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Archive for January, 2008

Fortune weighs in on free trade

Posted in Trade on January 28, 2008 | Comments Off

Fortune magazine has a revealing look at a growing uneasiness with free trade among America’s middle class. Washington Editor Nina Easton in her article, “America Sours on Free Trade,” cites a new Fortune survey that found 78 percent of those surveyed feel that free trade has made life worse for American workers.

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Media roundup

Posted in Uncategorized on January 25, 2008 | Comments Off

ABC News: Consumer group calls for stronger warnings on Botox
NY Times: Group seeks new Botox warning
Houston Chronicle: Feds propose new vehicle roof rule
FOXBusiness: As infomercials move to mainstream TV, stay alert for scams
Voice of America: Pfizer fights Nigerian lawsuits

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Presidential candidates talk about trade

Posted in Trade on January 25, 2008 | Comments Off

From Holly Shulman @ Eyes on Trade: Maybe this sounds like a bad joke, but what do Austan Goolsbee, Barack Obama’s economic advisor, Gary Gensler (Clinton campaign) Kevin Hassett (McCain) and Leo Hindery (Edwards) have in common? (hint: it’s not exhaustion from the campaign trail or a common love for walks on the beach…as far [...]

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Botoxic?

Posted in Consumer Protection, Health, Pharmaceuticals, Product Safety on January 24, 2008 | 1 Comment »

Frankly, we’d be worried if anyone told us they were going to inject botulinum toxin – the same toxin that causes food poisioning – into our body. However, that doesn’t stop many people from choosing Botox and Myobloc for therapeutic, as well as purely cosmetic reasons. What many of these people don’t know is that [...]

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Still more on the Vytorin, Zetia fallout

Posted in Health, Pharmaceuticals on January 23, 2008 | Comments Off

As the Vytorin-Zetia story continues to pick up traction in the mainstream media and on the Web, it looks like the drug makers, Merck and Schering-Plough, are in full damage-control mode. In what’s probably a smart move, the AP reports the pharma companies pulled their highly successful ads for Vytorin. Merck and Schering-Plough also bought [...]

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Maryland next to get the lead out?

Posted in Congress, Consumer Protection, Product Safety on January 23, 2008 | Comments Off

Maryland might be the next state to pass a ban on lead in children’s products, following California, Michigan and Illinois, which we wrote about yesterday. Laura Smitherman of the Baltimore Sun in her story, “Lawmakers mull ban on lead toys,” says some Maryland legislators don’t want to wait around for the feds to get their [...]

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Congress agrees to disagree on gift rules

Posted in Congress, Ethics on January 22, 2008 | Comments Off

From Craig Homan @ Watchdog Blog: In what no longer comes as a surprise, the House ethics committee — contradicted by their colleagues at the Senate ethics committee — have poked another gaping hole in the new ethics rules.  The new ethics rules ban gifts of any value from lobbying organizations to lawmakers.  Both the [...]

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Toymaker Ty Inc. refuses to recall toxic doll of death

Posted in Consumer Protection, Product Safety on January 22, 2008 | 1 Comment »

Sure, I like to harp about how greedy corporate interests are always putting profits over the public good. I don’t spend any time looking at all the good things big corporations do for society, you say. I’m thinking maybe you have a point. Then, of course, I come across Sam Roe’s and Ted Gregory’s story, [...]

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The NYT’s mixed messages on cholesterol drugs

Posted in Health, Pharmaceuticals on January 22, 2008 | 1 Comment »

New York Times reporter Tara Parker-Pope writes about the Vytorin controversy in her column, “What that Cholesterol Trial Didn’t Show,” and on her NYT health blog, Well. Both column and blog seem to state the case that there is a lot of confusion and misinformation about the recent Merck and Schering-Plough clinical trial that found [...]

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Well, it depends on how you define ‘lobby’

Posted in Campaign Finance on January 19, 2008 | Comments Off

Mitt Romney, who is fond of painting himself as a D.C. outsider, is finding it hard to have his cake and eat it, too. He got into it the other day with Associated Press reporter Glen Johnson during a South Carolina photo-op over the question of his ties to lobbyists. Mitt insists he is running [...]

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