<HTML>In a message dated 12/3/02 12:45:17 AM Pacific Standard Time, cgrimes@rawbw.com writes: <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px"> "the reign of the Mayberry Machiavellis." </BLOCKQUOTE> What a great phrase. Too bad DiJ is talking about the White House instead of, say, an especially political episode of Jerry Springer. I would be curious for any evidence that DiJ's own office produced results any more substantive than the rest of the administration. One reason I even ask: in October there was a conference in Seattle on Trafficking in Women and Children. (That it occurred at all was probably the most important point. Content completely left out the entire western hemisphere and was pretty focussed on sex trade. In other words, lots of facts on the ground and really feeble analysis.) One of the speakers was a woman from the State Department talking about a new initiative to (spend a lot of govt $ to) try and fight trafficking and work with the victims.  While her 40-minute Powerpoint heavy speech bounced once or twice over the concept of improving women's economic positions, I stopped counting after 10 mentions of "faith-based" organizations as partners and presumably grant recipients. There was never a single mention of a speicific organization or any indication of why the really secular crowd would even care, but the phrase "faith-based" popped up everywhere, and I suppose we have Mr. DiJ to thank.... DoreneC </HTML>