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| Taking a Closer Look at the Stories Ignored by the Corporate Media |
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Archive for the Month of March, 2005.
Viewing Corporatism NEWS articles 1 through 17 of 17.
- The Presidents of Argentina, Brazil and Venezuela have issued a joint statement saying they are committed to pursuing a South American Community of Nations. President Chavez Frias had declared the elitist, US Free Trade Agreement for the Americas (FTAA) is dead.
- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and other retailers are lobbying Congress to extend the workday for truckers to 16 hours, something labor unions and safety advocates say would make roadways more dangerous for all drivers.
- Long-term unemployment, defined as joblessness for six months or more, is at record rates. But there's an additional twist: An unusually large share of those chronically out of work are, like Gillespie, college graduates.
- More than 5,000 Chinese miners are killed each year, 75% of the global total, even though the country produces only a third of the world's coal. Working under appalling safety conditions, they are sacrificed to fuel the factories that make the cheap goods snapped up by consumers in Britain and other wealthy nations - Former WorldCom Inc. chief executive Bernard J. Ebbers was found guilty Tuesday on all counts against him of conspiracy, securities fraud and false regulatory filings for his role in a massive accounting fraud that led to the downfall of the nation's second-largest telecommunications firm and cost investors billions of dollars - Halliburton, where Vice President Cheney served as chief executive from 1995 to 2000, has come under persistent criticism for its handling of several Iraqi reconstruction contracts. For example, auditors turned up $1.8 billion in "unsupported costs" in a $10.5 billion Army logistics contract that KBR won on a competitive bid. Despite those findings and a recommendation to withhold some of the payments, the Army decided last month to continue paying Halliburton in full, plus performance bonuses.
- Tweleve separate requests to the Pentagon to view the completed audits on the contractor's $2.5bn contract to supply fuel and other services in post-war Iraq had been ignored.
- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. escaped criminal charges but agreed Friday to pay $11 million, a record fine in a civil immigration case, to end a federal probe into its use of illegal immigrants to clean floors at stores in 21 states.
- Stephen Johnson, Bush's nominee to run the EPA, advocates the testing of pesticides on humans -- even children -- for the benefit of large chemical companies.
- It's awfully refreshing when a former lawmaker simply owns up to becoming a lobbyist. A revolving door of politicians and lobbyists. - In the wake of the Dec. 26 killer wave, villagers and fishermen from southern India to Sri Lanka to Thailand say powerful businessmen, often in cahoots with politicians, are grabbing lucrative beachfront real estate. - So far, six colleges and universities in the United States--including Carleton, Oberlin and Bard--have responded to a call by the Colombian beverages union for a boycott, either by canceling contracts or banning vending machines. Chief among the accusations is the company's alleged complicity in the murder of union members by paramilitaries at bottling plants in Colombia.
- Fortune 500 companies that invested millions of dollars in electing Republicans are emerging as the earliest beneficiaries of a government controlled by President Bush and the largest GOP House and Senate majority in a half century.
- Next year, the administration will phase out the $2,000 tax credit for buying a hybrid vehicle, which gets over 50 miles per gallon, but will leave in place the $25,000 tax write-off for a Hummer, which gets 10-12 mpg. That's truly crazy, and that's truly what the whole Cheney energy policy is.
- Bush has implemented a number of tax cuts in recent years that have had a considerable impact on the benefits of ownership. But these have had the effect of increasing the wealth of existing, primarily large owners of wealth -- rather than aiding or helping to create new, smaller owners.
- The British government is using international aid money to promote the privatisation of water and sanitation services across the world
- The Carlyle Group has completed the world's largest corporate buyout capital-raising at $10 billion to finance mega-sized deals on both sides of the Atlantic, the private equity firm said on Tuesday.
Pages for March, 2005
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