31 July 2002
MORE ON US FOOD SAFETY STANDARDS, REGULATION, AND CORPORATE GOVERNANCE
items 3 - 5 from THE WEEKLY SPIN by PR WATCH (www.prwatch.org)
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1. Conagra Resold Rejected Meat
ConAgra executives knowingly resold about 80 tons of meat in 2000 that
South Korean customs agents had quarantined because they said it contained
listeria, a potentially lethal bacteria...executives at one of the world's
largest food conglomerates sold it to other countries with lower standards
than South Korea's - including the United States...company e-mails trace
the worldwide journey of the beef...The first e-mail informing a ConAgra
official about the listeria issue, dated May 15, 2000, was titled: "bacteria
- THIS COULD BE A PROBLEM."..."Once the company knows the meat is contaminated,
they should process it to make it safe before they sell it,"..."Otherwise
they're attempting to get one over on their customers, and it puts consumers
at risk."..."Sometimes you just do what's right, and companies don't seem
to want to do that anymore."....
Full Story:
http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36%257E53%257E759303%257E,00.html
2. EPA Told To Restore Whistle-Blower's Duties
The Labor Department has ordered the Environmental Protection Agency
to reinstate one of its former investigators to "ombudsman-related duties"
after concluding that the EPA had barred him from such activities in retaliation
for a series of complaints he made about the agency...determined that an
EPA policy analyst "suffered a continuing pattern of discrimination" and
that there was "no evidence of a valid reason for his removal from ombudsman
support duties." Moreover, the agency said, "the complainant had been prohibitedfrom
performing [those duties] in reprisal for performing a 'too effective job'
in support of the Ombudsman Program."....
Full Story:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16247-2002Jul16.html
3. MORE JUNK FROM THE JUNKMAN
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,58760,00.html
PR Watch has exposed the antics of [former Monsanto lobbyist] Steven
("the Junkman") Milloy more times than we can stand to remember [see The
Trashman Speweth: item 2 on the following page http://www.prwatch.org/prwissues/1999Q4/avery.html]
as he flacks for the tobacco industry, speaks up for asbestos, and attacks
environmentalists as "terrorists" and "fear profiteers." Nowadays he writes
a column for Fox News, where he is helping publicize a PR stunt concocted
by the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH), an industry front
group that is threatening to sue Whole Foods for baking bread which (like
all bread) contains trace carcinogens that ACSH says are harmless. (Milloy
and ACSH haven't always been this chummy. ACSH director Elizabeth Whelan,
who disagrees with Milloy's defense of secondhand cigarette smoke, once
accused him of "junking all science.")
SOURCE: Fox "News" Channel, July 26, 2002
More web links related to this story are available at:
http://www.prwatch.org/spin/July_2002.html#1027656000
4. ETHICAL HELP FOR WORLDCOM
http://www.odwyerpr.com/0725apco.htm
The APCO PR firm, which is currently representing WorldCom in its ongoing
bankruptcy scandal, has hired Tim Croasdaile as a senior vice president.
Croasdaile formerly chaired the National Investor Relations Institute's
ethics committee. He should fit right in at APCO, which has worked previously
to set up deceptive front groups for clients such as the tobacco industry
and Russian robber baron Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
SOURCE: O'Dwyer's PR Daily, July 25, 2002
More web links related to this story are available at:
http://www.prwatch.org/spin/July_2002.html#1027569600
5. JUDICIAL WATCH'S "PR STUNT"
http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAWIEQK44D.html
The White House allegedly threatened a Judicial Watch process server
with arrest while he was trying to provide legal notification of a lawsuit
to Vice President Dick Cheney. The conservative organization Judicial Watch
has brought a lawsuit against Cheney for fraudulent accounting practices
at Halliburton Corporation while Cheney was the company's chief executive.
AP reports Cheney's communications counselor Mary Matalin called Judicial
Watch's announcement about the process server a "PR stunt," saying that
the lawsuit should have been delivered to Cheney's private attorney, Terrence
O'Donnell of the Washington law firm Williams & Connolly. But Judicial
Watch president Tom Fitton told Reuters, "You don't serve lawsuits on lawyers,
you serve them on defendants." Judicial Watch says it has successfully
served lawsuits on Bill Clinton, Al Gore, and Hillary Clinton while theywere
in the White House.
SOURCE: Associated Press, July 26, 2002; Reuters, July 26, 2002
More web links related to this story are available at:
http://www.prwatch.org/spin/July_2002.html#1027656001