U.S. President Barack Obama

One of the major donor campaign Barack Obama for the upcoming November presidential elections allegedly a swindler. Previously, he has donated tens of thousands of dollars for winning Obama become President of the United States for up to four years.

Reported by Reuters on Tuesday, April 2, 2012, the donor is the founder of the Foundation Abake Abake Assongba that channel aid to Africa. Assongba reported to have donated up to U.S. $ 50,000 (Rp457 million) for the Obama campaign, making it one of the Democratic Party’s biggest donors.

According to the Washington Post, Assongba accused of cheating a businessman to U.S. $ 657,000 (Rp 6, 01 billion). He also reported getting a court to paythe demands of the former rentapartment in New York of U.S. $ 10,000 (Rp91 million) in the stump.

Federal Election Commission records show, a woman born in West Africa has contributed tensof thousands of dollars in recentyears. There has been no confirmation of these allegations Assongba. In the previous allegations, he denied.

If proven true Assongba is a fraud, then the contribution of money to be returned.

This is not the first time the Obama campaign donors was problematic. Previously, the teammust return the Democratic campaign fund of U.S. $ 200 million (Rp1, 8 billion) in January to the family of Mexican businessmen suspected of involvement in violence and corruption.

December last year, Democrats must also repatriate the U.S. $ 70,000 (Rp640 million) donation from MF Global Director Jon Corzine and his wife who was tripping problem. Last year, Corzine, a former director of Goldman Sachs, is holding a fundraising night for U.S. $ 35,800 which raised U.S. $ 500,000 for Obama winning.

“More than 1.3 million Americans have contributed to this campaign, and we continue to review each funding stream. Some easy to navigate, while some are very difficult. But whenthere is a problem, we solve it very well,” said Obama campaign spokesman, Ben LaBolt.

“Tele Pizza” is a well known company delivering pizzas everywhere in a city. The evening is a busy time and these boys have to speed up to deliver their grub hot. They drive their scooters fast through busy streets, jumping on the traffic lights. The reason of their speed is also because they are paid badly, but they get a bonus for every pizza they deliver. I once heard a big crash as I was walking in the street. I turned round to see a boy on the ground, his scooter here and the pizzas there. Surprisingly, he was unharmed. He collected the boxes, jumped on the scooter and sped up. These boys are also popularly known as Tele Donors”, because not all of them are as lucky as the one I watched. Many of them die while on duty. When they are taken dead to hospital, the doctors ask their families to donate their organs, but not many accept their babies to be into pieces on an operating table. If they donate their bodies, their poor mothers won’t have a grave to cry for them.

They don’t think that rather than rotting in a wooden box, their poor babies could be living in someone else body.

They are young and healthy. Their eyes could save another like him from blindness, or their kidneys to someone else who haven’t got much of chance to survive…

Worldwide there is a shortage of body tissue…

DYING IS A BIG BUSINESS

There are different packages in the same way there are cheap or expensive ones in hotels, restaurants and the like. It all depends on how much a family wishes (or can afford) to spend. If your family have money, you’ll be made up and dressed up with perhaps your favourite clothes. You’ll be laid in the funeral home regardless the price that can be like a four starred hotel room per day. Your loved ones will have a reception on your behalf and they will certainly play the music you loved. There will be flowers and a crowded march walking to the cemetery. There will be speeches saying how good you were and even the men covering your last dwelling with earth will want their day’s pay and, perhaps, a tip.

If your family is poor and you happen to die in hospital, you’ll be taken straightaway into the morgue. On the next day, your family will go to the funeral home to contract as a cheap burial as possible. Then, the men will collect you from the hospital to speed up to the cemetery. No flowers, no music, no make-up and no reception on your behalf. All of these cost, my dear.

But, in process of getting a website which shall raise the required donation is likely to cut loose some good portion of money, which if saved can be utilized to bring more happiness and hope to some individual’s life. Here are few things you can do as an owner of such an organisation to make sure that every such penny spent counts!

For a website, you do not need a domain name really, as the donor you are expecting is searching your type of organisation with some particular keyword and not particularly your name, at least when you are a beginner. There are few sites which do give you freedom to publish and promotion is taken care of by such sites. Thus, you achieve your goal for free, which is e-Presence. It is only that once you have e-Presence, people are going to recognize you and donate.

Step 1. Create a discussion group and a page on Facebook.

Create a personal account on facebook and create a page and discussion group for your society. Try making people come to your page with the help of Facebook Causes. Generate a cause and publish it. You are very certain to receive good response from such sites.

Step 2. Create a profile on sites like socialgo.com.

This site will give you a very good content management system(cms) for free. Also, you have paid options to be thought of later.

Step 3. Once you have some e-Presence from above sites, register a business account on PayPal.com.

Paypal.com gives you freedom to manage e-mail donations, subscribed donors and more. Its really read and apply process, if you face any problem, update me here in comments and I will try to suggest alternatives. Though you should face problems in getting a paypal account up and going for your organisation.

Step 4. Make a i-give profile on giveindia.org

Making a i-give profile on giveindia.org gives to access to 1000s of donors on this website. For people have some web presence, this should be the first step. This can really give you a boost in terms of popularization, respect, recongnization and donation ofcourse.

Step 5. Write articles, newletters of weekly activity or monthly activity and post on websites which promote ezine article submissions or press-release. By doing this, what you increase is the number of pages on internet linking to your web presence.

Till step 5. We have not spent a single rupee for effective promotion of your organisation. In next article, I will list how to plan to invest capital, after gaining this much of web-presence and acknowledgement. Do keep me update with your comments so that we can make this a checklist of successors to follow…

Today, the trafficking of kidneys can account for approximately 10% of all organ transplants worldwide. (World Health Organization) However, worldwide there is not a country where organ trafficking is legal, except one; Iran. The organ trade is flourishing mostly in poverty-stricken and developing countries. Taking advantage of people in such a manner is unacceptable. Although the need for organs is overwhelming, and waiting for donors is seemingly tormenting; exploiting the deprived is not an answer. The organ trade breeches ethical principles, and the fact that this type of exploitation happens today provokes me to believe that our society has no right to even consider the possibility that we have progressed as a race, it is unquestionable that human trafficking as a whole must desist.

It is possibly ignored by most that this exploitation is taking place, however, this kind trafficking happens very frequently. Recently 44 people in New Jersey were arrested for kidney trafficking- including prominent members of society; 2 mayors, and famous realtors. The Health Minister of Singapore Khaw Boon Wan stated that legalizing the payment of kidney donors would be beneficial: “We should not reject any idea just because it is radical or controversial,” he said. “We may be able to find an acceptable way to allow a meaningful compensation for some living, unrelated kidney donors…” (CNN) Although, Singapore has not yet taken any definite steps towards this proposition as of yet. It is questionable that if this were to take place there would likely be more exploitation of poverty-stricken places of Asia mostly by rich foreigners. February in India, officials broke up a team who have taken at least 500 kidneys from poor laborers and slaves. It is likely that there are more black-market kidney operations taking place, but it is unlikely that Canada will be able to do much about it besides educate the population. More than 80,000 people in the United States are waiting for a kidney transplant, and waiting for a donor can take up to 6 years.

Having a donor could be the essential key to saving your life. It is easy to understand the urgency of having a donor, but sacrificing someones life because yours is at risk is not even remotely a moral decision. Exploitation of the oppressed is not an option in today’s day and age. There are other ways to save lives, and the philosophy of sacrificing for the sake of likely wealthy westerners is beyond repulsive.

    Answer: Mission creep.    I  see the same set of  circumstances today as have developed over the years, and ever more apparent today.   Namely, non-profits, primarily charitable organizations, have allowed themselves to be convinced that their mission MUST expand because of the “need” and because Directors want larger organization to support more individual and staff pay.  

   So where do they wind up?   Not enough funds to cover expanded missions, but giving levels which would have been sufficient for their original mission.   Why less funds? Partly because Directors are usually paid, and as Non-profitsp’s get larger, some paid staff is added as well.   More volunteers are needed, more space, more overhead and occupancy costs, and here’s the killer; each year the percentage of revenues devoted to salaries and overhead increase, absent a top line revenue growth occasioned by extraordinary fund-raising.  

   So Directors expect more money (after all they are running a larger organization, and have more responsibility, right?), staff deserve raises, there ARE costs in acquiring, managing, and insuring volunteers, among other things.   It all adds up to a self-serving expansion, and much whining, and gnashing of teeth when donations and fund-raising “dry up.”  

   If you want a suggestion for non-profits , here it is;   Get Real! Reshape and rebuild your mission to one that normal levels of fund raising can support, even if that means forgoing expansion into another area, or adding new clients.   It doesn’t help that non-profits are part of the fastest growing “industry” in the U.S., each justifying their creation and the “needs” that spur them, each in isolation to be commended for altruism.  

   But, I wonder how they would manage their egos and motives if they had to devote their talents to supporting already existing non-profits profits with the same or very similar missions, locations, and importantly, fund-raising and donation sources.   Think of how much more efficiently, and productively their “clients ” would benefit; how costs would go down, and revenues devoted to clients would go up.  

   Anyone who thinks that No’s don’t compete for Donors has their head in the sand. Anyone who thinks that NP directors don’t drive Boards to authorize ever-increasing efforts just hasn’t been there.   It’s time to re-think fund raising and commit to an “endowment” goal in which a percentage of each years fund-raising is set aside, with the ten-year goal of generating enough inflation-adjusted income to support the basic mission, with a smaller percentage each year contributed to the trust, which would shortly allow for increasing support levels for Clients. And, the Board must absolutely be sufficiently independent to make sure that the endowment is used or diluted because of the “need.”  

   Nobody will starve, counseling will occur, missions will be maintained.  

   In the end, more will be done for more clients, and non-profits will have created an institution that doesn’t close shop because an economic downturn forces a re-examination of budgets and costs which have become onerous , and/or a closure or reduction in services to those in “need.”

Nancy Scheper-Hughes an anthropologist from the University of California has investigated the illegal traffic in human organs for ten years.Through information she has uncovered during her investigation she believes surgeons at a big Philadelphia hospital have been transplanting black market organs from the poorest impoverished people into rich dialysis patients from Israel, Europe and the United States. She has sixty pages of documented interviews with buyers, sellers, and brokers from every corner of the earth. Former transplant patients have told her that the Philadelphia Hospital is a good place to go for a brokered transplant. Two surgeons were named over and over again.

 Scheper-Hughes sometimes poses as a doctor or broker to collect her information. She has linked clergymen, surgeons,and gangsters from South Africa,Brazil and other under developed countries back to our own best medical facilities. She sat down for an interview at this Philadelphis hospital but could not acertain if they knowlingly did anything wrong. Afterwards they did tighten some regulations at the hospital to ensure better control of  foreign donors and recipients. But says, Scheper-Hughes  “After the interview, they basically threw me out.

It is illegal in every country except Iran to buy and sell human organs. But organ trafficing still flourishes. Kidneys, half livers, skin, eyes, and blood are brokered every day. It’s a case of supply and demand. In the United States alone people in need of a transplant have tripled in the last ten years, topping 100.000. While organ donors are still only 5,000 to 8,000 a year.

For Scheper-Hughes the most difficult part is getting people to believe the problem exists at all. “It used to be a joke that came up at conferences and between surgeons.”she says. It was in books and movies that you had people waking up in a tub of ice with a scar where a kidney used to be.  Because people do donate an organ out of kindness it provides an easy cover for those seeking profit. The seller can be out of the hospital  with his pay within a day.

Diflo who has worked in numerous hospitals over the last twenty years, says that hospitals who preform illegal transplants certainly exist in the United States. There are hospitals who have a reputation for doing transplants with paid donors, and some hospitals have a “don’t ask” “don’t tell” policy. Nancy has done outstanding work, literally risking her life to expose these networks.

Even as illegal trade is exposed, a roster of Web sites promising to match desperate dialysis patients with strangers continues to proliferate unchecked. “We have no way to know if money is changing hands or not,”says Diflo.  People need transplants and the donors want the money. In the United States the wait for a kidney is expected to increase to ten years by 2010. Most dialysis patients die in half that time.

The price of a kidney in nine countries;

Iraq; $750-1,000   Phillippines; $1,500   India; $1,500    Moldove,Romania; $2,700   Brazil; $6,000  Turkey;$7,500   Peru; $10,000   Israel; $10,000-20,000   United States; $30,000

PGD is (pre implantation genetic diagnosis). They use this to screen embryos for genetic diseases.

Parents choose to do this to have a healthy child without a disease and to make their upcoming child’s and themselves a better future. Parents avoid termination by taking PGD and IVF so their child has a disease it will not get terminated. They just throw it away the remainder eggs and choose two healthy embryos.
Well do you think its right to choose what baby you have?

DNA is deoxyribonucleic acid which chromosomes are made up from. Alleles are found in chromosomes. An allele is a different version of a gene, which codes for different version of a characteristic. A gene is what you inherit from your parents. Genes create proteins such as structural proteins to build the body and they create enzymes to speed up chemical reactions in cells.

Chromosomes are long thin, thread like structures in the nucleus of a cell made from a molecule of DNA. Chromosomes carry the genes and there are 23 pairs of chromosomes in your nuclei.

Ff = You carry the disease but don’t have it 

ff = You have the disease

FF = You are not related to the disease

Tim’s parents carry the disease meaning they have heterozygous alleles which mean they are different. They do not have the disease. Tim had a ¼ chance of having the disease. He had ½ chance of carrying it and ¼ chance of not related to the disease.

You can’t catch cystic fibrosis. It is a genetic disorder. This means it is passed down from generations to their children. The disease causes big problems for breathing and digestion. Cells that make mucus in the body don’t work properly. The mucus is much thicker than it should be, so it blocks up the lungs. It also blocks tubes that take the enzymes from the pancreas to the gut. People with cystic fibrosis get breathless. They also get lots of chest infections. The shortage of enzymes in their gut means that their food isn’t digested properly. So the person can be short of nutrients.

In IVF, eggs from a woman are fertilized by male sperm in a Petri dish and allowed to grow for five days until they become blastocysts consisting of about 50 to 65 cells. Because there are currently no precise methods for selecting viable embryos, couples typically choose to implant multiple blastocysts to enhance their chances of conceiving, which may also result in multiple pregnancies. IVF has been used since 1977 to help couples that can’t conceive a child naturally. Since then over 300.000 women worldwide have become pregnant by IVF treatment. Doctors can now help couples with a child at risk from a serious genetic disorder.

Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis is a method of identifying chromosomal abnormalities before implantation of the embryo. The procedure is conducted after the egg has been fertilized in vitro, and before the developing embryo is re-implanted into the womb. After fertilization, the embryo naturally cleaves into individual cells, or “blastomeres”. These cells are virtually identical to each other. Genetically testing one such blastomere can therefore usually reflect the genetic integrity of the embryo overall. PGD involves physically removing 1 or 2 such cells from the embryo with the help of various micromanipulation techniques. 

Arguments for Designer babies.

Designer babies are a good thing because it helps cure a child of a terrible and cruel disease and it isn’t like the new baby wont be loved any more or less than any other child and it has the chance to save a life.
 It does help people who couldn’t originally have a baby, and saves people from the emotional strain and the expensiveness from looking after an ill child, and provides the child with a much happier and healthier start to life and it is a good idea because it can prevent kids being born with unwanted inherited diseases that ruin their lives.

This will benefit parents without the stress of a child with a disorder and the emotionless pain they will feel. They will have a healthier child and not too much trouble with a child with disorder. 

The stem cell baby will be even more precious for representing two lives in one. And, as someone else has commented, medical intervention has deemed it fine to kill (late terminations due to Down’s etc), so why not use technological progress to cure. It is pompous sophistry to bang on about this somehow devaluing people with handicaps. Everyone should be valued for what they are, and if science can bring about the miracle of a cure for a child in the form of a by-product of creating another, wonderful life, then it should be welcomed. 

“What is becoming of us as a nation if we cannot value the lives of our own babies”? From http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/4493203.stm
this can really save lives with children who need a bone marrow transplant. Parents would be proud if their child gets cured.

The question to be asked is “Is this a wanted child or is it a child that’s only being made to be a donor to its older brother?” If it were the latter, then the baby would be being treated as a commodity. To see how wrong that would be let’s invent an extreme case: If a child was being created just to provide a cure and was going to be sent off for adoption after the treatment was complete, that would clearly be very wrong. But in this case the child is clearly going to be a much-loved member of the family. The new baby will be loved for its own sake, and the special techniques being used are being used to bring additional benefits from the birth. If the new baby can’t provide suitable cells for the treatment the parents will be disappointed that there won’t be a cure, they won’t be disappointed in their new child. So in this case (and in any case that would get HFEA permission) there is no risk of the baby being seen as a commodity. And consider this too: Parents often have mixed motives for having a child – maybe they want to provide company for an existing child, or to improve their own relationship, or satisfy the in-laws, and while we might raise an eyebrow we wouldn’t say that their action was morally wrong. “As a parent in this position there would be huge temptation to take advantage of the technology” from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/4493203.stm

Arguments against designer babies

Most people who oppose abortion do so because it involves, in their view, killing a person. They believe that this technique too inevitably kills people and that this outweighs any benefits there might be. During the process a number of embryos will be tested to see if they are suitable. Some embryos will be not being suitable. They will be disposed of. Pro-life people believe that human life begins the moment 
the sperm fertilises the egg. This means that every unsuitable embryo that is disposed of is a person who is killed. To put it in an extreme way: each fertilised embryo will be assessed by the scientists. It will only be allowed to live if it is a good match; if it is a bad match it will be denied its right to life. If you believe that life begins at conception, then this argument is conclusive, and the technique is morally wrong. If you don’t believe that life begins at conception then this argument has no weight and you can move on to look at other arguments.

Children are not a commodity, neither are they a right. They are individual human beings, and are not to satisfy their parent’s wants or needs. Neither are they spare part factories. There are always hard cases, but the rights of the “designer” baby fundamentally must come first, not the needs of parents or siblings.

Creating a child to help another is playing god. It’s just another step on the slippery slope to designer babies. People should let nature take its course. Its wrong to create one person to help another. Its not natural!they’ll be producing babies as organ doners next. Leave the child how it is , do not customise your child think could go wrong, let nature take its decision.

” The embryos are deliberately created and then destroyed and discarded like medical trash” from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/4493203.stm
or “Playing around with this natural phenomena could have devastating long term effects on the human race” from the same site.

This should not be allowed. Everyone as a human being has the right to choose whether or not they want to be a donor. Having a baby purely to use its blood or cells to help another is taking away its basic human rights. We need to learn to live with the fact that we cannot cure all diseases. In the past nature was left alone and there was no need for designer babies and now because scientists have started messing with genetics, there is now the need for designer babies to put right the mess they have made. Selecting one embryo conceived in vitro involves destroying others. The whole process reduces human beings to objects to be used or thrown away. Of course we must work to reduce suffering and seek cures for illnesses, but not at the cost of trivialising human life.

I think producing a designer baby is wrong because you cant mess with human rights. The baby has a right. It shouldn’t be used as a organ donater. Also using IVF and PGD is throwing away embryos and selecting two. In my opinion that is murdering. How could people be so selfish and only think about themselves , think about what is the loss. This could also lead to cloning which I also think is wrong because everyone is a individual and everyone has rights which shouldn’t be taken away from them.

Although designer babies can save lives it can also destoy lives such as the ones that are thrown away. Designer babies should not be allowed. This is because you cannot play God and go against the natural order of the world. Some people may not believe in God but still that does not mean it is right. Just because you have the knowledge to do something does not mean that you should do it. Suffering is a part of life and sometimes we have to accept it. A harsh reality but true.

1) Empathize – Many of your donors are hurting financially right now. Some have their lost jobs while others have watched their retirement savings disappear in a few short months. Don’t ignore your donors’ problems. Face them head on by acknowledging what is going on in the economy. Your donors feel a special connection to your organization because you speak to them about something they are truly passionate about. Let them know that you understand what they are going through and that now is not the time for you and them to part ways.

2) Be Current – Does the recession mean anything specific to the constituency you serve? Make the case that your organization is needed now more than ever. This is particularly obvious for organizations such as food banks, but almost any organization can make a valid case. Speak authentically about how the downturn in the economy affects the work you do.

3) Speak to Losses, Not Gains – Research shows that people are more likely to act when they believe they stand to lose something and are less likely to act when the problem is posed in terms of gains. That means you should talk about the services you will have to cut without your patron’s support instead of framing their donation in terms of how much more it could do. But that isn’t to say you have to give up your organization’s goals. Simply frames your goals in terms of losses. For example, if you planned on beginning a new program this year, tell your donors that without their support, you will lose your ability to start this new program and provide some vital service.

4) Be Frugal – Your donors no longer have money to burn, and they want to make sure that you aren’t wasting any of yours either. Refrain from doing anything that might give the appearance that your organization isn’t spending its money wisely.

5) Start a Sustaining Gift Program – If you don’t already allow your donors to give on a monthly basis, start today. A $250 annual donor may no longer be able to give that much this year; however, that donor likely still wants to support your organization. Allow that donor to give $25 a month instead. Yes, you’ll have to wait longer for the full donation, but it is better than receiving a smaller donation or no donation at all.

6) Move Online – You probably already raise money online (If you aren’t then start today). But if you are currently sending an appeal via mail but are not sending a corresponding appeal online, then you are wasting a valuable opportunity. Don’t underestimate your email list’s tolerance for email. Now is the time to emphasize to your donors that email saves you money and means more of your donors’ dollars go toward the cause they support.

7) Clean House – Don’t wait until your numbers fall short to start making cuts. Look hard at your organization’s expenses and tighten up where you can. Taking preventative action can bring your organizational budget more in line with changing realities.

Keep Prospecting – The long term health of your organization depends on the continuous acquisition of new donors. Many organizations spend up to $20 to acquire a new donor and don’t see a return on their investment until the second or third renewal cycle. This can look like an attractive place to cut in times of need, but it will make next year, and the year after that even more dire. Don’t get caught in a cycle that will lead your organization to failure.

9) Fight for your Budget – Some organizations scale back their development budgets when times get tough. This is a huge mistake. Your fundraising efforts need the proper funding to operate effectively at anytime, but especially during a recession.

10) Be a Winner – Intuition might lead us to believe that donors give to those most in need. That is simply not true. Donors want to give to a winner. Donors want to give to organizations doing the most important and vital work in their communities, and they want to give to those who are doing it the best. If your organization is seen as struggling to keep its doors open, your donors will move onto an organization that is thriving. Speak to your successes as they are your donors’ successes. Feel free to speak honestly about the challenges your organization faces, but never lead your donors to believe that your doors are closing, unless they truly are.

Recessions are part of a natural cycle that economies go through. They tend to weed out the weakest organizations while the strongest ones usually survive, and some times even thrive during these periods. Using these tips, you will be more able to navigate this challenging fundraising environment and be among those organizations that continue to thrive despite the general economy. Good luck on your fundraising efforts.

The perfect storm begins with defining the donor. Identifying a specific donor demographic will keep all efforts focused delivering the best rate of return. Once a donor group has been established in-depth market research should be performed. Learn everything possible about the donor group, such as, their giving profile and reasons they give, their key influences, their lifestyles and media behaviors. Use these findings to target donors through well-defined marketing and PR strategies.

The modern donor educates themselves on causes and is extremely savvy with their giving choices. They need to see their donation at work and want to make sure they are making a difference. Because of this, a personal connection between the donor and the mission is essential to non-profit success. Personal connection opportunities should concentrate on the essence of the mission making it tangible to everyone.

By enabling personal connection opportunities donors are touched by the mission bringing the cause to life creating satisfaction and loyalty. They will not only want to re-experience the connection, but will want to introduce others to the cause becoming the biggest advocate and assisting with awareness. Through word of mouth a virtuous cycle begins, generating continuous movement, attracting more donors, initiating more introductions, and so on and so on.

Crafting a perfect storm should produce successful results. Inviting donors to develop a personal connection with the mission should form a virtuous cycle. Constantly building awareness, loyalty and funding, the perfect storm should make non-profits top of mind in any competitive economy.