News: Corporate Hall of Shame. Open for Voting.

Global warming. Toxics in toys. Sub-prime mortgage lenders preying on the poor. Hired US guns killing civilians in Iraq. It’s been a year of corporate abuse.
Corporate Accountability International opened its poll booths. Vote for the Corporate Hall of Shame or submit a company you think should be set as an example of unresponsible corporate behaviour.

This year’s nominees include:

• ADM (Archer Daniels Midland), for helping make Indonesia the world’s third worst contributor to global warming through its clearing of endangered forests and wildlife habitat for palm oil plantations.
• Blackwater Worldwide, for killing unarmed Iraqi civilians, hiring paramilitaries trained under military dictatorships, and using its close political and financial ties with the Bush Administration to secure lucrative contracts.
• Countrywide, for predatory mortgage lending to elderly and non-English-speaking borrowers, and for gouging minority borrowers with discriminatory rates and fees.
• Mattel, for producing tens of millions of lead-contaminated children’s toys, and aggressively lobbying against bans on other highly toxic chemicals
• Nestlé, for numerous labor violations — including child exploitation — contributing to the obesity epidemic, and threatening community water supplies with its bottled water brands.
• Toyota, for aggressively lobbying against increased fuel economy standards and state measures to reduce global warming gas emissions while hypocritically spending millions to advertise its environmental “leadership” and popular Prius hybrids.
• Wal-Mart, for displacing local businesses, failing to cover employees under the corporation’s health plan, and opposing legislation that would increase homeland security.
• Wendy’s, for its contribution to the growing childhood obesity and diabetes epidemics, and for refusing to meet nutritional labeling regulations.