www.theomahachannel.com POSTED: 4:02 p.m. CST February 15, 2003 UPDATED: 4:05 p.m. CST February 15, 2003

OMAHA -- Leaders of Omaha's Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints say members of their church are prepared for the latest government-issued terror alert.

Mormons Offer Tips For Emergency Preparedness While many people are heeding the advice of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security by stocking up on duct tape and non-perishable foods, some Mormons saying they're just doing what they've done for nearly a century.

Sid Breese of Millard, a member of the LDS Church, has his basement full of food in case of an emergency.

The food and supplies aren't just for a terrorist attack or other emergency; they can also help if someone loses a job, he said.

Arthur Taylor, president of the Omaha Stake of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, says Mormons stockpile food and other supplies because of a directive from their church leader, whom they believe is a prophet.

Taylor said the supplies and food are like a home-insurance policy: You hope you'll never have to use it, but if there's an emergency, you're sure glad it's there.

The church has set up two hotlines for other churches, pastors or groups interested in finding out more information about storing food for the long term. The numbers to call are (402) 850-9722 and (402) 850-9723.

Copyright 2003 by TheOmahaChannel.com.

english.pravda.ru 10:00 2003-02-13

The project to create a continental market benefits only the US largest corporations

In November this year, the Southern US city of Miami will hold a new conference on the future of the Free Trade Area of the Americas - FTAA or ALCA in Spanish -. The intention of the US officials is to put more pressure on Latin American representatives to speed up the integration process.

US diplomats in Latin America are entitled to urge local Governments to have a favorable view on the question and adopt an active policy on the process. However, more and more voices inside and outside USA are rising against what the Brazilian President Lula Da Silva once considered "mere annexation" by Washington.

Notwithstanding, little has been explained on what really FTAA means and who benefits from the treaty. In practical terms, the FTAA is an extension of NAFTA to all Latin America from Guatemala to Argentina.

The program as it is today has five main characteristics. The main concept is Freedom of Trade, which means that all the countries will lift up limits to the import of goods. Analysts consider that it will have a serious impact on Latin American economies, as they will be compelled to produce only agricultural products.

Another key issue is the free access to the national markets. It means that goods and capitals will be considered nationals in any country member of the agreement, no matter where do they come from. Therefore, local Governments won't be allowed to promote local industries and to benefit them on public purchases.

The freedom of trade includes basic services, such as health-care and education. It means that in those areas, the public sector will be entitled to act only in the same way as the private corporations do it, to ensure fair competitive rules.

Additionally, national governments' decisions will be subject by warrants to the foreign investors. If one investor considers that a governmental regulation violates its interests, can prosecute those authorities before an international court. Such organism is to be composed by trade experts entitled to rule secretly. This seriously affects the national sovereignty of the State, as it will be unauthorized to rule on the benefit of the public.

In the opinion of Tom Hayden, Former State Senator of California and a well-known anti-globalization activist, the FTAA is a "NAFTA expanded". As NAFTA has failed in Mexico, driving up unemployment and finishing with country's middle class, there is no reason to think that the FTAA will succeed in the rest of the countries.

While serving in the California's Legislature, Hayden experienced NAFTA institutions: "I was chairman of the Natural Resources Committee of the California Senate. We had a gasoline additive that was leaking from the underground tanks to the drinking water. So I carried legislation to stop it. Eventually the California State stopped it. Then, the multinational company based in Canada went to the WTO asking for a $ 900 million compensation, which was their estimate of the profits they would lose from California trying to protect its water supply."

Therefore, the State could not sue the company for the poisoning of the water, but they could sue California for the lost of their profits from pollution. The case went to a WTO court, where three judges were appointed: one from Canada, one from Mexico and one from the USA. Hearings are secret, no reporters are allowed and no appeals can be made. The conclusions are yet to be released.

This sole example explains how FTAA or ALCO may work once established. Only benefits for the multinational companies and not a single word on cultural or politic integration, democracy or human rights. A n advance of the multinationals against people's interests.

Hernan Etchaleco PRAVDA.Ru Argentina

www.sfgate.com CRAIG KARMIN, The Wall Street Journal Wednesday, February 12, 2003

(02-12) 06:16 PST (AP) --

At a time when many U.S. companies are struggling to meet sales targets at home, a once-reliable market abroad suddenly looks much less hospitable: Latin America.

American multinational corporations in the 1990s earned billions of dollars from their subsidiaries based in South America and Mexico, as countries there enjoyed periods of high growth and attracted investment from hundreds of U.S. companies. But after recording a meager profit in the region during 2001, U.S. companies reported a loss of $500 million in South America through the first nine months of 2002, their first loss in the region in more than a decade.

Although Latin American economists suggest that 2002 may have marked the worst of the region's downturn, few are predicting much of a recovery this year -- or any meaningful profit rebound for most of the U.S. subsidiaries based there.

"Latin America will continue to be a drag on U.S. earnings in 2003," says Joseph Quinlan, global economist at Johns Hopkins' Center for Trans-Atlantic Relations in Washington. "That's something analysts may not have fully factored in."

A number of U.S. companies already have indicated that Latin America's economic turmoil and currency depreciations weighed on last year's earnings. In the telecommunications industry, BellSouth Corp. said that 2002 earnings from 11 Latin American countries fell 24 percent to $2.2 billion from a year earlier, while AT&T Corp. said last month it was taking a $1.1 billion charge related to its Latin American unit, which AT&T is in the process of selling. Energy company AES Corp. cited Brazil's energy rationing and currency devaluation in announcing a $1.3 billion write-down.

Some U.S. firms, sensing that profitable opportunities in Latin America are diminishing, have been reducing their exposure after years of beefing up investment. J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. last week said it plans to sell its Brazilian money management operations to Banco Bradesco, a Brazilian bank; Bank of America Corp. also said a few days ago that it is exiting capital-markets operations in Argentina and Brazil.

Other multinationals have warned that Latin America's economic weakness will continue to hurt earnings throughout this year. Kraft Foods Inc., for instance, recently said that 2003 profits will be hurt in part by depreciating currencies in Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela.

These sort of warnings represent a sharp break from the mostly prosperous years of the 1990s, when Latin America was a reassuringly bankable destination for U.S. multinationals. U.S. affiliate income from the region totaled $5.7 billion in 1990, and climbed steadily to a peak of $14.6 billion in 1997, before falling in 1998 because of the emerging-markets crisis.

During most of that decade, Latin America produced more annual profits for U.S. firms than did U.S. investments in the developing Asian markets. Indeed, the two biggest countries in the region, Brazil and Mexico, generated more earnings for U.S. firms than many European countries.

The recent evaporation of profits reflects a series of recent economic crises in the region, starting in 2001 with Argentina's default on debt and subsequent devaluation of its currency. Concern about Brazil's ability to meet international debt obligations, meanwhile, helped to push its currency down 50 percent against the dollar last year and led to the first loss for U.S. subsidiaries in that country since the 1980s.

Multinationals thought they could at least count on Venezuela, where U.S. companies earned $500 million in the first nine months of 2002. But more recently, a crippling oil workers' strike and political chaos threatens U.S. earnings in Venezuela, too. What's more, the rapidly falling Mexican peso has started cutting into affiliate company profits when translated back into dollars.

Just how much pain U.S. affiliate companies will feel is hard to say. Latin America's gross domestic product fell by 1.1 percent last year, with the economies in Argentina and Uruguay both contracting by 10 percent and Venezuela's by 8 percent, according to Merrill Lynch & Co. At the same time, GDP per capita in the region shrank last year to just $3,200, down from $4,200 in 1998.

"Effectively that means less buying power for U.S. products," notes Pablo Goldberg, Latin America economist for Merrill Lynch.

Mr. Goldberg predicts that economic growth in the region will perk up a bit in 2003, expanding at the rate of 1.7 percent. But he adds that Mexico is expected to count for much of that growth, and if the U.S. economy stagnates this year, U.S. companies shouldn't look for much earnings growth from Mexico or South America.

In fact, Mexico accounted for about one-third of U.S. earnings from Latin America over the past decade as the North American Free Trade Agreement increased economic ties between the two countries. Nafta also has helped transform Mexico from primarily a low-cost production base for multinational companies to an important consumer market for U.S. goods. U.S. foreign-affiliate sales to Mexico in 2000 totaled nearly $63 billion, making Mexico the seventh-biggest market globally for U.S. affiliate sales.

But the recent collapse of the peso threatens to undermine Mexico as a profit center. The peso has tumbled more than 20 percent against the dollar from its high in March 2002, largely on concern that the U.S. economic slowdown will batter the Mexican economy. Already, however, the peso weakness means less revenue for U.S. affiliate companies when translated back into dollars.

In Argentina, the financial crisis turned around what had been $600 million in U.S. profits in 1999 into $2 billion in losses accumulated since the fourth quarter of 2001. While the economic collapse appears to have bottomed, any recovery looks slow and tentative. U.S. subsidiaries, meanwhile, lost a combined $564 million in the second and third quarters last year in Brazil. A surprisingly market-friendly reform agenda put forth by newly elected President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva helped to boost the stock market and currency in the final weeks of the year. But Mr. Quinlan, the economist, thinks that U.S. firms in Brazil probably still lost money in the fourth quarter.

The profit backdrop looks even worse in Venezuela. Three years ago, as the South American nation pulled out of recession and President Hugo Chavez embraced a series of market-friendly initiatives to attract foreign capital, U.S. investment has been on the rise. The average annual investment in 1999 through 2001 was $2.1 billion, more than triple the amount averaged over the previous four years.

"Lost on investors is the fact that for the past two years, Venezuela has been an earnings backstop for U.S. companies bruised by events in Argentina and Brazil," says Mr. Quinlan. But given the devastating economic effect of the oil workers' strike and widespread street protests, he adds, "that's over."

usinfo.state.gov Washington File 12 February 2003

(Priorities stress prevention, recovery programs, disruption of drug markets) (1140)

The White House Office on National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) rolled out the Bush administration's plan for countering drug trafficking and substance abuse February 12. The top priorities identified in an ONDCP press release are stopping substance abuse before it starts, healing the nation's drug abusers and disrupting the profit flow in drug trafficking.

The goal of disrupting the market is based on the belief that drug traffickers will get out of the business if governments can make it very difficult for them to earn profits. In another statement released by ONDCP, Director John Walters said, "We must make drugs scarce, expensive, and of unreliable quality. Reducing the availability of dangerous substances will keep our children healthy and complement our efforts to reduce the demand for drugs. We look forward to working with our international partners and domestic law enforcement agencies to eliminate the misery for which the illegal drug industry is responsible."

The Bush administration is proposing $731 million in funding for the Andean Counterdrug Initiative to be applied in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Peru and Venezuela.

The $11,700 million budget identified by the Bush administration for implementation of the National Drug Control Strategy also increases funding for the Drug Free Communities Support Program and recovery programs for drug abusers.

The National Drug Control Strategy is available at www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov

Following is the text of the ONDCP press release:

(begin text)

White House Office on National Drug Control Policy February 12, 2003

THE NATIONAL DRUG CONTROL STRATEGY

One year ago today, the President's new Strategy announced the ambitious goals of reducing drug use by 10 percent over two years, and 25 percent over five years. Today, ONDCP Director John Walters will unveil the President's new National Drug Control Strategy for 2003, which reports initial progress toward meeting those goals, highlighted by reductions in drug use among young people that are on track for meeting the Strategy's two-year objectives. The Strategy also announces Recovery Now, a new initiative funded with $600 million over three years that will expand access to substance abuse treatment while at the same time driving accountability into the treatment system.

Background on the National Drug Control Strategy: The Strategy proposes a fiscal year 2004 budget of $11.7 billion for drug control. That budget will serve the Strategy's three core priorities:

-- Stopping drug use before it starts -- Healing America's drug users -- Disrupting the market

-- Stopping Drug Use Before It Starts: Consolidating the initial reductions in drug use by young people will require action by all Americans through education and community engagement. In homes, schools, places of worship, the workplace, and civic and social organizations, Americans must set norms that reaffirm the values of responsibility and good citizenship while dismissing the notion that drug use is consistent with individual freedom. Our children especially must learn from an early age that avoiding drug use is a lifelong responsibility.

-- The Strategy ties national leadership with community-level action to help recreate the formula that helped America succeed against drugs in the past. The President's budget backs up this goal with a $10 million increase in funding for the expanded Drug-Free Communities Support Program, along with providing $5 million for a new Parents Drug Corps.

-- The Strategy proposes that tools such as student drug testing be available in communities where parents and educators deem them appropriate, and funds them with $8 million in fiscal year 2004.

-- Healing America's Drug Users: Despite our substantial drug prevention efforts, some 16 million Americans still use drugs on a monthly basis, and roughly six million meet the clinical criteria for needing drug treatment. Yet the overwhelming majority of users in need of drug treatment fail to recognize their need. Priority II of the Strategy emphasizes the crucial need for family, friends, and people with shared experiences to intercede with and support those fighting to overcome substance abuse. Drug users also need the support of institutions and the people who run them-employers, law enforcement agencies, faith communities, and health care providers, among others-to help them recognize their drug use and direct those who need it into drug treatment.

-- Overall, for 2004, the Administration proposes $3.6 billion for drug treatment, an increase of 8.2 percent over 2003.

-- The fiscal year 2004 request includes new funding of $200 million ($600 million over three years) for Recovery Now, a program to provide drug treatment to individuals otherwise unable to obtain access to services. People in need of treatment, no matter where they are-emergency rooms, health clinics, the criminal justice system, schools, or the faith community-will receive an evidence-based assessment of their treatment need and will be issued vouchers for the cost of providing that treatment.

-- Disrupting the Market: Priority III of the Strategy, Disrupting the Market, seeks to capitalize on the engagement of producer and transit countries like Colombia and Mexico in order to address the drug trade as a business-one that faces numerous and often overlooked obstacles that may be used as pressure points. The drug trade is not an unstoppable force of nature but rather a profit-making enterprise where costs and rewards exist in an equilibrium that can be disrupted. Every action that makes the drug trade more costly and less profitable is a step toward "breaking" the market. As the Strategy explains, drug traffickers are in business to make money. We intend to deny them that revenue.

-- To help secure our borders, the President's budget includes $2.1 billion for drug interdiction, an increase of 7.3 percent from 2003. Internationally, the Bush Administration will continue to target the supply of illegal drugs in the source countries.

-- The Administration is requesting $731 million in dedicated funds in 2004 for the Andean Counterdrug Initiative to be applied in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Peru, and Venezuela.

-- To ensure unity of effort, the Strategy advocates the use of a single list identifying high-level targets (the Consolidated Priority Organization Targeting list) among the various agencies involved in domestic drug law enforcement.

Progress Toward Two- and Five-Year Goals: Only the first year of the two-year goal period has elapsed, yet already the goal of reducing current use by 10 percent among 8th, 10th, and 12th graders, as measured by the Monitoring the Future survey, is well on the way to being met (with reductions of 11.1, 8.4, and 1.2 percent respectively). Adjustments to the measuring baseline for the goals have been prompted by discontinuities in the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (NHSDA). As a result, the goal of reducing drug use among adults will still be measured by the NHSDA, but the baseline has been reset to the 2002 survey, which is not released until mid-year 2003.

(end text)

(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: usinfo.state.gov)

This site is produced and maintained by the U.S. Department of State's Office of International Information Programs (usinfo.state.gov). Links to other Internet sites should not be construed as an endorsement of the views contained therein.

goerie.com

This should be another big week for Erie International Airport. Continental Airlines is expected to give the official announcement that service between Erie and Cleveland is coming back, and Northwest Airlink is scheduled to put a regional jet on one more of its six Erie-to-Detroit flights. Northwest now uses three 50-passenger regional jets and three 32-passenger turboprop commuters. As of Thursday, the schedule calls for four regional jets and two turboprop commuters. According to the schedule on Continental's Web site, it will launch Erie service with two flights on April 6, and after that go to a regular schedule of four roundtrips a day, using 19-passenger Beechcraft. Erie officials have hinted that the service could be upgraded in the future, depending how the market responds. Northwest Airlink is getting praise from Erie International officials, first for bringing in regional jets in the post-9/11 days when things looked dark, and then for continuing to upgrade with more jet service to Erie. Of course, the bottom line is that all of the airlines in Erie are here because they believe they can make money in this market. Erie officials are waging a "Fly Erie" campaign and are working with the airlines to maintain competitive fares in hopes of generating the business needed to support four carriers. Airlines once had service representatives who checked prices in places like Erie to watch for imbalances in fare structures, but they haven't been able to afford to do that for years. Airport officials say they are now trying to fill that role. Local officials are paying close attention to fares and letting airlines know if they believe some fares are out of line with those the airline has posted in surrounding airports. That would help keep Erie competitive with the major carriers. Of course, discount carriers Southwest and Jet Blue still have fares that will lure some Erie travelers out of town, but local officials believe they can offer a combination of convenience and price that will lessen that impact and increase Erie's share of the market. Federal energy analysts described the oil markets last week as being "tight as a fully-stretched rubber band." Fuel experts with the National Association of Convenience Stores said domestic crude stocks are at their lowest point in 25 years — that current reserves are about 1 percent above the minimum acceptable level of 270 million barrels. The prospect of war with Iraq looms and unrest in Venezuela continues to reduce imports. If all that sounds like a recipe for higher prices, well, it is. The survey that OPIS Energy Group does for the AAA auto club showed the average price being charged by Erie gas stations climbed another 5 cents a gallon during the week that ended Friday. The average among Erie stations was reported to be $1.625. That is only 6.1 cents away from the survey's all-time Erie record of $1.68, which came in May 2001. The survey's averages in other nearby metro areas show $1.563 in Pittsburgh, $1.61 in Cleveland, $1.575 in Youngstown and $1.652 in Buffalo/Niagara Falls. State averages were reported as $1.561 in Pennsylvania, $1.607 in Ohio, and $1.677 in New York. This week is Child Passenger Safety Week and that is a good reminder of a new law will go into effect Feb. 21 to require parents to place children 4 to 8 years old in child safety seats or booster seats. Children aged 8 to 17 will be required to buckle up when riding anywhere in the vehicle, not just in the front seat. Research from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration shows that children ages 4 through 7 are three times more likely to sustain serious injuries in a traffic crash if they are using adult seat belts instead of booster seats, said Pennsylvania Department of Transportation officials. PennDOT reports police agencies will be out in force to check for child seat belt use when the new law takes effect. Delta Air Lines was making news over the past week. For one thing, the airline is falling in line with other carriers and charging passengers more if their suitcases are too heavy. As of this month, there will be a $25 charge for any bag weighing more than 50 pounds, and a $80 charge for a bag that weighs more than 70 pounds. The airline will not take a bag that weighs more than 100 pounds. Elite frequent fliers will not be charged extra for bags that weigh between 50 and 70 pounds. Also, the new policy does not apply to military duffels and sea bags up to 70 pounds, nor sporting equipment, wheelchairs and some other items. Delta also said it hopes to use lobby redesign, an increase in self-service kiosk technology and new customer service roles for employees to significantly reduce airport check-in wait times and lines at 81 airports. It didn't say which ones. But look for the airline to have lobby assist agents and service coordinators posted in airport terminals and more than 400 more self-serve kiosks and direct phone service to reservation agents. JIM CARROLL,who writes about transportation each Monday, can be reached at (814) 724-1716, 870-1727 or by e-mail at jim.carroll@timesnews.com.

Last changed: February 08. 2003 3:08PM