CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR– Besides chest-thumping fourth-quarter earnings, Goldman Sachs also announced its bonus pool on Thursday. At $16.2 billion, the total is 20 percent lower than the firm’s 2007 level but still amounts to an average of just under $500,000 per employee. If you’re picky, it’s only $498,000. Since it’s an average, a few people will rake in a lot, … Read More
DAILY MAIL– Drug companies manipulated the World Health Organisation into downgrading its definition of a pandemic so they could cash in on a swine flu outbreak, it is claimed. An inquiry heard yesterday that the WHO allegedly softened its criteria for declaring a H1N1 flu pandemic last spring – just weeks before announcing there was a worldwide outbreak. Critics said … Read More
TIMES OF INDIA– Even as questions are being raised about whether the swine flu scare was exaggerated to benefit pharma companies, evidence has surfaced that several members of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) vaccine board which pushed countries to buy the H1N1 vaccine have had significant ties with pharma companies. This fact, which is bound to raise issues of conflict … Read More
WASHINGTON INDEPEDENT– Employees of the CIA-connected private security corporation Blackwater diverted hundreds of weapons, including more than 500 AK-47 assault rifles, from a U.S. weapons bunker in Afghanistan intended to equip Afghan policemen, according to an investigation by the Senate Armed Services Committee. On at least one occasion, an individual claiming to work for the company evidently signed for a … Read More
NY DAILY NEWS– The embattled developer of three towers at Ground Zero wants a bailout, a report says. In a desperate bid to complete the long-stalled towers, Larry Silverstein has reached out to the Port Authority for financial help, The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday. Silverstein is requesting cash for at least two of the three planned office towers, sources … Read More
