World Bank Whistleblowers

|
Tend to get Wolfowitzed, reports Brett Stephens in the WSJ. Two of Wolfie's current accusers were responsible for a $50 million boondoggle, for which they retired with salaries, benefits and reputations intact. Not so the whistleblowers who questioned them.

The news the past few days has me "in a mood," so best not to say anything. Here are a few items worth reading, though.

  • Not the most explosive IEDs on the road: The Ft. Dix jihadis copied their practice videos at a commercial operation. Also, I can't put my finger on it, but I'm certain there's a connection between the hoaxers whose fraudulent email warnings always end with the instruction "forward this to everyone in your address book" and terrorists whose plans are "to kill as many people as possible."
  • Michael Barone on American demography. Everyone except the excruciatingly rich is moving to Dubuque and leaving NY, Boston, San Francisco & Los Angeles to the illegal immigrants. With various consequences. Here's a telling remark, though obvious to anyone who understands economics even slightly.
Democratic politicians like to decry what they describe as a widening economic gap in the nation. But the part of the nation where it is widening most visibly is their home turf, the place where they win their biggest margins (these metro areas voted 61% for John Kerry) and where, in exquisitely decorated Park Avenue apartments and Beverly Hills mansions with immigrant servants passing the hors d'oeuvres, they raise most of their money.
  • ninme's got the nicest post on the Queen's visit. Most of the press is sniffing & calling Bush an embarrassing Doofus because of a little gaffe (WaTi has the straight story). The Queen knows calling attention to gaffes is the most gauche etiquette violation there is.
  • Dear me. I'd read of the devastation of Greensburg, KS after a killer twister, but the aerial shots are unbelievable. It is not an exaggeration to say the whole town is gone.
  • B16's going to B-r-a-zil, which we're apparently calling "zil" now tomorrow. Brush up your Portuguese. Links to practically anything related to this story here. OMG, it's that puritanical blog programs won't let you write the word b-r-a! I wrote out the name of the country properly, and it automatically deleted it.