theSun | WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 18 2009
news without borders
Lincoln ranked
best US president
WASHINGTON: Days after
celebrations honouring his
bicentennial, Abraham Lincoln
(pix) kept his rank as best US
president, according to a survey
of 65 historians that landed
George W. Bush 36th out of 42
overall.
Abraham Lincoln (1861-
1865), the first US president
George Washington (1789-1797)
and New Deal architect Franklin
D. Roosevelt (1933-1945) were
ranked the top three out of the
42 men who have been the
country’s former chiefs, accord-
ing to a survey by cable channel
C-SPAN.
John F. Kennedy came in
sixth, ahead of Ronald Reagan
(10th) and Bill Clinton, who
jumped to 15th from 21st during
the last survey in 2000, when
Lincoln also ranked first.
Of all modern presidents,
Bush, who left office last month
after an eight-year term, fared
worst at 36th, nearly 10 spots be-
hind Richard Nixon (27th), who
was forced to resign in disgrace
in the aftermath of the Watergate
scandal.
Bush scored lowest in in-
ternational relations, where he
ranked 41st, and in economic
management, where he placed
40th. His best ranking was 24th,
in having “pursued equal justice
for all.” He placed 25th in crisis
leadership, and for his vision
and agenda setting.
Reagan fared well in public
persuasion, where he
was propelled to
third spot, from
his 10th place
overall.
B i l l
Clinton
a l s o
received
accolades
for his
public per-
suasion,
landing a
10th spot in
that category,
up from 15th
overall.
But presidential his-
torians were critical of the last
Democratic president’s moral
authority, placing him 37th,
ahead of Richard Nixon (41st),
but behind Bush (35th). Jimmy
Carter fell from 22nd to 25th
overall, and many others moved
positions. The fluidity of percep-
tions of past presidents reflects
contemporary concerns, accord-
ing to Edna Medford, a survey
leader and participant.
“Today’s concerns shape our
views of the past, be it in the area
of foreign policy, managing the
economy or human rights,” she
said in a statement. Presidents
James Buchanan, Andrew John-
son, Franklin Pierce and William
Henry Harrison ranked worst
overall. – AFP
Tainted food outbreaks
won’t go away: Regulators
CHICAGO: Tainted food out-
breaks like the deadly melamine
discovered in Chinese infant for-
mula will happen again and there
is not much that regulators can do
about it, safety experts warned on
Monday.
That’s because there are so
many different ways for a tainted
product to enter the food chain
and so few inspectors available to
guard against either deliberate or
accidental contamination.
“I do stay awake at night
worrying about what’s the next
melamine,” said Steve Solomon,
deputy director of regional opera-
Questions tions for the US Food and Drug
and Administration.
Counterfeiting is a major prob-
answers for lem in the global food industry
Malaysians with the level of fraud estimated
pg 16 at around US$50 billion (RM180
billion) a year, said John Spink of
Michigan State University’s Food
Safety Policy Centre.
That’s just shy of 10% of the to-
tal estimated trade in counterfeit
goods and is likely to increase as
food prices rise.
While some of that trade
poses little or no health risk – like
falsely labelling food as organic
or substituting tilapia for a more
expensive type of fish – adultera-
tion can be deadly.
When protein supplements
are watered down, “babies starve
to death of malnutrition while
their bellies are full of milk,” he
pointed out.
Another example is when low-
grade heating oil taints the grain
it is drying and cattle carry the
chemicals on to the consumer.
“If you think of about the bad
“They’re not aware
of, or they’re not
considering the
implications of, what
they do.”
– Spink
guys, their goal is to make more
money,” Spink told a meeting of
the American Association for the
Advancement of Science.
“They’re not aware of, or
they’re not considering the im-
plications of, what they do.”
While better regulations and
inspection systems are needed
in countries like China, recent
deaths due to tainted peanuts
which a US company knowingly
shipped to consumers shows that
13
even the best systems cannot
catch every criminal, Spink said.
“Monitoring all food manu-
facturing is not practical,” Spink
said.
“The problem and the solution
is all about profit.”
Crack-downs on counterfeit-
ers will lower the profit incentive,
while producers and exporting
countries will respond with bet-
ter standards after seeing their
business collapse in the wake of
health scares, he said.
But inadvertent contamination
is impossible to prevent even in
the most responsible companies,
warned Joseph Scimeca, director
of global regulatory affairs for
food giant Cargill.
“Accidents will happen,” Sci-
meca said.
The genetic modification of
plants for use in pharmaceuticals
and industry also threatens to
contaminate the food supply
with unapproved substances, he
noted. The problem from a food
safety perspective is the sheer
scale of modern food produc-
tion – a single shipment of high
fructose corn syrup can go into
two million cans of soda, he said.
– AFP