Special Features

THE 104TH CONGRESS IS down to its final days, and the Senate and House Banking Committees need to face up to their number one priority — straightening out the deposit insurance funds. Extending back to the last Congress, the two committees have procrastinated over what to do about recapitalizing the saving associations insurance fund (SAIF).…

From The Nader Letter July 1996 The slash and burn approach of the 104th Congress has produced a long list of foolish, counter productive and, often, dangerous cuts in the federal budget. But, few top the irresponsibility of the budget cutters who have applied a blunt meat axe to the General Accounting Office (GAO), the…

The media gurus love to expound on the glories of the First Amendment and the overriding importance of an open, accessible and accountable government where secrets are limited to only the most critical and immediate national security matters. But, extend these First Amendment arguments to include the Federal Reserve System and much of the national…

From The Nader Letter May 1996 The Clinton Administration and the Congress are in a mad scramble to come up with a solution to the problems created by an undercapitalized Savings Association Insurance Fund (SAIF) and a growing competitive disadvantage for the thrift industry vis a vis the nation’s commercial banks. The problems could have…

From The Nader Letter April 1996 As coronations go, the confirmation hearings for Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan and two new members of the Board were, if nothing else, a model of efficiency and speed, taking just a little more than three hours of the Senate Banking Committee’s time. So perfunctory was the Committee’s…

From The Nader Letter March 1996 Suddenly basic economic and trade issues are front and center in national politics. Discussions of job security, stagnant wages, corporate ethics and flights of factories to Mexico are pushing out the endless renditions of balanced budgets, deficits and arcane tax proposals as the hot button issues. Belatedly, politicians and…

The Audience Network: TIME FOR THE PEOPLE By Ralph Nader “Viewers and listeners have been without the capability to develop an organized media community of their own to influence public policy. The creation of such an organized, informed constituency of viewers and listeners is not only an urgent necessity for an initiatory media, but also…

The American Automobile Designed for Death? by Ralph Nader Harvard Law Record Originally Published: December 11, 1958 It was a bright summer day when Robert Burelson was driving home with his wife and three small children from a vacation trip. He had just entered Mint Canyon near Los An­geles when suddenly an automobile veered across…

American Indians: People Without a Future By Ralph Nader May 10, 1956 (Copyright 1956, Harvard Law School Record, Inc.) “We are the people who are better known for what we were not than what we were, for what we are not than for what we are.” –A Crow Indian, 1955 American historical and fictional writings…