Cheesespread

Read this book!
There’s a book out there that everybody should read: The Best Democracy Money Can Buy. It’s subtitled, “An Investigative Reporter Exposes the Truth about Globalization, Corporate Cons, and High Finance Fraudsters,” and it’s by Greg Palast. Most people don’t know who Palast is, and that’s a shame, because a lot of people (Michael Moore, for one) believe that if there were a dozen more reporters like him the world would be a much different place.

You may have seen Palast stories from Salon.com, the Washington Post, the Guardian—or maybe his “Inside Corporate America” column in the Observer. He’s probably the Bush administration’s and the IMF/World Bank’s most hated journalist. Palast broke the Katherine Harris/Jeb Bush story about how thousands of Democrats were illegally removed from voter rolls to steal the election for George II (plenty of documentation to show this modern-day lynching of black voters). He’s also done amazing work on the Iron Triangle of Globalization, Wal-Mart stores, corruption in Tony Blair’s government (for which he won Britain’s top prizes for investigative and business journalism), the real story behind the Exxon Valdez oil spill that ruined Alaska’s coastline (no, it wasn’t the drunk ol’ captain), and lots of other stories that will shock, enrage and enlighten you—many collected here in this 200-page book.

The thing that makes Palast such a rare journalist is that he has a background in economics. He’s worked for the government and for labor unions for years and is an internationally recognized expert on corporate power. He’s directed government investigations and prosecution of racketeering by nuclear-plant builders and others, but five years ago he got sick of trying to explain complexities to moronic journalists and decided to turn his investigative skills to journalism—especially after seeing how badly the mainstream press lied on numerous occasions.

Publication of Democracy and Regulation, his series of lectures at Cambridge University and the University of Sao Paulo, is coming next. For video links to these stories, documentation and updates go to www. GregPalast.com.

Some quotes that open the book:

“We cannot trust some people who are non-conformists."—Ray Kroc, deceased chairman of McDonald’s (where one in eight Americans will work once in their lives)

“I don’t have to be nice to the spirit of the Anti-Christ"—Rev. Pat Robertson

Weekly props
1. Last Thursday night market, Sept. 26

2. Cartoonist Aaron McGruder on C-Span

3. Neil Young “Comes a Time” with Indian dancers at Farm Aid

5. Prop. 52 (same-day registration/voting)