Urbes malorum virorum

I have often said that political levels, in order of importance are listed as such: Global, Federal, Provincial/State, Student and Municipal. Facetious, yes, but I’m really only half-joking. By this I am not promoting student politics, I am relegating municipal politics. Henry Kissinger once said that the reason student politics are so vicious is because the stakes are so low. By that rational, municipal politics must be something akin to Ragnarok. Arguments are chiefly centered over administrative pros and cons, rather than the philosophy of governmental direction or the shaping of national or regional cultures. The most contentious of issues are infrastructural and promotional in nature (with the exception of gay marriage, which is an anomaly in this political arena). City government is a steady, scandal-free place where, unless you are the mayor of New York City, you wield limited political power and do little more than sign zoning agreements, cut ribbons and discuss how fantastic your own city is. By and large, municipal elections are where the simple minded go to govern. It is then surprising that in major American cities over the last few weeks, municipal scandal has recently hit an apex, giving American voters yet another breed of politician to keep their eye on. A quick roll call of the cast of “All-American Urban Outrage 2005”:

• Spokane’s Republican and publicly anti-gay rights mayor Jim West is caught up in a embarrassing (to say the very least) set of allegations surrounding his activity on the chat rooms of colloquially unambiguous website gay.com, where it is alleged that he offered a number of young men jobs in the various departments of Spokane City Hall including, ironically enough, the Human Rights Commission.
  
  
• The mayoral campaign of Richard Daley, mayor of the Windy City and home of Karl Winslow, was apparently funded, at least in part, by payoff money, in a case similar to our own wonderful sponsorship scandal.
  
  
• Detroit Mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick racked up a cool $210,000 on his city-issued expense credit card in the past 33 months, mostly on food. Really, really good food. The majority owner of the restaurant where Kilpatrick racked up a $1,200+ bill during his term was convicted yesterday of funneling money to:
  
  
• Philadelphia Treasurer Corey Kemp, who was also convicted of 27 criminal counts, including fraud. The investigation in this case (conducted by the FBI) spawned 79 charges across 5 defendants. Yeeesh.
  
  
• Dick Murphy, Mayor of San Diego, has resigned because of a 1.37 Billion dollar deficit in the pension fund of the city. A new election will be held on July 16th, where it is expected that Donna Frye, a surf-shop owner and current city councilwoman, who came dangerously close to winning the recent mayoral race via write-in votes, will succeed him.
  

Today I will start testing you all with a question per post. The questions will be all over the place in terms of content (read: whatever I want), but they will be worth points, which I will be keeping track of. Submission rules will be on the right side.

Here is your first question:
In almost every language on earth (especially the non-western languages) the word for female parent starts with a certain sound. What is that sound? (10 points, this one is easy).