Comment 6 for bug 12461

The problem persists despite deleting the directory. The problem persists
despite the method used to invoke synaptic (as sudo -s or through the panel's menu).
The permissions of my root's home directory are
drwxr-xr-x 17 root root 4.0K Feb 4 19:46 root

I know I removed the directory properly because on start up synaptic warned me
about running it frequently for updates.

The permissions of the synaptic directory are
drwx------ 2 root root 4.0K Feb 4 19:47 .synaptic

What a strange bug.