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Politics : GOPwinger Lies/Distortions/Omissions/Perversions of Truth -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: midway moron who wrote (93115)	4/8/2007 8:24:01 PM
From: Lizzie Tudor	Respond to of 173976

Americans talked with their dollars to former front runner McCain's fundraising. He is finished. Although McCain is a principled man, and I actually liked him in the past, a president needs better judgement than to align oneself to Bush policies. The talk shows are saying there has NEVER BEEN AN ELECTION IN HISTORY where democrats out-fundraised republicans by almost 3:1. Republicans are toast in 08 already. Plus the fact that the top fundraiser was Romney who has no chance of winning their base! What a perdicament.

To: midway moron who wrote (93115)	4/8/2007 8:34:09 PM
From: jim-thompson	Respond to of 173976

news like this makes all of us look stupid. this guy should have been canned with donald rumsfeld. he got away clean as a whistle and he reaping the benefits for supporting donald rumsfeld. oh by the way, my dislike for rumsfeld is right up there with elitist john forbes kerry, and the kennedy puke who killed mary jo.... 'Outrage' at World Bank Over Colleague's Generous Salary By Al Kamen Friday, April 6, 2007; Page A19 The World Bank rank and file were most upset by our recent column noting that Shaha Riza, linked romantically with bank President Paul Wolfowitz, got some curiously hefty raises upon being detailed to work at the State Department -- but remaining on the bank's payroll. "Since publication of the . . . column," a bank-wide e-mail Wednesday from the bank's staff association said, the association "has been inundated with messages from staff expressing concern, dismay and outrage." Pay raises for Shaha Riza, now of State, have irked many at the World Bank. (World Bank) Every weekday, The Post's In The Loop column reports insider news from the nation's capital. On the Hill (Thurs.) • Patty Murray, No Newcomer to Advocating for Veterans (March 28) • More On the Hill On K Street (Tues.) • Wal-Mart, the Democrats' New Friend (April 2) • More On K Street About This Column Sign Up for RSS Feed In the Loop Archive How RSS Works Who's Blogging? Read what bloggers are saying about this article. Swampland - TIME WHATREALLYHAPPENED.COM Today's Edition Full List of Blogs (3 links) » Most Blogged About Articles On washingtonpost.com \| On the web Save & Share Article What's This? DiggGoogle del.icio.usYahoo! RedditFacebook The association "has looked into those concerns" and concluded that, while it couldn't "determine who drew up and approved" the agreement detailing Riza to State -- which the bank said was necessary to avoid a conflict of interest -- it did find that the terms are "grossly out of line with" bank rules. Riza, a senior communications officer for the Middle East and North Africa region, was promoted to a higher-paying position on Sept. 19, 2005, the day she left for Foggy Bottom, without any of the required open competition for the job, the association said. She also got a pay raise more than double the amount allowed by the rules, the e-mail said, followed by another allegedly overly large raise. Before these bumps up, Riza had been earning $132,660. She's now paid $193,590. (Correction: We said last week that this figure was about $7,000 a year more than what is paid to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, for whom Riza now works. That now appears to be very misleading. Riza's reported pay is net, we're told, and Rice's is gross. So Riza takes home a whole lot more than Rice. We regret the error.) The association said that in general it "defends a staff member's right to have" the bank "preserve the confidentiality of certain information -- and we deplore this leak of a staff member's confidential salary information. However, in this case, the information shared with the press reveals a violation of the staff rules and therefore seems to us a clear case of whistleblowing." The sharply worded e-mail called on the bank's board and top officials to "explain how/why the rules were bent in this case" and noted that "this is not the first instance of such staff rule violations by the current World Bank Group management." The association e-mail -- and other bank observers -- questioned how this matter squared with Wolfowitz's anti-corruption drive, which demands that recipients of World Bank loans crack down on graft, nepotism and so on. "It's ironic that Mr. Wolfowitz lectures developing countries about good governance and fighting corruption, while winking at an irregular promotion and overly generous pay increases to a partner," said Bea Edwards, international director of the Government Accountability Project, which first disclosed the pay data. Foreign Policy magazine's editors opined that "given Wolfowitz's crusade to fight corruption in countries that receive Bank aid, doesn't it seem a little hypocritical to hand your girlfriend inordinate bonuses?" But these criticisms tend to assign some blame to Wolfowitz, even though his spokesman has assured us that matters involving Riza's "arrangements" were made "at the direction of the bank's board of directors." And Riza's successor for the Middle East and North Africa region, Karem Elsharkawy, in an e-mail yesterday to his colleagues, implored them to "maintain a balanced position and be rational and fair." No wrongdoing has been proven, he said, and until then "we must give our colleague the benefit of all reasonable doubt." washingtonpost.com