textfiles/politics/CENSORSHIP/censor87.txt

             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                            THE INFORMATION MONOPOLY

          The rapidly increasing centralization of media ownership raises
     critical questions about the public's access to a diversity of
     opinion. Further, and perhaps not surprisingly, the impact of this
     monopolization of information on a free society continues to be
     ignored by the mass media.
          In 1982, when media expert Ben Bagdikian completed research for
     his book, THE MEDIA MONOPOLY, he found that 50 corporations controlled
     half or more of the media business. By December of 1986, when he
     finished a revision for a second edition, the 50 had shrunk to 29.
     About half a year later, when he wrote an article for EXTRA, the
     number was down to 26.
          He also warned that a number of serious Wall Street analysts of
     the media are predicting that by the 1990s a half dozen giant firms
     will control most of our media.
          Bagdikian notes that of the 1700 daily papers, 98 percent are
     local monopolies and fewer than 15 corporations control most of the
     country's circulation. A handful of firms have most of the magazine
     business, with Time, Inc. alone accounting for about 40 percent of
     that industry's revenues.  The three networks, Capital Cities/ABC,
     CBS, and NBC, still have majority access to the television audience,
     and most of the book business is controlled by fewer than a dozen
     companies, with major categories like paperback and trade books
     dominated by still fewer firms.
          Even worse, this situation is exacerbated by the conflict of
     interest inherent in interlocking boards of directors.  A earlier
     study, by Peter Dreier and Steven Weinberg, found interlocking
     directorates in major newspaper chains like Gannett which shared
     directors with Merrill Lynch, Standard Oil of Ohio, 20th Century Fox,
     Kerr-McGee, McDonnell Douglas Aircraft, McGraw-Hill, Eastern Airlines,
     Phillips Petroleum, Kellog Company, and the New York Telephone Co.
          The most influential newspaper in America, THE NEW YORK TIMES,
     was interlocked with Merck, Morgan Guaranty Trust, Bristol Myers,
     Charter Oil, Johns Manville, American Express, Bethlehem Steel, IBM,
     Scott Paper, Sun Oil, and First Boston Corporation.
          Time, Inc.'s interlocks included Mobil Oil, AT&T, American
     Express, Firestone Tire & Rubber Company, Mellon National Corporation,
     Atlantic Richfield, Xerox, General Dynamics, and most of the major
     international banks.
          Bagdikian's warning is ominous: "... a shrinking number of large
     media corporations now regard monopoly, oligopoly, and historic levels
     of profit as not only normal, but as their earned right.  In the
     process, the usual democratic expectations for the media -- diversity
     of ownership and ideas -- have disappeared as the goal of official
     policy and, worse, as a daily experience of a generation of American
     readers and viewers."
          Equally disturbing, the prevailing concern with the bottom line
     coupled with the traditional publishers' tendency to avoid controversy
     fosters wide-spread self-censorship among writers, journalists,
     editors, and news directors.

          SOURCES: EXTRA!, June 1987, "The 26 corporations that own our
     media," pp 1, 4, and MULTINATIONAL MONITOR, September 1987, "The Media
     Brokers," pp 7-12, both by Ben Bagdikian; UTNE READER, Jan/Feb 1988,
     "Censorshop in Publishing," by Lynette Lamb.


          Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"

        THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND ITS CONTRA-DRUG CONNECTION

     Though mounting evidence, with substantive and alarming implications
in terms of U.S. foreign policy and Reagan administration propriety,
pointed to a large-scale contra/CIA drug smuggling network, the major U.S.
media largely underreported it in 1987.
     Testimony by convicted drug smugglers as well as private citizens for
CBS's "West 57th Street" program, the Christic Institute's federal lawsuit
under the RICO statutes, and before congressional committees provided a
startling picture of large scale drug trafficking under the auspices of the
U.S. government/contra supply network.
     According to the Christic Institute (a Washington, D.C., based inter-
faith legal foundation), "Contra narcotics smuggling stretches from cocaine
plantations in Columbia, to dirt airstrips in Costa Rica, to pseudo-seafood
companies in Miami, and finally, to the drug-ridden streets of our
society."  The Christic Institute's investigation, sanctioned by the U.S.
Attorney's Office in Miami, provided evidence supporting allegations that
1) a major "guns-for-drugs" operation existed between North, Central, and
South America that helped finance the contra war; 2) the contra leadership
received direct funding and other support from major narcotics traffickers;
3) some contra leaders were directly involved in drug trafficking; 4) U.S.
government funds for the contras went to known narcotics dealers; and 5)
the CIA helped Miami-based drug traffickers smuggle their illicit cargo
into the U.S. in exchange for their help in arming the contras.
     Revelations of this U.S. contra/drug network first surfaced in 1986
when the Christic Institute files suit against the U.S. government alleging
complicity in the 1984 La Penca bombing in which eight journalists were
killed and dozens of others wounded.  The original lawsuit named 29 men
associated with the contra supply network and alleged to have ties to the
drug trafficking network.  Among those charged with complicity in the La
Penca bombing were ex-CIA and military officers including Oliver North,
Richard Secord, Albert Hakim, Theodore Shackley, Thomas Clines, and Rob
Owens.
     The Christic Institute's case cited evidence such as sworn statements
about their missions for the contra resupply network by Michael Tolliver
and Gary Betzner, Senator John Kerry's subcommittee's report, sworn
testimony by reputed ex-CIA "asset" and money launderer Ramon Milian-
Rodriguez, and numerous other documents.
     Despite the extraordinary allegations and supporting evidence, the
major U.S. media did not commit the resources necessary to explore those
charges and their validity.  In fact, few media even made significant note
of Attorney General Edwin Meese's efforts to stop the Miami-based
contra/CIA drug connection investigation.
     The U.S. Media owe the American public better investigative reporting
so that we can "just say no" not only to drugs, but also to government
complicity, impropriety, and possibly illegality.

SOURCES:  THE CHRISTIC INSTITUTE SPECIAL REPORT, November, 1987, "The
Contra-Drug Connection," by the Christic Institute, pp 1-12; NEWSDAY,
6/28/87, "Witness: Contras Got Drug Cash," by Knut Royce, pp 4, 15; THE
NATION, 9/5/87, "How the Drug Czar Got Away," by Martin A. Lee, pp 189-192;
IN THESE TIMES, 4/15/87, "CIA, contras hooked on drug money," by Vince
Bielski and Dennis Bernstein, pp 3, 10.





             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


         SECRET DOCUMENTS REVEAL DANGER OF WORLDWIDE NUCLEAR ACCIDENTS

          On March 11, 1987, NBC broadcast a documentary, "Nuclear Power:
     In France It Works."  It could have passed for a lengthy nuclear power
     commercial. Missing from anchorman Tom Brokaw's introduction was the
     fact that NBC's owner, General Electric, is America's second largest
     nuclear power salesman and third largest producer of nuclear weapons
     systems.
          One month after the NBC documentary, there were accidents at two
     French nuclear installations, injuring seven workers. THE CHRISTIAN
     SCIENCE MONITOR wrote of a "potentially explosive debate" in France,
     with new polls showing a third of the French public opposing nuclear
     power. That story was not reported on NBC News.
          NBC's policy which produced the "nuclear power works" commercial
     and censored the news about two nuclear accidents is typical of the
     international silence about reactor incidents which help explain the
     industry's undeserved reputation for safety.
          The lid to Pandora's nuclear safety box was partially opened last
     year when the West German weekly DER SPIEGEL published 48 of over 250
     secret nuclear reactor accdient reports compiled by the International
     Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The report of previously secret IAEA
     documents was translated into English for the first time and published
     in David Brower's EARTH ISLAND JOURNAL.
          Some of the "incidents" you never heard about: February 1983 --
     Bulgaria's Kozluduj nuclear power plant lost pressure in the primary
     cooling system; June 1983 -- three of four pumps failed in Argentina's
     Embalse nuclear plant; August 1984 -- the primary cooling system in
     West Germany's Bruno Leuschner plant in Greifswald burst; October 1984
     -- engineers at the Chooz A reactor on the French-Belgian border
     discovered numerous "breaks" and "broken welding seams" on the
     critical control rods of the 17-year-old reactor; 1984 --
     Czechoslovakia's Jaslovska Bohunice reactor spilled radioactive
     coolant into two reactor containment units due to the failure of 72
     defective bolts in the circulation system; January 1985 -- at
     Pakistan's Kanupp reactor, radioactive heavy water leaked while being
     transferred through a rubber hose; February 1985 -- during a fuel rod
     experiment in East Germany's Rheinsberg reactor, a measuring device
     stuck into the center of the reactor caused a leak of radioactive
     water; April 1985 -- radioactive water and sludge swamped two rooms of
     an auxiliary building at Belgium's Tihange reactor; December 1985 --
     emergency power in Canada's Pickerikng reactor failed in three
     separate units for five days.
          DER SPIEGEL said that in several of these previously unreported
     nuclear slip-ups "a meltdown was a real possibility." Worse yet for
     Americans, DER SPIEGEL found that human error "is most advanced in
     North America ... sometimes with hair-raising results." A survey of
     official records since the Three Mile Island reactor meltdown in 1979
     shows there have been more than 23,000 mishaps at U.S. reactors -- and
     the number are increasing. In 1986, there  were more than 3,000
     reported incidents -- up 24 percent over 1984. The chilling
     conclusion: "Humanity has been sitting on a powderkeg as a result of
     reliance on the 'peaceful' use of the atom."

          SOURCES: EARTH ISLAND JOURNAL, Summer, 1987, "Secet Documents
     Reveal Nuclear Accidents Worldwide," by Gar Smith with Hans
     Hollitscher, pp 21-24; EXTRA, June 1987, "Nuclear Broadcasting
     Company," p 5.







             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


       REAGAN'S MANIA FOR SECRECY: GOVERNMENT DECISIONS WITHOUT DEMOCRACY

          On December 3, 1986, President Ronald Reagan signed Public Law
     99-494 proclaiming 1987 "The Year of the Reader." The blatant
     hypocrisy of that act was clear throughout 1987 as the Reagan
     administration outdid itself in its efforts to control, interpret,
     manipulate, disinform, and censor all forms of information.
          Typical of the Reagan administration's efforts to control its own
     destiny and the nation's history was the Justice Department memorandum
     filed in a lawsuit that could enable Reagan to control the history of
     his involvement in the Iran/contra scandal. The administration is
     seeking to overturn a 1986 Federal court ruling which limited Nixon's
     right to block the release of his White House papers. The Justice
     Department memorandum would allow Nixon to withdraw any documentation
     he thought should be supressed. In effect, Nixon would be in control
     of U.S. history between 1968 and 1974. If Nixon wins, it will pave the
     way for Reagan to control U.S. history from l980 to 1988.
          While alarming, this is merely the tip of the iceberg when it
     comes to Reagan's mania for secrecy. Following are just three groups
     that tried to warn us about what was happening; the nation's leading
     press didn't think their stories were that important.
          PEOPLE FOR THE AMERICAN WAY -- A report titled "Government
     Secrecy: Decisions Without Democracy," published in December 1987,
     provides more than 100 pages of well-documented charges about the
     growing secrecy system and its dangers to American democracy. The
     report "tells the story of the institutionalization of secrecy
     throughout the federal government ... the story of unprecedented
     controls on information, not only on defense and foreign policy issues
     where legitimate secrets do need to be protected but on a host of
     topics vital to our daily lives, from toxic wastes to occupational
     hazards, from new technology to the health of our children."
          THE REPORTERS COMMITTEE FOR FREEDOM OF THE PRESS -- In March,
     1987, the Reporters Committee issued a "FYI Media Alert" about how the
     Reagan administration and its supporters restrict public and media
     access to government information and intrude on editorial freedom.
     The 50-page report, retroactive to March 1981, lists 135 specific
     actions, including threatened prosecution of the press for publishing
     classified information; expulsion of foreign journalists; proposed
     restrictive amendments to the Freedom of Information Act; proposed and
     actual use of lie detectors, and many other cases.
          THE AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION -- The ALA released its 1987
     updated "Less Access to Less Information By and About the U.S.
     Government: IX," covering 1987. The chronology, which was started in
     1981, provides a damning indictment of Reagan administration efforts
     to "restrict and privatize government information" which has led to
     significantly limited access to public documents and statistics. The
     new 1987 report adds 30 pages and 78 specific items to the case for
     Reagan's mania for secrecy.

          SOURCES: THE NATION, 5/23/87, "History Deleted," pp 669-670;
     GOVERNMENT DECISIONS WITHOUT DEMOCRACY, December 1987, by People For
     The American Way, pp 1-104+; FYI MEDIA ALERT 1987, March 1987, "The
     Reagan Administration & The News Media," by The Reporters Committee
     for Freedom of the Press, pp 1-50; THE AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION,
     Washington Office, "Less Access to Less Information By and About the
     U.S. Government: IX," December 1987, by Anne A. Heanue.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                       BUSH'S OILY ROLE IN IRAN ARMS DEAL

          Vice President George Bush's acknowledged support for the
     ill-fated secret arms shipments to Iran has been interpreted as
     evidence of his loyalty to the policies of President Reagan.
          Now, however, other evidence suggests that Bush, far more than
     President Reagan, promoted the Iran initiative, took part in key
     negotiations, and conferred upon Oliver North the secret powers
     necessary to carry it out.
          It also has been charged that Bush actively promoted the Iran
     arms sales because of an economic motive the president did not share
     -- the desire to stabilize the dropping oil prices in 1986.
          Peter Dale Scott, co-author of THE IRAN CONTRA CONNECTION and
     former senior fellow at the International Center for Development
     Policy in Washington, suggests that Bush's primary concern in early
     1986 was to stabilize falling crude oil prices by promoting a common
     price policy between the United States and the oil producers of the
     Persian Gulf, including, above all, Iran and Saudi Arabia.
          Further, Scott says, the interest in higher oil prices was an
     explicit goal in some of Oliver North's secret arms negotiations with
     the Iranians. The price of oil reflected the concerns of Bush, a
     former Texas oilman, rather than of Reagan, a free market advocate.
         Scott traces Bush's involvement back to the January 17, 1986,
     meeting of the president's national security advisers at which the
     president signed the controversial finding which authorized the arms
     sales. The meeting was attended only by Bush and three other known
     supporters of the arms sales intiative -- Chief of  Staff Donald
     Regan, National Security Adviser John Poindexter, and Poindexter's
     deputy Donald Fortier.
          As the Iran-Contra Select Committee Report points out, Secretary
     of State Goerge Schultz and Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger
     were deliberately kept in the dark about the trip North took with
     Robert McFarlane to Tehran three months later. Yet Bush not only knew
     of the trip but he helped in scheduling it.  In a little-noticed
     message of Aril 4, 1986, Pondexter told North that, "If we can manage
     it, the VP would appreciate it if the Iran trip did not take place
     until the VP leaves Saudi Arabia. If that screws up planning too much,
     then he will uderstand that we can't do it." The request was honored;
     the McFarlane-North trip took place a month after Bush returned from
     Saudi Arabia.
          Bush's mission to Saudi Arabia was to persuade leaders of that
     country to help stabilize oil prices then rapidly falling to under $10
     a barrel. His trip was successful;  Saudi Arabia King Fahd received
     the Iranian petroleum minister in the autumn of l986 and the two
     countries agreed to OPEC arrangements for boosting oil prices to $18 a
     barrel. The $18 price brought economic relief to oil-producing states
     like Texas which were the key to Bush's political base.
          After the arms sale became public, oil industry sources commented
     that McFarlane and Poindexter understood the connection between a
     strong domestic oil industry and national security better than most
     others in the administration.

          SOURCE: PACIFIC NEWS SERVICE, 12/21/87, "Bush had oil policy
     interest in promoting Iran arms deals," by Peter Dale Scott, pp 1-4.








             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


       PENTAGON BIOWARFARE RESEARCH CONDUCTED IN UNIVERSITY LABORATORIES

          Overshadowed by Star Wars and overlooked by the media, the push
     toward biowarfare has been one of the Reagan administration's best
     kept secrets. The research budget for infectious diseases and toxins
     has increased tenfold since fiscal '81 and most of the '86 budget of
     $42 million went to 24 U.S. university campuses where the world's most
     deadly organisms are being cultured in campus labs.
          The amount of military money available for biotechnology research
     is a powerful attraction for scientists whose civilian funding
     resources dried up. Scientists formerly working on widespread killers
     like cancer now use their talents developing strains of such rare
     pathogens as anthrax, dengue, Rift Valley fever, Japanes encephalitis,
     tularemia, shigella, botulin, Q fever, and mycotoxins.
          Many members of the academic community find the trend alarming,
     but when MIT's biology department voted to refuse Pentagon funds for
     biotech research, the administration forced it to reverse its
     decision. And, in 1987, the University of Wisconsin hired Philip
     Sobocinski, a retired Army colonel, to help professors tailor their
     research to attract Pentagon-funded biowarfare research to the school.
     Richard Jannaccio, a former science writer at UW, was dismissed from
     his job on August 25, 1987, the day after the student newspaper, THE
     DAILY CARDINAL, published his story disclosing the details of Colonel
     Sobicinski's mission at the University.
          Since the U.S. is a signatory to the 1972 Biological and Toxic
     Weapons Convention which bans "development, production, stockpiling
     and use of microbes or their poisonous products except in amounts
     necessary for protective and peaceful research," the university-based
     work is being pursued under the guise of defensive projects aimed at
     developing vaccines and protective gear. Scientists who oppose the
     program insist that germ-warfare defense is clearly impractical; every
     person would have to be vaccinated for every known harmful biological
     agent.  Since vaccinating the entire population would be virtually
     impossible, the only application of a defensive development is in
     conjunction with offensive use. Troops could be effectively vaccinated
     for a single agent prior to launching an attack with that agent.
     Colonel David Huxsoll, commander of the U.S. Army Medical Research
     Institute of Infectious Diseases admits that offensive research is
     indistinguishable from defensive research even for those doing it.
          Each of the sources for this synopsis raised ethical questions
     about the perversion of academia by military money and about the U.S.
     engaging in a biological arms race that could rival the nuclear
     threat, yet none mentioned the safety or the security of the labs
     involved.  The failure to investigate this aspect of the issue is a
     striking omission.  Release of pathogens, either by accident or
     design, would prove tragic at any of the following schools:  Brigham
     Young, California Institute of Technology, Colorado State University,
     Emory, Illinois Institute of Technology, Iowa University, M.I.T.,
     Purdue, State University of N.Y. at Albany, Texas A&M, and the
     Universities of California, California at Davis, Cincinnati,
     Connecticut, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland,
     Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, and Utah.

          SOURCES: ISTHMUS, 10/9/87, "Biowarfare and the UW,"  by Richard
     Jannaccio, pp 1, 9, 10; THE PROGRESSIVE, 11/16/87, "Poisons from the
     Pentagon," by Seth Shulman, pp 16-20; WALL STREET JOURNAL, 9/17/86,
     "Military Science," by Bill Richards and Tim Carrington, pp 1, 23.





             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


           BIASED COVERAGE OF THE ARIAS PEACE PLAN BY AMERICA'S PRESS

          On August 7, 1987, five Central American nations -- Costa Rica,
     El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua -- signed a regional
     peace proposal that was authored by Costa Rican president, Oscar
     Arias. The proposal, known as the Arias Plan, set specific guidelines
     and target dates for each nation to comply with in order to stabilize
     Central America and bring peace to the region.
          Two separate studies monitoring U.S. press coverage of the Arias
     peace plan revealed a startling bias in how America's leading
     newspapers covered the region following August 7th.  A national media
     watchdog group, the New York-based Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting
     (FAIR), concluded that the peace accord set off a U.S. media reaction
     that "showed once again the extent to which White House assumptions
     are shared by the national press corps" and how "Reagan's obsession
     with Nicaragua has turned into a media obsession."  FAIR's 90-day
     analysis of THE NEW YORK TIMES found that the TIMES devoted three
     times as many column inches of news space to Nicaragua than it did to
     Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador combined.
          The other study, by the Media Alliance, a San Francisco-based
     nonprofit organization of media professionals, monitored stories about
     the peace plan that appeared in seven major dailies -- THE N.Y. TIMES,
     L.A. TIMES, CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR, SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, S.F.
     CHRONICLE, S.F.EXAMINER, and the OAKLAND TRIBUNE. The conclusion was
     the same -- most newspapers followed the Reagan administration's
     direction as to what deserved coverage in Central America. Altogether,
     the cmmittee members read, sorted, and analyzed a total of 406
     individual articles and editorials and found:
          1) More than 80% of the articles published during the first six
     weeks after the signing of the plan focused entirely or almost
     entirely on Nicaragua -- the Reagan administration's demands on
     Nicaragua's Sandinista government, the prospects for renewed contra
     aid, or the extent to which Nicaragua was abiding by the Arias plan;
          2) While the seven newspapers published numerous articles
     critical of the Sandinistas and their efforts to comply with the plan,
     serious human rights problems and violations of the plan by the
     governments of El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala went largely
     unreported;
          3) Sources quoted for comments and analysis in the seven papers
     were almost always either administration officials, contra leaders, or
     representatives of other conservative organizations that advocate
     military solutions to the region's political conflicts;
          4) Editors at the seven papers, when contacted by the SAN
     FRANCISCO BAY GUARDIAN for its article, generally acknowledged that
     the national press has allowed the Reagan administration to set the
     tone for Central American news coverage.
          One result of the biased coverage of Central America last year
     was that Americans were outraged when the Sandinistas shut down the
     CIA-subsidized LA PRENSA (now reopened) while they were not even aware
     that 70 journalists had been murdered by death squads in El Salvador
     and Guatemala during the past decade. And that death squad activities
     have increased in those two nations since August 7th.
          SOURCES: SAN FRANCISCO BAY GUARDIAN, 1/6/88, "On Central America,
     U.S. Dailies Parrot Reagan Line," by Jeff Gillenkirk, pp 7, 9-11, 33;
     EXTRA, Aug/Sept 1987, "Media Put Reagan Spin on Arias Plan," by Jeff
     Cohen and Martin A. Lee, pp 1, 5-6.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                  DUMPING OUR TOXIC WASTES ON THE THIRD WORLD

          Exporting hazardous and toxic wastes to Third World countries is
     a growth industry. The exported material includes heavy metal residues
     and chemical-contaminated wastes, pharmaceutical refuse, and municipal
     sewage sludge and incinerator ash. The risks involved for countries
     that accept our wastes range from contamination of groundwater and
     crops to birth defects and cancer.
          Traditionally, the majority of U.S. toxic waste exports have gone
     to Canada where regulations are less stringent than in the U.S. But
     now the most abrupt increase is in shipments to the Third World where
     the regulations are either nonexistent or sketchily enforced.
          Creating the search for new overseas markets is an explosion in
     the volume of recorded hazardous wastes beng produced in the U.S.
     According to the General Accounting Office, the amount rose from about
     9 million metric tons in 1970 to at least 247 million in 1984; other
     experts place the current figure close to 400 millon metric tons.
          U.S. officials, aware of the sensitive legal and foreign policy
     questions involved, are reluctant to crack down on illegal dumpers
     and, in fact, the government itself is reponsible for generating a
     significant portion of the hazardous waste exports.  One large illegal
     operation broken up last year received more than half its toxic wastes
     from various branches of the Federal government, mainly the military.
          Some examples of what is happening as discovered by the authors
     using court records, interviews, and the Freedom of Information Act:
          Philadelphia is planning to ship 600,000 tons of ash residue a
     year from its municipal incinerator to Panama which plans to use the
     materials as landfill for roadbeds;
          U.S. sludge may end up in the tiny British Caribbean colony of
     Turks and Caicos Islands which proposes to use it as fertilizer;
          L.P.T., a company with offices in American Samoa and California,
     is seeking approval to build an incinerator in American Samoa to burn
     U.S. wastes and export the ash to the Philippines where it would be
     used as landfill;
          Western Pacific Waste Repositories, based in Carson City, Nevada,
     is poposing to build a hazardous waste storage and treatment plant on
     Erikub atoll, an unhinhabited area of the Marshall Islands.
          The key U.S. government officials responsible for monitoring
     waste traffic claim they are powerless.  "Under the federal system, we
     only have control over what's in the country," says Wendy Grieder, an
     official in the EPA's Office of International Activities.  "Once it
     leaves, we can't do anything about it."
          Finally, exported wastes may return to haunt us in a very direct
     way.  "It's possible that we could send sludge to the Caribbean and
     they might use it on, say, spinach or other vegetables," warned
     Grieder.  And since the Food and Drug Administation checks only a
     small portion of foods and vegetables that come into the U.S.,
     exported hazardous wastes could easily end up on our dinner table.

          SOURCE: THE NATION, 10/3/87 "The Export of U.S. Toxic Wastes," by
     Andrew Porterfield and David Weir, pp front cover, 341-344.







             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


         TORTURE IN EL SALVADOR:THE CENSORED REPORT FROM MARIONA PRISON

          In late 1986, a 165-page report was smuggled out of the Mariona
     men's prison in El Salvador. The report was compiled by five
     imprisoned members of the Human Rights Commission of El Salvador
     (CDHES). The report documents the "routine" and "systematic" use of at
     least 40 kinds of torture on political prisoners.
          The report made three main points: first, torture is systematic,
     not random; second, the methods of torture are becoming more clever;
     and finally, U.S. servicemen often act as supervisors. What is new to
     torture in El Salvador, according to the study, is that the use of
     torture, together with the continued (although diminished) use of
     death-squad kidnappings of the "disappeared," are all a systematic
     part of of the U.S. counterinsurgency program there.
          The Marin Interfaith Task Force, from Mill Valley, California,
     assembled the smuggled report from Mariona prison into a document
     titled "Torture in El Salvador." Starting in September, 1986, the Task
     Force has tried to generate media interest in the story.  Suzanne
     Bristol of the task force, said the group sent the report to the
     nation's major newspapers, including THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE
     WASHINGTON POST, THE BOSTON GLOBE, and the LOS ANGELES TIMES, as well
     as to the wire services. By February, 1987, when Alexander Cockburn
     wrote his article for THE NATION, UPI had run a Spanish-language story
     and the report had received coverage on Spanish-language radio, in
     Mexican periodicals and in Europe. Follow-up calls to the above papers
     produced nothing, except for two letters in December from Art
     Seidenbaum of the LOS ANGELES TIMES, who first wrote "You send plenty
     of homework," and later wrote "We really have ... no staff for making
     a 1500-word article out of a large series of reports."
          As Cockburn noted, it was "during this period, on November 22,
     Secretary of State George Shultz asked Congress to approve nearly $7
     million in police aid for El Salvador in 1987, providing the necessary
     certification that the government of El Salvador had 'made significant
     progress during the six-month period preceding this determination in
     eliminating any human rights violations, including torture,
     incommunicado detention ...'"
          Apparently only one newspaper gave the actual report substantial
     coverage.  The SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER ran two excellent articles by
     free lance journalist Ron Ridenhour, who quoted State Department
     spokesman James Callahan saying that the CDHES, the only Salvadoran
     human rights group recognized by the United Nations, is a communist
     "front organization." (It was Ridenhour's charges that led to the
     revelations about the Army's massacre of civilians in My Lai.)
          On October 26, 1987, assassins, probably belonging to the
     Salvadoran security forces, murdered Herbert Ernesto Anaya, head of
     the Salvadoran Human Rights Commission and the last survivor of that
     commission's eight founders.
          Anaya also was one of the five original researchers and authors
     of the smuggled report from the Mariona men's prison.

          SOURCES: THE NATION, 2/21/87, "After the Press Bus Left," pp
     206-207, and THE NATION, 11/14/87, "The Press and the Plan," pp
     546-547, both by Alexander Cockburn; SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER, 11/14/86,
     "In prison, Salvador rights panel works on," by Ron Ridenhour, p A-8;
     Marin Interfaith Task Force on Central America, 7/2/87 letter and
     various documents, by Liz Erringer.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


               PROJECT GALILEO SHUTTLE TO CARRY LETHAL PLUTONIUM

          Despite scientific warnings of a possible disaster, NASA is
     pursuing plans to launch the Project Galileo shuttle space probe which
     will carry enough plutonium to kill every person on earth.
          Theoretically, one pound of polutonium, uniformly distributed,
     has the potential to give everyone on the planet a fatal case of lung
     cancer.  Galileo will have 49.25 pounds of plutonium on board, most of
     it plutonium 238, a radioisotope 300 times more radioactive than the
     one used as fuel for atomic bombs.
          Critics of the plan, such as Dr. John Gofman, professor of
     medical physics at the University of California, Berkeley, and Michio
     Kaku, professor of nuclear physics at the City University of New York
     claim that putting Galileo's plutonium payload into space is both
     risky and unnecessary.
          The plutonium will be used to fuel "radioisotope thermoelectric
     generators" which keep instrumentation warm.  Although NASA and the
     DOE say there are no alternatives, professor Kaku asserts that the
     latest advances in solar cells make it possible to generate solar
     electricity even as far away as Jupiter, Galileo's destination.
          NASA downplays the possibility of the release of plutonim in an
     accident, stressing that the substance will be encapsulated in "clads"
     made from iridium alloy in a graphite shell.  The DOE contends that
     clads can withstand explosive pressures up to 2,200 pounds per square
     inch.  However, a DOE safety analysis report on the Galileo mission
     obtained under FOIA states that from the viewpoint of potential
     nuclear fuel release, the most critical accidents would occur on the
     launch pad.  Launch pad accident scenarios, such as "tipovers" and
     "pushovers" are estimated to generate explosive pressures as high as
     19,600 psi.
          Once in space, Galileo is still potentially danglerous.  Since
     the solid-fuel rocket substituted for the highly volatile liquid-fuel
     Centaur rocket used in the Challenger does not have the power of the
     Centaur, NASA devised a plan to use the earth's gravitational pull to
     increase the rocket's momentum sufficiently to reach Jupiter.  During
     the "flyby" orbits around the earth, Galileo would at times be only
     277 miles overhead.  A 1987 NASA report estimates the chance of
     Galileo inadvertently reentering the earth's atmosphere to be less
     than one in a million, and, as such, an accident scenario is deemed
     not credible.
          NASA set the probability figures for the chance of a shuttle
     accident at one in 100,000 for thhe Challenger. Investigation 
     following the crash put the figure at closer to one in 25.
          While "The Lethal Shuttle: Plutonium Payload Scheduled" was one
     of the top 10 overlooked stories cited by Project Censored in 1986,
     the continued failure of the media to draw attention to the potential
     risk of Project Galileo fully warrants its renomination for 1987.

          SOURCES: THE NATION, 1/23/88, "The Space Probe's Lethal Cargo,"
     by Karl Grossman;, pp 1, 78; L.A. TIMES, 2/6/86.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                    U.S. SENDS BULLETS TO STARVING CHILDREN

          Between 1979 and 1985, U.S. military and economic aid to Honduras
     jumped from $31 to $282 million yearly. The largest increase was in
     military aid which jumped to 28 times the 1979 level. In exchange,
     Honduras agreed to become a base for some 15,000 Nicaraguan "contras,"
     to join the U.S. military in joint maneuvers, and to provide
     logistical and intelligence support to the Salvadoran military in its
     war against the guerrillas.
          During the same time period, U.S. aid designated for development
     assistance dropped from 80 percent to six percent.
          To make matters even worse, floods washed away 60 percent of the
     corn crop in southern Honduras in May 1986.  A severe summer drought
     followed the flood, destroying all that remained of the corn and
     wiping out 60 percent of the area's sorghum.
          Bishop Raul Corriveau, the archbishop of Choluteca, said,
     "We've seen scenes of misery like never before. Children with swollen
     bellies, old people looking like corpses, women and children begging
     for food, men roaming the streets searching for work."
          Due to airstrips and bases built by the U.S. and the presence of
     contras and American troops (80,000 troops in 1987), Hondurans living
     in the southern region and along the eastern border have been
     displaced.  The livelihoods of 2,000 Honduran coffee growers have been
     destroyed and 16,000 Hondurans have been forced to leave their homes.
          Orphanages and temporary shelters have been filled with "economic
     orphans" -- children who have been abandoned by parents who can no
     longer afford to raise them ... parents who have seen their coffee
     bean fields turned into battlefields.
          It has been estimated that 70 percent of the children are
     malnourished. Among those brought to the capital's hospital for
     treatment, 10 to 15 percent die due to a lack of vitamins.
          Dr. Juan Almendares, a physician conducting research on
     malnutrition at the National University in Tegucigalpa, "When the
     government says there is no money available to help the hungry, we
     must remember that Honduras receives more than $200 million a year
     from the U.S. government. We Hondurans ask why isn't any of this money
     going to help the poor?"
          Ann M. Kelly, editor of FOOD FIRST NEWS, a quarterly published by
     the Institute for Food and Development Policy, wrote the following
     lead to Medea Benjamin's article about the Honduran situation:
          "While working on a new Food First book in Honduras, Medea
     Benjamin -- Food First's Central American analyst -- uncovered a food
     crisis of frightening proportions in the southern part of the country.
     We alerted national media in the United States but the story went
     uncovered."

          SOURCES: FOOD FIRST NEWS, Vol. 9, No. 28, Spring 1987, "Hunger in
     Southern Honduras," p 2, and  FOOD FIRST ACTION ALERT, 1987,
     "Honduras: The Real Loser in U.S. War Games," pp 1-4, both by Medea
     Benjamin; MOTHER JONES, January 1987, "The Pentagon Republic of
     Honduras, by Fred Setterberg, pp 21-24, 51-54,







             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


          DECLINE IN GENETIC DIVERSITY: GLOBAL DISASTER IN THE MAKING

          Diversity in the gene pool is shrinking at an alarming rate and
     could lead to what Robert Cowen, science editor of the CHRISTIAN
     SCIENCE MONITOR, says "could become a mass extinction of Earth's plant
     and animal species." Species extinction of both plants and animals has
     accelerated rapidly in the 20th century and has reached what many feel
     is a state of crisis. From 1600 to 1900, one species disappeared every
     four years; now perhaps 1,000 species become extinct each year. The
     Worldwatch Institute pamphlet on conserving the diversity of life,
     published in June 1987, predicts the extinction rate in 20 years will
     reach more than 100 species per day.
          The loss of life forms is more than an aesthetic issue.  The
     rapid extinction of food crop germplasm represents a disaster in the
     making.  Unless the trend is slowed, mass famine on a global scale is
     a real possibility.  The International Board for Plant Genetic
     Resources has issued warnings that the genetic diversity of many of
     the staple crops that feed the world such as wheat, rice, barley,
     millet, and sorghum is imperiled.  72% of the U.S. potato crop is
     concentrated in four genetic strains.  Six varieties account for 71%
     of the corn crop.  Of the cataloged vegetables grown in the U.S. in
     1901/02, less than four percent still existed in 1985.
          Genetic diversity is a prerequisite for agricultural success.
     Genetic uniformity makes crops vulnerable to environmental threats
     such as pests, blight, and drought.  The Irish potato famine was the
     result of genetic uniformity. The U.S. lost 75% of its durum wheat
     crop in 1953/54 and 50% of its corn crop in 1970, both due to genetic
     uniformity.
          The dimunition of diversity has led to what some researchers call
     the global "seed wars."  As plant species disappear around the world,
     "access to, control over and preservation of plant genetic resources
     becomes a matter of international concern and conflict." The vast
     majority of the world's genetic resources is concentrated in the Third
     World. In order to prevent crop stains from inbreeding, the industrial
     nations resort to "germplasm appropriation," a strategy for collecting
     plant genetic material from Third World countries. The fact that the
     "collection" is done without recompense further exacerbates tensions
     between industrial and developing nations.
          The Plant Variety Protection Act legislation of 1970, which
     broadened the interpretation of U.S. patent laws to allow corporations
     to patent seed varieties, has accelerated the extinction rate of food
     crop germplasm.  Germplasm appropriated from the Third World is sold
     back to developing countries in the form of hybridized, patented seed.
     Farmers in the world's centers of diversity are planting genetically
     uniform crops more and more frequently, thus causing further loss of
     indigenous seed.  The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization
     estimates that two thirds of all Third World crops will be from
     uniform strains by the year 2000.
          The disappearance of genetic diversity either by accident or
     design is a critical issue that has had little media coverage or
     public debate. Germplasm has not made headlines.  There are no "Save
     the Barley" bumperstickers. Yet every day, more and more of our
     precious food sources disappear forever.

          SOURCES:  UTNE READER, Jan/Feb 1988, "Conserving the Diversity of
     Life," by Jeremiah Creedon, pp 15-16;  MOTHER JONES, December 1982,
     "Seeds of Disaster," by Mark Schapiro, pp 11-15, 36-37.





             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


              THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:  INTERNATIONAL OUTLAW

          On June 27, 1986, the International Court of Justice, under the
     auspices of the United Nations, handed down a decision that found the
     United States in violation of international law.  The decision called
     for the United States to cease its international illegal activities
     against Nicaragua. The Court's decision, 12-3, held that the U.S.
     support of the contras was illegal. A further decision, 14-1, held
     that U.S. mining of Nicaragua's harbors and distribution of a CIA
     assassination manual also violated international law.
          In 1987, while President Reagan was defending his contra policy,
     while Oliver North was telling contra stories to Congress, and while
     Secretary of State George Schultz was asking Congress for $270 million
     in contra aid, the U.S. media failed to inform the American public
     that the Reagan administration's efforts were illegal.
         In fact, the International Court of Justice decision against the
     U.S. was, for all intents and purposes, a non-event in the U.S. media
     in 1987.
          This non-event status was never more evident that in the media's
     failure to cover the November 12, 1987, U.N. General Assembly vote,
     94-2, that called for "full and immediate compliance" with the World
     Court's June 1986 decision. In particular, the General Assembly called
     on the U.S. to cease funding its military activities against
     Nicaragua.
          The question of whether the U.S. government rejects international
     adjudication as having a part in aiding peace, or whether the rule of
     international law is valid, void, or only reserved for minor matters
     was never really explored by the U.S. media in light of the World
     Court and General Asesembly decisions in the United Nations.
          The American public has been kept ignorant of this international
     issue and its implications on U.S. policy toward Nicaragua largely
     because of media indifference.

          SOURCES: HUMAN RIGHTS, American Bar Association Press, Winter
     1987/88, "The World Court: Let's Not Forget This Anniversary,"  by
     Howard N. Meyer; ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, 8/7/86, "In Contempt of
     Court," (op/ed article), by Richard B. Bilder.







             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                 THE TRAGEDY OF GRENADA SINCE OCTOBER 25, 1983

          While the media permit Ronald Reagan to cite Grenada as an
     American success story, the people of Grenada aren't buying it. The
     following description of what has happened in Grenada since the 1983
     U.S. invasion was published last year by the Committee for Human
     Rights in Grenada.

     1. Removal of price controls on food, cement, housing, and other
     essentials of life.
     2. Summary firings of Grenadian workers without notice, compensation,
     or legal redress.
     3. Unemployment now well over 50%.
     4. Internationalist workers who previously provided free health
     services deported.
     5. Uncontrolled escalation of land, rent, and all prices.
     6. Free medical, dental, optical care, and medicines, formerly
     accessible to all Grenadians, now eliminated.
     7. Grenadian graduates of Cuban and other socialist-nation
     universities not allowed to practice in Grenada.
     8. Open prostitution since arrival of U.S. troops.
     9. Use of cocaine, heroin, and crack since invasion.
    10. National Women's Organization, National Youth Organization, and the
     Grenada Human Rights Organization eliminated.
    11. Former institutions now diminished to point of uselessness include
     independent, progressive union movement; free judiciary; and free and
     independent media.
    12. Severe devaluation of Grenadian dollar.
    13. Grenada, whose economy was praised by the World Bank and the IMF in
     Spring, 1983, had a $168 million debt as of March 28, 1986.

          Finally, the Committee reported in April, 1987, that the O.E.C.S.
     (Organization of Eastern Caribbean States) occupying troops, trained
     by the U.S. have returned in force to Grenada and that they are
     directed by U.S. military officers, usually in civilian dress.
     Ominously, the Committee adds "Their abuses are well known."

          The extent and inflammatory nature of the charges by the
     Committee for Human Rights in Grenada surely deserve investigation by
     the U.S. media.

          SOURCE: BULLETIN OF THE COMMITTEE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN GRENADA,
     No. 1, April/May 1987, by the Committee for Human Rights in Grenada,
     PO Box 20714, Cathedral Finance Station, New York, NY 10025, pp 1-8.







             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                         AMERICANS SPYING ON AMERICANS

          The Reagan administration's paranoid concern with communism has
     led to the development of a national private spying network and an
     official effort by the FBI to turn America's librarians into spies.
          People and groups who speak out against Reagan adminstration
     policies put themselves in jeopardy of surveillance by private
     intelligence-gathering organizations composed of conservative groups
     with close ties to the White House. Members say they pass on the
     information they collect to federal agencies, like the Justice
     Department, and on occasion to the White House itself.
          Conservative groups involved in these spying activities include
     the Institute for Contemporary Studies, the Young America's
     Foundation, the Council for Inter-American Security, and the Capital
     Research Center.
          Stephen Schwartz works at the Institute for Contemporary Studies,
     a San Francisco think-tank founded by top Reagan aides like Ed Meese.
     Schwartz calls it "the commie-watching network."
          Michael Boos, Program Director of Young America's Foundation,
     says the group promotes conservative ideas on college campuses .. and
     keeps track of what the left-wing opposition is up to.  Boos keeps
     files, makes lists, takes photographs ... all to keep an eye on
     students and professors he says "need watching."  Boos says that two
     top-level Reagan Adminstration officials -- Ken Cribb, Assistant to
     the President for Domestic Affairs, and Frank Donatelli, the
     President's chief Political Advisor -- support his work. Both serve on
     Young America's Board of Directors. Young America's financial records
     reveal the oganization received money from the federal government --
     over $100,000 from the United States Information Agency.
          Michael Waller gathers information on left-wing activists for a
     private political group called the Council for Inter-American
     Security. The Council claims that Bill Casey was driven to have a
     brain seizure because of harassment by the liberal media and liberal
     members of Congress. It also claims that Michigan Congressman George
     Crockett was once a communist agent and that other congressmen who
     secretly collaborated with the Soviet KGB included John Burton, Ted
     Weiss, Ron Dellums, John Conyers, Don Edwards, and Charles Rangle.
          Willa Johnson, who heads the Capital Research Center which
     gathers information on opponents of White House policies, is former
     Deputy Director of Personnel at the White House. The Center gets its
     money from corporations and right-wing benefactors like Joe Coors and
     Ellen Garwood, two key funders of the secret White House effort to
     support the contras.
          Meanwhile, the FBI officially recruits librarians to spy on
     library users who might be diplomats of hostile powers recruiting
     intelligence agents or gathering information potentially harmful to
     U.S. security. While the current program, euphemistically called the
     "Library Awareness Program," started shortly after the August, 1986,
     arrest of a Soviet spy who frequented New York Libraries in search of
     student recruits and stolen, unclassified library materials, the FBI
     said the program has existed for years in various incarnations.

          SOURCES: KRON-TV Target 4, San Francisco, 11/10-12/87, Sylvia
     Chase, Jonathan Dann; Center for Investigative Reporting, Dan Noyes;
     PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER, 2/23/88, "FBI asks librarians to help in the
     search for spies," by Amy Linn.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


             REAGAN'S 1980 "OCTOBER SURPRISE" -- ARMS FOR HOSTAGES

          In October 1980, nothing worried the Reagan campaign as much as
     the possibility that the 52 hostages held by Iran might come home.
     A "paramilitary wing" created by Reagan's campaign staff to prevent
     such a possibility was largely unreported in 1987.
          The revelations report that then campaign manager William J.
     Casey headed an "October surprise" team engaging the services of both
     retired and active military personnel.
          During the course of the 1980 campaign, campaign leaders Richard
     Allen, Edwin Meese, and Casey became concerned, almost to the point of
     paranoia (according to journalists Jack Germond and Jules Witcover)
     that Carter would get the hostages released thereby stealing away
     Reagan's election momentum and assuring Carter of re-election.
          Following is a brief overview of the reported activities of
     Reagan's "October 1980 surprise" team:
          Various reports reveal that Casey's "paramilitary wing"
     monitored U.S. military movements for the Reagan campaign, met with
     representatives of the Bani-Sadr government of Iran, and covertly
     obtained President Carter's debate briefing materials prior to the
     November election.
          These revelations alone carry enormous constitutional
     implications -- private citizens soliciting military and intelligence
     assistance in monitoring U.S. government operations, private citizens
     meeting with foreign dignitaries in possible state negotiations, and
     private citizens clandestinely obtaining property of the United States
     President -- and yet they were not followed up by the major media once
     discovered and revealed in small, non-mass media publications.
          Even more disturbing is the issue of Iranian arms shipments.
     Documents confirm that within its first month, the Reagan
     administration gave a green light to Israel to resume its arms
     shipments to the Iranian government.
          These revelations support former Iranian President Bani-Sadr's
     assertion that the arms supply contract Iran signed with Israel in
     March 1981, less than two months after Reagan's inauguration, was the
     payoff for delaying the release of the American hostages until after
     the November 4, 1980 election.
          The hostages remained in captivity until January 20, 1981, the
     day Reagan took the oath of office, and they left Teheran minutes
     after he became president.
          A conspiracy between a presidential candidate and a hostile
     foreign power against an incumbent president would seem to be without
     precedent in American history. At the very least, it would seem that
     the documented charges revealed by a few journalists last year
     deserved to be investigated for the benefit of the American public by
     the U.S. media.

          SOURCES: L.A. WEEKLY, 7/10/87, "Reagan's 1980 Hostage Deal," by
     Barbara Honegger with Jim Naureckas, pp 12, 14, 16; THE NATION,
     6/20/87 (p 842), 7/4/87 (p 7), 8/1/87 (p 80), 10/24/87 (p 440),
     11/21/87 (p 582), "Minority Report," all by Christopher Hitchens; S.F.
     EXAMINER, 7/12/87, "October Surprise," by Warren Hinckle, p A-13.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


               OLIVER NORTH'S SECRET PLAN TO DECLARE MARTIAL LAW

          While caught up in exposing Fawn Hall's hairstyle, Ollie North's
     heroic gap-toothed smile, and the soap opera ambience of the
     Congressional Contragate hearings, most of America's media ignored the
     chilling constitutional issue of Oliver North's secret plan to declare
     martial law.
          But Alfonso Chardy, of THE MIAMI HERALD, was not deluded by
     North's charisma nor frightened by North's earlier warning to him not
     to investigate the National Security Council's (NSC) connection to the
     Nicaraguan resistance.
          Unfortunately, Chardy's extraordinary disclosures about North
     went unexplored and unreported by other major media.
          On July 5, 1987, Chardy reported over the KNT News Wire that
     Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North helped draft a plan in 1984 to impose
     martial law in the United States in event of an emergency.
          According to Chardy, the secret plan called for suspension of the
     Constitution, turning control of the government over to the
     little-known Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), appointment
     of military commanders to run state and local governments, and the
     declaration of martial law in the event of such a crisis as nuclear
     war, violent and widespread internal dissent or national opposition to
     a U.S. military invasion abroad.
          North helped draft the plan to impose martial law while serving
     as the NSC's laiason to FEMA. Chardy reported that an administration
     official said the contingency plan was written as part of an executive
     order or legislative package that Reagan would sign and hold within
     NSC until such time as a severe crisis arose. "It is not known whether
     Reagan signed the plan," Chardy added.
          The plan was extraordinary enough to even frighten then-Attorney
     General William French Smith into protesting to Robert McFarlane,
     North's NSC boss at the time, that FEMA was establishing itself as an
     "emergency czar" and "exceeding its proper function as a coordinating
     agency for emergency preparedness."
          This secret plan to declare martial law in the event of internal
     dissent or national opposition to a U.S. military invasion abroad took
     on an added dimension as citizens gathered to protest the nation's
     intervention in Honduras in March, 1988.

          SOURCES:  KNT NEWS WIRE, 7/5/87, "North linked to plan for
     martial law," by Alfonso Chardy, p A1, SAN RAFAEL (CA) INDEPENDENT
     JOURNAL; THE NATION, 8/1/87, "Minority Report," by Christopher
     Hitchens, p 80.









                Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


          TUNING OUT NON-IONIZING RADIATION AND PUBLIC HEALTH/SAFETY HAZARDS

               Growing evidence that long wave non-ionizing radiation used in
          electromagnetic devices, microwave products, and TV/radio systems is
          harmful to the public's health, hazardous to effective public safety
          systems, and threatening to military security went largely unreported
          by America's media in 1987.  Also underreported were the related
          issues of the Environmental Protection Agency's shut-down of its
          funded programs to study non-ionizing radiation in light of a 1989
          deadline to establish safety standards for public exposure to radio
          frequencies, and, the lawsuit brought against the Reagan
          administration by a coalition of plaintiffs who charge that the
          administration has violated the National Enviromental Policy act by
          not adequately protecting the public and environment from the "Hazard
          of Electromagnetic Radiation to Ordnance" (HERO).
               Studies that suggest links between electromagetic fields (such as
          those produced by overhead power lines, broadcast towers, military
          hardware, hairdryers, microwave ovens, computers, TV and two-way
          radios, and radar), and cellular mutation, cancer, and childhood
          leukemia have received little attention. University of North Carolina
          epidemiologist David Savitz confirmed earlier reports about the
          apparent public health hazard.  Savitz emphasized the need for further
          research and more federal funding to determine the extent of this
          potential health risk.  Fifteen of 17 occupational studies have
          established links between exposure to low frequency electromagnetic
          fields and cancer.  Despite this mounting evidence, the EPA shut down
          its program to study non-ionizing radiation which is supposed to set
          acceptable levels of exposure for humans and the environment by 1989.
          Meanwhile, total federal funding to study the health effects of low
          frequency fields has dropped from $10 million to just $2.5 million.
               A coalition of Pentagon watchdog organizations and individuals
          has brought suit against the government charging Reagan administration
          officials with willful negligence in protecting the public from the
          HERO effect. Though the Navy and Army have been aware, for some 33
          years, of the hazard that electromagnetism poses to weapon systems,
          the Pentagon has acknowledged very little about the hazards that
          accidental explosions caused by various electromagnetic sources pose
          to public and environmental safety.  The plaintiffs cite five specific
          HERO related accidents, including the 1967 explosion on board the USS
          Forrestal which claimed 134 lives, along with a possible 25 other HERO
          related accidents that have occurred over the past 25 k;years.
               Finally, in a continuing conflict related to the issue of
          electromagnetic radiation and its effects on public safety and health,
          radar specialist veterans have been filing health claims, related to
          their exposrue to low frequency radiation, against the Veterans
          Administration.  All claims to date have been rejected.
               With such a newsworthy issue as the effects of electromagnetic
          radiation on public health and safety so clearly being played out
          during 1987, the news media, for the most part, failed to tune in.

               SOURCES:  KQED-TV 9, "EXPRESS," 12/9/87, "Radiation Risk?," by


          David Helvarg; RECON, Vol. 10, #4, January 1988, "HERO: Deadly Game of
          Roulette," by Patricia Axelrod, pp 1,2,8.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                 GLOWING OUTLOOK FOR FOOD IRRADIATION BUSINESS

          The food industry is going high-tech with a seemingly innocent
     procedure called irradiation -- a process that delays ripening by
     exposing food to radioactive materials that kill insects, mold, and
     bacteria.
          Critics point out that irradiation may produce food products that
     at best have lower nutritional value; at worst are carcinogenic.
     Irradition also poses significant health threats to workers and the
     public in transportation, storage, and disposal of radioactive waste.
     And there is real concern over the safety of radioactive devices used
     in food, beverage, cosmetic, and drug industries.
          While spices are the first irradiated edibles marketed in the
     U.S., the Food and Drug Admnstration (FDA) also has approved
     irradiation for use on produce and some meats. Interestingly, the FDA
     regulates irradiation not as a process but as an additive.
          The question, of course, is exactly what is "added" to irradiated
     food? Irradiated food looks and smells better for an extended time,
     but little is known about the chemical changes induced by the process.
          One science writer posed the complex issues when he asked "What
     do you get when you irradiate an apple with 100,000 rads of gamma
     rays.  Is that irradiation a process or an additive?  Who should
     control it?  Does it pose a carcinogenic threat to humans? Since it
     reduces food spoilage and replaces dangerous pesticides, is it a
     blessing for the world's hungry?"  And then he asked, "Why are there
     no answers to these questions?"
          Meanwhile, the track record in irradiation facilities is anything
     but reassuring.  The Radiation Technology plant in Far Rockaway, New
     Jersey, was closed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for
     willfully supplying false information about repeated safety
     violations; the NRC also shut down International Nutronics in Dover,
     New Jersey, after workers reported a coverup of a radioative spill of
     a tank of water containing cobalt-60 rods; and workers in Isomedix
     Co., Parsippany, New Jersey, were told to clean up leaks by pouring
     radioactive water down bathroom toilets and sinks.
          Earlier this year, the NRC suspended the use of an industrial
     air-purifying device that leaked tiny particles of radioactive
     polonium at plants around the nation. The NRC also order 3M to recall
     for inspection all 45,000 of the ionizing air guns used to control
     static electricty and remove dust from product containers. Of 828
     plants inspected so far, contamination was found at 118 sites; of
     those, the radiation exceeded the reportable limit of .005 microcuries
     in 39 plants. Subsequently, the NRC recalled 2,500 3M units used in
     the food, beverage, costmetic and drug industries.
          Given the potential problems, one would expect to find the
     irradiation issue on the national media agenda; but it isn't.
     Meanwhile, as serious questions go unanswered, the government has
     proposed federal regulations that would allow more irradiation.

          SOURCES: UTNE READER, May/June 1987, "Irradiation Business Gears
     Up," by Karin Winegar, pp 29-30; SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER SPECTRA,
     2/25/88, "Food Irradiation,"  by Rick Weiss, pp E1-E2, reprinted from
     SCIENCE NEWS; S. F. EXAMINER (AP), 2/19/88, "Ionizing guns recalled
     over radiation fear," p A5.





             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


         AMERICAN TALE OF TWO CITIES: THE GROWTH OF ECONOMIC APARTHEID

          The Atlanta Chamber of Commerce will produce reams of hype about
     the city this summer for the Democratic National Convention.  In turn,
     the media will dutifully hype the rest of the nation about Atlanta.
     But there is another side to Atlanta that has gone largely unreported
     by the U.S. Media.
          Economic forces at work in Atlanta are "producing a new kind of
     segregation, which threatens to leave blacks out of the great job
     reshuffling that is taking place not only in the Jewel of the South
     but throughout the country."
          In Atlanta, corporations are moving their operations and jobs to
     Cobb and Gwinnett counties, two overwhelmingly white, affluent,
     Republican-voting suburbs to the north of Atlanta.
          Though many media have profiled the MetroAtlanta economic
     renaissance, specifically highlighting Gwinnett County, the fastest
     growing county in the nation, most have failed to state that both Cobb
     and Gwinnett, though considered part of MetroAtlanta, do not share the
     tax base or government with the city.
          Black citizens of Atlanta have no share in the new economic
     affluence profiled by the media.  In fact, with the particulars of
     this MetroAtlanta economic demography in mind -- no shared tax-base,
     no shared government, no shared public transportation system, new
     freeway project connecting outlying suburbs and bypassing inner city
     access, corporate flight, and the traditional (racist) dividing line
     of Interstate 20 -- the proliferation of an economic apartheid is
     easily seen.
          When asked why corporate development went north, J. Patrick
     Murphy, the senior vice president for economic development of Gwinnett
     County's Chamber of Commerce, pulls out a map and points to Interstate
     20, which runs from east to west straight through Atlanta, halving the
     metropolitan region.  "Since before the time of the Civil War, it was
     understood that free blacks weren't to come above this line. And most
     of them still live south of it," says Murphy.  "I suppose development
     just follows the money."
          David Beers and Diana Hembree, who exlored this issue with
     support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism, said it "would be
     a mistake to interpret Atlanta's racially skewed boom as peculiar to
     the South and growing mainly out of the region's historical
     prejudices. It is probably more accurate to take Atlanta as it bills
     itself -- as the shape of things to come.  Similar growth patterns are
     occurring all over the United States, invariably favoring white
     suburbs and avoiding black urban centers.

          SOURCE: THE NATION, 3/21/87, "The new Atlanta: A Tale of Two
     Cities," by David Beers and Diana Hembree, pp 357-360.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


             OMB COMPILING NATION-WIDE BLACKLIST OF GRANT VIOLATORS

               The Office of Management and Budget is compiling a master
     computer list of those debarred or suspended from participating in
     government agency grant programs. Gary Bass, executive director of OMB
     Watch, a public interest group that monitors the budget office, said
     the goal of reducing waste, fraud and abuse is laudable but warned
     that the program "can become a hit list for individuals and
     organizations that the administration does not agree with."
          The controversial program will cover a wide range of
     transactions, including grants, cooperative agreements, scholarships,
     fellowships, loans and subsidies.  It would apply to both recipients
     of federal funds and those "doing business" with them. The system is
     expected to be fully operational by May, 1988.
          Under the new law (Reagan's Executive Order 12549), 20 agencies
     which disburse $100 billion in grants will forward their debarred
     lists to the OMB.  The master list will be computerized and placed on
     a nation-wide automated telephone system. Regulations published in the
     Federal Register (5/29/87) say that the master list will contain names
     and "other information" about currently debarred or suspended grant
     recipients, as well as about those whose debarment is pending.
          Under the directive, federal, state and local agencies, private
     organizations and individuals handling federal funds must check the
     list before providing anyone a federally-aided service, grant, loan or
     other assistance such as day care.  Any person or organization that
     fails to check the list may also be placed on it.  In addition,
     employees of federally-funded agencies and organizations, as well as
     anyone "doing business" with them or wishing to do business with them
     must submit annual certifications that neither they nor anyone
     "associated with" them are on the list, or being considered for it.
          Grounds for placement on the list include 1) violating any term
     of a "public agreement," regardless of whether federal funds were
     involved; 2) failure to repay a government-backed or assisted loan,
     such as a home mortgage, student or crop loan; 3) "failure to perform"
     or poor performance on a grant or other "public agreement;" 4) lack of
     "business integrity or honesty" or conviction of "business" crimes; 5)
     debarment or suspension by a public agency at any level of government,
     federal, state, or local.
          One can also make the blacklist if one: is a public school
     teacher and goes on strike despite a no-strike clause in one's
     contract; performs poorly on any grant from a public agency,
     regardless of whether federal funds were involved; does business with
     anyone known to be on OMB's new list.
          Various agencies already keep records of those who violate rules
     of grants, using the lists to prevent such recipients from getting
     additional grants from the agency involved. But, under current law
     those same recipients may obtain grants from other federal agencies.
          Rep. Jack Brooks (D-TX), chair of the House Government Operations
     Committee warned that the OMB's implementing guidelines "endorse guilt
     by association, reverse the presumption that a person is innocent
     until proven guilty, and define the operative offenses so vaguely as
     to potentially encompass many entirely legitimate activities."

          SOURCES: THE NEW YORK TIMES, 12/23/87, "U.S. Plans to Make Master
     List ...", by Martin Tolchin; OMB WATCH 1987 ANNUAL REPORT; FOUNDATION
     NEWS, July/August 1987, page 8.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                ROUNDUP -- THE WORLD'S MOST POPULAR WEED KILLER

          Eduardo Neaves was a healthy and happy twelve-year-old, the son
     of migrant farm workers. But after swimming in a canal in Coral
     Gables, Florida, he became a "total quadriplegic." The canal was
     contaminated with four times the recommended-use level of  Roundup, a
     herbicide produced by The Monsanto Company. Toxicologists were not
     surprised by the central nervous system damage that still afflicts the
     boy five years after the incident but were unable to prove a
     connection between Roundup and the paralysis in court.
          But whether Roundup can cause damage to the central nervous
     system may never be known. Although Monsanto's original neurotixicity
     studies were ruled invalid by the EPA because of "extensive gaps in
     the raw data supporting study findings and conclusions," there is no
     requirement that a new study be made. However, Roundup is far more
     dangerous than the public has been led to believe. Records of
     pesticide poisoning compiled over the last five years by California's
     Department of Agriculture show that among some 200 pesticides widely
     used in the state, Roundup has been linked to the greatest numbers of
     eye, skin, and internal injuries. The EPA's own Pesticide Incident
     Monitoring System (which was dissolved by the Reagan administration)
     recorded more than 100 cases of Roundup poisoning in 1980. Despite its
     own findings, the EPA concluded the weed killer is "not a primary skin
     irritant, and is only minimally irritating to the eye." That judgement
     was based solely on data provided by Monsanto.
          Dr. Ruth Shearer, a genetic toxicologist, charged that Monsanto's
     claims about the safety of the product are dishonest because they are
     based on phony studies on cancer and birth defects performed by the
     now defunct Industrial Bio-Test lab (IBT). Once the nation's leading
     generator of health effects studies for companies whose chemical
     products require government approval, IBT was found to have conducted
     shoddy tests and falsified results. Monsanto was IBT's biggest
     customer, according to court documents, and was reported to be one of
     four chemical companies that knew of IBT's fraudulent testing
     practices. One IBT executive, Paul L. Wright, was employed by Monsanto
     before and after his tenure at the testing lab.  It was during
     Wright's stay at IBT that the lab performed tests involving Roundup's
     connection to mutation in mice and tumors in rabbits.  Wright was
     convicted of fraudulent testing in 1983. (The IBT story was the top
     "censored" story of 1982.)  Despite the known hazards, the danger is
     compounded by the variety of new uses for which the herbicide is being
     promoted. It is applied to citrus and grape groves in California,
     soybeans in the Middle West, Christmas trees in Maine, coffee beans in
     Brazil, as well as crops grown for vitamins and spices, house plants,
     and government forests in the Pacific Northwest.  In fact, Roundup
     is the world's  most popular brand-name herbicide.  It is easily
     Monsanto's most important product, the first herbicide to reach annual
     sales of $1 billion.  It is marketed in 120 countries and accounts for
     more than half of Monsanto's foreign sales.
          Given Roundup's fraudulent approval; its significant health and
     environmental hazards; and that it is the most widely used brand-name
     herbicide in the world, the issue deserves significant media
     attention. At the very least, Monsanto should be required to redo the
     studies that are now known to be invalid.

          SOURCE: THE PROGRESSIVE, July 1987, "Weed Killer," by Anthony L.
     Kimery, pp 20-21.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


                  PUERTO RICO: THE REVOLUTION AT OUR DOORSTEP

          In August, of 1987, the United Nations Committee on
     Decolonization voted to ask the United States to immediately remove
     itself from Puerto Rico and to recognize the Puerto Ricans' right to
     self-determination and independence. This was the 11th time the U.N.
     committee made this request. And, each time the request was ignored by
     the United States government and by the U.S. press.
          In 1898, Puerto Rico won its autonomy from Spain and was well on
     its way to becoming an independent nation. That is until July 25,
     1898, when the United States invaded the island. After three years of
     resistance by the Puerto Rican people, the U.S. military might
     prevailed and Puerto Rico became a U.S. colony. In 1952, it became a
     "commonwealth," but the colonlial pattern, with 90 percent of the
     country's industry in U.S. hands, continues to this day.
          Puerto Rico is rife with social and environmental problems, many
     of them stemming from its status as an American colony. One
     independence group claims that "forty percent of Puerto Rican woman
     have been sterilized as part of a deliberate U.S. strategy to
     depopulate the island."  Unemployment drives many Puerto Ricans to
     seek work in the U.S. Many others left their homes in order to
     accommodate the seven military bases there. Military recruiters prey
     on desperate youth experiencing 75 percent unemployment. Bombing
     practice on the island of Vieques destroyed the local fishing industry
     there. And while Puerto Rico has eight federal "emergency list" toxic
     dump sites, no U.S. environmental laws apply there. The U.S. is in
     violation of the Treaty of Tlateloco, which prohibits the storage of
     nuclear arms in Latin America, by storing nuclear weapons in Puerto
     Rico.
          Unfortunately for Puerto Rico, its importance to the U.S. is not
     limited to its industrial development but rather to its critical
     position as a U.S. military base. Currently 13% of Puerto Rico is
     controlled by the U.S. military. Roosevelt Roads, the largest U.S.
     naval base outside the continentnal U.S., is located in Puerto Rico.
     And, when the U.S. military is forced to leave Guantanamo, Cuba, and
     Panama, in the 1990's, the military importance of Puerto Rico will
     increase significantly.
          The Puerto Rican people are resisting by every means they can
     from demonstrations protesting U.S. war games, to protests over plans
     to strip-mine mineral-rich Puerto Rico, to militant occupations of
     U.S. military controlled-land, to armed actions.
          As a result of the growing independencestruggle, the U.S. has
     intensified its repression.  FBI surveillance, the use of grand juries
     to imprison activists, and a deliberate media portrayal of Puerto
     Rican independistas as terrorists are all designed to destroy the
     movement for self-determination. It was recently revealed that the
     Puerto Rican Intelligence Division, a unit known for its closeness to
     the FBI, maintains a 74,000-person "subversives list" which includes
     not just those affiliated with armed actions but lawyers, writers, and
     others who engage in serious dissent.
          Given the ongoing repression and the increasing dissension, it
     may well be that our next Vietnam is not Nicaragua, but our very own
     "Commonwealth" -- Puerto Rico.

           SOURCES: NORTHERN SUN NEWS, October 1987,  "Puerto Rico: A long
     freedom struggle," by Melinda Power, p 5; UTNE READER, Jan/Feb 1988,
     "Puerto Rico: Revolution at doorstep?," by Chris Gunderson, pp 13-14.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


         CONGRESSIONAL CONFLICT OF INTEREST: COMPANY MAN PROBES CONTRAS

          The integrity of the congressional panel investigating the
     Iran-contra scandal was seriously compromised by the appointment of
     Thomas Polgar as an investigator. The appointment also might explain
     why CIA involvement in drug trafficking and the La Penca bombing were
     not explored during the televised hearings.
          During the Vietnam war, Polgar, the CIA station chief in Saigon,
     was the object of congressional criticism because of his ongoing
     misinformation campaign to defend a continuing U.S. presence in
     Vietnam even though his own emergency rooftop departure from the
     embassy was only two months away. Despite his history of misleading
     Congress, Polgar was appointed to the Senate panel which raises
     undeniable conflict-of-interest issues.
          Polgar is an active mmeber of the Association of Former
     Intelligence Officers (AFIO), an organization that actively lobbies
     Congress on behalf of U.S. intelligence activities. He served as a
     consultant to the Vice President's Task Force on Combatting Terrorism,
     a group loaded with operatives who participated in the covert aid
     pipeline to the contras, including John Poindexter and Oliver North.
     He is a paid consultant for a corporate risk-analysis firm that had
     ties to ex-Nicarguan dictator Anastasio Somoza. And in Vietnam, Polgar
     worked for Theodore Shackley, a former top CIA official who
     facilitated arms sales to Iran.
          Polgar was one of two investigators who traveled to Costa Rica to
     investigate such things as contra drug running and the La Penca
     bombing which was supposed to kill Eden Pastora, the dissident contra
     leader, but instead killed eight other people including one American
     journalist.
          Evidence supporting CIA involvement in the La Penca bombing and
     drug trafficking was within reach of Polgar when he arrived in Costa
     Rica.  John Hull, a U.S. rancher based in Costa Rica, would have been
     a logical witness to interview because of his ties to the supply
     network and allegations about his involvement in drug running.
     However, Hull told IN THESE TIMES that he never talked with Polgar.
     Polgar also failed to interview Peter Glibbery, a key witness to
     Hull's operation, who is in jail in Costa Rica.
          Polgar did interview two reporters from Costa Rica's English
     language newspaper, THE TICO TIMES, but did not seem interested in
     hard facts. "His questions were subjective, what we thought about
     Pastora and Hull", said reporter Beth Hawkins. "Polgar didn't want to
     hear anything specific -- dates, evidence, sources." Nor did he even
     ask about La Penca.
          As with Watergate, the congressional hearings on the Iran-contra
     issue could have helped restore credibility to our government;
     instead, sending a longtime CIA operative to investigate a scandal
     replete with CIA illegalities only further compromised the integrity
     of the system.

          SOURCE:  IN THESE TIMES, 6/10/87, "Congressional conflict of
     interest: a CIA good ol' boy probes the network," by Vince Bielski and
     Dennis Bernstein, pp 6-7.






             Nomination for the "Ten Best Censored Stories of 1987"


           SIT, FIDO.  DOWN.   ROLL OVER.  GOOD BOY.  NOW DIE FOR ME.

          Every once in a while, radical animal rights activists commit an
     act of protest which earns the media attention. But rarely do the
     media publicize the issues which drive the activists to action.
          According to the Congressional Office of Technological
     Assessment, 17 to 22 million animals are used yearly for testing in
     research laboratories.  Animal rights activists believe the figure is
     closer to 70 million.
          Animals have been used to determine what the potential adverse
     effects would be to humans if exposed to explosives, chemicals, binary
     poison gases, radiation, infectious bacterial and viral diseases, and,
     of course, cosmetics.
          Dogs, primates, rats, cats, mice, and rabbits are not the only
     animals being cruelly treated in the U.S.  Now the mistreatment of
     exotic animals is also being reported.
          Because the meat of exotic animals, like deer, elk, and buffalo,
     is leaner than commercial meat and without antibiotics, it has become
     a popular menu item in trendy East Coast restaurants.  Venison
     consumption jumped from 1,000 pounds a week in 1985 to 4,000 pounds a
     week in 1986 in New York.
          Animals reported slaughtered in 1986 in North America included
     9,000 bison, 5,000 caribou, countless thousands of deer, and untold
     numbers of wild boar, elk, llamas, and water buffalo. Before these
     animals were killed, many of them lived in stacked cages, barely with
     enough room to turn around in.
          In Australia, three to five million kangaroos are killed yearly.
     Marian Newman of the International Wildlife Coalition described this
     slaughhter as "one of the most barbaric commercial wildlife massacres
     in the world."  Their hides are typically used for athletic shoes,
     dress shoes, purses, belts, cattle whips and novelty items. According
     to Dean Wilkinson, legislative director for Greenpeace, in the U.S.,
     Adidas, Puma, and Florsheim continue to make kangaroo-leather shoes.
          In 1987, the corporate owners of three California Bay area pet
     stores agreed to pay a $150,000 settlement rather than risk a higher
     jury verdict for having allegedly sold sick animals, beat some animals
     to death, and practiced veterinarian medicine without a license.
     Unfortunately this was not an isolated case. Particularly offensive is
     the exotic bird trade which sees between 50,000 and 100,000 birds
     enter the U.S. illegally every year. But perhaps the most offensive
     thing about pet shops is not their greed and cruelty but their
     superfluousness.  With more than 20 million unadopted dogs and cats --
     many of them purebreds -- being put to death every year in the
     nation's tax-supported shelters, why do we need a pet industry?
          A nation of people who sometimes seem to care more for their pets
     than for one another might be tempted to do something about animal
     cruelty if they knew more about it. The issues that force animal
     rights activists to take to the streets surely deserve better coverage
     by our media.

          SOURCES: THE ANIMAL'S AGENDA, "Marsupial Wars -- Australia's
     Shame," by Peter A. Rawlinson, April 1987, pp 8-14, 48; "The
     Pentagon's Secret War on Animals," by Holly Metz, June 1987, pp 22-29,
     48; "Exotics for Slaughter," by Merritt Clifton, July/August 1987, pp
     41-43; "The Pet Shop Scam," by Jack Rosenberg, December 1987, pp
     12-15, 19-20.