7/21/02
5:17:43 PM
Files Reveal: Bush Knew Firm's Plight Before Stock Sale
by Mike Allen, The Washington Post, July 21, 2002; Page A07
As a businessman in 1990, George W. Bush was deluged with confidential information about the financial plight of a Texas oil company before he sold the majority of his holdings and triggered a federal investigation, according to Securities and Exchange Commission records.
President Bush has refused to authorize the SEC to open the full file on his investigation, but selected documents have been released under the Freedom of Information Act. The president's business dealings have come under more scrutiny as he tries to restore confidence in markets hurt by business scandals. Nearly half of 1,004 respondents in a Newsweek poll released yesterday said they thought Bush took advantage of the system for personal gain with the 1990 stock sale.
The documents show that four months before Bush sold most of his stake in Harken Energy Corp., he and other board members received a letter from management calling the previous year's profits disappointing and warning that the company would "continue to be severely limited in our activities due to cash constraints." The letter said that "as indicated at the December board meeting," the failure of a deal involving a subsidiary had "left the company with little cash flow flexibility."
A management letter to the board in July 1990, a month after Bush's $848,560 stock sale, portrayed the company as enduring months of turmoil. "Due to the nature of our tasks through this past quarter the stress level is beginning to show," the letter said.
The documents, released Friday by the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity, show that analysts following Harken were shocked by the losses reported for the quarter that ended eight days after Bush's sale. Harken President Mikel D. Faulkner told board members that he had received many calls from brokers, shareholders and creditors and had provided "as positive a response as is possible."
The White House has said Bush knew the company would record losses but did not know how large they would be. Harken's stock price initially plunged, then recovered and rose.
The SEC's investigation of Bush was closed after officials determined he did not have enough insider information before his stock sale to warrant a case.
SEC Chairman Harvey L. Pitt said last week that he would release the records if Bush asked him to. In response to a question about whether he would ask the SEC to release the file, Bush replied Wednesday that "the key document said there is no case."
The 150 pages of minutes and other board documents released Friday tie Bush to the company's sale of Aloha Petroleum Ltd., which was recorded in such a way that Harken masked massive losses, leading critics to compare the accounting to methods used by Enron Corp. The SEC forced Harken to restate the transaction.
The documents show Bush was proposed as chairman of a special committee of the board with duties that included reviewing Aloha-related debt. An analysis by the Center for Public Integrity said the documents "do not unambiguously resolve the question of what Bush knew about Harken's reporting of the sale."
Reflecting growing White House concern about the impact on the fall elections of corporate wrongdoing and falling stock markets, Bush used his radio address yesterday to promise that his administration "will do everything in its power to ensure business integrity and long-term growth."
Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A38246-2002Jul20.html
7/21/02
4:58:21 PM
t r u t h o u t | 07.22
Files Reveal: Bush Knew Firm's Plight Before Stock Sale
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.22A.bush.files.htm
Frank Rich | The Road to Perdition
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.22B.rich.perdition.htm
Halliburton Probe Is Growing Worry for Bush, Hill Republicans
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.22C.halli.probe.htm
Simple Shift in Bush Aid Budget Would Leverage Nearly $700 Million for Health, Environment Problems in Poorest Countries - At No Extra Cost to U.S.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.22D.nrdc.700M.htm
2nd California Officer Removed From Duty in Videotaped Beating Case
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.22E.la.vid.suspend.htm
7/21/02
4:30:16 PM
The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy: A Model of Explanation
The following is excerpted, and posted, in its entirety at
http://www.tomdavisbooks.com/library/salandria1.html
Part One
by Vincent J. Salandria, Attorney
Philadelphia, Pa.
"While the researchers have preoccupied themselves with how the assassination was accomplished, there has been almost no systematic thinking on why President Kennedy was killed."
(Based on an address at the conference of the New England Branch of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, Cambridge, Mass., Oct. 23, 1971.)
For almost eight years the American people have failed to address themselves to the crucial issue of why President John F. Kennedy was killed. Much valuable time has been lost; it is becoming increasingly clear that our delay has cost mankind dearly. I urge that no one drop this question, for to do so is to abandon the serious search for peace internationally and for domestic tranquility.
Government Evidence Cries Conspiracy
New Rulers Timed Diffusion of Evidence
Lone Assassin Myth Suggests Governmental Guilt
A Warning to Opponents
Silence of Kennedys Points to Top-Level Coup
A. Which Group Was Responsible?
1. J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI?
2. The Left?
3. The Right?
4. President Johnson and Friends?
5. President Kennedy's Own Estimate of a Possible Military Takeover
Was the American military on its own capable of this degree of sophistication? It does seem rather beyond the intelligence of the American military to have accomplished this crime alone. But it is not inconceivable to imagine the American military as having been involved in a plot to eliminate Kennedy, in order to ensure the continuation of the Cold War. Kennedy himself did not regard a military take-over as implausible. We have an excellent articulation of his feeling on this matter in a discussion with Paul B. Fay, Jr. [1] This colloquy occurred one summer weekend in 1962 on the Honey Fitz, the Kennedy yacht. The President was asked what he thought of the possibility of a military takeover in the United States. The discussion grew out of the book Seven Days in May by Fletcher Knebel and Charles W. Bailey.
President Kennedy said: "It's possible. It could happen in this country, but the conditions would have to be just right."
The conditions outlined by the President were as follows:
1.The country would have to be led by a young President.
2.There would be a Bay of Pigs.
3.Military criticism of the President would follow.
4.Then, if there were another Bay of Pigs, the military would consider overthrowing the elected establishment, and finally,
5."...if there were a third Bay of Pigs, it could happen."
Mr. Fay concluded this episode by describing how the President, "pausing long enough for all of us to assess the significance of his comment ... concluded with an old Navy phrase, 'But it won't happen on my watch.'"
These conditions were approximated during the Kennedy administration. President Kennedy was in fact a young President. There was a Bay of Pigs. The missile crisis which followed resulted not in the bombing of Cuba ---as the military advisors had urged upon the President --- but rather in a detente with Russia. This has followed by a nuclear test ban treaty which "...the Joint Chiefs of Staff declared themselves opposed to under almost any terms." [2]
The American University speech by President Kennedy following his reexamination of the Vietnamese policy, completely fulfilled the conditions set forth by President Kennedy for a take-over to happen on his watch.
Evidence for Military Involvement in the Assassination
There is much evidence to indicate military involvement in the assassination. There was the startling and incriminating action of the then Commander James J. Humes, the head of the Navy Bethesda autopsy team, who took the original autopsy notes --- and then burned them. [3] The autopsy was under the control of an army general who was not trained in medicine. [4] The autopsy was never completed. [5] The findings of the autopsy were contrary to the findings of the non-military physicians at Parkland Hospital. The pathologists were directed not to look at the Kennedy neck wound. [6] The x-rays were never turned over to the Commission by the military. The burning of the notes by Commander Humes did not deter the military from promoting him to Captain.
Military-ClA Interests Coincided
Although at the time of the assassination the interests of the CIA and the military coincided, now evidence of a CIA-military rift abounds. The Boston Globe of July 20, 1971 stated that the Pentagon Papers revealed that "one agency ...comes out ... with a record for calling its shots correctly." So Ellsberg did not do badly by his "ex" employer. The Boston Globe of July 3 offered an item which indicates the "ex"-Pentagon people are hitting back at the "ex"-CIA Ellsberg. "A former Pentagon liaison officer with the Central Intelligence Agency said in London that President Kennedy engendered the hate of the CIA by trying to curb the agency's power. He also said he did not think Lee Harvey Oswald 'by himself killed President Kennedy.'"
"L. Fletcher Prouty, a retired Air Force colonel and the director of special operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1962 and 1963, said Kennedy issued two directives in 1961 to limit the CIA's power but the documents never surfaced and were not implemented."
Jack Anderson on April 21 1971 said:
"International espionage is seldom as efficient as the inter-departmental spying that goes on in Washington.
"... the Central Intelligence Agency never makes a move without the Defense Intelligence Agency keeping close surveillance.
"... Government agencies in the best cloak-and-dagger tradition snoop upon one another." [8]
I view the American military's motive for involving itself in the killing of Kennedy as perversely patriotic in nature. But at that period of time there was, as we will demonstrate, a congruence of interests between the American military and the CIA. Kennedy was the enemy of both power groups at the time he was killed.
The Pentagon Papers -- a CIA Jab at Military?
6. Did the CIA Kill President Kennedy?
The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy: A Model of Explanation
This complete report:
http://www.tomdavisbooks.com/library/salandria1.html
7/21/02
4:21:13 PM
Senate Vote does not mean End to Yucca Mountain Fight!
Plans include more Congressional actions, legal suits, protests, and blockades!
Nuclear Information and Resource Service
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Kevin Kamps, 202.328.0002
July 9, 2002 cell: 202.262.9518
Michael Mariotte, 202.328.0002
Home: 301.277.3481
The outrageous 60-39 U.S. Senate vote on July 9, 2002, to override Nevada's veto of the proposed Yucca Mountain high-level nuclear waste dump does not mean Yucca Mountain ever will open. Instead, it simply sets the stage for years of courtroom activity, Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) licensing proceedings, continued Congressional action, and an increased likelihood of large protests and blockades of highways and railways.
"Today's Senate vote accomplished only one thing," said Michael Mariotte, executive director of Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS). "It proved that 60 members of the U.S. Senate caved in to the nuclear power industry and put those interests above the interests of the American people. By approving this project, the Senate has assured that this multi-billion dollar waste of taxpayer and ratepayer money will continue for now. But that doesn't mean Yucca is a done deal."
"The increased opposition to Yucca Mountain from previous votes should be a clear warning to the NRC and future Congresses that there is a great deal of doubt about Yucca Mountain, and they must be prepared to stop this project at anytime," said Kevin Kamps of NIRS' Radioactive Waste Project.
"The State of Nevada and environmental groups will be continuing to mount lawsuits against the project, on numerous grounds, including the failure of the project to meet the environmental regulations established to protect the public. Instead, the Department of Energy, NRC and Environmental Protection Agency all have weakened public protection standards in recent years to accommodate the ill-chosen site, rather than rejecting the site as should have been done," said Kamps.
NIRS expressed no confidence in the NRC to conduct a fair licensing process. "The NRC may be an 'independent' agency, but it is staffed entirely by nuclear advocates who want to see a new future for this obsolete technology," explained Mariotte. "Since its establishment in 1975, the NRC has rejected only two license applications of the thousands of it has received, and one of those, at the Byron nuclear complex in Illinois, was overturned on appeal. Only a 1996 decision by an Atomic Safety Licensing Board, which rejected on environmental racism grounds a uranium enrichment plant proposed by a company called Louisiana Energy Services (LES), ever stood. And the NRC then took steps to limit the public's right in such licensing hearings, to be sure that never happens again. Indeed, LES is on the verge of announcing a new effort to build such a plant."
NIRS pointed out that Yucca Mountain does little to solve the nation's growing radioactive waste problem. "Yucca Mountain is legally limited in how much high-level atomic waste it can accept," said Kamps. "Even if it opened, it would only be able to accept about half the waste expected to be generated by the nation's nuclear reactors. The rest will remain where it is now, on-site at every nuclear reactor in the country, and the Energy Department will be out there looking for another politically-weak state to dump the waste on."
"Meanwhile, the DOE is encouraging the construction of still more nuclear reactors that will have no place to store their lethal waste," said Mariotte. "Just two weeks ago, Secretary Abraham announced that he will give $17 million of taxpayer money to three wealthy nuclear utilities to begin the process of licensing new reactors. This is not only an unacceptable use of tax money, it gives the lie to any belief that DOE even cares about the nuclear waste problem. Where does Abraham propose this waste will go-under the DOE's Forrestal Building in downtown Washington, D.C.?"
"Yucca Mountain already is projected to cost some $58 Billion, and the costs seem to rise daily," said Mariotte. "And if Abraham and the nuclear utilities get their way, we're going to have to start this process all over again, with a new site, and tens of billions more dollars spent to support this unnecessary and dangerous source of electricity. It simply boggles the mind that any public official could propose such a plan. It is past time to aggressively promote sustainable energy technologies-that's where we should be spending our money, not on more nuclear power."
Mariotte said NIRS would now step up its preparations for large protests and blockades of highways and railways if the transport of high-level waste actually begins in the U.S. NIRS and grassroots environmental organizations have been training people in non-violent resistance to such shipments since 1997, and has sent activists to Germany to learn from the massive protests there in the past few years.
"Germany has made six shipments of nuclear waste casks since 1995," said Kamps, who was in Germany earlier this year to view a shipment. "It now requires some 30,000 police and $100 million to move a cask just 250 miles, disrupts the transportation network of much of the country, and requires a police state in large parts of northern Germany. The U.S. is talking about thousands of shipments, averaging 2,000 miles. There will be thousands of protestors along these routes," he predicted.
Mariotte also warned that some members of Congress may again attempt to open an "interim" storage site at Yucca Mountain next session, and begin the transportation of radioactive waste as soon as possible. "We expect Congress would reject such an attempt," he said, "but we will be ready if it does not."
To find out each Senators' vote on this issue, see:
http://www.nirs.org/YUCCAVOTELIST.htm
7/21/02
4:18:15 PM
Earth's Ice Melting Faster Than Projected
by Lester R. Brown
Several new studies report that the earth's ice cover is melting faster than projected by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in its landmark report released in early 2001. Among other things, this means that the IPCC team, which did not have the ice melt data through the 1990s, will need to revise upward its projected rise in sea level for this century--currently estimated to range from 0.09 meters to 0.88 meters (from 4 to 35 inches).
A study by two scientists from the University of Colorado's Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research shows that melting of the large glaciers on the west coast of Alaska and in northern Canada is accelerating. Earlier data indicated that the melting of glaciers in these areas was raising sea level by 0.14 millimeters per year, but the new data for the 1990s indicate that the more rapid melting is now raising sea level by 0.32 millimeters a year, more than twice as fast.
The Colorado study is reinforced by a U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) study, which indicates glaciers are now shrinking in all 11 of Alaska's glaciated mountain ranges. An earlier USGS study reported that the number of glaciers in Glacier National Park in the United States has dwindled from 150 in 1850 to fewer than 50 today. They project the remaining glaciers will disappear within 30 years.
Another team of USGS scientists, which uses satellite data to measure changes in the area covered by glaciers, describes an accelerated melting of glaciers in several mountainous regions, including the South American Andes, the Swiss Alps, and the French and Spanish Pyrenees.
Glaciers are shrinking faster throughout the Andes. Professor Lonnie Thompson of Ohio State University reports that for the Qori Kalis glacier, which is located on the west side of the Quelccaya ice cap in the Peruvian Andes, the annual shrinkage from 1998 to 2000 was three times that which occurred between 1995 and 1998. And that, in turn, was nearly double the annual rate of retreat from 1993 to 1995. Thompson also projects that the large Quelccaya ice cap will disappear entirely between 2010 and 2020.
The vast snow/ice mass in the Himalayas, which ranks third in fresh water stored, after Antarctica and Greenland, is also retreating. Although data are not widely available for the Himalayan glaciers, those that have been studied indicate an accelerating retreat. For example, data for the 1990s show that the Dokriani Bamak Glacier in the Indian Himalayas retreated by 20 meters in 1998, more than during the preceding five years.
Thompson has also studied Kilimanjaro, observing that between 1989 and 2000, Kilimanjaro lost 33 percent of its ice field. He projects that it could disappear entirely within the next 15 years. (See table http://www.earth-policy.org/Updates/Update8.htm.)
Both the North and the South Poles are showing the effects of climate change. The South Pole is covered by a continent the size of the United States. The Antarctic ice sheet, which is 1.5 miles thick in some places, contains over 90 percent of the world's fresh water.
While this vast ice sheet is relatively stable, the ice shelves--the portions of the ice sheet that extend into the surrounding seas--are fast disappearing. A team of U.S. and British scientists reported in 1999 that the ice shelves on either side of the Antarctic Peninsula are in full retreat. From mid-century through 1997, these areas lost 7,000 square kilometers as the ice sheet disintegrated. But then within scarcely one year they lost another 3,000 square kilometers. Delaware-sized icebergs that have broken off are a threat to ships in the area. The scientists attribute the accelerated ice melting to a regional temperature rise of 2.5 degrees Celsius (4.5 degrees Fahrenheit) since 1940.
While the South Pole is covered by a huge continent, the North Pole is covered by the Arctic Ocean. Arctic sea ice is melting fast. Over the last 35 years, the ice has thinned 42 percent--from an average of 3.1 meters to 1.8 meters. It has also shrunk by 6 percent since 1978. Together, thinning and shrinking have reduced the mass of sea ice by half. A team of Norwegian scientists projects that the Arctic Sea could be entirely ice-free during the summer by mid-century, if not before.
If this melting materializes as projected, the early explorers' dream of a northwest passage--a shortcut from Europe to Asia--could be realized. Unfortunately, what was a dream for them could be a nightmare for us.
If the Arctic Ocean becomes ice-free in the summer, it would not affect sea level because the ice is already in the water, but it would alter the regional heat balance. When sunlight strikes ice and snow, most of it is reflected back into space, but if it instead strikes land or open water, then much of the energy in the light is absorbed and converted into heat, leading to higher temperatures. This is what computer modelers refer to as a positive feedback loop, a situation where a trend creates conditions that reinforce itself.
Richard Kerr, writing in Science, says summer "would convert the Arctic Ocean from a brilliantly white reflector sending 80 percent of solar energy back into space into a heat collector absorbing 80 percent of [incoming sunlight]." The discovery of open water at the North Pole by an ice breaker cruise ship in August 2000 provides further evidence that the melting process may now be feeding on itself.
This prospect of much warmer summers in the Arctic is of concern because Greenland, which has the world's second largest ice sheet, is largely within the Arctic Circle. In a Science article in 2000, a team of U.S. scientists from NASA reported that the vast Greenland ice sheet is starting to melt. Greenland is gaining some ice in higher elevations in its northern reaches, but it is losing much more at the lower elevations along its southern and southeastern coasts. This huge island of 2.2 million square kilometers--three times the size of Texas--is experiencing a net loss of 51 billion cubic meters of ice each year, which is raising sea level by 0.13 millimeters per year, according to the NASA team.
The team also reports that the melting there appears to be accelerating because the ice sheet on its southern and eastern edges has thinned by more than a meter a year since 1993. If all the ice on Greenland were to melt, it would raise sea level by 7 meters (23 feet), but even under a high temperature rise scenario, it could take many centuries for it to melt completely.
The accelerated melting of ice, particularly during the last decade or so, is consistent with the accelerating rise in temperature that has occurred since 1980. With the IPCC projecting global average temperature to rise by 1.4 to 5.8 degrees Celsius (2.5 to 10.4 degrees Fahrenheit) during this century, the melting of ice will likely continue to gain momentum.
Our generation is the first to have the capacity to alter the earth's climate. We are also, therefore, the first to wrestle with the ethical question of whether the capacity to change the planet's climate gives us the right to do so.
Source: http://www.earth-policy.org/Updates/Update8_printable.htm
7/20/02
2:53:46 PM
t r u t h o u t | 07.21
Dow Plunges 390; Stocks Continue Four-Month Rout
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.21A.dow.dn.390.htm
John W. Dean | Predicting Presidential Scandals: Looking at Bush's New Vulnerability
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.21B.dean.scandals.htm
Florida Justice Dept Give Cops Broad New Power
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.21C.fl.cops.htm
Alaska Glaciers Melting More Rapidly
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.21D.warm.faster.htm
California Gov. Davis To Sign Landmark Global Warming Law On Monday
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.21E.davis.warm.htm
7/20/02
2:51:20 PM
Julia Butterfly Hill Was Arrested in Ecuador and Deported
Updated press release: July 18, 2002
Contacts: Lucy Braham (510) 419-0617 or cellular (310) 420- 8245 Alexandra Almeida, Acción Ecologíca in Ecuador, 011 593 2-254-7516
Midnight decision to deport Julia Butterfly Ecuadorian Government preempts her fair trial in oil protest
(Quito, Ecuador) -- Immigration police announced late last night that activist Julia Butterfly Hill will be deported to the United States early this morning. The deportation is set to occur just two hours before a scheduled Habeas Corpus hearing for Ms. Hill and the seven Ecuadorian activists with whom she was arrested Tuesday during a peaceful protest outside Occidental Petroleum (OXY)¹s Quito offices.
Ms. Hill has been in Ecuador since July 9, joining the national struggle to resist Ecuador¹s new OCP pipeline. Speaking after the deportation decision from Quito¹s Provisional Detention Center, where she and the other seven protesters have been held since their arrest, she said:
"I remain deeply committed to support the Ecuadorian communities engaged in this struggle. I will continue to do what I can from the US to work for the release of those arrested with me, and to fight this devastating pipeline project."
"The decision to deny due process to Julia Butterfly is clearly influenced by a desire on the part of the Ecuadorian government and OCP to avoid the spotlight being shined on the OCP pipeline," declared Atossa Soltani, Executive Director of Amazon Watch. "Those pushing this destructive project know that it will not bear being exposed to international scrutiny."
The OCP pipeline has been mired in controversy since its inception, with hundreds of protests over the last few months along its route, which crosses fragile ecosystems and 11 protected areas. Los Angeles-based Occidental Petroleum is a key member of the OCP consortium, and is planning significant expansion of its Ecuador operations in pristine Amazon ecosystems, in expectation of the pipeline¹s completion. At the Tuesday protest where the arrests took place, 50 community members from Mindo, Lago Agrio, Esmeraldas and Shushufindi, who are adversely affected by the new pipeline, rallied outside the offices of Occidental and the OCP to demand an end to the escalating destruction of their lands.
Seven people were also arrested yesterday in the Amazonian province of Sucumbios in another show of resistance against the OCP pipeline. Members of two local farming families near Lago Agrio were dispersed with tear gas by police. Two children were among those detained.
On Monday Julia Butterfly, best known for her 738 day tree sit 200 feet atop a 2000-year old threatened California old-growth redwood tree, accompanied Mindo community members to re-occupy OCP¹s construction site in the Mindo Nambillo Cloudforest Reserve. Construction has now illegally advanced 200 meters inside community-owned property. A judge will visit the site Friday, accompanied by local community members, to issue a ruling on the property demarcation.
Lead financer of the project, German bank WestLB, has come under intense fire for syndicating a $900 million loan to the OCP in violation of its own lending policies. The loan, which does not meet minimum World Bank environmental guidelines has sparked public outrage in the German state of North Rhine Westphalia (NWR), which holds a 43 percent stake in WestLB. US bank, Citigroup has also been highlighted as a top lender to consortium members.
The majority of Amazon crude that will flow through the pipeline is destined for US West Coast markets. The OCP Consortium includes: Alberta Energy (Canada), Occidental Petroleum (OXY- USA), AGIP (Italy), Repsol-YPF (Spain), Perez Companc (Argentina), and Techint (Argentina). JP Morgan Chase is financial advisor for the project.
Source: http://www.amazonwatch.org/newsroom/newsreleases02/020718_ocp.html
7/20/02
2:49:37 PM
Multinational Firms Corrupt Practices Continue In Developing World
by Emad Mekay, Inter Press Service, July 12, 2002
WASHINGTON - The multinational firms recently fingered for corrupt practices in the United States may be practicing similar operations on a larger scale in developing countries, say long-time corporate watchdogs.
Investors, shareholders, the U.S. administration, and economists world-wide are still reeling from the string of corporate frauds that includes U.S. energy giant Enron and WorldCom, the international telecommunications company. Allegations of misconduct have surfaced against several company executives, including U.S. President George W. Bush from his days as a director of an oil company.
While the United States and its northern neighbors have focused on the impact of such scandals on investor trust in wealthy nations, the anti-globalization movement cautions that the corruption scourge could be several times more harmful to the economies of developing countries.
They argue that many global companies operate freely in poor nations, protected by conditions dictated by international financial institutions, such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, and the political might of Northern governments.
"Enron and WorldCom are just symptoms of the way companies are able to do business without too much accountability," said Nadia Martinez, research associate at the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies.
"It is even worse in the developing world," she added. "It happens here and everyone goes up in arms. But in reality this has been happening in the developing world for decades with the support of Northern governments in many instances and with the support of our taxpayers' money by way of international institutions like the World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank."
Multinational watchdog Corpwatch says that these firms violate international law on many counts, including social and environmental violations and with flagrant corruption.
"Corruption is one of the many levels in which these companies very arrogantly come into a country and act like they own it and they do whatever they want," said Julie Light, managing editor of Corpwatch.org. "They can buy off the politicians and they can hire private security forces or pay the local police."
Earlier this month, The Wall Street Journal reported on corruption in the 550 million dollar Bujagali power project on the Nile River in Uganda. One of the contractors, the U.S. power producer AES, bribed a Ugandan official to hasten the dam's approval, said the report.
Martinez says that the shamed Enron, a now bankrupt firm with dubious off-balance sheet transactions, continues to operate internationally and is still seeking public funding for its non-scrutinized global projects.
Enron holds 25 percent of Transredes, a company seeking a 125 million-dollar loan from the International Development Bank (IDB) to expand a Bolivian gas pipeline. The Bank is expected to decide on the loan in September.
In research for the Institute for Policy Studies, Martinez says Enron's assets in Latin America alone include concerns in a pipeline in Colombia, gas and electricity companies in Venezuela and Brazil, and other operations in Panama, Guatemala, and Puerto Rico.
Public institutions, including the World Bank and the European Investment Bank have provided Enron with financing of about seven billion dollars, she adds.
WorldCom, a firm accused of cooking its books so it could overstate profits by 3.8 billion dollars, also has a presence in many developing countries. The company often boasted that its business interests span from everyday phone calls to advanced Internet-based networks in Latin America, Asia-Pacific, Europe and Africa.
Although activists like Martinez and Light have been calling attention to the practices of corporations in the South for years, they now say developing countries are more vulnerable than ever, because of diminishing monitoring. The IMF has been urging deregulation in the South for the past two decades.
"What the IMF, the WTO (World Trade Organization) and the World Bank have been saying to the third world is 'trust the market, deregulate, get the government out of the way, take the teeth out of the regulatory agencies, let corporate officials run government agencies, let them privatize'," said Danaher. "It's been a whole-package."
Poor nations stand defenseless before the mammoth-like corporations, some whose budgets are bigger than the spending of many poor nations combined, they add.
"If these corporations can wreck the United States, destroy our economy, take over the government, and bankrupt it in their interest, what are they going to do in Bolivia, Chad or Niger where there are not so many constitutional rights?" asked Danaher.
The activists say the cozy relationship between politics and business is partly to blame. Several officials of the Bush administration are former company executives, including the president himself and Vice President Dick Cheney.
"We need to close the revolving door of corporate leaders going into government, building up their Rolodex, finding out where the money is and then going back into the corporate world sucking public money out of government," said Danaher. "We need to build a firewall between money and policy making."
"It's time civil society groups started policing the corporations and holding them accountable on high-standards of international law, human rights law and local law," added Light.
7/20/02
2:47:47 PM
Should We All Be Vegetarians? (July 15, 2002)
Would we be healthier? Would the planet? The risks and benefits of a meat-free life
(...) Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest in Washington, sees most of the meat and dairy lobby's arguments as desperate, disingenuous scare stories. "It unmasks the industry's self-interest," he says, "when it voices concern about B12 while hundreds of thousands of people are dying prematurely because of too much saturated fat from meat and dairy products." Indeed, according to David Pimentel, a Cornell ecologist, the average American consumes 112 grams of protein a day, twice the amount recommended by the National Academy of Sciences. "This has implications for cancer risks and stress on the urinary system," says Pimentel. "And with this protein comes a lot of fat. Fully 40% of our calories-and heavy cardiovascular risks-come from fat."
Pimentel argues that vegetarianism is much more environment-friendly than diets revolving around meat. "In terms of caloric content, the grain consumed by American livestock could feed 800 million people-and, if exported, would boost the U.S. trade balance by $80 billion a year." Grain-fed livestock consume 100,000 liters of water for every kilogram of food they produce, compared with 2,000 liters for soybeans. Animal protein also demands tremendous expenditures of fossil-fuel energy-eight times as much as for a comparable amount of plant protein. Put another way, says Pimentel, the average omnivore diet burns the equivalent of a gallon of gas per day-twice what it takes to produce a vegan diet. And the U.S. livestock population-cattle, chickens, turkeys, lambs, pigs and the rest-consumes five times as much grain as the U.S. human population. But then there are 7 billion of them; they outnumber us 25 to 1. CLIP
http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101020715/story.html
7/20/02
2:45:56 PM
Summer Of Mistrust (Jul. 14, 2002)
Scamming CEOs have accomplished what Osama bin Laden could not - denting our spirit. Can anything restore our faith in the markets? (...) The corporate criminals among us, the swindlers and profiteers, are now described in language once saved for bin Laden's legions. Business professors are staggered by the suicidal audacity of top executives - did they really think they would not be caught? - and marvel at the damage done. "It's as if we have given the CEOs weapons of mass destruction - at least economically," says accounting professor Brian Shapiro at the University of Minnesota. "The companies they run are bigger than ever. When something happens, thousands can lose their jobs - and more people than ever are invested in them. So a few can do a lot of damage." And that damage may be lasting. A new TIME/CNN poll finds that fewer than one-third of Americans expect the economy to improve in the next year. It is not just that we have confronted in WorldCom the worst case of fraud in U.S. corporate history; today the bluest of chips, from Merck to General Electric, are being challenged about their bookkeeping. The perception of deception is so widespread, the stakes so high and the costs so great that investors are choosing to forfeit a game they now think is rigged. The markets skidded last week straight past their 9/11 lows into the most bearish forests in a generation. The dollar sank ever lower, and the Dow dropped through 9,000 toward a 7.4% loss for one week alone. Financial planners say many people won't open their 401(k) statements; they just can't look. CLIP
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,320782,00.html
The Rap on Bush and Cheney
Can the White House lead a cleanup crusade when it has had dubious deals of its own? You be the judge. (...) Bush's business dealings were legal but on the wrong side of the new corporate morality he is now preaching. How could the President chastise executives for doing the same kinds of things he did as a director, without apology? Bush received subsidized loans from Harken to buy company stock-a practice he now wants to ban. In 1989 Harken concealed losses by selling most of a subsidiary to an off-the-books entity controlled by company insiders. Bush was on the audit committee, which, at least in theory, approved the deal. It's the same tactic used by Enron-on a massive, more pernicious scale-before it imploded. CLIP
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,320735,00.html
Harken Papers Offer Details on Bush Knowledge
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.15aa.harken.papers.htm
Steps to Wealth: How Bush got rich through Harken
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.17C.krug.wealth.htm
NY Times: Halliburton Profits From Terror War
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.14A.halli.profit.htm
Bush Administration May Cause Failure of Environmental Summit
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.16E.bush.env.smt.htm
US Planning to Recruit One in 24 Americans as Citizen Spies
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.16F.us.spies.htm
Postal Service Won't Join TIPS Program
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.19C.po.no.tips.htm
Why Bush Is in No Hurry on Iraq (Jul. 09, 2002) Bush says he wants to remove Saddam - eventually. But key allies at home and abroad remain unconvinced over the need for a war. (...) Despite September 11, the Afghan campaign and the "axis of evil" speech, it's not hard to see why there's no rush to war with Iraq. While no significant constituency at home or abroad is comfortable accepting Saddam Hussein's continued brutal reign, there are few takers for launching a war in order to oust him. That's not only because victory may be neither cheap nor easy, but also because some of the stakeholders fear that victory itself may create a situation that's even less tolerable and stable than the present one. CLIP
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,319516,00.html
More of the U.S. War plan in Iraq at
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/05/international/middleeast/05IRAQ.html
Suggested by Nicolas Rousseau <nick17rou@yahoo.fr>
Here is a link which I think is very useful for people of the Earth Rainbow Network list, since, in our quest for truth, we are often presented with conspiracy theories. The Political Research Associate organization works at exposing lies, myths and illogical thinking. More precisely, the Political Research Associate organization's mission is to look for accurate information and to analyze the strategies and claims (like scapegoating, conspiracism, etc.) used by some in ways that perpetuate oppression. Political Research Associate wants to denounce such claims to quickfix solutions that are detrimental to a deeper analysis of the structural problems and that harmful to the research of fair solutions.
Check it out at: http://www.publiceye.org/
7/20/02
2:40:20 PM
U.S. Warplanes Strike Iraq Facility
by Waiel Falen, Associated Press Writer, July 19, 2002
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - U.S. and British warplanes destroyed a military communications facility in southern Iraq, the U.S. military said Friday. Iraq said the missile strike killed five people, including a couple and their children.
The Iraqi claim could not be independently verified.
The planes, patrolling the no-fly zone over southern Iraq, used precision-guided weapons to destroy the military site Thursday, U.S. Central Command said in a statement. The strikes came in response to continued Iraqi hostile actions toward coalition airplanes, it said.
Air Force Brig. Gen. John W. Rosa Jr. said Monday that Iraq had increased its challenges to coalition aircraft in the northern and southern no-fly zones. The two zones were created after the 1991 Gulf War ( news - web sites) to protect Kurds and minority Shiite Muslims from Iraqi military forces.
The Iraqi military said the coalition planes bombed "civilian and service installations" in Qadissiya province, 155 miles south of Baghdad, on Thursday night.
The attack hit two nearby homes, destroying one and damaging the other, killing five people and injuring 17 others, the military said in a statement carried by the official Iraqi News Agency.
Among the dead were a husband, wife and their two children, the agency said. A 60-year-old man who was also killed was thought to be a relative.
U.S. military officials say they take great care to avoid civilians when making retaliatory strikes in Iraq.
Funerals for the air raid victims were held Friday in Diwaniya, the capital of Qadissiya province, the agency said. Government officials and members of Saddam Hussein ( news - web sites)'s ruling Baath Party attended. Mourners shouted "Down with Bush" and "Down with America," while others demanded Saddam extract revenge.
Iraq has never recognized the no-fly zones and frequently tries to shoot down planes patrolling them.
Source: http://dailynews.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=540&u=/ap/20020719/ap_on_re_mi_ea/us_iraq_3
7/20/02
2:35:52 PM
The rhetoric over Iraq is reaching a dangerous pitch
18 July 2002
President Saddam Hussein lashed out defiantly yesterday, returning the Bush Administration's axis of evil rhetoric in kind and vowing that "evil tyrants and oppressors" would never defeat him. There are many reasons not to feel sympathy with him, starting with the suffering he has brought on his people by diverting cash from permitted oil sales away from the needy. Yet the shameless sabre-rattling that is issuing from Washington and being echoed from London should be just as worrying as the defiance from Baghdad, if not more so.
Where President Saddam is posturing from a position of weakness, Washington is piling up threats that it has the capacity to act upon. The British Prime Minister breathes hot and cold. Questioned by a Commons committee on Tuesday, he appeared to stand full square behind the Washington hawks. In Parliament yesterday, he said that Iraq's weapons had to be dealt with, but that any action would comply with international law.
Whatever Mr Blair said yesterday about no decision having been taken on military action, the impression created recently in Washington and London has been quite the opposite. We have been treated to elaborate details of a leaked Pentagon plan for a US-led assault on Iraq. We have been told of top-secret US and British special agents already in place in Iraq. We have watched prominent Iraqi exiles in the United States lavish interviews on the media about their readiness to topple President Saddam. And we have witnessed a huge gathering of Iraqi exiles in London, who formed a co-ordinating committee to the selfsame end.
The most positive interpretation would be that Washington is merely trying to scare Baghdad, in the hope perhaps of triggering a revolt among the top brass or scaring Saddam Hussein into complying with the UN weapons inspection regime. The unconcealed joy in Washington over the latest failure of UN-Iraq talks, however, suggests that Iraqi compliance is not high on US priorities. Which leaves open the possibility that the US is preparing action against Iraq as a contingency to save Mr Bush's political skin and that of his Republican Party at the autumn mid-term Congressional elections. Such cynical application of military force would be recklessness of the highest order. That this prospect seems more than marginally plausible is the severest of indictments on the image that the Bush regime has projected abroad.
Source: http://argument.independent.co.uk/leading_articles/story.jsp?story=315967
7/20/02
2:31:49 PM
Public Citizen issued the following two press releases today:
1) Lawsuit Prompts White House to Release Reagan-Bush Records; Unlawful Delay Prompted Challenge; Other Records Are Still Being Withheld
2) Brand-Name Drug Industry Overwhelms Generic in Campaign Contributions and Lobbying Spending
July 19, 2002
Lawsuit Prompts White House to Release Reagan-Bush Records
Unlawful Delay Prompted Challenge; Other Records Are Still Being Withheld
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The White House has approved the release of records of former President Ronald Reagan and former Vice President George H.W. Bush - records that were required by law to be released more than a year ago. The delay in releasing the records, as well as an unlawful executive order that purports to authorize the delay, was challenged by Public Citizen and a coalition of other groups in federal district court here. The Justice Department notified the Public Citizen Litigation Group of the White House's decision in a letter today. Although the lawsuit spurred the release, other documents, including about 1,600 pages about which former President Reagan's representatives have expressed unknown "concerns," remain under wraps.
The records to be released include approximately 150 pages of Reagan documents, the last of a group of about 68,000 pages of records that were supposed to be released in January 2001 under the Presidential Records Act, which governs access to records of former presidents and vice presidents. Most of the 150 pages, which the lawsuit's plaintiffs have not yet seen, are believed to consist of memoranda concerning Supreme Court appointments and other presidential appointments to federal office.
The Bush White House blocked release of the Reagan records in early 2001 and then issued an executive order in November 2001 that claimed to give former presidents and vice presidents, as well as the incumbent president, the power to veto the release of records by claiming "executive privilege." After Public Citizen and a coalition of historians and journalists filed a lawsuit in December challenging the executive order, the White House approved release of most of the 68,000 pages of Reagan records in March, but 150 pages that were considered especially sensitive were held back for further review, which resulted in another four months of delay in their release.
"The disclosure that the White House has finally decided to release these documents is a clear indication that they realize they can't make a claim of 'executive privilege' stick so many years after President Reagan left office," said Public Citizen attorney Scott L. Nelson. "And with the pressure of a lawsuit, they also knew they couldn't keep stalling indefinitely on the pretext that they were still 'reviewing' the documents."
Nelson added that he expects the government now to argue that the lawsuit should be dismissed because the Reagan documents will soon be released. "The White House desperately wants to avoid having a court decide whether its executive order is lawful, so it has made every effort to dodge the issue," he said. "But the government is continuing to implement the executive order and is using it to hold up release of other documents, so the legal challenge to the order remains a live issue."
In particular, Public Citizen has recently learned that there are another 1,654 pages of Reagan records, whose existence was not previously disclosed by the National Archives, that were supposed to be released in January 2001. But the Archives, apparently in deference to "concerns" expressed about the documents by Reagan's representatives, did not include them with the 68,000 pages that initially gave rise to the executive order and the litigation.
Only after Public Citizen raised questions about the handling of the additional 1,654 pages did the Archives belatedly notify the White House and Reagan in June that it intended to release them. The release of those documents, the contents of which are completely unknown, is currently being held up pending review by the former president's staff and the White House under the executive order.
The White House decision today also authorizes the release of about 40 pages of records of former Vice President Bush. Those pages, which were not part of the 68,000 pages of Reagan records, were among 884 pages of Bush vice presidential documents that were supposed to be released under the Presidential Records Act in January 2001. They, too, were held back until Public Citizen raised questions about their status. In June, 844 pages were released, but 40 pages remained under review pursuant to the executive order. Like the 150 pages of Reagan documents whose release has just been authorized, the 40 pages of Bush documents are said by the Archives to relate to appointments to federal office. So in all, the government plans to release 190 pages.
"Prying these documents loose has been like pulling teeth," said Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook. "We intend to keep fighting to overturn President Bush's illegal executive order on presidential records so that the unimpeded public access that the Presidential Records Act was designed to bring about is a reality."
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C.
For more information, please visit http;//www.Citizen.org
xoxo
July 19, 2002
Brand-Name Drug Industry Overwhelms Generic in Campaign Contributions and Lobbying Spending
Debate Over Quicker Access to Generic Drugs Showcases the Money and Influence of the Brand-Name Drug Industry
WASHINGTON, D.C. - As the U.S. Senate considers legislation opposed by the brand-name drug industry to provide consumers with faster access to cheaper generic drugs, a new Public Citizen study shows how the brand-name prescription drug industry has outspent the much smaller generic drug industry by a 40-to-1 margin on campaign contributions and lobbying.
Public Citizen's analysis of campaign contributions and lobbying expenditures from the past three election cycles shows how the brand-name drug industry is overpowering the generic drug industry when it comes to currying favor with members of Congress. In its attempts to influence Congress, the brand-name industry has spent more than $423 million on lobbying and campaign contributions during the past three election cycles, while the generic drug industry has spent about $10 million, or 2 percent of what the brand-name industry spent.
Each side has much at stake as the Senate debates the Greater Access to Affordable Pharmaceuticals (GAAP) Act, which closes loopholes that allow brand-name drug companies to keep generic drugs off the market. The Senate is debating this bill for two weeks and is also considering amendments to the bill that would add prescription drug coverage for Medicare beneficiaries.
"The lopsided spending is staggering," said Frank Clemente, director of Public Citizen's Congress Watch. "On every front - lobbying, campaign contributions, advertising - the brand-name drug industry overwhelms the generic drug industry, as well as consumers and seniors groups. With this firepower one is left to simply hope that senators will have the courage to vote with their constituents and not with the drug lobbyists."
Findings from the study include:
§ Generic drug companies and their trade groups have been overwhelmed on the lobbying front for the past five years and spent less than 2 percent of what the brand-name companies shelled out during that time. From 1997 to 2001, brand-name companies and their trade groups spent $388.8 million on lobbying compared to generic companies' $6.8 million.
§ In 2001 (the most recent year for which lobby disclosure reports are available), brand-name companies and their trade associations accounted for 97 percent of all pharmaceutical lobbying spending ($75.5 million out of a $78 million total). Brand-name companies also employed nine lobbyists for every one employed by generic companies.
§ The brand-name companies' trade group, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), spent more than $11.2 million on lobbying in 2001 while the Generic Pharmaceutical Association (GPhA) spent less than half a million. In 2001, PhRMA spent more on lobbying and hired more lobbyists (82) than any drug company or pharmaceutical trade group.
§ From 1997 to 2002, brand-name companies and their trade group contributed $34.5 million to federal candidates and parties while generic companies contributed $3.4 million.
§ In terms of "soft money" - the unlimited corporate and individual donations to the national political parties - brand-name companies and their trade group have given $23.2 million since 1997 while generic drug companies and their trade group have contributed $3.1 million in that time.
§ Drug companies also contribute heavily to soft money "527 political groups," which are incorporated to influence elections. Again, brand-name companies dominate this type of giving. Since July 2000 (when disclosure was first required), brand-name drug companies and their trade group contributed $914,947 to the largest 527 groups controlled by politicians and interest groups, while generic companies have given $65,000.
A copy of Public Citizen's analysis is available at
http://www.citizen.org/congress/reform/drug_industry/contribution/articles.cfm?ID=8045.
Public Citizen is a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C.
For more information, please visit http;//www.Citizen.org
7/20/02
2:29:02 PM
Perhaps you are interested in some or all of these items.
They are the newest postings to the IEER web site.
Peace Plan for India and Pakistan
by Admiral L Ramdas, former chief of the Indian Navy July 18, 2002
http://www.ieer.org/comments/dsmt/ramuplan.html
Also see his op-ed in The Hindu:
http://www.hinduonnet.com/2002/07/18/stories/2002071800601000.htm
Nuclear Dangers and the State of Security Treaties
Conference: New transcripts added July 12, 2002
http://www.ieer.org/latest/npt02ag.html
Past and Future of Nuclear War
April 29, 2002, talk given by Arjun Makhijani at American University
http://www.ieer.org/comments/dsmt/auspeech.html
Cleanup Standards for Future Generations / COGEMA: Above the Law?
Science for Democratic Action, vol. 10 no. 3, May 2002
http://www.ieer.org/sdafiles/vol_10/sda10-3.pdf [PDF only; 317KB]
Multilateral Treaties Are Fundamental Tools for Protecting Global Security
IEER/LCNP fact sheet, June 2002
http://www.ieer.org/reports/treaties/factsht.html
Radiological Warfare Suspicions Point Up Need for Materials Accounting and Reporting to Enhance Security
Press release, June 10, 2002
http://www.ieer.org/comments/radwpnpr.html
Could Asian Nuclear War Radioactivity Reach North America?
Earthfiles.com interview with Arjun Makhijani, June 4, 2002
http://www.earthfiles.com/news/news.cfm?ID=354&category=Environment
Independent Institute Recommends Alternative Nuclear Waste Plan
Press release, June 4, 2002
http://www.ieer.org/comments/waste/yuccaalt.html
7/20/02
2:26:50 PM
TomPaine.com
Independent, Commercial-free Public Affairs Reporting and Commentary
PRESIDENT BUSH SPARES JOHN WALKER LINDH
The First Sign Of Compassion In This Conservative Is For An Al Qaeda Fighter
by Michael Ryan
Bush has sent to death teenagers, battered women, and convicts who were mentally retarded. How is it, then, that this tough-on-crime President took such a personal interest in sparing Mr. Lindh?
http://www.tompaine.com/feature.cfm/ID/6034
THE SPY WHO READS YOUR METER
Ashcroft's Plan To Turn Your Neighbors Into Snoops
by Jennifer Bauduy
Civil-liberties groups say the TIPS government informant operation harkens back to George Orwell's 1984. Is it really a nationwide spy program intended to stifle dissent?
http://www.tompaine.com/feature.cfm/ID/6027
The Loyal Opposition:
CLINTON'S AIDS APOLOGY TO AFRICA
Too Little, Too Late
by David Corn
When Bill Clinton had the chance -- and the power -- to address the devastation in Africa, he took a pass. Now, Clinton should do more than issue apologies to help the 40 million Africans infected with AIDS.
http://www.tompaine.com/feature.cfm/ID/6033
Dispatch: Duluth, Minn.
JAPANESE SYSTEM TO PROVIDE CHEAP HOUSING?
'Lego Block' Houses Could Mean More Affordable Homes
by Stephanie Hemphill
With assembly a matter mostly of matching parts, the house-building system invented by Kato Sangyo may be the next step in helping the working poor find a place of their own.
http://www.tompaine.com/feature.cfm/ID/6024
HOMELAND SECURITY: UPSIDES AND DOWNSIDES
Beyond The Politics Are Issues Americans Will Live With For Years To Come
by Ehsan Ahrari
As the Senate takes up the White House's Homeland Security proposal, let's hope it debates issues that will affect ordinary Americans for years to come.
http://www.tompaine.com/feature.cfm/ID/6035
And from our CHECK IT OUT! section:
INS BIGOTRY
Since last December, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) has held more than 200 Haitian refugees in Florida detention centers as part of a new policy to discourage Haitians from seeking asylum, according to World Policy Institute Senior Fellow Michele Wucker. The INS insists that the intent of the policy is to prevent other Haitians from risking the high seas in leaky boats. However, refugees from other nations with plausible asylum claims are released within three to five days.
In May, a Florida district court judge denied human rights groups' pleas to reverse the policy and treat the Haitian asylum-seekers fairly. But lawyers are planning an appeal.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has called the policy discriminatory and illegal under international human rights law. Haitians are planning a protest in Boston on July 25 in front of the Boston Federal Building.
CHECK IT OUT! http://www.tompaine.com/check_it_out/
7/20/02
2:24:02 PM
DAILY GRIST
<http://www.gristmagazine.com>
GLACIER BOGGLES
Alaska's glaciers have been melting faster than previously thought and are responsible for more meltwater over the last half century than any other spot on Earth, according to a study published in today's edition of Science. The 10-year study, conducted by the University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute, found that meltwater from the state's glaciers raised global sea levels as much as about one-hundredth of an inch per year during the 1990s. That might not sound like much, but it means that melting Alaskan glaciers have accounted for fully 8 percent of the recent rise in the world's sea levels. (The Columbia Glacier alone has been losing about 25 feet of height per year and dumping more than 1.8 trillion gallons of water into Columbia Bay.) The findings suggest that scientists might be underestimating how much sea levels will keep rising, which could be very, very bad news for the world's population living in coastal areas. Is climate change at fault?
straight to the source: Anchorage Daily News, Doug O'Harra, 19 Jul 2002 <http://www.gristmagazine.com/forward.pl?forward_id=273>
straight to the source: Washington Post, Eric Pianin, 19 Jul 2002 <http://www.gristmagazine.com/forward.pl?forward_id=274>
only in Grist: This just in -- the latest climate change news -- in our Heat Beat section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/heatbeat/thisjustin071802.asp?source=daily>
BEER GOGGLES
Over here in the lofty halls of Grist Magazine, we've just finished collating our most recent batch of letters to the editor, and we've concluded that Grist readers are inordinately fond of beer. Or at least that's our best explanation for what can only be described as an unusually high volume of letters concerning the lime-in-a-bottle problem addressed last month by Umbra, environmental advice guru extraordinaire. (For those of you who missed it, the gist was, What are the recycling implications of a lime wedge stuck in a beer bottle? Please, don't send us your thoughts.) We've printed a selection of letters about limes -- not to mention a few about all those other enviro issues, e.g. renewable energy, electric vehicles, and the state of the Columbia River. Grab a cold one and check 'em out, only on the Grist Magazine website.
only in Grist: A man, a plan, a ... -- thoughts from Grist readers, in our Letters section <http://www.gristmagazine.com/letters/letters071902.asp?source=daily>
BK WHOPPER
Eighteen months ago, throngs of Filipinos gathered at a religious shrine for a rally that ended in the resignation of corrupt then-president Joseph Estrada. The massive turnout was widely attributed to mobile texting, with hundreds of thousands of Filipinos passing along messages encouraging people to attend. Now, the cell-phone-happy people of the Philippines are turning to text messaging to fight a different enemy: air pollution. The nonprofit organization Bantay Kalikasan, or Environmental Watchdog, has launched a campaign to get dirty trucks and buses off the streets of Manila, among the most polluted cities in Asia. People with cell phones are encouraged to report, via mobile text, any vehicles they see emitting black smoke; BK then sends lists of vehicles that have five or more complaints filed against them to the government agency responsible for issuing licenses to trucking and commercial vehicle companies, and the agency summons the owners for emissions testing. In the first two weeks of the campaign alone, 123 vehicle owners were called in. BK's ultimate goal is to get the government to enforce its Clean Air Act, enacted in 1999, so that cell-phone owners can go back to texting their friends.
straight to the source: Christian Science Monitor, Abby Tan, 19 Jul 2002 <http://www.gristmagazine.com/forward.pl?forward_id=275>
WHERE THE SUN DON'T SHINE
Confirming fears of those opposed to genetic engineering, researchers in Great Britain reported this week that DNA from transgenic crops can find its way into the bacteria that dwell in the human intestines. In a study by scientists at the University of Newcastle, seven volunteers (all of whom had earlier had their lower bowels removed in unrelated surgeries) were given a single meal consisting of a burger and milkshake containing genetically modified soy. Intestinal bacteria from three of the seven volunteers later tested positive for trace levels of an herbicide-resistance gene from the soy. Although most GM material in foods is not thought to pose a risk to human health, many GM crops contain antibiotic-resistant marker genes as well, which critics fear could compromise the human immune system. Britain's Food Standards Agency, which commissioned the study, dismissed such fears, saying the cross-over DNA was only found in trace levels, but Friends of the Earth said the report raised serious concerns about the safety of GM food and called for its withdrawal from the market until further testing could be done.
straight to the source: Planet Ark, Reuters, 19 Jul 2002 <http://www.gristmagazine.com/forward.pl?forward_id=276>
do good: Take action to fight against Frankenfoods <http://www.gristmagazine.com/dogood/food.asp?source=daily#frankenfood>
GROSS OUT
If Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack (D) has his way, a part of his state's share of the national tobacco settlement will be used to fund alternative energy projects. On Wednesday, Vilsack suggested spending $50 million of the $438 million settlement to help cities in Iowa build renewable energy plants such as wind turbines. The governor said his goal was to develop statewide energy resources, reduce how much money Iowa spends on buying out-of-state energy, and ultimately reverse the tables, with Iowa selling excess energy to other states. Vilsack's energy proposal, which is part of a plan to raise per capita income in Iowa, was heavily criticized by Republican gubernatorial candidate Doug Gross. Gross said the funding source would be temporary and asked, "What would happen in year two?" But a spokesperson for the governor noted that energy plants don't require recurring funding sources: "You don't rebuild a wind farm every year."
straight to the source: Des Moines Register, Thomas Beaumont, 18 Jul 2002 <http://www.gristmagazine.com/forward.pl?forward_id=277>
do good: Take action to plead for a world run on renewable energy <http://www.gristmagazine.com/dogood/climate.asp?source=daily#positive>
7/20/02
2:19:09 PM
Court Protects Marijuana Use With Doctors' OK
by Maura Dolan, Los Angeles Times, July 19, 2002
Law: A patient who grows or smokes marijuana for personal health reasons, with a doctor's OK, cannot be prosecuted in state court, California justices rule.
Californians who use or grow marijuana for personal medical use are protected from prosecution in state court as long as they have doctors' approval, the California Supreme Court decided unanimously Thursday.
In its first review of the medical marijuana initiative, which was approved by voters in 1996, the court said a medical user who is arrested can get the charges dismissed without a trial if the patient has a note on a prescription pad or any other evidence of a doctor's approval.
The ruling overturns the felony conviction of a blind man with diabetes who was arrested after police spotted 31 marijuana plants growing in the frontyard of his home in Twain Harte in Tuolumne County.
Under the state law, "the possession and cultivation of marijuana is no more criminal--so long as its conditions are satisfied--than the possession and acquisition of any prescription drug with a physician's prescription," Chief Justice Ronald M. George wrote for the court.
The decision widens the gap between the treatment of marijuana cases in California's state courts and in federal courts in the state.
Until Thursday, all major rulings on Proposition 215, the state's medical marijuana law, have been made by federal courts and based on federal law.
The U.S. Supreme Court, in a case on the California initiative, ruled that there is no medical exception for the use of marijuana under federal law. As a result, people can still be prosecuted in federal court, regardless of the state law.
But individual users and growers in California are generally prosecuted in state courts, which are required to follow Thursday's ruling.
Gerald Uelmen, a University of Santa Clara law professor who argued the case for defendant Myron Carlyle Mower, 40, said the decision would reduce prosecutions throughout the state.
Since 56% of voters approved Proposition 215, dozens of Californians have been arrested on marijuana charges despite claims of medical need, he said.
"It is a wonderful victory for patients," Uelmen said.
He said he hoped the ruling would discourage police from arresting those who grow marijuana and have doctors' notes recommending its use.
"I don't think police are interested in arresting people who are not going to be prosecuted," he said.
Ann Brick, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union, which also argued for Mower, praised the court for being "quite protective of the rights of medical marijuana patients."
"The court is making very clear that it understands the people of California wanted to confer real protection to the medical users of marijuana, and this decision helps make that possible," Brick said.
The state attorney general's office, which represented Tuolumne County prosecutors in the appeal, said it was reviewing the decision.
California is one of nine states with medical marijuana laws. The decision was the first by a state high court on such a law, Uelmen said.
After Mower's conviction, a state appeals court said the voter initiative had merely given defendants the right to present a medical defense during a trial.
That ruling, by a Court of Appeal in Fresno, also said that users or growers must show, by a preponderance of the evidence, that they had the marijuana solely for medical purposes.
Under Thursday's ruling, by contrast, a grower or user can ask a judge to dismiss the charges without trial.
If the amount of marijuana involved is considered large or the doctor's approval questionable, the defendant might still face a trial to determine whether the marijuana was purely for the defendant's medical use.
But the ruling also made it easier for such defendants to win if a case goes to court. Under the court's ruling, the defendant does not have to prove that the marijuana is solely for medical use. If there is any reasonable doubt about the marijuana's use, the defendant wins. "Most similar is the defense of possession of a dangerous or restricted drug with a physician's prescription, against a charge of unlawful possession of such a drug," George wrote.
"For that defense, a defendant need raise only a reasonable doubt as to his or her possession of the drug in question with a physician's prescription."
The court cited a provision in the initiative that says criminal penalties "shall not apply to a patient, or to a patient's primary caregiver, who possesses or cultivates marijuana for the personal medical purposes of the patient upon the written or oral recommendation or approval of a physician."
"The provision," the court said in People v. Mower, S094490, "renders possession and cultivation of marijuana noncriminal" when it is done for medical purposes.
Mower, who has had diabetes since he was 8 years old, testified that the 31 plants would supply him with 5 pounds of marijuana in a year and estimated his consumption at eight grams a day.
An expert witness for the defense testified that the plants would yield 4.35 pounds a year, but an expert for the prosecution countered that the plants would produce 31 to 62 pounds.
"Had the jury properly been instructed that defendant was required merely to raise a reasonable doubt about his purposes ... it might have found him not guilty," George wrote for the court. "We come to this conclusion because the jury might have found that defendant raised a reasonable doubt--to wit, whether the 31 plants would yield a harvest of only about 5 pounds for a year's supply."
Mower, who said he cannot maintain his weight without using marijuana, had been sentenced to five years' probation for growing the plants.
"I have a doctor who completely agrees with me that I need to have this," Mower said. "I have nausea all the time and wasting syndrome. And if I smoke a little, I am in the kitchen looking for something to eat and drink."
He said marijuana also puts him in a good mood and gives him stamina.
The issue in Mower's case was the number of plants he was growing. A Tuolumne County police policy says medical users may have three plants.
"They pulled out all but three of the worst plants and two weeks later took us to jail, booked me and kept my wife overnight," Mower said.
He said he now hopes to return to court and ask a judge to permit him to grow more than three plants, which are "not anywhere near enough." He said he needs to smoke about six or seven marijuana cigarettes a day and has been forced to buy from an illicit dealer.
"Those drug houses are dangerous places to be," he said.
Counties around the state have different policies about how many plants a medical user may grow. The permitted amounts range from three plants to 99. The ruling did not address the variance in policies.
"That's a bit of a disappointment," said Uelmen, Mower's lawyer, "because it is an issue of a grave statewide concern and a cause of a lot of confusion....We need a statewide standard, but that will have to wait for another day."
For users who are not advised to smoke marijuana for medical reasons, possession of less than an ounce in California is a misdemeanor punishable by a $100 fine. Cultivation is a felony.
Lael Rubin, special counsel to the Los Angeles County district attorney, said the district attorney's office does not prosecute growers unless they have at least 25 plants and there is evidence of a commercial purpose, such as scales and plastic bags. Other cases are treated as misdemeanors and referred to the city attorney, she said.
Source: http://www.LATimes.com
7/20/02
2:12:47 PM
t r u t h o u t | 07.20
White House Still Selling Privatization of Social Security
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.20A.bush.ss.htm
Judge: U.S. Must Explain Detention
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.20B.jge.detention.htm
Rangel Harshly Critical of Trade Bill; "Blatant Protectionism"
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.20C.rangel.trade.htm
Nicholas D. Kristof | Case of the Missing Anthrax
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.20D.krs.anthrax.htm
David Corn | Bush and the Billionaire: How Insider Capitalism Benefited W.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.20E.corn.insider.htm
Court Protects Marijuana Use With Doctors' OK
http://www.truthout.org/docs_02/07.20F.court.pot.htm
7/20/02
2:07:03 PM
The Nation
Did George Soros know George W. Bush back in 1986 when a company he owned, Harken, bought up Spectrum 7, Bush's failed oil business? "I didn't know him," Soros said. "He was supposed to bring in the Gulf connection. But it didn't come to anything. We were buying political influence. That was it. He was not much of a businessman."
For the full story of Bush and the Billionaire, read the latest installment of David Corn's Capital Games now at:
http://www.thenation.com//capitalgames/index.mhtml?bid=3&pid=82
And don't miss Jason Leopold's related editorial showing how Bush's current refusal to be open about his past business practices is in line with a long pattern of stonewalling dating back to four different incidents over the course of a decade.
Exclusively available at:
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=special&s=leopold20020718
Also of related interest is John Nichols' look at why US Rep. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont Independent who has for years been one of Congress' most consistent critics of corporate excess, is worried about the current controversy over corporate governance.
Exclusively available at:
http://www.thenation.com/thebeat/index.mhtml?bid=1&pid=81
7/20/02
2:03:45 PM
Bush And The Billionaire: How Insider Capitalism Benefited W.
by David Corn, The Nation, July 17, 2002
It's awfully tough to be Mr. Corporate Responsibility after you have profited from the actions of an irresponsible corporation that engaged in a shady deal. George W. Bush is finding that out, for as he tries desperately to stay ahead of the assorted corporate scandals, his own past as a failed oil man has emerged as an issue for reporters, columnists, and the cable-news crowd. What's drawn the most attention is Bush's handling of his 1990 Harken stock deal. Much of that story was public during the presidential election of 2000 (and it had been a minor issue when Bush first ran for governor of Texas in 1994). But two years ago, few seemed to care that Bush had made a bundle through his association with an oil company that employed phony accounting, that he benefited by selling shares in this troubled company (in which he happened to be a director) before these problems became known publicly, and that he failed to meet the federal deadline for disclosing this stock dump (as well as several others).
Now, reporters jump on any new factoid they can unearth. A few days ago, it was reported Bush had received a "flash report" in early June 1990--sixteen days before he sold his Harken holdings--that might have indicated the company was facing a huge loss. The White House says Bush believed the company was going to lose $9 million that quarter--not $23 million, as the losses turned out to be. The latest news, courtesy of Associated Press, is that Bush signed a "lockup" letter on April 3, 1990, pledging not to sell his Harken stock for six months after a proposed public stock offering. Yet two months later, he cashed out his Harken shares for nearly $850,000--a transaction that bolstered his financial position at a crucial time, for he had to cover a loan he earlier used to purchase the Texas Ranger baseball team.
With the public offering unconsummated at that point, perhaps Bush had a loophole to slide through. But here's another question: who bought his Harken securities? Supposedly, an institutional investor that has not been identified. The White House maintains it is in no position to release the minutes of Harken board meetings from this period, but it has not explained what prevents Bush from publicly requesting that Harken disclose these records or that the institution that purchased his stock identify itself.
At the end of two weeks of Harken-ish news (and don't forget Vice President Dick Cheney's troubles, as Halliburton, the company he once chaired, faces investigation for accounting irregularities), conservative journalist William Kristol was left saying (hoping?) it was unlikely Bush would suffer political repercussions, for the recent details did not prove the Harken deal was illegal. (Remember when conservatives scoffed at an it-wasn't-illegal standard for the president?)
Details, of course, matter. But the story is already complete enough to justify a judgment, for the issue isn't merely the legality of Bush's Harken stock sale. It's Bush's record as a beneficiary of insider capitalism. Whether he sold his Harken stock due to insider knowledge or not, he was only in a position to conduct this transaction because Harken had rescued his sinking oil business. In 1986, Bush's own oil firm, Spectrum 7, was collapsing. Before it went belly-up, Harken purchased Spectrum for $2.25 million worth of Harken stock and made Bush a Harken director and consultant. That is, Harken saved Bush from ruin.
Why? It wasn't Bush's record as an oil man. He had run two oil companies into the ground. Could it have been Bush's insider credentials as the son of a vice president?
At the time, Harken was owned by global billionaire George Soros, the Harvard Management Corporation, and others. A few weeks ago, I was at the opening of the new Washington offices of the Open Society Institute, a nonprofit policy and advocacy organization founded by Soros. OSI reflects the left-of-center beliefs of Soros. In the United States and overseas, it promotes campaign finance reform, government openness, drug policy reform, abolition of the death penalty and many other issues. At the party, practically the entire liberal policy community of the capital was present. Well-wishers (and grant-seekers?) were eagerly congratulating Soros. While chatting with one of his employees, I said to her, "One day, you should ask Soros what he knew about the Harken deal and why his company took on Bush." She blanched and mumbled that she could never raise that with Soros.
Later, when I saw the billionaire almost alone, I sidled up to him. "Nice offices," I said. "But can I ask you about some ancient history?" Sure, he said, with a good-natured smile. What was the deal with Harken buying up Spectrum 7? I inquired. Did Soros know Bush back then?
"I didn't know him," Soros replied. "He was supposed to bring in the Gulf connection. But it didn't come to anything. We were buying political influence. That was it. He was not much of a businessman."
Then my time with the billionaire was up. If Soros--who disagrees with most Bush policies--is telling the truth, it means Bush only survived in the corporate jungle because of his surname and connections. Yes, that hardly comes as a surprise. But it does render Bush a purebred embodiment of the central issue of the current business scandals: those on the inside play by a different set of rules than the rest of Americans (including workers and small investors). The market works for Bush--as well as for Martha Stewart and the execs of WorldCom and Enron--in ways others can only imagine, or read about, once in a great while, in an indictment.
Had it not been for Soros and his Harken partners, what might have become of George the Younger? Because a liberal billionaire and his corporate allies sought political juice in 1986--for they knew the business world is no meritocracy--Bush's corporate career was artificially inflated. Consequently, he was able to enter politics, citing his business experience, and land in a position where he could implement policies that make Soros gag. (O. Henry would enjoy this turnabout.)
Even if Bush did not trade on inside information, he fully exploited insider capitalism. If it takes a crony to bust up crony capitalism, the nation has the right man for the job.
Source: http://www.thenation.com//capitalgames/index.mhtml?bid=3&pid=82
7/20/02
1:50:37 PM
How The CIA Tried To Thwart Crop Circles And Colin Andrews
by Michael Irving, World-Action, July 19, 2002
Colin Andrews was the world's leading authority on Crop Patterns, right from the time this amazing phenomenon came onto the world's stage in the mid 1980s. I knew Colin personally, and I am totally sure the plan described by Colin, below, was later completely executed. Colin Andrews now wouldn't be able to tell you the truth on the ET origins of Crop Patterns even he wanted to. If he did, he'd probably have the shortest life expectancy of anyone on Earth.
I, myself, was 'taken out' by character defamation. Pat Delgado was set up, and his spirit never recovered. Colin Andrews was forced out, as described below.
'Cosmic Top Secret' - The Unseen Agenda By Jon King Editor of UFO Reality (UK) 1998/1999. New English Library Hodder & Stoughton ISBN 0 340 70822 0 Pages: 279-287 ___
File 28: Appendix 01 Part 2 Case Profile: Cosmic Top-X32 'The CIA And The Crop Circles'
[JK = Jon King, CA = Colin Andrews]
JK: So, Colin. Can you think of any other instances where government agents have become involved in the crop circles research programme?
CA: Yes, yes, I can. One instance in particular comes to mind. A man who announced himself as working for the CIA back in, I think, June or July of 1989, approached me and said he had been assigned to 'bring me into a plan', or more precisely, 'buy me into a plan'. He said this was the sole reason he'd come to England - that his assignment was to implement and execute this plan in which I was to be involved.
JK: And did he tell you what this plan was?
CA: He did, yes. He told me that certain individuals, all of whom you know, Jon -Richard Andrews, Terence Meaden, Pat Delgado, to name a few - he told me that the CIA were about to promote each major researcher in turn and then publicly debunk them. He said this was a ploy that was frequently used. He said they would give them a stage, encourage them to declare their hand and, one by one, take them out. He said that I would then be left with a 'role' that he later revealed to me.
JK: How did this man make his approach? How did he contact you?
CA: Well, when he first arrived, Pat and I were asked to go up to Pebble Mill television studios in Birmingham to take part in a programme called Daytime Live. It was a kind of live TV debate situation. They were going to air the sequence that contained the mysterious sound detected in a crop formation and recorded by the BBC - the sound that destroyed a hundred thousand pounds' worth of TV camera one sunny afternoon at a crop circle site in Wiltshire! As we came on air, they were running this particular sequence. Anyway, on the morning of the programme we were in our hotel, and we received a phone call from David Morgenstern of the BBC who said that they had received some communication from a man who claimed he had actually seen a crop circle being formed, and what questions should they ask that would allow them to know if he was telling the truth? So we gave them some questions that we thought would be helpful. When we arrived at the studios we were told that this man had been flown directly in to Birmingham and that we would not be able to meet him because they wanted it to be an absolutely first-time contact on air. As we came on air they panned to the studio audience, and this man described what he'd seen, live on TV.
JK: What exactly did he say?
CA: That he'd been out studying foxes in Scotland, and that one of the foxes on this particular night had refused to follow its regular path which, he explained, was not consistent with the usual behaviour of foxes. I don't know if this is right or not, but it sounded plausible. The fox apparently refused to go any further and instead went back the way it had come. The man then apparently heard some rustling, and then he described the way this circle formed. What he was saying is that the fox had presumably sensed something strange and that after it had scampered off he witnessed the formation of this circle. But the point is that his live TV appearance seemed to legitimize him.
JK: You think this was his way of becoming accepted on the crop circle scene?
CA: Right. From that moment on his being seen in the presence of the crop circle researchers - myself and Pat in particular - became acceptable. It was his 'way in', so to speak.
JK: So what happened next?
CA: Well, some weeks later there was a rap on my door, and when I answered it I immediately recognized the man standing there. It was the 'fox-study' man. He said that he'd come to tell me something ... he wanted me to get Pat Delgado over to my place because he wanted to talk to both of us. Pat lived about seventeen miles away. It was late at night but I phoned him and he agreed to come over. When he arrived the man spent all evening into the early hours with both of us, asking question after question. He appeared to be comparing the answers I gave against those that Pat gave. Well, perhaps not surprisingly, Pat eventually grew more and more frustrated, and said to the man: 'Look, exactly what have you come to tell us?' But the man just shook his head, as if to say: 'I'm not ready to tell you yet.' So Pat just stood up and said something like: 'Well, I've got better things to do with my time,' and headed out the door and went home. He was very angry. The guy accompanied me to the door to see Pat out (I didn't know whether he was going to leave as well - I was rather hoping he would, because I was pretty bloody angry about it, too) but as Pat left and I closed the door the man just spun round on me and said: 'Get your jacket on. I want to tell you something.' So against my better judgement I went through into the front room and told my wife I was popping out for a few minutes (I wanted to tell her so she didn't become worried). We then went out.
JK: Where did you go at that time of night?
CA: We wandered down towards Andover town centre, then back up Salisbury Road, back and forth, back and forth, questions and more questions, most of a fairly general nature, but none of the questions were about me. Rather they were to do with things like, you know: Where were the circles? Who were we in touch with? What did we know, particularly about the Russians? That kind of thing. He was asking every question you could possibly think of that an intelligence agent would probably ask. But the conversation wasn't going anywhere at all. As for myself I was furious, but I didn't quite have the courage to walk away.
JK: But presumably at some point he told you what it was he'd come to tell you?
CA: Yes. When we eventually started to walk back towards my home he stopped on the pavement and said: 'You are now one of us.' So I said: 'What do you mean by that?' He said, simply: 'CIA.' When I asked him for ID he just laughed and said: 'You really think a CIA agent would carry identification?' And then he laughed again. He told me I would never see his boss, and that he never saw his boss's boss. He said that was the way it worked. He said that from here on in I was 'one of them'. He gave me no say in the matter whatever. He never asked me if I wanted to be associated with the CIA - he just told me that from then on I was to consider myself one of them. Following this he named a lot of people - most of whom were my colleagues in crop circle research - who were to be eliminated from the research programme (he did not mean that they were to be killed or anything quite like that, but they were nevertheless to be taken off the stage, so to speak). And they have been. I have watched the process in operation for some years now - a process he openly told me about on that night. And every name he named that night has since been 'got at', and everything that he said would happen has happened.
JK: Could you give us an example?
CA: Well, for instance, the following year Terence Meaden was never out of the newspapers. Nobody else could get a look in. This is exactly what he told me would happen. But where is Terence Meaden now? Who knows what Terence Meaden's latest ideas are? Answer: no one. Because, presumably, his stage has been taken from him - he's been 'taken out'. Pat Delgado was next, and we all know what happened to him.
[Author's note: sadly, Pat Delgado was so taken in by the 'Doug And Dave' episode, and so distraught because of it, that he retired from crop circle research soon thereafter.]
JK: Do you think there was a reason why you weren't 'taken out', too? Did this man indicate why you should be singled out from the rest?
CA: He did, yes. The CIA guy told me that, so far as they were concerned, I seemed to have a particular affinity and contact with the public. 'You have a way,' is what he said. The public identify with you.'
JK: And at the time, of course, you were getting a lot of media coverage.
CA: Yes, I was. There were really only two people in those days, Pat and myself. We'd written a book and it had sold a lot of copies. We were getting a lot of TV and radio coverage. But a decision seemed to be made that night that I was the one. I mean, if you look at it logically, it could have been either one of us. So this man must have been in a position to make a decision. He must have carried some authority within his agency.
JK: Right.
CA: So he chose me to go with this 'role' ...
JK: And what was this 'role'?
CA: Once they had taken these other researchers out of the frame, so to speak, they wanted me to do something for them. He said I was to carry on being Colin Andrews, researching the phenomenon, just doing my thing, and at some point in the near future I would be asked to do one interview which would enjoy maximum, saturated media coverage. During the course of this interview I was to make one statement, and one statement only. They wanted me to state publicly that the crop circle phenomenon was a hoax. When we got back to my home he said that he would show me how to say it and what to say. In return for this I was offered a bank account in Switzerland, in which would be enough money that I would never need to even think about money ever again. On top of this he said that they were in possession of some kind of 'instrument' which they would send to me within two weeks. He said that this instrument would allow me to identify immediately a real crop circle from a hoax - something that, presumably, could measure some or other microwave residue, or some other residual effect. He told me: 'You will then be in a privileged position, and we will put you right out there as the number one crop circle expert.' He then said that they would send me to a certain college. . . (which I know to be a government establishment, so my ears pricked up at this point). . . where you will be familiarized with coding structures. I mean, this is an absolute bloody horror story I'm hearing ... I mean, I was . . . God, no one will ever know how I felt that night. I was terrified. I even cried. I was completely and utterly bloody freaked. I even saw my daughter the next day and I broke down while I was talking to her, too. I said to her: 'Darling, I want you to forget everything I've ever told you about crop circles. I think I'm in terrible trouble. You know, I'm in bloody trouble.' Of course, she didn't know what I was talking about but I just wanted my family out of it. It took everything I knew to get over that ordeal and carry on a relatively normal life . . . (At this point Colin took a few moments to himself. It was obvious that the ordeal had affected him very deeply - indeed, that the memory was as painful as the ordeal itself. A short while later we resumed.)
CA: ... So anyway ... I was told that there would be another couple of contacts made and that these would be 'voice-only' contacts via the telephone. And sure enough they phoned me, but by this time I'd had time to think about the situation and I'd decided I was going to take his head off, you know. There was no way I was going to give them what they wanted.
JK: So what did you do?
CA: I was given a contact number at the Ministry of Defence and I rang that number and told them that I'd had this approach, but I was told they had no jurisdiction. Can you believe that? A British subject was being harassed by a member of US Intelligence and the MoD had no jurisdiction to protect me! My God! I mean, it really made me ashamed to be British. Anyway, they also told me that I was not to be concerned, that I should simply refuse to cooperate with them. They said that if I refused to go along with it there should not be any danger to me. Hah! I thought: Thanks for the invaluable assistance!'
JK: And is that what you did?
CA: In the event, yes. That's precisely what I did. I literally ignored the phone calls. And I guess, in retrospect, it might just have saved my life, the fact that I'd contacted the MoD. Perhaps they have a little more jurisdiction than they admitted to. Perhaps the fact that I contacted the MoD meant that the CIA dared not harm me in any way.
JK: So how did you know which calls to ignore? How did you know it was them?
CA: Oh, it was them, all right. The guy was on the answer machine saying: 'Pick up the phone. Pick up the phone.' But I didn't. I just let it go. Then the voice said: 'Ring me back at this number.' And then they gave a number, but I didn't ring back. A few days later they phoned again, and this time what they said was vile, and frightening. But my answer was: 'Sorry, I'm not playing.' And that was that so far as I was concerned. Like I said, perhaps they knew I'd contacted the MoD. Maybe, just maybe, this was enough for them to leave me alone.
JK: Have you had similar approaches since you moved to America?
CA: Well, nothing quite like that. But I have certainly been approached, yes. A computer analyst at the Pentagon, for example, approached me with a person called [name deleted] Pretty soon this woman, [name deleted], sought [name deleted] out and asked to see her in her office. Now this meant that my new office - which I used to share with [name deleted] - had already been infiltrated by people who we now know for sure were CIA. I have since had several approaches by both of these people.
JK: Sounds like someone was pretty desperate to gain access to your database.
CA: Absolutely. That's the only possible answer. Well, I know that's what it was all about. They told me so. For instance, [name deleted], who is an author in the US, offered that I should co-author a book with her and she went to every extreme in order to get me to agree. She wanted to work with me on the project in my office here in Connecticut, which of course would have allowed her unlimited access to my database. But again, I turned the offer down.
JK: Well, thank you for being so frank, Colin. I'm sure you've opened a lot of people's minds about the ways in which the world's intelligence agencies work and about just how seriously they view the UFO and crop circle phenomena. Thanks once again.
CA: My pleasure.
http://www.world-action.co.uk/conspire.html
WHAT HAPPENED TO COLIN
They got to him. Colin Andrews was taken out of the Crop Pattern scene. All of us in the Wiltshire area of southern England knew that ET was making the original Crop Patterns and, at the end of the 1980s, even though Colin was being very scientifically cautious, we knew that he knew too - and we were just waiting for him to reveal to the world the immediate presence of ET in and around the Earth -everywhere. They must have found some way to get to Colin. In the mid 1990s, it was revealed that Colin had suddenly started working for a Rockefeller foundation and had been given a vast fund and/or salary. Colin was a man of principle - that is why we all liked him so much. Obviously they found a way to coerce Colin to keep quiet about the ET connection. Colin travelled to the USA a lot. Perhaps it was during one of these USA visits. Colin had to be silenced. 100s of millions of people worldwide had become interested in the 'out-of-this-world' Crop Patterns -they were not going to waste 50 years concerted effort to confuse us about the reality we live in, to let just one single man change the course of history.
World-Action British Isles: http://www.world-action.co.uk
http://www.rumormillnews.net/cgi-bin/config.pl?read=21147
7/20/02
1:29:39 PM
UTNE WEB WATCH
The Best of the Alternative Web
WE NEED A GLOBAL DECLARATION OF INTERDEPENDENCE
by Wade Davis, The Toronto Globe and Mail
-- If Americans really want to know "Why they hate us," we must start looking elsewhere for clues.
CAMPAIGNING FOR A LIVING WAGE
Web site review by Rebecca Wienbar
-- When people who are willing and able to work full-time are living below the poverty line, it's time for change. In Chatham County, Georgia, that's exactly what's happening.
DISGRUNTLED HOUSEWIFE
Web site review by Julie Madsen
-- Though billed as "Your guide to modern living and intersex relationships," the site offers more entertaining diversions than practical advice.
Links to the above articles: http://www.utne.com/webwatch
7/20/02
1:27:21 PM
SciTech Daily Review
Want to know on what date van Gogh composed White House at Night? Or how Paul Revere managed to slip past a British warship on a moonlit night? Multidisciplinary astronomer Donald Olson tells all
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/16/science/space/16MOON.html
China is reported to have cloned more than 30 human embryos, a feat that has made it the first country in the world to have an abundant supply of embryonic stem cells
http://straitstimes.com.sg/asia/story/0,1870,132058,00.html
A global array of microphones that detect low frequency rumbles could help avert nuclear war
http://www.nature.com/nsu/020715/020715-4.html
Scientists believe they may have uncovered one reason why women live longer than men -- they are better sleepers
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/-/hi/english/health/newsid_2129000/2129578.stm
Who's afraid of 1984? George Orwell's nightmare vision of technology wedded to tyranny had a fatal flaw
http://www.technologyreview.com/articles/wo_muller071202.asp
The dot-com bubble may have burst, but multimedia art is still thriving online
http://www.chicagotribune.com/technology/chi-0207080008jul08.story?coll=chi%2Dtechnology%2Dhed
Like a bad genetic copy of a bad genetic copy, the official account of the US President's Council on Bioethics' cloning report is a double distortion, says William Saletan
http://slate.msn.com/?id=2068129
A NASA-commissioned survey calls for a decade's worth of bold robotic space missions, from a big-ticket mission to Europa to sending a probe to the Kuiper Belt and Pluto
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solar_system_020711.html
Claims by a Japanese surgeon that computer games can damage the brain have been greeted with scepticism by psychologists and neuroscientists
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99992538
7/20/02
1:19:07 PM
Air Force Kills Wind Farm On Nevada Test Site
LAS VEGAS, Nevada, July 18, 2002 (ENS) - A $130 million wind farm planned for land that is part of the Nevada Test Site about 85 miles northwest of Las Vegas has been abruptly canceled by a federal agency due to military concerns.
The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Nevada Operations Office has terminated the siting process for the wind farm based on objections raised by officials at the adjacent Nellis Air Force Base.
Air Force officials said the whirling turbine blades might interfere with radar signals. They said the interference would impact testing, training and tactics development on the nearby Nevada Test and Training Range.
Planes from Nellis Air Force Base fly a training mission over the Nevada Test Site (Photo courtesy U.S. Air Force)
Kathleen Carlson, manager of the Nevada Operations Office, made the final decision with review and concurrence by NNSA Administrator John Gordon.
“We had clearly hoped this project could come to fruition," said Carlson. "However, we must support the mission requirements of the Air Force to train, test and develop tactics in an unfettered environment.”
The wind farm was a project of MNS Wind Power, a private company composed of M&N Wind Power Inc. of La Jolla, California and Siemens Energy & Automation, Inc. of Atlanta, Georgia. It was to have been built and operated in partnership with the Nevada Test Site Development Corporation, a nonprofit corporation that works with the U.S. Department of Energy to promote the growth of science and technology in Nevada.
Nevada Test Site Development Corporation CEO and president George Ormiston declined to comment on the halt to wind farm development.
Two years in the planning, the wind farm would have covered 1,069 acres with up to 545 wind turbines, and generated up to 600 megawatts of electricity. One megawatt is enough to power 1,000 typical homes.
Siting in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act had been going on about seven months with experts looking for the windiest location in an area called Shoshone Peak.
The wind project was part of a Clinton administration plan to purchase three percent of federal energy requirements from renewable sources by 2005.
Nuclear test fired October 26, 1958 at the Nevada Test Site. After July 1962, all NTS weapons tests were underground. (Photo courtesy DOE)
More than 1,100 support buildings and laboratories are spread across the 1,350 square mile nuclear test site. Established as the Atomic Energy Commission's pr