Dollars & Sense articles from July 2005

Dollars & Sense archives from July 2005

Corporate power and global development.(from the editors)
July 1, 2005... From South Asia's coast to Central America to rural Pennsylvania, communities around the globe are fighting to gain control over economic development processes dominated by corporations that have no obligations to the communities or the...

Tilting at windmills.(Lamar Alexander plans to establish windmill complex)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2005... Like Don Quixote minus the good intentions, Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander is on a quest to battle windmills. Alexander recently fought a Democrat-led proposal to require utilities to produce more power from wind and other "renewable energy...

Oops ... wrong music.(the short run)
July 1, 2005... General Electric recently kicked off its "ecomagination" ad campaign with three new television commercials. One 60-second spot, titled "Model Miners," touts the benefits of GE's coal gasification technology. The ad shows attractive, scantily...

Jammin' to Big Macs.(Maven Strategies contracts with McDonald)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2005... The already-thin line between advertisement and entertainment is being further blurred by a new trend: paid product placement in rap music. While popular music lyrics have long contained references to various brands (think Don McLean's Chevy),...

Bush policies leave even the rich behind.(the short run)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2005... The Bush administration's tax policies give a whole new meaning to the term "targeted tax cut." That poor and middle-class Americans have not benefited from the Bush tax cuts is old news, but a recent New York Times report shows that the cuts...

There they go again.(WalMart employees must work whenever needed)(the short run)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2005... Hard as we try, we just can't keep up with WalMart's crimes against workers. The company's Cross Lanes, W.V., store recently implemented a new policy that requires employees "to work almost any shift, any day of the week, whenever management...

"Botax" injections.(Plastic Surgeons protesting against tax on cosmetic surgery procedures )(Brief Article)
July 1, 2005... The popular TV shows "I Want a Famous Face" and "The Swan" have inspired a rush of new plastic surgery patients. In response, Rod Rohrich, president of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, cautions that "the new wave of plastic surgery...

Don't work for Halliburton.(faces investigations on accounting fraud)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2005... CorpWatch released its alternative annual report on Halliburton in time for the corporation's shareholder meeting in Houston this May. Halliburton, including its subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), is, of course, one of the big winners in...

EPA refused to enforce lead law.(the short run)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2005... The Environmental Protection Agency is supposed to enforce environmental laws, right? It turns out that in the lead paint arena, the EPA illegally and surreptitiously failed to implement a 1992 law designed to protect the public. The law...

False intelligence pays off.(the short run)(George Norris and Robert Campos receives award)(Brief Article)
July 1, 2005... Two analysts from the Army National Ground Intelligence Center have received "performance awards" in the form of lump-sum cash payments for the past three years even though (or because?) they reported inaccurate information about Iraq's...

Ampersand.(the short run)(Cartoon)
July 1, 2005... amptoons.com [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Beware: TABOR is coming; After devastating government services in Colorado, the "Taxpayer Bill of Rights" threatens to spread.(active culture)
July 1, 2005... In 1992, after tireless nagging by Grover Norquist and his minions at Americans for Tax Reform, Colorado voters amended the state constitution to strictly limit the government's ability to raise revenue. The Taxpayer Bill of Rights, or TABOR,...

Outing Alan Greenspan.(comment)
July 1, 2005... I'm not a big Alan Greenspan fan... I think he's one of the biggest political hacks we have in Washington. --Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) on CNN's "Inside Politics," March 2005 Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan...

Supports for low-wage workers or subsidies for WalMart?(comment)
July 1, 2005... Is the left promoting contradictory strategies to raise the standard of living for low-income workers? A minimally decent standard of living must include basic necessities: at least food, shelter, housing, transportation, child care, and health...

Fisherfolk out, tourists in: Sri Lanka's tsunami reconstruction plans displace devastated coastal residents to make way for tourism industry expansion.
July 1, 2005... Two days after the south Asian tsunami struck last December, as thousands around him were grappling with its devastating impact, former German chancellor Helmut Kohl was airlifted from the roof of his holiday resort in southern Sri Lanka by the...

After Kyoto: finally in effect, the Kyoto Protocol falls short. But there are better paths to just development and climate stabilization.
July 1, 2005... After seven long years of political wrangling, the Kyoto Protocol finally came into force last February. The agreement sets targets for reducing emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (C[O.sub.2]) in participating industrialized...

Rights fight: townships in rural Pennsylvania take on factory farms--and corporate rights.
July 1, 2005... They hang the man and flog the woman, Who steals the goose from off the common, Yet let the greater villain loose, That steals the common from the goose. --17th-century English protest rhyme In the late 1990s, life was...

CAFTA's debt trap: the trade agreement will make financial crises more likely and more devastating in Central America.(Central American Free Trade Agreement )
July 1, 2005... The proposed Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) would create a trade and investment block that includes the United States, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic. Modeled on the failed...

Ill and insolvent: illness and medical bills trigger half of all personal bankruptcies, and private insurance offers little protection.(economy in numbers)
July 1, 2005... This spring, Congress voted overwhelmingly to pass the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act, which makes it harder for people to declare bankruptcy. President Bush hurriedly added his signature on April 20, saying, "America...