Nation Topics - Corporations | The Nation

Support was provided by the Fund for Investigative Journalism and the
Dick Goldensohn Fund, and is gratefully acknowledged. Liza Featherstone
is writing a book about Wal-Mart and women workers, to be published by
Basic Books in late 2004.

As one of the largest private employers in Africa, the Coca-Cola Company could
dramatically alter the course of HIV/AIDS.

How genetically engineered American corn has altered the global
landscape.

In 1998 the World Bank notified the Bolivian government that it would
refuse to guarantee a $25 million loan to refinance water services in
the Bolivian city of Cochabamba unless the local government sold its
public water utility to the private sector and passed on the costs to
consumers. Bolivian authorities gave the contract to a holding company
for US construction giant Bechtel, which immediately doubled the price
of water. For most Bolivians, this meant that water would now cost more
than food. Led by Oscar Olivera, a former machinist turned union
activist, a broad-based movement of workers, peasants, farmers and
others created La Coordinadora de Defensa del Agua y de la Vida (the
Coalition in Defense of Water and Life) to deprivatize the local water
system.

In early 2000 thousands of Bolivians marched to Cochabamba in a showdown
with the government, and a general strike and transportation stoppage
brought the city to a standstill. In spite of mass arrests, violence and
several deaths, the people held firm; in the spring of that year, the
company abandoned Bolivia and the government revoked its hated
privatization legislation. With no one to run the local water company,
leaders of the uprising set up a new public company, whose first act was
to deliver water to the poorest communities in the city. Bechtel,
meanwhile, is suing the government of Bolivia for $25 million at the
World Bank's International Centre for the Settlement of Investment
Disputes.

He says he had no clue the stock would tank.
About the details he is still evasive.
Though "on the board but clueless" could sound lame,
With Bush, a clueless claim sounds quite persuasive.

Last week, while Bush spoke to Wall Street about corporate malfeasance, he was beset by questions about the timing of his sale of stock twelve years ago while he served as a director of Harken En

For President Bush to pretend to be shocked that some of the nation's top executives deal from a stacked deck is akin to a madam feigning surprise that sexual favors have been sold in her establi

Dead ends, new beginnings--the industry's twenty-five-year crisis
continues.

Attempts to organize are squelched by a flying column of
unionbusters.

Speech to The Democratic National Committee--Western Caucus
Saturday, May 25, 2002
Seattle, Washington