“New Exotic Investments Emerging on Wall Street - New York Times” plus 4 more |
- New Exotic Investments Emerging on Wall Street - New York Times
- Woman's case reflects prisoners' treatment in Iran - WJLA
- Text size - Chicago Tribune
- EPA's Failure to Publicize Drinking Water Data Prompts Rethinking in ... - Common Dreams
- EPA's Failure To Publicize Drinking Water Data Prompts Agency ... - Huffingtonpost.com
| New Exotic Investments Emerging on Wall Street - New York Times Posted: 05 Sep 2009 09:57 AM PDT After the mortgage business imploded last year, Wall Street investment banks began searching for another big idea to make money. They think they may have found one. The bankers plan to buy "life settlements," life insurance policies that ill and elderly people sell for cash — $400,000 for a $1 million policy, say, depending on the life expectancy of the insured person. Then they plan to "securitize" these policies, in Wall Street jargon, by packaging hundreds or thousands together into bonds. They will then resell those bonds to investors, like big pension funds, who will receive the payouts when people with the insurance die. The earlier the policyholder dies, the bigger the return — though if people live longer than expected, investors could get poor returns or even lose money. Either way, Wall Street would profit by pocketing sizable fees for creating the bonds, reselling them and subsequently trading them. But some who have studied life settlements warn that insurers might have to raise premiums in the short term if they end up having to pay out more death claims than they had anticipated. The idea is still in the planning stages. But already "our phones have been ringing off the hook with inquiries," says Kathleen Tillwitz, a senior vice president at DBRS, which gives risk ratings to investments and is reviewing nine proposals for life-insurance securitizations from private investors and financial firms, including Credit Suisse. "We're hoping to get a herd stampeding after the first offering," said one investment banker not authorized to speak to the news media. In the aftermath of the financial meltdown, exotic investments dreamed up by Wall Street got much of the blame. It was not just subprime mortgage securities but an array of products — credit-default swaps, structured investment vehicles, collateralized debt obligations — that proved far riskier than anticipated. The debacle gave financial wizardry a bad name generally, but not on Wall Street. Even as Washington debates increased financial regulation, bankers are scurrying to concoct new products. In addition to securitizing life settlements, for example, some banks are repackaging their money-losing securities into higher-rated ones, called re-remics (re-securitization of real estate mortgage investment conduits). Morgan Stanley says at least $30 billion in residential re-remics have been done this year. Financial innovation can be good, of course, by lowering the cost of borrowing for everyone, giving consumers more investment choices and, more broadly, by helping the economy to grow. And the proponents of securitizing life settlements say it would benefit people who want to cash out their policies while they are alive. But some are dismayed by Wall Street's quick return to its old ways, chasing profits with complicated new products. "It's bittersweet," said James D. Cox, a professor of corporate and securities law at Duke University. "The sweet part is there are investors interested in exotic products created by underwriters who make large fees and rating agencies who then get paid to confer ratings. The bitter part is it's a return to the good old days." Indeed, what is good for Wall Street could be bad for the insurance industry, and perhaps for customers, too. That is because policyholders often let their life insurance lapse before they die, for a variety of reasons — their children grow up and no longer need the financial protection, or the premiums become too expensive. When that happens, the insurer does not have to make a payout. But if a policy is purchased and packaged into a security, investors will keep paying the premiums that might have been abandoned; as a result, more policies will stay in force, ensuring more payouts over time and less money for the insurance companies. "When they set their premiums they were basing them on assumptions that were wrong," said Neil A. Doherty, a professor at Wharton who has studied life settlements. Indeed, Mr. Doherty says that in reaction to widespread securitization, insurers most likely would have to raise the premiums on new life policies. Critics of life settlements believe "this defeats the idea of what life insurance is supposed to be," said Steven Weisbart, senior vice president and chief economist for the Insurance Information Institute, a trade group. "It's not an investment product, a gambling product." After Mortgages Undeterred, Wall Street is racing ahead for a simple reason: With $26 trillion of life insurance policies in force in the United States, the market could be huge. Not all policyholders would be interested in selling their policies, of course. And investors are not interested in healthy people's policies because they would have to pay those premiums for too long, reducing profits on the investment. But even if a small fraction of policy holders do sell them, some in the industry predict the market could reach $500 billion. That would help Wall Street offset the loss of revenue from the collapse of the United States residential mortgage securities market, to $140 billion so far this year from a peak of $918 billion in 2006, according to Dealogic, a firm that tracks financial data. Some financial firms are moving to outpace their rivals. Credit Suisse, for example, is in effect building a financial assembly line to buy large numbers of life insurance policies, package and resell them — just as Wall Street firms did with subprime securities. The bank bought a company that originates life settlements, and it has set up a group dedicated to structuring deals and one to sell the products. Goldman Sachs has developed a tradable index of life settlements, enabling investors to bet on whether people will live longer than expected or die sooner than planned. The index is similar to tradable stock market indices that allow investors to bet on the overall direction of the market without buying stocks. Spokesmen for Credit Suisse and Goldman Sachs declined to comment. If Wall Street succeeds in securitizing life insurance policies, it would take a controversial business — the buying and selling of policies — that has been around on a smaller scale for a couple of decades and potentially increase it drastically. Defenders of life settlements argue that creating a market to allow the ill or elderly to sell their policies for cash is a public service. Insurance companies, they note, offer only a "cash surrender value," typically at a small fraction of the death benefit, when a policyholder wants to cash out, even after paying large premiums for many years. Enter life settlement companies. Depending on various factors, they will pay 20 to 200 percent more than the surrender value an insurer would pay. But the industry has been plagued by fraud complaints. State insurance regulators, hamstrung by a patchwork of laws and regulations, have criticized life settlement brokers for coercing the ill and elderly to take out policies with the sole purpose of selling them back to the brokers, called "stranger-owned life insurance." In 2006, while he was New York attorney general, Eliot Spitzer sued Coventry, one of the largest life settlement companies, accusing it of engaging in bid-rigging with rivals to keep down prices offered to people who wanted to sell their policies. The case is continuing. "Predators in the life settlement market have the motive, means and, if left unchecked by legislators and regulators and by their own community, the opportunity to take advantage of seniors," Stephan Leimberg, co-author of a book on life settlements, testified at a Senate Special Committee on Aging last April. Tricky Predictions In addition to fraud, there is another potential risk for investors: that some people could live far longer than expected. It is not just a hypothetical risk. That is what happened in the 1980s, when new treatments prolonged the life of AIDS patients. Investors who bought their policies on the expectation that the most victims would die within two years ended up losing money. It happened again last fall when companies that calculate life expectancy determined that people were living longer. The challenge for Wall Street is to make securitized life insurance policies more predictable — and, ideally, safer — investments. And for any securitized bond to interest big investors, a seal of approval is needed from a credit rating agency that measures the level of risk. In many ways, banks are seeking to replicate the model of subprime mortgage securities, which became popular after ratings agencies bestowed on them the comfort of a top-tier, triple-A rating. An individual mortgage to a home buyer with poor credit might have been considered risky, because of the possibility of default; but packaging lots of mortgages together limited risk, the theory went, because it was unlikely many would default at the same time. While that idea was, in retrospect, badly flawed, Wall Street is convinced that it can solve the risk riddle with securitized life settlement policies. That is why bankers from Credit Suisse and Goldman Sachs have been visiting DBRS, a little known rating agency in lower Manhattan. In early 2008, the firm published criteria for ways to securitize a life settlements portfolio so that the risks were minimized. Interest poured in. Hedge funds that have acquired life settlements, for example, are keen to buy and sell policies more easily, so they can cash out both on investments that are losing money and on ones that are profitable. Wall Street banks, beaten down by the financial crisis, are looking to get their securitization machines humming again. Ms. Tillwitz, an executive overseeing the project for DBRS, said the firm spent nine months getting comfortable with the myriad risks associated with rating a pool of life settlements. Could a way be found to protect against possible fraud by agents buying insurance policies and reselling them — to avoid problems like those in the subprime mortgage market, where some brokers made fraudulent loans that ended up in packages of securities sold to investors? How could investors be assured that the policies were legitimately acquired, so that the payouts would not be disputed when the original policyholder died? And how could they make sure that policies being bought were legally sellable, given that some states prohibit the sale of policies until they have been in force two to five years? Spreading the Risk To help understand how to manage these risks, Ms. Tillwitz and her colleague Jan Buckler — a mathematics whiz with a Ph.D. in nuclear engineering — traveled the world visiting firms that handle life settlements. "We do not want to rate a deal that blows up," Ms. Tillwitz said. The solution? A bond made up of life settlements would ideally have policies from people with a range of diseases — leukemia, lung cancer, heart disease, breast cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer's. That is because if too many people with leukemia are in the securitization portfolio, and a cure is developed, the value of the bond would plummet. As an added precaution, DBRS would run background checks on all issuers. Also, a range of quality of life insurers would have to be included. To test how different mixes of policies would perform, Mr. Buckler has run computer simulations to show what would happen to returns if people lived significantly longer than expected. But even with a math whiz calculating every possibility, some risks may not be apparent until after the fact. How can a computer accurately predict what would happen if health reform passed, for example, and better care for a large number of Americans meant that people generally started living longer? Or if a magic-bullet cure for all types of cancer was developed? If the computer models were wrong, investors could lose a lot of money. As unlikely as those assumptions may seem, that is effectively what happened with many securitized subprime loans that were given triple-A ratings. Investment banks that sold these securities sought to lower the risks by, among other things, packaging mortgages from different regions and with differing credit levels of the borrowers. They thought that if house prices dropped in one region — say Florida, causing widespread defaults in that part of the portfolio — it was highly unlikely that they would fall at the same time in, say, California. Indeed, economists noted that historically, housing prices had fallen regionally but never nationwide. When they did fall nationwide, investors lost hundreds of billions of dollars. Both Standard & Poor's and Moody's, which gave out many triple-A ratings and were burned by that experience, are approaching life settlements with greater caution. Standard & Poor's, which rated a similar deal called Dignity Partners in the 1990s, declined to comment on its plans. Moody's said it has been approached by financial firms interested in securitizing life settlements, but has not yet seen a portfolio of policies that meets its standards. Investor Appetite Despite the mortgage debacle, investors like Andrew Terrell are intrigued. Mr. Terrell was the co-head of Bear Stearns's longevity and mortality desk — which traded unrated portfolios of life settlements — and later worked at Goldman Sachs's Institutional Life Companies, a venture that was introducing a trading platform for life settlements. He thinks securitized life policies have big potential, explaining that investors who want to spread their risks are constantly looking for new investments that do not move in tandem with their other investments. "It's an interesting asset class because it's less correlated to the rest of the market than other asset classes," Mr. Terrell said. Some academics who have studied life settlement securitization agree it is a good idea. One difference, they concur, is that death is not correlated to the rise and fall of stocks. "These assets do not have risks that are difficult to estimate and they are not, for the most part, exposed to broader economic risks," said Joshua Coval, a professor of finance at the Harvard Business School. "By pooling and tranching, you are not amplifying systemic risks in the underlying assets." The insurance industry is girding for a fight. "Just as all mortgage providers have been tarred by subprime mortgages, so too is the concern that all life insurance companies would be tarred with the brush of subprime life insurance settlements," said Michael Lovendusky, vice president and associate general counsel of the American Council of Life Insurers, a trade group that represents life insurance companies. And the industry may find allies in government. Among those expressing concern about life settlements at the Senate committee hearing in April were insurance regulators from Florida and Illinois, who argued that regulation was inadequate. "The securitization of life settlements adds another element of possible risk to an industry that is already in need of enhanced regulations, more transparency and consumer safeguards," said Senator Herb Kohl, the Democrat from Wisconsin who is chairman of the Special Committee on Aging. DBRS agrees on the need to be careful. "We want this market to flourish in a safe way," Ms. Tillwitz said.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Woman's case reflects prisoners' treatment in Iran - WJLA Posted: 05 Sep 2009 09:00 AM PDT
BEIRUT - The interrogator politely apologized for grilling the prisoner about her role in the mass protests over Iran's disputed presidential election. Then the prisoner was made to sit facing a wall in the courtyard of Iran's Evin Prison, blindfolded, handcuffed and covered in an all-enveloping chador for four and a half hours under the blazing sun. "America is our enemy," the interrogator told her. "Why are you so naive and can't see this? It's exploiting the situation here and wants to ransack the country. They don't have your interest at heart. The ordeal of Nazy, a 29-year-old university student who worked with the campaign of defeated presidential candidate Mehdi Karroubi, gives a rare glimpse of what is happening to detained protesters. Nazy spoke to The Associated Press by telephone from Tehran after her release on the condition that only her first name be used, to protect herself and her family. Thousands have been arrested since incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was declared the winner, despite cries of fraud. The opposition claims detainees were savagely raped by their jailers and at least 69 people were killed, including some from beatings in prison. A female guard pulled out a poster from Nazy's bag. "Ha, instead of saying 'In the Name of God,' she's written 'In the Name of Democracy' on the poster," the guard mocked Nazy. "I'll show you what democracy really is." Another guard came in and challenged Nazy for being a member of the 'One Million Signature' campaign - a group pressing for changes in Iran's laws on women. "Why don't you live your life quietly?" she said. "Do you really consider yourself a woman? We are women who work to bring bread to the table, just like normal people. You ought to do the same and work. You call collecting signatures work?" She said Nazy's family was looking all over town for her and added, "Why don't you use your brain a little?" Nazy said she was working for the woman's rights. "Can't you find a better way to fight for our rights?" the officer asked her. By 4 p.m. the number of detainees - mostly men picked up at the protest sites - had swelled to more than 100. Nazy and two other women waited for several hours in a van while more female demonstrators were brought in. It was dark by the time the van, which seated 12, was filled with 19 women plus two female and one male officers. They sat three to a seat, blindfolded, their hands tied to the chairs. Every time they said a word, they were smacked in the head. At one point, the male officer threw six heavy bottles full of water on their heads. Nazy slightly lifted her blindfold and watched guards hit around 60 men - mostly young - in the head with batons. Blood streamed down their faces and soaked their shirts. The women were driven to the Vozara Monkerat (Moral Police), a temporary jailhouse for prostitutes and drug addicts. The officers dumped them inside the green metal gates of the building and left. No one at the Monkerat knew why the 19 women were there, who had brought them, what their offenses were. They shoved every five of them into a 3 by 2 meter (10 by 6 feet) carpeted room where they couldn't even stretch their legs. The rooms were dark, with no windows. By the time dawn broke, the women were screaming. A young mother was wailing. She had left her three-year-old child in the house alone to shop at the corner store when she was arrested. After 15 hours, they were allowed to use the toilet, and only once. Just before midnight, the women were escorted up the stairs into a room with a big library. They were given forms to fill: reason for their detention. The middle-aged interrogator - in a short-sleeved white shirt and white pants and a golden chain around his neck - did not look like a typical officer of the regime. Nor did his assistant, a young man also clean-shaven and wearing chains. A few minutes later, a young, thin man wearing a suit walked in. "Do you realize your crime is much heavier than others?" the new man asked Nazy. "Because you are with the ("One Million Signature') campaign." "I don't even know why I have been arrested," she replied. He wrote at the bottom of the paper: "to be released on billion rial (about $100,000) bail." He told her to sign the paper so she could go home that night. Her charge was: disruption of law and order, action against national security, destruction of public property, participation in illegal gathering. She said did not accept any of the charges. "Then you will stay right here," he said. "Put on her handcuffs and blindfold and take her downstairs," he told the guard. Nazy was terrified. She didn't want to stay there alone, and was worried about her family. "If I sign it means I accept the charges?" she asked the man. He said the charges would remain whether she signed or not. She was afraid that if she accepted the charges, they would slap a prison sentence on her. "Don't sign. Stay here until you die," the man threatened her. The young assistant tried to persuade her to sign. "Will I then go home tonight?" she asked him. "Yes. Don't you see you are signing bail?" he assured her. The moment she signed, the interrogator said: "Put on her handcuffs and blindfold and take her to Evin." "But you said I will be going home tonight!" Nazy said. "Who do you think you are that I have to answer to you? Take her to Evin!" the man snapped. It was after 2 a.m. when she and 6 other prisoners arrived at Evin. No one was expecting them. Guards said they had no vacant rooms, the prison was overcrowded. Meanwhile, six busloads of men tied to the windows arrived from the criminal detention center of Shahpour, one of the most notorious centers known for torturing inmates. Finally, at 2.30 a.m. the new arrivals were allowed into the Women's Section 2. They were searched and fingerprinted. Every six of them were put in a cell with a carpet, a toilet, a shower and a washbasin. The inmates included a 30-year-old woman with breast cancer who was sexually molested while she was driven from Shahpour to Evin. The woman, who had undergone surgery a few months earlier, was bleeding when she arrived. Among the others were a 15-year-old arrested with her mother and aunt; two 16-year-old girls riding bicycles near the protest site and, ironically, four supporters of Ahmadinejad, including a 40-year-old seamstress whose brother was a senior Revolutionary Guard official. Most of the food was camphorated and numbed their lips. Water was undrinkable. Many prisoners felt nausea. In the morning, Nazy wore a chador, was handcuffed and blindfolded and walked with a guard to an interrogation center known as the Evin School - so called perhaps because of the school desks used there. The interrogator stood behind her asking questions and told her to write the answers at the bottom of the paper from underneath her blindfold. "He used foul language," said Nazy. For every question, he took the paper from Nazy, wrote it down and returned it to her to write the answer. He asked the same questions over and over again. Why did you vote for Mehdi Karroubi? Why did you choose Karroubi over Mousavi? How much money did you get? Where did your meetings take place? Did you wear the veil at the campaign headquarters? How did you know how many votes you got? Who said so? Who was the decision-maker in your campaign? Who wrote the slogans? Before the elections, did you plan if the results were not in favor of your candidate that you would cause disturbances? He grilled her for nearly three and a half hours. Nazy's last interrogation took 4 1/2 hours under the sun. All the female prisoners were brought to the courtyard and made to sit facing the wall. Interrogators sat behind them. Some were very aggressive and even kicked and slapped the prisoners. But Nazy's interrogator was polite. "This is what happens when there's a mass sweep. Some are innocent," he told Nazy. "Why did you have to come into the street that day when you knew the situation was tense?" Then he gave her a lecture about U.S. designs against the Islamic Republic and the attempts of opportunists to destabilize the country. "You've done nothing here, but if we don't find those responsible we will have to blame you, charge you for it. Why? Because you brought about a situation where they could exploit it," he said. Nazy was released on bail at 11.30 the following night, one week after being arrested. She awaits a summons from court.
 This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Posted: 05 Sep 2009 08:46 AM PDT |
| EPA's Failure to Publicize Drinking Water Data Prompts Rethinking in ... - Common Dreams Posted: 05 Sep 2009 08:24 AM PDT There is some evidence that Congress -- and the Environmental Protection Agency -- are rethinking their policies on a commonly used weed-killer after disclosures that the EPA failed to notify the public about high levels of the herbicide in drinking water. As the Investigative Fund revealed last week, the herbicide atrazine has been found at levels above the federal safety limit in drinking water in at least four states. The chemical has been studied for its potential link to breast cancer, prostate cancer, and birth defects, and the EPA considers it to be a potential endocrine disruptor. It is banned in the European Union. The Natural Resources Defense Council published a report on atrazine levels last week, and the New York Times weighed in with an article on growing questions about the herbicide's health effects. The Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee has asked the EPA for a comprehensive briefing next week on the agency's failure to publicize results of tests that showed high levels of atrazine. The committee also is asking the EPA to develop a specific plan for reporting this data to the public in the future. A senior committee staffer confirmed today that Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and her staff plan to meet with "key players" at the EPA next week to discuss their data on atrazine. "This is a top priority for us," the staff member said. "We're not going to shy away from this. People have a right to know what is in their drinking water, particularly when the EPA's data suggests that there could be a health concern." For five years, the EPA has been collecting weekly tests of drinking water in about 150 watersheds, primarily in the Midwest, where farmers spray the herbicide on cornfields and other crops. The agency, however, never acted on the results. Nor had it ever published the data -- until tonight. EPA officials say they have now decided to make the test results available on their Web site. The Investigative Fund obtained the data this summer through a public records request and published it last week. In a statement to the I-Fund tonight, the EPA said the change in policy is important "because now people can get the data much easier" without going through the "burdensome" process of requesting public records. The statement from the EPA said: "EPA is taking a hard look at atrazine, including many of the issues you raise. Atrazine is very controversial ... Administrator Jackson has made a commitment to strengthen the Agency's chemical management programs, which she identified as one of her top priorities upon her arrival at the Agency. This includes atrazine. We really want to emphasize that this new team is actively rethinking how to address atrazine." It's not only the Senate and EPA that plan to take a look at policy on atrazine. In the House, one congressman is planning to reintroduce legislation to ban the herbicide atrazine in the fall. Last August, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) introduced a bill (H.R.3399), prohibiting the use, production, sale, importation, or exportation of any pesticide containing atrazine. It died in the health subcommittee last September. Minh Ta, legislative director for Ellison, said the congressman is concentrating on the financial crisis and health care, but would reintroduce the bill in the fall. "It's an issue that the Congressman has been concerned about," Ta said. "These articles in the Huffington Post reinforce the need to act quickly." But Richard Wiles, executive director at the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy group, said that it will be difficult to garner broad congressional support for tighter atrazine regulation, let alone a ban. "This is the big kahuna," Wiles said. "Atrazine is one of those pollutants with a fortress of defenders — more so than most other chemicals." Wiles said that any attempt to restrict atrazine use would likely be blocked by the House Agriculture Committee, who tend to favor the "pro-pesticide farm lobby and pesticide makers." The committee is chaired by Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Peterson was the top congressional recipient of campaign contributions from the agricultural services industry (which includes Syngenta Corp) in the 2008 and 2006 election cycles. Peterson's office did not respond to a request for comment.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| EPA's Failure To Publicize Drinking Water Data Prompts Agency ... - Huffingtonpost.com Posted: 05 Sep 2009 07:41 AM PDT There is some evidence that Congress -- and the Environmental Protection Agency -- are rethinking their policies on a commonly used weed-killer after disclosures that the EPA failed to notify the public about high levels of the herbicide in drinking water. As the Investigative Fund revealed last week, the herbicide atrazine has been found at levels above the federal safety limit in drinking water in at least four states. The chemical has been studied for its potential link to breast cancer, prostate cancer, and birth defects, and the EPA considers it to be a potential endocrine disruptor. It is banned in the European Union. The Natural Resources Defense Council published a report on atrazine levels last week, and the New York Times weighed in with an article on growing questions about the herbicide's health effects. The Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee has asked the EPA for a comprehensive briefing next week on the agency's failure to publicize results of tests that showed high levels of atrazine. The committee also is asking the EPA to develop a specific plan for reporting this data to the public in the future. A senior committee staffer confirmed today that Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and her staff plan to meet with "key players" at the EPA next week to discuss their data on atrazine. "This is a top priority for us," the staff member said. "We're not going to shy away from this. People have a right to know what is in their drinking water, particularly when the EPA's data suggests that there could be a health concern." For five years, the EPA has been collecting weekly tests of drinking water in about 150 watersheds, primarily in the Midwest, where farmers spray the herbicide on cornfields and other crops. The agency, however, never acted on the results. Nor had it ever published the data -- until tonight. EPA officials say they have now decided to make the test results available on their Web site. The Investigative Fund obtained the data this summer through a public records request and published it last week. In a statement to the I-Fund tonight, the EPA said the change in policy is important "because now people can get the data much easier" without going through the "burdensome" process of requesting public records. The statement from the EPA said: "EPA is taking a hard look at atrazine, including many of the issues you raise. Atrazine is very controversial ... Administrator Jackson has made a commitment to strengthen the Agency's chemical management programs, which she identified as one of her top priorities upon her arrival at the Agency. This includes atrazine. We really want to emphasize that this new team is actively rethinking how to address atrazine." It's not only the Senate and EPA that plan to take a look at policy on atrazine. In the House, one congressman is planning to reintroduce legislation to ban the herbicide atrazine in the fall. Last August, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) introduced a bill (H.R.3399), prohibiting the use, production, sale, importation, or exportation of any pesticide containing atrazine. It died in the health subcommittee last September. Minh Ta, legislative director for Ellison, said the congressman is concentrating on the financial crisis and health care, but would reintroduce the bill in the fall. "It's an issue that the Congressman has been concerned about," Ta said. "These articles in the Huffington Post reinforce the need to act quickly." But Richard Wiles, executive director at the Environmental Working Group, an advocacy group, said that it will be difficult to garner broad congressional support for tighter atrazine regulation, let alone a ban. "This is the big kahuna," Wiles said. "Atrazine is one of those pollutants with a fortress of defenders -- more so than most other chemicals." Wiles said that any attempt to restrict atrazine use would likely be blocked by the House Agriculture Committee, who tend to favor the "pro-pesticide farm lobby and pesticide makers." The committee is chaired by Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Peterson was the top congressional recipient of campaign contributions from the agricultural services industry (which includes Syngenta Corp) in the 2008 and 2006 election cycles. Peterson's office did not respond to a request for comment.  This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
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