History Forum / General / British History / December 2003

"A Fool and Her Money"

"Polly Toynbee, an Angry Left columnist for London's Guardian, was taken
in by a scam:

"With embarrassment, feeling a fool, I admit I was a victim of a
Nigerian fraud. Looking back now, I can't think why I was so easily
taken in but I did make a reasonable check. A hand-written letter
arrived from a Nigerian 14-year-old called Sandra. It was nicely written
on a religious school's headed paper, though not too perfect, telling me
her sad story. Both her parents had died and she had to complete her
last two years of school."

"Her results were good, and it would only cost ￡100 a year for the last
two years to cover the cost. I wrote back and I also wrote to her
headmaster, whose name appeared on the school letterhead, at a PO box.
He wrote back in more adult handwriting to say Sandra was indeed a needy
and promising student, and he enclosed her last term's report. It was an
impressive document, each subject carefully filled in by a teacher with
different writing, giving an excellent but not over-the-top report, with
some subjects subtly lagging a bit behind."

"So I sent a cheque for ￡200 and received another of Sandra's letters,
a bit too full of God's mercy and Jesus's blessings for my taste. I had
an idea I might keep in touch with her to see what became of her. If I
had any doubts, ￡200 was a modest sum for all the effort a fraudster
took to create these letters."

After she sent the money, Toynbee received several calls from her bank,
checking on suspicious transfers that someone had ordered from her
account to a bank in Osaka, Japan. Luckily, her alert bankers kept her
from losing anything more than the initial ￡200, but still, she's
understandably ticked off. Wouldn't you be?

Only guess who she blames:

"The line between honest and dishonest business is easily blurred. We
point fingers at Nigeria, this richest and best-educated country in
Africa that should be a mighty power had it not been so catastrophically
misgoverned, with legendary corruption. Yet what kind of global honesty
is promoted, what model of good capitalism and good government?..."

"The image of capitalism now being spread about the world is cowboy
stuff: little gleaned from America extols the virtue of regulation,
restraint and control. We reap from the third world what we sow: if some
Nigerians learned lessons in capitalism from global oil companies that
helped corrupt and despoil that land, it is hardly surpising [sic] they
absorbed some of the Texan oil values that now rule the White House.
Alas, the querulous, navel-gazing and increasingly non-internationalist
EU seems in no mood at present to offer a different and better face of
capitalism to the world."

That's right, there's one born every minute, and it's all George W.
Bush's fault."

James Taranto
The Wall Street Journal
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Hilarious Magnus Cum Laude!

The Loony Left On Parade ---- _The Grauniad_ Variant.

Deus Vult

D. Spencer Hines

Lux et Veritas et Libertas

Vires et Honor