| Ex-pastor accused of bilking member
HOLLY HILL -- About two years ago, Robert N. Riddle came to Ridgewood Avenue Community Church, a tiny congregation seeking stability and growth.
Parishioners were impressed by Riddle's charisma and energy. They even lent him $300,000 for a twin-engine plane.
Now, Riddle is in a Georgia jail, accused of bilking an elderly parishioner out of $80,000. The church's finances are a mess, and its bank accounts are frozen as an investigation widens into spending under Riddle.
The new pastor of the roughly 20-member church off Ridgewood Avenue doesn't even know how he will pay the bills.
His high hope for Easter Sunday service: raising enough to make ends meet.
"Right now, between past and current bills, we need $10,000,'' said the Rev.
Foreign banks “man-hunting”
VietNamNet Bridge - Foreign banks are strongly attacking the retail-service fields, besides purchasing shares of domestic banks. Ashok Sud, General Director of Standard Chartered Bank (SC) in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, in a recent meeting introduced the bank's retail manager, Namita Lai. This is the first time SC has had a retail manager in Indochina. Ms Namita Lai appears because SC needs her assistance in introducing international-level individual products in Vietnam. Mr Ashok Sud said that this year SC Vietnam would develop the consumption banking service field. Last year the bank earned US$3.178 billion of pre-tax profit, 19% more than 2005 and turnover of over $8.620 billion, up 26%. In the history of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) in Vietnam, foreigners have been the major clients at HSBC offices.
How blind can they be?
As our phony economy begins to unravel before our eyes, it is amazing how few people can actually see it. The collective wisdom of stock market pundits, economists, and Federal Reserve officials gives the impression that everything is just fine. Although some acknowledge that housing is slowing down a bit, that there are isolated problems with subprime mortgages, and that inflation is not moderating as quickly as they hoped it would (let's ignore surging oil prices), few can see any grave threats to continued economic expansion, or the bull market in stocks, bonds or real estate. Earlier this week a CNBC anchor asked a guest if the "economic baton" might now pass from housing to the consumer, much the same way it previously passed from the stock market to housing. I'm not exactly sure where the anchor believes that consumers will now be getting the money to lead us out of the economic morass.
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