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Date: Sun, 12 Oct 1997 17:48:23 +0000
From: Robert Campbell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Subject: Top Ten Censored: 7-10 Cashing in on Poverty, Big Bro., Food Sca
CASHING IN ON POVERTY
Sources:
THE NATION*
Date: 5/20/96
Title: "Cashing in on Poverty"
Author: Michael Hudson
THE HOUSTON CHRONICLE*
Date: 7/15/96
Title: "Bordering on scandal what some pay for credit"
Author: Michael Hudson
* excerpted from the book, "Merchants of Misery: How Corporate America Profits From
Poverty," Edited
by Michael Hudson (Common Courage Press, 1996).
Corporate America is in the poverty business and making huge profits from the
destitute in the United
States. Sixty million poor people without bank accounts or access to competitive-rate
loans must instead
use pawn shops, check-cashing outlets, rent-to-own stores, finance companies and
high-interest
mortgage lenders. These businesses generate yearly revenues of $200 to $300 billion
and are
increasingly owned or subsidized by Wall Street giants such as American Express, Bank
America,
Citibank, Ford, NationsBank, and Western Union.
While affluent credit card holders can pay as little as six to eight percent annual
interest, low-income
people are paying as much as 240% for a loan from a pawnbroker, 300% for a finance
company loan, and
even an amazing 2,000% for a fast OpaydayO loan from a check-cashing outlet. Large
corporations use
sophisticated marketing strategies to lure in new customers and increase their
business. The overall
number of check-cashing outlets in this country has nearly tripled to 5,500 since the
late 1980s, and
rent-to-own stores have skyrocketed from 2,000 to 7,500 in the same period. With a
typical loan rate of
200%, Cash AmericaOs chain of pawn shops has quickly grown to 325 in the United States
and
expanded abroad with thirty-four outlets in the United Kingdom and ten in Sweden.
The main investor in AmericaOs $4.5 billion rent-to-own market is Thorn EMI PLC, a
British
conglomerate. American Express finances ACE Cash Express, a national chain of 630
check-cashing
outlets. Charges average three to six percent of each checkOs value. Cash America, the
countryOs
largest chain of pawnshops, is bankrolled by NationsBank and traded on the New York
Stock Exchange.
Even though many of us think of Ford Motor Corporation in terms of its automobile
sales, their Fortune
500 status has actually been achieved through financial services holdings. In 1993,
three-fifths of FordOs
earnings came from car loans, mortgages and consumer loans. Associates Corporation of
North America
is a Ford subsidiary targeting low-income, blue-collar and minority consumers. In
1994, it financed $18.5
billion in mortgages and consumer loans and earned just under $1 billion in pre-tax
profits. Stock
analysts estimate that used-car loans for people with shaky credit now top $60 billion
a year. Non-bank
finance companies like Ford and defense contractor Textron make small loans at rates
as high as 300%
in some states.
Along with astronomically high charges, many low-income consumers are also victimized
by additional
hidden fees, forged loan documents, and harassing collection tactics. And unless there
is increased
government protection for the destitute or a growth in alternative non-profit
financial institutions, big
business will continue to expand these practices.
SSU Censored Researchers:
Jody Howard
Anne Shea
8
BIG BROTHER GOES HIGH-TECH
Sources:
COVERT ACTION QUARTERLY
Date: Spring 1996
Title: "Big Brother Goes High-Tech"
Author: David Banisar
INSIGHT
Date: 8/19/96
Title: "Access, Privacy and Power"
Authors: Michael Rust and Susan Crabtree
Date: 9/9/96
Title: "New Surveillance Camera Cheers Police, Worries ACLU"*
Author: Joyce Price
(*Reprint from Washington Times)
George Orwell's prediction concerning government surveillance in his science fiction
novel 1984 is rapidly
becoming reality in the "free world." Information on individuals in the developed
world can now be obtained
by governments and corporations using new surveillance, identification, and networking
technologies.
These new technologies are rapidly facilitating the mass and routine surveillance of
large segments of the
population--without the need for warrants and formal investigations.
In Britain, nearly all public areas are monitored by over 150,000 closed-circuit
television cameras (CCTV).
Equipped with a powerful zoom lens, each camera can read the wording on a cigarette
packet at 100
yards. These cameras can track individuals wherever they go--even into buildings. In
the U.S., Baltimore
announced plans to put 200 cameras in the city center. The FBI has also developed
miniaturized CCTV
units it can put in a "lamp, clock, radio, duffel bag, purse, picture frame, utility
pole, coin telephone, and
other [objects]" and then control remotely to "pan, tilt, zoom, and focus."
Another type of surveillance camera currently in development boasts the equivalent of
X-ray vision, and
can penetrate clothing to "see" concealed weapons, plastic explosives or drugs. Known
as the passive
millimeter wave imager, it can also see through walls and detect activity. And while
neither is expected to
be available until 1997, the manufacturer has been flooded with calls from law
enforcement agencies
around the globe. The camera has also prompted suggestions that it is in violation of
the Fourth
Amendment, which guarantees the right to be secure against unreasonable search and
seizure.
Additionally, new biometric technologies which use sophisticated computer-scanning to
measure
personal characteristics--including fingerprints, retinal patterns, and the geometry
of the hand--are already
being tested by U.S. immigration authorities at JFK, Newark, and Vancouver airports in
place of
passports.
Other emerging fields of surveillance include Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS)
which track the
movements of all people using public or private transportation. Such systems are
linked to ordinary bank
accounts and can generate records that show a driverOs name and address, and the exact
time and
place where tolls have been charged. Nine states in the U.S. already use similar
systems to track over
250,000 vehicles every day, and 12 more states will soon put their own systems on-line.
While technologically dazzling, such advances threaten to render privacy vulnerable on
a scale never
seen before--without providing accountability for those who may misuse it.
SSU Censored Researchers:
Richard Henderson
Stacey Merrick
9
U.S. TROOPS EXPOSED TO DEPLETED URANIUM DURING GULF WAR
Sources:
MILITARY TOXICS PROJECT'S DEPLETED URANIUM CITIZENSO NETWORK
Date: 1/16/96 (release of report)
Title: Radioactive Battlefields Of The 1990s: A Response to the Army's Unreleased
Report on Depleted
Uranium Weaponry
Authors: Pat Broudy, Grace Bukowski, Leonard Dietz, Dan Fahey, John Paul Hasko, Cathy
Hinds,
Damaica Lopez, Dolly Lymburner, Arjun Makhijani, Richard Ochs, Laura Olah, Coy
Overstreet, Charles
Sheehan Miles, Judy Scotnicki, and Nikki F. Bas
Edited by Rebecca Solnit
MULTINATIONAL MONITOR
Date: Jan/Feb 1996
Title: "Radioactive Ammo Lays Them to Waste,"
Author: Gary Cohen
SWORDS TO PLOWSHARES
Date: 11/7/95 (presentation)
Title: Depleted Uranium: Objective Research and Analysis Required
Author: Dan Fahey
THE VVA VETERAN
Date: March 1996
Title: "Depleted Uranium: One ManOs Weapon, Another ManOs Poison"
Author: Bill Triplett
NATIONAL CATHOLIC REPORTER
Date: 1/19/96
Title: "Depleted Uranium, First Used In Iraq, Deployed in Bosnia"
Author: Kathryn Casa
Depleted uranium (DU) weapons were used for the first time in a war situation in the
Persian Gulf in 1991
and were hailed as a new and incredibly effective weapon by the Department of Defense.
Since the
Manhattan Project of World War II, numerous government studies have indicated that
while DU weapons
are highly effective, they are still extremely toxic and need to be handled with
special precautionary tools
and protective gear.
Although army training manuals were written in the 1980s to warn tank crews and
commanders of the
dangers associated with DU rounds, the Pentagon failed to warn Gulf War troops of the
dangers. The
Defense Department did circulate a memo to Gulf War commanders that contained three
key points: any
vehicle or system struck by a DU penetrator can be assumed to be contaminated;
personnel should
avoid entering contaminated areas; and, if troops must enter contaminated areas, they
should wear
protective clothing. Unfortunately, this memo was written on March 7, 1991, eight days
after the firing of
weapons ceased in the Persian Gulf.
Without this knowledge, and without the necessary protective clothing, the 144th Army
National Guard
Service and Supply Company was allowed to perform DU battlefield cleanup for three
weeks in Kuwait
and southern Iraq, where the U.S. Army fired at least 14,000 rounds (or 40 tons) of DU
ammunition.
The Department of Energy possesses over 500,000 tons of DU that has been accumulating
since the
Manhattan Project. Billions of dollars have been spent by the U.S. government to find
a final dumpsite for
the radioactive waste, but other nations and communities in Maine and New Mexico have
resisted the
efforts to dump the DU waste in their area. The use of this weaponry in the Persian
Gulf, then, served two
purposes. It eliminated enemy troops and weapons and disposed of tens or even
thousands of tons of the
radioactive DU on the Persian Gulf battlefields.
The effects of depleted uranium exposure, however, are just beginning to be known. DU
has now been
linked to many illnesses, including the mysterious "Gulf War Syndrome." Despite
widespread concern
among Gulf War vets and in U.S. communities about the dangers of DU weapons, the
Pentagon,
Department of Energy and military defense contractors are all excited about the sales
potential of DU
weapons as well as the transfer of DU to allies for their own weapons production.
According to Nuclear
Regulatory Commission shipment records, steady transfers--amounting to several million
pounds of
DU--have been flowing to U.S. allies over the past decade, with Britain, France and
Canada being the
largest recipients.
SSU Censored Researchers:
Aaron Butler
Deborah Udall
10
FACING FOOD SCARCITY
Sources:
WORLD WATCH
Date: November/December 1995
Title: "Facing Food Scarcity;"
Date: May June 1996
Title: "Japanese Government Breaks With World Bank Food Forecast"
Author: Lester R. Brown
The Japanese Ministry of Agriculture released projections in late December 1995 which
show a doubling
of world grain prices by 2010. The world prices for wheat and rice will exceed 2 times
that of the base
year of 1992. Around the same time, World Watch published an article, "Facing Food
Scarcity," which
supports the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture claim, and according to the World
Agricultural Outlook
Board, the world's stock of rice, wheat, corn, and other grains have fallen to their
lowest level in two
decades. These projections differ sharply from that of the World Bank, which has stuck
with its projection
of continuously declining grain prices over the same period. The Japanese analysis,
along with the World
Watch article take into account past experience with biological growth in finite
environments, (examples
include soil erosion, increased population, and land dehydration) while the economists
who are
responsible for projecting supply and demand of agriculture commodities for the World
Bank and at the
U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) do not.
As the world population continues to grow, more and more water must be diverted from
crop irrigation to
cities for direct consumption. This, along with the loss of agricultural land to
housing, creates a drastic
imbalance between the amount of people, and the food production necessary to feed
them. The
economically integrated world of the late nineties is moving into uncharted territory,
facing a set of
problems quite different in nature from those faced in the past.
The food shortage will become even more acute in light of the conclusions of the
recent World Food
Summit in November 1996. Convened by the FAO, the first summit in 22 years decided
that poor
countries will be responsible for feeding their own people, without the aid of
wealthier nations. But while
population is soaring, especially in poor nations, food aid to poor countries is
dropping by about half, and
the number of hungry people will continue to grow (San Francisco Chronicle, 11/18/96).
With the World Bank and FAO continuing to project surplus capacity and declining real
prices, it is
difficult to mobilize support for continued investment in agriculture or for the kinds
of social services such
as family planning that could help stabilize population growth.
SSU Censored Researchers:
Amy S. Cohen
Jeremy Lewis
Stacey Merrick
Robert Campbell
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
