-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.aci.net/kalliste/ Click Here: <A HREF="http://www.aci.net/kalliste/">The Home Page of J. Orlin Grabbe</A> ----- World Trade Organization Clinton Sucks Buchanan Wind Uses WTO to garner labor votes for Gore. Bill Clinton, the US president, yesterday threatened to plunge the World Trade Organisation into turmoil by demanding it should incorporate core labour standards in trade agreements and eventually use sanctions to enforce them. Mr Clinton's call, on his arrival at the WTO ministerial meeting in Seattle, went much further than existing US policy. It will anger developing countries - four-fifths of the WTO's membership - which condemn as disguised protectionism western efforts to link trade with labour standards. Supachai Panitchpakdi, Thailand's deputy prime minister and director-general designate of the WTO, said having trade sanctions on labour rights in the organisation would be "highly detrimental". Mr Clinton's proposal could frustrate the launch of a trade round and cause some developing countries to walk away from the table. However, US officials quickly emphasised that Mr Clinton had only been talking about US long-term goals. "He was expressing an ultimate goal not an immediate negotiating objective in the WTO." The president's remarks appeared aimed at satisfying US labour unions, led by the AFL-CIO, whose support for vice-president Al Gore and other Democratic candidates at next year's elections is considered crucial. About 25,000 union demonstrators marched through Seattle on Tuesday to demand the WTO should enforce labour standards. They were by far the most numerous of the protesters, who ranged from environmentalists to human rights and consumer activists. Much of the city centre was plunged into chaos when they took to the streets but calm returned yesterday. Mr Clinton told a Seattle newspaper: "What we ought to do first of all is to adopt the US position on having a working group on labour within the WTO, and then that working group should develop these core labour standards, and then they ought to be part of every trade agreement, and ultimately I would favour a system in which sanctions would come for violating any provision of a trade agreement." Until now, the US has suggested only that the WTO should create a working group to analyse links between trade and core labour standards such as prohibition of child and prison labour. Many developing, and some industrialised, countries say even this limited proposal is unacceptable. Britain was yesterday trying to head off a confrontation over labour rights by trying to rally developing countries behind a compromise proposal. Based on an EU proposal, it calls for the World Bank to join the WTO and the International Labour Organisation in setting up a standing joint committee on labour standards. The Financial Times, December 2, 1999 Digital Society Murdoch Tells Governments to Get Off Internet Empowering ordinary people. OXFORD, England (Reuters) - Media tycoon Rupert Murdoch sealed his conversion to the Internet Wednesday, painting a picture of a bright technological future hampered only by natural disasters and -- worse still -- meddling governments. He told Oxford University students in a lecture that the Internet was a revolutionary liberator of the individual that would sweep away rather than deepen social inequality and meet all our needs. The head of News Corp., who until this year had a cautious approach to business on the World Wide Web, said the valuation of Internet companies such as Yahoo and AOL was ``sometimes mystifying.'' But he said such high values were easier to grasp if one believed, as he appeared to, that the Internet's value would grow exponentially once enough people were online. ``I am not among those who fear that new technology will widen the gap between rich and poor,'' he told students at the university where he studied -- with, he confessed, a bust of Lenin in his rooms -- in the long-ago 1950s. ``We are not headed to a world in which the rich will have access to computers and related technology while the poor muddle along computerless. The new technologies are becoming widely available.'' Murdoch said the Internet empowers ordinary people by giving them knowledge others previously had hoarded. He predicted a strong future for new and existing trusted brand names that people, burdened by unparalleled choice, would turn to for the information and goods they needed. Hoping to ensure his News Corp. is among them, Murdoch this year entered a major partnership with Japan's Softbank Corp. to invest in Internet companies, signaling he was embracing the revolution. ``Take A Holiday At Your Peril'' The 68-year-old, who saw the maintenance or mechanical preservation of the brain as the next achievable challenge, said the new era had come upon the business world with blinding speed. ``In my own business, change is so rapid that you take a holiday at your peril. You might return ... to find a changed world,'' he said. Murdoch predicted that as much change would be squeezed into the next two to three decades as in the last 200 years, and suggested governments, who would face growing problems in tax collection, should embrace change, sell it to their people, and stand aside. ``Governments will have to get out of the way of change,'' he said. ``Change is not only accelerating, its direction and consequences are becoming less predictable. Central planning is a dangerous game.'' He said technology would enable us to feed the world and raise living standards all round, if governments allowed it to. ``The only 'social exclusion' we will see in the coming millennium will be the result of wrong-headed government policies.'' The Australian-turned-U.S. citizen has faced hostility in Britain and other countries for his powerful hold on newspapers, television and other media. Thrice-married Murdoch called for a return to family values and attacked continental European states -- which he said had created no net new private-sector jobs in 20 years -- for sneering at the U.S. model of economic success. He told reporters he still thought the Euro currency would be bad for Britain, but was trying to keep an open mind. Yahoo News, December 2, 1999 Models Elite Says Remorse Is Out of Fashion 15 is a very good year. THE Elite modelling agency yesterday proved that there are fashions in shame and penitence. An inconclusive series of resignations, re-instatements, charges and counter-charges showed that its disgraced French executives are only too keen to return to "business as usual" after a BBC exposé of the fashion world. The £60 million agency, which represents some of the world's most beautiful women, is still reeling after a BBC documentary showed the dark underside of modelling. It alleged that underage girls came under heavy pressure to have sex and take drugs. Gerald Marie, the president of Elite Europe, was shown in a hostess bar in Milan, where he offered a model one million lire to sleep with him. He was also seen telling an undercover reporter that he hoped to have sex with several of the contestants in the Elite Model Look contest, where the average age is 15. "How are you, then . . . boom," he says, describing his approach. "We only keep 15, the 15 best ones and then . . ." At this point, he rubbed his hands together and makes an unmistakeable grinding gesture. Xavier Moreau, the president of the Elite Model Look contest was shown making racist remarks. Although both men promptly stepped down after the programme was shown and M Marie acknowledged responsibility for his words, he now seems weary of grovelling and has gone on the counter-attack, accusing the BBC of fabrication and the French press of distortion. The board members and principal shareholders of Elite Europe asked both men to resume their posts, an invitation which they were evidently keen to accept. There is only the small matter of public perception to consider - and the views of Elite's founder-chairman, John Casablancas, who heads Elite Model Management in New York. Mr Casablancas offered an "unreserved apology" for the behaviour of the executives, which he called shocking and unacceptable. M Marie's Paris office yesterday stressed that Mr Casablancas, as an American, had to deal with the "puritanism" of the public at home, whereas in France views on sexual morality were less rigid. M Marie, said Michelle Marchand, a spokesman, did not come under Mr Casablancas's authority and intended to return to his position once an "investigation" into the allegations had been made. She said: "M Marie can return when he likes, it's up to him. For the time being, he has decided to stay out, but when all is clear and clean, he will of course come back. M Marie is Elite Europe and he has the support of his board." He had not, she added, committed any criminal offences and therefore should not be punished. She said: "The programme was very misleading and contained many fabrications." The defiant attitude of Elite Europe contrasts strongly with the mood in America, where Mr Casablancas cannot afford to give the impression of nonchalence. If the Elite Europe investigation confirmed that M Marie had used the words and gestures attributed to him, said Mr Casablancas, he should go permanently. He said: "I may not be in a position to dictate, but if the majority of the Elite Europe shareholders decide to maintain M Marie and I felt this was incorrect, I would resign." The London Telegraph, December 2, 1999 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soapboxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory', with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. 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