OCTOBER 1996 · VOLUME 17 · NUMBER 10
B E H I N D T H E L I N E S
OCTOBER 1996 · VOLUME 17 · NUMBER 10
B E H I N D T H E L I N E S
IN A STUNNING VICTORY for a conservative-liberal coalition against corporate welfare, the U.S. House of Representatives voted in September against reauthorization of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC).
OPIC is a federal agency which provides political risk insurance to U.S. corporations investing overseas, providing guarantees against the risk of expropriation, political violence or currency inconvertability. It also provides direct loans and loan guarantees for overseas operators.
The reauthorization would have given the agency an additional five-year lease on life, and doubled the amount of money it is permitted to loan and insure.
Opponents of the OPIC reauthorization were led by Representative John Kasich, R-Ohio, head of the House Budget Committee and liberals such as the Vermont independent Bernie Sanders.
OPIC defenders deny the agency provides corporate welfare. The agency is a self-sustaining program which takes in more in payments from beneficiaries than it spends in administrative costs, according to OPIC President Ruth Harkin.
But critics dispute Harkin's income figures. And, they note, default on OPIC loans or filings on the insurance claims could amount to a major drain on the federal treasury (as of September 1995, the agency had $4 billion in outstanding loans and $10 billion in outstanding insurance).
The OPIC vote, says Janice Shields of the Corporate Welfare Project, "is the first successful attack on what is a blatant corporate welfare program. We hope to continue to eliminate other such programs."
Even the OPIC victory is tenuous, however. The Clinton administration is seeking to secure reauthorization before Congress recesses, and, assuming it is returned to office, is sure to make reauthorization a top priority in 1997 if it fails this year.
While acknowledging they may not be able to hold their victory in total, OPIC opponents hope at least to prevent the increase in OPIC funding which the administration has sought.
Labor Riot Down Under
LABOR UNION MEMBERS, aboriginal people and students rocked the Australian capital of Canberra in August with demonstrations and riots in protest of anti-union labor legislation and an austerity budget announced by the conservative Liberal-National government.
On August 19, 1,000 protesters broke away from an estimated 25,000-person demonstration and stormed Australia's Parliament House. They smashed through a wall of police and rioted inside the parliament building. Thousands of workers in other cities also demonstrated, as unions closed down industrial facilities to enable workers to join the protests.
The next day, at a smaller rally, aboriginal activists burned an Australian flag and violence erupted again as approximately 150 aboriginals engaged in a 20-minute street fight with police.
The labor movement denounces the labor legislation as union-busting, saying it is designed to replace collective bargaining agreements with individual worker agreements. Labor is also upset with the public sector layoffs that are a consequence of the government's move toward a balanced budget.
The announced budget of the new Liberal-National government, headed by Prime Minister John Howard, would cut the government deficit by nearly half. Among the cuts are deep reductions in spending on aboriginal programs, education and programs for the unemployed.
The budget's many critics said the budget did little more than penalize the working class and poor, as well as other vulnerable groups like aborigines.
"The aim of the government's legislative changes is to crack down on people who have committed the sin of not being able to get a job," Reuters reported Greens Senator Bob Brown as saying.
Radioactive Skies
A NEW INTERNATIONAL STANDARD for air shipments of plutonium, approved in September by the board of governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), could lead to catastrophic releases of radioactivity in an air transport accident, the Nuclear Control Institute and Greenpeace charge. The groups announced a campaign to demand a ban on plutonium air shipments and to call on en-route nations to bar plutonium flights over their territories.
"Despite growing public concerns about air transport safety and the recognized toxicity of plutonium, tens of tons of plutonium could be shipped by air in containers not designed to survive a severe crash," the groups said in a joint statement.
Paul Leventhal, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Nuclear Control Institute, says that a study conducted for the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) shows that the proposed plutonium shipping cask will be tested to withstand far less severe crash and fire conditions than the "black box" package for the flight data and voice recorders aboard the aircraft.
"The entire process is a fraud," says Leventhal. "The IAEA set out to establish a stricter standard for shipping plutonium by air than by sea. Now, after a decade of deliberations, the IAEA is presenting us with the status quo ante -- a ridiculously weak air-crash standard that industry still cannot meet."
-- Robert Weissman and Russell Mokhiber