The Four Companies That Control the 147 Companies That Own Everything
skanda42The major cause of European debt crisis is the political control of the money
Dan OgdenIt would be interesting to see what the effect of inclusion or removal from the S&P does to a public company’s value afterwards.
2 comments, 2 called-out+ Comment now
3281
615
66
39
13
There may be 147 companies in the world that own everything, as colleague Bruce Upbin points out and they are dominated by investment companies as Eric Savitz rightly points out. But it’s not you and I who really control those companies, even though much of our money is in them. Given the nature of how money is invested, there are four companies in the shadows that really control those companies that own everything.
Before I reveal them, some light math:
According to the 2011 annual factbook from the Investment Company Institute, there is $24.7 trillion in all the mutual funds in the world (a little less than half from the US). Based on data from the ICI, $1.24 trillion of this is directly invested in index funds, plus another $992 billion in assets beyond that $24.7 trillion in Exchange Traded Funds, which aren’t mutual funds but are index funds. That means the bulk of that money is in “active” managed funds or fund of funds.
But then consider this: the chief of hedge funds at a very large asset manager told me last week (alas, I cannot identify either) that an internal study his firm recently performed found that the vast majority of mutual funds defined as actively managed see 95% of the assets they hold determined by an index.That means just 5% of actively managed funds really are driven by the active manager’s judgment.
This less-than-active management is for two reasons: one is to maintain the fund in a style box (i.e. large value stock, medium value stocks) and comply with the reality all mutual funds are required to have a benchmark index they compare their relative performance to. The other reason is to adhere to risk metrics to which most of the fund industry is beholden. This second point is partly due to Modern Portfolio Theory (a complex topic we won’t debate here) and to the human nature that active managers tend to build portfolios close to the indexes they benchmark against to avoid really awful downward relative performance years that ends up costing them their jobs.
So of the $25.69 trillion in worldwide assets we’ve identified, $2.23 trillion are directly in indexes (ETFs and index mutual funds) with another $22.3 trillion indirectly beholden to indexes (that 95% of actively managed fund holdings said to be determined by an index).
You can see where I’m headed here. That means the real power to control the world lies with four companies: McGraw-Hill, which owns Standard & Poor’s, Northwestern Mutual, which owns Russell Investments, the index arm of which runs the benchmark Russell 1,000 and Russell 3,000, CME Group which owns 90% of Dow Jones Indexes, and Barclay’s, which took over Lehman Brothers and its Lehman Aggregate Bond Index, the dominant world bond fund index. Together, these four firms dominate the world of indexing. And in turn, that means they hold real sway over the world’s money.
While that may seem benign – they are indexers after all you may say – a financial index isn’t cut and dried like the index of a book. It’s a misperception indexers merely do some simple math like identifying the 500 largest US companies and voila! you have the S&P 500. Every indexer has a fudge factor that allows them to say one company is more “economically significant” for the index at hand than another company. To again take the S&P 500 as an example, the 502-largest company by market cap could get the nod over number 500 by size if S&P decides it wants to.
The power is even more obvious in bonds. The now-Barclays Aggregate Bond Index attempts to mirror volume of bond issuance in a region or the world, but it can’t include even a sizable percentage of all the bonds issued. Essentially, there’s a big judgment call in there in what bonds it adds to its index. A judgment that influences bond fund flows worldwide.
What does all this mean? Researchers at a desk in midtown Manhattan are the butterflies that cause the hurricanes in the markets. For instance, 37% of all index funds in stocks are in a S&P 500 index fund. That’s $370 billion directly buying and selling stocks based on when the S&P analysts decide to drop ITT from the S&P500 and replace it with just one of three ITT spin-off, Xylem, as announced on Monday. Then add on top of that all of the so-called active mutual funds aiming to beat the S&P 500 (but still reflect 95% of the S&P in their funds) who react to the change and then all of the hedge funds who trade ahead of time trying to guess what S&P may drop or add.
I don’t have a grudge against any indexer (and full disclosure, I’ve done work for some of them). And the folks at McGraw-HIll don’t seem to spook people the way George Soros manages to. But when you discuss power in the world markets, the answer isn’t what you think it is.
Follow me on Twitter.
Sunday, 1 January 2012
The Four Companies That Control the 147 Companies That Own Everything - Forbes
#Extradition The Fight of Our Lives - http://juliasblog-the-fight-of-our-lives.blogspot.com/#
Dear.....Thank you for your email expressing your concerns about the nature of the UK’s extradition arrangements with America. Nick has asked me to respond.
The Liberal Democrats have been vocal in our criticism of the ‘lopsided’ extradition arrangements between Britain and the US. We believe that the treaty puts the citizens of the United Kingdom in a disadvantaged position when compared with citizens of the United States. That is why the Liberal Democrats proposed amendments to the Extradition Act in 2006 to protect the freedom and fair judicial treatment of British citizens. Sadly the previous Government refused to accept or act on these amendments.The Treaty is wrong in principle. Extradition is based on reciprocity. For a state to give up one of its citizens to another jurisdiction can be justified only by the confident knowledge that citizens of both states have equal rights.
As you know, Sir Scott Baker (a former Lord Justice of Appeal) recently published a Government commissioned review of the Extradition Act. The review concluded that the Extradition Act was not biased and that there was no need for reform.
You may be pleased to know that Nick has asked Sir Menzies Campbell QC to lead a Liberal Democrat review of the current extradition arrangements. Amongst many issues, the panel will consider the need to introduce a ‘forum bar’ which would give judges more discretion in deciding whether it is in the interests of justice for cases to be tried in the UK, such as the case involving Gary McKinnon.
I trust this is helpful.Yours sincerelyBarbara Masters
On behalf of:-NICK CLEGG MP
The Mysterious Death of Dr David Kelly: "Subversion of Due Process" of the Law in the United Kingdom
by Dr. Stephen Frost
0diggsdigg 14Share
Due process of the law has not been followed by the British state in the investigation into the death of Dr David Kelly. Of this there is now no doubt. The original inquest was derailed by Lord Falconer, in his dual capacity as Minister of State for Constitutional Affairs and Lord Chancellor.
Dr. Kelly remains the only British citizen not to have had his suspicious death examined properly at a coroner's inquest. This to some may seem trivial. It is not. It is a matter of the highest importance and should be of great concern to all British citizens, especially given the highly political context in which the death took place, inextricably linked as the death was to the United Kingdom's waging of illegal war (according to both the Geneva Conventions and the United Nations Charter) on the sovereign state of Iraq. Disregarding the political context of the death, all doctors are taught, or should be, that none of us is safe without inquests and that the Coroner speaks for the dead to protect the living.
The national disgrace, which the original failure to hold an inquest into this loyal public servant's death constitutes, is all the more concerning because it is a fact that the purported suicide verdict of Lord Hutton is the first time ever that a suicide verdict (if that is what Hutton's "finding" of suicide constituted) has been reached by someone other than a coroner. The standard of proof required to reach a suicide verdict is necessarily very high (the Coroner must be satisfied beyond reasonable doubt that the deceased not only killed himself but also that he intended to kill himself) because such a verdict closes down the case for ever, permanently smearing as it does the victim (who cannot argue back) and his family and stopping for ever any police investigation into the possibility of murder. With such a high standard of proof requirement one would have thought that Lord Hutton heard evidence under oath, but it later emerged that he did not. In simple practical terms, there has never been a case in which a suicide verdict has been overturned and a murderer subsequently convicted.
The possible, indeed probable, gross miscarriage of justice which Hutton's "finding" of suicide in the Kelly case constituted has now been compounded by the Attorney General Dominic Grieve's 9 June 2011 decision not to allow the doctors, who had put before him an unanswerable case for an inquest (see the twenty documents immediately below), permission to apply to the High Court, nor to apply himself, for an inquest.
The Memorial
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/07_01_11davidkelly1.pdf ,the Addendum to the Memorial
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/03_03_11_kellyinquest.pdf,and the Appendix to the Addendum to the Memorial
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/appendix-to-addendum-to-memorial.html,
all of which were submitted in the proper manner by Frances Swaine of the well known London law firm Leigh Day & Co. as part of a formal Section 13 application, were supplemented by no fewer than seventeen other submissions to the Attorney General:
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/first-submission-of-14-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/second-submission-of-14-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/third-submission-of-14-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/fourth-submission-of-14-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/fifth-submission-of-13-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/sixth-submission-of-13-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/seventh-submission-of-12-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/eighth-submission-of-12-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/ninth-submission-of-12-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/tenth-submission-of-12-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/eleventh-submission-of-12-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/twelfth-submission-of-12-from-me-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/submission-by-dr-david-halpin-to.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/office-of-attorney-general-december.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/third-submission-of-5-by-dr-david.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/fourth-submission-of-5-by-dr-david.html
http://drdavidkellyinquestrequired.blogspot.com/2011/06/fifth-submission-of-5-by-dr-david.htmlWorse still, an attempt by one of the group of doctors to judicially review the Attorney General's deeply disturbing decision was recently (19 December 2011) stopped, before clearing the first hurdle, by Mr Justice Nicol at the High Court. Despite the fact that the Attorney General is a Cabinet Minister and that his June decision was clearly political when it should have been based solely on the law and that his decision was infamously pre-empted by David Cameron's remarks on the case in the House of Commons, it seems that there is no provision to challenge the Attorney General's decision through the Courts.
This of course makes an already very bad situation much worse and raises profound constitutional questions, as well as questions of propriety. For common sense surely informs us that, of the many disingenuous assertions which the Attorney General Dominic Grieve made on behalf of the British state in June of this year, the conclusions he reached in his oral statement to the House of Commons are indefensible and misled Parliament:
"Having given the most careful consideration to all the material that has been sent to me, I have concluded that the evidence that Dr Kelly took his own life is overwhelmingly strong. Further, nothing that I have seen supports any allegation that Dr Kelly was murdered or that his death was the subject of any kind of conspiracy or cover-up. In my view, no purpose would be served by my making an application to the High Court for an inquest, and indeed I have no reasonable basis for doing so. There is no possibility that, at an inquest, a verdict other than suicide would be returned."
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201011/cmhansrd/cm110609/debtext/110609-0002.htmThe evidence that Dr Kelly took his own life was NOT overwhelmingly strong, for example crucially we are told there was no suicide note. Further, the Attorney General saw plenty of evidence that pointed to the possibility "that Dr Kelly was murdered" and plenty of evidence "that his death was the subject of" some "kind of conspiracy or cover-up". Further, the Attorney General's claim that "no purpose would be served by my making an application to the High Court for an inquest, and indeed I have no reasonable basis for doing so" is simply untrue. Finally, it is clearly impossible for him to predict the outcome of a future inquest and he must have known that for him to say in Parliament that "there is no possibility that, at an inquest, a verdict other than suicide would be returned" was misleading in the extreme.
Further, the Attorney General knew full well that the test for him (under a formal Section 13 application) to request an inquest or to allow the doctors to do so was very generous: he only had to conclude that at an inquest the verdict of suicide MIGHT be different NOT that it WOULD different.
There seems to be some confusion in the mind of the Attorney General as to whether or not an inquest took place. It makes no difference:if an inquest DID NOT take place a Section 13 application should be successful if the Coroner refuses or neglects to hold an inquest which ought to be held
AND
if an inquest DID take place a Section 13 application should be successful if that inquest was inadequate for any one of the following reasons:
1) insufficiency of inquiry
2) irregularity of proceedings
3) new facts or evidence
4) fraud
5) rejection of evidence
Whether an inquest did or did not take place, the doctors, in the evidence which they submitted to the Attorney General, satisfied not just one of the six requirements, but all six.
There are thus reasonable grounds for concluding that a high level conspiracy to pervert the course of justice has taken place. But what was/is so important to hide which would justify the risk of blocking an inquest, apparently at any cost?
At the very least, the David Kelly suicide verdict must be considered unsafe.
Dr Stephen Frost BSc MBChB (United Kingdom) Specialist in Diagnostic Radiology (Stockholm, Sweden)
Stephen Frost is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Stephen Frost
Email this article to a friend
Print this article
‘Holy’ Sex Toys? - The Daily Beast
Religious Sex-Toy Sites Vow to Save Marriages
Dec 30, 2011 4:45 AM EST
Christian, Jewish, and Muslim entrepreneurs have launched ‘religious’ sex-toy shops online in an effort to improve pious couples’ sex lives—and strengthen the marital bond. Allison Yarrow investigates: what makes a vibrator holy?
Joyce’s sex life can be divided into two acts: before and after the Turbo 8 Accelerator.
The evangelical Christian from California’s central valley had never had an orgasm alone nor with her husband of 25 years. “I didn’t know I wasn’t having one,” the 59-year-old mother of two told The Daily Beast. Yet after chatting with some church girlfriends, she learned what she was missing. “’All that happens to you?’” she asked. “They looked at me like I was crazy.”
Joyce, who requested that we use only her first name, and her equally devout spouse never would have found the bullet-shaped vibrator or the array of “marital aids” they’ve ordered since, if it wasn’t for the Christian sex toy website Book 22—introduced to her by a friend after their chat. “I’m a Christian, but this is awesome,” she said. “It was like being newlyweds again.”
Christian, Jewish and Muslim entrepreneurs have launched ‘religious’ sex toy shops online, in an effort to improve pious couples’ sex lives—and strengthen the marital bond. , Charles Benavidez / Getty Images
Sex and religion have long been perceived to be at odds, with carnal pleasures representing sin more than saintliness. Yet in recent years, a handful of savvy Christian, Jewish and Muslim entrepreneurs have embraced the notion that the two can coexist in a way that jibes with doctrine—and even glorifies traditional values by strengthening marriages.
Enter the religious sex-toy industry, which carefully markets and sells a range of sexual-pleasure products to the faithful. With the voice and disposition of a summer-camp director, Joy Wilson founded Book 22 a decade ago, when she had trouble “getting her body to respond” to her husband after their second child, and her online search for remedies yielded scandalous imagery that offended more than it helped. The pioneering site, named after the Biblical book also known as the Song of Solomon, now faces growing competition from rival vendors including Hooking Up Holy, Intimacy of Eden, and Covenant Spice.
And the industry grew exponentially this fall with the launch of the Orthodox Jewish shop Kosher Sex Toys, and last year with the Muslim vendor El Asira. The sites even enjoy the support of many community leaders. “Religious people do it like everybody else,” said David Ribner, a rabbi and sex therapist based in Israel, who works as a consultant for Kosher Sex Toys. “Why shouldn’t they have access to toys that make their lives more satisfying?”
To be clear, the “religious people” targeted are married, heterosexual religious people; pious sex-toy vendors market their products exclusively to these couples. Unlucky in love and looking for some solitary fun after morning prayers? Look elsewhere.
What happens in the heterosexual marital bed, however, should be nothing short of transcendent, say the site owners, who happily report that their holy books not only permit sexual fulfillment between partners, but require it. “If a man is unable to please a woman in bed, she can divorce him,” said Abdelaziz Aouragh, a 30-year-old Dutch Muslim businessman who founded El Asira—stressing the Islamic belief that “man and woman must reach their peak” during intercourse, and that only then is the “deed complete.”
The burgeoning niche, part of the roughly $15 billion sex-toy industry, reports that business has been steadily growing, with most sites shipping a few hundred orders per month. Clients usually find them through Google, say the owners, or a thoughtful religious leader or astute sex therapist. The vendors use many of the same distributors as secular shops, with most products made in China. Gavriel, a 25-year-old furniture salesman who owns Kosher Sex Toys (and asked that we use only his middle name) stressed in an interview, “There’s nothing wrong with having all the sex you want.”
To an outsider, visiting the religious sites feels a bit like listening to the bleeped-out version of an explicit hip-hop song: the substance is the same, it’s just missing the X-rated details. None of the sites feature any nudity, instead relying on mannequins to display lingerie. Nor do they feature any sexy language. Kosher Sex Toys, for example, rewrites product descriptions that risk shocking its audience. (The “Butterfly Clitoris Stimulator” becomes, simply, the “Vibrating Stimulator.”) And while they don’t flaunt their holiness, they’ll occasionally rely on religious messaging to sell themselves, or perhaps put potential customers at ease. Book 22, for example, promises to “enhance the intimate life of all God’s children.”
The “piousness” of the products themselves comes down to packaging and presentation. Book 22’s Wilson, who is 22 and lives in central Oregon, repackages plastics in plain boxes and includes additional care instructions. Kosher Sex Toys’s Gavriel also removes items from offensive packaging before shipping. Meanwhile, El Asira’s Aouragh only stocks brands that arrive in tasteful and inoffensive wrappings.
Despite consistencies across the religious sites, the vendors do vary based on doctrine, audience, and each owner’s preferences. Wilson refuses to sell anal devices and condoms, not because she objects, but because her customers do. “The Catholics protested the condoms, and the evangelical Christian community is sensitive about anal sex and play,” she said. “But I’ll special order anything if people ask.”
Aouragh, who rejects the term “sex shop,” preferring to say that he’s in the business of “sexual well-being,” sells only Sharia-compliant items. Meaning: no vibrators, dildos, or drugs that claim to enhance size or use, because these items misinterpret the male form. The homepage for El Asira, which means “The Society” in Arabic, is partitioned by gender, with two ornate mosque doors—and while it carries women's lingerie and a range of massage products, oils and lubricants sell best.
Meanwhile, Kosher Sex Toys’ Gavriel won’t stock male masturbatory aids because, he says, God frowns on wasted potential, according to the Torah. However, since Judaism doesn't prohibit female self-pleasure, he carries myriad trinkets that buzz. He also proudly sells whips and drip candles; performance-enhancing pills and sprays; clear-heeled shoes and thigh-high boots; and a variety of handcuffs, restraints, and tools for cutting them off.
"You can’t buy love and respect between a man and a woman," said Aouragh. "But we’re trying to be creative and clever in selling it."
And at least one customer is grateful for this inventory. Yaakov, a 25-year-old ultra-Orthodox Jewish salesman from New Jersey who preferred not to use his last name, views the site as a godsend. Shortly into his marriage, he discovered that he suffered from premature ejaculation, and his therapist, who works with many Orthodox couples, prescribed him “marital aids,” and directed him to Kosher Sex Toys. Without getting into detail, Yaakov told The Daily Beast simply, “It should be considered a mitzvah to use these things.” Of course, many religious leaders and worshipers disagree. Rabbi Avi Shafran, who works in communications at an Orthodox communal organization in New York City, said in an email that Kosher Sex Toys is “about as immodest—in the definition of the Jewish religious tradition—as one can get.” He describes Judaism's stance on sexual intimacy as “sublime” and “holy,” but believes toys taint this intention.
Indeed, navigating ingrained religious beliefs, and misconceptions, about sex and pleasure poses a continuous challenge for site owners, who have either taken it upon themselves to advise clients or enlisted the help of experts. Wilson pursued a master's degree in counseling to better help her customers. And Kosher Sex Toys keeps the rabbi and sex therapist Ribner on call as a licensed authority on both sex and scripture. Because of a lack of proper sex education, Ribner said, religious couples often suffer from misguided advice. “One couple was told that if the woman does not like sex, she should take two Tylenol and finish as quickly as possible,” he said. In his work with Kosher Sex Toys, he has advised on topics ranging from the science of erectile dysfunction to the morality of spanking a partner.
Ultimately, across religions, owners share the same lofty goal: to help fellow (married) worshipers find happiness and peace behind closed doors. “You can’t buy love and respect between a man and a woman,” said Aouragh. “But we’re trying to be creative and clever in selling it.”
Like The Daily Beast on Facebook and follow us on Twitter for updates all day long.
Allison Yarrow is assignment editor and a staff writer at Newsweek and The Daily Beast. Her essays and journalism have appeared in Huffington Post, Slate, CNN.com, Poets & Writers magazine and The Forward. She created and hosted the Yid Lit podcast, which interviews authors of literary fiction and nonfiction. Previously, as an associate producer at NBC News Productions, Allison produced health segments for a nationally syndicated program hosted by Hoda Kotb, and long-form documentary hours for MSNBC.
For inquiries, please contact The Daily Beast at editorial@thedailybeast.com.
Obama pledges to exempt Americans from indefinite detention law | The Raw Story
Obama pledges to exempt Americans from indefinite detention law
By Stephen C. Webster
Saturday, December 31, 2011
President Barack Obama signed on New Year’s Eve a bill that gives the military authority to detain American citizens indefinitely and without criminal charge, breaking with the stroke of a pen one of his many campaign promises, even as he pledged that the new powers the bill grants will not be applied to U.S. citizens.
The provision was just one part of a massive $662 billion defense spending authorization that funds the military, penalizes Iran’s central bank and freezes military aid to Pakistan, among other things.
The president’s opponents in Congress, including some Democrats, attached the indefinite detention provision to force the administration to either accept a much heavier load of terrorism suspects, many who would be heading to the Guantanamo Bay military prison, or veto the bill and stand accused of opposing funds for the troops.
President Obama issued a veto threat after a provision was added that required all terrorism suspects be automatically rendered into military custody — a fundamental change to the criminal justice system that members of the administration warned could stymie other agencies or put investigations at risk.
Obama agreed to sign it after language was left in the bill that allows the administration to dedicate terror prisoners to civilian courts instead of military custody. In its final form, the bill stipulates that all terrorism suspects are to be handled by the military unless the administration decides otherwise and explains its reasoning to Congress.
“My administration will not authorize the indefinite detention without trial of American citizens,” President Obama said in a signing statement, a tactic presidents occasionally use to clarify how they interpret laws. “Indeed, I believe that doing so would break with our most important traditions and values as a Nation. My Administration will interpret section 1021 in a manner that ensures that any detention it authorizes complies with the Constitution, the laws of war, and all other applicable law.”
Obama went on to explain that as he understands the indefinite detention provision, his administration is being given “broad authority to determine how best to implement it,” which he said would be used to ensure American citizens are exempt.
“I reject any approach that would mandate military custody where law enforcement provides the best method of incapacitating a terrorist threat,” Obama wrote.
“As my Administration has made clear, the only responsible way to combat the threat al-Qa’ida poses is to remain relentlessly practical, guided by the factual and legal complexities of each case and the relative strengths and weaknesses of each system. Otherwise, investigations could be compromised, our authorities to hold dangerous individuals could be jeopardized, and intelligence could be lost. I will not tolerate that result, and under no circumstances will my Administration accept or adhere to a rigid across-the-board requirement for military detention.”
The signing statement, while likely a relief to some of the president’s more liberal allies, will not assuage all criticism. As one writer for the progressive blog FireDogLake pointed out, future administrations may interpret the law differently, applying a wholly new standard of who should or should not be held in military custody.
“President Obama’s action today is a blight on his legacy because he will forever be known as the president who signed indefinite detention without charge or trial into law,” Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union, explained in a media advisory. “The statute is particularly dangerous because it has no temporal or geographic limitations, and can be used by this and future presidents to militarily detain people captured far from any battlefield. The ACLU will fight worldwide detention authority wherever we can, be it in court, in Congress, or internationally.”
“We are incredibly disappointed that President Obama signed this new law even though his administration had already claimed overly broad detention authority in court,” he added. “Any hope that the Obama administration would roll back the constitutional excesses of George Bush in the war on terror was extinguished today.”
Stephen C. Webster
Stephen C. Webster is the senior editor of Raw Story, and is based out of Austin, Texas. He previously worked as the associate editor of The Lone Star Iconoclast in Crawford, Texas, where he covered state politics and the peace movement’s resurgence at the start of the Iraq war. Webster has also contributed to publications such as True/Slant, Austin Monthly, The Dallas Business Journal, The Dallas Morning News, Fort Worth Weekly, The News Connection and others. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenCWebster.
Share this story >>
MORE FROM RAW STORY
(function () {try{VCM.media.render({sid:15473,media_id:6,media_type:8,version:"1.0"});} catch(e){}}());
