Posted on 10/20/2005 10:06:42 AM PDT by SirLinksalot
When will trial lawyers dip their scoops into Ben & Jerry's?
STEPHEN MOORE
I've always prided myself on conscientiously avoiding funding anti-free-market liberal causes in America, so you won't ever catch me pouring Newman's Own oil-and-vinegar dressing on my salad. But I confess to an addiction to Ben & Jerry's Chunky Monkey and the greatest flavor ever invented in ice-creamdom, Coffee Heath Bar Crunch.
So this weekend, while in Vermont to speak at the Freedom Fest sponsored by the Ethan Allen Institute, a conservative state think tank, I paid a visit to the world-famous Ben & Jerry's ice-cream factory.
To be in Vermont and not visit this landmark would be as unforgivable as visiting Rome and not going to the Colosseum. So I slapped down three bucks and waited in the gift shop where a pint of ice cream costs $3.99--which to me borders on price-gouging. (One of the supreme ironies of this socially conscious firm is that it is one of the best capitalists you'll ever come across.)
The tour itself is a 30-minute propaganda campaign explaining why the company's founders, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, deserve the Nobel Peace Prize for their unwavering commitment to the environment and economic justice.
Meanwhile, their factory is a monument to the efficiencies of capitalism and technological progress: Several dozen giant computer-operated machines churn out hundreds of thousands of cartons a day. I half expect the massive energy-gulping freezers to be solar-paneled or powered by green-friendly windmills, but no, they use lots and lots of conventional electricity. It turns out that if you want really good ice cream, you just have to tolerate a little more global warming. That's a trade-off that I personally am willing to make.
(Excerpt) Read more at opinionjournal.com ...
The following paragraphs made me chuckle non-stop :
That's not irony, it's hypocrisy, and it's straight out of the Leftist Playbook. (How can you get to write for the Wall Street Journal and not know that?)
Hmm, a socialist practicing capitalism. Who would have thought. Wonder if the thought has ever crossed their minds about how much money from there business would actually make it into their own pockets in a socialist nation.
The only problem was that someone did a little research and found out that Ben & Jerry's had already signed an agreement with Wal-Mart to open an ice cream concession inside the store.
Nothing wrong with hedging you bets by hitching your wagon to a "greedy giant corporation" that's looking to "destroy your small-state way of life," I guess.
It was purchased by the Dutch conglomerate Unilever a few years back after the incompetent CEO Ben and Jerry hired to succeed them ran the company into the ground.
I love confronting and confounding liberals with logic. Doubtless, though, the guide answered, "I don't know, I just work here."
Chunky Commie Ice Cream-- In April, America bid a fond adieux to Ben & Jerry's Homemade Inc. $326 million million capitalist dollars was the bloody ransom paid for the greatest social experiment since Twentieth Century Motor. This funky ice cream brand now sits in the Unilever portfolio, alongside Skippy Peanut Butter, Helmans Mayonnaise, and Pepsodent Toothpaste. And with the Ben and Jerry's deal, Unilever also acquired Slimfast, to insure they have you as a customer, both coming and going.
Unintentionally, founders Ben and Jerry Cohen had stumbled into the greatest marketing scheme of the eighties. Their ice cream is nothing more than a frozen one pound candy bar. Flavors like "Chubby Hubby" mock how truly decadent their confection is. This would normally cause your average liberal to shiver with guilt, adding lipids to their already excessive form, while societies are starving in Africa.
Ben and Jerry’s Ice cream was the biggest vendor of guilt relief in the modern world. Health consciousness had forbidden the kind of fat laden, cholesterol rich delight that lives in those recycled paper tubs. But who can resist? Instead of relieving your guilt by promising 100% of your daily vitamin requirements, Ben & Jerry offer something a little more substantial, Social Nutrition. Sure your clogging your arteries and gaining weight, but never mind, We’ll help save the earth with every mouthful. Yum, was that a saturated fat filled nut I just sank my tooth into? Yes but don’t worry, It was a brazil nut from the South American rain forest, every one you eat saves a little bit of forest. Sure that was a mouthful of rich Swiss Chocolate, but it came from a chocolate company that never starved infants. Yes our cream is 100% milk fat, but that milk fat came from family farmers, and was blended with 100% pure cane sugar in a plant where everybody makes almost the same wage.
The company also became an unintentional experiment in the nature of the CEO. Marxists like Michael Moore find humor in the fact that the CEO of IBM cannot reconfigure a hard drive. The assumption of course is that anybody can be a CEO. Women and minorities constantly decry the "Glass Ceiling" that prevents their ascending to the top floor offices, held back solely by their gender or race. When Ben & Jerry decided to retire (wealthy), they went in search of a Socially responsible CEO. Certainly a woman or minority would be preferred. but because they organize their corporate structure in a socially equitable pattern, the highest paid employee could only make five times the pay of the lowest. The company was flooded with applications for the 60K/year position, but not one was qualified.
To great fanfare they announced in February of 1994 they had succeeded in their search for a qualified CEO. Robert Holland, an African American, took the helm of the company for a much greater salary than the 60K advertised. The truth is that Qualified Women and Minority CEOs can pretty much write their own ticket, as their demand for diversity in the boardroom is actually quite high. Mr Holland was forced to resign two years later amidst rapidly plummeting stock prices.
Ben and Jerry, obviously consumed with greed then hired a white male executive from a gun manufacturer to replace him at a substantially higher salary. Apparently social justice only is important when your stock price is up Ben and Jerry, now very well educated in the truth about capitalism decided to take the money and run. God speed blessed comrades, god speed.
"It is fortuitous that I am here the very week Ben & Jerry's announced that, for the first time in 10 years, it will get back to "leading with its values" by spending $5 million on a social awareness TV ad campaign."
More crap from Bum & Jerky (yet their product is made by a multinational conglomerate)..the signing Blue Bell cow ads will beat the stuffing out of the B/J ads!
Stephen Moore does not work for the WSJ. He is, however, a great supply-sider (yippee!).
That said, I truly do see irony in the behavior of the leftists and the corporations that serve them. Companies like Ben and Jerry's act in their own best interest. They have concluded it is in their best interest to appeal to the lefties. Therefore, they adopt a "socially conscious" culture to appeal to the lefties. The "socially conscious" culture is adopted to further the corporate interests. No hypocrisy there. The leftists admire the "socially conscious" culture. No hyporisy there, either, but certainly irony because the culture they admire was created to further the corporation's own self-interest.
"It was purchased by the Dutch conglomerate Unilever a few years back after the incompetent CEO Ben and Jerry hired to succeed them ran the company into the ground."
Wasn't that guy an affirmative action pick? It's hard to feel sorry for a pair of G-damn hippies.
I find it very funny how so many "intellectuals" and rich kids turn socialist. It's such a great and wonderful theory isn't it. Yet, I'd like to see one of these spoiled rich kids actually sell all their wealth and give it to the poor. You never see that happen, do you? They rather loot from members of the middle class and give what their socialist cohorts don't squander to less industrious members of the middle class.
Man, ain't that the truth.
This is called progress. What is Ben & Jerry's proposed solution, anyway? To turn back the clock and abolish the tractor? Many Americans seem to be under the illusion that the small family farmer has lived a carefree idyllic lifestyle. In truth, this livelihood has traditionally involved backbreaking toil, work-days that last from sun-up to sundown, and monotony--which is why sons and daughters have been fleeing the farm for five generations. The only people who actually want to save small farms are people who've never worked on a farm.
The Ben & Jerry's ads moan that the corporatization of farming is a horrid trend. I couldn't help asking our tour guide during the Q-&-A why, if corporatization of farming is such a bad thing, that isn't also true of the corporatization of ice cream. Those same 22 pairs of eyes glare back at me.
LOL! Read the whole article - well worth it. I prefer Vanilla Heath Bar Crunch myself!
The author is wrong....Marsha Marsha Marshmallow is the best flavor.
Ayn Rand ping?
From a gun manufacturer? The horror! LOL!
Weren't Ben and Jerry involved in trying to prevent unions from forming in the company some years ago?
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