Ban this...

Compared to his predecessor, Kofi Annan, Ban Ki-Moon is but a puny amateur in the sweepstakes of sleaze. Though I guess we ought to give him time, this interesting tidbit has surfaced which shows how much he has in common with the egregious Annan. Only days after telling us in no uncertain terms that unless we pony up the big money we're all gonna fry, come news that the UN has been...err, economical...with the truth about the previous "we're all gonna die!!" global catastrophe: HIV/AIDS: (emphasis mine)

The United Nations' top AIDS scientists plan to acknowledge this week
that they have long overestimated both the size and the course of the epidemic,
which they now believe has been slowing for nearly a decade, according to U.N.
documents prepared for the announcement. AIDS remains a devastating public
health crisis in the most heavily affected areas of sub-Saharan Africa. But the far-reaching revisions amount to at least a partial acknowledgment of criticisms long leveled by outside researchers who disputed the U.N. portrayal of an ever-expanding global epidemic........Having millions fewer people with a lethal contagious disease is good news. Some researchers, however, contend that persistent overestimates in the widely quoted U.N. reports have long skewed funding decisions and obscured potential lessons about how to slow the spread of HIV. Critics have also said that U.N. officials overstated the extent of the epidemic to help gather political and financial support for combating AIDS.

"There was a tendency toward alarmism, and that fit perhaps a certain fundraising agenda," said Helen Epstein, author of "The Invisible Cure: Africa, the West, and the Fight Against AIDS." "I hope these new numbers will help refocus the response in a more pragmatic way."

Hmm. Sounds familiar.