Check the Project Censored website for over 1,000
direct links to
alternative, independent news sources: http://www.projectcensored.org
If you come across news of great importance that
you're not seeing or
hearing about from mainstream sources, nominate the
article for
consideration as one of the top news stories of 2002 by sending
the
article, with name and date of publication and author's name,
to
Project Censored.
Project Censored's review process for the
Censored 2002/2003 yearbook
has already resulted in an evaluative
consideration of hundreds of
news stories. With more articles being nominated
every day, Story
Management intern, Dana Small, provides the following
synopses of a
couple of the more interesting stories in store so
far:
The following is an abstract of various articles detailing
the
relationship between The Carlyle Group and numerous political
leaders
around the world. The websites cited are:
1. Veritas Capital
Equity News
http://www.veritascapital.com/view_news.asp?ID=14
2. TomPaine.com
http://www.tompaine.com/news/2001/10/11/
3. Washington Business Journal
http://washington.bcentral.com/washington/stories/2001/04/16/daily23.html
4. Truthout - Issues
http://www.truthout.com/0662.Bush.Saudi.htm
5. Judicial Watch
http://www.judicialwatch.org/press_release.asp?pr_id=1624
6. Emperors-clothes.com - BushLaden
http://emperors-clothes.com/news/bushladen.htm
Private equity firms create a capital fund by
raising money from a
small group of investors to buy undervalued companies
and resell them
for a profit. Defense companies are stable and less risky
than most
commercial businesses, and offer an opportunity to work on
high
technology, global-scale projects. The Carlyle Group, based
here,
headed by former U.S. Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci, is
considered
by analysts to be one of the largest private equity funds active
in
the defense and aerospace industry, with a .5 billion
capital
fund. The Carlyle Group's focus on the defense and aerospace
sector
comes from its extensive contacts here and in other world
capitals.
Former U.S. President George Bush is a senior adviser to the
group,
and John Major, the former prime minister of Great Britain,
was
recently appointed as the chairman of the company's
European
operations
The Group employs a motorcade of former ranking
Republicans,
including Frank Carlucci, Jim Baker and Richard
Darman. The Carlyle
Group even has lured the treasurer and chief
investment officer of
the World Bank to the firm as a managing director and
partner. These
political powerhouses open doors overseas for Carlyle's
"access
capitalists". Bush specializes in Asia and has been in and out
of
Saudi Arabia and Kuwait (countries that revere him thanks to the
Gulf
War) often on business since his presidency. The Carlyle
connection
means that George Bush Senior is on the payroll from
private
interests that have defense business before the government, while
his
son is the president. Baker, the pinstriped midwife of
'Election
2000' was working his network in the 'stands' before the ink was
dry
on Clinton's first inaugural address. The Bin Laden
family
(presumably the friendly wing) is also invested in Carlyle.
George
W. Bush could, some day, benefit financially from his
own
administration's decisions, through his father's
investments.
Carlyle also gave the Bush family a hand in 1990 by putting
George W.
Bush, who was then struggling to find a career, on the board of
a
Carlyle subsidiary, Caterair, an airline-catering
company.
________________________________
"Freed from federal
restrictions, pharmaceutical companies are
flooding television with ads for
prescription drugs. What does it
mean for our health care when serious
medicine is marketed like
soap?" - By Lisa Belkin
Mother Jones
March/April 2001
Abstract by Dana Small, Jan 4, 2002
Television ads
for prescription drugs, all but outlawed as little as
4 years ago, are now
flooding the airwaves. For nearly ten years ad
agencies, drug
companies, and major television networks lobbied the
FDA for less restrictive
ads, and were successful in August 1997 when
the rules were
"clarified".
Proponents of the new FDA policy argue that this is another
step in
the march for Patients' Rights. Allowing such ads, among
other
things, is the best way to inform consumers about available
drugs,
says a branch chief within the FDA.
Doctor visits by patients
complaining of allergy symptoms increased
from between 13 to 14 million
visits a year from 1990 to 1998, to 18
million allergy visits in 1999.
It adds an extra source of confusion
and frustration to the doctor/patient
relationship when the patient
starts directing the treatment based on what
they learned on TV.
The ads send a strong signal that prescription drugs
are just like
any consumer product - soap, cereal, etc. Many doctors
worry about
the dangerous liver complications that drugs called statins,
which
have proven very effective at lowering cholesterol, have been
known
to cause. They need careful physician supervision, however it
takes
time to speak to a patient about exercise, weight control, and
diet;
it takes less time to just write a prescription.
Glitzy ads can
also cause consumers to misunderstand the actual
purpose of the
medication. Glaxo-SmithKline's drug Paxil, an
antidepressant approved
by the FDA for the secondary purpose of
treating social anxiety disorder, can
too easily be seen as a pill
for shyness rather than a powerful drug for a
real and debilitating
condition.
A study found that nearly half of
respondents believed that drug ads
are prescreened and somehow sanctioned by
the FDA. The fact is that
the agency is "forbidden by law from
requiring preclearance". All
the FDA is allowed to do is require that a
copy of the ad be sent to
its office when the ad begins to air.
It is
likely that some patients are getting stronger prescription
drugs when less
expensive, more easily obtainable drugs may be more
appropriate. Last
year alone Blue Cross Blue Shield Association saw
an estimated "25% increase
in the cost of prescription drugs compared
with 6 to 8 percent for physician
and hospital services".
Advertising is also promoting drugs before many
physicians even get a
chance to learn all of the details of the
medication. Also, one can
buy many popular prescription drugs over the
internet, without even
seeing a
doctor.
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