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The China Lobby is on the march — and posing serious problems to citizens in the United States and China alike. Big Business is pulling out all the stops to encourage Congress to grant Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR, formerly known as permanent most favored nation) status. The many corporations that have endorsed PNTR are…

On May 7, 2000 the Federal Bureau of Investigation, released data on serious crime in the United States. The FBI notes that both murder and robbery registered 8-percent drops since 1988. Missing from the FBI news release were any data on crime in the suites. That information vacuum is notable because corporate crime and violence…

As the titanic antitrust case against Microsoft moves into its end-game, the question of the hour is what remedies will be effective in taming this wealthy and ruthless monopoly. The goal of any set of remedies should be to ensure that there will, in fact, be innovation, competition and reasonable prices in some of the…

In a recent annual report, Coca-Cola assured its shareholders that it had plenty of room for growth. The company only sold one billion of the world’s 48 billion beverage servings, the annual report noted. “A billion a day is just the beginning,” the company proclaimed, “because people still say, ‘for all the tea in China.’”…

Six months ago, who could have imagined a crowd of 20,000 or more gathered in Washington, D.C. to protest the policies of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank? What were the odds that such a demonstration would accompany thousands more in the streets engaging in festive civil disobedience during the spring meetings of…

Last year the Congress made Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan a virtual regulatory czar over financial services corporations. Considering the waves of adulation that have been sweeping over Greenspan, the anointment was not a surprise. Before placing this important regulatory power under the Federal Reserve, it would be reasonable to assume that Congress undertook…

Few American corporations live a more charmed existence than Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the giant enterprises which dominate the nation’s housing finance markets. As former entities of the federal government, Fannie and Freddie exist in a corporate twilight zone in which they rake in huge profits as private corporations without being required to sever…

Industrial hemp is one of the longest and strongest natural fibers in the plant kingdom. It is also one of the most versatile plants, with approximately 25,000 uses, ranging from paper to textiles to cosmetics, and is a good rotation crop that can be grown with a minimum of pesticides. Once deemed an indispensable commodity…

The news media suddenly is doing a great job of publicizing predatory lending. Front page stories and editorials in the New York Times and a companion piece on the “20-20” news program aired by the American Broadcasting Company have put a national spotlight on the sleazy credit merchants. This is a welcome development for consumer…

Imagine a public interest artist using the town square as a canvass. Now comes Gene Stilp, a 49-year-old lawyer with a keen advocacy sense, a nose for news and the creativity and skills to symbolically present a complicated public policy initiative with a prop guaranteed to generate media coverage and capture hearts and minds at…