr Kueperkoch said that he was confident of demand for a brothel in the area and planned to take a claim for compensation to the highest court. Prostitution was legalised in Germany in 2002 because the government believed that this would help to combat trafficking in women and cut links to organised crime. Miss Garweg believes that pressure on job centres to meet employment targets will soon result in them using their powers to cut the benefits of women who refuse jobs providing sexual services. "They are already prepared to push women into jobs related to sexual services, but which don't count as prostitution,'' she said. "Now that prostitution is no longer considered by the law to be immoral, there is really nothing but the goodwill of the job centres to stop them from pushing women into jobs they don't want to do." © Copyright of Telegraph Gro

To: Wayners who wrote (25124)	1/31/2005 6:48:26 AM
From: lorne	Respond to of 27181

Democrats cautiously welcome Iraqi elections Sun Jan 30, 4:48 PM ET news.yahoo.com WASHINGTON (AFP) - Leading Democratic Party critics of US President George W. Bush (news - web sites)'s Iraq (news - web sites) policy cautiously welcomed the successful staging of elections and distanced themselves from calls for the start of an immediate US troop withdrawal. Massachusetts Senator John Kerry (news - web sites), who lost the November presidential election against Republican President George W. Bush, described the Iraqi elections as "significant" and "important" but said they should not be "overhyped." "It is significant that there is a vote in Iraq," Kerry said in an interview with NBC television's Meet the Press. "But ... no one in the United States should try to overhype this election. "This election is a sort of demarcation point, and what really counts now is the effort to have a legitimate political reconciliation," Kerry said. "And it's going to take a massive diplomatic effort and a much more significant outreach to the international community than this administration has been willing to engage in. "Absent that, we will not be successful in Iraq," he said. Kerry also said he did not support fellow Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy's call last week for the immediate pullout of at least 12,000 US troops from Iraq following the elections. "I wouldn't do a specific timetable, but I certainly agree with (Kennedy) in principle, that the goal must be to withdraw American troops," Kerry said. Another influential Democrat, Delaware Senator Joseph Biden, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also rejected Kennedy's call for an immediate withdrawal of some American forces. "I think pulling American forces out now would be, quite frankly, a serious mistake," Biden said on CBS television's Face the Nation. "I think it's much too premature. I think there would be a collapse, quite frankly, of any sense of order in the country." Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, whose name has been mentioned as a possible presidential candidate in 2008, described the Iraqi elections as a "great day for democracy" but cautioned that "this is only one step in what is going to be a long and difficult process." "It's a good day, but we need to see it through to a successful conclusion," Bayh said. "And frankly, I'm concerned, given some of the past mistakes, whether this leadership team will be capable of that." He said he disagreed with Kennedy's call for the start of a US troop withdrawal from Iraq. "We've planted our flag," Bayh said. "I think that we need to be successful now, and unfortunately that's going to require our presence for some time. "I think to cut and run at this juncture would be a terrible mistake." Michigan Senator Carl Levin, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee (news - web sites), said, challenges remain. "I'm afraid there were some areas where the turnout is extremely low, and that's the Sunni Triangle areas or parts thereof," he said. "And that's the challenge that we now face. "But Iraqis that did turn out in large numbers, at least in some areas and in some places, took their lives in their hands in doing so, and we're very delighted with that," he said. Levin said it was too early to talk about a troop withdrawal. "I think that is putting the cart a little bit ahead of the horse," he said. "As important as it is that we finally obtain some kind of an exit strategy, we have to negotiate that with the sovereign government and see whether or not the Iraqis will step up to their own security as well. "We've got to see whether or not the Iraqi people will put their lives on the line in joining the security forces," Levin said. "There are very few trained Iraqi security forces in Iraq. That is a huge challenge."