In the Public Interest

A book came out last year which should have gotten more attention had the nation’s news media not fallen in the obsessive trap of the Iraq-obsessive President. It is called “The Two-Income Trap: Why Middle-Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke”(Basic Books). Written by Harvard Law Professor Elizabeth Warren, an expert on consumer bankruptcy, and…

If there was ever a sign as to how consumers have been abandoned, check out the recent surges in the prices of gasoline, heating oil, and natural gas. They are more than comparable to the energy price hikes in the Seventies which caused an uproar in the country, prompted Congressional investigations, Justice Department lawsuits demanding…

Over thirty years ago, I started the Pension Rights Center which concerned itself with such issues as shortening the time of corporate pensions vesting or improving their portability for job-changing employees. No one nightmared that companies would dramatically cut their contributions to these defined benefit plans during years of economic growth and record company profits.…

Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan strayed away from his charter once again to warn about the people’s entitlement programs-Social Security and Medicare- becoming unaffordable. He suggested cuts in benefits to reduce deficits. In the same breath, Mr. Greenspan urged that Mr. Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy-a huge cause of the growing federal deficits-be made…

Last week, Open Debates (see Opendebates.org), a nonprofit, non-partisan organization, whose purposes I support, filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) against the Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD) which was created and is controlled by the Republican and Democratic Parties. Open Debates charged, with documentation, that the CPD is not non-partisan but is…

From the failed savings and loan bailout racket to the stately giant redwood trees of Humboldt County, California, the story of the predator corporation Maxxam — Pacific Lumber someday may make a movie on corporate arrogance and abuse. The storyline has taken a bizarre twist today, some years after Maxxam bought out a family-owned lumber…

We pass by them without a murmur of salutation or gratitude. Yet we could not function without them. We would never do their work, yet they are among the lowest paid laborers in our country. Their numbers are growing fast. There are millions of them. They are the cleaners of America. They clean our airports…

Each day the news becomes more ominous regarding the spread of a “bird flu” or avian influenza through nine east Asian countries. Millions of chickens have died from this disease and millions more have been slaughtered to stop the spread to humans. For now, humans can contract this flu by direct contact with the fowl’s…

 In reading the latest news reports of uncontrollable corporate greed, I recalled the cover of Fortune Magazine about 2 years ago which headlined the runaway compensation packages of the big corporate bosses and why nothing would be done about it. Also recalled was the Business Week cover story in the year 2000 titled “Too Much…

You have heard, no doubt, about Michael Jackson’s troubles, but have you heard about a new Presidential Citizens’ Debate Commission being established that could give Americans more choices and voices when they watch these debates later this autumn? Probably not. This is the trouble with the media’s sense of what is news and what is…