By John Solomon
How the government's punishing of the exposure of official wrongdoing can linger for years
Long before Christopher Columbus reached the Bahamas, Portuguese explorers were colonizing islands in the eastern Atlantic and trading in Africa for slaves and gold. In 1499, Vasco da Gama completed his voyage to India, and the following year, a fleet commanded by Pedro Alvarez Cabral reached Brazil. Traders from Portugal arrived in China in 1513 and then ventured ashore in Japan three decades later.
