NEWS

Vol. 30, No. 4 • July/August 2010

Hold BP Accountable
Public Citizen, Energy Staffer
Allies Protest Travels to La.,
BP in D.C. Witnesses
By Dorry Samuels
“We want safe jobs and clean
Spill’s Effects
energy. No more oil spills —
Editor’s note: Allison Fisher,
ARREST BP!”
an organizer with Public Citizen’s
A crowd of more than 100 peo-
Energy Program, recently trav-
ple gathered June 4 outside BP’s
eled to Louisiana for a firsthand
Washington, D.C., headquarters
look at how the oil spill was af-
to articulate Americans’ deep
fecting residents. Excerpts from
frustration with how the oil gi-
her journal entries follow.
ant has handled the oil spill in
the Gulf of Mexico. The protest
6/17: Made right?
was organized by Public Citi-
On my first night in Baton
zen, Friends of the Earth, Green-
Rouge, La., I sat in an audito-
peace, Energy Action Coalition,
rium on the Louisiana State
350.org, Chesapeake Climate Ac-
University campus and watched
tion Network, the Center for Bio-
Public Citizen Photos/Bridgette Blair

Above: Organization leaders rally activ- a documentary on the legacy

logical Diversity and the Hip Hop ists at the June 4 protest in front of BP’s
of Exxon Valdez called “Black
Caucus. Washington, D.C., headquarters. (From
left) Tyson Slocum, director of Public Wave.”
And there was an arrest, of
Citizen’s Energy Program; Erich Pica, I saw footage from a 1989
sorts. The protesters organized president of Friends of the Earth; the town hall meeting in Cordova,
a mock citizen’s arrest of BP CEO Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jr., president of Alaska, where an Exxon spokes-
Tony Hayward. However, no BP the Hip Hop Caucus; Robert Weissman,
person told the angry citizens
representative descended from president of Public Citizen; and Phil
Radford, executive director of Green- that they were in good hands.
the building, which houses BP’s peace. Right: A protester holds a figure “Exxon will make you whole,”
22,000-square-foot offices. depicting BP CEO Tony Hayward in a he pledged.
At the base of a 13-foot-tall in- prison jumpsuit.
The Valdez victims’ initial law-
flatable oil barrel, group leaders
suit, involving 32,000 plaintiffs,
read from a list of charges against
see BP, page 8 see Journal, page 10
Non-Profit Org.

Permit No. 435

Frederick, MD
US POSTAGE

Wall Street Hires Former Lawmakers as Lobbyists

PAID

By Joe Newman As Congress wrestled with former members of Congress, of

If people needed a lesson on
how business is done in Wash-
ington, D.C., all they had to do
this spring and summer was keep
track of the men and women in
crisp black suits making the daily
circuit between their influential
1600 20th St. NW, Washington, DC 20009
reforming Wall Street, corpora-
tions affected by the legislation
were employing a virtual army of
lobbyists to weaken or eliminate
proposals that would rein in the
financial services industry.
Many of these lobbyists had no
whom 17 served on the principal
House and Senate committees
that crafted the financial reform
legislation.
Prominent former members of
Congress who lobbied this year
on behalf of the financial servic-

K Street lobbying firms and the problem navigating the hallways es sector interests included two
U.S. Capitol. inside the Senate and House of- former Senate majority leaders
Although the U.S. House of fice buildings. Analyses by Pub- (Bob Dole [R-Kan.] and Trent Lott
Representatives and Senate ap- lic Citizen and the Center for [R-Miss.]), two former House
proved a sweeping financial Responsive Politics showed that majority leaders (Dick Armey
reform package, it didn’t pass the financial services industry
without a fight. lobbyists included at least 73 see Revolving door, page 4

INSIDE U.S. Supreme Court again sides

with business, page 6
Win! House passes election
spending disclosure bill, page 16

Printed on 100% recycled paper (45% post-consumer material)

2 July/August 2010
In this issue Vol. 30, No. 4
Energy and climate
Hold BP accountable:
Public Citizen, allies protest BP in D.C. ....... 1
Energy staffer travels to Louisiana,
witnesses spill’s effects ............................. 1
Spending bill devotes $9 billion to
nuclear loan guarantees .......................... 14
Government and financial reform
Wall Street hires former lawmakers
as lobbyists ............................................... 1
Outnumbered: New report says bank shills
exceed financial reformers 11-to-1 ............. 5
Win! House passes election spending
disclosure bill...........................................16
Litigation
Shutting the courthouse doors:
U.S. Supreme Court again rules
on the side of business............................... 6
Win! Public Citizen scores victory
in Maryland arbitration case ...................... 7
Claiming “personal privacy,”
AT&T attempts to keep records
from public ............................................... 7
Globalization and trade
Mining company case shows the need
for a trade pact overhaul ........................... 11
Health and safety
Survey: Most support shorter
medical resident shifts .............................12
Public Citizen to FDA: Unethical Avandia
clinical trial should not continue . .............13
For your entertainment
Public Citizen crossword ..........................15
“A Presidency in Peril” .............................15
“Casino Jack and the
United States of Money” ...........................15
“The DeMarco Factor” ..............................15
Other
Get to Know Public Citizen ........................ 2
President’s View ....................................... 3
Public Citizen News wins Apex Award ....... 3
In the Spotlight ........................................12
Public Citizen News
Get to Know Public Citizen
An ongoing series profiling edit website content, e-mail action alerts
and online fundraising appeals. I help with
Public Citizen staff members the technical, “behind-the-scenes” work of
Glenn Simpson is a self-proclaimed “life- our website and e-mail programs. And I help
long radical.” As a high school student in strategize about how to make our website
the mid-1980s in Columbia, Md., he would a better resource, our e-mail more useful,
frequently cut class to attend anti-apartheid and our online outreach more engaging and
and no-nukes rallies in Washington, D.C. popular.
Now, he brings this free spirit and love of
activism to Public Citizen, Q: What sparked your
where he has worked for interest in online
more than a year. Simpson, communications?
online communications SIMPSON: Most of the jobs
coordinator, says the key to I’ve had boil down to making
spreading the word about information available to peo-
Public Citizen’s work is ple who need it. The Internet
putting the power in the is a better tool for organizing
hands of Public Citizen and presenting information
members and supporters. — and interacting with those
“Public Citizen’s 40- who use that information —
year track record and our than any other form of com-
reputation for doing what’s munications humankind has
right are simply unparal- so far developed.
leled,” Simpson said. “The Glenn Simpson
most effective way to Q: What recent call to action
introduce new people to our work and the resulted in the largest response from our
benefits of Public Citizen membership is for online supporters?
people who already know and value what we SIMPSON: Our petition at www.DontGet
do to tell their friends, family, neighbors and Rolled.org calling for a constitutional amend-
colleagues about Public Citizen.” ment to prevent corporations from spending
Prior to working at Public Citizen, Simp- unlimited amounts of money to influence
son held jobs ranging from managing online our political process has more than 50,000
communications at Workplace Fairness, a signatures so far.
nonprofit organization with a goal of preserv-
ing and promoting employee rights; to doing Q: What Public Citizen issues motivate you?
quality control for Internet search engine SIMPSON: With a seemingly insatiable hun-
Google; to indexing, editing and publishing at ger for profits, corporations are devouring
the Alternative Press Index, a nonprofit with our democracy, our liberty and our lives. Ev-
the aim of providing access to and increasing erything Public Citizen does is fundamentally
the public’s awareness of alternative press; to about standing up for things that make life
coaching high school badminton. better for people and standing up to the ways
His interests include bicycle commuting, corporations put profits before people. Along
record collecting, playing Scrabble and fol- with every Public Citizen member past and
lowing the Washington Capitals. present, I’m fighting on the side of justice
and righteousness. And we’re going to win!
Q: What does your job as online
communications coordinator entail? Q: What’s your favorite part of your job?
SIMPSON: I help manage the online tools that SIMPSON: Contributing to the legacy and
facilitate the dialogue among Public Citizen, ongoing good work that is Public Citizen.
its members and the public. I help write and — Compiled by Arlene Tonoff
Public Citizen is a national President
nonprofit membership organization Robert Weissman
based in Washington, D.C. Since its
founding by Ralph Nader in 1971, Pub- Public Citizen Inc. Board of Directors
lic Citizen has fought for corporate Jason Adkins (chair), Barbara Ehrenreich, Joan Claybrook, Andrew S.
Friedman, Jim Hightower, Joy Howell, Adolph L. Reed Jr., Cynthia Renfro,
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Public Citizen News July/August 2010 3

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Getting Results
Public Citizen Takes on Giant Corporations — and Wins
I wake up every morning ex-
cited about getting to work
and taking on the challenges of
combination of litigation, lob-
bying, research and grassroots
pressure. We are among the only
the day at Public Cit- groups advocating
izen. I know we’re in all branches of
going to be involved government.
in something — usu- And we get re-
ally many some- sults. We boast an
things — to make the unparalleled record
world safer, healthi- of achievement over
er, greener, happier the past 40 years
or more just. and continuing up
Does that sound to today. I’m very
corny? I don’t mean proud of our staff.
to sound that way. president’s view They are passionate,
I’m absolutely seri- committed, smart,
Robert weissman
ous. And I hope you strategic and more.
feel the same way We couldn’t do what
about being a Public we do without our
Citizen member. superb staff.
There is no other organization At the same time, we couldn’t
like Public Citizen. succeed without our members, generous support helps us keep the way, and thousands of you
First is what we do: Take on either. When we testify before the lights on and pay our staff. mobilized into action when the
the giant corporations that domi- Congress, lobby a member of We are profoundly thankful for issue was before the Senate.
nate our economy, society and Congress or meet with a govern- your donations. Despite the reform measure’s
politics. Fight for the people’s ment regulator, they know we We know from communicat- considerable shortcomings, Pub-
interest. Assert common sense represent more than 150,000 ing with so many of you over the lic Citizen is strongly supportive
against accepted corporate fic- members and supporters. years that you get it. You value of it. It includes a number of very
tions (like the idea that corpora- Altogether, our voice is a what Public Citizen does, you positive elements — foremost
tions are people entitled to the counterbalance to the influence know how unique our work is. among them, creation of a new
same First Amendment rights as of corporate America. And, more You join Public Citizen to make Consumer Financial Protection
living, breathing humans). Cam- and more, Public Citizen speaks your voice heard, to join together Bureau — and very little that is
paign for the things that matter: not just through our staff. You with others to build a powerful harmful. It’s a very imperfect
health, safety, a livable planet, — our members — are working counterweight to the corporate victory, but it’s a big victory, and
an economy that works for all of together to carry strategic mes- lobbies, and to get information we should all be proud of the
us, a working democracy. sages and powerful demands and incisive analyses of the key work we did to win it.
Then there is how we do it: No to Congress, corporate execu- issues facing our country. You One of the defining features
public interest group matches tives, executive branch officials join to make change. of Public Citizen is our stick-to-
our breadth of work and depth and others. Through telephone At press time, both chambers it-iveness. We won something
of expertise. We frame broad calls, e-mails, electronic peti- of the U.S. Congress passed important with Wall Street
public policy debates and then tions and in-person meetings, Wall Street reform legislation, reform, but we know it’s not
engage in disputes over the thousands and thousands of you which President Barack Obama enough. We’re going to moni-
minute details of statutes and are responding to timely calls to will sign shortly. We’ll tell you tor the rules implementing the
regulations, where a comma or action by becoming active public more about this in the next issue legislation, and we’re going to
“and” can cost the public billions citizens. Of course, we rely on of Public Citizen News, but our keep demanding that the giant
of dollars. We bridge the insider- you for financial support, as work on Wall Street reform il- banks be broken up, that out-of-
outsider dichotomy: We bring well. Our staff does extraordi- lustrates my point. Public Citizen control executive and top trader
outsider pressure into the halls nary things, and we operate as worked very hard over the past compensation be brought under
of power in Washington, D.C. frugally as possible. But it takes year to make Wall Street reform control, and more.
Our advocacy draws on a unique money to do what we do. Your as strong as possible. Together, we are going to win
When many said there was a tamed financial system that
no point in talking about break- serves the economy, rather than
ing up the banks, we insisted demands that everyone serve
the issue was too important to it. That’s what Public Citizen
Public Citizen News Wins Apex Award ignore. We didn’t win, but we does. We stake a position on the
During the past year, Public Citizen News has updated the newspaper helped forced the issue to a vote merits, even if it seems “unrea-
and added new features. Recently, we received recognition for our work in the Senate. And, thanks in no sonable” at first. But we keep
in the form of a 2010 Apex Award for “Magapaper & Newspaper Design small part to the advocacy by plugging away, keep making the
& Layout.” (A magapaper is a magazine-newspaper hybrid.) Our win- Public Citizen members, the vote arguments, keep building sup-
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make Public Citizen News better with each issue. Let us know what you imagined possible just a couple do win.
think at editor@citizen.org. months before. We kept you in-
formed about these issues along
4 July/August 2010 Public Citizen News

Former Lawmakers, Staff Lobby on Behalf of Financial Sector

Revolving door, from page 1
[R-Texas] and Dick Gephardt [D-
Mo.]) and a former speaker of the
House (Dennis Hastert [R-Ill.]).
Since the beginning of 2009,
the financial services sector had
employed at least 1,447 former
federal employees to lobby Con-
gress and federal agencies, ac-
cording to Public Citizen’s analy-
sis of data collected by the Center
for Responsive Politics.
“Wall Street hires former mem-
bers of Congress and their staffs
for a reason,” said David Arkush,
director of Public Citizen’s Con-
gress Watch division. “These
people are influential because
they have personal relationships
with current members and staff.
It’s hard to say no to your friends,
but that’s what Congress needs
to do.”
Along with the 73 former mem-
bers of Congress, at least 66 in-
dustry lobbyists worked for the
House or Senate banking com-
mittees as staffers, while 82 ad-
ditional lobbyists once worked
for members of Congress who
currently serve on these key
committees.
Additionally, at least 42 finan-
cial services lobbyists formerly
served in some capacity in the
U.S. Treasury Department.
At least seven served in the
Office of the Comptroller of the
Currency, including two former
comptrollers. These lobbyists
have the inside track when it
comes to dealing with members
of Congress and agency directors.
The six-figure and million-dollar
salaries firms pay these lobby-
ists are a small price to shape
legislation.
Barricading the
revolving door
Public Citizen has long called
for stronger rules to slow down
the revolving door between
Congress and K Street.
Under current House rules, for-
mer members of the House are
prohibited from making any lob-
bying contact with their former
colleagues for at least one year.
However, they can participate in
lobbying strategy and are free to
lobby the executive branch.
Former senators are prohibited
from making lobbying contacts
with Congress for two years.
Senior House and Senate staff-
ers also face restrictions when
leaving their jobs.
Senior House staffers cannot
make contact with their former
office or committee for at least
one year, while senior Senate
staffers cannot make contact with
any Senate office or committee
for a year.
Public Citizen has advocated
that former members of the
House and Senate should have
at least a two-year cooling off
period before they can make lob-
bying contacts — and that period
should also ban any type of lobby
work, such as strategizing.
It’s one reason that Public Citi-
zen called on the 47 lawmak-
ers who are retiring this year to
pledge not to take a job for two
years with any business that lob-
bied the lawmaker or his or her
committee.
None of the lawmakers whom
Public Citizen contacted agreed
to take the pledge.
“If you’re a member of Con-
gress, you’re very unlikely to
clamp down on Wall Street if
you’re planning on taking a job
with a Wall Street firm,” said
Robert Weissman, president of
Public Citizen. “You’re not likely
to hurt Big Oil if you’re contem-
plating a job with the petroleum
lobby. You’re going to be more
inclined to do favors for Big Phar-
ma if you think pharmaceutical
companies will be signing your
future paychecks. Our elected of-
ficials should pledge their loyalty
to their constituents by pledging
not to take jobs with businesses
that have lobbied them.”
Joe Newman is deputy direc-
tor of communications for Public
Citizen.

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Public Citizen News
New Report: Bank Shills Exceed Financial Reformers 11-to-1
By Barbara Holzer
Since the beginning of 2009,
legions of lobbyists for financial
institutions have fought tooth
and nail on Capitol Hill to pre-
vent the passage of any legisla-
tion that would crack down on
Wall Street.
On a much smaller scale, pub-
lic interest advocates — includ-
ing Public Citizen — battled back
by calling for key reforms, chief
among them breaking up the big
banks and regulating derivatives
transactions.
We now have a better sense of
the degree to which advocates
on the side of the public interest
have been at a disadvantage.
Bank lobbyists pushing to re-
tain as little oversight as possible
of their lucrative and secretive
derivatives business have out-
numbered pro-reform public in-
terest lobbyists 11-to-1, according
to a new Public Citizen report,
“Eleven to One: Pro-Reform De-
rivatives Lobbyists Vastly Out-
numbered by Opposition,” re-
leased May 18. The report is the
result of Public Citizen’s analysis
of lobbying disclosure data filed
with the U.S. House of Represen-
tatives between Jan. 1, 2009, and
March 31, 2010.
Because of the subjectivity of
lobbying reporting and its less-
than-stringent requirements,
Public Citizen cannot claim to
know all of the lobbying work
that has transpired on financial
regulation reform in the past
18 months.
But we do know this: At a mini-
mum, nearly 1,000 lobbyists
worked on at least one of nine
key bills in 2009 or early 2010 —
all bills designed to rewrite the
rules governing derivatives, the
complex financial instrument cit-
ed by many experts as one of the
chief causes of the 2008 financial
meltdown.
In the report, Public Citizen
shows that anti-reform lobby-
ists representing opponents of
strong derivatives reform num-
bered 903, compared to only 79
pro-reform lobbyists. Among the
223 clients represented by the
anti-reform lobbyists were the
nation’s five largest banks, sever-
al major financial trade associa-
tions and the “Godzilla” of busi-
ness lobbyists, the U.S. Chamber
of Commerce.
Outnumbered
“We always knew we faced an
uphill battle to reform the
financial system. This report
confirms that we are vastly
outgunned by Wall Street.”
director, Public Citizen’s
Congress Watch division
“We always knew we faced an
uphill battle to reform the finan-
cial system. This report confirms
that we are vastly outgunned by
Wall Street,” said David Arkush,
director of Public Citizen’s
Congress Watch division.
The report also shows that nine
of the 10 organizations hiring the
most financial lobbyists oppose
financial reform on principle.
The organizations with
the most anti-reform lobby-
ists were the American Bank-
ers Association (30), the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce (29)
and the National Association of
Manufacturers (28).
Not all businesses were anti-
reform, however. For instance,
airlines want predictability in the
future price of fuel, something
they can use derivatives to man-
age, but the current opaque and
mostly unregulated derivatives
market leaves them vulnerable
to price-gouging, fraud, manipu-
lation and excessive speculation
by Wall Street banks.
In fact, two of the top three
pro-reform organizations with
the most lobbyists are part of the
airline industry — the Air Trans-
port Association of America (27)
and Delta Air Lines (9).
The Environmental Defense
Action Fund (13) rounds out the
top three.
Of the 14 organizations lobby-
ing for reform, all but the Envi-
ronmental Defense Action Fund
David Arkush
are members of at least one of
three public interest coalitions:
Americans for Financial Reform
(AFR), the Derivatives Reform
Alliance or the Commodity Mar-
kets Oversight Coalition. (Public
Citizen is a member of all three
coalitions.)
More than two-thirds of all the
lobbyists in the study — pro- and
anti-reform — worked on the De-
rivatives Markets Transparency
and Accountability Act of 2009
(H.R. 977).
That act called for requiring
most over-the-counter deriva-
tives to go through organiza-
tions regulated by the Securities
and Exchange Commission or
the Commodity Futures Trad-
ing Commission (CFTC). This
translates to increased author-
ity for the CFTC to intervene in
derivatives transactions, which
historically have been shrouded
in secrecy as private transactions
between parties.
The U.S. Senate’s version of the
Wall Street reform bill included
relatively aggressive derivatives
regulation. The bill would have
required that most derivatives be
cleared and traded on open ex-
changes and would have denied
federal deposit insurance to de-
rivatives traders.
This latter requirement would
have forced commercial banks to
spin off their derivatives trading
operations, making them inde-
pendent companies but still al-
July/August 2010 5
lowing them to remain under the
same holding company.
Wall Street pushed to under-
mine these provisions, desper-
ately lobbying for its old way
of life.
The House passed a final ver-
sion of the bill in late June, and
the Senate followed suit in July.
Portions of the derivatives provi-
sion remained intact.
Most important, the resulting
bill makes the $600 trillion de-
rivatives market transparent by
requiring that transactions be
handled through clearinghouses
and exchanges.
Among other measures,
this legislation imposes new
limits on credit card compa-
nies’ merchant fees and estab-
lishes a Consumer Financial
Protection Bureau.
“The lobbyists may have over-
run Capitol Hill but, in the end,
they did not prevail,” said Rob-
ert Weissman, president of Pub-
lic Citizen. “Certain provisions
have been weakened or had their
effective date delayed, but ulti-
mately, public interest champi-
ons did a remarkable job beating
back those horrible 11-1 odds.
We will continue that work and
push for additional reforms that
should have been included but
weren’t.”
Barbara Holzer is Public Citi-
zen’s broadcast and marketing
manager.
6 July/August 2010
Shutting the Courthouse Doors
U.S. Supreme Court Again Rules on the Side of Business
By Angela Bradbery
The U.S. Supreme Court once
again has sided with corpora-
tions, this time in a case involv-
ing an arbitration clause in an
employee’s contract.
In one of its last decisions of
the 2009-2010 term, the U.S. Su-
preme Court on June 21 ruled 5-4
in Rent-A-Center v. Jackson that
a company can force a person to
go to an arbitrator, rather than a
judge, to challenge the fairness
of an arbitration clause. Because
arbitration systems favor the
companies that impose them,
this decision will put workers,
consumers and others at a great
disadvantage, essentially giving
them little recourse if they dis-
agree with the terms of an arbi-
tration clause.
Public Citizen attorneys Deepak
Gupta and Scott Nelson served as
co-counsel for respondent Anto-
nio Jackson, the Nevada resident
who brought the lawsuit.
“The court’s decision effective-
ly puts the fox in charge of the
henhouse,” Gupta said. “Under
the court’s logic, the company’s
hand-picked arbitrator can de-
cide whether it’s fair for the com-
pany to hand-pick the arbitrator.
That’s absurd.”
Retiring Justice John Paul Ste-
vens agreed. In a stinging dis-
sent, he wrote that neither party
had recommended the rule the
court adopted, and he charac-
terized the court’s reasoning as
“fantastic.”  ness franchise or admit a rela-
Several U.S. senators expressed
outrage. Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-
Vt.) called the Rent-A-Center de-
cision “a blow to our nation’s civ-
il rights laws and the protections
that American workers have long
enjoyed under those laws.”
Citing the decision, Sen. Shel-
don Whitehouse (D-R.I.), dur-
ing confirmation hearings for
Supreme Court nominee Elena
Arbitration clauses are often
buried in the fine print of paperwork
people receive when they take a job,
buy a cell phone or new home, start
a small business franchise or admit
a relative to a nursing home.
Public Citizen attorney Deepak Gupta will
argue another key arbitration case before
the U.S. Supreme Court in November. In
the case, AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion, the
court will consider the extent to which com-
panies can ban class-action lawsuits in the
fine print of their contracts with consumers
and employees. Class actions provide criti-
cal recourse when consumers are victims
of wrongdoing but the individual claims are
too small for people to sue the company
individually. Companies have increasingly
included class-action bans in their stan-
dard mandatory arbitration agreements.
Kagan, said, “For all the talk of In January, in Citizens United
umpires and balls and strikes at v. Federal Election Commission,
the Supreme Court, the strike the Supreme Court dramati-
zone for corporations gets better cally expanded corporate rights
every day.” Added Sen. Al Fran- when it said that corporations
ken (D-Minn.), “Talk about not have a First Amendment right
getting your day in court. Now to spend unlimited amounts of
you can’t get your day in court to money to influence elections.
get your day in court.” In doing so, the court upended
Arbitration clauses are often a century of precedent and gave
buried in the fine print of paper- corporations the ability to have
work people receive when they a bigger voice in government
take a job, buy a cell phone or than voters.
new home, start a small busi- The Rent-A-Center case
stemmed from a lawsuit filed by
tive to a nursing home. The Jackson, of Sparks, Nev., who
clauses require people to give up was hired in 2003 as an account
their right to sue the company manager for Rent-A-Center, a
if disputes arise; instead, dis- rent-to-own company that pro-
putes must be decided through vides furniture, electronics, ap-
binding arbitration — a system pliances and computers. When
that stacks the deck for the he was hired, Jackson signed pa-
corporations. pers that included an arbitration
Rent-A-Center is another ruling agreement as a condition of his
in the corporate interest, against employment.
the public interest. Jackson, who is African-Amer-
ican, sought a promotion several
times but was denied it, he said
in a 2007 lawsuit alleging race
discrimination and retaliation.
Rent-A-Center asked the court to
dismiss the claim because the ar-
bitration agreement said that any
dispute would be resolved by an
arbitrator, not a court.
The arbitration agreement
Jackson signed also said that an
arbitrator would have exclusive
authority to resolve any dispute
about the agreement itself, in-
Public Citizen News
Deepak Gupta
cluding any claim that the agree-
ment was unfair. Jackson’s law-
yer argued that the arbitration
agreement was unconscionable
because, among other things, it
was one-sided in favor of his em-
ployer and was presented to him
as a non-negotiable condition of
his employment.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for
the Ninth Circuit agreed with
Jackson that the fairness of the
agreement was a question for the
courts. The company then ap-
pealed to the Supreme Court.
Next step: Congress
The court’s ruling further high-
lights the need for Congress to
pass the Arbitration Fairness Act,
Public Citizen says.
That bill, which is pending in
both the U.S. House of Repre-
sentatives and the Senate (H.R.
1020, S. 931), would allow parties
to a dispute to choose wheth-
er to go to arbitration or court,
rather than forcing people into
arbitration.
“At Public Citizen, we don’t
give up,” said Robert Weissman,
president of Public Citizen. “We
will be spearheading aggres-
sive efforts to get this legislation
passed in Congress.”
For more information, visit
www.citizen.org/arbitration.
Angela Bradbery is Public Citi-
zen’s communications director.
Public Citizen News
WIN! Public Citizen Scores Victory in Md. Arbitration Case
By Bridgette Blair
Public Citizen has won a ma-
jor victory in the effort to curb
the pervasive corporate practice
of inserting forced arbitration
clauses in the fine print of nurs-
ing home contracts.
Dickerson v. Longoria raised
the issue of whether one person
(a relative or friend) can sign an
agreement on behalf of another
person who is being admitted to a
nursing home, waiving the rights
of the admitted person to resolve
disputes in court and requir-
ing instead that any disputes be
submitted to arbitration. Public
Citizen argued that the forced ar-
bitration agreement in question,
which gave the nursing home the
unfettered right to choose the ar-
bitrator, should not be enforced.
In a decision issued in May,
the Maryland Court of Appeals —
the highest court for the state of
Maryland — agreed.
The court held that the au-
thority to make health care and
financial decisions on a nursing
home resident’s behalf does not
give that person authority to sign
away the resident’s right to go
to court.
“Admitting a family member to
a nursing home can be a stress-
ful experience, and most people
have too much on their mind to
concentrate on the fine print,”
Claiming ‘Personal Privacy,’ AT&T Attempts to Keep Records From Public
By Bridgette Blair
Recently, corporations have
been asserting that they have
First Amendment rights, just like
people. And in its Citizens United
v. Federal Election Commission
decision earlier this year, the U.S.
Supreme Court agreed.
Now, a major corporation is
claiming that it has personal pri-
vacy rights, just like people. In a
recent decision, a federal appeals
court agreed. Public Citizen and
other groups want the Supreme
Court to overturn this decision.
In Federal Communications
Commission v. AT&T, AT&T in-
voked “personal privacy” to
prevent the government from
disclosing records about the cor-
poration to the public.
Under the Freedom of Informa-
tion Act (FOIA), the public has a
right to access documents of gov-
“Forced arbitration contracts push
people into a system where the deck
is too often stacked against them. The
court’s ruling in this case is a victory for
all consumers.”
Public Citizen attorney
said Deepak Gupta, a Public Citi-
zen attorney who worked on the
case. “This decision makes it
harder for nursing homes to force
people into signing away their
right to seek redress in court for
abuse or neglect.”
The nursing home resident,
Carter Bradley, died from in-
fected bedsores that spread and
deteriorated while he was a resi-
dent at St. Thomas More Nurs-
ing and Rehabilitation Center in
Hyattsville, Md., operated by the
nursing home company Heritage
Care Inc.
Bradley’s niece, Carman Dick-
erson, filed a medical malprac-
tice claim against Heritage Care
and two doctors, but Heritage
Care said that the case had to
be arbitrated because Dickerson
ernment agencies unless those
records are classified or other-
wise exempt.
In this case, a FOIA request was
submitted to the Federal Com-
munications Commission (FCC)
for certain records relating to
AT&T. The agency determined
that FOIA required it to release
some documents related to an
agency investigation of AT&T
for overbilling the government.
AT&T sued the FCC to stop the
release and claimed that mak-
ing the records public would
violate the company’s “personal
privacy.”
The U.S. Court of Appeals
for the Third Circuit ruled in
AT&T’s favor.
The FCC filed a petition asking
the Supreme Court to review the
decision. In May, Public Citizen,
Citizens for Responsibility and
Deepak Gupta
had signed the forced arbitration
agreement when Bradley was ad-
mitted to the nursing home.
When Bradley was being admit-
ted to the facility, he was groan-
ing in pain and suffering from
dementia. At the time, Dicker-
son signed a “large stack of ad-
missions documents, including
Heritage Care’s arbitration agree-
ment,” according to court docu-
ments. The appeals court ruled
that Dickerson did not have the
legal authority to sign away Brad-
ley’s rights.
The ruling means that Dick-
erson can now pursue the legal
claim in court.
Most people don’t realize that
when they sign contracts to pur-
chase a cell phone, accept a credit
card, open a retirement account,
Ethics in Washington, the Na-
tional Security Archive, OpenThe
Government.org, the Electronic
Frontier Foundation and the Re-
porters Committee for Freedom
of the Press filed a friend-of-the-
court brief, supporting the agen-
cy’s petition and urging the court
to hear the case.
“Corporations’ valid competi-
tive interests are already pro-
tected under FOIA,” said Mar-
garet Kwoka, the Public Citizen
attorney who wrote the brief.
“They should not be allowed to
circumvent the limits of those
protections by shoehorning
their fears of bad publicity into
a FOIA exemption meant to pro-
tect only the intimate details of
individuals’ lives.”
What could be hidden from the
public?
Records pertaining to federal
July/August 2010 7
sign a home building contract, or,
as in this case, admit someone
to a nursing home, they may be
signing away the right to go to
court if they are harmed by the
company.
Forced arbitration provisions
require people to use corpora-
tion-friendly arbitration panels
instead of the court system.
In addition to fighting forced
arbitration in the courts, Pub-
lic Citizen is pressing Congress
to pass the Fairness in Nursing
Home Arbitration Act (H.R. 1237,
S. 512) — legislation that would
bar forced arbitration provisions
in nursing home, assisted living
and other long-term care facility
contracts.
Public Citizen also is calling for
passage of the Arbitration Fair-
ness Act (H.R. 1020, S. 931), which
would protect millions of other
consumers from forced arbitra-
tion by allowing parties to a dis-
pute to choose whether to go to
arbitration or court, rather than
forcing people into arbitration.
“Forced arbitration contracts
push people into a system where
the deck is too often stacked
against them,” Gupta said. “The
court’s ruling in this case is a vic-
tory for all consumers.”
Bridgette Blair is editor of Public
Citizen News.
investigations involving the eco-
nomic downturn, the BP oil spill
and the Massey Energy mine
explosion might potentially be
withheld as a result of the ap-
peals court’s ruling, according to
the brief.
“If this lower court ruling
stands, the number of now-pub-
lic records that agencies and cor-
porations may claim can be kept
from the public is breathtaking,”
Kwoka said. “We urge the Su-
preme Court to grant review and
not allow important records to be
withheld based on the idea that
corporations have personal pri-
vacy interests.”
The Supreme Court is expected
to decide this fall whether to re-
view the case.
For more information, visit
www.citizen.org/documents/FC
CAmicus.pdf.
8 July/August 2010
Clockwise, from left: TV cameras surround organization leaders — including Robert Weissman (center), president of Public Citizen — during the June 4 protest in front of BP’s Washington, D.C., headqu
hold a “Crude Awakening” sign. Allison Fisher, an organizer with Public Citizen’s Energy Program, participates in the protest. Tom “Smitty” Smith, director of Public Citizen’s Texas office, takes part in the
Public Citizen Organizes
BP, from page 1
the corporation, including a dis-
regard for worker safety, criminal
negligence, the price-gouging of
consumers and taxpayers, and
violations of environmental laws.
The groups found Hayward guilty
as charged and held aloft a pris-
on jumpsuit for him. The crowd
waved signs with Hayward’s face
atop prison garb, as well as with
BP’s logo dripping with oil. Po-
lice officers shut down the street
in front of BP’s offices during the
energetic protest.
“If you were driving a car, you
look away, you were on your
cell phone … you were tired, you
didn’t drink enough coffee, and
you swerve … and you hit some-
one [and] you kill them, the dis-
trict attorney is coming after you.
He’s going to charge you with
negligent homicide. BP was far
more reckless than that,” Public
Citizen President Robert Weiss-
man said at the protest. “[BP]
shouldn’t have been drilling there
in the first place. They didn’t in-
vest in modest safety precautions
that could have stopped this.
They bullied their contractors
not to take safety measures. They
ignored test data coming in …
the rig exploded. Eleven people
are dead from their recklessness.
They have got to be criminally
prosecuted. And it’s up to us … to
take the first step.”
Public Citizen has organized a
nationwide boycott asking peo-
ple to avoid buying gas and prod-
ucts from BP and its subsidiar-
ies for three months to show BP
what consumers think about its
negligence and the environmen-
tal devastation in the Gulf. The
boycott has earned worldwide
attention, ranging from The New
York Times to NPR, The Guardian
(U.K.) to Al Jazeera.
A petition Public Citizen posted
online asking people to pledge
to boycott the company has gar-
nered more than 22,000 signa-
tures, and more than 13,000 peo-
ple have joined Public Citizen’s
Facebook group, “1,000,000
Strong to Boycott BP.” (Find more
information about the boycott at
www.BeyondBP.org.)
The making of an
environmental disaster
Following the April 20 explo-
sion that killed 11 workers on
the Deepwater Horizon oil rig —
which is owned by Transocean,
the world’s largest offshore drill-
ing contractor, and leased by
London-based BP — the world’s
attention focused on the millions
of gallons of oil gushing into the
Gulf of Mexico.
While the exact amount of oil
that has poured from the broken
well is still unknown, experts es-
timate that as much as 4.2 million
gallons poured into the Gulf daily
since the explosion.
The oil spill has caused un-
told environmental damage
and robbed many in the fishing
and tourism industries of their
livelihoods.
Birds, sea turtles and other ani-
mals have been found drenched
in thick, sludgy oil; now even
manatees are being monitored.
Tar balls litter the beaches in
Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, Mis-
sissippi and Texas.
The disaster also has focused
attention on BP’s abysmal work-
er and environmental safety re-
cord, which is the worst of any oil
company operating in America.
In just the past few years, BP has
pleaded guilty to two crimes and
paid more than $730 million in
fines and settlements to the U.S.
and state governments, and in
civil lawsuit judgments for envi-
ronmental crimes, willful neglect
of worker safety rules and pen-
alties for manipulating energy
markets.
Despite all this, BP still man-
ages to successfully navigate the
government. Since the beginning
of 2009, BP has employed 49 lob-
byists at a cost of $19.5 million.
Of these 49 lobbyists, 35 — or 71
percent — previously worked for
federal agencies and members of
Congress, according to a Public
Citizen analysis released in June.
Public Citizen News
Pu
One is Kenneth Duberstein, who
was chief of staff for President
Ronald Reagan; another is former
U.S. Rep. Jim Turner (D-Texas).
The trouble doesn’t stop there;
the revolving door between the
oil industry and the former Min-
erals and Management Service
(MMS), the government agency
tasked with overseeing offshore
drilling operations, was spinning
out of control.
In fact, just a few years ago,
Jim Grant, the MMS chief of staff
overseeing the government’s
operations in the Gulf of Mexico
region, left to take a job with BP.
And that’s not all. Some MMS
regulators even allowed drillers
to fill in their own safety inspec-
tion forms in pencil, only to trace
over the words themselves in pen
later, according to news reports.
Regulators readily accepted gifts
from Big Oil, allowing BP and
other oil companies to continue
to manipulate the system.
Pattern of negligence
BP failed to install a backup
safety device that could have
prevented the explosion — a
valve that would have cost only
$500,000. Now, BP is faced with
fees and penalties that could
amount to tens of billions of
dollars.
“BP made a conscious decision
not to install a $500,000 safety
 Public Citizen News
ublic Citizen Photos/Bridgette Blair
uarters. Protesters Clockwise, from left: A 13-foot-tall inflatable oil barrel bears the message “Boycott BP.” Tyson Slocum (left), director of Public Citizen’s Energy Program, protests alongside other
e event. activists. James Ploeser, senior field organizer with Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch division, leads chants. Protesters, including Rick Claypool (right), online organizer with
Public Citizen’s Congress Watch division, stand outside BP’s Washington, D.C., headquarters.
s Protest, Boycott of BP
device that could have prevent-
ed the Gulf disaster,” said Tyson
Slocum, director of Public Citi-
zen’s Energy Program. “A compa-
ny that made $14 billion in profits
in 2009 — and that was a bad year
— refused to spend a fraction of a
percent of its profits to safeguard
against the worst oil spill in U.S.
history. The sheer greed at the
expense of safety and the envi-
ronment is mind-boggling.”
Power to
the government
“Hey, Obama, who’s in charge?
BP oil is livin’ large!” shouted the
crowd at the June 4 protest.
It’s time to take power back
from the corporations and restore
it to the regulators that are sup-
posed to monitor the industry,
protest leaders said.
A recent inspector general au-
dit of the MMS found widespread
cronyism, ethical breaches, deci-
mated auditing staff and overreli-
ance on information provided by
Big Oil, all of which contributed
to a culture of cozy relationships
and lax regulation.
There must be more regula-
tion of oil companies and drill-
ing procedures, Slocum said. The
Obama administration unilater-
ally announced that it would di-
vide MMS into three parts to bet-
ter regulate and enforce drilling
practices: the Bureau of Ocean
Energy Management, the Bureau
of Safety and Environmental En-
forcement, and the Office of Nat-
ural Resources Revenue.
But this plan doesn’t go far
enough, Slocum said. It still con-
centrates too much authority in
the tainted Department of the
Interior, he said. Public Citizen
advocates moving regulatory
oversight functions to the Na-
tional Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration and the Environ-
mental Protection Agency so that
scientists — not government em-
ployees who maintain close ties
to the oil industry — are in charge
of conducting the scientific re-
views of oil drilling requests.
With Obama’s prodding, BP
established a $20 billion escrow
fund over four years to pay for
claims resulting from the oil
gusher. The oil giant will contrib-
ute $100 million to support job-
less oil rig workers.
A look toward the future
The Obama administration
must focus on developing clean,
sustainable alternative energy
sources, not rely on dirty energy
resources that threaten the en-
vironment and lives of workers,
Public Citizen maintains.
President Barack Obama, who
had supported efforts to expand
offshore drilling, took a step in
the right direction May 27 when
he extended a moratorium on
drilling until a commission com-
pletes its investigation of the
Deepwater Horizon explosion
and makes recommendations.
However, amid pressure from
Gulf Coast states over the loss of
jobs and income resulting from
the moratorium, the Obama ad-
ministration indicated June 7
that it would move quickly to
release new safety requirements
that would allow the reopening
of offshore oil and gas explora-
tion in shallow waters.
On June 22, a federal judge in
New Orleans ruled against the six-
month moratorium on deepwater
drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, sug-
gesting that the administration’s
suspension was “arbitrary and
capricious.” The White House ap-
pealed the ruling, but a federal
appeals court upheld it.
The White House then issued a
new order July 12, banning most
new deepwater-drilling activities
until Nov. 30.
This latest order, amended to
address the court’s “arbitrary” ar-
gument, takes into account new
evidence regarding safety con-
cerns, shortcomings in industry
equipment to control blowouts
and capabilities to respond to
spills, according to Secretary of
the Interior Ken Salazar.
Slocum said that Congress must
act immediately to ensure that
July/August 2010 9
Public Citizen Photos/Bridgette Blair
future deepwater drilling does
not compromise the health and
safety of oil rig workers and Gulf
residents.
“Deepwater drilling currently
represents a fraction of our do-
mestic oil production. Banning
this practice won’t lead to higher
gasoline prices or force us to im-
port more oil — but it would help
ensure that our environment is
protected,” Slocum said. “Deep-
sea drilling poses catastrophic
risks to workers and the environ-
ment. It is bad policy to allow the
practice to continue.”
Public Citizen will continue to
denounce offshore drilling and
advocate clean energy alterna-
tives to fill our energy needs.
You can help. Sign the Beyond
BP petition. Join the Facebook
group, “1,000,000 Strong to Boy-
cott BP.” Urge President Obama
to ban the expansion of offshore
drilling.
Most important, tell your
friends. For more information,
visit www.BeyondBP.org.
Because, as the June 4 pro-
testers said, “Oh, BP, don’t you
know? Dirty oil has got to go! My,
my, my, my. BP ain’t got no alibi.
Oh, BP, don’t you know? Dirty oil
has got to go! Hey, hey, hey, hey.
We are not a-goin’ away!”
Dorry Samuels is Public Citizen’s
press office coordinator.
10 July/August 2010
The Oil Spill’s Effects
Energy Organizer Witnesses the Gusher’s Impact on La. Residents
Journal, from page 1
found Exxon “reckless” and
rendered an award of more than
$5 billion, $5 billion of which was
for punitive damages.
Over the course of the next
14 years, Exxon’s onslaught of
appeals eventually landed the
case before the U.S. Supreme
Court. In June 2008, the court
ruled that Exxon could not be
required to pay more than $507
million (equivalent to the total
compensatory damages paid to
the plaintiffs) — one-tenth of the
original punitive award.
The American people have
heard the same promise from BP
— a promise to “make it right.”
If “make it right” is a different
version of the same “make you
whole” playbook, the communi-
ties that surround the Gulf of
Mexico have reason to be ner-
vous. If the government can in-
tervene and laws can be enacted
to ensure just compensation for
victims and full accountability
for environmental clean-up and
restoration, some level of wrong
could be made right.
6/19: Beauty and
the Beast
My first day driving down the
bayou to Louisiana’s coast pre-
sented a dichotomy of the area’s
vast beauty and the consequenc-
es of the beast that has long
dominated the local economy.
My first stop landed me at a BP
Claims Center in Chauvin. Before
arriving in Louisiana, I thought
that compensation meant BP ac-
countability — that those harmed
Louisiana residents post signs, like the above, telling passers-by their viewpoints about BP
and the effect the oil spill has had on them.
The BP Gulf of Mexico disaster should yield its own set of
lessons that warrant new amendments to the Oil Pollution
Act. To that end, funding should be set aside not only to
remediate the impacted area but to invest in new clean
energy infrastructure, manufacturing and generation.
by the disaster would receive a is unclear. What is evident is the
stipend to supplement their lost need for economic diversity —
incomes. We all want BP to pay without which the beautiful wet-
for the environmental disaster lands of Louisiana will only be
and economic upheaval it has known as the oil and gas fields.
created. And to some extent, The BP Gulf of Mexico disaster
the claims process ensures an should yield its own set of les-
immediate infusion of cash to sons that warrant new amend-
those who have bills to pay and ments to the Oil Pollution Act. To
mouths to feed now. that end, funding should be set
The downside is that the aside not only to remediate the
monthly payments feel more like impacted area but to invest in
welfare checks than restitution new clean energy infrastructure,
for those who want their way manufacturing and generation.
of life back. The claims officer I
spoke with could not speculate 6/20: Beyond a price
how long the checks would be Local sentiment toward BP in
administered. The claims pro- Grand Isle, La., the large bar-
cess was triggered by the Oil rier island located on the Gulf
Pollution Act of 1990, enacted of Mexico, is understandably
after the Exxon Valdez spill. The harsh, but the sentiment toward
act seeks to address both the re- offshore drilling is generally
sources necessary to respond to favorable. While fishing, shrimp-
spills and damages compensable ing, crabbing and oyster har-
to those impacted by a spill. But vesting were declared dead by
the act did not anticipate a spill the arrival of oil in the bays and
of this magnitude. Some analysts wetlands that surround Grand
estimate the total cost of reim- Isle, offshore drilling remains a
bursement at more than $40 bil- large part of Louisiana’s tenuous
lion over the next two decades. economy. Louisiana and other
Whether BP will be able to states that line the Gulf rank
shell out the necessary reim- among the bottom 10 U.S. states
bursements over the long haul in per-capita income.
One needs only to take in the
billboards that line the one road
that leads to the coast to under-
stand the limited opportuni-
ties of those who reside there.
The landscape is dominated by
advertisements for offshore oil
jobs, interrupted only by the oc-
casional personal injury lawyer
services — a suitable companion
or harbinger of these high-risk
jobs. Below the glossy billboards
are hand-painted signs that read
“live crabs” and “fresh shrimp,”
but since the waters have closed,
these signs are less about en-
couraging passers-by to stop for
Public Citizen Photos/Allison Fisher
local seafood and more a stark
reminder of an extinct
livelihood.
Public Citizen News
While the rest of the country
is measuring the oil crisis in the
time since the Deepwater Hori-
zon explosion, Raleigh and Kay
Leseigne are measuring the crisis
in the days since they discov-
ered oil in their oyster beds. The
Louisiana Department of Wild-
life and Fisheries closed waters
in the Grand Isle area on May 22.
A sign outside their Grand Isle
home, addressed to BP, notes the
number of days since their busi-
ness was shut down. It reads,
“[O]n 5.24.2010 your oil got
into our inshore waters … you
robbed us of making a living with
crabs-oyster-shrimp. How much
longer? Months or years?”
Sixty-five-year-old Raleigh,
who has been crabbing and har-
vesting oysters for 50 years, has
no illusions about his livelihood.
He told me over lunch that he
doesn’t think he’ll ever work the
waters again. The couple already
received their first compensation
check for their crabbing busi-
ness, but the money will never
replace the way of life that they
have lost. Raleigh told of loving
to wake in the morning to look
over the heaven that is Grand
Isle. Now he feels that BP has
brought hell to his community.
These days, Raleigh is un-
sure how to spend his time. His
health and age preclude him
from seeking a job as a contract
worker for the clean-up
operation.
As I prepared to leave their
home, I commented on their
good nature and smiling faces
despite the disaster. Kay replied
that I would need to visit them
again in the coming months to
see if the smiles were still there.
To see Fisher’s full journal
about her trip, visit http://citizen
vox.org/2010/06/30/five-days-in-
louisiana/.
Public Citizen News
Mining Co. Case Shows Need for Trade Pact Overhaul
By Angela Bradbery
A mining company’s attempt to
use a trade agreement’s foreign
investor rights to squeeze hun-
dreds of millions of dollars out
of the El Salvadoran government
over a cyanide leach gold mine
the company sought to open there
provides yet another example of
why trade agreements must be
dramatically overhauled.
In making the claim, the Ca-
nadian-based multinational
firm, Pacific Rim Mining Corp.,
brought the first environmental
case to date under the investor-
to-state arbitration mechanism
of the Central America Free Trade
Agreement (CAFTA). This system
allows foreign corporations to
sue governments and demand
compensation when they believe
their investor rights, as spelled
out in the trade pact, have been
violated. A World Bank tribunal
heard initial arguments in the
case in early June.
Pacific Rim Mining planned to
use hundreds of tons of cyanide
and hundreds of millions of liters
of water per year to recover gold
from ore in the basin of El Salva-
dor’s largest river. This proposed
project, as well as applications
filed by various companies for 28
other gold and silver mines, gen-
erated a major national debate
about the health and environ-
mental implications of mining
in El Salvador, a densely popu-
lated country the size of Mas-
sachusetts with limited water
resources. Leaders of El Salva-
dor’s major political parties, the
Catholic Church and a large civil
society network expressed con-
cerns about contamination of
water resources on which mil-
lions of people rely.
The firm never completed its
application process. Instead,
shortly after the government
formed a commission of experts
to review the country’s mining
policy, Pacific Rim Mining turned
to CAFTA, using it to demand
hundreds of millions of dollars in
compensation and claiming that
El Salvador had violated its trade
pact investor rights.
The case spotlights the con-
cerns that have led Public Citi-
zen, environmental and human
rights advocates, and many in
Congress to demand changes to
the past model of trade pact for-
eign investor rights and their pri-
vate enforcement.
Tribunals have ordered more
July/August 2010 11
the proposed Pacific Rim mine
site in 2001.
Public concerns grew about
“Increasingly, multinational companies this project and the dozens of
are invoking trade-agreement investor other mining permits being
sought. In March 2008, then-Sal-
rights in situations where natural re-
vadoran President Elias Antonio
sources and public health are at stake. Saca, leader of the conservative
As the Obama administration launches ARENA party, announced that
he would establish a commission
new trade talks and considers whether
to review the country’s mining
it will renegotiate the leftover Bush law and would not grant mining
[free trade agreements], negotiators permits until the commission
need to close the door to the kinds of reported.
Meanwhile, Pacific Rim Min-
outrageous challenges to essential en- ing, a Canadian company that
vironmental laws like we now see in the would not have standing under
Pacific Rim case.” CAFTA because Canada was not
a party to the trade agreement,
reincorporated a subsidiary as
a Nevada corporation, Pac Rim
Lori Wallach Cayman LLC. The U.S. subsidiary,
director, Public Citizen’s newly covered by CAFTA, filed its
Global Trade Watch CAFTA claim in December 2008.
The company claims that the
Salvadoran government capri-
ciously halted progress on ap-
proving the proposed mine for
political reasons. The Salvadoran
than $200 million in payments to the National Coalition Against government argues that it has a
investors under similar terms in Metallic Mining. right to set the terms for mining
the North American Free Trade In addition, Wallach organized in its country.
Agreement (NAFTA). congressional briefings with the CAFTA’s investor-to-state dis-
“At stake is whether the op- visiting Salvadorans for staffers pute settlement provision is very
erations of the fragile democracy in the U.S. House of Representa- similar to NAFTA’s investor-to-
that emerged from 12 years of tives and the Senate. Public Citi- state provision and those in the
civil war in El Salvador and the zen has urged activists to contact Bush-era free trade agreements
policies by its elected leaders to President Barack Obama and de- (FTAs) the Obama administra-
ensure mining does not further mand a better trade model. tion has said it will send to Con-
damage the country’s ravaged gress, Wallach said. This system
environment will prevail — or Pacific Rim Mining’s empowers foreign corporations
whether CAFTA will allow the de- plans to demand government compen-
mands of a multinational mining A 1996 Salvadoran law estab- sation in foreign tribunals, skirt-
firm to reign supreme over the lishes a two-step process for ing domestic courts and laws,
rule of law in El Salvador,” said companies wishing to establish for government actions, includ-
Lori Wallach, director of Public a mine. Pacific Rim Mining com- ing environmental regulations,
Citizen’s Global Trade Watch di- pleted the first step when it ac- that the investors believe violate
vision. “It also shines a spotlight quired an exploration permit and their trade pact rights. Under
on the extreme foreign investor began exploratory drilling for NAFTA, corporations have chal-
rights provided in NAFTA, CAF- gold in 2002. However, to oper- lenged dozens of environmental
TA and now in the leftover Bush ate a mine, the company needed and other public interest laws in
trade deals with Korea, Colombia an exploitation permit, which the United States, Canada and
and Panama that the Obama ad- requires an environmental im- Mexico.
ministration recently announced pact assessment and a feasibility “This problem extends beyond
it wants to complete.” study. El Salvador. Increasingly, multi-
Public Citizen has been out In 2005, Pacific Rim Mining national companies are invoking
front in publicizing the case and submitted its environmental trade-agreement investor rights
its ramifications. In May, the or- impact assessment to the gov- in situations where natural re-
ganization held a press briefing ernment. A geologist hired by a sources and public health are
with Friends of the Earth and local community group found it at stake,” Wallach said. “As the
two Salvadoran community lead- lacking detail about the amount Obama administration launches
ers from the region where the of water required for the project new trade talks and considers
proposed mine would be built: and the prospect for cyanide con- whether it will renegotiate the
Miguel Rivera, founder of the As- tamination. The region is subject leftover Bush FTAs, negotiators
sociation of Friends of San Isidro to earthquakes and torrential need to close the door to the
Cabañas, whose brother was rains, which heightened con- kinds of outrageous challenges
murdered last year after speak- cerns about the proposed mine’s to essential environmental laws
ing out against the project, and safety. A 4.7-magnitude earth- like we now see in the Pacific
Vidalina Morales de Gámez, with quake occurred directly below Rim case.”
12 July/August 2010
Survey: Most Support Shorter Medical Resident Shifts
By Arlene Tonoff
A new study — the first of its
kind — shows that most Ameri-
cans object to medical residents
working longer than 24-hour
shifts and favor tighter regula-
tions for resident work hours.
The study, released June 1, was
published by the online journal
BMC Medicine and showed that
90 percent of those surveyed be-
lieve the maximum shift duration
for medical residents should be 16
hours or less. (A 2008 Institute of
Medicine [IOM] report said that
resident physicians who work
more than 16 consecutive hours
without sleep pose a safety haz-
ard for themselves and patients.)
In contrast, current work hour
rules permit residents to work up
to 30-hour shifts twice weekly.
IN THE SPOTLIGHT
The following are some highlights from our recent
media coverage.
Robert Weissman, Public
Citizen president: On the June 4
BP protest: The New York Times,
The Baton Rouge Advocate,
PBS’ “Nightly Business Report,”
Bloomberg, Bloomberg Busi-
nessweek, The San Francisco
Chronicle. On the call to boy-
cott BP: The Philadelphia Daily
News, Los Angeles Times. On
the financial reform bill: PBS’
“Nightly Business Report,” ABC’s
“World News Tonight.” On the
case for implementing a financial
speculation tax: The American
Prospect.
Tyson Slocum, director of Public
Citizen’s Energy Program: On the
call to boycott BP: Financial
Times, USA Today, CNN’s “An-
derson Cooper 360,” The Guard-
ian (U.K.), NPR. On the June 4 BP
protest: Fox News, MSNBC with
Chris Jansing, NPR. On the BP oil
spill: NPR, The Dallas Morning
News, The St. Petersburg Times.
David Arkush, director of Public
Citizen’s Congress Watch
division: On the revolving door
between Congress and Wall
Street: The Boston Globe, CNN
Money, Politico, Bloomberg,
Bloomberg Businessweek, San
Francisco Chronicle, USA Today,
The Huffington Post. Featured in
Time magazine on the lobbying
culture in Washington, D.C.
These long shifts result in fa-
tigued residents who are more
prone to errors.
The research was conducted by
Lake Research Partners and spon-
sored financially by Public Citizen
and the Committee of Interns and
Residents/Service Employees In-
ternational Union (SEIU).
The study authors included
representatives from Public Citi-
zen, Harvard Medical School,
Mount Sinai School of Medicine,
Montefiore Medical Center at Al-
bert Einstein College of Medicine
and the Committee of Interns and
Residents/SEIU.
These groups have pressed the
body overseeing resident physi-
cian training, the Accreditation
Council on Graduate Medical
Education (ACGME), to improve
Dr. Sidney Wolfe, director of Public
Citizen’s Health Research Group:
On the need for more transpar-
ency and disclosure from the
Food and Drug Administration:
Reuters, The Associated Press,
Fox Business, Bloomberg Busi-
nessweek, San Francisco Chron-
icle, The Charleston Daily Mail
(W.Va.), FDA Week, The Akron
Beacon Journal. On the safety of
the diabetes drug Avandia: ABC
News.
Lori Wallach, director of Public
Citizen’s Global Trade Watch divi-
sion: On fixing the U.S.-Domin-
ican Republic-Central America
Free Trade Agreement: BNA
Daily Report. On former trade
czar Rob Portman’s ties to former
President George W. Bush: The
Columbus Dispatch.
Allison Zieve, director of the Public
Citizen Litigation Group: On the
Department of Justice keep-
ing secret the names of people
whose applications for pardons
were denied by Bush: The Na-
tional Law Journal, Legal Intel-
ligencer, The American Lawyer,
Texas Lawyer.
Tom “Smitty” Smith, director of
Public Citizen’s Texas office: On
reconciling Texas air quality with
new national standards: The
Houston Chronicle, San Antonio
Express, The Texas Tribune.
medical resident work hours.
In June, ACGME did propose
some slight improvements to its
guidelines for medical resident
work hours. An ACGME task
force is recommending that the
maximum length of shifts for
new doctors in their first year of
residency training programs in
hospitals be cut from 24 hours to
16 hours. The group also is rec-
ommending closer supervision
by experienced doctors.
However, maximum work
shifts for residents in their second
year and beyond would still be
very long — 24 consecutive hours
plus an additional four hours
for transitioning care. These 28-
hour shifts can be scheduled ev-
ery third night. Maximum work
weeks would remain at 80 hours
for all hospital residents. The
weekly hours may be averaged
over one month, meaning that a
resident may work 60 hours one
week, followed by 100 hours the
next week. The long shifts still
would lead the residents to a
chronic state of fatigue.
The ACGME is accepting public
comments on the recommenda-
tions until Aug. 9 at www.acgme.
org. The new standards are sched-
uled to go into effect in July 2011.
Public Citizen and other patient
safety advocates will continue to
push for further improvements
to medical resident guidelines.
“The improvements in the new
ACGME guidelines are largely
swamped by the failure to cover
the majority of medical residents
with the protection of not hav-
ing to work more than 16 hours
continuously,” said Dr. Sidney
Wolfe, director of Public Citizen’s
Health Research Group. “This is
the second revision of ACGME
requirements in the past seven
years, and the organization still
does not get it right.”
Survey says: fewer
hours for residents
Respondents to the study pub-
lished in BMC Medicine said that
patients should be informed if
the doctor treating them has been
working for 24 hours. Most of the
respondents to the study, which
surveyed 1,200 people, also said
that if told that their doctor had
been awake for a day, they would
request care from a different
doctor.
Other findings include:
• Only 1 percent of the gen-
eral public supports shifts
longer than 24 hours for
Public Citizen News
medical residents;
• The majority of respon-
dents said they believe that
resident physicians work
shifts of less than 12 hours;
• 81 percent of the general
public believes that reduc-
ing resident physician
work hours would be very
or somewhat effective in
reducing medical errors; 
• When asked about specific
recommendations of the
IOM, four of five respon-
dents support limiting the
duration of individual work
shifts to 16 hours, capping
weekly work hours at a
maximum of 80 hours in
any single week and ensur-
ing that medical residents
have at least one day off
per week;
• 68 percent favor the IOM
recommendation that resi-
dent physicians not work
more than 16 hours over an
alternative IOM proposal
that would permit resident
physicians to remain in the
hospital for 30 hours, as
long as they were provided
the opportunity to sleep for
five hours without inter-
ruption after 16 hours of
work.
“Working for 24 hours with-
out sleep impairs performance
to a degree that is comparable
to being legally drunk,” said Dr.
Charles Czeisler, a senior author
of the study and professor of
sleep medicine at Harvard School
of Medicine. “Patients have a
right to be concerned for their
safety when doctors work mara-
thon 24-hour shifts. Reducing
resident physician work hours is
an effective way to improve pa-
tient safety.”
Currently, New Zealand and
most European countries have
restrictions that limit the number
of consecutive hours residents
are allowed to work.
“The leaders within academic
medicine who are resisting these
sensible changes are out of step
with the public, and that jeop-
ardizes the notion of patient-
centered care and threatens the
health of patients as well as doc-
tors,” Wolfe said.
For more information, visit
www.wakeupdoctor.org.
Arlene Tonoff is an intern in
Public Citizen’s communications
office.
Public Citizen News
Public Citizen
To FDA: Unethical
Avandia Clinical
Trial Should
Not Continue
By Kate Resnevic
Public Citizen is calling for the
immediate halt of an unethical
diabetes drug trial aimed at as-
sessing the heart risks associated
with the diabetes drug Avandia,
saying that the Food and Drug
Administration (FDA) has seen
enough research to know that the
drug is more dangerous than the
closely related drug Actos.
“The price of such definitive
proof will almost certainly be
measured in the lives of study
subjects who have been incom-
pletely informed about the risks
and benefits of participation,” Dr.
Sidney Wolfe, director of Public
Citizen’s Health Research Group,
and Dr. David Juurlink, a Toronto
researcher who has published
one of the studies finding Avan-
dia to be more dangerous than
Actos, wrote in a May 11 letter
to FDA Commissioner Margaret
Hamburg.
The drug company Glaxo-
SmithKline began the Thiazoli-
dinedione Intervention in Vita-
min D Evaluation (TIDE) trial in
May 2009 at the request of the
FDA. The study involves 14 coun-
tries, including the U.S. and de-
veloping countries such as Mex-
ico, Chile, India, Pakistan and
Colombia, and is intended to in-
clude as many as 16,000 subjects.
The targeted completion date
is 2015.
A major objective of TIDE is to
compare the safety risks of Avan-
dia (generic name: rosiglitazone)
with those of Actos (generic
name: pioglitazone).
“Surely no patient would will-
ingly participate in a trial in which
they have a substantial likelihood
of taking a drug that, in the opin-
ion of a large group of experts, has
no role in present day therapeu-
tics because of its risks,” Wolfe
said. “The trial shouldn’t contin-
ue because the question has been
answered. If the trial continues,
the health of thousands of pa-
tients will be jeopardized. It is
unethical to continue this trial.”   Kate Resnevic is managing
A large body of research has
shown Avandia to be more dan-
July/August 2010 13
gerous than Actos. Avandia is
more likely to cause heart fail-
ure; even FDA scientists estimate
that the risk of heart failure with
Avandia is roughly 50 percent
higher than with Actos. Avandia
also is associated with a higher
risk of death than Actos.
Are your medicines
Avandia and Actos have both
been associated with a host of side
sAfe?
effects, including fluid accumula-
tion in the eye and other places,
anemia, congestive heart failure,
heart attack, bony fractures and
acute liver injury — some cases of
which have been fatal.
And in mid-July, Wolfe testi-
fied before an FDA advisory com- Many drugs that come to market have risks that outweigh
mittee and urged members to ban their benefits. Others, found to have risks only after they
the drug. The committee gave no
are approved, are left on the market for dangerously long
clear recommendation on how
the FDA should proceed; the final
periods of time. Find out which drugs are safe — and which
decision lies with Hamburg. you should avoid — with Public Citizen’s WorstPills.org and
In 2008, expert committees Worst Pills, Best Pills News.
from the American Diabetes As-
sociation (ADA) and the Euro- To subscribe to WorstPills.org, our online database, for
pean Association for the Study of only $15 a year, visit www.WorstPills.org, and type in
Diabetes, the European equiva- promotional code PCNJAWPA when prompted.
lent of the ADA, advised against
using Avandia, and the Saudi To subscribe to the monthly print edition of Worst Pills, Best
Arabian drug regulatory agency
Pills News for $10 a year, please fill out the form below.
has recently removed Avandia
from the market. The FDA has
ordered a black box warning to z Yes! I will subscribe to the print edition of Worst Pills,
be placed on Avandia (but not Best Pills News for only $10 for 12 monthly issues.
Actos) because of concerns about
heart attacks. all orders must be prepaid zcheck (make payable to public citizen)
charge to credit card: zVisa zmc zameX zdiscoVer
Juurlink led a study, published
in 2009, comparing adverse ef-
fects in 39,000 people who be- credit card number eXp. date
gan using either Avandia or Actos
between 2002 and 2008. Juurl- signature (as it appears on card)
ink and his colleagues found a
significantly higher risk of con- name 8-digit id no. (from mailing label)
gestive heart failure and death
from any cause in patients taking street address city/state/zip
Avandia. The authors estimated
that one additional hospitaliza-
e-mail address phone number
tion for heart failure would occur
annually for every 120 patients
For more information, call (800) 289-3787, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. EDT
EP4G5PC
prescribed Avandia rather than
Monday-Friday or e-mail member@citizen.org. Send order to:
Actos, and that one additional Public Citizen, P.O. Box 96978, Washington, D.C. 20090-6978
death would occur each year for
every 269 patients treated with
Avandia rather than Actos.
www.WorstPills.org
editor of Worst Pills, Best
Pills News.
14 July/August 2010 Public Citizen News

Spending Bill
Devotes $9 Billion
To Nuclear Loan
Guarantees
its share in the project more than
Public Citizen five-fold.
is battling to stop To block the STP, Public Citi-
loan guarantees zen appeared in April before the

Thanks for Your and nuclear

reactors.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission
(NRC) to contest the project’s en-
vironmental impact statement.
Leadership support By Dorry Samuels
Public Citizen, along with other
environmental groups, also filed
Public Citizen is proud to recognize new and renewing Torchbearers and A closed-door deal between comments with the NRC contest-
Partners in Citizenship. These donors provide a critical source of funding for President Barack Obama and ing the need for the plant and
our most important work.
Congress would put taxpayers have intervened in the licensing
In each issue of Public Citizen News, we will recognize new and renewing on the hook if companies invest- process.
donors to our leadership giving programs. This list includes donations that ing in nuclear reactors default on “There is no need for the plant.
were received in April and May 2010. their loans. The energy needs can be provid-
In the current version of the ed by renewables and energy ef-
Torchbearers Ailene S. Taylor 2010 Supplemental Appropria- ficiency for only a fraction of the
Peter G. Angelos Murray Tobak
tions Bill (H.R. 4899), $9 billion in cost,” said Tom “Smitty” Smith,
The Attias Family Foundation Robert Van Ry
Gibson Vance
loan guarantees (on top of $18.5 director of Public Citizen’s Texas
Jere Beasley
Allan W. Bernat Barry & Elisa Waxman billion already allocated by the office. “STP is a poster child for
Elspeth G. Bobbs J. Dix & Barbara Wayman Obama administration) would why we shouldn’t be giving nu-
Peter & Alice Broner Henry W.H. Weis be devoted to building new nu- clear loan guarantees. It has more
Philip Harnett Corboy, Jr. F.R. Wollaeger clear reactors that could include than tripled in cost before con-
Thomas Demetrio two reactors at the South Texas struction even begins and there
Jeffrey L. Dennis ParTners Project (STP) in Bay City, Tex- are no buyers for the energy.”
Richard Epstein David Arpi & Natalie Gubb
as, and two reactors in Calvert
Louis F. Farese Jr. William & Ilene Birge
Ronald & Mary Forthofer David & Kay Brennan Cliffs, Md. Even more loan
Jordan Fox Guy Coheleach But all hope is not lost — guarantees?
Andrew Friedman Marie L. Farr this measure has yet to pass Of the original $18.5 billion in
Paul Friedman Audrey Gerson Congress, as of press time. nuclear loan guarantees allo-
Marie Lee Gaillard Robert Ginsberg Public Citizen is fighting hard cated by the Obama administra-
Francis Hagan Barbara Grodd to stop the new reactors. Generat- tion, $8.3 billion will go to South-
Frances Harmon Clara Harari ern Company for two reactors
ing nuclear energy contaminates
John Irsak Wade C. Johnson
soil, air and water, and produces in Georgia. The remaining $10.2
David Irwin Stewart & Sherry Kahn
Milnor & Miriam Jones Charles L. Kerstein dangerous, long-lasting radioac- billion is widely expected to be
Sydney K. Kay Donald L. Knutson tive waste. offered to Unistar, a consortium
Shannon Liss-Riordan Edgar Lyngholm In addition, not only are cost of Constellation Energy and the
Donna Litowitz Janet Morrow overruns all too common in nucle- French government-owned util-
Royceann Mather Paul & Margaret Nelson ar reactor construction projects, ity Électricité de France, for two
Patricia McSweeney Michael Nimkoff but with the loan guarantees, tax- reactors in Calvert Cliffs, Md.
Thomas J. Methvin Carol D. Norberg The administration is request-
payers will end up footing the bill
Lisa Mezzetti David Pinkham Jr.
when costs skyrocket and inves- ing more money to finance
Nicholas & Barbara Millhouse Juliet Sabit
Wilma S. Mills Peter & Judith Sager tors can’t make up the difference. both the Calvert Cliffs reactor
Nancy & Herbert Milstein Michael Shannon Chances are high that companies and STP.
Victoria Nugent Robert Sherman will default — according to a May Further, even more govern-
Jean Nunes George & Sheryl Sinas 2003 Congressional Budget Of- ment (read: taxpayer) funds are
Wesley H. Quigley Andrew E. Stein fice report, the risk is “very high likely to be allocated to nuclear
Eugene & Jeanne Rondeau George & Glenna Stewart — well above 50 percent.” energy in the near future. Sens.
Mary M. Russell Margaret E. Truman
With the STP plans, for exam- John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lie-
Joseph Sellers J.P. Villedrouin
Mary B. Williams ple, no shovel has hit the ground, berman (I-Conn.) proposed $54
Marlowe Steege
Harold L. Stokes but costs have ballooned from billion in nuclear loan guarantees
around $5 billion to more than in their proposed American Pow-
To become a leader, contact Alice Butler in the $18 billion because developers er Act, which was released to the
development office at (202) 588-7753, or via e-mail underestimated costs. This proj- public on May 12. That’s a lot of
at abutler@citizen.org. ect is expected to be completed taxpayer money on the line.
by 2016 — still plenty of time for Call your representative and
costs to rise even higher. And senators at (202) 224-3121 and tell
this is for a project whose inves- them not to support taxpayer-fi-
tors have already flirted with the nanced nuclear power — or nucle-
idea of backing out; one reduced ar power in general.
Public Citizen News July/August 2010 15

FOR YOUR ENTERTAINMENT

Public Citizen Crossword By Sam Bellotto Jr.
Answers are on page 16.
ACROSS DOWN 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
1 Seize illegally 1 Implore
6 Runway safety org. 2 Motown music 13 14 15
9 St. Louis landmark 3 Not pretty
13 “Got it” in radio-speak 4 KO counter 16 17 18
14 Robbins of ice cream fame 5 Place a ban on
15 Senate investigation 6 Of a child 19 20 21
16 Deepwater Horizon event, 7 End of a drunk?
in the news 8 Part of an Israeli city 22 23 24
19 City on the Ouse 9 Atomic number 33
20 Japanese affirmative 10 Habitual 25 26 27 28 29
21 Facades 11 Radio-active trucker?
22 Zero in on 12 Miss-marked 30 31 32 33
24 Recyclable item 15 Vintage travel bag logo
25 Subject of the Kyoto Protocol 17 “___ lineman for the 34 35 36 37 38 39
30 Garlicky condiment county ...”
31 Treasure of mine 18 Off-the-record 40 41 42 43 44
32 Nuke 22 It merged with Time Warner
45 46 47 48
34 Art teacher’s deg. 23 Type of question
35 La Brea attractions 25 Shower items
49 50
39 Golf phenom Michelle 26 Unwilling
40 Fax cover-sheet letters 27 Former press secretary 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58
42 Fed. drugbusters Fleischer
43 Downsizing phase 28 Kind of situation 59 60 61
45 Off ___ (led to 16 Across) 29 On one’s way
49 Dedicatory words 30 Org. for court figures 62 63 64
50 Grand Central arrival 33 St. Bernard’s burden
51 In abundance 36 “Why, thou owest God ___”: 65 66 67
55 Place to pay and stay Shak.
56 Cycle starter 37 Election Day state color
59 They contribute to 25 Across 38 Kennedy press secretary
62 Ramshackle Pierre 48 Interstate division 56 Boeing Co. customer
63 Test for master’s entrants 41 Phrase used to describe 51 Taj Mahal city 57 First name on the moon
64 Letters without envelopes feel-good laws 52 Hyde Park baby buggy 58 Ocean oasis
65 Bombay housemaid 44 Mark a ballot 53 “___ Smile Be Your Umbrella” 60 Starbucks dispenser
66 Former Border Patrol agcy. 46 Cox in “RoboCop” 54 Bear who is smarter 61 Pierre’s pal
67 Part of NRA 47 Perennial flowers than average

Public Citizen Recommends ...

‘A
Presidency
in Peril’
By Robert
Kuttner;
Chelsea Green;
$25
The Obama administration
has had an opportunity to make
strong progressive change but
thus far has failed to do so.
In “A Presidency in Peril,”
Robert Kuttner, co-editor of The
American Prospect and distin-
guished senior fellow at progres-
sive think tank Demos, critiques
the administration’s missteps
— whether they were policies
developed with influence from
To order books, contact the
publisher or visit your local
bookstore or library.
Wall Street (financial reform) or
insurance companies
(health reform).
President Barack Obama needs
to get a little partisan and stand
up for the American people, says
Kuttner, who spoke about his
new book at an April event held
at Public Citizen’s headquarters
in Washington, D.C.
However, after laying out a
sharp critique, Kuttner ends the
book optimistically.
“Despite a year of disappoint-
ment and disillusion, we have
three things on our side,” Kutt-
ner writes. “We have reality—
most people are not experienc-
ing the economic recovery being
enjoyed on Wall Street. We have
a clever but empty opposition—
a right-wing Republican Party
offering nothing to solve this
severe crisis. And, in Barack
Obama, we have a president who
has only begun to realize his full
potential as a leader. Whether he
does will be a test of his charac-
ter—and ours.”
— Bridgette Blair
‘Casino Jack and the
United States of Money’
Written and directed by Alex Gibney;
for more information, visit www.
takepart.com/casinojack
Jack Abramoff was not just the
ultimate Washington lobbyist
but a political “fixer” on a grand
scale — that is, until he became
the poster child for the very
worst aspects of
political life: the
buying and sell-
ing of influence
over lawmakers.
The docu-
mentary follows
Abramoff’s early escapades with
high-profile conservatives to his
big-time fleecing of American
Indian tribes and his downfall.
With interviews from reporters,
watchdogs, former Abramoff
colleagues and ex-congressional
staffers, filmmaker Alex Gibney
connects the many ugly dots of
Abramoff’s sordid career.
One of the choicest moments
in the film — and there are many
— is when one of Abramoff’s
former allies said that he was so
slick, he could talk a dog off a
meat truck.
— Barbara Holzer
‘The DeMarco Factor’
By Michael Pertschuk; Vanderbilt
University Press; $24.95
Vinny DeMarco has made
dreams of social justice come
true. The relentless and tireless
public interest advocate has
won against the gun lobby and
big tobacco companies, and has
obtained health care coverage
for Maryland’s uninsured.
In this book, author Michael
Pertschuk, former chairman of
the Federal Trade Commission,
details DeMarco’s history and
provides an insider’s look at
public advocacy. The book offers
lessons in reaching out to media,
framing messages, organizing
communities and securing tech-
nical and financial assistance.
It promises to inspire all those
who seek to fight for the greater
good.
— Arlene Tonoff
16 July/August 2010 Public Citizen News

WIN! House Passes Election Spending Disclosure Bill

By Joe Newman who donate $1,000 or more for eign corporations from paying when it comes to spending on
This summer, Congress took its campaign ads. directly for such ads. elections.
first steps to counter the U.S. Su- Craig Holman, Public Citizen’s The Senate is expected to vote Public Citizen maintains that
preme Court’s disastrous Citizens government affairs lobbyist and on the DISCLOSE Act before the Congress must pass the Share-
United ruling, which opened the expert on campaign finance re- end of July. holder Protection Act (H.R. 4790)
floodgates for unlimited corpo- form, said the measure closes Its fate there is uncertain be- to ensure that corporations do
rate spending on elections. gaping loopholes in current law cause of fierce opposition from not spend shareholders’ money
The U.S. House of Representa- that allow corporations to hide Republican leaders and efforts to on elections against their wishes.
tives in June passed the DISCLOSE their campaign spending by fun- defeat the bill by the U.S. Cham- And lawmakers must pass the
Act (Democracy Is Strengthened neling their money through front ber of Commerce and other big Fair Elections Now Act (H.R. 1826
by Casting Light On Spending in groups. business lobbyists. and S. 752) to ensure that candi-
Elections), a measure that would “Revealing the funders behind In May, Holman testified about dates who do not have corporate
require corporations, unions and these groups is perhaps the most the need for the DISCLOSE Act backing have a foundation to run
other organizations to identify valuable tool voters can use in before the House Administration viable campaigns.
how much they spend on elec- evaluating the merits of the cam- Committee. But even if those measures be-
tions and from where the money paign messages that are about to “Today, corporate lobbyists come law, they won’t be enough,
is coming. besiege them,” Holman said. can walk into a lobbying meet- said Public Citizen President
Election-related advertise- The act also would ban major ing carrying a big stick to intimi- Robert Weissman. Ultimately,
ments purchased by these groups government contractors and for- date lawmakers,” Holman said. there needs to be a constitutional
would have to list the top five “A healthy democracy is going amendment specifying that for-
donors to their election-activity to have a hard time surviving profit corporations are not enti-
accounts and contain a stand-by- Crossword Answers this corporate onslaught without tled to First Amendment protec-
your-ad disclaimer, in which an (from page 15) meaningful measures to mitigate tions, except for freedom of the
organization’s top official and its the corrupting role of unlimited press, he said.
biggest funder must declare on U S U R P F A A A R C H
corporate money.” “Democracy is rule of the peo-
R O G E R I R V P R O B E
camera that they agree with the G U L F O I L D I S A S T E R While Public Citizen lobbied ple — real, live humans, not arti-
content of the ad and are respon- E L Y H A I V E N E E R S hard to get the DISCLOSE Act ficial entity corporations,” Weiss-
sible for its airing. A I M A T C A N through the House, the measure man said. “Now it’s time for the
Under the DISCLOSE Act, G L O B A L W A R M I
N G
by itself falls far short of repair- people to reassert their rights.”
A I O L I O R E C
O O K
groups would have to iden- B F A T A R P I T S W I E ing the damage done by the Citi-
tify their major donors. In the A T T N D E A A X I N G zens United v. Federal Election
House-passed version of the S H O R E D R I L L I N G Commission ruling.
In the Next Issue ...
bill, that means disclosure of
T O A T R A I N
A P L E N T Y I N N U N I
In that Jan. 21 decision, the Su-
donors of $600 or more for cam- G R E E N H O U S E G A S E S preme Court ruled 5-4 that cor- Public Citizen’s 2009-2010
paign ads, while in the Senate R A T T Y G R E E M A I L porations should have the First congressional scorecard
bill, it means disclosure of those A M A H I N S R I F L E
Amendment rights of people

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