– that a woman plundered more than $370,000 from a dementia sufferer after placing him in a nursing home without his family’s knowledge, a court has been told. Shanta Mani Naidu, 52, of Regents Park, in Brisbane’s south, has pleaded not guilty to fraud allegedly committed between September 2002 and April 2004 against James McFarlane, 82. (Go pick on someone with equal mental capacity, you piece of sh*t.)

The Stupid Shitty-Porean Award

– that a man who suspected his wife of infidelity, gagged her, tied her to a bed with ropes, and tattooed her arms, breasts and abdomen in order to ‘teach her a lesson’. The 45-year-old man was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment and six strokes of the cane. A friend who had helped the man to restrain and tattoo the 33-year-old woman is still at large, the court official said. The men had tattooed stars, patterns of the sun, an arrow, and the words ‘one way’ on the wife’s body, court documents showed. The couple had been living apart when the incident took place last August. A doctor told the court that it could take up to five months of laser treatment to remove the tattoos, at a total cost of as much as $4950, the court documents showed. (Some people are such idiots. The tattoos would not remove the intercourse she had even if she did.)

The World This Week

– that World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz Wolfxxkwit is fighting for his political life after coming under fire for allegations of favouritism. It revolves around Shaha Ali Riza, his close female friend whom he was romantically involved, who received a significant pay rise when she was assigned to the U.S. State Department. (All the architects of the Iraqi War are arseholes, from Warmonger Bush, to Rumsfool to Wolfxxkwit…)

– that his mea culpa was not enough for the World Bank’s staff association, which said Wolfxxkwit had ‘destroyed’ the trust of employees and should quit. “He must act honorably and resign,” the de facto union said in a letter to the World Bank’s 10,000 rank-and-file staff. In an editorial, the Financial Times newspaper also called for Wolfxxkwit to go, either voluntarily or at the behest of the board. (The World Bank should recover every cent paid to him and sue him until he’s a bankrupt too.)

– that Wolfxxkwit decried what he called a ‘smear campaign’ against him and told a special bank panel that he acted in good faith in securing a promotion and pay raise for his girlfriend. In a prepared statement to the panel, Wolfxxkit said the institution’s ethics committee had access to all the details surrounding the arrangement involving bank employee Shaha Riza, ‘if they wanted it’. (Nepotism by any other name or intention is still nepotism…)

– that the alleged ‘D.C. madam’ dropped a name in court documents filed, but the man named laughed at being accused of hiring the high-end escort service run by Deborah Jeane Palfrey. Gover-min prosecutors say Pamela Martin and Associates was actually a prostitution ring that Palfrey operated in the Washington area for 13 years but Palfrey denies that her business provided sexual services to its customers. In her motion to reconsider appointment of counsel, Palfrey named Harlan K. Ullman as ‘one of the regular customers’ of the business. Ullman is one of the leading theorists behind the ‘shock and awe’ military strategy that was associated with the 2003 invasion of Iraq. (It won’t be a surprise if Ullman is just another ‘lar sup’ [dirty] little bastard. Reason: Iraq.)

– that top White House adviser Karl Rove is at the centre of a row over potentially lost e-mails that could shed light on the firing of prosecutors last year. Democrats probing the dismissals wanted to see the e-mails as part of their inquiry – and expressed disbelief they could have been deleted. (It is a joke if that the White Hose does not have daily backups, weekly backups, monthly backups, and yearly backups etc. Or worse come to worst, use those blasted forensic proggies to find it.)

– that the Chilean gover-min is upset with Google Earth for moving one of its villages to Argentina. The 1,100 residents of Villa O’Higgins, which was named after a Chilean hero, do in fact live in Chile instead of Argentina. The Chilean gover-min has petitioned Google to change its map markers to reflect that fact. In Google Earth’s defense, this area does have a very complicated border – and the two countries have almost gone to war over it. (It would be quite funny – though disastrous – if they went to war because of a mistake on Google Earth.)

– that AIDS charities have reacted angrily to John Howard’s opposition to HIV-positive immigrants moving to Australia. Mr Howard proposed a blanket ban, which would only be exempt in special cases, during a radio interview in Melbourne. Australian HIV activists said the country’s immigration laws already had tight restrictions. The UK’s National AIDS Trust described the proposal as illegal, discriminatory and ineffective. (Howard has the right to do what’s best in the interest of the Commonwealth of Australia no matter what the ninnys say.)

– that the Australian gover-min has announced plans to outlaw material that advocates terrorism – a move designed to tighten its already strict censorship rules. Books and films deemed to glorify terrorism will be removed from shelves and barred from entering the country. The gover-min says the changes are part of its zero tolerance policy towards terrorism. But critics say they will lead to the censorship of material helpful to those wishing to understand radical Islam. (There is no such thing as ‘radical Islam’. Call a spade a spade. It is nothing but terrorism and murder in the name of religion.)

– that Israelis clamoured for Ehud Olmert to resign as his ruling coalition began to fray after a gover-min probe blasted his lea-duhship for serious failure in the Lebanon war. As one cabinet minister quit and newspapers shrieked for Olmert to follow suit over a scathing interim report into the conflict, party faithful rallied around and commentators warned he could yet ride out the political storm. (Stop wasting everyone else’s time, Olmert. You have destroyed Sharon’s dream. Go.)

– that Ehud Olmert remained defiant in the face of a party mutiny that joined calls for him to quit in the wake of a damning report of his lea-duhship – or the lack of it – in the Lebanon war. He spoke after an aide to Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni – a top Kadima official considered one of the frontrunners to take over party lea-duhship – said that she would ask Olmert to quit during a meeting. (There is no point delaying the inevitable, Olmert.)

– that a wall U.S. troops are building around a Sunni enclave in Baghdad came under increasing criticism on Saturday, with residents calling it ‘collective punishment’ and a local lea-duh saying construction began without the neighborhood council’s approval. Some residents of the neighborhood, which is surrounded by Shiite areas, complained that they had not been consulted in advance about the barrier. The U.S. military says the wall in Baghdad is meant to secure the minority Sunni community of Azamiyah, which ‘has been trapped in a spiral of sectarian violence and retaliation’. The area, located on the eastern side of the Tigris River, would be completely gated, with entrances and exits manned by Iraqi soldiers, the U.S. military said earlier this week. (There’s this sense that this is a disaster waiting to happen. Just try and imagine that if the soldiers at the gate were bribed and a Shi’ite militia enters the village and start killing people house to house. There will be no place for the residents in this enclave to flee to.)

– that the U.S. Army is tightening restrictions on soldiers’ blogs and other Web site postings to ensure sensitive information about military operations does not make it onto public forums. Soldiers in war zones are already subject to restrictions on blogging and public posts. But the Army’s new regulation could affect service members who have returned from war zones and started blogs about their combat experiences. (They lost Vietnam War because of the media. They won’t lose the Iraq one because of blogs.)

– that Iran’s president has come under fire from a conservative newspaper after he publicly kissed the hand of a woman who used to be his school teacher. Mahmoud Mah-bouk Ahmadinejad, a conservative by the standards of Iranian politics, was attacked by the Hizbullah newspaper for acting ‘contrary to Sharia law’. It accused him of ‘indecency and violating religious values’. (Maybe time for Iran to stop some of the funding for the Hizbullah.)

– that the Taliban has taken barbarism to new heights by using a child as an executioner – and releasing a videotape of him beheading an ‘American spy’. (These very savages should be denied their basic human rights, and hunt down for the beasts that they are.)

– that the Japanese gover-min admitted in a statement the killing of non-combatants by the Japanese imperial army in the Nanjing Massacre in China, Kyodo News reported. It thinks it cannot deny such facts as the killing of non-combatants and plunder, but it is difficult to make a conclusion on the exact number of the slain people since there have been different voices, the statement said. The statement was released in response to an inquiry by a member of the Lower House, or the House of Representatives. (That’s good enough. It makes no difference if you had killed 3 non-combatants or 300,000.)

– that Nina Wang, formerly Hong Kong’s richest woman, has left her fortune to her feng shui adviser, her lawyer says. Businessman Chan Chun-chuen, 48, was the sole beneficiary of the multi-billion-dollar estate, he said. And Wang allegedly made the decision because Mr Chan understood her ‘personal philosophy’. The announcement sets the stage for a possible court battle, amid reports of a second will in which Ms Wang promised her money to a charitable trust. Ms Wang, who died on 3 April, is thought to have left an estate worth about $4.2bn. (She got it in a legal battle. In the same way it will go to her beneficiary.)

– that two MPs who faked a hostage-taking at Taiwan’s top university after the U.S. school shootings have been condemned by the island’s governing party. The DPP made a public apology after two MPs reported that students had been taken hostage at National Taiwan University. Armed police rushed to the campus, only to be told that the call was a hoax aimed at testing their response time. (In Singapore, they put people in jail for hoaxes like this.)

– that the U.S. opposes Taiwan’s deployment of offensive missiles targeting Mainland China, the top American envoy to Taiwan, Stephen Young. Washington reiterated that it supports Taipei’s efforts to protect itself, but stressed that this should only be done through the use of defensive weapons. U.S. officials are concerned that development of offensive missiles on both sides of the Taiwan Strait could threaten regional security. Reports say China now has over 900 missiles targeting Taiwan. (Read: ‘You will buy all sub-standard weapons from us. Not make your own.’)

– that an Indonesian passenger jet was forced to turn round in Indian airspace to avoid a nuclear-capable missile test flight, the Indonesian gover-min says. Officials from Garuda airlines say they received no advance notice of the test. But India’s Ministry of External Affairs said the tests followed normal safety precautions, and that Garuda was given advance warning. (And the Indonesians will keep quiet because they only pick on those who are smaller.)

– that Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said that developing nations should strive for good governance and invest in their citizens to free them from poverty and violence. Developing countries should aim for accountability and invest in their people through high quality education and health care, he said. They could free their citizens from the ‘bondage of poverty and conflict’ by nurturing their creativity, Yudhoyono added. (Is Indonesia suddenly ready to give up it’s ‘tried and tested solution’ which is to blame its Chinese population and / or Singapore for it’s own sorry predicament?)

– that Indonesia is losing its forests faster than any other country, with the equivalent of about 300 football pitches destroyed every hour, the environmental group Greenpeace has said. About 4.5 million acres of forest were lost each year between 2000 and 2005. (With that smoke blanketing the region almost yearly for more than a decade, it is no surprised.)

Singapore This Week

– that Singapore has been accused of acting like an ‘authoritarian state’ after refusing to allow European Parliament members to speak during a visit. The seven MEPs, from the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE), as well as a Cambodian and a Philippines congresswoman, were denied permission to speak at a forum on democracy in Europe and Asia. One MEP likened the Singaporeans’ to repressive regimes such as North Korea, Myanmar and China. The Singapore gover-min said foreigners did not have permission to address the event. (Even foreigners must bow to a 66.6% mandate, except for those who fits the TaliPAP’s description of ‘talent’.)

– that the gover-min said this week that mini$ter$ and $enior civil servants $erpent$ would enjoy a 60% pay increase, giving them an average salary of S$1.9 million. Baby Lee’s pay is set to jump to S$3.1 million – five times what Warmonger Bush earns. (外国有偷鸡摸狗的贪污官员，我们有巧取豪夺所谓的 ‘廉洁政府’ 。 Thank you very much 66.6%!! Thank you very much!!)

– that the announcement has drawn widespread criticism from ordinary Singaporeans given the country’s widening income gap and the fact the city-state’s mini$ter$ were already among the highest-paid in the world. (是吗？那当记住这犹如切身之痛与莫名的愤怒，大选时好好利用。[Translation: Is that so? Then remember this pain which is as if your flesh is cut and also the unexplained fury, and use it well during the elections.] Anyway, have fun reading this.)

– that the pay rise for political office holders and civil serpents is not linked to the upcoming GST hike. Yaacob Ibrahim, made this clarification at a dialogue session in Tampines. (One will have to bury his conscience to actually believe this.)

– that the police told the SDP it could not hold a public forum to discuss the increases, and the immigration authority rejected applications for professional visit passes for the seven foreigners the SDP invited to speak. (Chee and the SDP should have known better.)

– that “Singapore’s politics are reserved for Singaporeans. As visitors to our country, foreigners should not abuse their privilege by interfering in our domestic politics,” the MHA said in a statement. (And even so, Singapore’s politics are reserved only for Singaporeans who played by the rules. Those who don’t, end up like JBJ or CSJ.)

– that according to the SDP Web site, Chee Soon Juan plans to speak at the forum and rebut remarks made by Lao Kok Kok about the mini$ter$’ pay hike. Lao Kok Kok said earlier this week that Singapore should pay mini$ter$ competitive wages because the city-state needs an ‘extraordinary gover-min with extraordinary gover-min officers’. (夜郎自大。 Lao Kok Kok’s pride knows no bounds. Come back and talk about being extraordinary when you rule something bigger than an island.)

– that Lao Kok Kok say Singapore has to be as cosmopolitan as other world class cities like New York and London, for its own survival and success. He said, “If we are dynamic, we will attract talent, we will grow because we have more talent. When I say talent, it means people who add to the dynamism of that society. Singaporeans, if I can chose an analogy, we are the hard disk of a computer, the foreign talent are the megabytes you add to your storage capacity. So your computer never hangs because you got enormous storage capacity.” (Whether the system hangs does not always have something to do with the hard disk because it isn’t the only component. And the system hangs if the motherboard fails too, not to mention the system can become extremely slow because of an old motherboard. Or the OS gets too old it can’t run new programs. Just image the Tali-PAP being that motherboard or the OS.)

– that Lao Kok Kok say that times have changed and it would be unrealistic to expect such selfless sacrifice [from the current mini$ter$] now. (For the love of money, some lose their souls.)

– that since its soft launch last December, there have been growing rumbles of discontent from some of the 262 tenants at the AMK Hub. Low human traffic caused by renovation work and frequent power trips are among the gripes, and letters asking for rent refunds have been forwarded to the management. Some disgruntled tenants – most of them on the second level – wanted a refund of a month’s rent because of sluggish business, which they claimed was the result of renovation works on the floors above. (Like the landlord cares if you have got no business? As they used to say… fools rush in where angels fear to tread.)

– that the smoke from Indonesia helps to block out direct sunlight, preventing extreme heat in Singapore, according to an academic. According to Dr John Yong, Natural Sciences & Science Education, National Institute of Education, “The haze smoke now has two functions. First it reduces the amount of sunlight reaching Singapore and the haze smoke also helps in developing more clouds and these clouds actually reflect off the sun, energy from reaching Singapore. (Does it matter to this bleeding moron that whatever ‘positive’ effects there are… it doesn’t really matter to those who needs to see a doctor?)

– that according to the WHO’s World Health Report 2006, the number of hospital beds ratio in Singapore (in 2004) is only 28 per 10,000 population. Countries with similar GNP per capita as Singapore have a much higher hospital beds ratio than Singapore. Among the four Asian dragons, the Republic of Korea led the way with 89 hospital beds per 10,000 population, followed by Taiwan [48 beds], Hong Kong [47 beds] and Singapore [28 beds]. (And Singapore still wants to be a medical hub. I shudder to think how Singaporeans are going to find a bed when all the Novo Richies in the region comes and take up the beds. It reminds me again of a conversation I had before with a health assistant in the therapy department who says she does not understand why Singaporeans suffering from paralysis lost the will to live while overseas, people does anything to try and stay alive and regain control of their limbs. But I do. If medical fees costs a bomb, I also lose my will to live because I do not want to be a burden to my family.)

– that a well meaning writer, Lan Zhong Zheng wrote this in a letter to Voices on TODAY: “The ultimate solution is not to carry out means testing on Singaporeans but to increase the supply of beds in the subsidised wards in hospitals here. Implementing means testing infringes on the right of the people to choose.” (Poor Lan doesn’t yet understand they would never do that because that means the gover-min will pay. And guess what, their best method to turn down such a great idea is simply to say, “The cost may need to be pass to taxpayers…”)

– that after a protracted investigation that took almost two years, the youth blamed for causing the death of a car salesgirl was finally charged in court with reckless driving. Regan Lee Da Wen, 26, was accused of causing the death of Ms He Xueli, 22, by driving a Mazda MX-5 convertible dangerously during a test drive in October 2005. Lee, who will appear in court on June 18 for a pre-trial conference, faces a maximum five-year jail term if found guilty. His lawyer Julian Tay said his client was ‘haunted’ by the accident. (该死的不死。 He should be banned from driving for life and get a 10 year term for it.)

– that earlier this month, the youth incurred the rage of Netizens and car enthusiasts after he wrote in a motoring forum that he was shopping for sports cars and could not decide between a Subaru WRX and a Volkswagen Golf GTI. Many were angry that he was allowed to drive while investigations were ongoing. (More will be angrier if he is still allowed to drive and is let off with a short jail term.)

– that visiting gover-min officials from an Asian country had lamented to the NTUC that they wished their unions could be as ‘constructive’ as their Singapore counterparts. But when the NTUC lea-duhs related this to union lea-duhs from that Asian country, the retort was: “Please tell our gover-min that the day it behaves like the $ingapore gover-min, we will behave like the NTUC.” (For that, their gover-min will need the ISD, and have all those who failed to ‘behave’ will be invited to help them clear their stock of 25cts coffee..)

– that ‘Horlicks Kar Ching’ has been named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world. She is among 29 women in the list which includes US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Indra Nooyi of PepsiCo. This is the first time ‘Horlicks’ has made it to the list of Time’s Most Influential. (Shin Shit Corp. ‘Nuff said.)

– that Singapore needs a team of lea-duhs who are capable, competent, have the right values to improve the lives of all and have mastered the issues over many years – not lea-duhs who come and go – so as to develop ‘not just any solutions, but good ones’ to our problems. (Then give us something better other than that crap ERP on the CTE. And give us something better than this ‘World Class’ system that the people who called it so do not use it daily!)

– that the train and bus operator SMRT booked a net profit of nearly S$136 million for the year ended in March. That is up nearly one-third compared to the previous year. SMRT said it saw broad-based growth in all of its business segments during the last business year, pushing its revenue more than 4% higher to S$743 million. (And it’s not likey they won’t raise fares because of this!)

– that SMRT however said the 2 percentage-point hike in GST starting from 1 July is expected to eat into earnings. (Wow, already finding the excuse to raise fares!)

Trivial, Jokes and Thoughts from Discussions

– that Israeli researchers are looking into whether spider venom could help cure impotency after men bitten by arachnids experienced prolonged erection. The research was launched after observations that some men bitten by spiders ‘suffered from prolonged erections’. “This is the first research of its kind and could help a great number of men.” Among the spiders beings studied are the black widow, the female spider who is known for sometimes eating her mate after copulation, as well as two other arachnids that can be found in Africa and South America. (Stand aside, Viagra and Cialis. Here comes Spid-ralis.)

– that Arizona State University researchers have learned that, during photosynthesis, bacteria may realign crucial proteins very quickly. This allows the bacteria to capture nearly every photon of available light in a millionth of a millionth of a second, about the same time it takes for a supercomputer to carry out a single flop. To make measurements in such tiny time scales, the scientists used an ultrafast laser facility. Moving those proteins around rapidly allows the bacteria to capture most of the potential energy in their biological circuitry. Thus, photosynthesis can take place under less than perfect conditions. (And all these creatures exists by chance!!)

– that ‘A great leader is one who plans his exit when he or she enters the job.’ – Anonymous. (So Lao Kok Kok is definitely not one. He can’t and won’t exit.)

– that Apple reported financial results far ahead of Wall Street’s expectations, and the company’s board of directors defended Steve Jobs’ role in Apple’s stock options backdating scandal. Revenue for Apple’s second quarter, which ended March 31, was $5.26 billion, up 21 percent compared with revenue of $4.36 billion in the same quarter last year. Profit was up nearly 88% at $770 million, or 87 cents / share, compared with profit of $410 million, or 47 cents / share, last year. Wall Street analysts surveyed by Thomson First Call had been expecting revenue of $5.17 billion and earnings per share of 64 cents. (Sounds familiar? The NKF board defended T.T. Durai too. It’s high time someone open another arsehole for Jobs just like what the SPH did to Durai.)

– that Greenpeace gave a cautious welcome to Apple’s ambitions to be more environmentally friendly. In a statement Steve Jobs said the company would stop using toxic and hazardous chemicals in manufacturing. Greenpeace praised Apple for its decision to phase out the most harmful chemicals but said the electronics giant could do more. The group wants Apple to improve its recycling policy and stop dumping old products in other parts of the world. (And stop manufacturing iPods too. All that plastic is more unfriendly to the planet’s environment than anything else.)

– that Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer sentenced Paris Hilton to 45 days in county jail for violating her probation. She must go to jail by June 5 to a women’s jail in suburban Lynwoodand will not be allowed any work release, furloughs, use of an alternative jail or electronic monitoring in lieu of jail, ruled after a hearing. The judge’s ruling excluded her from paying to serve time in a jail of her choice, as some violators are allowed to do. (Just make sure she doesn’t screw the guards and make a video of it.)