Madonna confirms widely reported Malawi adoption post

Today, Madonna has officially confirmed her attempts to adopt a young Malawian girl. Her spokesperson that standard procedures for adoption are being followed legally, in spite of the protests, that she was using her fame to speed the process. While in Malawi, she took her 3-year-old son David to visit his biological father for the first time, since leaving the country in 2006, showing her openeness in allowing David to connect with this roots. They also had toured the country and visited the day-care center that her charity had constructed.

In her statement this is attempting to adopt a girl by the name of Chifundo "Mercy" James, 4 years old. Her mother had died soon after giving birth, according to Mercy's uncle John Ngalande. Her father keeps little contact.
A coalition of non-governmental organizations called Mwakusungula have criticized Madonna's adoption attempts, saying that adoption should be the last resort and that children need to be taken care of by their own family.

Opinion: In my opinion, it seems as though Madonna is merely doing this merely based on a celebrity trend ( Angelina Jolie ). Also Madonna, is using her fame to skip through loopholes in the adoption system is completely unacceptable. In personal experience, my Aunt had tried to adopt a child from Africa around a year ago, but because she was single, the adoption agencies would not let her adopt. She had followed the whole process legally and fairly, and was stricken with much grief at the end. But Madonna can adopt a child, because she is able to afford nannies, when she is never home because of all the time being famous takes away. The nannies will be the real mothers, but Madonna never will. People should see that she is merely doing this for the fame rather that the goodwill that is attached. Although Mercy will be given a better life, Madonna should not be credited because she is relocating Mercy rather than being a mother.

Vancancies Become Easier to Fill

The continuing decline in Canada's economy is proving to be profitable for only one segment of the population, job recruiters. One Alberta job recruiter, Gerald Clark, says, "there are better candidates available today than there were a year ago. It was very difficult recruiting and hiring people in 2007 because things were very tight." This year, Clark can be much more selective in his selection of candidates, now that his field of applicants has grown nearly five times. On the whole, those living in Alberta are holding onto their jobs at a much higher rate than the rest of Canada, In fact, Calgary's unemployment rate is only 3.4%, compared with the national rate of nearly 6.4%. At the very least, this economic slowdown is bringing the quality of Canadian job applications up.

Opinion: I have mixed feelings on this issue. On one hand the quality of applicants is improving, and job recruiters are seeing resumes they haven't seen in "nearly five years." However, the fact remains that more Canadians are out of work. If the pool of unemployed in Canada is growing, that is still unsettling. Furthermore, Alberta job recruiters have also said many of those seeking jobs in Edmonton and Calgary are coming from the United States, so I can't imagine this being beneficial for those in the Edmonton area seeking employment. I suppose the moral here is: with every gain there is sometimes a loss.

Today a prosectuer alleged that a boyfriend of 15 year-old school girl pressured him into killing a fellow schoolgirl Stefanie Rengel over jealousy. The unnamed boyfriend lured the 15-year-old girl in the early evening of New Year's Day 2008 from her East York home with a cellphone call, and then proceded to stab her six times. In the previous weeks before the murder, police had found several MSN chat messages, and numerous phone calls which had urged the boyfriend to kill Rengel. At the time she was a Grade 9 Student at Rosedale Heights School for the Arts.
Flumerfelt was who was the prosecuter had stated that Stefanie Rengel was savagely murdered for no other reason besides jealousy.
In previous months, the stabber had "come on to" Rengel, and she felt bad for the accused, Flumerfelt said. So Rengel asked the accused's cousin to warn her about the boyfriend. "And so (the accused) decided for herself that Stefanie Rengel's life would end."
Today she had pleaded guilty to first-degree murder.
After killing Stefanie, the boyfriend than proceded to a friend's house and confessed that he had stabbed Rengel around 5 times, and then received a phone call from the accused asking if he had killed Rengel. The previus October before the killing, the boyfriend had visited Rengel at her Northdale Blvd. home and asked for her. He had asked Stefanie to call his girlfriend, and just tell her that he had tried to kill her, to get her to stop pestering him. The girlfriend tried several times through MSN messaging to pressure her boyfriend. Messages like " I want her dead....LOL", and messages like "UR getting blocked until u kill her"



Opinion: In my opinion I thought that this was an appaling story. However I think that the boyfriend was really in fault here. Empty threats like " Im gonna block you on MSN", or that "we are going to be friends, if you dont kill her in a week" are not threats that should pressure you to commit a murderous acts. The boyfriend should have taken better action, and probably have called the police. Better job by the parents, to keep a computer in a public place where the whole family can moderate computer activity probably could have prevented this from happening. I also believe that Stefanie should have maybe been in contact with authorities, if she was aware of death threats being opposed to her.