Reprinted from Casa Cry, the newsletter of the Casa Maria Catholic Worker, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, February & March 1999.


* Since executions resumed in the US there have been more than 6,300 people sentenced to die, and more than 500 of them have already been killed.

* The Colombian military is asking for $1.3 billion from the US. Colombia has one of the worst human rights records in the world.

* Hidden subsidies and tax loopholes to politically connected industry and rich people will cost the rest of taxpayers $3.7 trillion over the next seven years. In a recent year, the Federal Government aid to corporations amounted to $167 billion, nearly five times the amount that trickled down to the poor and their children.

* Fifteen people were arrested for nonviolent civil disobedience on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day at ELF. ELF is not Santa's helper! It is communication tower for the Trident nuclear submarines. The Trident missiles are first-strike weapons. ELF wastes about $60 million or more every five years while it creates a mere 32 jobs.

* On July 8, 1996, the World Court ruled that, for all practical purposes, all nuclear weapons are illegal under all circurmtances. We thank all those who work for disarmament and the closure of ELF. Write to: Laurentian Shield Resources for Nonviolence, 12833 E STH 13, Maple WI 54854.

* Chances that a dollar spent on lobbying by a major oil company in 1997 came from Exxon or Mobil... 1 in 4.

* Amount a fourth grade Denver class has raised since last March to buy and free Sudanese slaves ... $35,000. Number of Sudanese no longer enslaved as a result ... 600.

* Estimated number of people, per 10,000, who died of starvation in one Sudanese village over 11 days last July ... 69.

* Amount of money United States uses to bury six billion worth of edible food per year ... one billion dollars.

* Average amount the United States military spent last year on recruiting per soldier enlisted ... $7,187.

* Average amount Minneapolis spent last year on educating a child ... $6,146.

* Number of survivors of Spanish American War soldiers who received Veterans Department benefits last year... 1,029

* Number of world's nations that are required by the 1984 Torture Convention to indite or extradite suspected torturers... 122.

* The US Dwight D. Eisenhower, one of the ships used in Iraq, cost five billion dollars to build. The planes (two billion each), cruisers, frigates, nuclear submarine, the carrier and its battle group cost equals the combined annual military budget of Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Cuba, Syria and Libya.

* In 1998, United Sates intelligence officials said "hundreds of thousands" of N. Koreans had died of starvation or starvation-related illnesses and that as many as 1 million deaths seemed "not impossible."

* More than 300,000 children under the age of 18 are currently fighting in conflicts around the world. Many were used on suicide missions, forced to kill their own families and were raped or given to military commanders as sexual slaves.

United States Campaign to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers, 4545 42nd Street. NW, Suite 209, Washington DC 20016.

* The US, with 5% of the world's population, accounts for a quarter of its energy use; 20% of the world's population consumes about 60% of its energy.

* Nearly 40% of the handguns used to commit crimes were purchased from federally licensed dealers in the last three years.

* The Waukesha Expo Center allows the selling of handguns without doing background checks on buyers. Nearly 42% of Mexican military currently are stationed in Chiapas.

* Almost 91 % of W-2 families say they use a food pantry to help get enough food. About 25% of W-2 people say that transportation was the reason why they could not be hired for a job.

* Every year, US taxpayers fund seven billion in subsidies to weapons manufacturers over half the cost of the weapons.

* Tax money is used to allow rich investors to build huge hog factories in the Midwest. These hog factories ruin the water and devalue the land. Hog prices are as low as $1.00 a pound in Wisconsin for the family farmer.

* The farm workers under their union, FLOC, have initiated a boycott against Mount Olive Pickle Co. Mount Olive is refusing to bargain in good faith with the farm workers.

* The African Growth and Opportunity Act is essentially a son of NAFTA or the Recolonization of Africa. It would lock African states into a market economy" in which the major transnational. corporations call the tune. Goods produced by them would be "duty-free". The African states would be forced to reduce health, education and welfare programs; reduce corporation taxes; end agricultural subsidies; privatize public assets such as telephone, electric power, timber and mines; and remove restrictions on foreign investment in mines, etc. allowing the privatized assets to be bought at bargain rates; since they would be forced to pay off their foreign debts which already take up to 80% of their money. The alternative trade bill introduced by Rep. Jessee Jackson Jr. Would be much better for the African people. Call Congress

* In Sudan at least 1.9 million men, women and children have died in the last 15 years from the civil war or from intentional policies of the Sudan government. In the first half of 1998 alone, an estimated 70,000 civilians have died of war-related causes. Another half million have been displaced.

* The world spends 780 billion dollars every year on maintaining its military and buying new weapons--that's 2.1 billion dollars every day. If you were to count by one number every second, without stopping, it would take you 32 years to reach one billion.

* Right now, there are 28 wars raging across the world. Last year, the world's governments spend over two billion dollars every single day on the military.

* The US Office of Special Investigations annually gets 53 million dollars to find ex-Nazi soldiers. According to conservative official figures, at least 13 million workers are currently unemployed in China's cities, including 7.1 million laid-off workers have gotten little press.

* The United States onslaught of the Iraqi people was led to the deaths of 1.5 million Iraqis and has cost the United States taxpayers 425 billion dollars. Every 1.1 million dollars Tomahawk cruise missile fired into Iraq deprives others of decent housing, health care and education. The hoof and mouth outbreak, which has infected 982,000 sheep and 50,000 cattle and already killed 50,000 newborn lambs and calves, is likely to infect Iraq's seven million farm animals. The facility that was once used for producing the vaccine for this disease was destroyed in 1993 because the United States insisted that the facility had been producing biological and chemical weapons. Please call for an end to the sanctions and bombing on Iraq.

* The better-funded candidate won 94% of the races in the United States Senate and 95% in the

United States House of Representatives.

* Americans spend 33 billion dollars each year for fat reducing methods.

* The federal government estimates that in 1998, contractors and United States retailers avoided more than 200 million dollars in duties for one billion dollars worth of garments shipped from Saipan. Although Saipan's garment factories are owned predominantly by Chinese and Korean companies, quality control inspectors from The Gap, the Limited, and other US retailers allegedly oversee the manufacturing process.

* Hospitality. The Balkans contains much oil. Gaining control over the Balkans by the United States has to do with this more than the human rights of the people. Why are we not concerned about the infighting of the African nations where there are no so many natural resources?

* Gun makers make six billion a year selling small-arms in the world.

* Paso authorities in 1992 had found three truck loads of highly toxic chlorinated biphenyl which were destined for Juarez, Mexico, to be dumped there. Oil drillers have ruined the fragile eastern part of Ecuador's Amazon region, just north of Peru. They spilled 66 million liters of oil into the rivers that the Quechua people depend on to live. Oil drilling affects the people of Colombia and Nigeria as well.

* Rocky Mountain Media Watch analyzed 100 local TV newscasts from 55 markets across the nation on February 26, 1997. The average show included about 13 minutes of news, not including time spent on ads, sports, weather, promos, or "anchor chitchat."

* Special Interest groups since 1997 spent 1.26 billion dollars or roughly 2.4 million dollars per member of Congress for lobbying. Pharmaceutical and health products manufacturers led the list.

* As many as 20,000 Cuban Americans in Florida signed a document demanding an end to the blockade policy against Cuba. Postal packages from the United States are sent to Cuba containing bombs. On one occasion as many as five workers sustained very serious injuries.

* Germany, England and Canada have lower healthcare costs than the United States, but more generous length of hospital stay.

* Defense Secretary William Cohen claims the bulk of the 276 billion dollars military budget for this year is for pay and benefit increases for the troops, but the details of the budget show otherwise. The largest increase is for new weapons procurement, which is expected to grow by 53%, from 49 billion dollars this year to 75 billion dollars in 2005. In 2000 alone, eight weapons programs are designated to receive one billion dollars or more.

* When will we learn that making friends by providing for their needs is the only defense. Do we really think that the United States can make friends by making more and more weapons and aiming them at people who do not do as we wish? Christ is wiser than us. He said that we should love our enemies, do good to them who do all manner of evil against us.