Wednesday, July 30, 2008

The rise of the Asian giants


Rivals: how the power struggle between China, India and Japan will shape our next decade

Bill EmmottAllen Lane, £20Tablet bookshop

price £18 Tel 01420 592974


China and India are invoked as bogeys by British politicians seeking to persuade the public that the economy must become more competitive to survive in an age of globalisation.

The two fast-growing Asian giants are also seen as ominous contributors to climate change. They have come to impinge on British consciousness in an unprecedented way.


Thirty years ago, Japan occupied a comparable position. That was the age of investment by consumer electronic companies such as Sony and Matsushita, which were followed by car-makers and other large-scale manufacturers. Management techniques such as a common canteen for bosses and workers, "quality circles" and just-in-time ordering were held up as models to a domestic industry in dire straits.
Lessons were learnt but then Japan faded from public view as the stock - and property-market - bubbles burst and the country entered a decade of stagnation. Yet its economy remained the second largest in the world, after the United States, and since 2002 it has been recovering. The rapid switch from emulation to oblivion always seemed artificial.
It is the merit of Bill Emmott's book that he brackets these three Asian powers not just as dominant players in their own continent but as certain to have a profound global impact over the next 10 years - thus the inflated subtitle of his book. The rise, first of Japan, then of China and India, he argues, is creating a market for goods, services and capital running from Tokyo to Tehran. This will form "the single biggest and most beneficial economic development in the twenty-first century, providing dynamism, trade, technological innovation and growth that will help us all".
However, as the subtitle also indicates, such progress could be blown off course by clashing interests. Emmott compares the emergence of three power centres in Asia with rivalry between Austria, Britain, France, Germany and Russia in the nineteenth century. That culminated in two world wars. Since then, however, Europe has sought to put conflict behind it through economic and political integration. The foundation for this process was reconciliation between France and West Germany.
In Asia, by contrast, the scars of the past, whether Japanese military atrocities or India's drubbing by China in the border war of 1962, are still livid. And the structures for handling tension remain embryonic; compare them with the Helsinki Process during the Cold War and the subsequent creation of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe.
Rivals opens with praise for George W. Bush for putting ties with the world's most populous democracy, India, on a completely new footing. Rapprochement began after the nuclear tests of 1998 and resulted in the first presidential visit to New Delhi, by Bill Clinton, in 22 years. In 2006 Mr Bush went much further than his predecessor by agreeing to collaborate over civil nuclear energy, despite the fact that India had not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Emmott sees this strategic partnership as a prime example of great-power manoeuvring, the purpose in this case being to limit the influence of China.
All three countries are devoting huge resources to defence. Last year China demonstrated its new capabilities by destroying one of its weather satellites with a surface-to-air missile; India is refurbishing or building aircraft carriers; and Japan has got round constitutional restraints on military spending by sharply increasing the budget of the Coastguard. Fear of conflict drives this investment in a continent with a number of potential flashpoints. Emmott identifies five: the Sino-Indian border and Tibet; the Korean peninsula; the East China Sea; Taiwan; and Pakistan.
Both China and India have claims on the other's territory, the first on Arunachal Pradesh, the second on Aksai Chin. In addition, India affords asylum to the Dalai Lama, whom Beijing accuses of inciting recent rioting in Lhasa. The quandary on the Korean peninsula is the impossibility of assessing the future of the North's regime; its sudden collapse might tempt China to intervene, thus provoking confrontation with the South.
In the East China Sea, Japan and China are competing for rights to drill for oil and gas based on what each considers to be its exclusive economic zone; the dispute is symbolised by rival claims to the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands. Over Taiwan, tension with Beijing has eased following the victory of the Kuomintang in both parliamentary and presidential elections, although no serious politician on the island can accede to the mainland's demands for reunification while it remains a dictatorship.
As for Pakistan, the uneasy relationship between the president and the parliament, the open defiance of Islamabad by jihadis in the tribal areas and Baluchistan, the limited authority of the Afghan president within his own country and the lack of progress in talks with India leave that nuclear-armed country as volatile as ever.
Emmott concludes his book with nine recommendations for preventing conflict in Asia. Among them are increasing the veto-wielding members of the Security Council to include India, Japan and various other countries, and similar reform of the G8, which excludes China and India. Within the region, the author suggests that the East Asia Summit, which was launched in 2005 and embraces East Asia, South-East Asia, India, Australia and New Zealand, is the best forum for confidence-building.
Japan, he writes, needs to follow up repeated apologies for what happened in the 1930s and 1940s with a fundamental change of attitude towards that period. China, whose ambitions cause the most anxiety in Asia, would benefit from transparency in its decision-making and defence spending. And India's main weakness is a poor relationship with its South Asian neighbours - above all, Pakistan. Lastly, the United States retains a vital stabilising role in the region, which it should enhance by giving greater priority to the NPT and climate change and by remedying its neglect of South-East Asia.
A former editor of The Economist and the author of six books on Japan, Emmott is a sensible and convivial guide through the minefield of intra-Asian rivalry. There are, however, several blemishes. Most seriously, he underplays the damage done to the NPT by the nuclear deal between Washington and New Delhi. To a lesser extent, the same applies to Japan's strategic concerns lest China invade Taiwan. I would not describe India's post-independence foreign policy as "isolationist"; it was a leading figure in the non-aligned movement and forged a close relationship with the
Soviet Union. And a fuller exploration of Chinese and Japanese attitudes towards the Yasukuni Shrine for the war-dead, the psychological core of differences between the two countries, would have been welcome. Finally, as a matter of fact, the number of US Marines stationed in Okinawa does not exceed that for American forces in South Korea; it is about half that figure.
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Thursday, December 06, 2007

I think I'm gonna be sad,
I think it's today, yeah.
The girl that's driving me mad
Is going away.

She's got a ticket to ride,
She's got a ticket to ride,
She's got a ticket to ride,
But she don't care.

She said that living with me
Was bringing her down yeah.
She would never be free
When I was around.

She's got a ticket to ride,She's got a ticket to ride,She's got a ticket to ride,But she don't care.I don't know why she's ridin' so high,She ought to think twice,She ought to do right by me.Before she gets to saying goodbye,She ought to think twice,She ought to do right by me.I think I'm gonna be sad,I think it's today yeah.The girl that's driving me madIs going away, yeah.She's got a ticket to ride,She's got a ticket to ride,She's got a ticket to ride,But she don't care.I don't know why she's ridin' so high,She ought to think twice,She ought to do right by me.Before she gets to saying goodbye,She ought to think twice,She ought to do right by me.She heard that living with me,Was bringing her down, yeah.She would never be freeWhen I was around.Ah, she's got a ticket to ride,She's got a ticket to ride,She's got a ticket to ride,But she don't care.My baby don't care, my baby don't care.My baby don't care, my baby don't care.My baby don't care.

Wednesday, December 05, 2007

4 Words That Will Make You Poor

By Rick Aristotle Munarriz December 4, 2007
4 Recommendations
We live and die one catch phrase at a time. We can't help it. Mantras feel so good as they roll from our tongues. We cling to them because they're catchy, like cotton candy on sticky fingers.
We can be so stupid sometimes.
OK, let me narrow that down. I can be so stupid sometimes. I've been seduced by market poetry. I've accepted a battle cry like "bulls make money, bears make money, but pigs get slaughtered" as a Wall Street truism. But maybe it's time I stick up for this little piggy that went to market.
I understand why bulls make money. There's a historical advantage to going long. Daily downticks and corporate meltdowns show how bears make money, even if it's a trickier practice, given the market's tendency to inch higher over long stretches of time.
But I get lost with this obsession with turning a pig into canned pork product. What's the problem here? Are you a glutton at the feeding trough if you hold on to a company for too long? Of course not. Great investors like Warren Buffett have held winning stocks for generations. Are you piggish because you hold a 10-bagger with the hope that it will roll into a 20-bagger? If so, hold your snout up high, because some other nervous Nellie cashed out earlier when it was just a five-bagger.
I would argue that "bulls make money, bears make money, pigs make more" is a better slogan. Yes, it sounds hedonistically stubborn. There's a certain stench of Gordon Gekko arrogance in claiming that greedy investors come out ahead. However, history teaches us that there are times when it's good to be a pig.

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Thursday, October 25, 2007

healthy diet will give u long life?

http://unblock22.blogspot.com/2006_06_25_archive.html ",

I disagree with u Krys
i dont believe DIET is all that important

the human body is designned by GOD
and can take all kinds of abuse

we have immunity
when that immunity breaks down
it is a form of HIV

in India we have poor people who live on the payments
who drink muddy water filtered by a dirty cloth
they eat food discarded
discarded bcoz it is spoilt

they dont eat fruits and nutritious meals
but GOD looks after His people

Do not worry about what u eat
what u put into your mouth dont matter

u can eat any thing
but what comes out of your mouth matters

says Jesus

Saby

Friday, May 26, 2006

on slavery

"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause." The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume V, "Letter to Horace Greeley" (August 22, 1862), p. 388.

Thursday, March 02, 2006

Saddam Hussein, a profile





Saddam is no monster as he is made out to be
the USA has supped wid more brutal dictators in the past

Saddam did wat most polly ticians do (all over the world) to preserve his power
and then there is collateral damage

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saddam_Hussein

Thursday, February 23, 2006

Porn searches and GOOGLE

DoJ may regret battling Google over porn probe
Declan McCullaghCNET News.comFebruary 22, 2006, 13:30 GMT

Tell us your opinion
Legal experts think that a Google victory in defence of its users' privacy could have wide-ranging implications for the US Justice Departement

The US Department of Justice's
attempt to compel Google to divulge millions of search records could backfire on police and prosecutors.
If Google convinces California courts that a federal privacy law protects Internet users' search terms from a subpoena, it would become more difficult for law enforcement to seek such records in future criminal investigations, legal experts are saying.
That's "absolutely" a concern, said Paul Ohm, a former Justice Department prosecutor who now teaches at the University of Colorado at Boulder. "There's a lot of precedent for that kind of thing."
In Google's written
response to the Justice Department's subpoena, filed with a San Jose, California, court on Friday, the search company argued that a 1986 privacy law means that it "cannot disclose the contents" of search terms based on a subpoena. A subpoena is a letter from a prosecutor sent without a judge's prior approval or review.
That law, called the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) provides potent legal safeguards for "electronic communication services". Google said that because of features it offers, such as the ability to send news alerts, it qualifies as such a service; the search terms of its users are therefore legally protected, it argued.
"It is time for the government to declare whether search terms are covered by ECPA," said Al Gidari, an attorney at Perkins Coie who co-authored Friday's brief on behalf of Google. "It makes no difference, in our view, that the government wants anonymous search queries. [Its argument] would allow them to search email so long as we removed the customer names."
Last month, the Justice Department asked a judge to force Google to hand over a random sample of one million Web pages from its index, along with copies of a week's worth of anonymous search terms, to aid in the Bush administration's defence of an Internet pornography law. US District Judge James Ware has scheduled a hearing for 13 March.
It's not clear how often search terms are used in criminal investigations. One North Carolina man was found guilty of murder in November in part because he Googled the words "neck", "snap", "break" and "hold" before his wife was killed. In a ZDNet UK sister site
CNET News.com survey published this month, Google, America Online, Microsoft and Yahoo declined to answer whether they had received requests for search records from police.
The Justice Department subpoena normally would have been a routine matter, and AOL, Microsoft and Yahoo
voluntarily complied with similar requests . But Google's resistance sparked a furore over privacy, with Senator Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, asking the Justice Department for details. A bill announced in the House of Representatives also would require Web sites to delete information about visitors.
There's no guarantee, of course, that ECPA will be decisive in this case; The Justice Department and Google could settle, or the judge could rule on unrelated grounds.
But if the federal courts adopt Google's interpretation of the law, the FBI and other police agencies would find it more difficult to obtain records of search terms in criminal investigations. Similar searches, such as those performed on databases like LexisNexis or Westlaw, or on news sites such as those of The New York Times and Yahoo, would also receive higher privacy protection.
Lawyers in civil cases, such as divorce attorneys and employers in severance disputes, would also encounter a new legal roadblock when seeking search terms.
"That is a good thing for privacy and I think the correct application of the law," says Kevin Bankston, an attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital-rights group based in San Francisco.
A spokesman for the Justice Department declined to comment Tuesday on whether the subpoena could backfire on prosecutors, saying the matter was under litigation.
Ohm, the former Justice Department prosecutor, said any federal appeals court that makes a sweeping proclamation about ECPA in a civil case is the government's "nightmare scenario" because such an interpretation of the law could make criminal investigations more difficult.
If that happens in the Google subpoena litigation, Ohm said, "Who knows? You may see calls for new legislation."
This case is unusual because it was brought by the Justice Department's civil division, which is hoping to use the search terms for social-science research instead of as part of a criminal investigation. The department's ECPA specialists in the Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section would not normally have been involved, Ohm said.
ECPA says that anyone offering an "electronic communication service to the public" generally may not divulge the contents of a communication except with the consent of the user or to a law enforcement agency that has a search warrant or a court order — instead of just a subpoena.
One twist in ECPA, however, could doom the Justice Department's pursuit of the search terms of Google's users. A search warrant is usually authorised only for criminal investigations, and ECPA's court order requirement also specifies an "ongoing criminal investigation".
But the Justice Department's defence of the Child Online Protection Act in a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union is a civil dispute, not a criminal investigation.
Google stands up to government porn probe
Google porn probe gets court date
Google misses profits target
Google keeps up porn probe battle

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Abortion is murder ?


















The cemetery of the victims of human cruelty in our century is extended to include yet another vast cemetery, that of the unborn.
-Pope John Paul II (b. 1920)


Quote WorldFamous Quotes at QuoteWorld.org


http://www.mttu.com/abort-pics/

When is abortion justified, if at all?
Certainly not if it is bcoz it is a female child


Female foeticide is very prevalent in the metros in India

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

Romance id dead

I’m Not the One You Love
lyrics by Bob Schneider



I’m not the one you love
I’m not the one you want

I know it sucks but honey like it or not
I’m the only one you’ve got

I’m not the one you digBut I’m your main house nigI know it sucks but honey like it or notI’m the only one you’ve got
You’re lonely I’m hornyI know it may sound cornyI’ve got it you need itYour pussy’s starved I’ll feed itI’m easy don’t tease meI know it may sound cheesyBut I love thee I need theeSo please don’t ever leave me
I’m not Antonio BanderasBut check my underwearasThey’re mighty stinky cause I wear them alotBut they’re the only ones I’ve got
I’m caring and daringMy butt I’ll soon be baringBut don’t worry just relaxJust take a few more zanaxIt’s allright it’s I don’t mindJust wash it down with some wineCause I love thee I need theeSo please don’t ever leave me

Friday, December 16, 2005

the maddest people on planet earth

THE COMPLETE LIST OF MAD Magazine's 20 Dumbest People, Events and Things of 2005: 1. Hurricane Katrina: The Bush League Response Shattering his old record for totally ignoring a national disaster (8 minutes of slacking following the 9/11 attacks), President Bush set a new standard this year for utter cluelessness. As Katrina grew to a class five hurricane and smashed the Gulf Coast, leaving New Orleans underwater and thousands stranded and suffering, Dubya spent his time clearing brush, presenting a birthday cake to John McCain, strumming a guitar at a GOP fundraiser, and sleeping. By the time he apologized to the nation two weeks later, it was painfully clear that the President had a lot in common with the citizens of New Orleans: he, too, was in way over his head.2. Tom Cruise: From Pretty Boy To "Hoo Boy!" As a Scientologist, Tom Cruise believes that all human suffering is caused by the galactic tyrant Xenu, who stacked billions of alien ghosts in volcanoes 75,000,000 years ago and then blew them up with his H-bombs. To us that sounds completely plausible, especially when compared to Tom's recent super crazy rants against psychotherapy and his wide-eyed, maniacal declarations of love for Katie Holmes. (Note to Katie: Get out now!) Damn that Xenu for making us all suffer through Cruise's weird, pathetic meltdown.3. There Goes The Bride: Jennifer Wilbanks Says "Adieu" Here comes the bride, all dressed in...whoops, not so fast! Just days before her upcoming nuptials, spooked bride-to-be Jennifer Wilbanks faked being kidnapped by a "Hispanic man" to avoid tying the knot. After an entire police force and 150 volunteers spent days looking for her to the tune of $60,000, she admitted that the story of her abduction on the eve of marriage was even phonier than the story of Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey's happy marriage. But still, the most troubling and highly disturbing aspect of the whole story? Her freaky-assed bug-eyes!4. Russell Crowe's Telephone Tantrum: Dial "M" For Moron Russell Crowe may not get a Best Actor Oscar nomination for Cinderella Man, but if there was a category for Best Real Life Temper Tantrum Thrown By a Pampered, Spoiled Multi-Millionaire Crybaby, then he'd be a sure-fire winner. The only performance of Crowe's that anyone paid any attention to this year was his caveman-like hotel lobby hissy fit during which he chucked a malfunctioning telephone at the head of a hapless desk clerk. All we can say is it's a good thing Russell wasn't having any problems with his toilet. 5. Karl Rove: A Man For All Treasons There's an old saying that goes, if you piss in the wind enough, sooner or later it's bound to come back and hit you in the face. And so it was with White House advisor and political smear-meister, Karl Rove. When Rove heard that former diplomat Robert Wilson was issuing a report debunking the Bush administration's main reason for invading Iraq, and unable to refute Wilson with the facts, Karl did the only thing he could do: attack Wilson by secretly leaking to the press that his wife, Valerie Plame, was an undercover CIA agent. There were two problems with Karl's plan: 1) It's against the law, and 2) He got caught. Next thing Karl knew, he was in front of a federal grand jury probing his verbal incontinence. Bad boy, Karl. Bad boy!6. Prince Harry: Not Knowing Reich From Wrong Nearly a year after it happened, we're still trying to figure out why in Himmler's name Britain's Prince Harry thought it was a jolly good idea to attend a costume party dressed in full Nazi regalia. As part of a family that says it doesn't want to attract undue attention, parading around with a Swastika armband isn't exactly the way to go unnoticed. Note to His Highness: Next time you get a hankering for dressing up as a Nazi, play it safe and go as the Soup Nazi. Unlike you, he's funny.7. Dave Chapelle: Must Flee TV Everyone handles success differently. Some immediately embrace it, some slowly adapt to it and others panic, crap their pants and haul ass to South Africa. Just after signing a record-breaking $50 million contract with Comedy Central, guess which category Dave Chappelle fell into? Even though his impersonations of Lil John, Rick James and Prince made him a star, Dave is now most famous for a baffling new impression: Runaway Bride Jennifer Wilbanks. 8. Pat Robertson: Hitman Of The Cloth Pat Roberston has long been respected and admired as a leading authority on sanctimonious, pea-brained, hateful ideas. This year, however, the Reverend's disturbing slide into advanced dementia reached a new low point when he called for the assassination of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. We're not Biblical scholars, but we missed the part in the Good Book where Jesus advocates killing. Perhaps Robertson's Bible includes The Gospel According To Jack (Ruby). We'd take issue with Pat more fervently, but honestly, we wouldn't want him to put a hit out on us, too. 9. Scam Artist Gives Wendy's The Finger It was a fast food scam so stupid, it made the Hamburglar look like a criminal mastermind. Anna Ayala thought she had cooked up the perfect swindle — plant a severed digit in her Wendy's chili and just wait for that easy lawsuit money to come rolling in! Only one problem: for some crazy reason, Wendy's wanted to figure out exactly how "Chili con Fingertip" ended up on their menu. It didn't take much investigating before Ayala's Biggie lies were exposed and she and her husband were arrested — but not before her stunt cost Wendy's millions of bucks in lost business. Amazingly, in a story that involved a woman almost eating a severed human finger, Ayala's greedy, dumbass behavior managed to stand out as the most disgusting part.10. Rafael Palmeiro Testifies Negative, Tests Positive When people say an athlete's had quite a year, they're usually referring to his on-the-field heroics. Not so with mustachioed, unnaturally tanned baseball star Rafael Palmeiro. After waving his finger in Clinton-esque fashion in front of Congress and testifying that he'd never used steroids, Rafy tested positive. Ever defiant, he then claimed that he never "intentionally" used steroids. But soon it was revealed that the heavy-duty 'roid he tested positive for is never found in tainted supplements, so he went to his next lame defense and blamed a teammate for giving him a tainted vitamin injection. Not long ago Palmeiro was hired to pitch Viagra to people who had trouble keeping it up. A good choice, because when it comes to dishing out the heavy BS, Rafy can keep it up forever.11. The Terry Schiavo Circus When a living creature perishes, eventually disgusting maggots appear to feed on its dead flesh. In the case of Terry Schiavo, the maggots — the self-righteous politicians, sanctimonious preachers, cable news talking heads and partisan grandstanders — actually fed on poor Terry while she was still alive. Upon hearing of this personal family tragedy, they quickly seized the opportunity to push forth their own selfish agendas. And an entire nation watched as these lowlife freaks whipped themselves — and the public — into a feeding frenzy. If only we could have disconnected the feeding tube on those bastards. 12. Michael Jackson's Touching Tale Even after being acquitted on his latest round of boy-touching accusations, Michael Jackson's story was as full of unexplained holes as his kabuki face. But you'd never know it, if you checked out the self-adoring celebration that erupted on his website. The King of Perv compared his "innocent" verdict to the birth of Martin Luther King, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the release of Nelson Mandela. It's good to see Michael finally gets it. 13. Brajelina: The Lame Of Love Like a cockroach that you step on over and over that will not die, so it is with the Brad Pitt/Jennifer Aniston/Angelina Jolie love triangle. Supermarket tabloids, TV entertainment shows and gossip websites fulfilled their brain-dead audience's insatiable desire for The juicy details...The sordid confessions...The smoldering fury! (Even when they had to make it up.) So much money has been made by the parasitic media feeding off these three people's private lives, we figure it won't be long before the ever-greedy comic book business jumps on the bottom-feeder bandwagon.14. Teen Queens' Extreme Weight Loss: Into Thin Err Unhappy with their images as robust, beautiful and healthy young women, Lindsay Lohan, Jessica Simpson and Nicole Ritchie decided it was time for an extreme makeover and quickly transformed themselves into sickly, walking skeletons. They probably think they look drop dead gorgeous, but to us they look more like they're just about to drop dead. 15. Saddam Photographed In Jail: The News In Briefs We're continually being told that for America to be successful in Iraq that we have to win the "hearts and minds" of the people on the Arab street. Our first efforts got off to a somewhat shaky start. There was that whole Abu Grahib naked prisoners on dog leashes thing, followed by the accidentally dropping and flushing the Koran down the toilet several times. This year we hit the trifecta when humiliating photos of the incarcerated Saddam Hussein, wearing nothing but tightie whities, were leaked to a British tabloid. The Pentagon, of course, promised to get to the bottom of their latest "crack" in security. Meanwhile, they're suffering from yet another public relations wedgie any child could relate to. 16. Homo-Neurotic: Right-Wing Group Outs SpongeBob Early this year, Focus On The Family founder Dr. James Dobson claimed there was a "sinister agenda" behind a children's video because it featured "pro-homosexual" cartoon characters, such as SpongeBob SquarePants, singing the 1979 Sister Sledge hit We Are Family. We can't help thinking that Dr. J has actually lost his focus on the family — isn't it much more sinister that the video is trying to revive disco music? And, given that SpongeBob works as a deep-fry cook churning out Krabby Patties, shouldn't family groups be more worried about childhood obesity? As right-wingers continue to warn us about harmful influences in the fictional world of animation, they better take a look at this utterly shocking information we've uncovered, as it is indeed cause for grave concern.17. Paula Abdul: Judge Juicy We always knew that Paula Abdul was super-nice to American Idol contestants, but she apparently took it to the extreme with Season 2 contestant (and all-around loser) Corey Clark. Corey claimed that the once-sexy Abdul had an affair with him while he was on the show -- and also that she secretly coached him, chose his songs, designed his new look and even paid for his wardrobe, hairstyling and cell phone. The former Laker babe was cleared of any wrongdoing by FOX . (Note: Given that FOX's new fall line-up included The War At Home, Head Cases and So You Think You Can Dance, they're clearly experts when it comes to wrong-doing!) Well, one thing's for sure: we'll never be able to look at Ruben Studdard again without wondering if maybe, just maybe...18. Kevin Federline: From Beer to Paternity It was April 12th when both People Magazine editors and readers spontaneously wet themselves as Britney Spears announced that she and second husband, former dancer/current bum Kevin Federline were — Oh! My! God! — expecting. While makin' babies was sure to be a new experience for Spears, it was old hat for Federline who had already fathered two kids — not even waiting around for the second one to be born before hooking up with Spears. A healthy baby boy was born on September 14 — and while Britney had cause to worry over Kevin's lack of employment, drinking, partying, gambling and forays to strip clubs, she might take comfort in the knowledge that all those lap dances he's been enjoying (and she's been paying for) are good practice for when he bounces little Sean Preston Spears Federline on his knee.19. "INTELLIGENT DESIGN" 20. What Screws Up Must Come Down: The A-list of A-holes Lately, when someone does something really stupid, illegal or immoral, they're "punished" with a fat book contract or their own reality TV show. But that's not always the case. Occasionally there is a God. Someone does something wrong and there are repercussions. And so it was with a bunch of notorious lowlifes this year. In one way or another, from fraud to professional ethics gaffes to racist remarks, each of these once-esteemed people screwed up and lost. Some lost their freedom. Some lost their job. Some lost whatever credibility and respect they had. But they all found at least one thing: a place among this group of unquestionable morons.

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