An international consumer group is calling for world trade authorities to withdraw a key endorsement of Monsanto's controversial growth hormone for cows in the wake of Observer revelations that the company had obtained access to confidential EU documents. (Show me more...)

When US Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin was a little boy, he dreamed of becoming President - of Brazil. And now his dream has come true. Of course, in light of his Washington address and US nationality, Rubin won control of Brazil the only way he could - through a brilliant swindle. (Show me more...)

Thirty seven per cent of Americans over the age of 15 find sexual intercourse painful, difficult to perform or just plain unenjoyable. Who says so? Doctors Edward Laumann and Raymond Rosen, that's who. And because they said it in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association, it popped up last week in every US newspaper. (Show me more...)

Monsanto, the US biotech group fined in an English court last week for failing to control genetic modification trials, is under attack on two new fronts. First for obtaining an advance look at confidential European Commission documents during its campaign to win regulatory approval for its controversial bovine growth hormone (BST). Second, because of its legal actions against hundreds of North American farmers for failing to pay for its genetically modified seeds. (Show me more...)

Scottish Power's troubled takeover of United States electricity company Pacificorp is under further pressure this weekend. Veteran consumer campaigner Ralph Nader is preparing legal action to block it, while tougher limits on profits threatened by US regulators could make the deal unviable. (Show me more...)

By Gregory Palast

For The Guardian UK, Sunday 24 January 1999

Up in the hills of Tennessee, they just love air pollution. Can't get enough of it. In fact, they'll spend hard cash for more of it.

In May 1992, the Tennessee Valley Authority paid a Wisconsin power company for the 'rights' to belch several tons of sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere, allowing the authority to legally exceed contamination limits set by law. Wisconsin cut its own pollution to offset Tennessee's. (Show me more...)

Here's something to put your mind at ease. The federal government payroll in the United States includes 150 bureaucrats whose job is to measure the space between the mattresses and railings on bunk beds. (Show me more...)