ee oe = BOOKS Fast Food Nation — The Dark Side of the All-American Meal by Eric Schlosser Houghton Mifflin 2001 REVIEWED BY NORMAN GARCIA EVERY TIME WE impulsively drive our sorry butts into a McDonald’s, Burger King or Taco Bell, we should be reminded — we're all an integral part of a fast food nation. And Canada, is a mirror reflection of the United States, when it comes to junk food consump- tion. Released in 2001 and now out in paperback, investigative journalist Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation — The Dark Side of the All- American Meal, is one of the best books this reviewer has read in some time. And it should be on the must- read list of every trade unionist. Schlosser meticulously traces the pre and post WWII development of America’s fast food industry: chron- icaling the early efforts of such pio- neers as Carl N. Karcher and Ray Kroc and the McDonald Brothers that Kroc bought out. The impact of the fast food indus- try, as Schlosser points out, is far and and wide; from the affects on adver- tising to children at an early age; the advertising and distribution of fast foods in cash-strapped educational institutions; to their obvious nutri- tional and health consequences; to drastic affects on cultural homoge- McDonaids OVER 8G BILUON SERVED = The golden arches dot our North American nations. pHoto NoRMAN GARCIA nization; to direct and indirect envi- ronmental consequences: and their impacts on workers’ rights. Chapters entitled “behind the counter,” “cogs in the great machine,” and “the most dangerous job” are the most riveting. The author uses real- life samples to illustrate how the industry, while portraying itself as socially-responsible, has geared itself to exploit the most marginal- ized workers — including teenagers, recent immigrants, the elderly and the handicapped. And whenever or wherever workers, (especially those at McDonald’s) have tried to unionize, the corpora- tion’s response has been swift and uncompromising. The book visits goulish slaughter- houses that make up a large parts of forgotten America and reveals how once-unionized meatpacking jobs relocated from Chicago to western states. Immigrant workers work furiously on production lines, often not reporting injuries. In an indus- try dominated by corporate giants ConAgra, IBC and Excel, graveyard contractors pay illegal immigrants one-third the wages of meat pack- ers, in conditions of hellish stench, heat and air quality. Once you start this book it’s hard to set down. And you'll do a double- take next time you grease up at a McDonald’s. wT = MUSIC Fair and Square by John Prine Oh Boy Records 2005 BUNKHOUSE MUSICIANS in camps all over Canada should rejoice when they hear John Prine’s latest release, Fair and Square. The former postal worker from Chicago provides a beauty of a record, with that unique three-finger, alternate bass-picking style, backed up by a collection of top-notch musicians. The working-class author of anti- Viet Nam war classics, including Sam Stone and You're Flag Decal Won't Get You into Heaven Any More, remains one of today’s most wry social commenta- tors. In Some Humans Ain’t Human he points a verse directly at U.S. President George W. Bush: “Just when you're feeling you're free- dom/And the wind’s at your back/Some cowboy from Texas/Starts his own war in Iraq.” This record has a superb amalga- mation of folk, blues, bluegrass and rockabilly tunes, including Carter family patriarch AP Carter's Bear Creek. On Crazy as a Loon, he shrugs at life’s futile moments, neath a blue Canadian moon, and on Taking a Walk, Prine’s unrequit- ed love feels about as “welcome as a Wal-Mart superstore.” Fair and Square is an instant classic — the best John Prine recordings since Bruised Orange. - review by Norman Garcia THE ALLIED WORKER DECEMBER 2005 | 35